LET THE TIME OF IGNORANCE END
Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on June 29, 2022 under AM Bible Study |
AM Bible Study Group: June 29, 2022 from Acts 3:1-26
Theme: The promises about Jesus are fulfilled and He is alive—so let the time of ignorance end!
(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).
Back in Chapter 2—right after the Holy Spirit had been given—the apostle Peter was empowered to preach the first great gospel sermon in all of church history. And now, in Chapter 3, we come to the story of the second great gospel sermon.
And a key point of this second sermon is found in verses 17-19. That’s where Peter told his Jewish kinsmen—those who had crucified the Lord Jesus;
“I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers. But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. Repent therefore and be converted …” (Acts 3:17-19).
And so, one of the great things that this passage does for us is to establish that there can now be no further excuse for ignorance. The promises of God in the prophets concerning His Servant Jesus Christ have been fulfilled, He is now demonstrably alive, and all people—including the Jewish people—are given the call: ‘Let the time of ignorance now come to an end! Repent and believe on Jesus for salvation!’
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Now; like all good sermons, this one had a compelling introduction. So; the first thing that we’re told about is …
1. THE MIRACLE THAT CAUGHT ATTENTION (vv. 1-10).
It says in verse 1,
Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour (v. 1).
This would have been just a day or so after Pentecost—just a day or so after that first sermon. And Peter and John—being devout Jewish men—went to the temple to pray. But they would have gone with a new perspective of things. Jesus—the Lamb of God—had been slain, The veil of the temple had been torn in two. The old covenant had been brought to an end; and the new covenant era had begun. The Holy Spirit had been given. The church on earth had been born. So, these men still went to the temple to worship and pray as they always had—but now with the awareness that everything that the temple symbolized had been fulfilled in Christ.
The time that they went was “the hour of prayer, the ninth hour”. It was the set time for prayers in the temple—at about 3 pm. And along the way, they encountered a man who must have been well known to all who came to the temple. Verses 2-3 tell us;
And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple; who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked for alms (vv. 3-4).
Chapter 4:22 tells us that this man was over forty years old. He was in legitimate need. And it may have been a very strategic thing that he was placed at this large gate to the temple; because no one entering in would have been comfortable worshiping God if they had ignored the poor man. He saw Peter and John—and perhaps Peter and John already knew about him from all the other times that they entered the temple and had seen him.
But this time Peter didn’t give the man just a passing glance. He looked intently at him. Luke tells us in verses 4-7;
And fixing his eyes on him, with John, Peter said, “Look at us.” So he gave them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength (vv. 4-7).
Peter didn’t do what so many do with such a person. He didn’t say, “I can’t give you anything.” Instead, he said that even though he didn’t have what the man was asking for, he did have something to give him that he truly needed. Do you notice that he told the man to rise up in the name of “Jesus Christ of Nazareth”? That spoke of Jesus’ humanity as He walked upon this earth in the midst of the world of people—the Man from the humble town of Nazareth. For this to have made sense to this poor man, he must have already known something of who Jesus was. After all, he sat by the temple all day, every day; and it must have been that he had heard the talk about Jesus. It must have been that he had put the pieces together to some degree, and had some kind of a budding faith in Jesus. We can even see this in the fact that, later on in this passage, it was by faith in Jesus that this man was healed.
But what a daring thing it must have been for Peter to do!—to lift this poor, life-long lame man up! The man had never stood on those feet in all his life. He had never stood shoulder to shoulder with another man before. But now he could—because instantly, God gave his feet and ankles strength in the name of Jesus.
So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God. Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him (vv. 8-10).
This was at a time of day when many people would have been in the court of the temple. And they would all have known a little of this man. Later on, even the rulers of the Jewish people had to admit that this was an undeniable miracle. And so—by God’s grace—this man became a tolling bell that called his people to hear the message of salvation through Jesus Christ!
May it be that Jesus so transforms our lives that we become a tolling bell to others!
Now; just imagine what a spectacle this must have been! The lame man—who everyone knew truly had been lame from birth—was now standing, and dancing, and shouting, and praising God; and he would not let go of Peter and John. The apostles knew that God had opened a great door of opportunity to them. And so; as we read on, we then see …
2. THE DECLARATION OF JESUS’ POWER (vv. 11-16).
Everyone had been staring in amazement at the healed man. But they’d also have been staring in amazement at the men that he was clinging to. Luke goes on to tell us in verses 11-12;
Now as the lame man who was healed held on to Peter and John, all the people ran together to them in the porch which is called Solomon’s, greatly amazed. So when Peter saw it, he responded to the people: “Men of Israel, why do you marvel at this? Or why look so intently at us, as though by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk?” (vv. 11-12).
It’s important to notice the place from where Peter began his sermon; because it is a key part of the significance of this moment. It had been at that very place—at Solomon’s Porch—that the Jewish leaders had surrounded Jesus back in John 10, and demanded that He declare who He was to them. They had even taken up stones to stone Him to death when He said, “I and My Father are one.” They had rejected the truth about His identity before. And now, it was at that very same place that His identity was being proclaimed to them again in this miracle.
