Delivering Nothing But the Truth

Acts 4:5-12 ESV

5 On the next day their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem, 6 with Annas the high priest and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of the high-priestly family. 7 And when they had set them in the midst, they inquired, “By what power or by what name did you do this?” 8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders, 9 if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, 10 let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing before you well. 11 This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. 12 And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

Throughout the series in which we are currently working through, the account of the Apostle’s Peter and John being brought before the Jewish Council, the main theme that is highlighted is truth.

Now, we ask ourselves, “What is truth?” And when we ask ourselves that, we probably say, “Truth is that which is true”. Now that much is obvious, but I think that a better definition for truth is: “that which is in accordance with fact or reality.”

Many people say that truth is relative, in other words, many say that truth can be several or even, an unlimited number of things.

In other words, many believe that if something is true to me, then it is true, and if something is true to you, then it is true.

But what if what I say is true to me makes what is true to you a lie? Then is what is true to me still true? And then does what is true to you then become a lie?

You see, this whole truth is relative argument is nonsense, for as we just said, truth is in accordance with fact or reality. I may say that what is true is that I am a housecat. Now, I can say that that is true, but is it reality? Not at all. So even though I may think that it is the truth, it isn’t reality, so, by definition, it is not the truth.

Now, we may look at an example like that and laugh, saying that it is absurd that anyone would ever say that something like that is the truth, or argue for that point, and so it would be ridiculous to ever compromise on such a point.

I mean, it’s obvious. So, why ever compromise on such a matter? Well, something that is so much more obvious, and something that we as Christians should never ever compromise on in a thousand years is truth when it comes to God.

What I mean by that is truth concerning Who God is, how God saves us, and the way in which we should view God.

And just like in any other matter concerning truth, when it comes to God there is reality, which is truth, and there is that which is not reality and therefore is not the truth. What I mean is that God is not Who we say He is. God is Who He says He is. And we read of where God says Who He is in the Bible.

In the Bible we find the truth, the only truth about God. And while we talked last week about how these apostles delivered the truth to their audience, this week we are going to be looking at the content of the truth.

But before we get to the exact contents of the truth, let us spend a few minutes looking at the context and the setting in which these apostles told the truth.

First, we see who it was that these apostles had the privilege of relaying the content of the truth to in verses 5 and 6 of our reading, where it says:

Acts 4:5-6 ESV

5 On the next day their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem, 6 with Annas the high priest and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of the high-priestly family.

Peter and John had spent the night in jail for proclaiming the Gospel the day before. Now, today is a new day, and these apostles are brought in amongst what our reading describes as the rulers and elders and scribes. These were the constituent members of the Jewish council, or the Sanhedrin.

But in addition to the Sanhedrin, our text also mentions four other men, who on most occasions, would not have been present for such proceedings also being present on this particular occasion.

It is written that Annas the High Priest, Caiaphas, John, and Alexander were all present. What is interesting is that at this time, Caiaphas was actually the High Priest, but his father-in-law, Annas, who was a former High Priest, was believed to be the one who was truly wielding power in Israel, and he used his son-in-law, Caiaphas, the current High Priest merely as a puppet whom he used to continue to rule through, thus it written here that Annas, and not Caiaphas was the high priest.

And this John spoken of here was most likely a son of Annas, and this Alexander was also some kind of relation to Annas. So, this group of men was almost like a mafia with Annas acting as what we might know as the godfather.

So, needless to say, Peter and John were brought into the presence of some very powerful men who had the authority and power to do whatever they pleased with these apostles.

What this group of powerful men was hoping to do was get these most influential leaders in the Christian faith to be so intimidated by them and their power that they would renounce the faith and thus put an end to the growth of the faith and discourage whoever else was still adhering to it.

Thus, the Council and the high priestly family publicly asked these apostles the following question:

Acts 4:7b ESV

7b “By what power or by what name did you do this?”

So, here, surrounded by the Jewish Council and the high priestly family, with this great display of political, societal, and religious power these two lonely apostles were essentially told, “We are the power in Jerusalem.” And they then follow that up by asking the apostles, “Now you tell us, by what power did you heal the lame man who would sit in front of the temple?”

You see what was happening here… they wanted to scare the apostles into saying that Jesus didn’t empower them and thus heal this man who had been lame.

