Chaya that Bibles are yours for the taking at the table in the back At the information station upstairs. We would have no one go home without a Bible if you'd like one We'd be glad to provide one for you Acts chapter three Now Peter and John were going up to the temple at the ninth hour the hour of prayer and a certain man who had been lame from his mother's womb Was being carried along a man whom they used to sit down every day at the gate of the temple the gate called Beautiful in order to beg alms of those who were entering the temple when he stopped Peter and John about to go into the temple He began asking to receive alms and Peter along with John fixed his gaze on the man and said look at us He began to give them his attention expecting to receive something Peter said I don't possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene Walk Seizing him by the right hand He raised him up and immediately his feet his ankles were strengthened and with the leap he stood up right and began to walk And he entered the temple with them walking leaping and praising God and all the people saw him walking and praising God They were taking note of him as being the one who used to sit at the beautiful gate of the temple to beg and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened and While he was clinging to Peter and John all the people ran together to them with a so-called Portico of Solomon full of amazement When Peter saw this he replied to the people men of Israel Why do you marvel at this or why do you gaze at us as if by our own power or piety we had made him walk? The God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob the God of our fathers has glorified his servant Jesus the one whom you delivered up and disowned in the presence of Pilate when he had decided to release him But you disowned the Holy and righteous one and asked for a murderer to be granted to you and Put to death the principal life the one whom God raised from the dead a fact to which we are witnesses and On the basis of faith in his name It is the name of Jesus which is strengthening this man whom you see and know and the faith which comes through him has given him This perfect help in the presence of you all now brethren I know that you acted in ignorance just as your rulers did also but the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the Prophets that his Christ should suffer he has thus fulfilled Repent therefor and return that your sins may be wiped away in order the times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord and That he may send Jesus the Christ appointed for you Whom heaven must receive until the period of the restoration of all things About which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets from ancient time Moses said the Lord God shall raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren to him You shall give heed in everything he says to you and it shall be that every soul that does not heed that prophet She'll be utterly destroyed from among the people Likewise all the prophets who have spoken from Samuel and his successors onward also announced these days It is you who are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with your father saying to Abraham And in your seed all the families of the earth She'll be blessed for you first God raised up his servant and send him to bless you by turning every one of you From your wicked way May God bless this reading of his holy and infallible word The grass withers in the flower fade But not the word of God know the word of God stands forever Father now may the words of my mouth and The meditations of all our hearts Be acceptable in your sight our rock and our redeemer Amen Be seated please Things fall apart don't they That's in this beautiful This week the beginning of our week was taken up with Trading our car in we've had a car for nine years and mysteriously it had become wrinkled on one side
Not only that the transmission was begrudging about letting you leave first gear or second or third That car was now getting ten miles to the gallon the seals it all fallen out of the doors in the trunk So that for chance it might rain in Florida than the rain would be captured inside the car That usually made the carpet have a real pungent You know a sinus cleansing smell and in fact on almost any day of the year raining or not You could step in the car and your glasses would all fog up with that tropical feeling Things fall apart cars fall apart not in fact we did trade it in and got a Replacement car brought it yesterday to the hardware store to get another key made Well, they made the key indeed and I put it in and drove the car home and when I turned the car off the key wouldn't come out Sell the car sits in the driveway the new car With its steering column disassembled And an attempt by the locksmith to remove the key things Fall apart don't think My wife is in Chicago this week Because things fall apart It was a couple years ago that a member of her extended family I had came down with the cancer She's fought that cancer bravely but last weekend her life came to an end Things They really do fall apart don't they See the second law of thermodynamics says that Um, there's a principle