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Through the Bible with Les Feldick
LESSON 3 * PART 3 * BOOK 17
ACTS CHAPTER 3, 4, & 5
Let's go to Acts Chapter 3 for our study. Where do Peter and John go? To the Temple. No one has told them to stop Temple worship. "NOW Peter and John went up together into the Temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour."
Peter and John. Now turn for a moment to Chapter 4 verse 22:
Acts 4:22
Who must have walked by this man time and time again in those 3 years of His earthy ministry? Christ. Jesus was leaving all that for this time. That's the beauty of a Sovereign God, and so Jesus never healed him, knowing that the time would come when Peter and John would pass him by, and this would precipitate a whole group of events. So this forty-year-old man was carried and laid at the gate which is called Beautiful and begged.
"Who seeing Peter and John about to go into the Temple asked an alms. And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on us. Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee (now watch this): In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk."
What should Peter have put in there? Peter doesn't even mention it, he only refers again to Who Jesus was, The Messiah, Israel's promised King, and Saviour.
Acts 3:7
Now verse 12:
Acts 3:12
"And when Peter saw it (the amazement of the people), he answered unto the people, `Ye men of Israel (He was talking only to Jews), why marvel ye at this? Remember most Jews don't accept the New Testament. Look carefully at verse 13:
Acts 3:13
"The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob (those three names are for the Jews and the beginning of their Nation. And it was to them that Israel's Covenant promises were repeated almost word for word. Peter says you caused Him to be crucified. Now verse 14:
No), whom God hath raised from the dead; whereof we are witnesses." What does Peter now set up for these people to believe His name.
The name implied that Jesus was The Christ, He was The Messiah, He was the promised One according to the Covenant. Peter is hoping that Israel would wake up and realize that the One they killed was the promised Messiah.
Acts 3:17
"And now, brethren (Peter could never address Gentiles as brethren. Many years ago I had a retired pastor at one of my classes ask me, "Why did Peter give Israel this option, that they had killed their Messiah in ignorance? Israel, had she rejected Him, knowing Who He was, God would have had to put them to death by completely destroying them. Paul only writes to believers. I Corinthians 2:7,8
"But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery (a secret), even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:" God knew that this apostle to the Gentile world would become a writer of Scripture. Now verse 8:
Come back to Acts Chapter 3, and Peter is using this as an escape route for the Nation of Israel.
God's not through with the Nation, His mercy will come back them. Israel should have known, Israel could have known, but they didn't know. You can't stop God. Verse 20 is a continuation of that same thought.
"And he (God) shall send Jesus Christ which before was preached unto you:"
Even though Peter is expecting The Lord's immediate return to the Nation of Israel if they would repent, he also recognizes that they are going to go through seven years of restitution. That after the Tribulation, Christ would return. But it was hinging on Israel's repentance. Peter tells us that ALL must repent and believe on His name. At the present time we are seeing God bring the Jews back to the land. We know that God, after the final rejection, turns to the Gentiles through the Apostle Paul with Salvation by Grace with no connection to Israel's Law. We call it the Church Age. Calling out a people for His name, the Body of Christ.
All Peter knows is that Israel is still under the Abrahamic Covenant, and if Israel would believe they could have The King and Kingdom as promised in Psalms Chapter 2. But all of Israel had to accept the fact that Jesus was their Messiah. Always remember that the first part of Acts is nothing but Peter and the Nation of Israel. Then in Chapter 10, Peter goes to the house of Cornelius a Gentile, and that is all new. Israel is going off the scene, and Gentiles are coming into God's favor under Grace. Now verse 22. Peter is still sticking to the Old Testament prophets and Covenant programs.
"For Moses truly said unto the fathers, `A prophet shall the Lord of your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me (Christ was a Jew); him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you. "Ye are the children of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham,..."

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