Acts | Chapter 7

Acts Ch 7:1

“The Call of Abraham”

Intro.
The High Priest was most likely Caiaphas who tried Jesus a few years earlier. So at the violent arrest of Stephen the Sanhedrin was probably ready and waiting and old Caiaphas just asked Stephen, “How do you plead?”  

Now Stephen’s defense is not what you would expect from a young Christian on trial for his life in front of the highest court in the land. In fact he does not attempt to explain, apologize or do anything that would win his acquittal. Instead his sermon, the longest recorded in the book of Acts, aims not on his release but rather theirs from the bondage of sin and pride. As an overview Stephen will point out three areas of pride that have kept Jews and specifically themselves from following God. Eight times in seven verses Stephen will identify with the three-fold pride of their forefathers by using the words, “Our fathers”. But when it comes to the three-fold pride and how it caused them to reject Jesus he says, “your fathers”, (verses 51-52). So what was this three-fold pride that caused the forefathers and themselves to reject time and again the move of God?

Vs. 2-36 The Land: They evaluated their relationship with God as good, based upon the fact that they were in the land of promise. In Gen. 12:7 God had told Abram “To your descendants I will give this land.” So they determined that they were alright with God because they were still in the land. Simply put their spiritual heritage was tied to their ancestry living in a land that God had blessed them with. Perhaps some today would say, “Hey, I’m ok with God my folks are Baptists from way back!” It does not matter what your ancestors were but it does matter if you are “doing the will of the Father!”

Vs. 37-43 The Law: They took great pride in the fact that they had the Word of God, the “the law”. In fact Jesus busts them on this in John 5:39 where says, “You search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life; and these are they which testify of Me.” Perhaps today we would hear someone say, “Hey I’m ok with God I go to Church and read my Bible!” Folks, our relationship with God is not based upon our spiritual practice to Him it is based upon His devotion to us! People can do all sorts of religious contortions out of rote and not from the heart!

Vs. 44-50 The Temple: Lastly, they took great pride in the fact that they had a center for religious devotion. Perhaps today people would say, “Hey, I’m ok with God I go to this great glorious building and get all emotional.” It’s not where you are at that makes for a right worship, it’s who you are worshipping! 

Do you see how the pride in things can keep us from the true worship of God?

• Instead of the Land causing them to be prideful, it ought to remind them of God’s faithfulness at keeping His promise in spite of us.

• Instead of the Law causing them to be prideful, it ought to remind them of how far short they come to God’s standard in His Word.

• Instead of the Temple causing them to be prideful, it ought to have caused them to be thankful of the opportunity they had to worship the true and living God.

Vs. 2 Stephen starts out with, and continues through verse 8, one of their greatest heroes Abraham. He reminds them of the fact that God called Abraham while he was still in a land that worships the moon. 

Vs. 3-4 Stephen says, “Yes it’s true that God called him to a land but the reason was to separate him so that Abraham could have a relationship with God. The fact that God was speaking with Abraham before and during his journey to the land shows that the land was not the source of the relationship God was!” God was with Abraham through the journey. Man does that speak to me! It’s not where you are going that is important, it’s who you are going with! Our spiritual journey is not about a destination, it’s about an ongoing continual relationship, where every day affords you new and exciting opportunities to walk with your God! These guys took pride in the fact that they had arrived spiritually! What a bummer folks to think that right here and now we are as close to God as we can ever be! 

Vs. 5-7 Now Stephen’s next emphasis is that if God calling Abraham to the land is such a big deal then why was the only thing he ever possessed in it was a burial plot for his wife Sarah? God clearly had a relationship with Abraham and it was that relationship that the land was to symbolize. The land was forever to show Abraham’s descendents that God wanted to live amongst them. Furthermore, while Abraham’s descendents were away from the land what happened to them? Well they were blessed. So it was not the land that was the place of blessing it was in the relationship that Abraham had with God which was as Gal. 3 puts it, “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.  Therefore know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham.” You see God was blessing them even while they were outside the land of promise even while they were in bondage to another nation.

Vs. 8 Finally Stephen says, God gave Abraham and all of us a sign of the cutting away of the flesh to show us how to maintain a relationship with Him. Cut away the reproduction of the energy of your old nature. Do you see that? The problem these folks were having was pride in ancestry and Stephen points out that the circumcision that they had done when they were eight days old was to remind them to die to pride! So what’s the conclusion? “It’s not where you dwell that makes you special, It’s who you dwell with!”   

