Acts chapter 2. In the message
that the Apostle Peter preaches on this day, so long ago, it's
a message that has been covered time and time again by Paul,
by Peter, by the rest of the Apostles, and down through time,
Gospel preachers have been bringing the same message, and that is
the three R's. Peter was clear to point out
to these people that they were ruined by the fall, that there
was nothing within themselves that would merit salvation, that
they could not work enough or ever to produce the blessings
that God had in His salvation. We find also in this passage
of Scripture that the second R, that they were redeemed by
Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ went to
the cross on purpose. And he went to the cross on purpose
to lay down his life, a ransom for many. He went to the cross
on purpose to give his life for his sheep. And he did that. And he was put in a borrowed
tomb. And three days later, he came out of that tomb. But 40
days after that, we have a hallelujah moment when Jesus Christ was
invited back to the throne of glory that he had left previous.
He had been on this earth for 33 and a half years, and now
with the work finished, with redemption paid for, with His
people purchased by His own blood, He's welcomed back by the Father
to sit down at the right hand and there wait until He makes
His enemies His footstool. And then we find out in this
passage of Scripture that there is going to be a great work of
the Spirit, the third R, We are going to be regenerated by the
Holy Spirit. That's the only way we can ever
see God is if we've been regenerated by the Holy Spirit. And that's
not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but that
is according to God's good purpose of grace. He said you must be
born again, and He never gives us in that passage or anywhere
else the formula for doing that. I don't care who wrote a book
on it. You'll not have a formula for being born again. It is an
act of God. I don't know how many times recently,
in the past year or two, I've asked people, how much did you
have to do with your physical salvation? And they will answer
correctly, nothing. And then when it comes to their
spiritual part, oh, I believed, I followed Jesus, I did this,
I did that, I'm working and so forth. Well, the Lord used that
picture of a birth on purpose. And then he comes up and says,
you must be born again. You must have this birth that
comes from God. And so we have the Apostle Peter
bringing that out in this message. And all gospel preachers have
stood for those great truths throughout all time. They will
not give in, they will not pass over, they must bring forth the
gospel that Jesus Christ is truly the one that gives us life. And
that life is given to us by the Spirit of God, and it is in that
we can rejoice that we have new life, a new heart, and that we
can truly worship the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Now here we have
a host of people. They're Jews by birth. They're
Jews by nature. They're Jews by practice. We
find the Apostle Paul fit himself into that very place there in
the book of Philippians. A Hebrew of the Hebrews. Circumcised
the eighth day. A Pharisee of the Pharisees.
And he goes down through that list and says, all of that, when
it come to salvation, I count as dung. Now, I had a young man
back here around the table yesterday. He came to me a year or so ago
and said he needed to be baptized. And we found out that he thought
baptism was the way he's going to be saved. And I said, we need
to have some scriptures. We need to go to the Bible first.
And as we were talking, I asked him, how did you get into this
world? Was it by your own production?
He said, no. And then when we talk about regeneration,
we find out in the scriptures that it is the Spirit of God
that gives us that rich blessing. And we have nothing to do with
it. We are recipients. We're like an empty cup. And
God comes along with His Spirit and pours His Spirit into us.
