The first Christian sermon Part 2

Acts 2:22-24

The gospel is not just a message of salvation, but it is the very power of God for salvation. We are touched and transformed spiritually by the gospel. It is the power to overcome hardened sinners' hearts. Miracles and social programs are not the power, but the gospel is the power to transform people. While the signs merely gathered a bewildered, curious, and mocking crowd, it was the gospel proclamation that cut to the heart.

Peter's sermon intro capitalised on the accusation that they were drunk. Peter told them that what they were witnessing was not drunkenness, rather it was the fulfillment of Joel's prophecy.

Peter's sermon was a model sermon. After the hook/intro, the focus was immediately drawn to the life, work, identity, death (and God's involvement in that death), and resurrection of Jesus. The sermon also had an exposition of the scriptures with a Christological hermeneutic, using Psalm 16 and 110. There was also the clear urgency and appeal to both heart and mind, as well as a clear call to action to repentance.

LIFE OF CHRIST [Acts 2:22 Men of Israel, hear these words: Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know]

"Attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs"

Jesus was not just a man who did cool stuff, but the signs God did through Him pointed to specific things about Jesus' nature, person, and mission. The raising of Lazarus pointed to the fact that Jesus was the resurrection and the life. His miracles of the loaves and fishes pointed to the fact that He was the Bread of life. Just prior to the opening of the blind man's eyes, Jesus said that he was the Light of the world. Signs could also point to judgement for the spiritually blind who saw the miracles and yet did not believe. Jn 9:39 Jesus said, “For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.” The healing of the demoniacs pointed to the freedom that Christ brings, the calming of the sea pointed to His power over nature. The changing of water to wine pointed to the old order being pushed aside to allow the new order to come in its place. The miracles of Jesus had incredible symbolism.

"as you yourselves know"

These miracles were done in their midst, and they knew that this was the case. Lack of evidence was not what stopped them from becoming believers. The problem of the human heart is the hardness of the human heart. The heart is hostile to God, and can only be overcome by His grace and mercy. Peter reminded them that they knew all this and yet crucified Him. Romans 1 tells us that everyone knows there is a God and that we deserve death for breaking the righteous decrees of God, and yet people supress the truth and do not believe. Even with a magician and a hat, no one believes that the magician actually pulls a rabbit out of a hat. However people are able to believe that the universe and everything in it happened just be accident, even while saying there is no God. They know that God exists and that He is holy and that they have sinned. In evangelism we merely remind people of what they know deep down. We remind them of their deadly disease of sin and tell them about the cure.

DEATH OF CHRIST [Acts 2:23 This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men.]

Jesus' death was not a cosmic accident nor a gruesome end to a religious movement. All the moments that seemed to be frustrations of God's plan—the betrayal of Judas, arrest of Christ in the garden, Jews manipulating the system to get Jesus killed, mockery of a trial, and decision of Pilate—were in fact part of the plan. The crowd in the gathering in Acts may have been pretty much the same crowd who were there at the time of the crucifixion.

"definite plan and foreknowledge of God"

Some people explain this by saying that God looked down the corridors of time and saw the opportunity there for Jesus to be crucified, and that God knew that if Jesus were sent at that time, he would be crucified. In other words, God saw the opportunity and took it. But opportunism is not planning. The Bible leans strongly towards definite planning. This has implications for how people are saved as well.

Another problem with this view is that it makes God dependent on human beings in order to be God. For if God has to look down the corridors of time and take His opportunity, this makes Him one who learns from us, and is dependent on us, when in actual fact, God cannot ever learns anything new, God never reacts, and God never changes His mind.

"you crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men"

Everything is based on His eternal decree, and it is on this basis that He foreknows the future.

Everything that ever happens must be predestined by God or God is not God. Does this remove human responsibility? In Peter's mind it does not, because immediately after this, he tells them that it was evil of the Jews to crucify Him. We cannot explain this completely, but we can understand that they still had a will and they chose to destroy Him. God works in various ways in the background, handing men over to their desires at certain times in history, even unleashing Satan into the heart of Judas. We must say with Paul in Rom 11:33 " Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!"

"This Jesus . . . YOU crucified"

It is easy to say that the Jews crucified Jesus. But this applies to us as much as it does to them. We are also responsible for the death of Christ for we contributed to the sin that took Christ to the cross. He not only died for us but because of us, because of the sins we will commit in our lives. We ought to put ourselves in this crowd—we are not any the less guilty—and feel the sting of the words: "This Jesus . . . YOU crucified."

John 19 quotes Zech 12 "You have looked on Him who they have pierced." God is calling us to do the same—to look on Him whom we have pierced. We must be uncomfortable because of this truth, and this discomfort is part of God's grace. Zech 12:10 and Zech 13:1 taken together brings out this wonderful truth.

Zech 12:10 "“And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn."

Zech 13:1 “On that day there shall be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness." When you mourn, grace opens up a fountain of grace. Peter tells his audience that they have killed Jesus, so that they may mourn and be blessed with the fountain of Grace.

Next week.

RESURRECTION OF CHRIST [Acts 2:24 God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death, because it was not possible for him to be held by it.]