called entropy That things work from order to disorder they don't work the other way around in other words Air Gets polluted and so does water Things fall apart and it's it's easier to foul a shoreline with oil than it is to ever Clean it up And and when somebody has aids because they were stuck with a dirty needle You can't stick them with a clean needle and get rid of it can you It doesn't work that way things don't move back in that direction do that Well, we know that we can apply the best of modern technology and medicine We can even give people new hearts and and new lungs and artificial skin and and fake hips and and knees We can even give people wonder of wonders New hair But it's all just a delaying game, right? Because inevitably Things fall apart so If you see a lame man walking It ought to get your attention That means that things are moving in the wrong direction You have to ask is is that an aberration or is that a reversal? Is that a sign that there's a reversal of this cosmic principle of entropy My kids like to say when their father says something they think is bizarre What's up with that when you see a lame man walking You ought to say to yourself What's up with that There's an old saying when you see a turtle on a fence post, you know what
It didn't get there by itself didn't and when you see a lame man walking He didn't get up by himself either goody The Bible says that a whole crowd ran together to see it for themselves And they all said what's up with that And Peter answered their question And we'll study that together too Take the sermon outline and we'll know at first the healing of this lame man And then what Peter had to say about it in Acts chapter 2 It's as the whole church was filled with on amazement because God was doing signs and wonders through the apostles Well, that's exactly what we read here in Acts chapter 3, isn't it? Perfect example of the same I Told you that the book of Acts is really mistitled in your Bible to be called the acts of the apostles doesn't really quite Capture what the Bible says in fact. It's the acts of Jesus Christ the acts of the resurrected Christ Seated at the right hand of the father Establishing his kingdom through the power of the Holy Spirit and the agency of the apostles, but I suppose that would Take up a lot of room on the title page But that is really what we have here an act of the risen Christ in his heavenly ministry Raising one who is lame to walk again And I want you to note three things about it. The first is I just want you to see it is a raw display of the power of God Peter and John are headed to the temple for afternoon prayers when their path intersects that of a cripple He's been brought by his friends to the gate beautiful to beg for alms We when they when he cries out and Peter and John in here His plea they look at him and they say silver and gold have we none But what we have we give unto you in the name of Jesus the Nazarene stand up and walk And Peter did just as he saw the Savior do With gyros his daughter he extends his hand he helps the lame man to his feet His legs his ankles are strengthened and he not only walks he runs he leaves filled with joy and praise for God It's a raw display of divine power. This is not somebody who's ill This is not somebody who's injured This is somebody with a congenital defect that they've had for their entire life 40 years on the earth their body not only didn't work It had never worked and with the decree the verbal decree of the apostles He has made completely well his spine his brain his legs whatever wasn't functioning properly is healed It's restored. It's made right cosmic entropy is reversed It's a raw display of divine power And our problem is that we're so familiar with the Bible that we read over it And we don't throw the Bible down and fall on our face and say Get away from me Like Peter when Jesus Fill their nets with fish Peter says what Lord get away from me A sense of fear and wonder and awe that has us saying I can't even be close to you Because your greatness and your majesty and your holiness and your righteousness and your power and your might I heard that they frightened me The Bible says the beginning of knowledge is the fear of the Lord if you don't fear God then you know nothing Then you are the you are of all men the most ignorant if you don't fear God and very often Christians say I don't get it God business to come we sing Jesus loves me this I know he gives us a place at his table the prodigal son runs into the welcoming and arms of this father How is it that we would fear God Fear someone who is as tender and loving and forgiving as God is a friend who goes like this Creatures always fear their creator As much as God bids us to come to him He will always be God And we are not Imagine yourself in a horrible storm or hurricane lashing the the shore and imagine that you're in a cottage along the ocean And you've been given some divine supernatural assurance that that you will not perish nor will anyone in your family So you're looking at a big plate glass window and you see The wave just crashing over the dunes and shaking the very foundations of the cottage you hear the roof lifting off The house and you see the rain coming horizontally like bullets against the window Would you be afraid to be filled with fear The God pleasing fear all in wonder That the God of the storm was your father and that once he was your adversary Once you were alienated from him and subject to his wrath But the God who was the God of this maelstrom was your God And you would be filled with fear and awe and amazement and so they were two thousand years ago And so should we be today If we are wise A raw display of divine power Second, I want you to note that it's a fulfillment of messianic prophecy
