Sunday, November 13, 2022 AM

Christ’s Commission, Pentecost, and the Pattern of Acts

Let's go to the Lord together in prayer. Heavenly Father, once again we come before you and our hearts even more full as we have been singing these praises to you, hearing the word of God, your word read to us.

Lord, we give you the great amen. We do agree with your ways and your purposes, and we rejoice in the manner in which you bring about our salvation. Father, we thank you that you show us how needy we are in the scope of what it means that you sent your only begotten son into this world to live and die and be raised from the dead for us and for our salvation.

We thank you that he has ascended to your right hand. We thank you that he reigns even now, that every day, from day to day, as we live, we live in the light of Christ's glorious reign. I pray, Father, that you would help us here this morning as we read your word together and consider the riches of our salvation in Christ, that you would do a special work in each one of our hearts, that you would deliver us from complaints, and that you would deliver us into thankfulness, that you would cleanse our mouths from complaints and our ears from hearing only what is critical, and that you would deliver us into thanksgiving, into giving of joy and rejoicing in your truth.

Lord, only you can do this, and we thank you that you have given us such a Savior in your Son, Jesus Christ, and it's in his name that we pray. Amen. Well, I invite you to open your Bibles and turn with me to Acts chapter 3.

We're going to be reading verses 17 through 26. I apologize I sent the wrong outline to our very capable secretarial staff, so hold on to that, meditate on it, see if these things are so, and in the Lord's will, I hope to preach that sermon to you in two weeks.

I've been reading ahead and studying ahead. Good things are yet to come. I was mentioning to a friend about how deep Peter's preaching is, and of course we know in Acts chapter 2, the sermon that we have from Peter was a faithful summary of what he said, because we also read after the finish of his preaching, with many other words Peter exhorted them to be saved from that perverse generation.

And if we do the math and the timing there in Acts 3 and see that John and Peter get arrested, by the time they're done preaching in Acts 4 verse 3, it says it was already evening. Now, they made it to the temple at three o 'clock in the afternoon, and they get arrested sometime around six.

So for three hours they're in the temple and Peter is preaching, so we have a faithful summary of the things that he said, by the hand of Luke and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. So I think why perhaps the details are so compressed, and the preaching is so rich and dense.

I do not want us to lose the forest for the trees, however, and so I wanted to kind of let you know where we are in this first half of the book of Acts. And I'm going to try to summarize the story of the first 14 chapters, and let you go with me on a little bit of a roller coaster ride.

So in Acts chapter 1 we hear about Christ's commission to the apostles, that they're going to be going to the nations, to the nations. Shortly after that they find the need to ordain, essentially, a new apostle, to recognize a new apostle according to the Word of God.

The name was Matthias. Right after that we have Pentecost in Acts chapter 2, wherein the gospel is proclaimed by the power of the Holy Spirit to Jews from all over the Roman Empire on a scale of a thousand miles east and west and 500 miles north and south wide.

And then we have Peter in chapter 3, where we are right now, preaching a sermon to the Jews in the temple who have gathered for the evening sacrifice at three o 'clock in the afternoon, very devout men of Judaism.

And Peter is preaching to this most religious of all the people in Jerusalem. He's preaching to the choir and he says to them, you must convert. You are nowhere near God, even though you've come here.

You need to repent and trust in Christ. And he begins to explain how the new covenant has come and has fulfilled the shadows of the old. So there's a new apostle, there's Pentecost, then there's a new covenant sermon.

Shortly after this we have the confrontation with the authorities, a showdown there in chapter 4. And then there's a crisis within the church, Ananias and Sapphira, but the solution comes by the power of the Holy Spirit, followed by another confrontation with the authorities, followed by another crisis within the church.

The Hellenistic widows are not being cared for. Once again, the solution is by the power of the Holy Spirit as the deacons are ordained, followed by another confrontation with the authorities. So as you've been tracking, right after the sermon explaining the new covenant, there's a confrontation with authorities, problem within the church solved by the Holy Spirit, confrontation with authorities, problem within the church solved by the Holy Spirit, confrontation with authorities.

What's next? That confrontation with authorities, by the way, was Stephen, and that's followed up with another sermon about how the new covenant fulfills the old, followed by another Pentecost among the Samaritans, followed by a new apostle whose name was Saul.

