Why Peter Didn't Preach the Gospel in Acts 3

Hello and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. Okay, it's good to have everybody back, and these months just literally fly by. It just seems like we were only here a week ago, and here it's been over a month. So anyway, we're glad to have all of you back with us, and again for all of you joining us on television, how we appreciate hearing from you. And I've just got to share with everyone, we've just come back from a week in Indiana and Ohio where we met so many of you, and our listeners out there, and it was so nice to be able to put a face on a name that before we had just known by letter or by telephone. So anyway, we appreciate hearing from all of you, and of course the financial help. We can't do it without that, even though I'll never ask for money. I certainly have to thank you periodically for being a part of our reaching out to so many folk. I've often told my classes here in Oklahoma, I wish I could just share all these letters with folks, and maybe someday we'll get some way of doing that. So anyway, for those of you who are just catching our program for the first time, and every week we get letters to that effect. I just caught your program accidentally for the first time, and I have to constantly remember that as I make my remarks. I have to make people aware that all the last four plus years of programs are available on videotape. We make them as nominal as we possibly can. Many of them are now being transcribed into print. Little by little we're catching up. It won't be long before we'll have every tape also in book form. To each his own. Some people like the books, some like the tapes, some like both of them. But anyway, they're available if you'll just call and write to us. Again we are just an informal Bible study. We are not plugging any one denomination. We just try to reach people from all walks of life, so that we can get them interested in studying the Scriptures. I never maintain that people have to agree with everything I say. But if I can just somehow spark a desire to study, I've challenged people for 20 years. If you can prove me wrong by proving it from the Scriptures, why have at it. Show me where you think I'm wrong, and I'll have an open ear. But I'm so confident that after all these years of teaching and seeing people just literally turned around, either by way of salvation or seeing their Christian life just exhilarated, then I cannot be too far out in left field. So as we start our study again today, I'd like to have the class here in the studio, and those of you watching with us, Acts chapter 3. Last program you remember we were in Acts chapter 2, and if I remember correctly I closed the program with the definition of the word church. Whenever you see the word church in the New Testament, it is not always applicable for the Church which is the Body of Christ. The word church came from the Greek word ekklesia, which is translated as a called out assembly. Moses and Israel in the desert were a called out assembly. Stephen refers to Acts chapter 7 as a church in the wilderness. Now that wasn't the New Testament church by any stretch of the imagination. And of course I feel the same way with these Jews here in Jerusalem. They as yet have not heard the Gospel of Grace as we know it. They have not comprehended that the death, burial, and resurrection of their Messiah was now intended to go out to the Gentile world. And so they are still properly and correctly, as the politicians use the word, are confining it only to the Jew. And I'm going to show you here in just a little bit why they are, and why God is having them do just that. So as we come out of chapter 2 and go into chapter 3, nothing has changed. It is still an extension of the Old Testament program. Only the Messiah that they should have and could have accepted as their King in His earthly ministry, they have crucified. God has raised Him from the dead. He has called Him back to glory to sit at the Father's right hand. But He is still dealing with the nation of Israel under that same set of circumstances that began with John the Baptist. And so of course Peter admonishes in chapter 2, "...ye men of Israel, and like I have told my classes for twenty some years, how can you push Gentiles in there when Gentiles aren't even mentioned?" And so I maintain that this is still all very, very Jewish. Now then in chapter 3, verse 1. Now Peter and John went up together, I did it last night in one of my classes, and I don't do this to be funny, I do this to draw attention to what the Scripture says. Now Peter and John went up together to the church on the corner of First and Grand. Did they? No. Where did they go? To the temple. The temple hasn't been closed down. They are still practicing the Law. No one has told them not to. And not only do they go to the temple, but on a required hour. See how that's stipulated? Now there's nothing in our church doctrine that stipulates that on such and such an hour, that you and I go to prayer. The Mohammedans do. They have their hours of prayer throughout the day. But we as grace age believers are not stipulated that on a particular hour we meet at the church house for prayer. But here these men are still under that Jewish habit, that Jewish ritual of going up to the temple at the ninth hour, since it's the hour of prayer. Now the next amazing thing is that as they go to the temple, there lays a lame man. Verse 2. And a certain lame man from his mother's womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple, which is called Beautiful, to ask alms, or to beg of them that entered the temple. Now stop and think. Who