Commentary - Acts 7:9-16

Bird's-eye view

In this section of his defense, Stephen continues his masterful recitation of Israel's history. But this is no mere history lesson; it is a polemic, a covenant lawsuit. The central charge against Stephen was that he blasphemed the Temple, this holy place (Acts 6:13). His response is to show that God's presence and blessing have never been confined to a box, no matter how gilded. God was with Abraham in Mesopotamia, and as we see here, He was with Joseph in pagan Egypt. The whole story is a grand rebuke to the thin and territorial theology of the Sanhedrin. They thought they had God in their pocket because they had the Temple. Stephen shows them that the God of glory is a God on the move, and He is a God who works His sovereign purposes through the most unlikely means, including the sinful jealousy of brothers and the hard providence of slavery and prison.

The story of Joseph is a central jewel in this argument. He is rejected by his brothers, the patriarchs, and sold into a foreign land. And yet, this rejection becomes the very instrument of their salvation. This is a clear and potent type of Christ, who was rejected by His own brethren, delivered over to the Gentiles, and who through that rejection secured the salvation of the world, including the salvation of the very ones who rejected Him. Stephen is not just defending himself; he is preaching the gospel, showing them that their pattern of rejecting God's chosen deliverers has a long and sordid history, and that they are the current-day culprits.

Outline

Clause-by-Clause Commentary

v. 9 And the patriarchs, becoming jealous of Joseph, sold him into Egypt. Yet God was with him,

Stephen begins with the patriarchs, the revered fathers of the nation, and immediately puts his finger on their sin: jealousy. This is not how you would flatter a court. The foundation of Israel's sojourn in Egypt was not some noble mission, but rather the bitter envy of brothers against the favored one. They saw the dreams, they saw their father's love, and they hated him for it. So they did what envious men do, they sought to get rid of the object of their envy. They sold him. But notice the immediate pivot, the great adversative: "Yet God was with him." This is the central lesson. The patriarchs were with their sin in Canaan, but God was with Joseph in Egypt. God is not bound by geography, and He is most certainly not thwarted by the sins of men. In fact, He uses the sins of men as the very fabric from which He weaves the tapestry of His redemption. This is hard providence, the kind that teaches us that God is God, and we are not.

v. 10 and rescued him from all his afflictions, and granted him favor and wisdom in the sight of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and he appointed him governor over Egypt and all his household.

God's presence with Joseph was not a sentimental feeling; it was an effectual power. It resulted in rescue. Not rescue from the afflictions, but rescue out of them. Joseph still had to endure the pit, the slavery, and the prison. God's favor doesn't mean a life free of trouble; it means a life where trouble cannot have the last word. God granted him "favor and wisdom." Wisdom here is not just cleverness, but the practical skill of godly living that commends itself even to a pagan king like Pharaoh. And the result is a staggering reversal of fortune. The boy sold for twenty pieces of silver is now the governor over the greatest empire on earth. This is a sneak preview of the gospel pattern: humiliation followed by exaltation. Joseph is cast down into the pit, and then raised up to rule. This is what God does with His beloved sons.

v. 11 Now a famine came over all Egypt and Canaan, and great affliction with it, and our fathers could find no food.

Now the stage for the great reunion is set. The famine, an instrument of God's judgment and providence, strikes everywhere. It strikes the land of promise, Canaan, just as hard as it strikes Egypt. This affliction drives the narrative. The very brothers who thought they had solved their Joseph problem now have a much bigger problem: starvation. Their sin did not lead to peace and prosperity; it led them to the end of their rope. God has a way of arranging circumstances to bring us face to face with the consequences of our rebellion and our desperate need for a savior.

v. 12 But when Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt, he sent our fathers there the first time.

Word gets out. There is bread in Egypt. The place where the patriarchs sent their brother to be forgotten is now the only place that can offer them life. The irony is thick, and it is all part of God's design. Jacob, hearing the rumor of salvation, sends his sons. They go seeking grain, entirely unaware that they are about to come face to face with the brother they wronged, the very one who now holds the keys to their survival. They are going to bow down to him, just as the dreams predicted. God's word, even when given in dreams to a young boy, does not return to Him void.

v. 13 And on the second visit Joseph made himself known to his brothers, and Joseph’s family was disclosed to Pharaoh.