So if you've been on the roller coaster ride, it goes like this, and a little bit like this, and a big M. This truly was the order of events that occurred in the early church, but Luke, as the composer and the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, is organizing the highlights in this particular way, because this is the way that his audience learned best, in this chiasm and the patterns paralleling.

The Risen Lord Jesus Directs the Church Through Conflict and Crisis

But that's not the end of the pattern, because soon after the new apostle, we hear in chapter 9, verse 41, that the gospel is going out to all the nations, just like it was said to needed to happen in chapter 1.

And this follows up with Peter, shown as a repentant apostle. Somebody who was not eager to preach the gospel to Gentiles, but brought to repentance. So God changes what goes on in Peter's life, followed by a Pentecost.

After the repentant apostle comes a Pentecost with Cornelius and his family, the Gentiles come to faith in Christ. And then Peter has to defend his actions to the Jews in the church by preaching, once again, a new covenant sermon.

This is followed by chapter 12, in which there are confrontation with authorities, as James is killed and ultimately God destroys Herod. And then there is a crisis in the church, in which the Holy Spirit overcomes, in chapter 13.

Another confrontation with authorities, followed by another sermon about the new covenant fulfilling the old, followed by another type of Pentecost. And then we get to chapter 14, and we don't have a repentant apostle, but we have Paul having been stoned.

We don't know if he actually died or was in an inch of his life, but he is resurrected right up from his stoning. And then he gets up, brushes the blood off, and goes back to the nations. I mentioned the patterns of how the axe is flowing.

I've been reading and reading and reading Acts, and I'm just very encouraged to see the flow of the story, all the way through this pattern of the focus of Christ saying to His church, to His apostles, you must go to the nations.

Clarity is brought. What does it mean to live in the new covenant? Despite whatever confrontation with the authorities that they encounter, there is always an overcoming in Christ. Despite whatever crisis there may be in this fledgling church, there's always an overcoming of those crises by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Throughout this first half of the book of Acts, there is a constant dependence upon the Lord, a constant returning to prayer, a constant dependent upon the Holy Spirit, and time and again what we find is that the risen Lord Jesus Christ, reigning from the right hand of the Father, overcomes in every single moment.

He is the one directing. He is the one providing. He is the one who gives the interpretation of the meaning of the promises. He is the one who gives them victory over their enemies. He is the one who settles the problems within the church.

Time and time again, what we see is a wonderful shepherd and the chief shepherd, Jesus Christ, which is again another appeal to change the title from the Acts of the Apostles to the Acts of the Risen Lord Jesus Christ.

This is what He is up to in building and establishing His church. This takes us back to chapter three of Acts, and I'm going to begin reading in verse 17. But as I do, remember the point of what is going on.

Peter is with John. They're in the temple. The man who was born lame has been healed as a sign to all who are there. And Peter begins to preach and declare to these most devoted men of the old covenant how they stand guilty before God in the murder of the Messiah, and they stand in great need of repentance and forgiveness of sins.

They need the salvation that Jesus of Nazareth alone brings. I invite you to stand with me now as I begin reading the Word of God, Acts chapter 3, beginning in verse 17. This is the Word of the Lord. Yet now, brethren, I know that you did it in ignorance, as did also your rulers.

But those things which God foretold by the mouth of all His prophets, that the Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.

For Moses truly said to the fathers, The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren. Him you shall hear in all things whatever He says to you, and it shall be that every soul who will not hear that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.

Yes, and all the prophets from Samuel and those who follow, as many as have spoken, have also foretold these days. You are sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with our fathers, saying to Abraham, And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

To you first, God, having raised up His servant Jesus, sent Him to bless you in turning away every one of you from your iniquities. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. We think too much of our sin, and we think too much of the sins of others.

I know that sounds off because we live in an age of excuses, and we live in an age of equivocation, and we live in an age of redefining sin in a time when the majority of pulpits will not preach about sin.

But I do not mean we think too much of our sin in terms of biblical truth. I mean that in the lack of biblically thinking about our sin, we think too much of it in other ways. In terms of its quality, I don't mean quantity.

