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Seeing Jesus for Who He Truly Is | Group Bible Study
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Seeing Jesus for Who He Truly Is | Group Bible Study
Series: Acts: The Story Continues...
We're making progress through the book of Acts, and it's a powerful and beautiful book, and it's a picture of how Jesus began, well, continued to do his work on this earth like he does right to this day. That he's never stopped, he's never slowed down, but he's continued his work in his church all the way through us. That we get to be part of that. He continues his work in us right now and through us right now in this world. And that's pretty, that's a pretty high honor to get to be ambassadors to the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Amen? Amen. So we're going to be in Acts chapter 3, Sunday. We're going to start there Sunday. We finished pretty thoroughly chapters 1 and chapter 2. And if you haven't been following along, what we're doing is Sunday. We're teaching sort of the bigger passages, preaching the gospel on Sunday, and on Thursday, we're slowing down. We're looking at details. We're going a little deeper. And so Sunday, we're going to really focus on verses 1 through 10. We're going to also cover the rest of the events that happened in the chapter, but our focus is more going to be on the events that led up to Peter's sermon, which is what happens in the first 10 verses is that Peter and John go up to the temple to pray and they see a man who's been lame from birth. And instead of giving him some alms, they they uh Jesus heals them, heals him through them. Okay, and so this starts this, you know, um big movement in the temple where people see what's happened and they come running, and then you know, the apostles Peter and John, they're basically like, Why are you looking at us? Why are you looking at us as if we did it? You know, as if we're some kind of superheroes or something that could actually heal somebody. That was Jesus, and now let me tell you about Jesus. And so it goes on from there. And so instead of just redoing what we're gonna talk about on Sunday, I thought, let's just go and talk about in more detail some of the things Peter says. Because we're not gonna have time for all that on Sunday. So after this happens, the the crowds they see what's happened, they see this man and they recognize this man as somebody they've passed day by day for years and years and years, and seen this. Have any of you ever seen like a homeless person that you just recognize them? They're always around, they're always in the same spot. You know, they kind of become a familiar feature. Well, this guy wasn't homeless, but he was a beggar and he was in this same spot, and this was somebody that recognized, and so when this happened, it was a big deal. This wasn't some um hidden person that they brought out of a closet somewhere. And so what Peter does is he immediately, instead of allowing them to put the focus onto themselves or even on the man upon whom the miracle was healed, he immediately redirects their attention back to Jesus. And when he does this, um, what I thought was so cool about this passage is that he uses very specific names and titles for Jesus. And he's trying to draw their attention to something. He's trying to point them to who Jesus really is. These are the same people that were chanting crucify him. Okay, some of them, right? And so the things he's saying are in your face, and he's saying it right in Solomon's Portico, in the in the court of the Gentiles, right in the temple, okay, right where there's Pharisees and there's Sadducees and there's scribes and there's teachers of the law that are there, and they're meant to be confrontational. They're confrontational. They're not something that can be reinterpreted in some other way, which is so hilarious because when I talk about some of these things, you know, say on social media, um, these are some of the biggest pushback I get. Things like Jesus never claimed to be God. The Bible doesn't say Jesus is God. Listen, he never claimed divinity, you know. And yet, in some of these things we're going to see here, um, you can't really take it another way. And so in verse 13, it says the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. In fact, let's start just a little bit before that. It says, all the people saw the man walking and praising God, recognized him as the one who sat at the beautiful gate, asking for alms. They're filled with wonder and amazement at what happened to him. And while he clung to Peter and John, all the people, utterly astounded, ran together to them in the portico called Solomon's, and when Peter saw it, he addressed the people. Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us as though by our own power or piety we've made him walk? He says, The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, okay? So that God that our people have worshipped from the very beginning, the God of gods, okay? The God who was Abraham and Isaac and Jacob's God, the God of our fathers, he glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him. But you denied the holy and righteous one, and you asked for a murderer to be granted to you. What Peter's immediately doing is he's pointing to Jesus, but he's also confronting the people. He's saying Jesus was here. Jesus was standing right here, right where we are right now, telling you who he is. This might be the exact location where the Pharisees confronted him, and they're saying, You're not even 50 years old, and you're saying you saw Abraham, and Jesus told him, Before Abraham was, I am. In other words, I am. I am that I am. The name that he gave to Moses to tell, go tell the people that I am has sent you. He said he was telling you who he was, and yet you delivered him over to be crucified to Pilate. And I love the titles he uses here. He calls Jesus the holy and righteous one. People will say, oh, Jesus, you know, he was a good teacher. He was a good teacher. He was a wonderful rabbi. There's people I know, friends of mine, who would, you know, they they have respect for Jesus as, you know, one of many, you know, good souls or spirits or teachers or you know, divinities that have showed humanity the way. They call it the Christ mind, you know, and it's this the way of Jesus. They they they see like the teachings, but what's so funny is that they don't acknowledge what he said about himself. But Peter, right here, in the holy, you know, in the temple, in the temple court, he's standing right there in the temple, the center of worship for Israel, and he's saying, Jesus is the holy and righteous one. And Isaiah, the holy one, was the word, was the phrase that he constantly called Yahweh. He referred to Yahweh, to God as the holy one. He says, You denied the holy and righteous one and asked for a murderer to be granted to you. Do you remember what that's about, the murderer part?
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah, that's when after Jesus has been clogged in, I mean, they offered who I am.
SPEAKER_00Barabbas.
SPEAKER_02And they all scream to let Barabbas go.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Like, why? What has he done? Why should I crucify him? You have a tradition that you, you know, you I let someone go for you. Do you want me to let Jesus, your king of the Jews, you want me to let him go? You have an opinion. Like Pastor Ron said, opinions are like belly buttons. Yeah. That's a very friendly way.
SPEAKER_02Just remind me of something else.
SPEAKER_00To be holy is to be set apart, it's to be without sin. And that's why really God is holy. You know, holiness is something that He can impart to us, but it's also something that we're never going to fully realize until we're perfected with Christ. Right? And so it's like that person said to him, Good teacher. He says, Why do you call me good? There's only one that's good. I hear Peter saying, Jesus is the holy one. He's the righteous one, the one that's perfect, the one that's pure, the one that's the holy one.
SPEAKER_02And so I hate to be done.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, he's confronting them, you know, and there's something to be said.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You denied the Holy One. And you think about that. People use his name for a cuss word, you know? You rejected the only truly righteous man who ever lived. And so the reflection question here, and these are probably for now or later, is do I see Jesus as morally perfect or do I just see him as good? Oh, he's a good teacher. He's a miracle worker, he was a healer, he was a social justice warrior. Or was he more than that? And do I understand the weight of rejecting him? This is why the preaching of the gospel needs to accompany the confrontation of sin, the awareness of the fact that we're sinful. If you don't realize that you are a sinful human being who will stand before a holy God and be judged, then how is the gospel really good news to you? To just tell somebody, well, Jesus died for you. Oh, that was nice. Tell them thank you. That was really kind of him. What a giving, thoughtful person he is. But no, you were a sinner who will stand before a holy and righteous judge and be eternally judged for that sin. And so God took on human flesh and he came into this world and was incarnated in human flesh and lived the perfect righteous life, and then he went to the cross and he paid the penalty for your sin, so that you could have his righteousness imparted to you, and your sin could be laid upon him, or the price would be paid in full, so that you could actually be reconciled to God, that your sin would be judged in him instead of in you. You know, Jesus died for you. That's what that means.
SPEAKER_02That is awesome.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, you don't understand it unless you know you're a sinner. And so he confronts them with their sin, and in verse 15 he said, You killed the author of life. Whom God raised from the dead, to this we're witnesses. What does that mean? The author? The author of life.
SPEAKER_02I mean, we created life. We took from the dirt and created life. I can't do that. I don't think anybody can.
