Monthly Archives: January 2020

Communism or Common Denominator? – Acts 4:32-37

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

 

Summary:

The way the disciples were living (4:32-35) wasn’t communism, for communists are not “of one heart and of one soul.”  They were able to live so unselfishly because they were filled with the Spirit (2:4) in a way that controlled them to where they couldn’t sin (I Jo. 3:9).  That’s the only way a “multitude” of 8,000 families could live this way for long. He was the common denominator that helped them live that way

This wasn’t supposed to happen till the kingdom (Jer. 32:37-40; Ezk. 11:1-20) but God was giving them a taste of kingdom powers (cf. Heb. 6:5).These verses confirm that the Spirit was the common denominator that enabled them to live that way.

The reason the Spirit was causing them to live this way was they were heading into the Tribulation that would have come if God hadn’t interrupted His prophetic program for Israel with the dispensation of the mystery.  In the Tribulation, believers won’t be able to buy food without the mark of the beast (Rev. 13:17), so the Lord told these men to pool their resources to get through that terrible time (Lu. 18:22).

Compare that to how men are preparing today, those who don’t know that we’ll be raptured before the Antichrist is revealed (II Thes. 2:1-8).  They’re not selling all and giving the proceeds to the church so others can survive the Tribulation.  They’re hoarding up supplies so they can survive

They had the “power” to work miracles of healing (4:33).  Their “great grace” was the grace of giving (cf. II Cor. 8:1-7).

We see this giving pictured when Ahimelech gave David food (I Sam. 21).  David said the Lord saved him through Ahimelech (Ps. 34).  Since David was on the run from Saul at the time, who was trying to kill him, that’s a type of how God will feed believers who will be on the run from Antichrist in the Tribulation, who will be trying to kill them.

God always provides so His children don’t “lack” for the basic necessities of life (Acts 4:34), but how He provides changes dispensationally.  For instance, men had no lack when God gave them manna (Ex. 16:18).  But today we have to go to work not to lack (I Thes. 4:11,12), like Adam did (Gen. 3:19).  But these men weren’t going to work, they were “daily” in the temple (Acts 2:46).

This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help other believers.  Acts 4:35 says “distribution” was made, and our apostle says we should be “distributing to the necessity of saints” (Rom. 12:13).  That doesn’t mean we should sell all we have to distribute to them, for that would be a burden, and Paul doesn’t want us burdened (II Cor. 8:13-15).  But the reason he quotes Ex.16:18 there (v. 15) is to say that if we help one another the way he suggests, God can meet the needs of others through us as effectively as He did through Moses and the manna.

Why’d Luke single out Barnabas (Acts 4:36,37) as an example of someone who did what he was talking about?  He was a “Levite” who depended on the tithes of the Jews, which were scarce when they weren’t walking with God.  And we know they weren’t walking with God here for they just killed His Son. And since they were paying taxes to Rome too, they had even less money to tithe.  So Luke’s point is: even poor Levites like Barnabas trusted God enough to sell all they had.

People won’t live like this in the kingdom, though.  They’ll have to plant and reap (Amos 9:13) and they’ll own things again (Micah 4:4 cf. Acts 4:32).  They’ll get back the lands they sold in the Tribulation, as we see typified when they got their lands back in the year of jubilee (Lev. 25:10).

But when God interrupted His prophetic program and the kingdom didn’t come, the ones who had no lack became “poor saints” (Rom. 15:26).  But God still made sure they didn’t lack by having Paul take up a collection among the Gentiles for them as they asked (Gal. 2:10).

The reason God described how they were living in Acts 2:42 -45 is that the context there was how to get saved (Acts 2:38) and selling all was part of how they got saved (Lu. 18:18, 22).  Here in Acts 4, the disciples have cited Psalm 2 (4:25, 26) to show they knew the Tribulation was near, so here the context is how to survive it, so he describes their lifestyle again.

