Acts 3:11-26 Times
of Refreshing
What
comes to your Mind Hear this statement:
Take
the Nestea plunge.
A)Popular 80s commercial
B)Being an ice tea Fan Panera Rubios
1) Liked that commercial
C)Great add on a hot day
nothing more refreshing to me cold glass of ice tea.
What
comes to your mind Refreshment?
A)Cold glass water/ ice tea
Refresh thirst
B)Beach in Maui Refresh
mentally
C)Good night sleep
refreshed Physically
But
what about your Soul and Spirit being refreshed.
That
is most important!
A) Because you see you can
be refreshed Thirst
Mentally Physically
1)But still be an absolute
mess If things are not right Spiritually
B)Today we are going to look
at Peters 2nd sermon remarkable sermon
1)Peter addresses this issue
of spiritual refreshment
Consider
the setting of this Sermon:
A)Last week we looked at the
first physical miracle in the book of Acts:
B)The
instantaneous
healing of a lame man who, waiting at the Beautiful Gate of the
temple, had asked for money from Peter and John as they went up to pray.
C)Silver and gold? no! but
what I do have I give
. 1)And taking him by the hand he lifted him up, and the man's feet and
ankles received strength,
D)Walking leaping and
praising God around the temple courts.
1)Now,
Luke tells us what followed immediately, beginning in verse eleven of chapter
three:
11 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.
A)Picture
this scene: This lame man now healed is filled with Joy - - leaping
praising
B)He held on to Peter and
John clung with both arms. They are trying to get away, but he will not let them
go.
1)The
Greek is very strong -- it means that he clung to them with great strength.
C)The
people around, seeing this commotion, rush over to Solomon's porch of the
temple,
1)and,
recognizing the former lame man who sat at the Beautiful Gate,
And
when Peter looked at their faces, he saw two things: He saw this astonishment
A)the fact that they were
bug-eyed with amazement at what had happened;
B)But he also saw that they
were sort of Star Struck
1)a
sense of hero worship toward him and John was
developing.
C)This is a danger to be
avoided in Christian circles 1)We can have the tendency to focus on Christs
servants rather than Christ
2)focus
on the gifted rather than the giver of the gifts.
D)Peter and John were very
quick to counter this reaction:
V.12 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?
Peter
asked two questions #1 Why Marvel men of Israel? -
A)Why should you be surprised
God would heal the history of our God is filled with Miraculous
You know your history, how God parted the Red Sea, provided
manna from heaven, used a slingshot to kill a giant.
A)Our God is
the God of the miraculous. Why, then, are you surprised that He healed a lame
man?
B)God of miracles Pray for
big things Bryan Newberry
C)Pray like it!
2nd Question
why are you looking at us.
A)Not our Power or our Piety
that did this!
B)We didnt do it we dont
deserve it! Not our strength or our standing
1)All God it is all grace.
C)Peter wants this focus to
be on God not on men.
So that is the setting for
this Sermon: V.13 -26 make up this second sermon. 3 point sermon
#1 A word of truth.
#2 There is grace.
#3 There is Hope.
Acts 3:13-15
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.
14 But you denied the Holy One and the Just,
and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, 15 and killed the Prince of
life, whom God raised from the dead, of which we are witnesses.
Peter
speaks the truth here:
A)God glorified his servant
Jesus but you V.13 Delivered him .v.14 You denied Him V.15 you killed Him.
B)Names for Jesus Gods
Servant, the Holy one, The prince or author of life. All messianic terms
C)You
in question: That Jewish generation
1)This generaton delivered,
denied, Killed the Messiah- Wow!
D)Pretty intense moment
1)Peter
speaks the truth - Truth reveals guilt
Now,
why would Peter do a thing like that?
A)Why start out with making
these people feel this terrible load of guilt?
B)Psychologists tell us
today, guilt is a destructive force in human lives.
1)We
cannot live with guilt. Every one of us has experienced it.
C)The fundamental
characteristic of fallen man is that he feels guilty.
Guilt
produces other emotions Such as fear
A)Remember
when you were little, and you did things that did not please your parents, and
felt guilty about it?
B)You discovered immediately
your reaction was to hide, because you were afraid.
