The 11^th Sunday after Trinity

SERMON

INI

Text: Acts 4:8-20

Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders of Israel: If we this day are judged for a good deed done to a helpless man, by what means he has been made well, let it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole. This is the ‘stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’ Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated and untrained men, they marveled. And they realized that they had been with Jesus. And seeing the man who had been healed standing with them, they could say nothing against it. But when they had commanded them to go aside out of the council, they conferred among themselves, saying, “What shall we do to these men? For, indeed, that a notable miracle has been done through them is evident to all who dwell in Jerusalem, and we cannot deny it. But so that it spreads no further among the people, let us severely threaten them, that from now on they speak to no man in this name.” So they called them and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered and said to them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.”

In Christ Jesus, the world’s one and only Savior, dear fellow redeemed:

Over 90% of the people living in India profess a belief in the Hindu religion. In many areas of that country there are laws against Hindus converting to Christianity. Yet, during the three weeks that I spent in India, I was not once criticized for being a Christian pastor or for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. In fact, two waiters at the little restaurant where I ate breakfast each morning confided quietly to me that they were recent Hindu converts to Christianity.

Pastor Mayhew, however, was not so fortunate. At one point he was confronted by a man who angrily told him to get out of the country. The man claimed that the Indians had their own gods and had no need for the Christian God. Sadly there are many people in our own country, who feel the same way. They have convinced themselves that Christian mission work is a type of religious imperialism, and that all people should simply be left alone to worship the god or gods of their ancestors. The thought underlying this opinion is that all religions ultimately are the same—that none is any better than another. When it comes to the religions created by men in this world, that thought is certainly true. But it is not true when it comes to Christianity. Christianity is not the creation of man’s mind, but rather it is the revelation of God to man! It is therefore distinct and different than every other religion in this world. This is why Peter could rightly say within our text: “Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved!” Brothers and sisters in Christ, the reason why it is so important that we share our Christian faith is because SALVATION IS FOUND IN JESUS ALONE!

I.

Jesus, first of all, who was crucified and raised from the dead for us! The event that led up to the confrontation recorded in our text involved the apostles Peter and John healing a lame man near the temple gate in Jerusalem. It was a very public act, and the miracle served to draw a large crowd of people to hear Peter and John preach as they stood in Solomon’s porch. We are told that the priests in the temple, the temple’s guard, and the Sadducees became very upset by that preaching and had Peter and John arrested. When Peter and John were brought before the Jewish religious council, we are told that Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit and addressed the leaders in the following way, “Rulers of the people and elders of Israel: If we this day are judged for a good deed done to a helpless man, by what means he has been made well, let it be known to you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by Him this man stands here before you whole.”

Notice how Peter ties Jesus Christ to two events in His life which define both His purpose and His person. He identifies Jesus, first of all, as having been “crucified.” Jesus’ purpose was not primarily to serve as our instructor—to tell us how to be good people and so thereby to win God the Father’s affection. The world is comfortable with such an understanding of Jesus’ purpose, for it allows them to place Jesus in the same category as the prophets of every other religion. Jesus came into this world, however, to be our substitute. He came to take our place—both in terms of fulfilling the law for us, but even more so suffering the condemnation of the law over against our sins and in our place. Isaiah prophesied, “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed” (53:5). Jesus’ death by crucifixion, however, was followed by His resurrection—an event which defines for us Jesus’ person. The apostle Paul asserts that by His resurrection, Jesus was “declared to be the Son of God with power” (Romans 1:4). This is true because as the Son of God Jesus, who laid down His life, took it back again! (cf. John 10:17) You and I can lay our lives down for someone or something, but we do not have the power to take them back again. Jesus does and Jesus did, thereby demonstrating the truth of Peter’s assertion that SALVATION IS FOUND IN JESUS ALONE!

II.

Secondly, Peter asserts that Jesus has become the Cornerstone of our faith! Having stated that the lame man walked because of Jesus’ name, Peter told the Jewish council, “The stone which was rejected by you builders…has become the chief cornerstone.” In our responsive reading earlier in this service, we read the words of Psalm 118, which Peter here quotes. Peter, whom the members of the council considered “uneducated and untrained,” quoted what for those religious leaders was their final authority—the Old Testament Scriptures. Peter thereby identified Jesus as the Christ promised by God down through the ages within His word. Jesus, therefore, was being tied to the promises God gave to Adam and Eve, to Abraham, to David, to Isaiah and all of the other prophets. He was not an isolated individual, whose birth began his life and whose death brought an end to His existence. No, He was the Christ, whom God determined to send from eternity, and who through His word would become the source of truth and the chief cornerstone of faith throughout eternity.