Video of this message is available on YouTube: Communism or Common Denominator? – Acts 4:32-37

Defiled-Minded Professors

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

I’m sure you’ve heard of absent-minded professors, men who are so engrossed in their deep thoughts that they tend to lose track of the little things we must all keep in mind in order to get along in life.  Well, in Paul’s letter to Titus, the apostle warned the young man about some false teachers, saying,

“…even their mind… is defiled.  They profess that they know God; but in works they deny Him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate” (Titus 1:15,16).

From the context, we know that these defiled-minded professors were the “vain talkers… of the circumcision” (Tit. 1:10) who were “teaching things which they ought not” (v. 11).  I think Paul called them “defiled” because these unsaved Jews were trying to teach the grace believers in Crete’s churches that they would be defiled if they ate meats prohibited by the law of Moses, for that’s what the law said of such people (Lev. 11:43).

But it doesn’t say that about those of us who are not under the law, but under grace (Rom. 6:15 cf. I Tim. 4:1-5).  Paul just finished saying of us, “unto the pure all things are pure” (v. 15), speaking of the foods we eat (cf. Rom. 14:20).  So Paul turned the tables on those defiled-minded professors, and said that it was “their mind” that was actually “defiled” for thinking that way, not the people who ate those meats!

When Paul said that these defiled-minded professors were “abominable,” he is again turning the tables on those legalizers.  You see, “abominable” is another word the law used of those who ate unclean meats (Lev. 11:41-43).  So in calling the legalizers “abominable,” Paul is assuring the grace believers in Crete’s churches that they weren’t abominable, their accusers were. 

In calling these false teachers “disobedient,” I believe Paul was again responding to the charges that these defiled-minded professors were levying against the saints.  When the grace believers in Crete’s churches insisted that they could eat meats that were banned by the law, they were probably accused of having cast the law behind their backs, for that’s the very definition of the word “disobedient” under the law (cf. Neh. 9:26).  But in rushing to the defense of the Cretian believers, Paul points out that the Law teachers were the ones who were really “disobedient,” as were all unsaved Jews (Rom. 10:21) who had not “obeyed the gospel” (Rom. 10:16).

Finally, Paul calls these legalizers “reprobate” (Tit. 1:16).  That’s a word that the dictionary defines as abandoned, and that’s how the word is used in Scripture as well.  In speaking of the Gentiles who lived before Abraham, God said that He had to give them up and give them over to “a reprobate mind” (Rom. 1:24,26,28).  That’s pretty much the definition of abandonment, and that’s why Paul called those ancient Gentiles reprobate.

But the unsaved Jews in Paul’s day had become just as reprobate! When Paul says that they were reprobate “unto every good work,” that meant they were totally incapable of doing anything that pleased God.  No wonder the apostle Paul, in speaking of both Jews and Gentiles, wrote:

“God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that He might have mercy upon all” (Romans 11:32).

Today, unsaved Jews are just as defiled-minded as unsaved Gentiles, but God is willing to have mercy on them all.  All He asks is that they believe the only reason they’re worthy of Heaven is that Christ paid for their sins on the cross of Calvary and rose again.  If you’re not saved, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved” (Acts 16:31).

To the Reader:

Some of our Two Minutes articles were written many years ago by Pastor C. R. Stam for publication in newspapers. When many of these articles were later compiled in book form, Pastor Stam wrote this word of explanation in the Preface:

"It should be borne in mind that the newspaper column, Two Minutes With the Bible, has now been published for many years, so that local, national and international events are discussed as if they occurred only recently. Rather than rewrite or date such articles, we have left them just as they were when first published. This, we felt, would add to the interest, especially since our readers understand that they first appeared as newspaper articles."

To this we would add that the same is true for the articles written by others that we continue to add, on a regular basis, to the Two Minutes library. We hope that you'll agree that while some of the references in these articles are dated, the spiritual truths taught therein are timeless.