And by that, we have the new birth. Well, here we have the
Apostle Peter dealing with some really Harsh people because he
tells them the truth about their very life. He said you have taken
the Lord of glory and Crucified him He made them understand from
a physical standpoint, and we're looking at and find out that
3,000 of them understood from a spiritual standpoint that it
was they that crucified the Lord. Now, they didn't hammer the nails
in His hands or His feet. But they were there crying, crucify
him, crucify him. And we find that that whole scenario
is summed up in the book of Romans when it says we're naturally
enmity with God. That's our natural tendency is
enmity with God, and we need that taken care of. Well, beginning
in the book of Acts chapter 2, beginning with verse 34, let's
read here just a little bit. Acts chapter 2, verse 34. David
is not ascended. Where did the Apostle Peter go
to to have proof texts about what he's preaching? He went
to the book of Joel and he went to the book of the Psalms. He's
using the Old Testament One reason is that is all they had Second
reason is Christ is there And thirdly, those prophets of old
preach Christ from the Old Testament, the Messiah, the soon coming
one. I like what Brother Mike had
to say. We just keep repeating it. Someone's coming. Old Testament. Someone's coming. The Messiah
is coming. The promised one is coming. The
one who can take care of the problem is coming. And while
he was here, someone is here. And you know what? He was not
very popular. In fact, he was so unpopular
that they crucified him. That's how popular he was. He
was treated like a common thief. And if it wasn't for the grace
of God and the mercy of God, he'd have been thrown out in
a pile of other dead bodies and would have never been taken care
of. But God took care of him and had a man come up and say,
I beg his body, I'll put it in my tomb. And that's where he
was placed. Alright, David is not ascended
into the heavens, but he saith himself the Lord said unto my
Lord Sit down my right hand until I've made thy foes thy footstool
Already prophesied in the Old Testament that the work of Christ
on the cross is successful he came on purpose to succeed on
purpose on the cross and Therefore let all the house of Israel know
assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus Now most of these
that he's speaking to knew Jesus of Nazareth He'd been in and
around Jerusalem He'd been in Galilee, he had been in the area
around there, and he has a lot of fame around him. If you could
have the same person that we read here going around and healing
all your family, and raising the dead, and providing food
for everybody that needed to have food that day, if you knew
about that, you'd find out his notoriety was quite prominent. And his notoriety was quite prominent. He had healed. He had raised
the dead. He provided food. He had stilled
the waters. He had... It just goes on and
on. And He did that to demonstrate
that He is God. He is God the Son and He is the
Son of God. So we have not let you know He's
more than Jesus of Nazareth. Most people understood that he
was Jesus of Nazareth and had very little respect for him.
In fact, they had great abhorrence for him from a natural state
because he said he was the Messiah. And you know what? He is. It
takes the grace of God to believe the word of God. He is more than
Jesus of Nazareth. It tells us there, God hath made
that same Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ. My goodness, the world fell in
on him. God has done this. God has made
this same Jesus. Whom ye crucified, both Lord
and Christ. He is the ruler of all things,
and he's the Messiah that was promised from the very beginning.
And they were unable to see that in their flesh. We're going to
read about 3,000 of them who were going to be able to see
that in the Spirit, though. God's going to work a wonderful
blessing there. And out of how many thousands
were gathered together, 3,000 were saved that day. Goes on
to tell us, now when they heard this, They were pricked in their
hearts and said unto Peter and unto the rest of the apostles,
men and brethren, what shall we do? Now that's just as common
as rain for a natural man to say, what shall we do? We find that that's what Jesus
dealt with when he was preaching. We find that's what Peter dealt
with when he was preaching. We're going to find out that
that's what Paul was dealing with when he was preaching, that
people come out and say, what must I do? And they approached
Jesus one day and said, what good works can we do that we
would do the work of God? He said, this is the work of
God that you believe. Now that work is belief. God
gives us. We can't produce that. So the
work of God, we can't do it. But thanks be unto God, through
the preaching of the gospel, He saves those that He had their
names written down in the Lamb's Book of Life. He saves those
that believe. Now He's going to tell them here,
men and brethren, what shall we do? Peter's going to bring
up the subject of repent. We've gone over this a little
bit, but I just want to restate a little bit. Judas repented,
but the word that is used there is he was sorry he got caught. He sold Jesus for 30 pieces of
silver. And by that, I mean he sold,
he said, I will identify him. It's very interesting that those,
the high priests and the chief priests and all those folks could
not identify him in a crowd. But Judas said, I will identify
him. What will you give me for it?
They bartered back and forth, you know My dad I used to watch
him. They'd start out guy one at 80.
He'd say how about 40? Then there's oh, how about 70?
