Only Jesus - [Acts 4:12]

Peter’s Arrest and the Healing of the Lame Man

You know, I've spent this weekend, I did it yesterday morning and probably some on Friday night, just confessing. So it's a good weekend to hang around me, hear all my confessions. I have a confession for you.

I fail. I know, you're shocked. I had a conversation with a lady this week and she was very angry. She started out angry and I don't think I helped very much. She wanted to argue about social issues and you know what I did?

I let her. That was an epic fail. I mean, come on. Am I some kind of debate champion? Is that what I'm supposed to do, right? Win debates? Score points? Make sure that she leaves mad? She did leave mad, by the way.

She gave me an hour of solitude. But was that what I should have been about? The answer is no, of course. She left without hearing about Jesus. A few days before that, I was having breakfast with a friend up in Vermont.

And it's so weird. You know, we're at a restaurant and you probably had this happen to you too. The waitress comes and brings the food and what do you do? I lowered my head to start praying. And then I realized my friend was there and I thought, you know, this unbelieving pagan dog, as he calls himself, by the way.

So I raised my head and he goes, no, go ahead and pray. And so normally I would pray silently, but I thought, okay, he just asked me to pray. I'm going to pray. So I prayed. And he said, you know what?

I mean, here was his takeaway eventually. This is later on. He says, you know, what I really learned from your prayer and our conversation was that I should start my day by being thankful. And I thought, so close.

Because I was talking about, we had a really good conversation about Jesus and about the gospel and about the necessity of believing in Christ. And his takeaway was, you know, I should be thankful in the morning.

Okay. I fail, but I suspect that I'm not alone. So I want to read from Acts chapter 4 verses 5 to 12 so that we have some context here. On the next day, their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem with Annas, the high priest and Caiaphas and John and Alexander and all who were of the high priestly family.

And when they had them set in the midst, they inquired, by what power or by what name did you do this? Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, rulers of the people and elders, If we are being examined today concerning a good deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead, by him, this man is standing before you well.

This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else. For there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.

The Miracle, the Sermon, and the Sanhedrin’s Objection

Now, when we were last in Acts, some of you were thinking, you know, it wasn't that long ago, Steve, you can't really, you know, do the same thing again, can you? Because we looked at verses 5 through 12 of chapter 4.

If you recall, Peter and John had been arrested, as I read there, for healing a man and then preaching the gospel in the temple. This man had been lame from the time he was born, some 40 years of being a social outcast and incapable of working.

Dr. Luke tells us what happened when the apostles met this man who'd been laid by some family at the beautiful gate of the temple. He was there to beg. He had no idea what was to happen. Back in chapter 3, verses 5 to 9, this man, it says of him, and he fixed his attention on them, on Peter and John, expecting to receive something from them.

But Peter said, I have no silver and gold, but what I do have, I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk. And he took him by the right hand and raised him up, and immediately his feet and ankles were made strong.

And leaping up, he stood and began to walk and entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. Verse 9, and all the people saw him walking and praising God. A miracle, a miracle to confirm that these men were who they said they were, a work of God, an intervention in the space-time continuum, God doing what only he could do, healing this man.

Peter then preaches Christ to the gathering crowd. We could say it this way, they come for the miracle and they stay for the sermon, right? They see the works, then they stay for the word. The temple guards and the religious authorities eventually respond because things aren't going as a normal midweek prayer service at the temple.

This is quite a disturbance. You'd think, I mean, we would think, if we hadn't read the whole thing, that they'd be happy that this poor fellow, who week after week is set at the same place and begging everybody, knowing that he can't even go into the temple because he's unclean, has been healed.

But Acts 4 verse 2 tells us they were greatly annoyed because they, Peter and John, were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. Yeah, great, you healed this guy, but what about all the stuff that you're saying?

So the apostles are arrested and tried the next day, and the core of the trial, the main issue of the trial, is given to us in verse 7. And when they, the Sanhedrin, had set them, the apostles, in their midst, surrounding them in this court, they inquired, by what power or by what name did you do this?

How did you heal this man? If you recall, I called the Holy Spirit the assisting counsel, right? The paraclete, the one who comes alongside. Verse 8, then Peter filled with the Holy Spirit. And it's just so wonderful to just consider Peter, the epically clumsy and foolish and always word of the mouth Peter, proclaiming the gospel and the guilt of the Sanhedrin.

