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Alive Again – Resurrection Surprise
Acts 3:11-26
8 May 2022
Rev’d Chris Johnson
When I was a child I remember asking Santa one year for a microscope.
I used the word microscope but
in my mind I was actually thinking of a magnifying glass.
I thought it would be great to go around outside
and look at all the plants and insects and see them greatly magnified.
So on Christmas Day when I'm opening my gift and expecting a magnifying glass to my great surprise I
found I had received a microscope.
This microscope looked incredibly complex, much more involved
than a magnifying glass.
It had glass panels you could put your specimen on and then you placed them
on a tray with a hole in the middle through which you could shine a light from underneath.
Then above the tray looking down on it there were three lens with three levels of magnification on a
little dial.
There was a very short lens, a medium lens and a long lens and you rotated the dial to which
level you wanted to magnify your specimen.
You then also had the eye piece and on it was a tiny wheel
which you could rotate up or down to focus.
This microscope blew my mind because it was so much more than I was expecting.
That Christmas I got
a wonderful surprise.
This morning we come to the third in our series ALIVE AGAIN - the Resurrection in Acts and our theme
this morning “Resurrection Surprise”.
When the apostles saw the risen Christ they got so much more
than they were expecting.
They were truly surprised.
When you read the Book of Acts as a whole, one of the things that really stands out is the witness of the
apostles to the resurrection of Christ.
In the early preaching of the gospel this was the most prominent
theme.
And you can understand it because for the apostles this was such a surprise.
At the cross they thought their leader had been executed and the show was all over.
They were ready to
go back to their fishing nets.
But then on the third day
-they discover an empty tomb,
-they meet again with the risen Lord who re inspires them with the Gospel vision.
There is no way they could have cooked up this story because it was the last thing they were expecting.
It really does have a ring of authenticity about it.
For them it was a complete surprise.
So we come to our story in Acts chapter 3. I hope it might be familiar to you.
The back story is in verses 1
to 10.
Peter and John have encountered this lame man begging at the Temple.
The beggar looks to the apostles for some money but Peter says in v6, “Silver or gold I do not have, but
what I do have I give you in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth walk.”
And guess what he jumps to his
feet and walks.
Not only that he is jumping and leaping and praising God around the Temple.
[Youth
Fellowship song]
This chap was a regular feature of the Temple.
We’re told, every day he was carried to the Temple gate
called ‘Beautiful’.
Everyone knew him as a cripple, so when they see him healed and so strong in his legs,
in v10 we’re told they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.
As we
might expect they were surprised.
1
Then in the passage we read from v11 we read again the people were astonished and gather around
Peter and John and start exalting them.
Peter's response is, “Fellow Israelites why does this surprise
you?”
And he deflects attention away from him and John as the source of the healing to Jesus.
v16
-It is by faith in the name of Jesus that the lame man has been made strong.
-It is the faith that comes through Jesus that has completely healed this man.
There is a strong contrast drawn here between
-what human beings have done which is not surprising and
-what God has done which is surprising.
V13b
-You handed him over to be killed,
-you disowned him before Pilate,
-you disowned the holy and righteous one and asked for a murderer to be released,
-you killed the author of life
-None of this is surprising really when you think that Jesus challenged people to give him their full
allegiance and their only allegiance to Him.
-And not surprising when you think how easily people can be manipulated, and of course were, by the
Pharisees and Jewish leaders.
-And it is not surprising that people get jealous and covet other people's popularity.
Hence the Jewish
leader’s plot to get rid of Jesus.
None of this is surprising that they wanted to crucify Jesus.
But what is surprising is what we find in the second part of verse 15.
“But God raised him from the dead.”
-Human beings did their worst but God did his best.
-Human beings thought they could control events but it was God who was in control.
God has the final say over sin and death.
Jesus death and resurrection, in fact, should not have been surprising.
This was simply fulfilling what
God had already foretold through the prophets saying that the Messiah would suffer.
[v17]
And the prophets he names are
V22 Moses
V24 Samuel and
V25 Abraham
Firstly, Moses v22, Peter quotes Deuteronomy 18:15 where Moses says to the people, “The Lord your
God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you must listen to everything
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