Acts 3: 1 – 26
‘Miracles’ -The Gift That Stopped Giving?
3 Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour. 2 And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple; 3 who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked for alms. 4 And fixing his eyes on him, with John, Peter said, “Look at us.” 5 So he gave them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. 6 Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” 7 And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength. 8 So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God. 9 And all the people saw him walking and praising God. 10 Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him. 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. 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? 13 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. 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. 18 But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. 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. 22 For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you. 23 And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.’ 24 Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. 25 You are sons of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’ 26 To you first, God, having raised up His Servant Jesus, sent Him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from your iniquities.”
Today we are going to speak about miracles. Can they still happen or did they just occur in the time when the church was starting? Personally I believe many people including church leaders do not expect that miracles still happen. Oh, they pray but they fail to believe that our Precious Holy Lord will still do healing miracles. They ask the Lord to give wisdom to the doctors and nurses to help a person but are too scared to ask the Merciful and Loving Jehovah Elohim – The Lord Most High to touch a person with His Divine physical healing. In the book of Hebrews chapter 13 verse 8 we read, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” So, this verse tells me that He still does the same wonders in our world today as He did in the past. Would you agree?
In the book of Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8 we read, “8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,” We have been saved from eternal damnation by faith in the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ in His shedding of His Precious Blood and death on the cross. This faith is through grace which is not of ourselves; it is God’s gift to us. Do you agree with this verse?
In the book of Isaiah 59 verse 1 it says, “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; nor His ear heavy, that it cannot hear.”
The apostle John teaches us in chapter 5 of his first epistle this fact, “14 now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. The Gospel of Matthew chapter 21 verse 2 we learn, “And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”
It is a no brainer to understand that no human on earth has the power to do a healing miracle. All miracles come from the Lord. As His children we are to ask Him for a divine healing by faith in Him through His grace. The outcome of our request is up to Him. In my faith in Him I know that He can do His miracles which can and should only point to Him as our Healer. Would you agree?
In the previous chapter of the book of Acts it has been stressed that the Apostles did ‘signs and wonders’. Now we are given a practical example in the healing of this notable cripple, one who had been so from birth and had regularly sat at the gate of the Temple.
Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour.
There were times of public prayer at the Temple. These included the morning prayers around the time of the morning sacrifice which is 9 am and the afternoon prayers around the time of the evening sacrifice (the ninth hour - 3.00 pm).
2 And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple;
As they passed through the Beautiful gate, they passed a man who had been born lame. Each day he was carried to the Temple so that he could receive alms or hand outs from those who entered the Temple. Beggars regularly sat at the gates of temples and shrines hoping to benefit from donors when they would be feeling at their most benevolent state of mind. We are not told for how many years this had occurred, but we can somehow surmise that he was now over forty years of age as we learn in Acts chapter 4 verse 22.
The Beautiful gate may be the Eastern gate which had glistening doors of Corinthian bronze-work. It led into the outer courtyard of the Temple. Here you could just look around and see all the silver and gold that was everywhere. As Peter gazed at it, it may well have filled his mind with the thought of silver and gold.
3 who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked for alms.
When the man saw Peter and John about to go into the Temple, he called on them to give him alms. Luke is bringing out his sad condition. All he could do, surrounded by all the splendor of the Temple, was beg and call out for help. He was like the people of Israel, dependent on others for comfort and with little hope as he sat there begging every day.
Luke in his wording makes a deliberate contrast here between the old and the new. Under the old existence of the nation the lame man has sat at the gate of the Temple, and all the Temple could offer him were the alms of those who went in and out. Year by year it was powerless to offer more. With all the glory of its silver and gold, and the Temple was splendid indeed, it could not offer restoration. That waited the new age as both the Old Testament and the teaching of our Lord Jesus stress that those who will be saved of old Israel are like the lame. In Isaiah 33.23 we read, in the context of the coming of the Lord as Judge, Lawgiver and King, ‘The lame took the prey’ where the thought is that it is God’s weak and helpless but restored people, who will finally, in God’s day, triumph and enjoy the spoils of victory.