Now, left to themselves, left to their own strength I’m sure that Peter and John would have been so frightened by this intimidating Council, which included the High Priest and his relatives and the power that they wielded that they would have buckled under pressure and said, “Yeah, you’re right, Jesus didn’t have anything to do with this.”

But fortunately, Peter and John didn’t do this according to their own strength, as the first part of verse 8 tells us:

Acts 4:8a ESV

8a Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them,

These frightening men with all of their authority and power were really flexing their political muscles here, trying to scare Peter and John into doing what they wanted them to do. And yes, politically, socially, these apostles were weak. But then the Holy Spirit, God Himself, Who, by the way, is a lot more powerful than this Council, filled Peter with His own power, and enabled him to respond to this intimidating force in a way that brought God the utmost glory.

These influential and intimidating men were essentially trying to scare Peter and John into lying. But the response of Peter, as he was inspired by God was what I was talking about earlier, and that is the truth, and the contents of the truth.

First, in verses 8-10, we see Peter telling these men what exactly the Power was that healed this man, where we read:

Acts 4:8b-10 ESV

8b “Rulers of the people and elders, 9 if we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, 10 let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing before you well.

Peter says, “You ask by what means, by what power was this man healed. And I publicly and boldly declare to you that it was by the power and authority of Jesus of Nazareth! This Jesus was and is the Christ! God’s Anointed, the Messiah! And you all may remember Him; He was the One youcrucified! You all thought that you had put an end to Him when you crucified Him, but guess what? God raised Him from the dead! Shows how much power you have! But even though your power is futile, His power is obviously alive and well, because it was by His power that this man who was crippled now stands before you, fully healed!”

Wow! What a bold statement! But that wasn’t all, Peter wasn’t done with his testimony quite yet as he makes plain to this intimidating force that Jesus isn’t just some miracle worker or divine healer, but that He is spoken of all throughout the Scriptures when he tells them:

Acts 4:11 ESV

11 This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone.

You see, the oracles of God, that is, His revelation, the Holy Scriptures were entrusted to the Jews. At that dispensation of time, it was God’s good pleasure to reveal Himself to the Jews alone. And what was promised in God’s revelation to His people was God’s Messiah.

Yet, the disturbing reality that we see in the Old Testament Scriptures is that the very chosen people of God would reject the One Whom God would send to fulfill the Old Testament Scriptures.

The Jews were entrusted with God’s revelation, yet here in what is a quotation from the Psalms, we see that it is foretold that when the Messiah would come, He would be rejected by the ones He came to. But though He would be rejected, He would prove to be the cornerstone, that is, the One Who held their entire faith together when He powerfully raised Himself from the dead.

So, what Peter says here is that it’s not surprising at all that these high Jewish officials, the ones whom the psalm calls the builders, have rejected Jesus. It’s not surprising at all, because many, many years before they rejected Him, God said that they would reject Him.

That was the truth. The truth was that they rejected God’s Messiah. But it was already foretold that they would. And I’m sure that for these men, the truth hurt. But it was about to get a lot more painful for them, because Peter follows this statement with one that I’m sure cut them straight to the heart, when he said:

Acts 4:12 ESV

12 And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

You see, the Jews looked for salvation in the fact that God claimed Israel for Himself. They looked for salvation in the fact that they were supposedly trying really hard to keep the Law of God. But the reality is that the salvation of God comes through the grace of God alone.

And that grace was and is extended not through anything we may do or who we are. If that was the case, then salvation wouldn’t be through grace. Rather, that grace that resulted in our salvation was and is extended through Jesus Christ alone.

So, Peter says, “Yes, it is through the power of Jesus alone that this man was healed. But it is also through the power of Jesus alone that anyone is saved!”

Now, this is indeed the truth. It always has been the truth. Yet today, just like in any other time period in history, the truth is attacked.

People say that it is prideful to say that in Jesus alone is there salvation. People say that it is unfair that in Jesus alone is there salvation. People say that it is cruel to say that in Jesus alone is there salvation.

But when people say this, what they are really saying is that they hate the truth! This is the truth! And we are to be the people of the truth. Therefore, beloved, may we, like Peter and John stand for that truth amid any and all adversity!

Amen?