Isaiah says when Messiah comes the lame will leap and they do don't say Remember when John the Baptist was dying about the die about the loser's life He sends messengers to Jesus and says are you the one? You know my cash and in my chips here for For no good reason or are you the one you're the one? You know take my life And Jesus sends back this word go tell John the blind see Go tell John the lame law go tell John the lepers are cleansed And the poor have the gospel of grace preach to them You see This is Isaiah. This is messianic prophecy fulfilled in Christ So not only is it a raw display of divine power It is pure fulfillment of messianic prophecy that proves that Jesus is the Christ But third what I want you to note in the healing of this cripple is our Proclivity to underestimate God's pleasure in doing good
We seek for so much less
We seek so much less than God intends To grant Well exhibit number one is the cripple what is he asked for a cup of coffee right A cold sandwich that's all he wants a few coins Maybe uh, maybe that day's meal that's that's all he could see that's all he could hope for that's all It could wish for that's all that lights granted him for 40 long years What does Peter say We're not gonna bother with silver and gold I Give you legs I give you health I give you eternal life and see those commercials. What is it master card or visa? You know they show the the dad and his son going to the ballgame and I'll say you know a hot dog Six bucks right that would have cost him and uh, you know a pen it and and uh You know on and on will go and they'll be a price to everything and they'll say a day with your dad priceless priceless You see here's one who asks for a hot dog And he gets eternal life It it reveals to us our proclivity To to to set our sights so low To fail to recognize the character of whom we're dealing one Who owns the cattle on a thousand hill and one who loves us one who's for us one who's in us One whose proclivity is to do us good a god who takes the life in caring for his children And yet there must be an old man in us that constantly whispers to our hearts and says you don't deserve anything from god You ought to be happy that he lets you breathe and live and move and and and exist
And so we fail to see the delight that god takes in doing us good in the pleasure that god takes the abundance that he would Share with us In this world I think of CS Lewis how he says we invite god into our little shack our little hubble our little cabin And we say you know that the sink needs The pipes need to be Cleaned out and the and the and the gutter and the shingles and and god comes in and he doesn't even bother with that He ignores our request he bulldozes the wall While all we've asked is for a little shack that'll keep us warm at night and and dry God bulldozes the whole thing and says I have a castle in mind for you We don't even we don't even know what to ask doing We don't even know how to pray and it's all this we don't know with whom we're dealing We don't understand the character of god He's far more generous and gracious and benevolent Then we give him credit for and that's evidently insulting isn't it Moses stood on Mount Sinai and said god I want you to reveal your glory to me and when god did This is what he said the Lord the Lord gracious and merciful Slowed to what Slowed to anger In other words, it's gonna take an awful lot to get anger out of me slow to anger but Abounding in loving kindness Means that while he will not pull the trigger on his anger It doesn't take much at all For him to pour out his kindness Brothers is this your stop for just a minute and consider our for Clivity to underestimate God's pleasure in doing good reading Recently about creation instead imagine creation if god approached work as we so often do In the beginning it was nine o'clock so god had to go to work He filled out a requisition to separate light from darkness He considered making stars to beautify the night and plan as to fill the skies but thought Sounds like too much work And besides god thought it's not my job So he knocked off early and called it a day looked at what he had done and said it'll do On the second day god separated the waters from the dry land and he made all the dry land flat plain and functional So that behold the whole earth looked like Kansas He thought about making mountains and valleys and glaciers and jungles and forests But he decided it wouldn't be worth the effort god looked at what he had done and said it'll do God made a pigeon to fly in the air and a carp to swim in the waters and a cat to creep on the dry ground And god thought about making millions of other species of all-size shapes and colors But he just couldn't drum up the enthusiasm for any other animals. He didn't even like the cat So god looked at all he'd done and said it'll do and at the end of the week god was seriously burned out He breathed a big sigh of relief and said thank me it's Friday
