May 27th, 2013
Today’s reading from Encounter with God

Twists and Turns

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Opening Prayer

Father, sometimes I’m hard of hearing and don’t learn Your lessons of grace easily. I’m eager to learn today.

Read Acts 7:1-16

[1] Then the high priest asked Stephen, “Are these charges true?” [2] To this he replied: “Brothers and fathers, listen to me! The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Harran. [3] ‘Leave your country and your people,’ God said, ‘and go to the land I will show you.’ [4] “So he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Harran. After the death of his father, God sent him to this land where you are now living. [5] He gave him no inheritance here, not even enough ground to set his foot on. But God promised him that he and his descendants after him would possess the land, even though at that time Abraham had no child. [6] God spoke to him in this way: ‘For four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated. [7] But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves,’ God said, ‘and afterward they will come out of that country and worship me in this place.’ [8] Then he gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision. And Abraham became the father of Isaac and circumcised him eight days after his birth. Later Isaac became the father of Jacob, and Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs. [9] “Because the patriarchs were jealous of Joseph, they sold him as a slave into Egypt. But God was with him [10] and rescued him from all his troubles. He gave Joseph wisdom and enabled him to gain the goodwill of Pharaoh king of Egypt. So Pharaoh made him ruler over Egypt and all his palace. [11] “Then a famine struck all Egypt and Canaan, bringing great suffering, and our ancestors could not find food. [12] When Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our forefathers on their first visit. [13] On their second visit, Joseph told his brothers who he was, and Pharaoh learned about Joseph’s family. [14] After this, Joseph sent for his father Jacob and his whole family, seventy-five in all. [15] Then Jacob went down to Egypt, where he and our ancestors died. [16] Their bodies were brought back to Shechem and placed in the tomb that Abraham had bought from the sons of Hamor at Shechem for a certain sum of money.

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. All rights reserved throughout the world. Used by permission of International Bible Society.

Meditate

“Don’t expect God to reveal his will for you next week until you practice it today” (Alan Redpath).

Think Further

We may know the twists and turns of biblical history so well that we lose sight of the fact that God often acts in a way that takes us by surprise. The story of Abraham, so venerated by the Jews, had become fossilized through familiarity. Stephen starts with the common ground that they share, and then breathes fresh air into it. They knew their history so well they had failed to be stirred by its unexpectedness.

Their history is full of drama. Again and again, God takes the initiative and leaves them breathless, struggling to know how to respond. There was no preparation for the extraordinary course of events that followed God’s appearance in Ur. Abraham had no training, no orientation and no initiation. When God calls, however, you must respond, even when it all seems uncomfortable and the outcome uncertain. God was on the move, and his long-term plan was the salvation of his people. It all seemed so confusing. Owning no land, Abraham was promised some; having no son, this elderly man was guaranteed descendants; set free from the confines of his stable life, he set out on a lonely journey in which God’s future plans included exile and slavery before deliverance would come. 

Stephen spells out that God’s purposes faced repeated hostility from his own people, from Joseph’s brothers onwards. Those who would save the nation would face false accusation and rejection before becoming their deliverer. This was true for Joseph. He was abandoned, sold, betrayed, falsely accused and imprisoned. Yet he never allowed rejection to feed a sense of bitterness. His hands remained open to all who would receive, and the needs of his family were met. Stephen is laying the groundwork of his defense, not just playing for time. One greater than Joseph is here!

Apply

How can you rebuild a sense of expectation into your Bible reading so that familiar stories become alive and fresh?

Closing prayer

Thank You, Lord, that You delight to do new things and are not trapped into tired ways of working. Renew in me a spirit of expectancy today.

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