Two Minutes with the Bible lets you start your day with short but powerful Bible study articles from the Berean Bible Society. Sign up now to receive Two Minutes With the Bible every day in your email inbox. We will never share your personal information and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Life Begins at Forty! – Acts 4:22-31

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

 

Summary:

Peter and John gave a lame man a new life when they healed him at age 40 (v. 22).  40 is the number of testing (Ex. 24:18; Num. 14:33,34).  So the healing of this 40-year-old means Israel was being tested to see if they’d accept the Spirit through the message of the Spirit-filled disciples (Acts 2:4).

The lame man lay each day outside the temple, but didn’t have the strength to enter (Acts 3:2), a type of the nation Israel, who was just outside the kingdom, but didn’t have the strength to enter it.  But the only reason the people of Israel were being tested is because they failed to receive the Lord’s offer to escort them into the kingdom, typified by the lame man that He healed (John 5:1-8).  He was lame 38 years; the apostles healed a man “above forty,” or 41.  That three-year difference symbolized the Lord’s 3-year ministry.  They could have been offered the kingdom 3 years earlier!

Peter told the Jews to save themselves from that generation (Acts 2:40) just like the Jews in Moses’ day had to be saved from the generation that died in the wilderness (Num. 32:13).

Most Christians today would pray, “Lord protect us from the rulers who are threatening us,” but the apostles didn’t.  They started their prayer by acknowledging God was creator of all things and could save them if He wanted (Acts 4:24), just like Hezekiah did when the King of Syria threatened him (II Ki. 19:15). But they didn’t ask for deliverance like he went on to do, for they knew where they stood in God’s program.

We know that because they quoted Psalm 2 (Acts 4:25,26). This shows they knew they were living in the time when the rulers of the Jews would get together with the kings of the Gentiles to kill the Lord.  They call Him God’s “child” (4:27) to emphasize the enormity of Israel’s crime.  Only a monster kills a child! They were telling God they understood why He was about to judge the world, as Psalm 2 went on to predict.

The Lord had to die one way or another, as they point out in Acts 4:28, but God wanted them to recognize their messiah and execute Him in faith, not crucify Him in unbelief.  That didn’t give the Jews or Gentiles any excuse for crucifying Him though, any more than it excused Judas (Luke 22:22).

The disciples asked God to notice the threatenings of the leaders for the same reason Hezekiah asked Him, to get Him to do something about it (Acts 4:29 cf. Isa. 37:17,20). So why didn’t they ask for deliverance like he did?  It was because, like him, they knew where they stood in God’s program.

Hezekiah lived under the law, which said that if Israel was good, God would save them from their enemies.  They’d been good, so he asked God to keep His promise, and He did (Isa. 37:26).  But the apostles knew the Lord had said it was time for them to be killed (Mt. 24:3), not delivered.

Of course, not all believers will die in the Tribulation.  So why didn’t they ask to be among those who will be delivered?  It was because they knew it was more important to ask for boldness (Acts 4:29).

God hasn’t promised to deliver you from anyone’s threatenings either.  In fact, the apostles were wrestling with their earthly rulers while we wrestle with the fallen rulers of Satan’s unseen kingdom (Eph. 6:12) who teach “doctrines of devils” through preachers (I Tim. 4:1).  So we should ask for the same boldness Paul did (Eph. 6:18,19).

As we read on, we see the disciples still called the Lord “child” (Acts 4:30) because they preached the resurrected Christ, and resurrection is a new birth (cf. Acts 13:33).  It was their way of saying they were thinking like God, that the slate had been wiped clean, and Israel was being given a fresh chance to receive the “child” mentioned in Isaiah 9:6.

The apostles prayed for miracles to help them be bold (Acts 4:30) because the Lord had promised to give them (Mark 16:17-20).  Do you see the importance of praying according to God’s will?  If not, notice that when the Lord was threatened He prayed, then chose the 12 (Lu. 6:11-13). That means He probably didn’t pray to be delivered from them. Since He knew He had to die, He likely prayed for help choosing the 12 as Isaiah 8:14-16 told Him to do after they rejected Him.