You put Jesus to death, but God raised him from the dead. These are the religious leaders. These are the men who sentenced, ultimately, Jesus to death. I mean, they used the crowd, but they're the ones.

And here's Peter, not afraid at all, and just giving them the gospel like he should. Now, when I learned I was going to be preaching today, I thought, good, I need to preach about Jesus some more. And this seemed like a good opportunity to do some kind of a summary statement.

And over the last couple of weeks, I've been really vexed in my spirit. First of all, I did the Mormon thing a couple of weeks ago. And if anything vexes me, irritates me, angers me, it's just reading kind of about Joseph Smith and all of his chutzpah and thinking that he was even better than Jesus.

And I get vexed. I was talking about this morning in Sunday school. I get vexed a lot. But I get vexed, and we'll go through this a little bit. I get vexed sometimes by the ESV. I'm frustrated by some of their translations.

I'm frustrated by some of the theology that I hear concerning Jesus. Well, who is he? Why is Jesus unique? How are we saved by Jesus? What does it mean to be saved? Standing before these religious experts, Peter declared Jesus to be singular, unique, salvific, and sufficient.

And that's our outline this morning, singular, salvific, and sufficient, three S's. Firstly, he's singular. And by the way, before I start, before I get into the meat of this, I just want to say this.

This is not going to be, I said it was going to be a summary statement. It's not going to be a typical tearing apart of the text. We're going to get into the text a little bit. But what I'm doing is a lot of confessional statements, a lot of different verses.

We're going to be going to a lot of different places, not just verse 12. But I want to expand on what it says here. I want us to come away just fully grasping who Jesus is, what he's done, and why we ought to be talking about him.

The Singularity of Christ: Only Begotten, True God, and True Man

He's singular. Look at verse 12, it says, And there is salvation in, and I highlighted these words, no one else. And then again, he says, for there is no other name. He is one of a kind. He's unique. There's nobody like Jesus.

There's nobody that we can compare him to. And I want to just turn to John chapter 1. And I mentioned this in Sunday school. This just absolutely is abominable to me. Not the verse, but the translation here in the ESV.

I'm going to read the ESV, even though I find it abominable. Verse 14. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory. Glory as of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth.

And you say, what's wrong with that? What's wrong with it? It sounds wonderful. It is wonderful. But it's a travesty of omission. The word there where it's translated only son is monogamous. Greek word.

And, you know, if you have another translation, it probably says something like only begotten son. Why is that important? Because it tells us something about Jesus that only son doesn't. A Mormon could read only son and go, yep, he's the first.

They might think, well, he's the first son. Jehovah Witness, a modalist could read that and they could all agree with that. But only begotten. I mean, even better would be to understand it eternally begotten.

That same word monogamous is also in verse 18. No one has ever seen God, the only God who is at the father's side. It's also in John 3, 16, John 3, 18, 1 John 4, 9. And it marks Jesus as one of a kind, the only begotten.

Theologically, as I said, eternally begotten. Now, what makes me unique? I'm going to read from the Nicene Creed, which, by the way, is on the wall in the men's room. I should have it memorized by now.

And in we believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only son of God. Oh, you see, there it goes. Only son of God. But listen, it goes on. Begotten from the father before all ages. Begotten from the father.

Begotten, not made, not created. Begotten. Well, what's the difference? Begotten. He's eternally begotten. There's a special relationship. And the Nicene Creed gives us some insight from that or about that.

Listen, God from God. Not a second God. But the very essence of God. In the second person of the Trinity. Before all ages, in a time where there was no time. Before anything was. And it says light from light.

Then listen, true God from true God. He's of the same essence as the father. This is what the early church wrestled with and struggled with. Fought over. People got excommunicated. For why? Because they didn't believe in the Jesus of the Bible.

And then today we have people who don't believe the same things. Who don't proclaim the same things. He's not lesser in form than the father. He's not lesser in function than the father. He's not lesser in power than the father.

Our confession says this. That Jesus sustains and governs everything he made. He's the sustainer. He's the king. And he is the creator. He made everything and sustains everything and governs everything.

He is God. Colossians 1, 16 and 17 says this. For by him, for by Jesus. All things were created in heaven and on earth. Visible and invisible. Whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things were created through him and for him.

And he is before all things. And in him all things hold together. How do we know that Jesus in his deity never, a, never stopped being God. And b, when he died on the cross. That was only in his humanity and not in his deity.

