So Peter's giving his sermon. He preaches the gospel.
He does quite well, but then he makes application. And that is his goal. His goal isn't to just dispense information. Dispensing information is not his goal. Getting them to transformation is his goal. He wants change to occur.
He calls a choice has to be made. Repent and be baptized. Today on Connect with Skip Heitzig, Pastor Skip examines Peter's bold preaching of the gospel on Pentecost. Now here's more about this month's resource to help you remember the sacrifice of Christian martyrs who came before you. We are witnessing an escalation in Christian persecution like we have rarely seen since the first century. Many people don't realize that today thousands of Christians are dying cruel deaths throughout much of the world. The New Book of Christian Martyrs commemorates these modern day heroes, highlighting key martyrs of past centuries and featuring stories of contemporary martyrs around the world. This compendium of heroes from the first century to the 21st century, from Europe to Africa and from Asia to the Americas is sure to inspire you to courageously stand up for your Christian faith, just as they've done for countless Christians around the globe. The New Book of Christian Martyrs comes as our thanks for your gift of $50 or more to keep messages like this one today on the air for you and others, equipping you to know God's Word and follow His will with courage and conviction. So request your copy when you give today.
Call 800-922-1888 or give securely online at connectwithskip.com slash offer. All right, now let's join Skip for today's teaching. We'll be in Acts 2. One of our biggest fears is the fear of failure. Most everyone has the fear of failing at something or failing with someone. Dream analysts even say that the most common form of dream is what they would call an anxiety dream. They are taking a test in the dream and they fail the test.
They have to get up and give a speech, and most people don't like to do that, and they're sweating in their dream. It's the fear of failing. And yet wouldn't you agree that failure is common to humanity? It's built into humanity.
We are born sinners separated from God. We need redemption, so failure is built into who we are. In fact, it is one of the most common things about us is failure. You have a long history of failure, as do I. The first time you tried to walk, you fell. You failed at walking the very first steps you took. You plopped on the ground.
You failed. The first time you jumped into a swimming pool, you almost drowned. Somebody encouraged you.
You're a little baby, a little child. They pushed you, perhaps, like they did me. My brother pushed me.
My dad caught me, but I just remember the frightening experience. I couldn't swim. I would have died unless somebody helped me in my failure.
The first time somebody threw a baseball toward me to hit, I missed. You didn't get straight into school. You didn't get straight A's in all your classes. And if you did, nobody liked you. Chances are you have let people down in your life.
You have failed. James says, we all stumble in many things. That's probably not a Bible verse you have underlined or made your life verse, but it's there. We all stumble in many things.
That's just part of human nature. At the same time, that doesn't take the sting away from our failures. Peter, and we're reading his message here in Acts chapter 2, Peter struggled with failure, spiritual failure. Jesus told Peter he would fail. Peter denied Jesus three times. The last time Peter denied Jesus, Luke tells us, and Jesus looked at Peter, and then Peter went out and wept bitterly.
I don't know what kind of a look it was. I can only guess it was a sympathetic look of great love that when Peter saw he understood, he realized what he had done to this one who loved him so much, and he went out and he wept bitterly. But at the same time, Peter's failure was a great hinge in his life.
It was a fulcrum for greater usability. Jesus said he would be used again. Jesus predicted that he would be strengthened again. He would be restored. And now we're reading about that same Peter, the failure, who preaches the first sermon, the one we're reading in Acts chapter 2. He will be the one who will lead the first Gentile to Christ, Cornelius.
He'll oversee the work and the spread of the gospel up into Samaria. I struggled with failure. I remember when my brother died, I felt the burden of his death on me for this reason. I felt like I had failed to lead him to Christ. I just felt so guilty that I could have done more, could have tried harder, could have shared other truths, wasn't a great witness, failed to lead him to make a commitment to Christ, and now it was over.
It was over. But failure is something that the Lord wants to use to make us more effective in the future. So we are landing, so to speak, right in the middle of this message that Peter is giving. And if we wouldn't know who it is, if we wouldn't know the past history of Peter, we would be looking at this sermon going, wow, this guy's amazing. He's well trained. And we would forget that he is the same fisherman from Galilee who struggled and failed. But we read him here and he's very articulate.
He's very knowledgeable. He quotes the book of Joel chapter 2. He quotes Psalm 16, which is a prophetic Psalm about the resurrection. Peter even says, David, being a prophet, foresaw this event. And he said, and he quotes Psalm 16, you will not leave my soul in hell or suffer your allow your Holy One to see corruption. David was speaking not of himself, but of Jesus, Peter says. And if you recall, because Peter says, here is his tomb. It's visible to this day.
And I think at the very end of the study, I said, if you come to Israel with us, remind me, and I'll point out where the Jews commemorate the burial of David. But we continue now. Let's look at verse 32. Peter continues, this Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses. Therefore, being exalted to the right hand of God and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he poured out this, which you now see and hear. Remember, they said, well, what is this?
They're drunk with new wine. And Peter said, this is that, which was spoken of by the prophet. So he goes then through the Scriptures, and he kind of comes to a conclusion.
