Acts 3:11-26

God, having raised up his servant, sent him to you first, to bless you by turning every one of you from your wickedness. (Acts 3:26)

Peter and John were “going up to the temple”. As they entered the temple, they saw a lame man begging for money.

The lame beggar was situated next to the gate leading into the area of the temple where people would give alms. He meets Peter and John, and is healed.

After he is healed, he clings to the apostles, not letting them go as they seek to enter the temple for worship.

His healing draws a crowd of onlookers into the outer court of the temple.

Peter then seizes the opportunity to share the gospel with a large crowd

Go read Acts 3:11-26. I won’t post it here since it’s a longer passage.

Peter’s sermon

Peter’s sermon is meant to explain the miracle: V12 “why do you wonder at this”?

But that is not the only purpose, or even the main purpose for which Peter speaks.

He takes advantage of a situation, much as he did at Pentecost, to proclaim the gospel.

I want to note a couple things from his sermon, and then ask you three questions.

Peter is acting very much like an OT prophet at this point. The OT prophets had three jobs: 1) expose idolatry, 2) announce judgment, 3) give hope. I could show you how each and every prophet in the OT does this. Each one focuses predominately on one of these three themes, but they all do all three.

Peter does the same thing here, but he starts with an explanation of who Jesus is. It is grand and sweeping. And it’s necessary. The prophets often reminded people who God is and what he has done before they began to expose the people’s idolatry, and they were talking to a very religious people who knew who they had committed idolatry against. But Peter, and we ourselves, must explain Christ, before we can explain sin.

Who is this Jesus?

Here is a list of the things Peter says about Jesus in the course of his sermon.

• God’s Servant (Isaiah 43: suffering servant, messiah)
• Holy One (Psalm 16:10, 78:41)
• Righteous One (Proverbs 21:12 – God as judge)
• Author of life (Creator)
• Raised from the dead (ch2:24 – conquered death and grave)
• Faith through Jesus (faith in God counted as righteousness, i.e. Abraham)
• His Christ (The Christ of God – messiah, promised redeemer, Eternal King)
• Prophet like Moses (One of them, law/grace giver, reveals God, creates nation, leads to the Promised Land)
• Name of Jesus (faith in his name, faith that is through him – heals/restores)

A few comments concerning verse 16:

It was Peter’s faith, not the lame man (He just wanted money. He didn’t even believe Peter. Peter had to grab his hand and pull him up.).

Peter repeats it three times for emphasis and clarity.

• Jesus name – not the apostles’ power
• Faith in his name – not a magic formula
• Faith that is through Jesus – It is Christ himself who works in and through his people

Exposing Idolatry

Peter points out sin. He isn’t afraid to call it sin. He tells them exactly what they’ve done. They:

“delivered over and denied” Jesus
“asked for a murderer” instead
“killed the Author of life”

Do you see the insanity that comes from rejecting Jesus? Insanity that leads to freeing a murderer and attempting to put God to death.

God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
—Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Section 125, tr. Walter Kaufmann

This is the original sin, is it not? The serpent told Eve:

For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. (Genesis 3:5)

Adam and Eve tried to become gods. The Jews, and Romans, in putting Jesus to death, were trying to take the place of the Christ.

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. (Exodus 20:2-3)

Martin Luther said that:

All those who do not at all times trust God and do not in all their works or sufferings, life and death, trust in His favor, grace and good-will, but seek His favor in other things or in themselves, do not keep this [First] Commandment, and practice real idolatry, even if they were to do the works of all the other Commandments, and in addition had all the prayers, obedience, patience, and chastity of all the saints combined. For the chief work is not present, without which all the others are nothing but mere sham, show and pretense, with nothing back of them… If we doubt or do not believe that God is gracious to us and is pleased with us, or if we presumptuously expect to please Him only through and after our works, then it is all pure deception, outwardly honoring God, but inwardly setting up self as a false [savior]…. (Part X. XI) Excerpts from Martin Luther, Treatise Concerning Good Works (1520).

What Luther is saying is that to reject Christ is to look to something else for our salvation. It is a failure to keep the first commandment. It is idolatry, namely of self. He says that behind any other sin is this sin of rejecting Christ-salvation and indulging in self-salvation.

Their sin was sin of idolatry. And Peter points it out for them in stark detail.

Judgment!

Can you imagine what punishment might be deserved for trying to kill God? Idolatry is cosmic treason! An attempt to overthrow the King of kings! The penalty for treason is death.

And it shall be that every soul who does not listen to that prophet shall be destroyed from the people. (Acts 3:23)

I know I said all sin is idolatry and therefore all sin is cosmic treason against the King. But…this is pretty bad. They put Jesus on a cross and murdered him.

Do you know anyone who has done anything worse? No matter what you may have done, you haven’t done anything worse than this. You haven’t done anything less than this either!

Hope given!

Yet Peter offers them hope. He gives them good news! The good news of Jesus.

What specific good news does Peter offer?

• “what God foretold…he thus fulfilled” – through their opposition and ignorance
• “your sins may be blotted out” – gone!
• “refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord” – coolness, rest, recreation
• “the Christ appointed for you” – Jesus is for you!
• “restoring all things” – all the brokenness of the universe reversed
• “God…sent him to you…to bless you” – not just to spare us, but to bless us!

To summarize:

1. Jesus proves God’s faithfulness
2. Jesus restores all things, including us (by removing our sin)
3. Jesus was sent to bless us

Peter offers his listeners hope, good news, blessing even. What does Peter say they must do to enjoy this blessing? (Repent, Faith in Jesus, listen to Jesus)

Isn’t he speaking to ethnic Jews? How does this promise of blessing apply to us?

You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant that God made with your fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your offspring all all the families of the earth be blessed.’ (Acts 3:25)

We’re included in verse 25. This isn’t just for the Jewish people. Christ, and the blessing he brings, is for the world.

What kind of blessing is promised here? Wealth, happiness, pain free life?

God, having raised up his servant, sent him to you first, to bless you by turning every one of you from your wickedness. (Acts 3:26)

God isn’t promising material blessing. The blessing he promises is that Christ will be active in us to sanctify us, to turn us from our wickedness and toward God. This turning away from sin and toward God is what we call repentance. The one thing we are required to do, so that we will not be destroyed, is to repent. And God promises that Christ will work repentance in us. It was for this purpose that he was sent. To turn us from our sin, and bring us to God!

A couple questions

1. What form of idolatry do you need to repent of?
2. Is Jesus at work in your life today to transform you “by turning…you from your wickedness” (v26) so that not-yet-believers would see you “walking and praising God” and would “recognize [you] as the one who” used to ____________, and so would be “filled with wonder and amazement at what [has happened to you]”? (v10)
3. The question of mission: The man was merely walking, an every day activity. But he was with Peter and John (clinging to them) and praising God as he did it. This lead to an opportunity for Peter to preach the gospel. What everyday activities could you engage in, with other believers, in the presence of not-yet-believers, that may give rise to an occasion to communicate the good news of Jesus?