1)Same
reaction as Adam and Eve nothing changed
C)So guilt always moves to fear, and fear is an unpleasant
companion to live with.
To
deal with Guilt some people run and hide takes the form of escapism. {Avoid the feeling.
A)Seek to escape guilt by
escaping into other pursuits.
B)Pleasure:
Drugs / sex / Hedonistic behavior
1)Mask the pain band aid
Pleasure treadmill
C)Possession
treadmill accumulation of stuff
1)Buy to feel good Charge
to take away pain
D)Others even Performance treadmill
1)Personal achievement at
work
2)Or in relationships they
want to be liked
3)Religious performance.
E)All in an attempt to
escape for the feeling of guilt.
1)But you cant leads to
despair even hostility.
Peter
starts with the truth that leads to guilt because before we will confess that
we need a doctor we need to come to grips with the fact we are sick.
A)So Peter says when you
should have recognized Jesus as the
Messiah { You didnt
B)Instead u delivered, denied and Killed the Author of
life.
C)In his indictment of them
he says something so powerful V.13 mentions
Pilate.
1)Pilate who was a pagan,
gentile, who didnt have their theological background
D)Pilate could see that
Jesus was innocent!
1)Pilate wanted to release
Jesus gave you a Choice
Jesus or Barabas - a
murderer!
E)You Chose Barabass instead
of Jesus!
In
other words: You rejected the giver of life and Chose a taker of life instead.
A)People
are still doing that today Jesus described Satan in this way John 10:10 He is a thief
and robber who comes to kill to rob and to destroy!
B)He is a taker Satan is
like a spider
he offers you things pleasure possessions lure you into his web
trapped drain the life right out of you.
This
is going to make me happy give me life reality opposite is true takes
our life.
A)Life is short to begin with folks
Billy Graham was asked
"What has been the greatest Surprise of your life" His answer
"The BREVITY of it"
B)You
don't think you're really that much Older on the outside because you still feel
so Young on the inside.
C)There are
certainly tell tales signs that one is GETTING OLD.
* You
know you're getting old when all the names in your little Black Book end in
"M.D."
You
know you're getting old when you get Winded PLAYING CHESS!
You
know you're getting old when you try to Straighten the Wrinkles in your Socks ...and you're not WEARING ANY!
You
know you're Getting Old when your Pacemaker accidentally opens the
Garage Door,
You
know you're getting old when you Bend over to Tie your Shoes and you wonder WHAT ELSE YOU CAN DO while you're Down there.
D)We are all getting older
folks
1)Where is our focus?
Giver of life or are we being seduced by the taker of life.
Insight from the great
author C.S. Lewis
"God
made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on
gasoline, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the
human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were
designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no
other.
God
cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not
there. There is no such thing!"
Augustine
who wrote You formed us for
yourself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.
I want to encourage you
today not to make the same mistake that they did reject the giver of life
for the taker of life.
Peter
Spoke the truth First step to Spiritual refreshment is we have to be honest
with ourselves.
A)David
prayed Psalm139:23-24
23 Search me, O
God, and know my heart;
Try me, and
know my anxieties;
24 And see if
there is any wicked way in me,
And lead me in
the way everlasting.
B)Show
me where I am guilty!
C)First
step to becoming whole!
#2
Remember there is Grace
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.
17 "Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance,
as did also your rulers.
Jesus
name that healed this man brought strength where there wasnt wholeness
where broken!
A)You delivered, denied,
Killed
B)But you did it in
ignorance!
C)Jesus prayed from the
Cross father forgive them for they dont know what they are doing.
1)They knew in their hearts
wrong injust
D)But they were blinded by
religious Zeal
E)Paul persecuted the Church
in ignorance blinded by religious devotion and zeal.
F)They were blinded in the
same way: Pride and ignorance a dangerous cocktail.
D)But in this we see the
grace of God
That
is, by the means of human stupidity and ignorance, God's purposes were
nevertheless worked out.
A)That
is grace, that through all the blindness and the folly, the foolishness of
human life, God is still working out his purposes?
Peter spoke the truth but
seasoned it with Grace
A)All
truth with no grace is Brutality
B)It
has to be both Jesus filled with Grace and truth
#3 There is Hope.