We think too much of our sin in the sense that we take ownership of it as our identities. We think too much of our sin in that we make it sacred, walling it in with excuses. We think too much of our sin, making it seem romantic by a history of experiences that nobody else can understand.

We think too much of our sin. We ponder it. We focus on it. We nourish it. We nurture it. And we do the same with the sins of others, either fixating on them because they have hurt us, or coming alongside others with their sin and affirming them as they make their sin their identity and make their sin holy.

We think too much of sin in these ways. Our issue is not so much the issue of the insecure Puritan who meditates upon the smallest nuances of sin and how wretched it makes him and grovels in the depths of it.

That's not our issue, not that type of introspection. It's a different type of self-focus, a different type of putting ourselves in orbit around our own glory, our own selves, our own worth, our own meaning.

That's what I mean when I say we think too much of our sin, because we do not think enough of salvation. We do not think enough of our Savior who redeems and forgives and restores. It is an observation, an axiom of scripture, that the more we think of ourselves, the less we think of Christ.

He himself told us that if anyone wants to follow him, we must take up our crosses and deny ourselves and follow him. In the self-denial, it certainly cannot be a prolonged, protracted, increasing introspection on the self that I choose to deny.

What a miserable condition. We think too much of our sin and the sin of others. We make too much of it. We make it too grand and too high, too impossible. We tend to be in orbit around sin and not around our Savior.

What we need is thankfulness. What we need is the discipline of thankfulness and everything give thanks. That's a discipline. It requires us to stop and to be thoughtful, not about self, but thoughtful about Christ.

Not to be focused upon our sins or the sins of others, but focused upon our Savior. The Savior who comes and dies as God's Lamb and is risen from the dead to satisfy the wrath of God concerning our sins and to carry our transgressions away from God as far as the east is from the west, whose victory is made clear in his resurrection and his ascension to the right hand of God.

We should think more of our Savior. We have a great need in our day of fear of man and fear of death and when our own souls are filled with doubt to build ourselves up on our most holy faith, which means to continually all the more consider what a Savior we have in Christ.

We have not begun to think too much about the gospel. We have not begun to think too much about the salvation that Christ achieves. We have an eternity ahead of us of reveling in the glories of Christ.

We have not begun to think enough about our Savior. When Peter preaches the superiority of the new covenant to the most faithful men of the old covenant, as they stand at Solomon's portico in the very temple courts, just yards away, cubits away, from the Lamb being slaughtered for the evening sacrifice, Peter tells them they must be saved.

Nothing for them there. Everything depends on their repentance and turning away from self and sin, from excuse, and everything that they think makes them special to turn to Christ, Jesus of Nazareth. When we read, he says, you're guilty.

You stand guilty. You're guilty of the murder of the Messiah. You did it in ignorance, but that just makes you even more guilty because you should have known. And he says that those things which God foretold by the mouth of all his prophets that the Christ would suffer, he is thus fulfilled.

You should have known from the scriptures who Jesus of Nazareth is. And indeed, you stand guilty of his murder, but Christ died according to the scriptures. Repent, therefore, he says in verse 19. Repent, therefore, and be converted.

Turn away. Turn away. Like Joab, there is no salvation, and grasping the horns of the altar, when you have rejected the son of David. There is only death for you. You must turn to Christ. Repent, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out.

We talked about forgiveness last time. That your sins may be blotted out. The record of decree of the guilt of your guilt that was against you. God has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross, Paul says to the Colossians.

Forgiveness of sins. What a critical promise of the new covenant. Throughout the Old Testament, all 12 places where the new covenant is expounded upon, forgiveness is declared. Forgiveness of sins. Essential in the new covenant.

They stand there in Solomon's portico. There's the lamb bleeding out, its throat having been slit. It's going to be put upon the altar. It's going to be burned to a crisp. And there's no forgiveness there.

It was only ever a sign. It was not a destination. Christ has come. And forgiveness is in Christ, and Christ alone. So Peter preaches to them that they must repent, turn to Christ, believe in him, be converted to Christ.

And he says, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord. So that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord. So let's talk about the Holy Spirit.

This word refreshing, times of refreshing, it's a very unique word. Doesn't hardly ever get used. But it breaks down into a compound term that means an inner blowing. An inner blowing. 26 times in the Gospel of Luke and in the book of Acts, the Gospel is proclaimed, the person and work of Jesus.

