Let us open our Bibles tonight
to Acts. Acts chapter 3. Acts chapter 3. And I'm going
to bring my message tonight from the last verse in this chapter.
Verse 26, unto you first God, having raised up his son Jesus,
sent him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his
iniquities. I'm going to speak from that
verse, but let's read the entire chapter beginning with verse
1. Now Peter and John went up together
into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. And a certain man lame from his
mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of
the temple, which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered
into the temple. 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. And he gave heed
unto them, expecting to receive something of them. Then Peter
said, silver and gold have I none, but such as I have, give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth, rise up and walk. And he took him by the right
hand and lifted him up. And immediately his feet and
ankle bones received strength. And he, leaping up, stood and
walked and entered with them into the temple. walking and
leaping and praising God. And all the people saw him walking
and praising God, and they knew that it was he which sat for
alms at the beautiful gate of the temple. And they were filled
with wonder and amazement at that which had happened unto
him. And as the lame man which was healed held Peter and John,
all the people ran together unto them in the porch which is called
Solomon's, greatly wondering. And when Peter saw it, he answered
unto the people, Ye men of Israel, why marvel you at this? Or why
look you so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or
holiness we had made this man to walk? The God of Abraham and
of Isaac and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified
his son Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied him in the presence
of Pilate when he was determined to let him go. But you denied
the Holy One and the just and desired a murderer to be granted
unto you. and killed the prince of life,
whom God hath raised from the dead, whereof we are witnesses. And his name, through faith in
his name, hath made this man strong, whom you see and know. Yea, the faith which is by him
hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all. And
now, brethren, I want that through ignorance you did it, as did
also your rulers. But those things which God before
had showed by the mouth of all his prophets, that Christ should
suffer, he hath so fulfilled. Repent you therefore, and be
converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times
of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord. And
he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you,
whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution
of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his
holy prophets since the world began. For Moses truly said unto
the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto
you of your brethren, like unto me. Him shall you hear in all
things whatsoever He shall say unto you. And it shall come to
pass that every soul which will not hear that prophet shall be
destroyed from among the people. Yea, and all the prophets from
Samuel and those that follow after, as many as have spoken,
have likewise foretold of these days. You are the children of
the prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers,
saying unto Abraham, and in thy seed shall all the kindreds of
the earth be blessed. unto you first God having raised
up his son Jesus sent him to bless you in turning away every
one of you from his iniquities. I began looking at this verse
last week after reading the blessing that God gave Moses for Aaron
the high priest to pronounce upon the nation of Israel. He was to pronounce this blessing,
the scripture says, on this wise you shall bless the children
of Israel, saying unto them, this is what God said to Moses,
you tell Aaron, your brother, the high priest, this is what
he is to say. The Lord bless thee and keep
thee. The Lord make his face to shine
upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The Lord lift up His countenance
upon thee and give thee peace. In that blessing, as I looked
at it, my thought was everything that a person could possibly
want or need is contained in that blessing. There's nothing
left out. Everything that any person, I
don't care who he or she is, could possibly ever desire is
all contained in that blessing. Aaron, the high priest, he was
typical of our great high priest, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he
could only say, this is what caught my eye, he could only
say the blessing, Aaron, and the high priest that followed
after him through the history of that nation. They could only
say that blessing. It's a beautiful blessing. But
the high priest himself could not actually bless anyone. He
had to say, the Lord bless thee, the Lord bless thee, the Lord
bless thee. But look to our text tonight.
Unto you first God, having raised up his son Jesus Christ, sent
him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his iniquities. God did not send His Son into
the world to say or to pronounce a blessing, but to bless. That's what the verse tells us.
Remember, our Lord Himself said this in John chapter 3. For God
sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that
the world through Him might be saved. Now I have three points
for us tonight from this verse of Scripture. First, consider
the you. The you in this verse. Unto you. Consider the you of this text
as it demonstrates God's grace. God's grace. Who does the Apostle
Peter mean when he says you? Unto you. Well, look above in
verses 12 and 13. We read this just a moment ago.