And I love it—don’t you?—that the apostles took no credit for this miracle. They didn’t advertise themselves as faith healers. They went out of their way to deny that the power was from them. Instead, they directed the attention to Jesus Himself. Peter introduced Jesus in a very Jewish way—pointing back in history to show that Jesus was the fulfillment of the promises God had made to the patriarchs of His people. He said in verses 13-15;
“The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified His Servant Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he was determined to let Him go. But you denied the Holy One and the Just, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, and killed the Prince of life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses” (vv. 13-15).
He showed how Jesus was connected to the whole history of the Jewish people. He was the “Servant” of God that was promised in the Book of Isaiah. He also called Jesus “the Prince of life” (or as it is better translated, “the Originator of life”). And yet, look what they did! They crucified God’s Servant, and put the Originator of life to death! It may seem like a harsh thing that Peter would remind them of all this; but the fact is that it was truly consistent with his message. After all, we cannot be motivated to come to Jesus Christ for salvation unless we first acknowledge that we are sinners who need to be saved; and the greatest sin of all is to reject the Son of God out of a preference of sin. The gospel is the good news of salvation; but we can’t receive the good news unless we first acknowledge the bad news of our desperate need for Him.
But do you notice that, to the bad news, Peter also attached the announcement that God had raised Him from the dead—a fact to which Peter and John stood as witnesses before them all. He is alive and active in this world, and is able to transform the life of anyone who turns to Him. And so; Peter went on to say in verse 16;
“And His name, through faith in His name, has made this man strong, whom you see and know. Yes, the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all” (v. 16).
Do you notice how Peter clearly declared that the man was made well by faith in Jesus? And in fact, he even made it clear that the faith itself came “through” Jesus. As Paul said in Ephesians 2:8-9;
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9).
In a sense, we’re all like this lame man. We are incapable of saving ourselves by our good works. We aren’t even capable of working up the faith to be saved. But God, by His grace, opens our eyes to our need, and then gives us the faith “through” Jesus to believe.
So; there could be no way to explain this great miracle but by the fact that Jesus Christ—who they had crucified—had been raised from the dead as the Savior of humankind. It’s true that the Romans did the crucifying; but it was the Jewish people who handed Him over to them for it. All people stand guilty of crucifying Jesus—whom God has now raised from the dead.
And that leads us, finally, to …
3. THE CALL TO REPENT AND BE CONVERTED (vv. 17-26).
Peter begins by telling them something that might surprise us. In verse 17, he declared,
“Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers” (v. 17).
Peter is compassionate. He called his hearers ‘brethren’. And he affirms that they acted in ignorance. Later on in Acts, Paul preached in a synagogue in Pisidian Antioch about Jesus; and he told his Jewish kinsmen,
“For those who dwell in Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they did not know Him, nor even the voices of the Prophets which are read every Sabbath, have fulfilled them in condemning Him” (Acts 13:27).
Even Paul himself admitted his ignorance. He used to fight against the gospel of Jesus. He said;
“I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man; but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief” (1 Timothy 1:13).
Peter now tells these same things to his Jewish audience. And he explained to them in verse 18;
But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled (v. 18).
In the mystery of God’s sovereignty, the Jewish leaders ignorantly fulfilled the very promises that God had made concerning the Lord Jesus; so that He died on the cross for the sins of humanity according to the Scriptures. In the words of Genesis 50:20, what they meant for evil, God meant for God. But now; the time of ignorance is over. The truth is declared. It’s time to respond with full understanding and belief. In verses 19-23, Peter then goes on to say;
“Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began. For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you. And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people’” (vv. 19-23).
The “times of refreshing” speaks of the return of the Lord; and “the times of the restoration of all things” speaks of His millennial reign on earth, upon the throne of King David, from the temple in Jerusalem—followed by the creation of a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. And Peter was urging his Jewish kinsmen to believe; so that the glories of Jesus’ reign on earth could begin. He affirmed that Jesus was that promised Prophet that Moses had spoken of long ago in Deuteronomy 18:15-19. If the Jewish people would ‘hear’ Him, then the glories of that reign would begin. But if they didn’t, then they would be destroyed.
Many who heard Peter that day did believe, and repented, and received Jesus. But as we read on, the Jewish leaders would not do so. And so, the gospel message went to the Gentiles; and the city of Jerusalem was destroyed in 70 A.D. But the gospel is now spreading around the world; and the Bible promises that the day will come when the Jewish people will receive Jesus as their Messiah. And then, the glories of His reign on earth will begin.
In that respect, the Jewish people truly are the ones in whom the whole world is blessed. Peter went on to conclude his sermon in verses 24-26;
“Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. You are sons of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’ To you first, God, having raised up His Servant Jesus, sent Him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from your iniquities” (vv. 24-26).
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It was a wonderful miracle that this lame man was healed in the temple. But he’s not really the main figure of this story. The main figure is the resurrected Lord Jesus who had made the lame man well; and the lame man simply became the opportunity for the good news to be proclaimed.
So; let’s heed that good news: ‘The promises of God have been fulfilled; and Jesus Christ is alive from the dead. He is coming again soon! Therefore, let the time of ignorance come to an end. Repent and believe the gospel.’
AE