Because when we read in Colossians 1, 17. And in him all things hold together. What happens if Jesus dies even for a moment as God? The whole universe flies apart. Why is it important that Jesus is truly God?

And by the way, I mentioned this in Sunday school this morning. This is fascinating to me. And why do I, you know, why do I get vexed about things? Well, it's stuff like this. The Ligonier survey of theology came out here in the last couple weeks.

They surveyed evangelicals and I mentioned this. 96 of evangelicals were asked, you know, do you believe in the Trinity? And they said, yes, absolutely. And you think, oh, that's pretty good, 96%. 56 of evangelicals agreed with this statement.

That Jesus was a good teacher, but was not God. That tells me a couple things. One is, they don't believe in the Trinity. They say they do, but they don't because they don't understand that Jesus Christ is God.

But secondly, I would really have some questions about their evangelical status. If evangelical means Christian, you can't be a Christian and not believe that Jesus is God. I'm sorry. I'm not sorry, but I'm sorry.

Why is it important that he's God? Because when he's on the cross, dying for our sins, his death has infinite value because he is God. Now, he doesn't die as God, but he is God on that cross. Therefore, he has infinite value and is able to redeem an infinite number of people.

As many as would believe. So he's truly God, but he's also truly man. Why is he unique? Because he's truly God and he's truly man. Listen to our confession again. At the proper time, he took on a human nature, along with all of its essential properties and common weaknesses, except sin.

We talk about our confession, and some people are like, well, don't we just need the Bible? Okay. The Bible tells us what our confession summarizes, what the Bible teaches, and I'll illustrate that. Listen to Galatians 4, 4 and 5 and tell me how it tracks with what I just read from our confession.

But when the fullness of time had come, at the proper time, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law. He took on human nature, along with all of its essential properties and common weaknesses, except sin, so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Now, when Paul writes that Jesus redeemed us, many of us know what that means to redeem. What does it mean? If you know, if you redeem something, you buy it back. We owed a debt because of our sin. And Jesus paid that debt.

He redeemed us. He is our Redeemer. Why was it necessary for him to be human to redeem us? One man wrote this. He said, Jesus experienced all the ordinary, non-sinful limitations of humanity. He grew and developed.

He experienced hunger, thirst, weariness. As a true human, the last Adam, he lived out obedience to God through our common humanity as our representative and substitute. We needed Jesus to do what Adam didn't do.

We needed him to obey everything that God told Adam to do and even more later. But we need that perfect obedience. We need the man, Christ Jesus, to die for us because only a human could pay the price for the sins of humans.

And only a human could actually die. I mean, think about it. All the blood and the ceremony in the Old Testament, the bulls and goats and rams and all the animals that are sacrificed. None of them could actually atone for sin.

It took the death of a perfect human being, the death of Jesus Christ. Now again, Paul writes about us being adopted. Well, why are we adopted? As a result of Christ's finished work. Because that was the plan of our triune God from the beginning.

Our confession says this. It pleased God in his eternal purpose to choose and ordain the Lord Jesus, his only begotten son, according to the covenant made between them both. Remember, I read John 17 in the beginning, beginning of the service today.

The covenant made between them both to be the mediator between God and man. That's what Jesus is, right? He is the only mediator between God and man. Our confession goes on to say that he is the prophet, priest and king, head and savior of the church, the heir of all things and judge of the world.

Unto whom he, the father, did from all eternity give a people to be his seed and to be by him in time redeemed, called justified, sanctified and glorified. It's like Romans 8, 28, 29, 30. That whole chain of golden chain of salvation.

But again, to just emphasize that this is always the plan and that our confession is a summary of what the Bible says. Let me read Ephesians 1, 3 to 5. Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.

Even as he chose us, the elect believers in him, that is to say in Christ, listen, before the foundation of the world. That we should be holy and blameless before him. Are we holy and blameless before him?

Only because we are in him. Only because we are in Christ. In love, he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ. According to the purpose of his will. It was always the plan. From before anything existed.

Now I mentioned that Jesus had weaknesses. All the weaknesses of a person, of a human, save sin. He was born of a virgin. Listen to what Calvin says. The son of God descended from heaven in such a way that without leaving heaven, he willed to be born in the virgin's womb.

To go about the earth and to hang upon the cross. Yet he continuously filled the world even as he had done from the beginning. From the time he entered Mary's womb to the moment he died on the cross, people could sense him.