Oh, how about 50 and they're bartering back and forth? I can
just see Judas and those priests doing this very thing and they
finally settled on that 30 pieces of silver which was the price
of a slave and And Judas said, I will identify
him with a kiss. And he did. Now, when that happened,
Jesus asked those folks, who are you seeking? And they, he
said, they said, Jesus of Nazareth. And he said, I am. The he has
been supplied by the translators. He, I am. Am that takes us right
back to the book of Exodus when God was speaking out of the burning
bush He said tell the children of Israel. I am that I am hath
sent you So here we have the I am the Lord Jesus Christ. I mean now he was in complete
control They could not take him without permission when he granted
permission. He's taken off He has tried You
can talk all you want to about how unfair that trial was and
how innocent he was and how guilty he was found. You can talk all
you want to. But the purpose of God was fulfilled that day
when they said crucify him because that was determined in the council
halls of eternity that this son would be crucified, put to death
on the behalf of God's people, the sheep of his pasture. So
he was. Peter said unto them, Repent. Now that word means have a change
of mind. We find out that the scriptures
teach us so plainly that that kind of repentance is granted
by God. We don't get it ourselves. We
may repent in our natural state, but it is always because we're
sorry we got caught. Now, when we repent in our spiritual
state, that's supplied by God, and that means I have a change
of mind, a change of heart, a change of attitude about Jesus of Nazareth. We could go through our whole
life and only know him as Jesus of Nazareth. But by the grace
of God, when He grants us repentance, we have a mind now that recognize
Him as the Son of God. What was it that Peter said about
the Lord Jesus? He tells us there, Jesus asked
him, whom do you say that I am? And you know, he'd already asked,
what do the people say? Well, there's all kinds of conflicting
answers about that, and they're ridiculous. They didn't believe
in reincarnation. But here they are saying, oh,
we think you're John the Baptist. We think you're one of the prophets
that have come back. How ridiculous. How ridiculous
religious people, me included, will answer the things about
God. No, we just make mistake after mistake because we can't
see Him for who He is. Jesus asked Peter, who do you
say that I am? And Peter said, thou art the
Christ. You're more than Jesus of Nazareth. Thou art the Christ. You're the
Messiah, the son of the living God. And Jesus answered him so
clearly about where this all came from. He said, flesh and
blood did not reveal that unto you. Now, flesh and blood may
reveal unto us, eat your green beans. Flesh and blood may tell
us not to go there. Flesh and blood may tell us to
do this. But when it comes to spiritual things, we find out
we can't get there from here, we don't have the capacity, we're
fallen in Adam, and he also took away our, will fell with us. So when he said, flesh and blood
did not reveal this unto you, but my father which is in heaven,
And we say, that's the same for everyone else. Flesh and blood
does not show that to us. Now we may read it in the scripture,
the preacher may preach it, but for us to really understand it,
to go beyond Jesus of Nazareth, born of Mary, stepfather Joseph,
here's his brothers, isn't that what they said? Is not this the
carpenter's son? That's as far as they could get with it. They
knew him from a physical standpoint, but he is the Christ, the son
of the living God. And Peter says, repent. Now this
word repent means if you are touched by God, you're going
to come up and confess Jesus Christ as more than Jesus of
Nazareth. He will be your life. He will
be your hope. He will be your sanctification.
He will be your redemption. He will be your all in all. Everything that God has ever
said, He will be it for your spiritual life. Now, if you're
still going back to a Jesus of Nazareth, a human estimation
of the Son of God, then you don't have what Jesus used through
Peter, repentance. That repentance is so special,
but in it, we find out we are trusting the Lord completely
and totally for our salvation. Now, keep your place right there
and turn with me, if you would, to the book of 1 Thessalonians
for just a moment. 1 Thessalonians chapter 1. 1st
Thessalonians chapter 1 the Apostle Paul is led by the Holy Spirit
to show us an example of what repentance is This is repentance
that God gives We can't do this on our own We will never ever
give up our idols on our own We are so needy To be able to
do that and here it tells us in the book of first Thessalonians
chapter 1 and verse 9 For they themselves show of us what manner
of entering in we had among you Not in word only But in power
Power of the Holy Spirit. He said what manner of entering
in we had with you and how ye What does it say? Turned to God. From what? If I have been turned
to God, what did I leave? Well, he goes on to say, you've
turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God. Well,
what is our main idol? We've been looking at that in
the book of Judges, and we find out that that idol, Baal, has
just permeated Israel, but it's also among the Midianites, the
Hittites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, every one of those guys are worshiping
the same thing. And it entered in among Israel.