SPEAKER_00I heard a joke about that one time. It said some scientists, you know, they got they got together, they had been studying and you know, doing experiments, and they finally got to the point, they, you know, they they stood before God and they said, Hey God, we did it. We did what you did. We're able to create life now. You know, we can take dirt, put it all together, and we can, you know, through our scientific methods, we can impart life to that dirt and cause it to become a living being. He goes, Okay, show me. So they start gathering all the dirt up and shaping it into a man. He goes, Wait, wait, wait, wait, get your own dirt.
SPEAKER_01I cover you enough already.
SPEAKER_00You got the dirt. I got the dirt on Tom. But the to be the author of something is to be the source of it, right? To be the origin of it, to be the giver of it. And some of these passages down here, these are the ones. If I go look at all my little videos and my Bible studies I've got on YouTube, these are the ones with the most pushback. From people of different faith groups, from atheists, from all kinds of different people. John 1, in the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. He was in the beginning with God, and all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made that was made. And in him was life, and that life was the light of men. And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we've seen his glory. Glory is of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Who is Jesus? He's God. He's God. He was with God, he was God, he was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him. Without him, nothing was made that was made. In him was life. Who is Jesus? Jesus is God. Colossians says that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible. Whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were made through him and for him. And he's before all things, and in him all things hold together. Who's Jesus? Jesus is God. Hebrews. He's the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by his power. Who's Jesus?
unknownGod.
SPEAKER_00Oh no, he's just some good teacher. He's a nice rabbi that lived in the first century, and he went around doing good and nice things. And he, you know, he healed some people. He had some kind of cool powers that he healed some people and he taught nice things. No. Jesus is God. And not only did he rise from the dead, but he's the one that was the source of life for everyone. It all came from him. And he's telling the people look, you didn't just kill some guy. He told you who he was. He told you who he was. He was the Messiah. He was God in human flesh. He's the creator. In him is life, and you killed the author of life. The one who you killed is the one who created you. He's the one who formed you. He's the one that made you. He's the one that formed you in your mother's womb. He's the one that knew you before he formed the world. And so the reflection on this section and this truth was this is my view of Jesus too small? And do I relate to him as my source of life? He's literally the one that sustains you. He ascended to fill all things. You know, he is the one who sustains you. In him all things hold together, Colossians said. I mean, that's Jesus. In verse 17, it says, and now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance. Okay, so he confronts them with his sin, with their sin, and now, and this word brothers, this word is a delphoi. Okay, so this isn't just men. He's not talking to the men, all you ladies are off the hook. This word means brothers and sisters. Okay, it's like, you know, including everyone who's present. Now I know you, brothers and sisters. I know you acted in ignorance, as did the rulers, your rulers. But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets, that is Christ would suffer, this he fulfilled. And so, this, like other truths in the Bible, it we talked about it, I think, last week, right? That how this is kind of similar to that idea that Judas betrayed Christ, and Judas is responsible for that, and yet God also ordained that Judas would betray Christ, and he allowed that to happen in order to serve his greater plan of redeeming all humanity, which doesn't alleviate Judas from his responsibility, right? But it makes God sovereign. And so Peter's holding true truths together. They're responsible for what they did. You're guilty because you handed the author of life over to Pilate and begged for him to be crucified. You had a chance, even when Pilate was going to let him off the hook, to let him off the hook, but you didn't. And they even said in that moment, remember, they said, Let his blood be upon our heads and upon our children. And so they're responsible, but at the same time, the same truth. Just as with Judas, God was using even that to fulfill his plan. It's amazing how God does that. He allows the brokenness and the sin of humanity. He allows that to continue on the earth as he also fulfills his plan, but he causes, he like redeems it. He causes it to serve his purposes. Anyone that comes to Jesus, anyone that asks forgiveness, anyone who asks for mercy, anybody who repents, bows before him, anyone, he's gonna forgive and accept.
SPEAKER_02But Judas did not choose that.