But that's not what the book of Genesis says is it The book of Genesis said god said let there be light and there was and god said what
He said It's good It's good because god loves to do good
And it was morning and there was evening of the first day and god said it's a zippity dude on day And the picture is as a god who delights in this earthly canvas And painting it and creating it all his creative juices all his creative power And they're all expressed for who is he doing it for himself does he need this something lacking in him He does it all for you For his children for his creatures How dare us How dare us underestimate the pleasure of god In doing good he's the happiest creature there is He loves to do good Sometimes I think we're going to build a sanctuary We're going to finish a christian high school. We're going to build a children's home. We're going to develop another 40 acres here We're going to plant churches in our own community and other places We're in the world would we get the nerve to ask god To provide for all that Well, I'd say from Acts chapter three Why would we ask for a cup of coffee When he intends to do so much more
So what's up with this Lane man who's walking Well, the bible says everybody there's asking the same question. They've seen him for 40 years languishing is a beggar They want to know what's happening too. They run And you'll notice the symmetry here in the bible. How does Acts chapter two start? It starts with people speaking languages. They'd never learned before And everyone ran up and said what's up with that? And Peter told them Acts chapter three a layman gets up walking and everyone runs up and says asking What's up with that? So Peter will tell them Peter preaches and what I want you to notice three things about is preaching the first is that it's christ center His preaching is christ center I want you to note that he doesn't um Really talk about the cripple Just forget the cripple and he doesn't talk about john and he doesn't talk about himself. That's not the issue here He talks about Jesus He talks about somebody who's not there You see Peter loves to tell the story the old old story of Jesus and his love It would cause Peter his life It would cost him his life. He would hang on across Upside out, but when Peter had a chance to preach he wanted to tell people about christ He told them about how christ had been rejected and how christ had died and how christ had had a risen from the dead And did this Jewish audience gathered there in Jerusalem Peter preaches christ primarily from what part of the bible He only has one part of the bible from the old testament And you know what he says if you look at the closing verses there and verse 18 on say of uh of chapter three of the book of Acts Peter says to this Jewish crowd Isaiah said that one is going to come who will suffer Is by his wounds. We will be healed. He will be chastised. He will be the the sacrificial lamb And Peter says that suffering servant is Jesus. He is Isaiah's suffering servant is Jesus Not only that Jesus is Moses promised profit Moses said that he's not the great prophet that somebody was coming after him who would reveal god in fresh ways that they've never experienced
Peter says that's Jesus He's the one who Moses spoke of he's the one who Isaiah spoke of And then he says not only that he's the one who Abraham spoke of or whom god spoke of when he promised to Abraham That I will give you a seed I will give you a land and one from among your seed will be a blessing to the entire earth So Jesus is Abraham's promised offspring Here's what I want you to realize The whole Bible is about Jesus and that has tremendous application for your life and your understanding This is a judge in Tampa, US district court judge named Elizabeth Kavakavik I undoubtedly haven't pronounced her name properly The case came before her in the spring a Lee County public school Board decided that they would teach the Bible in their school Well wonder wonder somebody objected And so the case came before This district court judge and she ruled that in Lee County they could teach the Bible in the public school But only the Old Testament now what is strange ruling I wonder what Person she wanted to exclude
She said they could teach the Old Testament and her rather twisted logic. She said they could teach the Old Testament because Um, it was okay to teach the history of the Bible. You couldn't teach she wanted to avoid any instruction on the miraculous
This is What one would believe that possibly the judge needed to open the Bible And discover that in the Old Testament there is such as the Red Sea being parted Israel going through and the rest of it falling on everyone. There's bread and meat that fall from heaven That's generally considered supernatural this unstands still people march around fortified city in the walls fall over And and gee the first couple words in the Bible sound pretty miraculous too
