Acts 2:22-24, 38 (NIV) 22 “Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. 23 This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24 But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him. 36 “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” 37 When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” 38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
The Cross was not merely the work of the people around it, nor the power of evil behind it. The Cross was also the work of God. How can the Cross be the result of the plotting of sinful people and the plan of God? It is hard to understand.
But, understanding is not what Peter is calling for as he speaks to us through his words to the people of Jerusalem. Acceptance is what Peter is calling for, acceptance of the truth about God and about ourselves. Is it not true that we want a God who will make things right when life goes wrong? When our plans for the future fall through?
God is not indifferent to our prayer, but God does not bend His will to fulfill our wishful thinking. As we come up against that God who does not bend we realize in the depths that we have come up against One who is real and good and true. The good news about God is that we find God not only in the joyous experiences of life and the blessings of health and prosperity. The good news is that in addition to these obvious tokens of God’s goodness, life’s crucifixions are as much a part of God’s good will as the sunshine. The day of Jesus’ death is called “Good Friday.” The good is only that Jesus was delivered up by the predetermined plan of God.
In whatever is happening, God is at work in it, behind it, and through it to do and accomplish His purpose for us as well. That is the truth about God that we are called to accept and to trust, for trust is not merely a matter of a grim endurance in life’s hardships. Trust is actively believing that beneath the surface of what we see there is more. There is God. Trust is believing against all evidence to the contrary and against the present appearance of things that God is love.
If we find that hard to believe it may be because we are harder than the events that happen to us. The Cross declares that God is not only present and at work in the bad events of life, He is also at work in the bad in you and me, and that is our greatest hope.
From a sermon preached by Henry Dobbs Pope April 12,1992
© Rhonda Hinkle Mitchell Broyles
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