must have passed that same begging gentleman for three years, off and on? The Lord Himself. Why didn't He heal him? Why didn't He? Well you see, the sovereign God does everything with a purpose. You remember back in John's Gospel when Lazarus was sick and Mary and Martha sent word to Jesus that He was sick? And what did Jesus do? He purposely delayed responding to them so that Lazarus would die, so that He could go back and raise him from the dead. Now had He gone back immediately as Mary and Martha had wanted, Lazarus wouldn't have died and we wouldn't have had that account. But you see, everything is done for a purpose, to teach us something even today in the 1990's. And so here again, Jesus had purposely bypassed this lame man because it says it was from His mother's womb and He's already 40 years old. So that Peter and John could precipitate these series of events that are now going to unfold in chapter 3. Alright, read on. So when they saw Peter and John about to go to the temple, they asked all of them. Peter fastened his eyes upon Him and said, and with John, said, "...look on us," and he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them. And then Peter said, "...but silver and gold have I none, but such as I have, I give thee." Now watch carefully. And again, I'm going to read it different from what your Bible says, only for sake of making an impression. "...in the name of Jesus Christ, who has died for your sins, and has been raised from the dead, get up and walk." Is that what Peter says? No! Peter doesn't even mention His death, burial, and resurrection. Now people don't stop and think of that. Now you see, for us today, this is the whole epitome of everything that God began to do when He created Adam and Eve, is to bring the world to a knowledge of the crucified, buried, and risen Christ. But Peter doesn't know that yet. And why do I say he doesn't know it yet? Because God has not revealed that yet. It's still secret. Now I'm going to chase down some references, and we've looked at them before. If we go back with me to Deuteronomy 29.29, and we're just going to show on just a few hopscotching through Scripture, how that over and over God has said, I'm keeping this secret. I'm not telling you everything. And this is the only way we can study Scripture with the idea that only periodically does God reveal something that those people back there didn't understand. And that's where Peter and John are in Acts chapter 3. They still haven't had an understanding of what God was going to put on the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. As yet all they understand is that He was the Messiah, He was the Son of God, He had proved it with His miracles, but He was only for the nation of Israel. But it wasn't that God had blanked the Gentiles out of His thinking, not at all. But God was going to use the favored nation, He was going to use the covenant people to reach out to those pagan, idolatrous Gentiles at the appropriate time. And of course Israel as yet is dragging their feet, and so that time hasn't come. Alright, Deuteronomy 29. Here it is. We've looked at it before. The secret things. See that? The secret things belong unto the Lord our God. Now those of you who are with us, or have watched the tapes, or read the little books, you'll notice that I made a rather strong point of one of the terms of deity referred to the everlasting God, but He was capable of hiding things. And even the psalmist asked the question, Lord, why do you hide these things? Well He's sovereign. He has the right to do that. And so here it is from Moses, the secret things belong unto the Lord our God. But those things which are, what's the next word? Revealed. Now keep that word in your computer up here, revealed. The other word that comes from the same root is revelation. And one writer of Scripture is constantly referring to the revelations that he got from the ascended Lord. Now remember that. But the things that are revealed belong unto us and to our children. Now not that much had even been revealed to Moses, but as much as had been revealed, they were to what? Believe it. Now let's go on up through the Old Testament a little ways to, oh let's go to, where were they going to go? Matthew, Luke 18. Right, let's go to Luke 18. Mark, Matthew, Mark, Luke, chapter 18. I was thinking I had one other one back in the Old Testament, but I guess that's on another line of thought. Luke 18. Drop down to verse 31. And all of this shocks people the first time they see it. And this isn't the only place it's written. Luke says the same thing in his Gospel. Almost word for word. So you can rest that this is the way it happened. 18 verse 31, Then he took, that is the Lord Jesus, took unto him the twelve, and he said unto them, Behold we go up to Jerusalem. Now get the setting again. Whenever you read Scripture, get the setting. Here we are up in northern Israel, north of Galilee, just shortly before the Passover and He's going to be crucified. It's at the end of His three years of earthly ministry. And so He took Him and He said to the twelve, Behold we go up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man shall be accomplished. For He, speaking of Himself, for He shall be delivered unto the Gentiles, that is the Romans. He shall be mocked and spitefully entreated and spitted on. They shall scourge Him, put Him to death, and the third day He shall rise again. Plain language, as plain as you can get it. But look at the next verse. And they, the twelve, who had been with Him for three years, understood none of these things. Almost unbelievable isn't it? And they understood none of these things. Why? Because