Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
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Call to worship
Sermon reading 1, for perspective
Sermon reading 2, main text
Prayer after the reading (or Psalm reading)
I.
It still amazes me— not even 60, or 70, or 80 days after all that’s happened with Jesus’ death and resurrection.
So close to the dust settling and the debris of the earthquake being scurried away in dustpans:
Still after all that, in our passage this morning, there’s still a temple in operation—and probably still with sacrifices, and offerings, and bulls and goats.
So a question for you: When is Christianity just overspent and undelivered, empty and ready to be closed up?
(I remember Dennis C’s classis exam being asked over 10 years ago…)
1 Corinthians 15:14,17,19 (ESV)
15:14, And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain (empty) and your faith is in vain.
15:17, And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile (worthless) and you are still in your sins.
15:19, If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied (miserable).
Some recognized that a temple in Jerusalem, at the ninth hour, had a new usage.
At the old hour of evening sacrifice, it was now the “hour of prayer.”
Jesus had come, Jesus had died…Jesus was raised!
Luke 23, the curtain is torn.
– The people who couldn’t see, or recognize the worthlessness: did they sew the curtain back up and repair it, so it was empty “business as usual?”
We have a story and a gospel episode here that’s focused and concentrated on access.
A lame man receives welcome and healing being ushered amazingly into the people and presence of God himself!
Peter and John—Jesus’ insiders, his closest disciples—are going up at this time, and they’re finding a man who is left for the outside.
Literal Greek, “a man lame from his mother’s womb, existing, was being carried as a burden, whom they laid down daily at the gate [i.e., while they themselves went on and entered the temple].”
Beautiful Gate: point of speculation and difference in the commentaries.
Best guess: it was the last gate that divided the Gentiles from the Israelites.
Separated the Court of the Gentiles from the Court of Women.
– (Where Luke’s Theophilus probably would have found his physical access barred.
Theophilus, “lover of God” (Acts 1:1 and Luke 1:1), probably being Greek and therefore uncircumcised, though even possibly a follower.)
It’s two steps removed from the entry to the Holy of Holies, the “mercy seat.”
The man is laid there to beg alms (lit., “mercy”) in the form of handouts, money, physical donations of goodwill.
Peter and John discover this.
Consider the disparity and the unevenness subjected over this man.
Acts 2:42, all the believers were TOGETHER.
Acts 2:46, DAILY they were attending the temple TOGETHER and breaking bread in their homes.
(Meanwhile, DAILY he’s dropped off and left about his begging and panhandling, while the worship continues right on—just paces from where he lies!)
Why the disparity?
--Introduce Mrs. I’s story.
Homeless person after evening service.
Was the disparity caused in Leviticus 21:18-19 (the only command involving those who were lame / injured in body)?
Leviticus 21:18–19 (ESV)
18 For no one who has a blemish shall draw near, a man blind or lame, or one who has a mutilated face or a limb too long, 19 or a man who has an injured foot or an injured hand.
The man can’t “draw near,” right?
He’s cut off and forbidden from the presence and meetingplace of God…
It’s legit, right?
It’s just the limits according to the law?
(Guess again!)
This was a command regarding the condition of the temple/tabernacle priests and Levites!
Not a command about the worshipers in the courts!
More likely, it was a forgetting of the imago Dei / the image of God / the humanity of the man they were carrying.
“Burden.”
He was “existing.”
APPLY: do we have that?? Have we shown that??—Who are we content to be disconnected from or leave on the outskirts?
APPLY: do we have that?? Have we shown that??
Who are we content to be disconnected from or leave on the outskirts?
--Maybe it was in the old masking or no-masking days… “To vaccinate, or not to vaccinate…”
--Maybe it’s the immediate aftermath of political and election season…
--Or there are denominations whose churches dismiss non-members prior to members receiving communion…
--Maybe it’s in the architecture of our buildings: whether we accommodate the aged or the differently-abled, and whether we take the time to consider and make their access as easy as it is for us…
--Or far be it from us to invite people into our homes to share an evening meal, and on that night we SKIP family worship and family devotions (rather than bringing our neighbor or friends right into that time with us)!
It’s something for thought, on their parts and ours—the signals, conscious and subconscious, that we make—and it needs a good reminder:
James 2:1–6 (ESV)
1 My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory.
2 For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in,
3 and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,”
4 have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?
5 Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him?
6 But you have dishonored the poor man.
II.
Peter and John enter as Jesus’ insiders—and they “see” the man.
It’s an operating word for the portion of scripture—and it makes all the transforming difference!
V. 3, The blind man SEES Peter and John entering.
V. 4, Peter “directed his gaze” (our word, “attention”), as did John, and said, “LOOK at us.”
V. 5, the man “fixed his attention” (different Greek word still).
We look at this and ask—why in the world, in a passage about healing and walking, is everything focused on looking?
Let’s look here then and ask about the nature of faith.
Why, in a situation of life-after-death, do we ourselves focus on faith?
Why, in eternal life, are we focused on grace, and faith, and forgiveness?
Shouldn’t it be good works, and good living, and making the best use of our time and abilities for the service of the world, in the time that we’re allotted?
Shouldn’t those be where we’re focused, rather than on the strange things of righteousness, and justification, and divine mercy?
Why, in the here and now, are we so focused on a heaven and getting to heaven??
If you asked the world, “how is it that you live,” the chances most likely are that the reply won’t be, “The righteous shall live by faith.”
Isn’t that right?
There are all sorts of ways that the world could say in response to how, or why, or in what way do you live.
But belief and faith and trust probably aren’t going to be the way.
It seems counterintuitive.
It seems mismatched.
It seems misconstrued.
BUT…the healing of a lame man that focuses on looking, is the faith of the gospel that focuses on trusting, and believing, and having confidence in Jesus!
So a man is lame, crippled from birth, unable to use his legs and perhaps his arms as well.
He hasn’t used his legs, not once, to walk or to move on his own from the day that he was born.
He’s carried and moved about, “like a burden.”
And yet the thrust and dynamic of the passage is to focus on the eyes, on looking.
Peter seeing…
The man looking…
The man fixing his attention…
(You go to the doctor and say, “Doc, I have this pain in my ankle.”
And the doctor, rather than examining the ankle, starts looking into your eyes!)
How do you react??
Do you even stay with the doctor, or do you start searching for another one???
Peter does two things after gaining the man’s attention that are worth noting:
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