Countenance.
We’re going to talk about “Countenance.”
Why was Stephen hated so much? What we have here is his countenance.
“And Stephen reflected God’s glory in his face.” Acts 6:15.
His face shone like an angel. Now again, he’s being stoned. Look at the picture there. They’re throwing rock. They’re putting rocks on him. They’re stoning him.
The glory of his face exposed the lifelessness of legalism.
Steven was hated because his face preached louder than their religion.
Stephen was hated because his face – what was inside of him was radiating Jesus’s love, peace, and joy.
What we read in verse 14 and 15, “For we have heard him say that Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place and change the customs that Moses handed down to us. All who were sitting in the Sanhedrin looked intently at Stephen, and they saw that his face was like the face of an angel.”
Steven’s persecutors saw that his face was like the face of an angel.
And that’s the countenance that we represent because of the love of Christ and because of receiving Christ in our heart with his love.
We’re not allowing the hatred, we’re not allowing the anger – the word spoken against us – to impact us because we have Christ in us, the hope of glory.
Amen and amen.
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