this saying was hid from them, neither understood they the things that were spoken. Who hid it? God did. God did. It wasn't time for them to know. See and this immediately substantiates that they had no idea when He was hanging on that cross that three days later He would be alive. You know I'm always making the point that had they had any understanding that He was going to die, yes He would be buried, but the third day He would be rising again. Where would they have been that early Sunday morning? Well outside the tomb. But they weren't. They had all given up. They thought it was all done. And you remember even when Mary Magdalene went to dress the body with the spices and so forth, she was all shook up because the body was gone. They had no idea that He was alive. Well God had purposely hidden these things from them because He's going to reveal in His own time the things that man has to know. We've got another one in John's Gospel. Peter has to be brought up short with almost the same kind of a statement again. In John's Gospel chapter 13 we come down to verse 7 and this is at the foot washing situation. You all know that one. When Jesus was washing the disciples' feet and He came to Peter, and Peter said, not me Lord, you're not going to wash my feet. And you know the account. And Jesus, verse 7 of John 13. I'm going to wait until you all find it, because I know if you find it, the people in their living rooms are finding it. John 13, verse 7. And Jesus answered and said unto him, to Peter, what I do thou knowest not, what's the next word? Now. But thou shalt know hereafter. Alright, we've got a couple more. Let's go all the way to Ephesians. Chapter 3. Ephesians, Galatians, Ephesians. Chapter 3. Now we're into the writings of Paul. And now Paul writes from a little different perspective. He writes now as one who has had these revelations. And that's the word he calls it. By revelation. By revelation. Ephesians chapter 3, beginning of verse 1. For this cause, in other words, everything that he's just written in chapter 2 concerning our salvation. For by grace are you saved through faith and not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. See that's Ephesians chapter 2. You who were dead in trespasses and sins. He hath made alive. Alright, now because of those statements he says for this cause. I, Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for whom? Gentiles. See? That's us. When we were in Ohio, I shared it with my classes. But I've got to share it because maybe some of these kids will get a chance to see the program. We had a chance to speak to a Christian high school. And oh for three hours those kids just ate it up. Boy we had hands in the air by the dozens constantly and we couldn't even get them out at the end of three hours. And it was exhausting. I was just totally beat when I got out of there but what a thrilling experience to see those kids just come alive and search the Scriptures and the headmaster was in my class that night and he said, They didn't stop all day long. He said they were still looking up Scriptures all afternoon. And the little third and fourth graders that they took out after the end of the first hour, they griped all day. Why did you take us out? But anyway, when people begin to see what the Scripture says, it does, it gets to you. And so now here he says that all these things have been written because Paul is a prisoner of the Lord for us Gentiles. And then come down to verse 3. Here it is, a revelation. A revealing. How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery, or a secret, as I wrote before in a few words, whereby when you read you may understand my knowledge as a result of revelations in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages, or generations, or administrations, or dispensations, they all come from the same root word, was not made known. Now you see how plain that is in the light of Deuteronomy 29. In the light of Luke 18. In the light of John 13. It all fits. These things were not made known because God had been keeping it secret. And so he says, these things were not made known to the sons of men as it is now, and here comes the word again, revealed, or unveiled, unto His holy apostles and prophets that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs in the same mind, and partakers of His promise in Christ by the Gospel. And now I'm reading ahead. Come all the way down to verse 9, for sake of time. And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the secret, or the mystery, which, now watch this, I'm not putting this in. This is here. Which from the beginning of the age, is a better word than world, from the beginning of the age has been, what's the next word? Hid. Where? In God. Now you can't get it any plainer than that. These things have never been revealed before because they've been hid. God has kept it secret, and that's His prerogative. Now I'm doing all this to show that when I say that Peter and John go up to the temple to pray, because they had no concept of what we call the church age. They were still under the legal system of Judaism, they were still an extension of Christ's earthly ministry, and when we get back to Acts here in a moment and see the miracle they perform, it's nothing different than what Christ had been doing for three years. Alright, but continuing on now then with this keeping things secret until God is ready to reveal it. He says, "...these things have been hid in God, the same God who created all things by Jesus the Christ." Alright, now just one more in that same line, Colossians chapter 1. Drop down to verse 26. Colossians chapter 1, verse 26. I