I say kind of, because he's not done talking. But he says, this, which you now see and hear, for David, verse 34, for David did not ascend into the heavens, but he says of himself, now watch, he's quoting yet another Psalm from the Old Testament, Psalm 110. But he says himself, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool.
Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. He's quoting Psalm 110, verse 1. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool. Quoting it right out of Psalm 110, verse 1. Now, that is an interesting Psalm, because that is the very same quotation that Jesus quoted in Matthew 22, on the day when the Herodians came to Jesus, the Pharisees came to Jesus, the Sadducees came to Jesus, and they peppered him with questions, hard questions. And he answered them, but then he asked them a question. He said, hey, what do you think of Messiah?
Whose son is he? And they said, he's David's son. They believed traditionally that the Messiah will be the son of David, which is accurate. But then Jesus quoting this Psalm says, well, then how is it that David in the spirit calls him Lord? And he quotes Psalm 110. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool. So if David calls him Lord, Jesus said, how then do you say he's David's son? And it says they didn't answer him and they didn't ask him any more questions.
It was perfectly logical and it just sort of shut up all their arguments. David would have a son or somebody from his physical offspring, his genealogy, who is Jesus. He's in the lineage of David. But in the spirit, David calls him Lord.
The Lord said to my Lord, Yahweh said to Adonai, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool. That famous messianic Psalm that Jesus himself quoted, Peter now quotes, therefore let all the house of Israel assuredly know that God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart.
That's conviction. They were convicted by the Lord. They were convicted of their sin. And they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? Notice Peter's answer. And Peter said to them, repent.
Repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. So Peter's giving his sermon. He preaches the gospel.
He does quite well. But then he makes application. And that is his goal. His goal isn't to just dispense information. Dispensing information is not his goal. Getting them to transformation is his goal. He wants change to occur. He calls a choice has to be made. Repent and be baptized.
Now, notice the order. He didn't say be baptized and repent. It's repentance first and then baptism.
Why? Because baptism is an outward sign of an inward change. Repentance, turning around, changing your mind, demonstrated that or demonstrating that by baptism. So it's important that you see this because some people will take this verse as proof for baptismal regeneration. Some of you have heard that term.
Some of you haven't. I was raised in a church growing up that believed in baptismal regeneration, that you get saved by the waters of baptism. And this was a verse often quoted where he says, be baptized in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins. And their arguments are, well, it is baptism that brings remission of sins. You're being baptized for, and they translate for, in order that, in order that, for, in order that, or so that your sins can be remitted. And they'll quote this verse as one of their proof texts.
Here's the problem. The word for, translated in English for, is the Greek word ice. And ice here could be better translated not so that or in order that, but because of.
I'll give you an example. If I say the soldier was decorated for bravery, do I mean the soldier was decorated in order for that soldier to become brave? No. I mean the soldier was decorated because he was brave. He was decorated for it because of it. If I were to say the criminal was punished and imprisoned for his crime, do I mean that this criminal was, or that man was imprisoned so that he would commit a crime?
No. It's the result of him already committing the crime. It's for it. It is because of it.
So that's the idea here. For the remission of sins is not so that your sins can be remitted, but because your sins have been remitted. One shows the other. One is a consequence of the other.
That's the idea of ice or for. Be baptized in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Now they had just seen and heard a mighty work and evidence of the Holy Spirit as the birthday of the church.
The birth of the church was on that day. They heard the rushing wind. They observed this speaking in their own dialects. They wondered what this is.
Some thought they were drunk. Peter explains that's not the case. Then he preached the gospel, told them to repent, and he says for the remission of sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Now watch this. This is concerning that promise of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and your children and to all who are a far off as many as the Lord our God will call. So I love that verse because if you call on the Lord today, that promise is also for you.
As you call on the Lord, that same empowering is available to you today. And with many other words, he testified and exhorted them saying, be saved from this perverse generation. And that's the same word Jesus used in describing this world. It's the same word we discussed this last weekend in our study in Philippians.
A perverse and crooked generation among whom you shine as lights in this world. And those who gladly received his word were baptized. And that day about 3,000 souls were added to them. Man, that must have been a long baptism. You know, I know the other week when we had like 50, 60 or we get 70 of us like, man, even with a whole bunch of us baptizing, it can take a while.
3,000 people. I can just go, man, those apostles were tuckered out after that baptism. And then the question is where in Jerusalem were they baptized? What place was there to accommodate 3,000 people in the waters of baptism? Well, I hate to give you this cliffhanger, but I need to show that to you when we go to Jerusalem. Remind me of that when we're on the southern steps and I'll point out where I believe they were baptized. You go, not fair.
Well, and if I told you, it probably wouldn't make a whole lot of difference anyway, so I'd have to show you and I will. Then fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common and sold their possessions and goods and divided them among all as anyone had needs.
So continuing with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of hearts. Did I leave a verse out? Did I leave out verse 42? Did I read that? I read it? I didn't read it.