Vs. 9-16 The Land and Jacob

Vs. 9-10 Now Stephen switches to another great man from there past Joseph. Again he is still speaking to them about the land and look how many times he uses the word Egypt, six times! It is interesting the parallels that Stephen points out between Joseph and Jesus.

• Both were sold out by their brethren because of envy, (Joseph 20, Jesus 30 pieces of silver).

• Both were punished for crimes they did not commit.

• Both were favored by God.

• Both were freed from bondage.

Vs. 11-16 The point of Stephen’s message here is that even though the brother of Joseph sold him into slavery God turned around and used that for their will being. The pride of their forefathers did not hinder the work of God. The first time they came to get grain they did not recognize Joseph but the 2nd time they came Joseph revealed himself to them. The warning is this: Don’t get prideful, it only hurts your opportunity to grow in God’s blessings! Oh, the times you and I have ripped ourselves off from growing in the grace and knowledge of God because of our foolish pride! The point of this section is that God is not limited in blessing us by our location only by a hard heart!

Acts. 7:17-53

“In the grip of glory”

Vs. 17-36 From bondage in bondage

Vs. 37-43 Living Word in dead hearts

Vs. 44-53 A well decorated shack

Intro.

Earlier we covered Stephen’s message before the Sanhedrin, which was like our supreme court. Stephen was on trial for his life and he was most likely only a year old in the Lord. He started his message out with the words, “The God of Glory appeared” and He will end his message by seeing the God of Glory as he gazes into heaven. Now the thrust of his message is using their Jewish history in which they were extremely prideful over as a basis of showing why they still were rejecting God. You see Israel was a lot like us in that they tended to over estimate the reasons for their success while down playing the reasons for their failures. Simply put they had a bad case of revisionism in terms of their ancestors. Perhaps we would call it “padding their stats”! As we have already seen their pride lay in their ancestors accomplishments as seen in three areas:

• Land (2-16, 17-36)

• Law (37-43)

• Temple (44-50)

So those old relatives that had been a part of these three things were brought to the place of superstars, but while those people accomplished much they failed to recognize that their ancestors had failed to respond to these men. So like the nation of old they too were missing the move of God in sending His only Son to be their Messiah. Through the message of Stephen God is going to bring these rulers with their pride crumbling back to earth. Have you ever experienced that yourself?

This past weekend my wife and I got invited to a special party honoring Thomas Kincade the “painter of light”. He is probably one of the best loved and known artists in the world. He has just opened a museum in Monterey housing several million dollars of his original works and set up a foundation to help youth as well as others develop their talent in art that glorifies God! Well over a year ago when he first had this idea he was with several of his assistants painting the old Monterey courthouse in a style known as “plinair” which is quite different from the paintings most of us associate with him. Well anyway these two elderly ladies came up to watch him paint for a while, when one of the sweet ladies leaned over to him and said, “You know you’re not too bad at this, if you keep practicing at this you might one day get good at it.”

Thomas was very polite to her and thanked her for the compliment. This made her all the more bold as she began to instruct him on where to add color, quite pleased with herself she again made an attempt at a compliment by saying, “You know what, you keep at this and one day you may be able to even sell one of your paintings.” “Well you know”, said Thomas, “I have actually sold several of my paintings already, in fact some of them have even gone to print.” “You mean you make a living at this, she asked?” “Yes I do”, replied Thomas. “Well you know I have a favorite artist and have several of his prints on my walls at home, perhaps you have heard of him, Thomas Kincade?” Now by this time the assistants could not stand it any longer and they leaned over to the lady and said, “Miss, um, this is Thomas Kincade!” Puzzled by this new revelation she got close to Thomas, looked at him real good then again looked at the painting she had instructed him in and said, “No way!” 

Vs. 17-36 From bondage in bondage

Vs. 17-19 In the first 16 verses Stephen spoke of the land in reference to Abraham to Joseph.

 His points were:

• “Its not where you dwell that makes you special, It’s who you dwell with!”

• “God is not limited in blessing us by our location only by a hard heart!”