A response is called for, either repentance or faith, two sides of the same coin. And the promises of salvation are described most often in these two terms, forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

We've already seen this earlier in the book of Acts. We see in Acts chapter 2 in verse 2 on the day of Pentecost, suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind. It filled the whole house where they were sitting.

Jesus sits across from Nicodemus, most religious, most credentialed man of the old covenant. He says, Nicodemus, unless you are born again, you cannot even see the kingdom of God. This man has more understanding of the scriptures than all of his peers.

He grew up in Judaism. How many times had he been to the temple? And Jesus says, you haven't even seen the kingdom of God. You know nothing of the kingdom of God unless you are born again. Nicodemus says, what does that mean?

Do I enter my mother's womb a second time? And Jesus says, no, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, but that which is born of the spirit is spirit. As the wind blows and you hear the sound of it, you see the effects of it, but you have no idea where it's coming from or where it's going.

You have no control of the wind. So are also those who are born of the Holy Spirit. Jesus himself uses this expression of the blowing of the wind. We also read in Acts, in chapter 2 and verse 17, the promise from Joel, and it shall come about in the last days, the last days of the old covenant, says God that I will pour out of my spirit and all flesh.

Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your young men shall see visions in your old dream. Your old men shall dream dreams. And this is connected as the promise of the new covenant. Also, verse 21, it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.

The gift of the Holy Spirit and the forgiveness of sins. So this expression of times of inner blowing, the times of refreshment coming from the Lord, Jesus himself said, I will send to you another comforter.

Holy Spirit comes from the Father and the Son to bless us. So Peter is saying, repent, therefore, be converted, that your sins may be blotted out so that times of refreshing may come from the presence, from the presence of the Lord.

Times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord. He's already been preaching this in Pentecost, forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

What are we to make of this?

This is emphasized from the presence of God, from the presence of the Lord. For this is how we are brought into living daily communion with God. Jesus said, I will not leave you orphans. I will send to you another comforter.

Comforter. He promises to send forth the Holy Spirit that we may not be orphans, that we may not be alone, that we may not be cut off, that we would know that we have a Father. It's by the Holy Spirit living and abiding in us that we may cry, Abba, Father.

It is by the Holy Spirit's indwelling us, his presence with us, that we are assured of God's love for us in Christ. Jesus said that the Holy Spirit would come and bring to mind all the things that he had taught so that the word of God interpreted by the light of the world, Jesus Christ himself, would be made clear to us by the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit, we are told, intercedes for us. When we don't know how to pray, the Holy Spirit prays with us and for us, bringing our pain and petitions, our groanings, our needs, before a good heavenly Father who welcomes us because of his Son.

The Holy Spirit indwells us as the new temple of God. We are living stones. Don't hold your breath for a temple to be rebuilt in Palestine. Scripture says we are the new temple. We are living stones, and God himself indwells us.

Put your focus on Christ. We have power to live, to follow Christ because of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us life, new life. We are made new creatures, new creations, because of the work of the Holy Spirit.

We are sealed. The stamp of God's ownership and provision and protection is placed upon us by the Holy Spirit. Jesus put it this way. When he spoke to the Samaritan woman who was trying to distract from her sinfulness by bringing up a theological debate, some say we should worship at this mountain, some say this other mountain.

Jesus says, no. I tell you, a day is coming and now is when those who worship God shall worship him in spirit and in truth. And he offers her what? Living water. They're at a well.

He's thirsty.

She's thirsty. He says, what you need is living water. And having drunk this living water, he will thirst no more. What is this living water? Jesus expounds upon the living water in chapter 7 of John, three chapters later, when he declares that all who would come to him would have streams of living water bursting and flowing from them.

And John says he spoke this of the Holy Spirit. What is the image we have of the triune God in Revelation? God and the Lamb on the throne. And what flows from the throne? A river of living water. So what do we have with the forgiveness of sins?

A true, absolute, because of Christ, a true, absolute standing before God in Christ's own righteousness, where God looks upon us and not only says not guilty, not guilty, but he also says righteous. Not only does he say all is forgiven, but he says welcome.

