Acts 3:12-20: Chapter 2 Depends on Chapter 1

When Peter saw this, he said to them: “Fellow Israelites, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus. You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go. You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you. You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this. By faith in the name of Jesus, this man whom you see and know was made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has completely healed him, as you can all see.

“Now, fellow Israelites, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders. But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Messiah would suffer. Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus - Acts 3:12-20

Here is my summary of what Peter said: People of Israel, you are watching Act 2 of this drama and you really shouldn't be surprised at what is going on. You must have been sleeping or come in late for Act 1, but that was where the action really was when Jesus, the author of life, was killed by you, the audience. This whole healing is just Act 2, the natural follow on to all the stuff that happened in Act 1. And if Act 1 and Act 2 aren't just a bad Hallmark drama, then you should really change your lives and start your new life as Act 3 of this story. What does that make me, reading this story? Probably Act 1,000, a spin-off, but still all based on what happened back in Act 1.

Luke 24:13-49

Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; but they were kept from recognizing him.

He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”

They stood still, their faces downcast. One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

“What things?” he asked.

“About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”

He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.

As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.

When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”

They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem. There they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, “It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.” Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread.

While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”

They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”

When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” They gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and ate it in their presence.

He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”

Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. He told them, “This is what is written: The Messiah will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.” - Luke 24:13-49

 How to believe something that you fundamentally knew was not possible? The only evidence you have is that someone told you that there were indications something had happened and other people told you it did happen. From an experiential point of view, those who die are dead. From a theological perspective, those who die are dead. From a practical point of view, those who die are not coming back. From an emotional perspective, it was time to move through the seven stages of grief and move on. But things were niggling at them. The story told by the women who went to the tomb. The story of the disciples who went to the tomb. Then the Emmaus duo and Simon say that they saw him. Then Jesus shows up. Even though you are happy, perhaps you are hallucinating or dreaming or sick in the head or seeing a ghost. What would I do in this situation? Would we recognize Jesus and be willing to say so? Or would we put it down to my own misunderstanding and this miss the truth of our own experience. 

1 Corinthians 5:6-8: Advocating Almost Any Sin

Your glorying is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

When does tolerance go too far? We want to be seen as tolerant, understanding and wise in the ways that the world works. We want people who live in sin to feel like they can find a place of acceptance in the,  church. After all, didn't Jesus himself dine with tax collectors and sinners?  Look! How accepting we are! Not judgmental at all!

But where does it stop? If the church accepts behavior that even non-Christians find repulsive, how easy it is to justify--not just justify, but be proud of--almost any sin. At that point, we are indistinguishable from the world because we effectively advocating that sin. 

"...you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler." (1 Cor. 5:11)

So we don't play with these things or wink at these things, but call them out for the destructive things that they are.

Isaiah 25:6-9: Negentropy Defines Our Eternal Life

On this mountain the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine—the best of meats and the finest of wines.

On this mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from all faces; he will remove his people’s disgrace from all the earth. The Lord has spoken.

In that day they will say, “Surely this is our God; we trusted in him, and he saved us. This is the Lord, we trusted in him; let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.” - Isaiah 25:6-9

Benjamin Franklin once famously said, "In this world nothing is certain except death and taxes". We delay taxes until the last possible day, we avoid taxes with deductions and tax shelters, we want our taxes to go to things we are think are important. In a similar fashion, we try to stave off death or even the appearance of death. We avoid death. We want our death to mean something. Death's inevitability casts a long shadow, pronouncing a conclusion to every endeavor with finality.

In these verses, Isaiah paints a strange scene, saying "The Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples" who are all dead, covered with a shroud-"a cloth placed over or around a dead body". If someone were to do that we would call it morbid and wasteful and bizarre.

Unless it is God, who "will destroy the shroud...he will swallow up death forever." The inevitable is not so inevitable after all because God. And because "the Lord has spoken" we are confronted not with the grinding, wearing down entropy of death but with the wonder and gladness of life. We have grown up living in avoidance, when the removal of shroud allows living in the abundance from God. 

Negentropy is the opposite of entropy, it is the process of things because more ordered or organized. Science terms this as a temporary state that exists before entropy starts. God says that it is the permanent state of those who are his people. I want to see what that looks like.

 

John 3:14-21: Rescue from Our Own Testimoy

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. - John 3:14-21

I think that people are not condemned by God so much as condemned by the standard that they have professed. We all have some mental red lines that we use to determine if something is good or bad. Then because we are unreliable in and of ourselves, we find that we have crossed that red line.  We stand condemned already. God passes judgement using the evidence that we hand to him. 

Paul asks: "you, then, who teach others, do you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal? You who say that people should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by breaking the law?" (Rom. 2:21-23)

Maybe we claim that we know of no law or commandment that we disobey and are therefore innocent. I think that the judgement seat of Christ will be a replay of our words, deeds and thoughts to the jury of the saints. "so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God." It will be our own indisputable testimony in evidence against ourselves. But those who believe escape the condemnation because we agree with God that we need the rescue.

Ephesians 2:1-10: Discovered All the Good We Can Do

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. - Ephesians 2:1-10

Paul wants to draw out the clear difference between who we were and what we deserved, who we are and what we received and who we will be and what we can do.

We were "dead in our transgressions" and "deserving of wrath". Without the leadership of Christ in our lives, our default setting is to follow the ways of this world and its ruler who leads us into his path of disobedience.

We are "alive with Christ" and "seated with him in the heavenly realms" because of his great love for us. It isn't something we work for ourselves or something that we bribe God to get or something that we extort from him, it is a gift--freely given.

We will be doing "good works" and witnessing the full extent of his "handiwork", the "incomparable riches of his grace" because that's what God has "prepared in advance for us to do."  We certainly weren't created to lounge about on clouds in heaven. Where's the challenge in that? No, we were created to discover all the good that we can do now that we are redeemed

Psalm 107:1-3,17-22: Redeemed Consequences

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story—those he redeemed from the hand of the foe, those he gathered from the lands, from east and west, from north and south.

Some became fools through their rebellious ways and suffered affliction because of their iniquities. They loathed all food and drew near the gates of death. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress. He sent out his word and healed them; he rescued them from the grave. Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for mankind. Let them sacrifice thank offerings and tell of his works with songs of joy. - Psalm 107:1-3,17-22

We don't always get the result that can be logically tied to our actions. Actions have consequences. The odds would often predict a different result. Sometimes we expect better. The well-intentioned effort by us doesn't work out and we are left empty handed. Sometimes we expect worse. The petty words spoken or the lazy try seems to work out well and we are left with unexpected blessing. But that's why we live life, leaving the outcome in the hands of God.

It is the surprise happy outcome that fills out the meaning of "redeemed". Based on our foolish actions, our future had been mortgaged by our rebellious ways and now the time has come for the consequences.  When we realize how we have been, sadness and hopelessness sets in "they loathed all food and drew near the gates of death.". But then someone steps in and pays the karmic debt and we are left suddenly free. 

How often I have benefited this rescue? Jesus kept from me the natural, logical result of my own stupidity and wrong-headedess. And I know it is stupid and I am so worried about how bad things are going to be because of it. Then Jesus steps in  and lifts the burden from me. I can breathe and am so grateful. This is what it means to be "redeemed"