So in these three verses he takes us to another stage in Israel’s history, “the time of promise” You will find that time of promise in Gen. 15:13-14 where God tells Abraham, “Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions.” God is going to fulfill the promise of giving the land to his offspring.

What is interesting is that by the time this took place all of the patriarchs were dead. So? Well if the land was what made them special then why did they never live to see it? Israel put way too much importance on the “holy land”. Yes it was the land promised by God and given to them as an inheritance but they had begun to worship the land rather than the giver of the land. Is it not amazing how we Christians start worshiping the “things” God gives us to the point that they become a greater source of worship than the Lord? I mean we get all caught up in our possessions and all, then we end up being possessed by our possessions!

         God had not forgotten His promise in fact He blessed the nation more in the land of bondage then He had in the land of promise as they “grew and multiplied in Egypt” from 75 to over 2 million. It was the fear of Pharaoh that he could no longer control the Jews that led to his policy of killing all the male babies.

Vs. 20-28 Now Stephen is going to introduce another one of their ancestors that they took pride in, Moses. In doing this Stephen speaks of Moses’ life in 40-year periods.

• Vs. 20-28 From birth to 40. Here we see Moses as delivered, but even in this Stephen is careful to show Moses failures as he spent the first 40 years becoming something. A good looking baby hidden for 3 months, then brought up in Pharaoh’s house, educated in the ways of the Egyptians and mighty in words and deeds. But Moses felt a call on his life at 40 and wanted to help his own people. You remember the story, as he sees the suffering of his people at the hands of the Egyptians he tries to do the work of God in the energy of the flesh and all that happens is that someone dies. The next day he thinks he accomplished something for God and he sees two Jews fight and this time instead of being a deliverer he tries his hand at being a reconciler attempting to bring the two combatants together.

They don’t accept Moses’ attempt and question him as to who made him boss. It is evident by their statement that they don’t respect his authority based upon his previous action. Hey, folks there is a big difference between Moses at this time and Jesus. Moses was willing to kill someone to accomplish his calling and Jesus was willing to die to himself to accomplish His calling. The people rejected Moses to be ruler and judge over them though now they esteemed him. Yet, now they were denying Jesus as ruler and judge over them as well.

• Vs. 29-36 From 40 to 80. Now the next 40 years Moses spends in gentile lands thinking he was nothing. So over the next 40 more years Moses gets married, has two boys and changes careers from prince to shepherd. Then Stephen says at the end of the 2nd 40 year period God comes to him, (Vs 30-34). Notice how God speaks to Moses, “I have seen, I have heard, I have come” (verse 34). You see Moses had 40 years earlier “seen, heard and killed”, now God says that He has seen, heard, and come so Moses must go! You see it took 40 years to work on the heart of Moses so that he would GO in the strength of the Lord not in his own strength. Now again if the land was so important as the meeting place of God then why did he meet with Moses while he was in Midian?

So Moses had failed, the people had failed but God was faithful to the promise he made. Stephen is showing a pattern in the human heart in the history of their forefather’s Spiritual pride and ignorance has consistently caused them to reject God’s deliverance. The patriarchs rejected their brother Joseph but God was faithful. Then the Israelites rejected Moses but the 2nd time they followed him reluctantly only after God had worked signs and wonders in Egypt, the Red Sea and during the wilderness.    

Vs. 37-43 Living Word in dead hearts

Stephen now further shows how their forefathers rejected those that God had sent by showing that they rejected Moses in the third 40-year period as LAWGIVER.

• Vs. 37-43 From 80 to 120. This is the last 40 years of Moses’ life where God shows Moses that He can only do something through nothing. Now you will remember that in chapter 6:11-13 they had accused Stephen of speaking blasphemy against Moses, (verse 11) and the Law, (verse 13). They made this claim because Stephen had spoken so much about Jesus. So in this section we see how Stephen answers their pride because of the law by using three points:

• Vs. 37-38 By quoting Deut. 18:15. “Hey, Moses himself spoke of God raising up another prophet like him.” So they could not claim that God’s truth and plan was limited to Moses alone as the Sadducees believed. So the same guy they so honored as the one who brought forth the “living oracles” is the same one who said that God was going to bring another like him. Do you get his point? You received his words but you don’t receive the One whom his words foretold? 

