God’s Migrant Caravan: Migration Rhetoric as Missionary Strategy in Acts 7:1-60

Abstract This article explores Stephen’s speech in Acts 7 as a migration narrative that legitimates the Jesus movement’s mission to the Gentiles. In response to the opponents’ charge that Stephen has spoken against the Law and the Temple, Luke uses Exodus rhetoric—its topoi of Liberation, Wilderness Wanderings, and Promised Land—to redefine the Exodus as an ongoing migration journey. Consequently, Luke transforms the nascent Jesus movement into a migrant caravan and portrays God as a migrant deity who is comfortable accompanying believers in a tent. Reading against the grain, Stephen’s speech contrasts the naivete of the Jesus movement with the zeal of manumitted Diaspora Jews. Thus, as a migration narrative, Stephen’s speech reveals the tensions, hopes, and disenchaments that leaving or returning to one’s home entails.