What does that mean? Well, Baal is the god of fertility. And you know what they're telling
us right there? I'm depending on my idol for my spiritual life. That's how I am made alive. And there is no life in an idol.
Jesus Christ is the only place that we get spiritual life. You must be born again. So they
had turned to God from idols. Their idols were removed. They
have a, well, I remember Pastor who brought me the gospel he
said someone came up to him after he preached He said you've made
Jesus an idol, and he said you've given me the best compliment.
I think I've ever had in my preaching turn Jesus into the object of
worship and Not this or this or this church or affiliation
or baptism well Peter goes on let's go back over there to the
book of Acts chapter 2 and Acts chapter 2. Peter, the apostle,
has preached the message of grace. He's preached the Lord Jesus.
He's preached the three R's. You're ruined by the fall, redeemed by the Lamb, and regenerated
by the Holy Spirit. And here they asked this question,
chapter two there, verses 37, is it? They were pricked in their
heart and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles.
Now, 11 other preachers are preaching that same day. And it must have
been that the same question came up with all the rest of them.
What shall we do? What shall we do? Then Peter said unto them, repent.
You must have this repentance that's granted by God so that
you will have a change of mind about Jesus of Nazareth. It's
more than just a man walking on this earth. He is the son
of God. You must have him as the son
of God. You must have the Christ, the
son of the living God. It is a totally new view of God. I remember going through the
Bible before the Lord saved me, and you know, most of the time,
the only place I could stop and read it and make sense out of
it was a story. Jericho, David and Goliath, creation,
Noah and the ark. You know, you can make some sense
out of that. Most people could if they had any idea about the
Bible, but you never saw the living life in those accounts. You never saw the Lord Jesus
in his great work of grace in those accounts. And so when the
Lord saves us, we have a totally new view of the Bible. We have
a totally new view about God. He is sovereign. He is high and
lifted up, and you won't argue about it. We have a totally new
view about Christ. He's the Son of God, the Redeemer,
and we won't have an argument about it. We have a totally new
view about sin. Yes, I am the chiefest of sinners. I am a sinner from the very beginning.
I came forth from my mother's womb speaking lies. I am a sinner
by nature, a sinner by practice, and a sinner by choice. I didn't
want to admit that in my old life, but I must admit that now. And Jesus Christ came for sinners. And then we have a different
view of heaven. Oh, the old view was, you know,
if I work hard, even if I've made a profession of faith, I
am going to be better off than many because I have been more
faithful. I've got those positions. Oh, well, then we find out, you
know, there's only one place in the kingdom, and that is every
one that God ever saves gets to sit next to Jesus in eternity. He is our Lord and our Master.
In some way, we're going to get there and sit with Him in the
kingdom. We're going to sit with Him for
eternity. We're going to be in His presence singing songs of
praise to Him. There's not going to be any big
eyes and little youths. There's not going to be the Pharisaic
attitude that says, I thank you, God, that I'm better than other
men. We find in the Old Testament
that holier-than-thou attitude. He strips us of that. We find
out we're nothing more than publicans and sinners, and we have this
message in our heart. God, be merciful to me, a sinner. May you have propitiated for
me. That man went down to his house
justified, it tells us. So Peter preached there, repent.