This is an extremely important point for us today! We are living in a time in which the truths of Jesus found within His word are being disputed and denied not just by the world, but within the churches of our day. It would be very easy to point to the problems that have arisen within other Christian denominations regarding both faith and morals because they have drifted away from and denied the authority of the Scriptures. But, rather let us focus on ourselves and the attitudes we find within our hearts. A “cornerstone” in Jesus’ day was the first stone laid when constructing a building. It was very carefully crafted so that its angles were as perfect as possible, for the lines of the building were sighted using that single stone. Only when the walls were true to the angles provided by the cornerstone would the building be square and sound. Do we use the word of our Savior God as the cornerstone of our faith, or do we allow the world to shape our thinking? The world wants us to believe that as long as two individuals truly love each other, they can involve themselves in pre-marital or extra-marital sexual activity, yet the word of our Savior Jesus labels such behavior “fornication and adultery” and announces that God will judge such immoral behavior (cf. Hebrews 13:4). The world suggests that our ultimate goal in life should be “personal happiness,” but the word of our Savior Jesus declares that our ultimate goal should be “personal faithfulness” with the promise that such faithfulness will lead ultimately to happiness in heaven (cf. Revelation 2:10).

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the apostle Paul pleaded with the Christians of the first century even as I do today, “By the mercies of God…present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” (Romans 12:1-2). That good, acceptable, and perfect will of God is found for us in the Scriptures, which assure us without any hesitation or equivocation that SALVATION IS FOUND IN JESUS ALONE!

III.

Jesus…whose miracles are clearly evident in our lives today! The religious leaders, before whom Peter and John were standing, were stunned. They did not know how to respond. Peter and John were fishermen. They had not been educated in rhetoric, yet here they were speaking out with authority in public. They had not been trained in the elite schools of the scribes and Pharisees, yet here they were quoting Scripture and leaving the religious leaders stumbling in their responses. Beyond that the lame man who had been healed was standing right their next to Peter and John. Every one of the religious leaders had seen the man sitting and begging by the temple entrance. No doubt many of them had taken pity on the man and given him alms to sustain his meager existence. They could not with any credibility deny that a miracle had been done. What should they do? The proper response would have been humble repentance. The LORD God, after all, stated through His prophet Isaiah, “On this one will I look: on him who is poor and of a contrite spirit, and who trembles at My word” (66:2b). But this is not what the religious leaders chose to do. Instead they chose to attempt to intimidate Peter and John. They decided to threaten them and command them never to speak in Jesus’ name again.

Man’s response to God and His gospel word has not changed much over time. I mentioned in the introduction to this meditation the man who angrily told Pastor Mayhew to leave India, resorting to an attempt at intimidation. In our country it is frequently the educated religious leaders of the church who stray the furthest from the word of God. Unlike the religious leaders confronting Peter and John, who could not deny their powerful miracle, the religious leaders of our day often do deny the historic nature of these miracles, suggesting in their unbelief that such account were merely the result of people making up stories to honor Jesus and His disciples. Peter, himself, contradicts such a suggestion in his second epistle, when he writes, “We did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made know to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty” (2 Peter 1:16). As author Lee Strobel so convincingly demonstrates is his book, The Case for Christ, the early disciples of Christ did not die for a fairytale, but rather the sacrifice of their lives demonstrates the truth of their claims!

In reality, however, Jesus’ miracles are clearly evident in our lives today. The fact that you and I believe in Jesus as our Savior is a miracle of God’s grace and evidence of the power of the Holy Spirit. As the apostle Paul explains, “No one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit,” (1 Corinthians 12:3), yet he later explains this miracle of spiritual regeneration when he writes, “It is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). Conversion is a miracle comparable to that of God’s original miracle of creating light! Beyond that each and every one of us can think of those times when our Savior has miraculously answered our prayers, preserved our lives from danger, or opened doors of opportunity for us in ways that often seem to the world around us as quite natural, but which we cannot explain in ways apart from the power and intervention of our Savior!

Truly Jesus is unlike any god of man-made religions. As I was preparing a sermon in India, I was visiting with Nireekshana Benjamin. He commented that if we in our sermons simply preach Christ—His power and majesty, His presence and blessing, it will become apparent to all that are listening that the gods of this world simply cannot and do not compare. SALVATION IS FOUND IN JESUS ALONE!

IV.

Jesus…who wants us boldly to proclaim His saving name! Having decided on a plan for dealing with Peter and John, the Jewish council called them back into their presence. With great fury they commanded the apostles to refrain from any further preaching in the name of Jesus. Peter’s response is so very instructive: “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.” God has commanded us to listen to and obey those whom He has placed over us in this world. However, when those in authority command the child of God to do something contrary to God’s will, or to refrain from doing something commanded in God’s will, the child of God must listen to God! So Peter stated the case; such is the case for you and for me today.

My dear friends, there is no question that our Savior Jesus wants us boldly to proclaim His saving name. He had told us “to make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19); “to preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15); and, in general, to be “His witnesses…to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8). There is only one reason for us to fulfill these commands—to take the time, to make the effort, to go to the expense, and to risk the danger! That reason is that SALVATION IS FOUND IN JESUS ALONE! May the Spirit fill our hearts with the love of our Savior, with an understanding of the precious nature of the truths of His word, and with the conviction that the very best thing we can do for anyone is to share with them the name of Jesus! Amen.

Soli Dei Gloria!
—Pastor Paul D. Nolting