• Vs. 39-40 The second point Stephen uses is that their forefathers had rejected Moses even after God had shown them that Moses was the anointed deliverer. So it was not Stephen who was disobeying the law and rejecting Moses it was rather them as they were doing just what their fathers had done in not obeying the first two commandments of the law. Do you see his point? Moses and the Law, in which they held in such high regard that they were accusing him of blaspheming, did not keep their forefathers from making the same mistake as they were doing by rejecting the “Living Word”.

• Vs. 41-43 Even after the 2nd time God had Moses go up the hill to receive the Law as well as the sacrificial system the people still fell into pride and the worship of idols. Stephen quotes Amos to support this fact of their history. The worship of the calf of Egypt at the foot of Mount Sinai led God to give them over to that which they wanted to worship. The prophet reveals that what the Israelites had really been doing in the wilderness was offering sacrifices to idols while having a pretense of doing so before the Lord. They were all the while worshipping “Molech” the god of prosperity and pleasure. They also worshiped before the Babylonian captivity their god for Saturn. Now we are not sure what that entailed other than it must have been really bad as the Jews later used that name to mean abomination. So God said if you want to worship the gods of Babylon then I’ll send you there for 70 years until you get sick of it.   

They accused Stephen of blaspheme and they were the ones by their very actions and pride that were blaspheming. So what’s the point? Well, it is not having a Bible that makes you right before God, it is obedience to it!

Vs. 44-53 A well decorated shack

Vs. 44-50 Stephen now moves to the last issue of pride that they had, the temple. They had also accused him of blaspheming the temple, (6:13). The first thing he does is show that in the beginning God was not concerned about its location. In fact the directions of how to build it made it completely mobile. Wherever they went He was with them, God showed them that the place of the heart was more important then where the tent of meeting was pitched. The temple or tabernacle showed them that God wanted to be with them everywhere they went even when they went into the land of promise occupied by the gentiles. 

God would root them out because He was with them. The tabernacle remained movable for over 400 years until the time of David. God never asked for a temple to be built; it was David that did that. It is not the temple that is great but God, that is Stephen’s argument! No building is ever big enough to hold God, that’s not what God wants anyway. We’re in the presence of God every moment of every day, all that any building does is facilitate service; it is never to be seen as the “house of God”. Solomon understood this even though God allowed him to build the temple when he declared, “Will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You. How much less this temple which I have built!” (1 Kings 8:27). 

Vs. 51-53 If they had not been all that sure that Stephen was talking about them he is going to make sure they get the point now. Eight times the Old testament refers to the Jews as stiff-necked. The term describes a person’s refusal to bow down before the Lord. In other words Stephen calls them prideful. In Jeremiah 9:26 he says that “all the houses of Israel are uncircumcised in the heart.” You see Israel had refused to surrender its heart and therefore its ears to the truth and so they were blaspheming One far more important than the temple, the law, or the land they were going against the Holy Spirit! They had committed an even far worse act than had their forefathers who had killed God’s messengers who testified of Jesus, they had actually killed God’s only Son.

         Man what a horrible thing pride is! It is the most dangerous thing known by man and every one of us battles it. Look at how Stephen distances himself for the final act of rebellion by saying (you, 4 times and your, 2 times), in these three verses. Maybe you hear today and you have been hard hearted and prideful don’t get mad just surrender your heart to the truth of the person of Jesus.   

Acts 7:54-60

“Dying to speak about Jesus”

Vs. 7:54-56 Being full of the Holy Spirit

Vs. 57-60 Even the rocks will cry out

Vs. 8:1-4 Shattered and scattered

Intro.

This past Friday night my daughter Nicole reached a milestone in her life as she graduated from Merced High. As her father I’m extremely proud of her. As I listened to all the speeches from the students, there were several themes carried out. The fun they had during their Merced High years, hope for the future and yes wondering if their lives mattered. It got me to think, does your or my life leave an impact?       

As we come now to the end of the life of Stephen we are prone to call this the martyrdom of him. I think we Christians describe martyrs as those that were willing to die for Jesus. The truth of the matter is that a martyr is not a person who died for Jesus but rather it is all about how they lived. What? Think about it, a martyr speaks about how a person so lived their lives that even at death this world could not hold them down. You know the longer I’m a Christian and the older I get the more I begin to think about how one day I will be brought into the presence of my Lord. Oh dear saints that ought to cause you to live differently.