In Isaiah 35.6 Israel is likened to a lame man who is restored and leaps like a deer, no longer lame because the Kingly Rule of God is here, a place where there can be no lameness.
In Jeremiah 31.8 ‘the blind and the lame’ will be among the people of God who return triumphantly from far off to enjoy God’s coming Rule. In Matthew 11.5; Luke 7.22 the lame walking is to be a sign to John the Baptist that the Kingdom of God is here. In Luke 14.13 the maimed and the lame were the ones who were to be called when someone gave a supper, and this was immediately followed by the parable of the man who made a great supper (representing ‘eating bread in the Kingdom of God’), only for his invitation to be rejected by all who were invited, so that the invitation instead went out to the poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind (Luke 14.21). They were the ones who would come to his feast.
4 And fixing his eyes on him, with John, Peter said, “Look at us.” 5 So he gave them his attention, expecting to receive something from them.
Immediately they turned their eyes and looked at him. At this he waited expectantly, assuming that they would give him something. But Peter’s words had been in order to turn his eyes on the two Apostles because they alone could bring him the message of hope
6 Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.”
Peter then informed him that he had no money, no silver or gold, the things that men craved after as they sat there day in and day out. What he did have meant that he could offer him something better. We can compare here Proverbs 23.1 where loving favor is specifically represented as better than silver and gold. What Peter carried with him was the authority of the name of Jesus the Messiah of Nazareth. He was here with all the authority of the Messiah. And by that authority he now commanded him to rise from the dust and walk. He thus turned the man’s attention wholly on Jesus as Messiah.
We are reminded of the words of Isaiah 52.2, “Awake, awake, put on your strength --- shake yourself from the dust”. These words in Isaiah were preparatory to the description of the Servant of the Lord when He offered Himself in total self-giving.
‘In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.’ ‘In the name’ means through the power of the One Whose name it is. Peter was claiming to act in His Name and with His authority. This is the first time that ‘the name’ of Jesus is called on. It contains within it the idea of all that Jesus Is. That was why He was named ‘Yahweh Is salvation’.
Through the inspiration of our Precious Holy Spirit Luke wants all Israel, and indeed all men, to recognize that what God brings to men is not silver and gold and outward success and wealth, but the power to make men whole. Israel’s problem lay in its yearning for the silver and gold of the past, for the past glory of Solomon. And it was proud of its Temple which manifested silver and gold in abundance. Here was the glory of man and of decayed religion. But what they should be doing, says Luke, is looking to the One Who offers far more than silver and gold. Peter will go on in his first epistle chapter 1 verse 18 where again he contrasts silver and gold with God’s offer of life in Christ. They should be looking to the One Who can offer strength, and vigor and life.
7 And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength. 8 So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God.
Then Peter reached out and, taking him by the right hand, raised him up. And the man immediately felt the strength entering his ankle-bones. He rises up, and he walks and leaps.
9 And all the people saw him walking and praising God. 10 Then they knew that it was he who sat begging alms at the Beautiful Gate of the temple; and they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him.
When the people saw him they were filled with ‘wonder and amazement’ at what had happened to him, for they recognized who he was. They recognized him as the lame man who had for so long begged for alms at one of the gates of the Temple. And now here he was walking and praising God within the Temple. The one who had been outside was now in.
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.
The representatives of the whole of Israel were receiving God’s witness, and they were all amazed. But the question was, would they see that they too were lame and needed to be healed? The crowd ran together greatly wondering. But what would they do? The porch might be called ‘Solomon’s’. But would they reveal the Wisdom of Solomon in their response? Would they too ‘hold on’ to the Apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ or would they remain ‘lame’?
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?
I have come across some really evil people in my life. I have witnessed them assume a working attitude that they [1] delegate all responsibility. [2] Accept all credit for what others did, and [3] shift all blame when they are the ones whose wrong decision caused the mess. Where has common sense gone? Why would anyone take any credit for something that they did not do? As I mentioned earlier all healing is done by our Precious Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. You got to be out of your mind to take credit for something He has done.