I mean, Mary certainly could sense him. People could see him when he was born. Then when he lived his life while he was dying, he was located in one place. Calvin says he filled the world. We could stretch that a little bit and say he filled the universe.

He didn't stop being God. He never ceased to be omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient, etc. It's all the divine attributes. Truly man, truly God, and the only possible sacrifice for sin. He is singular.

There's nobody like him. Second S, he's salvific. Again, verse 12, by which we must be saved. It's in him alone that we can be saved. People won't like that. Talk about vexed, right? Tell people that Jesus is the only way to heaven.

Good to know. Jesus said that. Let them be offended by him. Jesus said to him, I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me. And if we think about it long enough, we'll try to come up with other ways to get to heaven.

I mean, this is what every false religion is about, right? There must be some other way. There has to be some other way other than the way God ordained the other way than the way God says. How about this?

How about being good enough? I dare say there are probably billions of people. You know, if there is a God, how do you plan on getting past him and getting into heaven? By being good enough. It's a wonderful measure, isn't it?

Because who decides what's good enough? I do. I've set the bar. And, you know, by the way, I'm going to set the bar a little bit lower. The knees aren't what they used to be. I'm not going to set it up here because that's impossible.

I want it to be low enough to where I can get over it. And that's what people do. But what is good enough? Jesus said this about being good. He said, For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

You want it to be like this high. But the reality is it's way up here. Even the scribes and the Pharisees who make up rules, who create laws, who have an infinite number, and they're always generating more.

You have to be a better rule keeper than the experts at rule keeping. Okay, so being good enough isn't going to work. How about perfection? Will that work? I mean, Jesus said, Be perfect even as your father in heaven is perfect.

Maybe we can do that. Most people, at least, are sensible enough to say that they're not perfect. The Bible makes it clear that we're not perfect. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But let's make it super easy.

To be perfect, you only really have to do two things. Jesus said, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. In other words, love God. This is the first and great commandment, or great and first commandment.

And a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. But we don't do that because we can't do that. Here's where our confession of faith says, From our original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good.

How do you like that? Because of Adam's fall, you are opposite. You are opposed to all good. And wholly inclined to all evil. Because of that, do precede all actual transgressions. Perfection isn't going to work.

I had a discussion with my friend about murder. You know, and about capital punishment. And I suggested, I won't even go through all the details of this case, but I suggested there was a particular case where this person deserved the death penalty.

And he said that would be governmental murder. I don't know about that. But what about it? And here was his point. His point was, you know, maybe there's some way that this person who's done this awful thing can redeem themselves by their own good works.

Right? If they start super low, well, maybe they can just kind of work their way up. Maybe they can work their way into heaven. In fact, maybe there's some kind of a bank. Some sort of supernatural place where, you know, people who do a lot of really good works, their excess, the works that are above and beyond what they need to get into heaven, those things can be put into a bank account and we can draw on that.

Here's what the Confession of Faith says. We cannot, by our best works, merit pardon of sin or eternal life at the hand of God, by reason of the great disproportion that is between them, our works, and the glory to come.

Our best efforts compared to the glory to come, there's a big disconnect. And the infinite distance between that is between us and God, whom by them we can neither profit nor satisfy for the debt of our former sins.

In other words, there is nothing you can do, no matter how great you think your works are, to make up for your sin. The Confession goes on to say, but when we have done all we can, our best efforts, we have done but our duty and our unprofitable servants.

And because as good as, and because as they are good, they proceed from, in other words, any good works come from the Holy Spirit, they're fruits of the Spirit, and they are wrought by us, I'm sorry, and as they are wrought by us, they are defiled and mixed with so much weakness and imperfection that they cannot endure the severity of God's punishments.

What does the Bible say? Romans 3 .20, for by the works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight. How about this one from Psalm 143 .2? The psalmist begs, enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous before you.

You don't want to stand before a God, not even the psalmist does, without Christ. There is no way but Christ. And that's precisely what God designed. Again, our confession of faith, the Lord Jesus, by His perfect obedience and sacrifice of Himself, which He through the eternal Spirit once offered up unto God, has fully satisfied the justice of God, procuring reconciliation, reconciled us to God, and purchasing an everlasting inheritance in the kingdom of heaven for all those whom the Father has given unto Him.

A few verses here. Hebrews 9 .14 -15, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.

Therefore He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant.

Jesus' death redeems believers. Hebrews 10 .14, for by a single offering, He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified. We stand before God not condemned, but perfect because of Christ.

