2 Samuel 23:24-24:25, Acts 3:1-26, Psalms 123:1-4, Proverbs 16:21-23
Today is the 5th day of June welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is wonderful, what a joy to be here with you at the…well…at the closing…the closing of another week or, you know, of another work week anyway. So, it’s great to be here with you as we head into the weekend, but it doesn’t matter what day it is or weekend or what part of the week it is. We have a rhythm, a daily rhythm. Daily we immerse ourselves into the Scriptures, and that adds up to making a huge difference in our year. So, let’s take that next step forward. And today’s step in the Old Testament, which is the book of second Samuel is going to bring us to the conclusion of second Samuel. So, we’ll finish second Samuel today before getting into the book of Acts, and then tomorrow we’ll move forward into a new book in the Old Testament. So, we’re reading from the God’s Word Translation this week. Today, second Samuel 23 verse 24 through 24 verse 25.
Commentary:
Okay. So, as we continue our journey through the book of Acts and we’re just kind of getting going and just getting moved in we encounter a story today where John and Peter are…are doing ministry in the temple complex, and there’s a man who is a beggar, basically gets brought to one of the gates. In this case the Beautiful Gate is named. And, so, he asks for money. We…we see this tradition continue until today throughout the earth. So, nothing new there in particular, other than this man is in the temple complex and he’s taking donations and Peter and John there looking at him and the guys thinking he’s gonna maybe get a coin or something. And they tell him, “like, I don’t have any money”, right, “silver and gold have I none” - if we’re like quoting the older translations - “but I will give you what I do have in the name of Jesus. Get up and walk.” The man gets up and walks. The people are aware of who this man is because, you know, he's…he’s normally asking for money at this gate…like this is a person who’s there, they’ve seen him before and now he’s walking around praising God. He won’t leave Peter and John. And a crowd begins to form as you could imagine that it would. And then, boom, we sort of begin to see the point of this story in the book of Acts emerge because the crowd forms because they’ve seen something happened that is very unusual. A man who was a beggar who was lame is now walking. It seems like a miracle has happened and their astonished. And Peter says, “what are you so surprised about here? Like, what is so surprising about this man? What’s so surprising about all this?” And it’s a bit of a rhetorical question because a miracle, right, that a miracle has taken place, that’s what’s so surprising about all this. But what Peter began to unpack is Jesus is the source of this power, the one that you took and crucified. The one that you denied and ignored, he was killed by you, but God would not leave Him. He was raised from the dead and has sent His Holy Spirit into the world. It’s not us you should be astonished by. We haven’t really done anything we’ve just been here as a conduit for this power of the Holy Spirit. The power of Jesus has healed this man, not us. And then Peter has the opportunity to share the gospel. What we see here though in the book of Acts is the first recorded miraculous event after Jesus ascended to the Father. This is the first time we see what Jesus told His disciples would happen actually happening. And Jesus physical presence was gone. And yet, His Spirit remained and through His disciples these things happened. The thing to kinda linger on in this story is…is Peter’s question, “why…why are you so surprised about this? Like, what’s so surprising about this?” Because, in effect what Peter’s saying is, “a new normal is here. In spite of you God is doing a new thing. What is so surprising about this?” Applying this to our own lives, we have the ability to ask the same questions. What is so surprising about this? Because when…when something that is out of the ordinary or even miraculously happens and we are somewhere in the vicinity and we hear this or we…we witness this, we go the same places that the people would go. And Peter’s trying to say, “this shouldn’t surprise you. These are the repercussions of this new thing that God is doing in the world. This separation between man and God is no longer real. There isn’t any separation anymore. Anything is possible.” So, let’s kind of move ourselves into the end of this week and into this… and into this weekend like letting those words of Peter kinda bounce around in our hearts and minds. “What’s so surprising about this?” Because that’s a posture change. Like…like that…that goes from the shock of the unexpected to the expectancy that God will move in spite of anything, that nothing is impossible. So, what if we were to imagine that. What if we were to imagine a world where nothing is impossible with God. If we lived in that world. If that’s how we lived our lives with that expectancy than we could also with Peter have that same posture. What’s so surprising about this. This is what our loving Father does. This is what the most-high God is like. He makes the impossible possible.
Prayer:
Father, we embrace that we carry that with us into this day. We invite Your Holy Spirit to keep it alive in our hearts as we move into the weekend and we ask that You begin to change our posture, to change our heart so that we expect these things to happen because it’s Your kingdom breaking out on this earth. What’s so surprising about that? It’s been Your plan all along. Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.
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