Video of this message is available on YouTube: Life Begins at Forty – Acts 4:22-31

The Cure For the Impure

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

“Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled” (Titus 1:15).

The “pure” here are people whom God has saved by His grace (Eph. 2:8,9), “purifying their hearts by faith” (Acts 15:9).  In Crete, where Titus was stationed (Tit. 1:5), some “vain talkers…of the circumcision” (1:10) were telling the purified believers in Crete’s churches that they would be “defiled” if they ate meats prohibited by the law of Moses (Lev. 11:43).  But “we are not under the law, but under grace” (Rom. 6:15), and under grace “the kingdom of God is not meat and drink” so “all things indeed are pure” for purified believers (Rom. 14:17,20)—just as Paul told Titus (Tit. 1:15).

But “unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure,” not even the meats that Moses approved under the law!  If you’re wondering why everything an unbeliever eats is impure, it is because everything he does is impure.  You see, everything an unbeliever does is sin.  When a believer plows his field, he is being obedient to God’s command to work for a living, but “the plowing of the wicked, is sin” (Pr. 21:4).  The “wonderful works” that unsaved men do are considered “iniquity” in God’s eyes (Mt. 7:22,23), for all of their righteousnesses “are as filthy rags” (Isa. 64:6).  “Even their mind and conscience is defiled” (Tit. 1:15), for “the thoughts of the wicked are an abomination to the LORD” (Pr. 15:26), because “their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity” (Isa. 59:7).

The bad news is, if your mind is defiled, you’re not going to be able to trust your conscience, despite how unsaved people encourage one another to “let your conscience be your guide.”  Paul knew by experience that the conscience of unsaved men “is defiled” (Tit. 1:15), for before he was saved, he brutally executed God’s people “in all good conscience before God” (Acts 23:1).  His defiled mind was telling him that they were wrong and he was right, so his defiled conscience didn’t bother him a bit!

The good news is, there is a cure for the impure!  As impure as men are in the sight of God, “our Saviour Jesus Christ… gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people” (Titus 2:13,14).   “Jesus Christ…loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood” (Revelation 1:5).  The Corinthians were a very sinful group of people, but Paul could even write to them and say, “ye are washed…ye are sanctified…ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus” (I Cor. 6:11).

How does an impure sinner access this cleansing blood of Christ?  Well, it is certainly “not by works of righteousness which we have done” (Titus 3:5).  Every purified sinner knows that it was “according to His mercy He saved us, by the washing of regeneration” (Titus 3:5).  The word “regeneration” means the giving of “newness of life” (Romans 6:4).

If you don’t care much for your present life, why not let God give you a new life?  One that will begin the moment you believe that “Christ died for our sins…and…rose again” (I Corinthians 15:3,4)—everlasting life that will never see an end.

To the Reader:

Some of our Two Minutes articles were written many years ago by Pastor C. R. Stam for publication in newspapers. When many of these articles were later compiled in book form, Pastor Stam wrote this word of explanation in the Preface:

"It should be borne in mind that the newspaper column, Two Minutes With the Bible, has now been published for many years, so that local, national and international events are discussed as if they occurred only recently. Rather than rewrite or date such articles, we have left them just as they were when first published. This, we felt, would add to the interest, especially since our readers understand that they first appeared as newspaper articles."

To this we would add that the same is true for the articles written by others that we continue to add, on a regular basis, to the Two Minutes library. We hope that you'll agree that while some of the references in these articles are dated, the spiritual truths taught therein are timeless.

Two Minutes with the Bible lets you start your day with short but powerful Bible study articles from the Berean Bible Society. Sign up now to receive Two Minutes With the Bible every day in your email inbox. We will never share your personal information and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Apostolic Boldness – Acts 4:13-22

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

 

Summary:

“Boldness” (4:13) means courage, the thing the apostles were showing when they went right back to preaching Christ after being jailed for preaching Christ.  Just 40 days earlier they weren’t so bold (Mt. 26:56).  But the Lord had told them that if He rose, they’d rise too (John 11:25), so they no longer feared death. We don’t have to fear death either (II Cor. 4:14).