He said this to them. Peter saw it. He answered unto
the people, You men of Israel, why marvel you at this? Or why
look you so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or
holiness we had made this man to walk? The God of Abraham,
of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified
his son Jesus. And notice Here are the you. You men of Israel. Here are the you. Unto you. This is what Peter said, unto
you. First God, having raised up His
Son, Jesus Christ, sent Him to bless you. Who are the you? Well, they are the men of Israel
who delivered up and denied the Lord Jesus Christ. They are those
who denied the Holy One, the Just One, that is Jesus Christ
our Lord. And notice they desired a murderer. When Pilate, as Peter says, he
was determined to free the Lord Jesus Christ. He knew that He
was brought to Him because of the envy and the malice of the
high priest. He was determined to let Him
go. But Peter says, You, You desired, You delivered up the
Just One, the Holy One. You desired a murderer to be
released unto You. And that Christ, the Just One,
the Holy One, be crucified. If you look back to Acts chapter
1, just a minute, Acts chapter 1 and verse 8, I know we're familiar
with the words of our Lord here when He spoke to His disciples
just before He ascended back into heaven. He said, but you,
Acts 1 and verse 8, but you shall receive power after that the
Holy Ghost has come upon you and you shall be witnesses unto
me. Now where does he begin? Where
are they to begin? In Jerusalem, in the very place
and to the very people who had cried out, crucify him, crucify
him. This is where you are to begin. And Peter says, unto you, unto
you, you men of Israel, who delivered up the just one and desired a
murderer to be released unto you, begin at Jerusalem, begin
to preach, to witness to the very ones who had delivered up
and denied and cried for the crucifixion of his son. John
Bunyan, in his writings, he speaks about, he uses this term, the
Jerusalem sinner. The Jerusalem sinner. And by
that he meant the vilest of the vile. A Jerusalem sinner. A man, a woman, who was actually
involved in the crucifixion of the Holy One, the Just One, the
Son of God. Does this not speak to us of
God's grace? God's grace? God's purpose of
grace includes some of the vilest of sinners. No one, no one, I
don't care who he is, No one, because of his sin, should ever
judge himself beyond the saving power of the Lord Jesus Christ. Beyond the grace of the Lord
God Almighty. I don't care how vile a person
is, how sinful, how depraved a person may be. No one should
ever judge themselves beyond the grace of God. His unmerited
favor. He saved the chief of sinners.
Remember that. Right off the bat. Right off
the bat, He saved the chief of sinners, didn't He? Saul of Tarsus. So that now for the last two
thousand years or so, men have been able to preach just what
I finished saying. The vilest of the vile. Look
to Christ. Unto you. That's what Peter said.
Unto you. You Jerusalem sinners! Look with
me in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, just a moment, and then we'll
come back here. But in 1 Corinthians chapter
6, now Corinth was a very wicked city. It was a very wicked, a
pagan city. In fact, there was a phrase to
Corinthianize a person was to make that person even more sinful. And notice as Paul's writing
to this church in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, beginning with verse
9, he said, Know you not that the unrighteous shall not inherit
the kingdom of God? Be not deceived, neither fornicators,
nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of
themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, Nor drunkards,
nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of
God. And such were some of you." Not all of them. Not all of them,
I'm sure. And none of them probably were
guilty of all of those sins that he listed there. But what we
see is unto you, that is unto you, Jerusalem sinners. God saves sinners of all types,
doesn't he? He saves some in their youth,
he saves some who are older, he saves some who are educated,
some who are uneducated, some who are rich, some who are poor.