And then he says something here, and be baptized every one of
you. Now I was reading about this verse of scripture. It's
one of the most controversial scriptures in the Bible. Now
I am convinced that if you're prone to believing that works,
any works, part works, part of your salvation, you're going
to tell me that you had to be baptized to be saved. If you
have been saved by the grace of God, and you have confessed
Christ, and He is your Savior, and you know Him as Jesus Christ
the Righteous, Jesus the Son of God, Jesus Christ the Son
of God, then we'll look at this and find out nowhere in Scripture
is baptism ever part of salvation. It comes afterward. It is a,
well, in the Old Testament, there were many ordinances, many sacrifices. Under the new covenant in gospel
time, our time, there are two, and neither one of them are efficacious. They're both pictorial. Baptism
pictures for us the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
It is an answer of a good conscience towards God. Now, if it is necessary,
why do we read? Turn with me, if you would, to
1 Corinthians 1. 1 Corinthians 1, the Apostle Paul was told
to write this down. Verse 14, the Apostle Paul, a great preacher
of grace, but he would put himself right up there with the thief
on the cross. Do you know he was a preacher
of grace? Defund the cross. Remember me when you enter into
your kingdom. I'm a nothing. You're an everything. Remember me. And Jesus said,
today thou shall be with me in paradise. All right. First Corinthians
chapter one, verse 14, the apostle Paul, this is what he thought
about the importance of baptism for our salvation. I thank God
that I baptized none of you. but Crispus and Gaius, lest any
should say that I have baptized in my own name. And I baptized
also the house of Stephanus, besides, oh no, not whether I
baptized any other." You know, if it was so important, the apostle
Paul says, well, we need to get this to happen. But he said,
I did not, I was not sent to baptize. I was sent to preach
the gospel. Now, the result of preaching
the gospel, there is this, God has said, just as Peter did,
be baptized. You know, baptism puts us in
an element that we are not familiar with. I had a little brother or older
brother drowned because he spent too much time in the water. It
is a perilous thing. to be in water and not have any
help if we can't swim. But here we are totally dependent
upon someone else. When we're put into that water
of baptism, what a statement it makes about the Lord Jesus.
We are totally dependent upon the Lord Jesus Christ for our
salvation. And we're going to be put into
an element that we're not familiar with, and that is the spirit
working in us. We're not used to that. We're
not used to that. You know, before we were born,
where were we? We were in water. Then take a
breath. And in that condition, everything
we needed was supplied. And in Christ, everything that
we need is supplied. We're not dependent upon ourself
for anything. We're in an element that is beyond
our capacity. We've been placed in the spirit
of God. That's what Peter's gonna go
on and say. We've been made a new creature in Christ Jesus. We
have the spirit of God leading us. And it is an element that
we are not familiar with in our standard religious life. It takes the new birth, and we
find out then we are absolutely dependent upon the Lord Jesus
Christ for everything. He does not allow us to supply
one thing. So as we're taken, it's never
a part of salvation. It is always after we're born
again, after we're saved. The Lord Jesus never asked his
disciples, which when he gave them the commission that they
should baptize only, they should only baptize those who believed.
Baptism would be a declaration made before that would have the
person embrace Jesus as their Messiah. Now, when he talks to
this whole group of people that have been Jews, and they've had
this view about Jesus of Nazareth only, that He is just a human
being and He causes a lot of trouble. I've been so happy going up there
to the temple and doing my thing and worshiping God in my way.
And he comes along and says, that's not anything. You don't
get anything out of that. You have to be born again before
you can appreciate anything about God. And that just bugged them
to no end. In fact, it bugged them so much
they said, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him. Now we have
that whole group of people right in front of him and he's talking
to them and he says, repent and be baptized. You know, That was
something they were never gonna go through. What did that mean
if they were baptized? You know, there were several
times, it tells us in the scriptures, that the priest said, are you
also one of them? Are you one of them? Man, no
way. Nope, nope, nope. I'm certainly
not one of those. But it took the grace of God
for them to say, Peter, I've been born again. I must needs
be baptized. In the name, and he says the
name of Jesus. Over in the book of Matthew,
he uses the three. Well, I think, my own personal
opinion, that when it came time, because they were not baptized
right now, it's going to be a little bit later in this chapter, but
I personally believe that when it came time for their baptism,
they were baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Ghost. But when he points out to them,
you must be baptized in the name of Jesus, there's going to be
some of these folks that have listened to him preach the gospel
are going to shy away. You know what it meant for them
to be baptized? They were kicked out of their
families. They were no longer welcome down at the temple. They
lost their jobs. It was a serious, serious thing
for them to be baptized. And only those that God had regenerated
would ever go through with it. You know, when I grew up, we
heard those messages, count the cost, count the cost. You need
to count the cost. You know what? When God is dealing
with us and saves us, it doesn't matter who or what, what job,
which family member disagrees with us, we could care less. Because we have Christ He'll
take the point with us. So he brought that up baptism
was it's a private embrace of Repentance and and faith and
it's a public embrace that baptism. I'm declaring to the world that
that I believe that Jesus is more than Jesus of Nazareth. I believe in my heart, through
repentance granted to me by the Father, that He is the Son of
God. He is the Savior of His people.