Why did Israel’s religious leaders marvel that “unlearned and ignorant” apostles could be bold?  To answer that, we have to figure out what they meant by “unlearned.”  They called the Lord unlearned (John 7:14) because He hadn’t been to their schools.  But people said He was bold (Jo. 7:25,26) because He was able to use the Bible against leaders who claimed to be experts in the Bible (John 7:23).

And that’s what the apostles did too (Acts 4:10,11).  The Jews would know what the psalm they quoted meant.  They knew God promised to lay the foundation stone of Messiah in Israel (Isa. 28:16) for them to build the kingdom church on.  But they also knew from Psalm 118:22 that God predicted they wouldn’t build the church on Him, but that God would make Him the cornerstone of the church anyway.

And when the apostles quoted the same psalm the Lord did to answer the rulers (Mt. 21:23,42), the leaders knew they had “been with Jesus” (Acts 4:13).  Nobody since Him had been able to tie them up in knots using their own Bible like the apostles were doing here!

Not even the Lord’s enemies could say anything against the healing of the lame man (Acts 4:14), for they knew it was a legitimate miracle.  Compare that to modern “healings” you see on TV, where you don’t know the person being healed, so you don’t know if he was really sick or injured.

Israel’s religious leaders decide to have a closed-door meeting (4:15), in which they confessed they didn’t know what to do with the apostles (4:16), for they had performed a “notable” miracle, and everyone in town knew it.  So they decide to tell them to stop preaching Christ (4:17).  Obviously, nothing had changed since the Lord’s day, when those same leaders refused to believe, and didn’t want anyone else to believe either (Mt. 23:13).

After the private meeting was done, Israel’s leaders called the apostles back in (v. 18).  But how did Luke (who wrote the Book of Acts) know what they said in that closed-door meeting?  The Spirit could have told him (cf. II Kings 6:12), but it is also possible that some of those leaders later got saved (Acts 6:7) and told Luke.

Now since Israel was a theocracy, those religious leaders were also their civil leaders, and God’s people are always supposed to obey our civil leaders.  But Peter and John refused to (Acts 4:19), for they knew that we have to draw the line and say no when our leaders tell us to disobey God (Ex. 1:15-17; Dan. 3:18; 6:10).

Notice that neither Daniel nor his three Hebrew friends need-ed to do what their leaders said to do.  They didn’t need to go behind closed doors to talk over whether or not they should obey the command to disobey God.  Obeying God had become like second nature to them.  How?  By learning God’s precepts (Ps. 119:104).  If you’ll learn God’s precepts, obeying God can become like second nature to you too!

Peter went on to tell the leaders that even if God hadn’t commanded him to preach Christ, he couldn’t help but speak about the lame men he’d seen the Lord heal, etc. (Acts 4:20).

Fear of the people saved the apostles from these leaders (v. 21), just as it had the Lord (Mt. 21:45,46).

The man they healed hadn’t walked in forty years (Acts 4:22).  We don’t have miracles like that in the dispensation of grace.  But what we do have is examples of men who haven’t walked with God for forty, fifty, sixty years or more—and then get saved and begin to walk with Him.

If you’ve been saved many years but haven’t been walking with God, why not start now?  You’ll be eternally glad you did.

Video of this message is available on YouTube: Apostolic Boldness – Acts 4:13-22

Be Sure of What’s Pure!

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

“Unto the pure all things are pure…” (Titus 1:15).

Boy, a verse like that sure begs the questions, “Who are these pure people, and why are all things pure for them?”

Well, the word “pure” just means “clean,” as we see when Solomon asked,

“Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?” (Pr. 20:9).