Hey, may I have your attention for a moment? If you or I were to go home with the Lord what impact would that have on those we left behind in the world? I mean would your or my life be remembered in such a way that it would be a continual testimony to the person and work of Christ? I read this quote from a book by Elisabeth Elliot, widow of missionary Jim Elliot, whose life was taken along with four others on January 8th 1956 by the Auca Indians in an Ecuadorian jungle. In one of his many journal entries he wrote this down, “When it comes time to die, make sure that all you have left to do is die!” Off the coast of Italy a young naval officer had been involved in an accident at sea. As he floated alone on a raft he pondered his mortality and these very words that he had read in the newspaper article about their death stuck in his heart. He prayed to God for he realized that he had more to do for God than to die. How about it? Are you and I ready to live so that we would be called a martyr? 

Vs. 7:54-56 Being full of the Holy Spirit

Vs. 54-56 In this section Luke quotes the three final sentences of Stephen while he was still on earth, (verses 56, 59, 60). In the first sentence he speaks of Jesus to those about ready to kill him, in the final two he speaks to Jesus about his readiness to be with Him and for forgiveness to those who have just killed him. I personally can think of no better way to leave this world than to end it by speaking of Jesus and to Jesus!

         Luke graphically describes Stephen’s assassins as, “cut to the heart” and “gnashing at him with their teeth.” The words “cut to the heart” mean to cut in half. Simply put Stephen’s words ripped apart their religious veneer and they in turn acted as wild beasts literally snarling at him. Now let’s not forget that Stephen is before the religious elite of his day. What a contrast between Stephen with his relationship with Jesus and the self-righteous religious. Stephen is said to look like Jesus with a face of an angel, (6:16) they look like, well hell! Seven different times Jesus describes hell as a place of gnashing of teeth.

Look again at those words of verse 55! Truth! You can’t handle the truth! As the line in the movie goes. How about it, do you react more like the religious crowd or Stephen when confronted by truth? How was Stephen able to maintain such a right on attitude? Well, he was a super saint who knew Greek and Hebrew fluently. No, we do not have to guess as we are told over and over that he was a man controlled by the Holy Spirit. May I make a statement that may freak you out a bit? Both Stephen and the religious folks were acting possessed, but they were possessed by opposite things, which caused exact opposite responses. Oh, to God that more of us would be possessed by the Holy Spirit!

         And what does Stephen full of the Holy Spirit see? Well he sees, “The Son of Man STANDING at the right hand of God.” Many times we are told of Jesus sitting at the right hand of the Father, (Matt. 26:64, Col. 3:1, Eph. 1:20) to mention a few but here Stephen gets a fresh glimpse of God’s glory in heaven and sees his risen Lord STANDING. Is that not cool or what?

• Stephen is confessing Jesus before men so Jesus is confessing Stephen before God.

• Stephen is in a moment of crisis in his life and Jesus is standing at attention. Psalm 116:15 says, “Precious in the sight of the LORD Is the death of His saints.”

• Stephen is seeing Jesus, His Lord who he so lived for and now was about to die for give him a standing ovation. Stephen, whose name means a victor’s crown is ready for his coronation.

Now what I really like is that which Stephen saw he proclaims. Can you imagine the look on his face as he gazed up into heaven and saw Jesus there waiting for him? “Hey, did you guys see that? It’s Jesus and he is standing at the right hand of the Father.” Have you ever known a Christian who so lived their life for Jesus that when you are around them you feel like they are continually in the presence of Jesus? I’ve got to tell you that they make my day! Man did this ever bust their chops, I mean Jesus had claimed to them that He would be at the right hand of the Father and Stephen says, “Yep, there He is alright!”  

Vs. 57-60 Even the rocks will cry out

Vs. 57-59 Now that last statement before them was more than they could handle. Stephen looked up into heaven while the religious looked down at Stephen. Pride had been their problem as Stephen had pointed out to them and now they are going to demonstrate it. 

Hey you know what you can see in the history of these fellows a progression of pride:

• At the death of John the Baptist they did nothing and allowed him to be beheaded by Herod. In doing so they sinned against God the Father who sent him.