I think judge Kavakavik made a big mistake because not only does the Old Testament contain ample evidence of God's supernatural intervention in history being It also contains constant instruction about Jesus And yet it's not only that judge that fails to see that it's very often Churches And I would bet that if you've gone to church most of your life you've heard heard much Old Testament instruction That was moralistic and legalistic and left you Crawling from church and burdened with more guilt than when you came in. Let me give you an example Take the life of David Many places you'd be instructed with about Old Testament people like David or other Old Testament characters Where you would be told that they are models for our own living and the way that we should live For instance, here's David a king after God's own a man with a You know after God's own heart and when the the giant Philistine ogre Goliath Comes out and taunts the armies of Israel nobody will go out and fight Goliath But little David gets his stones in his sling and goes out and takes on the mighty giant And conquers him and so at that point to a hushed crowd the preacher says what You two should be as zealous for the glory of God and you two should be filled with courage Like David Sounds pretty good, right sounds like Bible teaching What's the problem? We're not We're not and we won't be We don't have courage We're coward And that's just the truth We're not even we don't even live in a day of persecution and we're still coward We're afraid to invite people to church. We're afraid to identify with Christ We're not just cowards in that way. We're cowards in our marriages We're afraid to enter into deep relationship with people. We don't even know how to do We're afraid by telling something. I saw fear all over this place this morning We're afraid to walk up and greet people. We don't even know and say hello to them There's a hesitation unless the pastor tells you to do it and and frames the time to do it very often It won't even get done on Sunday morning because we're afraid So so we can have all this preaching about how all we got to face the mighty giant Goliath but the fact is work coward And no matter how much you work on it You always will be You know when we read that story about David you know what we ought to see David Is not so much a moral example for us to follow as he is a picture of the coming Messiah The Christ the king who will truly have a heart That is always after God's own heart who will never sin who will never fail to obey his father In fact, he will take on the giant of Satan and death and sin and he will conquer them all Not so that we can follow and do like he did He'll do it for us what we could never do ourselves. Do you see the difference? You understand the Christianity is a god about a god who does for us What we cannot do so we rest in what our king the victory he won for us Jesus is not primarily our moral example It's not about going and doing as he did Jesus did for you what you'll never do It's about resting in that You'll never know security in Jesus Christ if you wake up every morning and are going to depend on your performance that day As the basis of your security with God Because I don't care how you hard you try You'll mess up So either you're going to depend on the one who never messed up or you're going to keep putting your faith in your moral record And you will be perpetually burdened with guilt I long for this to be a place where people have been set free from legalistic moralisms And are finding rest in Christ. I'll give you an example This week I took my wife to the airport on Wednesday She's flying Chicago I'll tell you something my performance was incredible I was I was I could have been nominated for husband of the year I got up early took care of some church business raised back to the house. She was a Beseech with work. So I um, I cleaned up the kitchen. I I um, I mean just the whole context of course. I'm taking time off work I'm I'm putting her ahead of the ministry I'm driving her to the airport somebody else could have done it. She even offered but no I'm going to be inconvenienced for my wife Because I'm I'm like husband of the year. I'm I'd listen. I'm not only cleaning the kitchen But in the mad scrambled a leave. I didn't sit outside in the haunted horn I didn't sit in a chair going come on come on come on come on come on come on come on Which is normally what I do I haven't went back and helped her pack her suitcase Ha how many men Actually touched the little dainies, you know and pack a woman. I went back there I'm not ashamed. I'm a servant pack the suitcase put it in the car got her out there drop to the airport friendly chatter and As we're approaching Orlando, I did something I admit. I don't do enough with my wife knowing that she was somewhat tense about this Trip I prayed with her what a tender spiritual shepherd of my wife we prayed together in the car and and I want to tell you we can pull up to the airport got her bags checked in and She gave me a tender warm hug kiss and brace. I think she recognized Just how fortunate she is. I even raised around the corner to Starbucks but a large cup of of coffee But a Danish Put it in the nice bag ran back and put it in her hand
