The One who came to bless (Acts 3:11 - 26)

Introduction

Good morning Connect Community.

I so look forward to the future where we can worship again all of our church family; a complete church family in one space.

But as we gather today from our couch or our easy chairs I ask you to embrace this time, remember it, seek to keep some of what we have gained.

Time with our families, togetherness, the establishments of church in every home.

Today we gather and we seek the Lord for what He has for us today in the hammer of a sermon from Peter.

So turn with me to Acts chapter 3.

I love Peter’s story here and what he does as the crowd come to see and here what Jesus has done.

So let’s just jump in today as we continue our Church on Mission series.

Acts 3 beginning in verse 11..

Pray with me today.

Prayer....

1st we see the Boldness of faith.

Boldness from Faith

We come back to the Acts and Peter and John have just healed the lame man at the gate and last time we saw this man; he was jumping and praising God.

Look at verse 11...

Acts 3:11 CSB

11 While he was holding on to Peter and John, all the people, utterly astonished, ran toward them in what is called Solomon’s Colonnade.

The crowd gathers around the man and Peter in a moment a great boldness as he begins to preach to the crowd empowered by the Spirit of God.

This is the same Peter who denied Jesus.

The same Peter who was afraid of the crowds and what they thought about his association with the Christ, but the power of the Holy Spirit is moving in the life of Peter.

Look at what Peter does here…verse 12.

Acts 3:12 CSB

12 When Peter saw this, he addressed the people: “Fellow Israelites, why are you amazed at this? Why do you stare at us, as though we had made him walk by our own power or godliness?

He makes the point that he or John did not make him walk..no amount of human power…no amount of human righteousness healed this man.

It was God...

Acts 3:13 CSB

13 The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his servant Jesus, whom you handed over and denied before Pilate, though he had decided to release him.

This is our God… the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob

Peter was very specific to mention Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

He want the crowd to understand that this God who had given praise to Jesus and worked through Jesus; was the same God; the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

God adored this Jesus so much that God used Him to save creation.

Then Peter says this…he drops a hammer.

Our God who has glorified Jesus..who you gave to be killed.

You denied the Holy and Righteous One…you denied Him by not recognizing who He was.

Verse 14...

Acts 3:14 CSB

14 You denied the Holy and Righteous One and asked to have a murderer released to you.

Remember the crowd screamed for Barabbas to be released back into society when Jesus was in front of Pilate.

They released a killer and killed the Holy One..the One whom Peter called the source of life...

Acts 3:15 CSB

15 You killed the source of life, whom God raised from the dead; we are witnesses of this.

You killed the source of Life.

This is so bold of Peter…he flat out indicts them of their crime.

He indicts them just as his words indicts us.

He indicts us of killing Christ by our own rejection.

We reject Him by our our denial, by our worship and by our placement of faith in other things.

But Peter keeps Jesus at the forefront of the miracle.

Verse 16...

Acts 3:16 CSB

16 By faith in his name, his name has made this man strong, whom you see and know. So the faith that comes through Jesus has given him this perfect health in front of all of you.

By faith he is healed…by faith he walks.

Faith gives the lame man and us perfect health.

For the man a physical health and for us a spiritual health that brings a trust when we believe by faith.

Faith is central to your walk with God.

Are you at a intersection of faith?

Intersections are the most dangerous places when we are driving.

When we come to an intersection we have so many dangers…other cars…bicycles, other people walking.

When we enter an intersection we are challenged with which way to go.

Which direction do we go..sometimes we do not know the way.

What do I think I believe?

Great questions to ponder...

What do I do; where do my thoughts go to; where do my actions take me when things do not go my way.

Our life brings forth challenges which often brings us to a brink on what we believe.

Why should we put our faith God when He is putting me through whatever it is I’m going through?

This my friend is a crossroad and intersection of faith.

Faith is belief in something not seen.

Faith is not a feeling

Our emotions lie to us…our emotions sometimes make our faith go out the window.