The answer to this rhetorical question is that none of us can make our heart clean!  That’s why we need God to save and purify us.  So when sinners believe the gospel, God saves them by His grace, “purifying their hearts by faith” (cf. Acts 15:9)—so much so that Paul could tell even the carnal Corinthians that they were “washed” clean because they were saved (I Cor. 6:11).

That means the “pure” people in our text are saved people.  But when Paul says that “all things are pure” unto the pure, it doesn’t take a Bible scholar to know that he can’t be saying that sinful things are pure for saved people.

No, in the context, Paul is telling Titus how to deal with “vain talkers…of the circumcision” (Tit. 1:10), unsaved Jews who were teaching the “vain jangling” of the Law (cf. I Tim. 1:6,7).  These teachers of the law were probably insisting that certain meats were “unclean” for the pure because the law said they were (Lev. 11:4,5,6,7,8 etc.).  For nearly 1500 years, Jews under the law would not eat impure foods.

Of course, Gentiles who were not under the law would eat anything.  That’s one of the reasons the Lord called the Gentiles “dogs” (Mt. 15:26), for a dog will eat anything!  Your dog might be a fussy eater, but even he will eat anything if he is hungry enough.

But today, in the dispensation of grace, we are all “baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles” (I Cor. 12:13).   That means when our apostle Paul says that “we are not under law, but under grace” (Rom. 6:15), even Jewish believers are free to eat meats that God once classified as unclean.

That’s why Paul wrote that “commanding to abstain from meats” (I Tim. 4:3) is one of the many “doctrines of devils” that we should avoid (v. 1).  If you take a doctrine that God gave specifically to people in one dispensation and impose it on people in another dispensation, it becomes a doctrine of devils.  When Paul added that “every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused” (v. 4), that’s just another way of saying, “unto the pure all things are pure.”

The apostle expressed this truth again when he wrote,

“…the kingdom of God is not meat and drink… all things indeed are pure” (Rom. 14:17,20).

Had Paul written those words during Old Testament times, someone would have steered him to Leviticus 11 and reminded him that the kingdom of God did involve meat and drink under the law.  Then they would have led him out to be stoned for saying otherwise!

I know there are many who insist that unclean meats are still impure for the pure, but the only reason God pronounced certain foods unclean was to teach the Jews that certain people were unclean—the unsaved Gentiles (Lev. 20:24,25).  We know that Peter understood this, for after the Lord told him he could eat unclean meats (Acts 10:9-16), he said about the Gentiles,

“God hath shewed me that I should not call any man common or unclean” (Acts 10:28).

So to say that certain meats are unclean today under grace is to say that the Gentiles are still unclean, and God says otherwise.  It’s better to agree with Him when He says, “unto the pure all things are pure.”

Now would somebody please pass the bacon!

To the Reader:

Some of our Two Minutes articles were written many years ago by Pastor C. R. Stam for publication in newspapers. When many of these articles were later compiled in book form, Pastor Stam wrote this word of explanation in the Preface:

"It should be borne in mind that the newspaper column, Two Minutes With the Bible, has now been published for many years, so that local, national and international events are discussed as if they occurred only recently. Rather than rewrite or date such articles, we have left them just as they were when first published. This, we felt, would add to the interest, especially since our readers understand that they first appeared as newspaper articles."

To this we would add that the same is true for the articles written by others that we continue to add, on a regular basis, to the Two Minutes library. We hope that you'll agree that while some of the references in these articles are dated, the spiritual truths taught therein are timeless.

Two Minutes with the Bible lets you start your day with short but powerful Bible study articles from the Berean Bible Society. Sign up now to receive Two Minutes With the Bible every day in your email inbox. We will never share your personal information and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Enter the Big Shots – Acts 4:1-12

Posted on by Pastor Ricky Kurth

 

Summary:

It was the job of the priests (4:1) to teach the people (Lev. 10:8-11), so they didn’t like it when the apostles taught them.  “The captain of the temple” (4:1) was supposed to keep everyone but priests out of the temple (II Chron. 23:1-9), but the leaders in Israel used them and their weapons as “muscle” to arrest the Lord (Lu. 22:52) and the apostles here (4:2).  So the captain didn’t like the apostles preaching Christ, for it made him look bad for arresting Him.  And “the Sadducees” didn’t like it when they preached “the resurrect-tion” (4:2) because they didn’t believe in the resurrection (Acts 23:8).