Christ’s Finished Work and the Sufficiency of Salvation

Move a little bit, but our first S, singular. Second S, salvific. Jesus saves and only Jesus saves. Our third S, He is sufficient. Again, verse 12, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved, He alone.

And He fully saves. Well, who determines this? Why should anybody believe this? You know, is this just your opinion? One commentator, Water, says, Jesus is not one among many saviors. His death and resurrection, His exaltation and authority constitute Him the one and only Savior since nobody else possesses His qualifications.

We are saved by the man of God's choosing and we are saved only on God's terms. But we are saved. Jesus is a complete Savior, sufficient to meet all the sinner's spiritual needs before God. There's no such thing as purgatory.

There's no such thing as our efforts making any difference in our position. What we do is to the glory of God. It's out of gratitude, but it doesn't change anything. We rely on Jesus alone. He is sufficient.

Our Confession of Faith says this, This office of mediator between God and man is proper only to Christ, who is the prophet, priest, and king of the church of God and may not be either in whole or in any part thereof transferred from Him to any other.

I think they were thinking about Mary at that point. Nobody else can mediate. Nobody else can reconcile. Nobody else can pay the price. It is Jesus alone and He does it fully and completely. I can't resist this quote from this man because his name is Dr. Strange.

So I had to... Nothing compares with knowing that we have acceptance. Not because of who we are or what we have done, but rather despite who we are and what we have done. Because of who Jesus is and what He has done.

We have an acceptance, listen, greater than Adam had in the period of probation. In other words, before Adam sinned, when he was walking and talking in the Garden of Eden with the pre-incarnate Christ.

He says we have an acceptance greater than that. Because we are fully confirmed by Christ's active and passive obedience. He fully kept the law and He willingly went to the cross. That's what those two things mean in brief.

And we are now as accepted by God as we ever will be. He notes in heaven we will be more happy. True, right? No more tears, no more concerns, no more worries. He says, but we won't be any more secure.

We are as secure now as we ever will be because Christ is sufficient. He has fully saved us. And what does that make you think? Well, if Jesus has fully saved me, then what? I can rest. Peter was not preaching to these men a partial Savior or a possible Savior.

With his life on the line filled with the Holy Spirit, he presented the only hope for these religious men, for these people who would think they were good, that they were just, that they were right before God.

But only Jesus could redeem them. Only Jesus could pay the price for their sin. Only the righteousness of Jesus could be accounted to them and make them fit for heaven. Only Jesus perfectly obeyed the law.

Only Jesus voluntarily laid down His life to save the elect. Only Jesus was raised from the grave to demonstrate that He was indeed the Son of God. Only Jesus is sufficient for salvation. Now, friends, we have a tendency to be involved in a lot of important things, things that are very vital or seem vital.

But we can sometimes be like I was this week. We can forget the most vital thing we have, the most important task we have, which is to tell people about Jesus. I guess we could say forget or we could say neglect.

We could shrink from the moment. We could frame it in any number of ways. And it was driven home to me again this week. A couple days ago, I heard of a 19-year-old son of an acquaintance of mine in town.

Her son died suddenly. And as soon as I heard about it, you know, it's not like she and I are friends. But as soon as I heard about that, my heart ached for her, having some sense of what she's going through.

And as I contemplated that, I thought, I'm just going to look. You know, Pastor Mike talks about this kind of thing all the time. I'm just going to Google it. 150 ,000 people die every day and enter into eternity.

We can't stop that. But we can tell some of those people about Jesus. That's the only hope they have of escaping eternity and hell. We know what will happen to them apart from Christ if they don't trust in Jesus Christ.

They have sin that they cannot pay for, sin which are just God must punish. He will demand an eternal price for. But our God is also loving. And he's given the world a cure for their eternal peril. And that cure is Jesus Christ.

Jesus is all we need, only Jesus. Let's pray. Father, we confess that we often fall short of the glory of God. Not just in our actions, but in our failures. Our failures to think this person, their main need isn't to have the right idea about life.

It's not to agree with my opinion about various issues. Their number one need is forgiveness of sins. And that need can only be met in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Lord, help us to be like Peter in this sense, that our goal in every conversation, our greatest joy when we put our heads on the pillow at night, is to think, I told somebody about Jesus Christ today.

Father, would you save them? Would you seal them? Would you grant them pardon? In Christ Jesus. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.