I admire your restraint for not just applaud it
Quickly jumped in the restroom before the long trip back to citrus county came back out and here's where it went awry
You see I actually bought the coffee the Danish for me And when I took it back this quizzical look came over her face and she said oh That's not for me And I said oh Okay, it's for you. Yeah, I Why don't you take it and I had to realize I didn't even thought of her I went up there to Starbucks and bought myself stuff I'm even thought of her hadn't even crossed my mind And I was cooked I mean, I may as well have just dropped that stuff in the garbage Not yet, but I
Well, you pray for me when I go to pick her up tomorrow I'm gonna have to have something really good You know what I really tried hard And I blew it And you know what I don't care what you try hard at today or tomorrow or the day after you'll blow it too So every single day you lay your head in the pill at the end of the day you're either going to be resting in what Christ did for you Or you're gonna rest in how you did that day
And well unto you if you really think you did pretty well
That's the problem with people go to church Is the truth is We don't do well any day of our life But if we don't rest in Christ pretty soon we start telling ourselves that we did And we are self-righteous and arrogant fools before a watching world Who knows we're not really very hot stuff We're the only ones who think we are
Peter's preaching is Christ centered Peter's preaching is direct repent and return That's his message you killed Christ You don't have any option he says to that crowd do you realize what you did you turned him over to pilot you had him executed the Messiah In the Old Testament there were cities of refuge you know the cities of refuge were if you killed someone accidentally Their family would come after you to kill you you shed someone else's blood Their family would come and take your life. That's just the way it was. That's just the way it worked But God established a system of mercy if you killed someone accidentally if it was manslaughter You could beat a path to the city of refuge and if you could beat The Avengers and get safely inside the wall Then you were safe they couldn't touch you And that's exactly what Peter says you killed the Christ But repent and flee to the city of refuge Who is Jesus Peter's preaching is Christ centered and it's direct And I don't know why I shouldn't be direct as well and ask him you fled You heard people stand at these microphones and tell how Jesus Christ came into their life and apprehended their heart And so the question is has the appriended your heart Why not get inside those walls Well, you have a chance play Don't be a fool Life and death. I don't know why you wouldn't do it today The son of God stands before you and says and that's the third point Peter's preaching is filled with hope. I will wipe away your sin Come to Jesus and your sins will be wiped away And there will be times of refreshment from the Lord Tell how hard it is to walk in this world on your own It was a dying barn stood at this microphone and said what? I turned to God filled with bitterness my husbands a workaholic alcoholic our marriage is terrible and I'm angry And I said God help me and the next morning I woke up and the way to the world has come off my shoulders Turn to Jesus your sins are wiped away and times of refreshment come from the Lord Cast all your cares upon me because I what I care for you My yoke is easy and my burden is life Jesus said Satan's a liar Satan will sell you a bill of goods Live on your own pick there yourself But Jesus comes along and says no, no, no, no, don't be fooled anymore He sells you slavery. I offer you life I'm free to Jesus for refreshment and restoration Know what the church is it's a model home It's a model home in a city of urban blight where every other house is broken down with there's glass in the street There's uh there's burned out the hulks of rusting cars. There's broken windows There's a loitering men selling drugs in the street corner and right in the middle of it all It's a beautiful restored brownstone with a manicured lawn with flowers in the windows with lace curtains with leaded glass behind the door Everything trim everything neat The envy of the neighborhood that's what god says he's doing Everything falls apart But when you see lame men walking you know what The god's reversing at all And he started to put the world back together again
That means a day is coming when Nina Nina and mark his child won't sit in wheelchairs anymore Will they And Tom Gorsky won't have to go get platelets and take chemotherapy
The family was here last night whose son is in prison Won't have to visit him there anymore Bible says god's putting it all back together again and he started he's already started Because when you see seven rivers church you know that it didn't get there by itself
Humpty dumpy sat on a wall Humpty dumpy had a great fall And all the king's horses and all the king's men Couldn't put Humpty together again, but what all the king's horses and all the king's men could not do The king came and did himself