SPEAKER_00He didn't do that, and he wouldn't do that. The fact that he didn't do it shows he probably never would have done it, even if he didn't hang himself. Remember that all of our names were written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world. And people look at that in different ways. You know, that's so it's all based upon that Jesus, the God knew who would choose him before the foundations of the world. And others say, well, God initiates that salvation within the heart. He has to regenerate you and cause faith and salvation to come to pass that if he never intervened, this is where I sit, if you if he didn't intervene in my life at any point, if he didn't intervene in my life to to make me spiritually aware and alive, I would never have chosen him. Oh, I had all the freedom in the world to choose him if I wanted to, but I never would have wanted to. He had to make me even want to.
SPEAKER_01I still have the day of my stone passed away. And why might oppose it? And the birthday came there. If you need help. When he was handed to us. And same with my son Tommy, who just lived a lot north again. He also was an optic. And we were handed a direct from the womb of his mother, who was both of their mothers were nurses at Owen Beach Memorial. Neither of them knew who the father was. They delivered kids, they put them through the LA County Bureau of Adoption. Then to adopt kids. And we did. We adopted children and had one of our own. So I don't know. Some things happened. But some things never leave my mind. And sometimes. Sometimes I'm really cold. He was so sweet, so kind. He was Portuguese and Italian. And my son Tony, who just lives right north here, is Northern European. They were both born from nurses at Norwich Memorial. Who made mistakes with doctors.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And fortunately they put them up for adoption.
SPEAKER_00There's some things that we just aren't gonna know. You know? There's some things we're just not gonna know.
SPEAKER_01But it still bothers me.
SPEAKER_00It would bother anyone, especially a parent. You know, you were Jimmy's father, of course, it bothers you. I couldn't even imagine walking through that.
SPEAKER_01My daughter used to, every time she came to town, can we go visit Jimmy's grave? And I would go. I hated it. Yeah. I went because I knew she needed that. Also there's a railroad track right next to his grave almost. And when I've been there if my train goes alright, I took the word in that way. So moving. I don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_00The only thing we do is we trust that the Lord knows what he's doing, you know?
SPEAKER_01And I've come to that finally.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01They took three ribs, they took half of his left lung. They they butchered him to stop this cancer from killing him, but it killed him anyway.
SPEAKER_00The Jimmy's called.
SPEAKER_01And I had some real issues with God.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure you did. Do you remember a few weeks ago talking about 2 Peter chapter 3? And there's what he says in that passage is that in the last day there are going to be mockers. There are going to be good people who say, Where's the promise of his coming? I thought you said he was going to come, that he was going to make all things new, that he was going to take away pain and suffering and injustice and terrible things like that, like cancer from the world. If your God is so good, why does he allow it to continue? If your God has the power, why doesn't he stop it? And Peter, I don't need to look at this. Peter says, God isn't slack concerning his promises. God isn't being slow. He's not renigging on his agreement. He's not forgetting about our pain. He's not forgetting about our suffering. He's not forgetting about the injustice. But he's long suffering. He's patient toward us. We talked about that there is pain and there's injustice and there's suffering. There's terrible things that are happening in the world right now. And you think, well, why doesn't God just come stop it now? Why doesn't Jesus return now? Why didn't he return at 70 AD when the temple was being destroyed? Why didn't he return, you know, in all the wars and all the horrible things that have happened over human history? But God, the Bible says, is being patient. He's being long, he's suffering with us. He's long suffering. He's putting up with, he's allowing these things to come to pass. And these things are not God's things. He's not causing these things. These things are all a result of human sin. They're a result of the garden. The cancer, the sickness, the disease, the injustice, the wickedness, all of the things that happen on this earth that hurt people and hurt us, they're a result of our own human sin. And that he's putting up with it for this reason, because he's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But he's being patient and he's long-suffering and he's waiting so that all who will come to repentance do. And so the amazing thing about the power and the sovereignty of God is that even as he endures our wickedness and he endures the results of sin in this earth, what he does is he actually redeems those things to serve his purposes. He might redeem our pain, where we, you know, maybe like for Tom, he's told me before, that that event caused him to run and run from God. And yet, what was the result of it? And how did God redeem it for your life? That he brought Marie. He brought Marie into your life. And through Marie, he's drawn you back to himself and redeemed you. He gave Justin a grandfather. And all the good things that have come through your life because you're his have all been a result of the fact that God has redeemed your pain to serve his greater purposes of redemption for the people that are around you and in your life. And that's what he does. That's what God does with our pain. That's what he's done with all my pain. My pain in my life, we don't know, I don't know if we ever fully get rid of all of the pain, right? But the pain in my life has made me who I am. I couldn't be who I am. I couldn't help anyone else if I hadn't walked through that pain. It's like you learn who he is. You learn what he's capable of. You find out, oh, he's real.