He is the Shepherd of His sheep. He is the One that has been promised
throughout eternity. He is the Redeemer set aside
in the covenant of grace. Baptism is not for salvation. It's to declare that we have
already been saved. Now, in our day and time, it's
just old hat. I was down there in North Carolina,
and Betty Rivenbark's next-door neighbor was talking to me about
her church, and she said, next Sunday, we're baptizing 150 people.
150 well on this day they baptized
3,000 but you know the way she put it it's just it's part of
getting into our church it's part of our religious ceremonies
and it is not a religious ceremony it is a declaration a declaration
that I know Jesus more than just Jesus of Nazareth and it is commanded
by God to everyone that believes. It is an answer of a good conscience
toward God. And then, if we look back with
me here to the book of Acts again, Acts chapter 2. In Acts chapter
2, we find out in Acts chapter 2 and verse 39, Now this is part of a quote from
the book of Joel. He says, for the promise is unto
you and to your children and to all that are far off, even
as many as the Lord our God shall call. Now that call of God must
be involved in this. We have to be called. I love
when I read in the scriptures, here's a man over here collecting
taxes, Matthew. He's collecting taxes. Jesus
come up and said, follow me. You know what he did? The voice
of the Lord was so powerful in his innermost being that Matthew
left the seat of receipt of taxes and followed him. with no reservations
and no regrets. That's what God does for His
people. He calls us with a holy calling. And it is irrevocable. It is unchangeable. It will not
be taken away. And God's people will respond
to it in such a way that they will say, I never regret being
called out of darkness to His marvelous light. I never regret
that God came upon me. Now, at that moment, I was so
put out by the man who preached it, and I was so put out by God's
means of salvation, and that's grace alone. But when he caused
me to repent and see Jesus as more than Jesus of Nazareth,
but he's the Son of God, I followed. And that's what he does. He's
still doing that very thing. He's calling his people out of
darkness to his marvelous light. to as many as the Lord our God
shall call." Now, notice in the previous verse, we didn't quite
finish on it. We just want to go back there.
It says in the latter part of that, in the name of Jesus Christ
for the remission of sins, and you know, that's a verse that
has been wrangled over for centuries, for the remission of sins. You
know, we're not baptized for the remission of sins. We are
baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ because
of the forgiveness of sins. That should have been how it
was translated, because of the forgiveness of sins. So, because
of the forgiveness of sins, you are baptized the promises to
you and all that should the Lord our God should call and With
many other words did he testify and exhort save yourselves from
this untoward generation So this preaching goes on we don't have
the record of it, but the preaching goes on There's other words that
he's going to give and when it was over 3,000 out of that host of people that
they had preached to that day, came and said, I believe he's
more than Jesus of Nazareth. I believe, as Peter said, thou
art the Christ, the Son of the living God. What a change took
place in their hearts. They were given a new heart.
They were given a heart to confess the Lord Jesus. They were given
a heart that was revealed by the Father. They're given a heart
to believe that the blood of Christ is their redemption. They
were given a heart, much more than being now justified by His
blood. They were justified by His blood.
His blood is the thing. And then over there in the book
of Revelation, it says they were washed in His blood. And what
did they come out? white, clean, clear. The blood of Christ cleanseth
us from all sin. So the preaching continues. We'll
pick this up next time, Lord, will we? But the preaching of
the gospel continues, and he's preaching to them, ruined by
the fall, redeemed by Christ, regenerated by the Holy Spirit,
and this is extended to all that the Lord our God should call. Brother Mike.