The grace of God. extends, doesn't it, to all of
God's people, no matter where they may be. Unto you. So, notice back in our text tonight,
we know, we know from the Scriptures, from the book of Acts, that many,
a large number of these Jerusalem sinners were saved. Unto you
first, the Apostle Peter said. If you look in Acts chapter 2,
you're familiar with this, but Acts chapter 2 on the day of
Pentecost, verse 41. Then they that gladly received
his word were baptized, and the same day there were added unto
them three thousand souls. That's three thousand of these
Jerusalem sinners. Alright, look also in chapter
4 of Acts, verses 1 through 4. And as they spake unto the people,
the priest and the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees
came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people,
and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead. And
they laid hands on them, and put them in hold until the next
day. For it was now even time, howbeit,
howbeit, many, Many of them which heard the word believed, and
the number of the men was about 5,000." That's 8,000 souls in
just a day or two that were saved, these Jerusalem sinners. So when Peter in our text tonight
says, unto you, who's he talking to? He's talking to men and women,
no doubt, who had denied the Holy One, delivered Him up to
be crucified. But notice also they're identified
in verse 25, ye, this is who he's talking to, not only are
they identified as those who had denied the Holy One and the
just and desired a murderer, but you are the children of the
prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers,
saying unto Abraham, and in thy seed shall all the kindreds of
the earth be blessed. The you were the children of
the prophets, of the prophets and the fathers with whom God
made a covenant. In his seed, in thy seed, Abraham,
in thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Christ
is Abraham's seed in whom all of Abraham's spiritual seed are
blessed. Now he took Abraham out into
the night and told him to look up into the sky. Can you just
picture how many stars he saw that night? How many stars? Oh, millions, no doubt. His spiritual
seed includes both Jew and Gentiles. And so the book of Acts begins
with mainly Jews being saved until Acts chapter 13. You remember
it is in Acts 13. Let's look there just a moment.
When the Gentiles came together to hear the word in Antioch of
Pisidia, It says, and the next Sabbath,
verse 44, Paul preached the gospel. My,
look at verse 38 and 39. Inside the synagogue, this is
what he preached. Be it known unto you, therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you
the forgiveness of sins, and by him all that believe are justified
from all things, from which you could not be justified by the
law of Moses. Now in that synagogue there were
Jews, of course, but there were also proselytes. And in verse
42 it said, and when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue,
the Gentiles, here's the Gentiles, besought that these words might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. We want to hear this
message. We want our friends. We want
our neighbors. We want our kinfolks to hear
this message that we just heard. that by this man all who believe
are justified from all things, from which you could never be
justified by the law of Moses. And when the Jews were gone out
of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now, when the congregation
was broken up, many of the Jews and religious proselytes followed
Paul in Barnabas who, speaking to them, persuaded them to continue
in the grace of God. And the next Sabbath, a week
later, came almost the whole city together
to hear the Word of God. And most of these were Gentiles,
the whole city. But when the Jews saw the multitudes,
they were filled with envy and spake against those things which
were spoken by Paul. They spoke against the gospel,
didn't they? That's what Paul was speaking.
He was preaching the gospel. They spoke against the gospel,
contradicting and blaspheming. Now notice, then Paul and Barnabas
waxed bold and said, it was necessary that the word of God should first
We have that in our text, don't we? First have been spoken to
you, you Jews, but seeing you put it from you and judge yourselves
unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded
us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that
thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And
when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified
the word of the Lord, and as many as were ordained to eternal
life believed. So the you of our text, first
of all, were those who had denied the just one. They were the children
of the fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, with whom God had
made that covenant. In your seed shall all the nations
of the earth be blessed. So the first part of the book
of Acts Many, many Jews were saved. But from Acts 13 on to
the end, we see Gentiles, many Gentiles being saved. So let's
look back at our text. You. Unto you first. Now I want us to look at these
two words, unto you first God, having raised up his son Jesus,
his son Jesus. Now, I want us to think about
this. The word you, I wanted that to
illustrate to us the grace of God. Do we see that? I mean the vilest of the vile,
to you, to those who crucified the Son of God, God's grace. We don't ever get over that,
do we? God's grace. It's amazing grace. It's marvelous
grace. Grace abounding to the chief
of sinners. But now, I want us to see these
two words, the name, His Son, Jesus, as it demonstrates God's
faithfulness. The sending of His Son, Jesus,
fulfilled a number of Old Testament prophecies, beginning with in
the Garden of Eden, the seed of the woman, and all the way
through. Notice it says in verse 18, But those things which God
before had showed by the mouth of all, all His prophets, all
of His prophets, they spoke of Him, of Christ, How many times have we pointed
this out, and yet it does us good to hear it again. The message
of the Bible is Christ. It's a hymn book. And men make
a big mistake, a big mistake, when they use the Word of God
to teach a number of various things that may be good and fine,
but the message of the Bible is Christ. Christ and Him crucified. All the holy prophets, Peter
said, they've all spoke of Him. From the beginning of the world.