Peter immediately turns the people’s gaze away from himself - ‘You men of Israel.’ The call is to all Israel to face up to Jesus. They had seen Him walking among them constantly doing such miracles. Why then were they marveling? Rather they should be saying, ‘Jesus is still among us’. Why were they looking at Peter and John when they should be recognizing Whose power and Godliness had made this man walk? Their eyes were turned in the wrong direction.
13 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.
As in his first message Peter first refers back to the past, but this time it is to ‘the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’, the ones who had received from God the promise of blessing - Jesus’. God Is the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, The One Who delivered His people from Egypt. Then he goes on to describe Jesus as the Servant of God referred to by Isaiah, Who had come and had been rejected by them (Isaiah 50.4-9) and had been slain (Isaiah 53.1-12), and refers to the Scriptures that have therefore now been fulfilled, declaring Him to be the Messiah, and calls on them to repent so that God may then give them the everlasting Rule of God through His Messiah Jesus. He finishes by confirming that Jesus Is God’s great expected Prophet whom they must listen to, and His Servant Who can deliver them from sin. He wants it known that all that he is saying is in line with the teaching of the prophets.
Isn’t it amazing at all the wisdom that Peter now has regarding all the Scripture. Here is a guy who spent almost his entire life out on the water fishing and he now gives out a more balanced report using the word of God then I have ever even witnessed from men with Theological Doctor degrees.
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.
The heinousness of their crime is brought out by contrast. They denied the Holy and Righteous One -- they refused to listen to the One Who taught and did only what was good, and chose rather the survival of a murderer. They killed -- the source and sustainer of Life. In further contrast while they killed Him, God demonstrated what He thought of their action by raising Him up. Thus while He was spurned by Israel He was vindicated by God, as they, the Apostles, can all bear witness to.
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.
And the fact that He had been raised and was truly the Prince of Life, and the Holy and Righteous One, was evidenced by the fact that it was His Name, as a result of faith in His Name, which had made this man strong. It was He who had healed the lame. None other could have done it. While He walked and ministered on earth He performed signs and wonders which were all verified. Now He Is alive in Heaven and please note that He still continues to do signs and wonders through His servants. What has happened has established once for all His essential worth and power, through which this was accomplished. This once lame man was the evidence to all of Who and What Jesus was and Is, and to the power of His being.
But it had nevertheless required faith that the Lord could and would answer the request of His servant Peter. This faith was a gift from God’s Grace to Peter which allowed him to fully trust and hope in the Holy One, Jesus Christ in Whose Name may be totally relied on, and Who in response to faith will respond in this miraculous way.
17 “Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers.
Do you remember the words of our Lord when He was on the cross? We read in the Gospel of Luke chapter 23 this, “Then said Jesus, Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. And they parted his raiment, and cast lots.” Peter had been forgiven by our Lord Jesus Christ for his betrayal of Him. Grace received then can be grace given. Peter can acknowledge that what they had done they had done in ignorance. When they had done it they had not realized what they were doing. And this was true both of them and their rulers. So, like Peter, they were now being given another chance. Now in the light of what had happened they could have their eyes opened, recover their position and see the truth.
But ignorance was no excuse now that the light had shown. It was in ignorance that the Jews perpetrated the terrible act of crucifying their Messiah, but the thought is that now in the light of His resurrection and ensuing wonders that ignorance is no longer possible, and, therefore, there can be no excuse for their further rejection of Jesus Christ for He has risen, and He has revealed Himself openly in what has happened to this lame man.
18 But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled.
However, he makes it clear that they should not have been ignorant. Let them recognize that what had happened had actually fulfilled what God had shown beforehand through the mouth of His prophets, that His Messiah would suffer. This had been made apparent in the prophecies concerning the Suffering Servant and Lamb of God of Isaiah chapters 50 through 53, in the Davidic Psalms such as 22.12-18, which applied to all the house of David but especially to the coming greater David, and in Zechariah 13.7 where God’s Shepherd and the man who was God’s fellow was to be smitten. Furthermore it could be discerned by the initiated in all references to the sacrifice of lambs in the Old Testament, for He was the Lamb of God (John 1.19).
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.
Now came the familiar call to repent. They must have a change of heart and mind. They must ‘turn again’, turning to God’s way and to the Savior from sin, turning from sin and from their own way. They must seek the prince of life. They must respond to Jesus the Messiah.