When the Lord was here on earth, most of His grief came from the Pharisees, because they sat in Moses’ seat (Mt. 23:2), and they preferred Moses to the Lord (Jo. 9:16,28).  So the Pharisees led the way in arresting the Lord (Jo. 18:3).  But when the apostles preached the resurrection of Christ, the Sadducees took over as God’s chief opponents.

Resurrection “from” the dead (4:1) is when one is raised from among the dead and the rest of the dead stayed dead (Jo. 12:1).  Resurrection “of” the dead comes when a whole group of people are raised (Jo. 5:29).  That shows how carefully and accurately the Bible is written.  By the way, men don’t like to believe in resurrection, for it means they’ll be judged (Acts 10:40-42; 17:30,31).

The arrest of the apostles was the response of Israel’s leaders to Peter’s offer of the kingdom (Acts 3:19-21).  But the apostles weren’t surprised, for the Lord had warned them this would happen (Jo. 15:20), unless they could figure out a way to preach the truth without making men mad.  But that would have made them greater than the Lord, for He couldn’t figure that out, for it can’t be done!  Men hate the truth!

But I’m sure the apostles didn’t care they were arrested after they heard 5,000 men alone believed (4:4).  That large group, plus the 3,000 that believed earlier (2:41), means they were getting way more results than the Lord got (1:15), something the Lord also predicted (Jo. 12:24).

This is just a sample of the awesome victory God will win over the devil because of what Christ did. He will “spoil” the devil (Isa. 53:11) of his captives (49:24,25 cf. Mt. 12:28,29).

Annas and Caiaphas (Acts 4:5,6) were both high priest at that time (Lu. 3:2), perhaps because they were related (Jo. 18:12) and the office was in transition.  When they asked the apostles by what “power” and “name” they healed the lame man, that shows the word power here means authority (cf. Ro. 13:1).  They were the authority in Israel, and they knew they hadn’t given the apostles authority to heal anyone.

You’ll notice they asked by what authority the apostles did “this” (4:7), afraid to charge them with healing a man!  But Peter called them on it (Acts 5:8,9)!  He was filled with the Spirit when he spoke (5:8) just as the Lord promised (Lu. 12:11,12).  We can’t speak with the Spirit inspiring our every word as he did, but we can speak graciously (Col. 4:6) which is just as important as speaking accurately. 

Peter knew they didn’t like hearing that their Messiah was from Nazareth (4:10 cf. Jo. 1:46), and that they had killed Him, and that God had raised Him, but he said all those things anyway (4:10) to bring them under conviction.  He then quoted Psalm 118 (4:11), the same verse the Lord quoted when they asked Him by what authority He did what He did (Mt. 21:23-42).  The Jews knew God promised to send a foundation stone that they were supposed to build the kingdom on (Isa. 28:16).  They refused Him, but God made Him the cornerstone of the kingdom church anyway.

Now when Peter concluded his message by saying that the name of Jesus was the only name by which men could be saved (4:12), we use that verse to say men can’t be saved by Buddha or Mohammed, etc.  But the Jews wouldn’t have thought salvation was in the name of Zeus or any of the other false gods of the day.  No, the leaders had asked the apostles by what “name” they’d healed the lame man, so they responded by saying the name of Jesus healed him and saved him.  The Lord did what they could see (heal his lameness) to prove He could do what they couldn’t see (save him) as He did in Matthew 9:5,6.

Video of this sermon is available on YouTube: Enter the Big Shots – Acts 4:1-12