Many prophecies. And Peter gives them one prophecy
that was a very well-known prophecy to all of them in verses 22 and
23. And this is found, of course,
in Deuteronomy chapter 18. For Moses truly said unto the
fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you
of your brethren, like unto me. Moses said, God's going to raise
up a prophet from your brethren, from the nation of Israel. He's
going to be like unto me. Remember when that delegation
from Jerusalem went out to ask John the Baptist, who are you?
Who are you? One of their questions was, are
you that prophet? What prophet are they talking
about? They're talking about that prophet that was promised
who would be like unto Moses. Now, let me just give you several
ways that God's son, Jesus, was like unto Moses. First, God spoke
more intimately with Moses. The scripture says face-to-face
than any other prophet. Any other Old Testament prophet,
God spoke more intimately with Moses. Face-to-face. With his son, like Moses, God
was more intimate with his son, Jesus, who always knew and did
his father's will. A second way, God ordained Moses
to deliver his people from bondage and lead them through the wilderness. Like Moses, God ordained his
son Jesus to deliver his people from the bondage of sin and lead
us through this wilderness world. Number three, Moses was a prince
and a lawgiver. Like Moses, God's son, Jesus,
is the prince of princes, the king of kings, and he is the
lawgiver to his church. He gave us two commands, didn't
he? The command of baptism, go you
into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature,
whosoever believeth and is baptized shall be saved, whosoever believeth
not shall be damned, He gave His church that command and also
He gave us the command of the Lord's Supper. This do in remembrance
of me, like Moses. Moses was a prince and a law
giver. Fourth, Moses was faithful as
a servant in building the tabernacle. I mean, God gave him the exact
dimensions and instructions of that tabernacle, didn't he? Had
to be built exactly, made exactly. The materials used, everything
had to be done exactly like God told Moses. And in the book of
Hebrews, we are told that he was faithful as a servant in
building that tabernacle. Well, like Moses, God's son,
Jesus, is faithful in building His temple. This spiritual temple,
this temple of which every believer is a stone, a rock in this tabernacle. And number five, Moses, like
Moses died alone upon the mountain. Like Moses, God's son Jesus died
alone, forsaken of God upon the mountain, Mount Calvary. Now, before I go to the third
point, I want to say this. We must be impressed. We must
be impressed with the boldness and the certainty with which
Peter preaches. You know, early on in the Gospels,
Peter, he confessed, Thou art the Christ, the Son of God. But
it seems that with the other disciples, when Christ died,
when Jesus died on the cross, they lost hope. Because we know
two of them on the road to Emmaus, they told the Lord, they did
not recognize Him, but they told Him this. We trusted that it
should have been He which should have redeemed Israel. We trusted
that Him, Christ, it should have been
He which should have redeemed Israel. But you notice now after
His resurrection it is no more we trusted that it should have
been Him. No, He is. He is risen from the
dead and we are witnesses of His resurrection. He speaks emphatically
assuredly, dogmatically, unto you first, God having raised
up his son Jesus, send him to bless you, to bless you. And that's my third point. Consider
the blessing the text speaks to us of. And this demonstrates
God's goodness. We've seen God's grace, God's
faithfulness, God's goodness. God, unto you first, God having
raised up his son Jesus, send him to bless you. There are many
deceived people who believe that God sent His Son Jesus to bless
people with health and wealth, and that's all they're interested
in. But Peter didn't say anything here about God sending His Son
to bless you with health or wealth. No, no. But what he did say,
he sent him to bless you in turning away every one of you from his
iniquities. You know, at one time, I think
Peter himself thought that the blessings of the Messiah's kingdom
would be material because he wanted to sit on the right hand
or the left hand in the kingdom. that he thought the prince would
set up in this world. But now, now, after the death,
after the resurrection, after the coming of the Holy Spirit
upon him, Peter sees, Peter knows, Peter preaches that the blessing
that God sent his son to bless you is a spiritual blessing. It has nothing to do with wealth,
health, and the things of this world. Now, God does bless us. There's no question about it
with those things. I would not deny that. But if
that's all a person is interested in, they're going to be, sadly,
deceived, they are sadly deceived because the blessings of Christ
that God sent his son to bless us with are spiritual blessings. They have to do with sin, have
to do with iniquities, have to do with transgressions. God,
look at the text, unto you first God having raised up his son
Jesus sent him to bless you in turning away every one of you
from his iniquities. Turning us away from our iniquities
involves two things, two things. First, he had to pardon, he had
to purchase, rather, our pardon. To turn us away from our iniquities,
he had to purchase a pardon for our iniquities, for our sins.