That's what it means for our sins to be blotted out. Not only that, but eternal life. The Holy Spirit given to us brings to us eternal life. That is not simply sometime later on, having put our faith in Jesus Christ, sometime later on after we die, we get a place in heaven.

Eternal life is both now and not yet. A living out of eternal life, a life which will never truly come to an end. To be absent from the body, to be present from the Lord, but that's not the end. Even after this, we anticipate the resurrection from the dead and full glorification.

There's that moment in John Bunyan's work, Pilgrim's Progress, where Christian is convicted of his sins and he is becoming more and more convinced he must leave the city of destruction. And many are calling to him and trying to convince him to stay.

But he is convinced by the word that has been brought to him, he must flee, he must repent. And he knows the direction he must go because evangelists told him where he must run to. And to stop all of the excuses and all of the rebuttals that are being hoisted upon him, he covers his ears and he begins to run and he begins to yell, Life!

Life! Eternal life! Is this not the sound that the river of life makes flowing? Is this not the sound of the wind that the Holy Spirit makes? Life! Life! Eternal life! That's what it means to have the promise of the Holy Spirit.

To be born again of the Holy Spirit. To be indwelled by God himself. To be made into the living everlasting temple. To be filled with the power of God himself. To live out life instead of sinning and embracing death.

Peter preaches to men who have gathered for the hour of prayer. The lamb being burnt on the altar cannot save, cannot help them. Those who are administering the ceremonies are walking according to a dead letter.

And engaging in a ministry of death. The stones, the massive gold overlaid stones of the temple are dead stones. There's nothing here for them that is life. Peter preaches to them even as he said to the lame man, Silver and gold, I have none.

But what I give to you, I say in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, Rise up and walk. And he's preaching the very same message, albeit even more important to these Jews who don't even understand that their condition was worse than being born lame.

They're dead and they're trespasses and sins. What do they need? They do not need silver and gold. They don't need more silver and gold. More silver and gold, which was what the temple was about in those days.

Putting more silver and gold on the walls and the columns and everywhere else. They don't need silver and gold. They need the name of Jesus of Nazareth, who is the Christ, the son of the living God. That their sins may be forgiven.

That they may be given eternal life. That a new season would come, an inner blowing from the presence of the Lord, the promise of eternal life, the Holy Spirit himself. Are we thankful for the person of the Holy Spirit, his ministry in us, in our lives, to give us life, life, eternal life, day after day, until the final day.

And when day knows no more night. Not only forgiveness in the Holy Spirit, our promise, but also hope.

Hope.

Peter says, verse 19, the times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord. Not only is this gift from the Holy Spirit, but, and that, verse 20, and that he may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before.

Where is he now? God has raised him from the dead. God has glorified him. God has welcomed him to the right hand. God has given him a name which is above every name. That at his name every knee should bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father.

But look, hope. He may send Jesus Christ. There is hope. We live in hope of Christ's return. And his complete victory. Hebrews chapter 9, verse 28, locates our hope. Locates what we are looking forward to.

Verse 27 says,. And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many, to those who eagerly wait for him, he will appear a second time apart from sin for salvation.

First time he came, he came to suffer on the cross and die for our sins. The next time he comes, he comes in victory to finish every aspect of our salvation. We live in hope. We are made absolutely ready, are we not, by these preeminent gifts of the new covenant, of the forgiveness of our sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit.

We are brought into right fellowship with God himself. We have no trepidation about the return of Christ. Oh, we want that to happen. We eagerly seek for the return of Jesus Christ because we know there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Because of the gifts and the blessings of the salvation that he has brought. So we have forgiveness of sins. We can be thankful every day for the forgiveness of our sins. We have the gift of the Holy Spirit.

We can be thankful every day for his presence with us. And we have hope. We have hope. Something to look forward to. And why wait? What goes on now?

Peter says,.

And that he may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive, until the times of restoration of all things, whom heaven must receive. Why must heaven receive him? Be lifted up, you gates, and you ancient doors be lifted up, that the King of glory may come in.

Nobody has the right to stand before God and open the seals. But wait, the Lion of Judah, the Lamb who was slain, he is worthy. Worthy, worthy is the Lamb who was slain. Heaven must receive him. He is the Son of Man.

