In Acts 7, the apostle Stephen is killed for sharing the gospel. In his final words to the people he asks them to stop denying the Holy Ghost and persecuting the prophets. He pleads with them to repent but the people just get more angry. Then he is filled with the Holy Ghost and sees a vision of Jesus Christ standing on the right hand of God. This is one of the very few scriptural instances where all three members of the Godhead are present. From this we learn that they are three distinct beings because they are in three different places. The part of these verses that is most impressive to me though, is that as they are stoning him, Stephen asks the Lord to "lay not this sin at their charge" (
Acts 7:60) The last words he speaks in his mortal life are pleading with God to forgive those who are killing him. It reminds me of Christ when he was on the cross and He plead with the Father to "forgive them; for they know not what they do" (
Luke 23:34). I can't even imagine praying for God to forgive the people that are killing me as they are doing it. It's hard enough for me to pray for the driver of the car who just cut me off in traffic. Just reading these verses makes me realize how much farther I have to go to get to that level of perfection.
There is a similar story in the Book of Mormon about a man named Abinadi (
Mosiah 17:7-20). Both Abinadi and Stephen were killed because they would not deny their testimonies and the things that they prophesied about. They made the greatest sacrifice they could ever make, the sacrifice of their lives. They loved the gospel and those people so much that they were willing to die to help the people come to the truth. As I read their stories I have a greater desire to live the gospel. I want my testimony to be strong enough that if I were called upon to die for that testimony I would be willing.