Keep your place here, but look back to Psalm 32 just a moment. Psalm 32, and Paul quotes these
verses in the letter of Romans in showing how that God justifies
by faith. But here in Psalm 32, blessed
is he whose transgression is forgiven. Now God sent his son
to bless you and turning everyone away from his iniquity. To do
that, first of all, he had to purchase our pardon. Now this
word here, blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, that
word forgiven literally means lifted up. Lifted up. Reminding us that God lifted
the sins of his people and laid them upon Christ. The substitute. Blessed is he whose transgression
is forgiven. Blessed is whose sin, rather,
is covered. Now that word covered, of course,
means atonement, doesn't it? Remember that mercy seat? It
covered the law. The law which we had broken.
The law which cried out for our destruction. the wrath of God
upon us for breaking that holy law of God, but the mercy seat
covered that. He's a cover for us, right? In
Him we're safe from the justice of God. And notice the next verse,
blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Every one of those things, transgression,
sin, and iniquity. God sent His Son to bless you
in turning everyone away from His iniquity. Now, I said to
do this, two things are involved. First of all, He had to purchase
pardon for us. But second, He must apply pardon
to us. We call this turning. This is
the word He used, right? To turn. In turning away every
one of you from his iniquities. This is what is referred to as
conversion, isn't it? Conversion. The turning. And
I'll ask you to turn to one other place before I finish. 1 Thessalonians chapter 1. Because
here we have an outline or example of what is meant by turning. Conversion. 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 and beginning
with verse 2. We give thanks to God always
for you all, making mention of you in our prayers, remembering
without ceasing your work of faith and labor of love and patience
of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the sight of God and our Father,
knowing, brethren, beloved, your election of God For our gospel
came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the
Holy Ghost, and in much assurance, as you know what manner of men
we were among you for your sake. And you became followers of us
and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction,
with joy in the Holy Ghost. so that you were in samples or
examples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia for from
you sounded out the word of the Lord not only in Macedonia and
Achaia but also in every place your faith to God were to spread
abroad so that we need not to speak anything for they themselves
show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you and how you
turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God and to
wait for His Son from heaven. Do you notice there, first of
all, how God's Son blessed them? And this is the same for you,
if you're one of His children. First of all, He sent His Gospel
to them in power and in the Holy Ghost. Now the Gospel goes out. It's preached and it goes out.
But God sends it, God blesses it to His people, and it comes
to them in power and in the Holy Ghost. Number two, they received
the Word and followed the Lord. When the Gospel comes in power,
a person receives the Word. To as many as received Him, to
them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His name. Now they turned The gospel came
to them in power. They received the word and they
turned. They turned from their idols
to serve the true and the living God. And number four, they waited
for God's son to come from heaven. Verse 9 and 10. So God sent his son to bless
you in turning everyone from his iniquities. Has God blessed
you? Has he? Has the gospel come to
you in power and demonstration of the Holy Spirit? Have you
received the word? You received Christ. You were
born not of blood, not of the will of man, nor of the flesh,
but of God. Have you turned? Have you turned
from your idols to serve the true and living God? Are you
waiting for his son to come? God blessed you. God sent his
son to bless you. What a blessing, right? What
a blessing. I pray that the Lord would bless
these words to all of us here tonight.