For some when fear or when the trauma hits our emotions take over and we start to look everywhere but in the hands of God.

But our God is in control of your situation.

If you believe; if you are a follower of the Lord then you should trust that He knows more than your do.

Our God in Omniscient.

God’s omniscience refers to God’s perfect knowledge of both himself and that which he has created.

He knows you…He knows your plight…and He knows what is next for you.

He does not miss what is going…you need to place your faith in the Lord

Our knowledge is different…our knowledge arises from how we conform to culture and how our own minds bend toward to what is true or not true.

God’s knowledge is different from ours.

God’s perfect knowledge flows from his activity as the Creator of all.

God not only knows what He wills but also that which he does not will.

In other words, God knows all states of affairs, both actual and possible.

God knows...

So it is our responsibility to go from thinking we have faith to knowing we have faith.

This happens when we build our faith.

Building our faith?

How do we build faith?

The first step is believing in God’s perfect knowledge.

We must place our faith in Him...

After that we must exercise those things that help us have faith.

We need get to know God.

Invest in His Word, join a Bible Study group, Connect in Small groups.

These things build up your spiritual knowledge, build up our relationships in Christian Community and fellowship.

Seek accountability…add somebody to your circle who is wise in the things of God so they can help you navigate this journey.

Participate in the mission of God.

Building our faith builds our spiritual muscle so then when we face crisis; when we face the unknown we have the strenght to endure.

We go from thinking to knowing we have faith.

A faith strong so when we reach the intersection and think we have no way to go; we can know that our Lord is with us.

This is what Peter is pointing out to these people He has before Him.

He is asking asking them…why are you amazed…it is our God who did this…our God who healed…it is the faith of this man who believed in Jesus that made Him walk.

He is placing them at an intersection where they have to make a choice.

Peters boldness comes from his faith…his faith brings with it the Holy Spirit and in that can he can proclaim to them the news of Christ crucified.

In Christ crucified we can place our faith…in Christ crucified we are healed.

Next we see healing by and through repentance.

Healing by repentance

Acts 3:17–24 CSB

17 “And now, brothers and sisters, I know that you acted in ignorance, just as your leaders also did. 18 In this way God fulfilled what he had predicted through all the prophets—that his Messiah would suffer. 19 Therefore repent and turn back, so that your sins may be wiped out, 20 that seasons of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send Jesus, who has been appointed for you as the Messiah. 21 Heaven must receive him until the time of the restoration of all things, which God spoke about through his holy prophets from the beginning. 22 Moses said: The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers and sisters. You must listen to everything he tells you. 23 And everyone who does not listen to that prophet will be completely cut off from the people. 24 “In addition, all the prophets who have spoken, from Samuel and those after him, have also foretold these days.

Peter displays some empathy as he enters into the 2nd phase of his preaching.

Again he points to the prophets and the predicted suffering of the Messiah.

Peter speaks of Christ need to die…the need to be taken back up until final days…until as Peter puts it the restoration of all things...

He appeals to them through Moses.

Moses spoke of One to come…one whom God will send.

Deuteronomy 18:18 CSB

18 I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him.

This sent one that Moses speaks about is Jesus..but here is what I want to focus on this morning...

Acts 3 verse 24...

Acts 3:24–26 CSB

24 “In addition, all the prophets who have spoken, from Samuel and those after him, have also foretold these days. 25 You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant that God made with your ancestors, saying to Abraham, And all the families of the earth will be blessed through your offspring. 26 God raised up his servant and sent him first to you to bless you by turning each of you from your evil ways.”

Look what Peter does…He relates to them…he connects them to their past faith and calls for their repentance.

He communicates to them to turn away from things that displease God and things that is our not His will and turn back to God.

See this message to them is as old as time…the prophets who Peter speaks about continually called for the people to turn back to God.

Peter is asking them to search what they know…they would know of what was spoken…they know of what the prophets said.