guess we really should start at verse 24. You people that are in classes two or three nights a week, you're used to that aren't you? I'll give out a verse and I'll say, no we better go back, we gotta go back, we gotta go back. Alright, let's go up to verse 24. "...who now rejoice in my sufferings for you," and remember Paul is writing here to Gentile believers. Colossians is up in Asia Minor. "...and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the church." Now you see the difference in language? Here it's the church which is the body of Christ. This is the one that you and I are acquainted with. Alright, verse 25. "...whereof I am made a minister," Paul writes, "...according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you." Now do you see the order? Those of you who were with me way back in Exodus, I made the point, and I'll probably make it again, that just as surely as God gave the law to Israel through what man? Moses. He didn't give it to them directly. He gave it through Moses. Moses took it down off the mountain and shared it with the nation of Israel. Consequently, in his earthly ministry, when they came and asked him doctrinal questions, he didn't answer them. Instead, what did he say? You have Moses. In other words, go back and read it yourself. You've got all you need to know, because Moses has written it. Alright, now he's done the same thing for us today with the Apostle Paul. Now I know once in a while somebody will complain that I make more of Paul than I should. No, I don't. I don't make any more of Paul than the Scripture does, or any more than they made of Moses. In fact, I maintain they are the two greatest men other than Christ Himself. Moses back there, and Paul up here. In fact, one of the denominational leaders that Iris and I heard one Sunday morning, he was a guest speaker, and quite a few degrees behind his name, and it just thrilled me to death as he opened his message that Sunday morning. Now he said, I'm going to be taking my message from the Apostle Paul, whom I feel is the greatest man that ever lived other than Christ Himself. Now you see, I'm even going to temper that. I don't call Paul the greatest. I put him on a keel with Moses. But you see, I'm not alone when I say that we have to listen to what this Apostle says, because he is writing to us, to Gentiles. Now look what he says, verse 26. To fulfill the Word of God, coming out of verse 25, even the mystery, now that's always translated also as secret, even the secret which has been hid from ages and from generations, but now is manifest to His saints. Alright, now we've only got a couple of minutes left already. Let's go back to Acts chapter 3. And in that light, when I say that Peter and John did not have any knowledge of the Church, which is the Body of Christ, but they are still associated with the Judaism that Christ dealt with, that John the Baptist preached, the Kingdom of Heaven, repent and be baptized, that is still Peter and the 11 men here in the early part of Acts. As I understand the Scriptures, and I had another thought just driving up this morning, throughout these whole early chapters, or even study Bibles, or many times headed the First Church or the First Christians, there isn't a word of Church language in here. There's not a word about bishops and deacons and pastors, is there? Not a word. There's not a word in here as how to behave in the house of God. And so I don't care what denomination people may be from, where does most local churches get their ideas of church government? From Paul, see? He describes the office of the deacon. He describes the requirements to be a pastor. He describes what it takes to be an elder and a deacon. Here you don't. This is just an extension of Judaism. Temple, worship, prayer at the ninth hour, and now they're healing the lame man. Not on the power of resurrection, but on the power of the Messiah, the Christ, the Lord Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God. And now read on with the two minutes we have left. And so in verse 6 of Acts chapter 3, Peter takes this lame man by the hand, and he says, "...in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk." Appropriate? Absolutely! Because he's just continuing on what Christ has been doing for three years, and that was the whole idea when Jesus said in Acts 1.8 that when the Holy Spirit would come, they were to have power. Well what kind of power? To do what He had been doing. And there again, what did Jesus tell the Twelve? That the Holy Spirit would not come until He left. And so it's just simply a transition of power. The Lord Jesus goes up to glory, and the Holy Spirit comes down to continue dealing especially with the nation of Israel. Now I've got a little bit of time, I'm going to jump you all the way ahead to chapter 5. I've got a half a minute now. Go ahead to chapter 5, and drop down to verse 31. Your Bible says it just as well as mine. Him, speaking of Jesus in verse 30, in fact read verse 30, "...the God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom you slew and hanged on a tree. Him hath God exalted with His right hand to be a Prince and a Savior, to give repentance to Israel." Period. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. If you would like more information about the Les Feldick Ministries, a Bible study in your area, or about this program, write to Les Feldick Ministries, Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. That's Route 1, Box 760, Kinta, Oklahoma, 74552. Through the Bible with Les Feldick is viewer supported, and your gift is appreciated. Thank you, and be sure to tune in next time for Through the Bible with Les Feldick.