I skipped it. Okay, I need to go over that. And they continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship in the breaking of bread and prayers. Then fear came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles and all who believed were together and had all things in common and they sold their possessions and divided them up among all as anyone had need. So continuing daily with one accord in the temple and breaking bread from house to house, they ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart. Praising God and having favor with all the people and the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved.
There's a lot there and I just want to point out a few things. First of all, if we're getting a snapshot of what the very first church was like, we need to look at these verses a little more closely. So in verse 42, we have a little list.
These were their priorities. They continued steadfastly, number one, in the apostles' doctrine. So we learn right away they were a learning church. Doctrine is one of those words I always feel sorry for when I read it in the Bible.
I go, oh, man, I feel so sorry for you, little word, because people don't like you. The apostles' doctrine, didache, doctrine, teaching, instruction. And I say that I feel sorry for it because I've heard believers say things like, and it's almost like their badge of spirituality. You know, it's not about knowing doctrine, man. It's about, like, loving Jesus. And I'm not into, like, doctrine.
I'm just into loving Jesus. And it sounds like, ooh, you're, like, so spiritual, because you're, like, a cut above us all, because you're not into teaching. You're not into instruction.
What a sad thing to say. Yeah, man, I'm not into good Bible teaching. I'm not into truth. I just want to love Jesus.
Well, how on earth will you love Him unless you are given good instruction on who He is and how to do it? Jesus said to the Pharisees, you are ignorant, not knowing the Scriptures nor the power of God. Or as the old King Jimmy says, you err, not knowing the Scriptures. On another occasion, He said, have you not read? He's talking to leaders going, you should be Bible teachers by now. Haven't you read that text? Don't you know what the Scriptures say?
You are in error. You are ignorant because you don't know the Scriptures nor the power of God. And yet, and the reason I press this, is because we live in a day and age where Bible doctrine is not tolerated, Bible teaching is not tolerated, and people go to church and want just a pep rally. Somebody just to whip them up with a little exhortation and a cool little clever phrase, and woo-hoo, awesome. And so we have produced Christianettes, Christianettes, because they love sermonettes.
And sermonettes are for Christianettes who can't wait to get outside and smoke their cigarettes or whatever. But they devoted themselves, they were into the apostles doctrine first on their list, they were a learning church. Second thing to make note of, they were a loving church. Notice the word fellowship, verse 42. They continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine, that's one.
Number two, and fellowship. You know the word, right? What is the word in Greek?
Tell me. Koinonia, thank you. Koinonia, koinos, commonness. It is sharing in something with someone or sharing with someone something that you have. Here's something I have, here's something I have, I'm going to share it with you. Or I'm going to share in this activity with you. That's the idea of participation, fellowship.
So they loved one another. Fellowship is something you can't do alone. You can't say, you know what, I'm going to get on my podcast and have some fellowship. I'm going to my computer, and my computer and I, man, we're going to have fellowship together.
I loved the computer age, I love podcasts, I love to listen to them, but you can't have a rich, full relationship with Christ without the body of Christ. You need fellowship. People say, do I need to go to church?
Do you need to ask that? And if you're in a home where somebody has to say, hey, dad, are we going to church today? It's Sunday. Are we going to church? You don't auction church off.
You're like, does the sun rise? You see, it's the Lord's day, church is happening, I think we're going because we are, yeah, we're Christians, that's right, we're believers. So fellowship, they devoted themselves to fellowship. You can't do it alone. You need other people to enrich your lives. You know, you can't be a lone ranger, we used to say.
See, the lone ranger even had Tonto, right? He had fellowship. Not only were they a learning church, not only were they a loving church, but just because I'm a preacher and I like to do this, they were a lauding church, lauding, L-A-U-D, worshiping church, appraising church. Notice what it says, and in the breaking of bread and in prayers, breaking of bread, sharing communion together. And in prayers, those are exercises of praise and worship. And it goes down in verse 47, praising God and having favor with all the people. That Skip showing you that a proper response to the gospel message involves action and transformation.
It's a message from the series, Expound Acts. Find the full message, as well as books, booklets, and full teaching series at connectwithskip.com. Connect with Skip Heitzig exists to connect more people to God's unchanging truth through verse by verse teaching of His word. That's why we make messages like this one today available to you and others on air and online. If they've helped you in your walk with Christ today, please consider making a gift to help others around the world connect with Him in the same way. Just call 800-922-1888. That's 800-922-1888. Or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. That's connectwithskip.com slash donate.
Thank you. Join us again tomorrow as Skip looks at what makes a miracle, a miracle. A miracle is different from something that's awesome. We overuse that word.
We overuse just about every word in our language. A miracle is humanly impossible, but divinely simple. Okay, so we have natural laws. We have natural order.
A miracle is when God decides to supersede natural law with His own law, which for Him is in a wow moment. It's just like, it's easy. Make a connection. Make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast all burdens on His word. Make a connection. A connection. Connect with Skip Hyten is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never changing truth in ever-changing times.
