The Fifth Sunday of Easter - May 3, 2026

St. Pauls - Easter 5 - May 3, 2026

When we read biblical narratives, we tend to place ourselves as the protagonist--at least I do. Almost without thinking, I imagine that the only way to learn from the story is if I am at the center.

In the call of Abram story, I rarely imagine myself as one of those not called. Instead I ask, what if God called me to leave my home? What can I learn about obedience here? In the Jonah story, I never think I might be one of the sinners in Nineveh. It's always, what if I were the one stuck inside the whale?

With this week's reading from Acts, I wonder if most of us automatically see ourselves as Stephen. But if we approach the text with an open and receptive spirit, where else in this martyrdom scene might we find ourselves? 

A few years ago, Susan and I went on part of the Civil Rights trail. We visited the city of Montgomery and saw the Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and justice. among other Civil Rights museums and memorials. 

The National Memorial for Peace and Justice is on a hilltop overlooking Montgomery . This is the nation’s first comprehensive memorial dedicated to the legacy of Black Americans who were enslaved, terrorized by lynching, humiliated by racial segregation, and presumed guilty and dangerous. It was there I read about Ell Persons. On May 22, 1917, in Memphis, Tennessee, a mob lynched Ell Persons. Reports indicated that 5,000 people showed up to participate or watch. Persons was tied to a log, doused with gasoline, and set on fire. According to newspaper reports, his death was slow and agonizing. The crowd cheered as the smell of burnt flesh filled the air. After he died, they mutilated his body.

When I read the story of Stephen, I cannot help but think of Persons and the many other people who were lynched by mobs. We typically preach this as the story of Stephen the perfect martyr, the one who selflessly accepted his call to serve. But in this story we also see that when Stephen’s faith called on him to bear witness to the gospel, not everyone was receptive to his message. Being faithful to the gospel got Stephen into trouble, and we should spend some time discussing that trouble.

Instead, we often rush quickly to the “good news” of the text. We might say that when we doubt we have taken the right stand, God gives us confirmation. Or we remind people that even in the stoning pits of life, we don’t stand alone—that the Jesus who sits at the right hand of God also stands on our behalf. He goes through the turmoil with us, stone for stone. We are never alone. Jesus goes with us, and even when people cover their ears and don’t want to hear us anymore, deaf with hate and rage, the Son of humanity still stands and goes through it with us.

This is indeed good news. But what about the other characters in the story?

There is of course the mob, the people throwing stones. These are not people we might expect to act this way. These are religious folks, and apparently they have a problem with who Stephen is. In Acts 6 it seems Stephen’s only crime is performing “great wonders and signs among the people.” The religious folks begin to argue with him, and then they decide to persuade some folks to lie about him. That’s how he ends up before the council.

How do we, as good religious folks, sometimes act as a mob? The overwhelming majority of the people at Ell Persons’s lynching were good church folks. They were people of faith. They even had a minister there—a man known as “Brother Royal,” who declined to pray for Persons or to even allow Persons to pray for himself. I wonder how many lies people told in order for Persons to be there that day. While many of us will never be guilty of lynching another human, how have we been guilty of throwing our own stones?

The other character in the text is Saul. He doesn’t throw any stones, but he watches the coats. He doesn’t get his hands dirty, but he sees what is going on. He doesn’t yell and scream, but he hears the yells and screams. He doesn’t do the deed, but he approves it.

By standing by and doing nothing, Saul gives validity to what the mob is doing. We can see ourselves in him. Even when we didn’t throw the stones, we may have known what was happening and known that it was wrong. We stood and watched and held the coats.

Life is full of decisions big and small, and we can’t avoid making them. The decision to stand and do nothing but watch and hold coats is itself a decision. When we sit on the fence, walk the tightrope, try to play the middle, or hide behind not making a decision, we make a decision to watch and to hold coats.

Our world is only becoming more diverse. Like it or not, ready or not, we will increasingly be confronted with neighbors, colleagues, and even new friends who have different ideas from ours. What could happen if we approached difference in culture, faith, and people the same way we try to approach scripture, with an open and receptive spirit? I wonder what the people in the crowd surrounding Stephen are so afraid of hearing. What aspects of their world is threatened by listening to what Stephen has to say; what notions of God do they find so offensive?

I think we need to ask ourselves how we're like that crowd that covers its ears or Paul, watching the coats?   How are we refusing to listen to perspectives that challenge our own worldview?  How are we encouraging division when we could be building community?  How are we giving in to hate and fear when we could be fighting for love?  How are we letting death win when we could be embracing new life in Christ? Because I think that when we look at the world around us, it's pretty clear that a lot of people prefer to cover their ears.  There's a lot of shouting and not a lot of listening.  And we, the church, we're part of that.  We're just as guilty as the rest of this fallen world of shutting out voices that we don't like, whether those voices come from within the church or from without it. 

If by chance we discover that in this story, we are not Stephen, how might we answer such questions ourselves--

The story of Stephen shows us that many times the mob and the coat watchers are us. It teaches that we good church folks are the ones who stand in need of forgiveness and mercy. It also demonstrates something else we don’t talk about enough in our churches: sometimes the mob wins, at least for the moment.

I can’t help but wonder if Stephen or Persons silently recited Psalm 31, a psalm asking for deliverance from one’s enemies: Rescue me speedily. Be a rock of refuge for me, a strong fortress to save me. But when deliverance does not come on this side of eternity, the good news is that we can commit our spirit into the hands of the one who has already prepared a place for us—the one who stands with us in the stoning pits of life, the one ready to redeem and forgive us if we are guilty of throwing stones and watching coats.

I would like to close with a prayer poem written by Kate Bowler called Regret

I would go back, God,

to the moment it happened.

No. To the moment before that.

I would rewind this pain like a cassette.

The person who made that decision—

who was that?

They never existed at all.

But, instead, here we are. Downriver.

Carried by the currents of circumstances

and my own damn choices.

Lord, I want to undo what’s been done

and unwrite this story.

Take me back, take me back,

make me someone else entirely.

Grief. Embarrassment. Shame.

Since we can’t go back, Lord,

pull me forward. Remind me of the

surreal truth that you unwrite any sin.

I confess and you forgive.

Your love is simple. Clean.

You really do take me back

to that moment of decision

or circumstance

and can make me someone else entirely.

My worst moments are written

in disappearing ink.

Love. Relief. Mercy.

Now pull me to my feet, God.

If I need to apologize, help.

If I can’t apologize, help.

If I am not forgiven, help.

Thank you for helping me become

someone else, someone new.