Day 59 – Unclean and Peter's Second Sermon

Today’s reading: Acts 3

The Apostles are becoming bolder and have come out of hiding.  They travel to the temple to preach.  There Peter heals a man who has been lame for life.  The crowd is enthralled.  They recognize that this is a great miracle.  The gather together and Peter preaches to them.  He says some important things:

…and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses.  And his name—by faith in his name—has made this man strong whom you see and know, and the faith that is through Jesus has given the man this perfect health in the presence of you all.

Notice, Peter calls Jesus, “the Author of life”.  This is a clear statement that Jesus is God.

Second, notice that Peter says that faith, particularly faith in Jesus has cured this man.  As discussed previously, when we reviewed Peter’s first sermon faith is always presumed to be the pre-requisite.  However, that doesn’t negate the fact that faith brings about a call to action.  As Peter said in his first sermon, when asked ‘what must we do to be saved’, he responded “repent and be baptized”, Peter delivers the same message now.

Tomorrow: Acts 4:1-22