From A Lame Sinner To A Leaping Saint

FROM A LAME SINNER TO A LEAPING SAINT !!

Text: Acts 3:1-11

Intro: This morning I want to take a look at this passage in the book of Acts and try to share a thought that the Lord gave me as I studied yesterday. Now if you have studied the book of acts and the beginning of the Church you will know that here in Acts 3 we find the first miracle performed by the Apostles since the Lord Jesus’ ascension and the filling of the Holy Spirit. I want concentrate on these first few verses and if you will watch with me you and I can see a wonderful picture of the Salvation of a man, here in this account of the Lame man being healed.

I. Lame from birth.

This man here in Acts represents a sinner, and in fact all humanity. We find in our scripture that this poor man was lame or crippled from the time that he was born into this world. He has lived all his life in this condition, now we do not know how old that he is, but simply he is a man. I pictured in my mind that he was a man, possibly in his thirties or forties, and he had lived all his life as a lame person, and was carried everyday and laid at the gate that he might beg for alms from those that passed by.

So this man was lame from his birth.

Now there is a false teaching that has spread far and wide that many people have embraced. This teaching declares the ‘Fatherhood’ of God and the ‘Brotherhood’ of Man.

There is a shred of truth to this teaching. Most heresy is based upon a fragment of truth. The truth of this teaching is that mankind is part of a brotherhood. They are all kin through the relation of Sin. The Bible tells us that we are all in Adam.

1 Corinthians 15:21-22 For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

So in this sense there is a brotherhood of Man, this is contrary to the universalistic teaching. They state that all men are brothers are that God is the Father of all.

This does not quite line up with what the Lord Jesus Christ preached. He preached that all men were sinners and that their Father was Satan, not God.

John 8:42-47 Jesus said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he sent me. 43 Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. 44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. 45 And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. 46 Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? 47 He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.

This teaching is obviously contrary to the Word of God. God is undoubtedly the Father, but only of the born again. My point to this is to say that this man was born into the world with a problem, he was lame, just as is every other person is born into the world with a problem, they are spiritually crippled, they are sinners in the eyes of a Holy and Just God.

Listen to the way that Isaiah described a sinner: Isaiah 1:6 From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and putrifying sores: they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment.

II. Laid and begged.

There were two things that this man did every day of his life. He lay on the ground on his small mat outside the gate of the temple and he begged for alms. These two things speak volumes about sinful man’s true state.

First this man simply lay in whatever spot that he was carried to. He was unable to carry himself anywhere. This man could not even do as all the other Jews did in Jesus day, and that was to go at prayer time and enter the temple and pray and worship God.

This is where sinful man is he cannot approach of come nigh to God. He has no way to get to God. This is why Jesus came and died on the cross, He fulfilled the law and the veil was torn and now man can be cleansed and God can be approached.