In three chapters in Acts, we meet the first Christian martyr, the first organised persecution of Christians and the first inquisitor. At the same time, the church was growing massively in a way that modern, Western Christians find hard to understand. In this verse, Stephen tells us that persecution is an entirely predictable part of the Christian life.
Predictable persecution
Acts 7:51
51 “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.