The first visit is one of testing and concealed identity. But on the second visit, the great revelation occurs. Joseph, the savior of Egypt, reveals himself to be their brother. You can imagine the shock, the fear, the shame. The one they sold is the one who can save. This is the gospel in miniature. The Jesus whom these men on the Sanhedrin had rejected, the one they had handed over, is the only one who can save them from the famine of their souls. And notice, this family affair becomes public knowledge. Joseph's family is "disclosed to Pharaoh." God's work of redemption is not a secret, private thing. It has public, cosmic implications.

v. 14 Then Joseph sent word and invited Jacob his father and all his relatives to come to him, seventy-five persons in all.

The invitation goes out. The one who was cast out now becomes the one who invites in. He doesn't just give them grain to go away; he brings them into his portion, into the land of Goshen. He saves his entire family. The number given here, seventy-five, follows the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament), which was the version most commonly used in the early church. The Hebrew text of Genesis 46:27 lists seventy. This is not a contradiction to be afraid of; it is a textual variant that any honest student of the Bible acknowledges. Stephen, speaking to Hellenistic Jews, simply uses the number from their Bible. The theological point is what matters: God is preserving the entire covenant family through the one they had rejected.

v. 15 And Jacob went down to Egypt and there he and our fathers died.

So the covenant family leaves the promised land and goes down to Egypt. This is a crucial part of their history. They are preserved from famine, but they are also being set up for four hundred years of bondage, just as God had told Abraham (Gen. 15:13). And there, in that foreign land, the patriarchs die. Their story does not end with them taking possession of the promised land. Their hope was not in the dirt of Canaan, but in the promises of God, which looked forward to a better country, a heavenly one (Heb. 11:16).

v. 16 And from there they were removed to Shechem and placed in the tomb which Abraham had purchased for a sum of money from the sons of Hamor in Shechem.

This verse summarizes a few different events. Joseph's bones were famously carried out of Egypt during the Exodus and buried in Shechem (Josh. 24:32), in the plot of ground Jacob had bought (Gen. 33:19). Stephen, in his rapid-fire summary, conflates this with the tomb Abraham bought, which was in Hebron (Gen. 23). Is this a mistake? Only if you are a pedant with no soul. Stephen is making a theological point, not giving a pedantic real estate lecture. The point is that the patriarchs, even in death, were looking toward the promise. Their bones were a down payment on the land. They were buried in faith, believing that God would fulfill His word. Their final resting place was a testimony to their hope in the resurrection and the promised inheritance, a hope that Stephen now sees fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

Application

The story of Joseph, as Stephen retells it, is a profound lesson in the sovereignty of God over the affairs of men, especially over the sins of men. The patriarchs acted out of wicked jealousy, and yet God used their sin to save them. This should give us a robust confidence in what the apostle Paul would later write, that "all things work together for good to them that love God" (Rom. 8:28). This does not mean that sin is not sinful, or that pain does not hurt. It means that God is such a great artist that He can use the darkest colors to create a masterpiece. When you are in the midst of a "hard providence," when you have been wronged, betrayed, or cast down, remember Joseph. God was with him. And if you are in Christ, God is with you. Your afflictions are not meaningless; they are part of a story that ends in resurrection and exaltation.

Furthermore, this passage is a stark warning against rejecting God's chosen instruments. The patriarchs rejected Joseph. The Israelites in the wilderness would reject Moses. And Stephen's audience, the leaders of Israel, had just rejected the ultimate Joseph, the true Moses, the Lord Jesus Christ. They, like the patriarchs, were jealous. They thought they were getting rid of a problem, but they were actually rejecting their only hope. We must ask ourselves if there are ways in which we do the same. Do we reject the authority of Christ when it is inconvenient? Do we despise His messengers? Do we trust in our own religious real estate, our own temples, rather than in the living God who cannot be contained? The message of Stephen is that God's presence is with His rejected Son, and it is only by coming to that Son that we can find favor, wisdom, and deliverance from the famine that is coming upon the whole world.