The Name of Jesus (Acts 3: 11-23)
I want to talk about spiritual authority and the power of repentance in the life of the church today as many people think that being a Christian means they can remain the same with no change in life or change in what they do, or to the lifestyle that have been leading. They assume forgiveness from above and just go to church! They don’t realize that positionally and in their identity, they are radically different from before. Radically different! I’ll begin by saying that the decision to come to faith is not just a human decision. It’s actually a decision made by God. We have been chosen to be included into family, to be a child of the living God. Our choice was to accept that choice. Faith is a gift more than anything else. We are like the hungry person who’s just been given a meal and we have a role to play but the heavy lifting has been done already. The journey after that though requires intentionality and strength. We are now in a new position with all the authority that befits our position as children of God and thus begins the battle against entrenched sin in our lives. In Eph 2: 6, we are seated “with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” Notice, it doesn’t say that we will sit with Christ in the after life. Those words are sitting with Christ in the present tense. We are an anointed people.
That means God will bring his power to bear for his people. Some people however, remain spiritual babes even after being born again. They never come to terms with the worth they have in God’s eyes or the authority that goes with being a child of the living God and the freedom from release of sin.
2.1. We Represent God: We are now the people of the living God and we have to realize that we have worth in the eyes of God:
“Everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.” Isa 43:7
“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” 1 Pet 2:9
I want to explain all this in the context of the early church and how Peter discovers this new position. Remember, he was the guy who denied Jesus. I don’t want to be too severe on him as we really don’t know what we’d have done in his position. Can you say with confidence that you won’t have done what he did if you were put on the spot? But, on Pentecost, he preaches one sermon and 3000 are added to the church. Then in chap 3, he prays for the healing of a man who’s been crippled and he gets healed. Does Peter go and let that get to his head? Does he make the silly mistake of thinking that it was he who did it all? Peter now realizes that he is an instrument of God. He is a chosen servant, an anointed servant. You might ask,
what is an anointed servant?
2.2. Anointed: This word is first seen in the OT to describe the spreading of oil for a special purpose. It is for holy use and the person is set aside for a task. They anointed priests, kings, and used oil as a symbol of the Holy Spirit to empower. In the NT, much use of the word is to describe the work of Jesus as the anointed one. In the NT Paul writes:
“God who establishes us with you in Christ and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.” (1 Cor 1:21-22)
Peter is anointed and that means he is chosen and empowered. Without anointing, he runs away from a crisis but with the anointing, he serves in power.
We too are anointed because we have the Spirit.
We all have the Spirit but does the Spirit have us?
When the Spirit has us then we move in the anointing. It is a sad day when servants of God do not move in the anointing of the Spirit. They do not walk in the power that comes from the anointing. The first pre-condition is the
subject has to be humble. That is a pre-condition of servanthood. The heart cannot overreach and become prideful. That’s a recipe for disaster. God looks to those who are humble in spirit.
2.3. Peter is Aware: The second thing they do is to serve in pairs. Here it is Peter and John. We first see this in Mk 6:7. There is much wisdom here and being in a team makes one accountable and keeps one in check. The 2nd thing we see is Peter not taking credit for the healing of the cripped man:
“why do you stare at us as though by our own power or piety we have made him walk” (Acts 3:12).
The Christian world is strewn with the histories of preachers and evangelists who got caught up in the pride of the moment, got careless and fell. It is seen in their lack of servanthood or pride or selfishness. Here, Peter attributes all to Jesus. He is a servant and servants don’t behave like bog bosses. They don’t hog the spotlight as that leads inevitably to pride and sin. I’ll speak more about sin later because that is what we have to guard against most.