SPEAKER_02I could not go through this if he wasn't with me.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We learn that.
SPEAKER_00And that's the story of the lame man. For 40 years of his life, he sat there at this gate. I don't know if he was 40. He probably didn't lay him there as an infant, but let's just say 25. For 25 years of his life, he sat at this gate asking for alms. As people passed him by and went in and out of this temple, living life, having relationships, being a part of community, worshiping God, all the things that they got to be a part of that he never did, and he just sat there as the guy that was the lame man that had to ask for alms. And you don't think he asked why? You don't think he wondered how God could be so cruel as people looked at him and said, Oh, what'd he do? He must have done something wicked, or maybe his parents were sinners. And yet when that time came, and all the people saw what happened to him, and they came forward. You know the end of the story is that thousands of people came to faith in Christ because of what they saw happen to him and Peter and John's preaching of the gospel. Hi, Lynn. God redeems our pain. He doesn't cause it, but he allows it. He does allow it. And the purpose in it is that he's working redemption in not just our lives, but in the lives of people around us. He's allowing it to cause his purpose and his plan of redemption in the world to come to pass, to bring it to fruition, to bring other people into his kingdom, and that's eternal.
SPEAKER_02Yes, Stacey. Um she did a podcast. She says, This is my mission field now. Doctors and nurses.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02She goes, I'm on a new mission. This is my mission.
SPEAKER_00She's powerful. She's powerful.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00So it's okay that you're late, Lynn. Better late than ever. We're glad to have you. And it's okay that you're late too, Harry. I don't know that we're gonna get through all of this now, but that was good. I think that's the Holy Spirit wanting to have us talk about something a little different. And it's amazing how that will definitely dovetail with Sunday's message as well. So you can read the rest of this. And um, Lynn and those of you who joined us online, if you email me, um, go to the Faith Church Norwalk page, and in on one of the posts right before this live, I actually put uh my email address on there so you guys can email me and I can um start to on Thursday mornings forward over the notes for this Bible study so that you can be a part of what we're doing here. Everybody here has a copy. Um I know I send a copy to Robert through text and I send them to Jennifer through text, but um I'll also send them to you guys as well. So um it's uh almost 11, so maybe we should pray. Is there anything else, guys?
SPEAKER_02Or you can cover some of this Sunday, right?
SPEAKER_00Some of this. If you guys want me to keep going, I'm happy to, but I didn't want to keep anybody longer than I need to.
SPEAKER_02Is there anything in here you want to quick touch on?
SPEAKER_00Some of these things are bigger topics. They're really good, really cool things. But um basically, what it all comes down to in the end of his sermon is that he tells them who Jesus is. He's revealing to them who Jesus is, he's confronting them with the sin and that what they've done. And all of us have sin. We're not immune to that. We're not, you know, the one holy one, the one righteous one. All of us have sinned. And his answer for them is repent. Repent and turn to Jesus, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord. He's saying he sent him, he came to you first, that he might turn you from your wickedness. And so Peter's message, the sermon is who Jesus is, what we've done, what God has accomplished, and what we must do. And so the question is what must we do, guys? What must we do? Repent and believe. If we confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in our hearts that God has raised him from the dead, we will be saved.