Then he tells them to turn away…to repent…repent so you can see the blessing.

The Scriptures call us in much they same way…they challenge us to think about our past; and think about how we have made our lives about so many other things than the love of our God.

Repent and turn to Jesus…your sins are wiped out…repent and be clean before God.

Repentance is more than just saying the words...

Repentance is reflected inward

Repentance starts in our hearts.

It starts with us accepting that we are not living out the will of God in our life; that we are rejecting God with how we go about life…we have to come to that recognition.

I cannot make you or anybody else come to the place where they seek God.

I can only proclaim what God has placed before every man and women; that which is revealed in the text.

I can help you walk through the scripture.

I can help you with questions; but it is your choice on what to do with what you learn.

I pray for the souls of all people whom I come in contact with to know Jesus Christ.

I will be here when you want to explore what God wants from you; but you need to make the choice with what you have learned.

The choice and the desire to repent and turn from a life that dis pleases God has to come from within.

2nd...

Repentance is also reflected outward

Repentance is displayed in our running from our sin.

Repentance is making up our mind to avoid the things we have in our life that displease God.

Repentance is putting controls in our life that help us make the decision to run to God or not.

For some is giving others permission to confront you when you behavior gets out of control.

For some it is moving the location of our computers or devices.

For some it is bypassing the local hangout.

For some it is adjusting our calendars to make sure we place time for family and friends that honor God.

For some it is as simple as this; stop lying.

For some we have to sever ties with certain people.

Repentance needs to be acted upon outwardly; not that we shout out to people that we have repented, but run from sin and that we put things in our life to help us continually run from the sin we have present in our life.

3rd...

Repentance is ongoing

The reality of human nature is that we keep missing the mark that God sets for us.

Just when we think we have one area of our life cleaned up…something else pops up.

It is like trying to control weeds in a garden.

Get one type of weed killed another type comes up.

Ongoing repentance happens when we learn to listen to God versus listening to our nature.

Just as Peter calls them to look at the their past, he is also calling them to recognize the God who was in front of them…who died for them to be able to have fellowship with God.

Application:

The main idea of this passage is this.

God told of the One who would come and make things right; the one who would bless you; so turn from evil and turn to our Lord…the Lord Jesus.

In your life are you going to place your faith in Jesus or are you going to miss everything He has for you?

God sent Jesus first to bless you.

We so often miss the mark of our Lord’s expectations of us and sometimes it is hard for us to accept or even to know we do so.

Sometimes our failure leads us to the glory of Christ and other times opportunities are on the other side of obstacles.

The obstacle before humanity was that there never seemed to be simple pathway to God…it was full of do this…don’t do that.

How many of us were taught be this way or you do not get to heaven.

The thing is here we must believe in Jesus and have faith in Jesus.

Faith that He knows more than we do…faith that His plan is better…faith that His ways are better than our ways…faith that He is God and it is our faith in that God that will see us through the challenges we have in our lives.

Faith that goes beyond our emotions of what we feel is true.

Belief that leads to faith starts with repentance…turning back or in some of our cases turning to God.

Repentance is an avenue to turn back to God.

Walking with God here and now is a life of repentance.

A life where we say no to sin; where we turn away from sin.

The obstacle you face in your life may be your lack of repentance!

Repentance to God is the start of a life seeking to please God...

The opportunity you seek in your life may be in rooted in your agreement with God about who you really are, repenting and then beginning your walk with God.

I call you today to take the teaching of Peter and use it to look back upon your life…look at the markers in your life that define you and they ask yourself where you want to be.

Some of you will say you life is fine…but is it?

Some of you will say I walk with God…do you?

Some of you will say I do not need to agree with God…really?

The promise of present and future peace lies in our Savior.

It lies in His death upon the cross.

It is Jesus who makes you whole and give you the ability to stand clean before God.

It is Jesus who completes you.

Peter asks the people to turn from their and I call you to turn to Jesus today...

Pray with me...