He is the Son of God. He has all glory. Yes, heaven must receive him. He is worthy. Indeed, he is worthy. And so he reigns. The kingdom is given to him, an everlasting kingdom, which will never be shaken, never be destroyed.

Unlike those earthly kingdoms of Babylon and Medo-Persia and Greece and Rome. Oh, those kingdoms can be shaken and were shaken. But not Christ's kingdom. His kingdom is not like those kingdoms. His kingdom can never be shaken.

His kingdom can never be destroyed. Think of our Savior today and be thankful for the nature of his salvation. Think of our Savior today. Too often we don't think of our Savior enough and with enough clarity.

Our Savior is not a tall Caucasian shampoo model, good with kids, sitting on a daisy-ordained slight rise. In Israel, this is not our Savior. He is far more human than we can possibly realize. And far more glorious in his divinity than we can comprehend.

A better picture of our Savior is given to us in Revelation 1. Go read Revelation 1 if you want to know what Jesus looks like. And he is worthy. He's at the right hand. He told a story. He told a story in Luke 19.

And it starts this way in verse 12. I'll just read the start of it. Therefore, he said, a certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return. Dearly beloved, our Savior has gone into a far country.

The disciples watched him being carried up into heaven. And the Shekinah glory cloud obscured him from their sight. He has gone into a far country and he has received for himself a kingdom. And he has that kingdom and he has that authority.

And he's going to return. And Jesus tells the story about how this nobleman entrusted to his servants, entrusted to those he reigned over, responsibilities that they were to follow through on while he was gone.

Those who did it for his glory were rewarded according to his grace. And those who rejected his reign, rejected the fact of his authority, ended up judged and destroyed. And in the final assessment, when it came down to the wedding feast, those who rejoiced with him were those who were clothed by his righteousness and not by their own.

Our king has gone into a far country. That doesn't mean he doesn't reign now. He does. That doesn't mean that he's absent from us. Oh, he's present with us by his spirit. It doesn't mean that he has nothing to do with us.

Every single day we live, we live in the light of his glorious reign. And we can thank God for that. And notice that he reigns, he reigns, until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.

Now this is near and dear to the heart of Peter, because in Acts chapter one, after realizing that Jesus, he's raised from the dead, he's giving us instructions, he's about to ascend to the heavens. And so my most critical question right now, Peter says, is when are you going to restore the kingdom to Israel?

He uses the same term, restoration, restore, because he had all these Old Testament promises. He wanted to see them fulfilled. He knows that Christ is the one who fulfills them. So he's asking Jesus, how is this going to work?

Well, he's gotten his answer. He's gotten his answer because now, Acts two, Acts three, he is preaching from those promises. Promises that Moses recorded, promises that Joel recorded, promises in the Psalms that David recorded.

And he is saying, see, it's all fulfilled in Christ and the kingdom that he brings. It's all fulfilled in Christ and this new covenant that he is the mediator of. How long does Christ reign? How long do we have?

It says in the text, heaven must receive Christ until the times of restoration of all things. Until the times of restoration of all things. Well, this is what Paul said as well. First Corinthians 15, 20 through 26.

But now Christ is risen from the dead and has become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since by man came death, so also by man also came the resurrection from the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive.

Are you in Adam? Then the most significant thing about your life is death. The wages of sin is death.

Eternal death.

Or are you in Christ? Then your life is characterized by life. Christ's life. Verse 23, but each one in his own order. Christ, the first fruits. He is raised first. Christ is risen from the dead. That's why we meet on Sundays.

Jesus was raised on a Sunday. That's why we meet on Sundays. The first fruits of the resurrection to come. Christ has been made alive. So each one in his own order. Afterward, those who are Christ's at his coming.

Verse 24, then comes the end when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father. Heaven must receive him and he must reign until the restoration of all things. When he delivers the kingdom to God the Father.

When he puts an end to all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign until he has put all enemies under his feet. The restoration of all things. The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.

Not only are we rejoicing in the hope of Christ who's coming back, but he's going to come back having defeated all the enemies of God. Even death itself. He will raise us from the dead. And we have that to be thankful for.

So when Peter preaches the superiority of the new covenant to the old covenant, it's not a matter of saying the old covenant has no connection to the new. He's saying this was long promised, just as it was prophesied through all the prophets of the old covenant.