• Then at the death of Jesus they asked Pilate to kill Jesus for them. In doing so they sinned against God the Son.

• Now here they disregard Roman law, which forbids the Jews of capital punishment. They disregard the fact that they could not execute a criminal on the same day of his trial. In doing so they sinned against the Holy Spirit Who had filled him to speak of Jesus.

Folks, watch out for pride! You start out by just turning the other way when wrongs are being done. Then when you harden your heart still more in pride you get involved in wrong doing by chuckling at others while they do it. Lastly, you progress to the point in pride where you are actively pursuing wrong! Now notice how their three actions taken against Stephen mimicked their spiritual condition:

They did not want to listen.

Vs. 57 They stopped their ears: Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, so they did not like the truth and like a child who does not want to hear what is being said they plugged their ears. Look at what that led to:

Cried out with a loud voice: Do you see that? Well they did not want to hear what God said so they shouted so they could only hear what they said. That is always what pride will do, does it not? I mean you get in an argument with someone and pretty soon the voices start getting louder so that you don’t have to listen to what the other is saying. Sometimes people think if they say something long enough and loud enough it will actually become true.

They ran at Him with one accord: The word run here is the same one used to describe the demonic pigs that ran into the sea and drowned. It also is used by Luke to describe the crowd that rushed the theater at Ephesus. They were religiously insane. Hey, if you want to silence the truth yell if that doesn’t work act crazy, out of control you know!  

They were outside of a relationship    

• Vs. 58 They cast him outside the city. Stephen had proclaimed to them that they were outside of a relationship with God. So they cast him out.

They were spiritually dead

• Vs. 59 They stoned Stephen. They were dead spiritually so they were going to kill Stephen.

Now we are told that stoning was a particular awful way to die. They would take a person to a cliff that was twice the height of a man. Then while he was not looking someone would push him into the hole. Then those who were the ones to testify against him would take a large boulder and throw it at his chest from about 15 feet. If that did not kill him then the next witness would aim for his head. After that then all there would start throwing rocks until he was dead.

So here we are told that the witnesses of 6:13-14 lay off their outer garments at the feet of a young man named Saul. This is our first introduction to Saul who is said to be a “young man” literally a man in his prime. Now we know that he was a voting member of the Sanhedrin. What blows my mind is how Stephen’s death will be used to change Saul’s life. Paul would later in his own defense say (22:17-21), “Lord, they know that in every synagogue I imprisoned and beat those who believe on You.   “And when the blood of Your martyr Stephen was shed, I also was standing by consenting to his death, and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him.”

Vs. 59-60 Here then are the final two statements Stephen makes this side of heaven.

The first recorded here is telling of his readiness to go home to be with Jesus. So how about it, are you ready as Stephen?

The Last is Stephen interceding on behalf of his killers. Is that radical or what? And you know what? God heard the prayer of Stephen and touched the life of Saul! So when you get into heaven make sure you thank Stephen for Paul! Man, think of the fellowship those two are having now! Hey, I like what G. Campbell Morgan said; “Stephen was a martyr before they stoned him.”

Folks, the question is not are you willing to die for Jesus. No, the question is are you willing to LIVE for him. Dying for Him is going to be easy; it’s the living that I have a problem with! Folks, you and I have one life as an opportunity to impact the world with the life of Jesus so how about it? Paul would later challenge the Church at Rome to be “living sacrifices!”

         Look at how the good Dr. describes Stephen’s death, even as horrible as it was he says that Stephen, “fell asleep”. Did you get that? Paul would later say in 1 Cor. 15:54-55, “Death is swallowed up in victory. O Death, where is your sting?” As a Christian it does not matter the way you fall asleep you are still going to awake in the presence of God. The story is told of a couple who wanted to send a flower arrangement to a friend who owned a business that just changed locations. Well when the friend got the arrangement he was surprised to find the words from his friends that said, “Sorry to hear about your loss.”

Confused by this he gave them a call to find out what the cryptic saying meant. Well the flowers were from them alright but the saying had gotten mixed up by the florist. Quickly they called where they purchased the flowers but it was too late the card had already been delivered to the mortuary with, you guessed it the words, “Congratulations on your new home.” Hey, for a Christian that is perfect is it not? Send some flowers to my wife when I go with those words!