If they are willing to do this, then their sins will be blotted out. And then will come seasons of refreshing from the presence of the Lord, followed by the coming again of Messiah Himself Whom the heavens have necessarily received until the times of the restoration of all things, that time of restoration spoken of by His holy prophets from ancient times. As a result of faith in His Name they will be made whole.
We should note that repentance and faith are two sides of the same coin. The person whose faith in God is opened up and made real cannot but repent. When a person becomes aware of God they can do no other than ‘repent’, changing their hearts and minds and wills about sin and about God. Job was evidence of this. He said. ‘I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you, wherefore I hate myself and I repent in dust and ashes’ (Job 42.5-6). He did not try or struggle to repent. He saw God and he had no choice. Indeed every man and woman who by faith sees Him will be driven to repentance, that is why Peter has made Him known. Once these men became aware of God as He Is, and Jesus Christ as He Is, repentance will be the inevitable result. Peter was trusting God that this would be true here as it had been for Job and Isaiah. All he could do was present and interpret the facts, and face them up to Jesus. Then he looked for God to work on his hearer’s hearts and make them know the truth about Himself and about Him. His call was therefore that on recognizing that truth they would respond. Repentance is simply faith responding. Becoming aware of God and believing, they are to turn to God from their sins, yielding to His Rule and walking in His ways.
22 For Moses truly said to the fathers, ‘The LORD your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things, whatever He says to you.
Peter’s thoughts now turn to justifying his position further in the light of Scripture, by showing Whom it is that they have crucified (the Holy and Righteous One) by declaring that Jesus was the Prophet who had been promised by Moses. He does this firstly by introducing the idea of the Great Prophet promised by Moses in Deuteronomy 18.15, then by stating that all the prophets pointed ahead to Him, and connects Him with the idea of Abraham, through whom the whole world was to be blessed. He clearly sees the Messiah and ‘the Prophet’ as synonymous. Many people in those days expected the coming of a Great Prophet, who would introduce the blessing of Abraham, and some saw him as synonymous with the Messiah. Peter was in no doubt on the matter.
23 And it shall be that every soul who will not hear that Prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.’
For God had warned severely, that if anyone did not listen to Him responsively as He spoke through that Prophet, he would be cut off from Israel. The warning is even more intense that being killed. Remember this quote from our Lord Jesus recorded by Matthew in chapter 10 of his Gospel, “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”
24 Yes, and all the prophets, from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days.
It was not only Moses who had spoken of these days which have now come. It was also all the prophets who followed him from Samuel onwards. The mention of Samuel was especially significant as he had anointed David in whom the promises of an anointed king to come had begun.
25 You are sons of the prophets, and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’ 26 To you first, God, having raised up His Servant Jesus, sent Him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from your iniquities.”
So they should listen. For they are the ‘sons of the prophets’, that is they come from the same background ideas and thoughts and mind-stream and nationality of the prophets, and look to the prophets as their ‘fathers’ and are the ones who would expect therefore to obey their prophecies.
Furthermore they are the sons ‘of the covenant’ which God made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They have first right to this promise and covenant if only they will receive it. And the promise given there was that in their seed all the nations of the earth would be blessed. But Scripture also promised that from the seed of Abraham God would rise up His Servant, through whom that blessing would come. The whole world was to enjoy the blessing, but the Servant had brought it to them first.
Please note the significant point Peter brings out when he says, ‘unto you first.’ Before the earth as a whole receives His blessing, as Isaiah has made clear that it will one day through the Servant, God has first appointed it to them, (to the Jew first, and then to the Gentile). That is why He has ‘raised up’ His Servant (caused Him to come forth in His purposes), so that Israel might receive the anticipated blessing of Abraham and be blessed in turning away from their iniquities. The choice now therefore lies with them. They can refuse to hear His words and be cut off from Israel. Or they can respond and enter into the promised blessing by turning from their sin and having them blotted out as He has promised.
If you were standing with the people, what would be your choice to do? So, today is the day of Salvation. If you have not believed in the Son of God, Jesus Christ, do it now!
