Jordan Paul

Grant us, O Lord, we beseech thee, to learn to love our enemies, by the example of thy first Martyr Saint Stephen, who prayed to thee for his persecutors. Who livest and reignest with God the Father, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

Friends,

While our lectionary titles today as the Friday after the First Sunday after Christmas, in a previous era we would be celebrating the Octave Day of St. Stephen.

St. Stephen was, of course, the Church’s first martyr, having been stoned to death.

He seems to be known primarily for his plea to God to not hold the actions of the executioners against them. His plea was successful for at least one person, given that his execution was witnessed and approved of by the future St. Paul. 

In his Epistle to the Ephesians, St. Paul implores us to “walk worthy of the vocation wherewith [we] are called” and to cease being children—who are “tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive”—and to become the people that God has called us to be. 

Rather than contend with what that imploration might mean—a rule of life, fasting, a lifestyle shift, etc.—it often feels as if many would rather not engage with it at all: church is something to be done on Sundays (when there is time); the calling to follow Jesus is a call to follow a great moral teacher but perhaps not much else; St. Paul’s command to resist being “tossed to and fro” certainly applies to worldly concerns but not restrictions that might be placed on us or our lives by the Church.

St. Paul’s imploration is not easy. But God certainly makes it possible—look no further than St. Paul himself.

For all of my faults and falling short of who God has called me to be, I’ve never been a violent persecutor of Christians. Yet, St. Paul was. And, he was so compelled by God’s command that his words have come down to us through the centuries not merely as an example of someone whose actions we should avoid but as the one whose words implore us to follow God’s command more deeply. 

Thanks be to God.

In Christ,

—Jordan