A)Hope and refreshment come
with repentance.
B)Two fold aspect
immediate and future.
1)Personal and national
individual and global
C)First immediate/ personal{
Hope in a suffering Messiah
18 But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His
prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled.
Prophets
prophesied Messiah would suffer!
A)All part of the plan of
God to pay for sin
B)He suffered instead of us-
Thru His death would come life.
C)His suffering was designed
by God Ransom for many take the wrath
Life
refreshment for all who repent and believe!
Acts
3:19-21
19 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, 20 and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you
before, 21 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.
Repent:
Change your mind Change your direction: A)Change the way you were thinking about Jesus!
B)Peters
message is if you CHANGE your mind RIGHT NOW
1)If your thinking ALIGNS w/ the truth of who Jesus is
C)You
will first of all experience your sins being blotted out!
This is a vivid word.
A)Ancient
writing was upon papyrus and the ink had no acid in it. It therefore did not
bite into the papyrus like modern ink, but simply lay on top of it.
B)To
erase the writing a man simply wiped it away with a wet sponge; so God wipes
out the sin of the forgiven man.
Hebrews
1:3 tells us that Jesus purged our sins like a Dr. who removes a cancerous
tumor and then cleansing the wound and binding it and bringing healing
You will not
only experience forgiveness of sins
You will experience refreshing that comes
from the presence of the Lord
A)Refresh = given new
breath!
B)Running on pleasure
treadmill/ performance
Possession treadmill
C)Out of breath - panting
There
is refreshment found in Jesus
A)Spirit refreshed given
new breath
B)It happens when we repent
C)Change our mind about
sin about attitude
Change our direction
1)Moving away from the Lord
moving to
Repentance
is more than remorse or regret
Regret in itself, is a useless
emotion. It produces nothing.
Its
like putting a car in neutral and revving the engine. There is a lot of noise,
but no progress (
Regret
focuses on what can never change!
While on the other hand,
Repentance focuses on what has to change!
Its
putting the car in gear, and making ground.
This
is possible!
Repentance
is when you detect and destroy the rationalizations that lead to your sin.
There
are NUMEROUS rationalizations
#5
Just this once, I can handle this!
#4
Ill hide it, Ill cover it; no one will know!
#3
Every body else is doing it
#2
It cant be wrong if it feels so right
#1
Ill just do it, then ask God to forgive me!
Its
changing your mind about those lies.
That
is the personal and the immediate Change that happens to everyone who repents
A)Sins blotted out
Refreshed spiritual
B)Taking the Jesus plunge.
C)But there is also a future
aspect to this promise
National for Israel
1)Global for the world
Read v. 22-26
Times of
restoration:
A)Israel as the pp of God
the promise to Abe his seed
B)Global Millenium Lion
lamb peace
C)Early Church Anchored
moving forward in the immient return Jesus soon
1)Earthquakes/ Economy God is getting our attention
With repentance comes times
of refreshment:
A)Times of refreshing is
literally a Fresh breath.
B)Like we were panting out
of breath running in this world
C)Talked about the
Possession treadmill running after materialism
Others running on the
Performance treadmill Religious routine and ritual
A)Trying to please God that
way.
B) It is all God it is all
grace
Others running on the
Pleasure treadmill One new experience after another
A)Out of breath
B)When we change our mind
direction come to God heart to Jesus
C)Fresh Breath
Sins blotted out
This
is a vivid word. Ancient writing was upon papyrus and the ink had no acid in
it. It therefore did not bite into the papyrus like modern ink, but simply lay
on top of it. To erase the writing a man simply wiped it away with a wet
sponge; so God wipes out the sin of the forgiven man. It will affect the future;
it will bring times of refreshing. Into life will come something which will be
a strength in weakness and a rest in weariness.
Present and Future
Fulfillment to this Promise. V.21-26
A)Immediate refreshing of the Spirit that take place sins forgiven guilt
removed.
B)What
Jesus does when he comes to a heart
C)But
also what he is going to do when he comes back again to the earth 2nd
coming
Restoration of all things Promised thru the prophets
Moses / Samuel etc
A)Put
things back lion / lamb but also the standing of Israel
Living
in the last days Earth quakes
God
is trying to get our attention.