Bible Guys Classics: Acts 4

Hey, everybody, we're the Bibble guys, and if you're just tuning in recently, just know that we are showing a little bit of reruns for a few months, and then we'll be back bigger and better than ever on August thirty first, because behind the scenes, we're taking a hiatus to do some very important things. Yeah, we're building building out a new studio and we've got some new structure. Super excited about it. So August thirty first, brand new content. But in the meantime, enjoy some of our greatest hits. So today we're talking about the apostle Peter calling a bunch of people a bunch of names. Wow. So he's Chris, I'm Jeff, and we're the Dayta Bible guys. So listen, here's what we want to do today. We would love to invite our listeners, huh, to be a part of what we're calling a mail bag segment. Mail bag segment, although not we're going to read mail from our listener. Yeah, but from our listener the one. But we don't want physical mails, right, This isn't from the nineteen eighties, this is this would be email, right, So the email is going to be listed right here on the screen and it's info at bibbleayes dot com. That's right. And so when you email in and here's what we want you to do. We want you to ask us about us. So this is more like I get to know you kind of a thing. So in the past, the enigma that is Chris Tarba. Yes, if you just start peeling back the laber. If anybody cares about such things. Wow, but it's your mom and my mom. There's the two listeners. Well, here was the idea behind the brainstorm behind these meetings is that in the past we started off podcasts just by asking each other random questions. Yeah, that was the fun. Yeah, that was just goofy. So the question is this, if you if someone else could ask a question, what would they ask? Oh yeah, right, or what would they want to know? So I'll give you an example. So you look up to well, I mean people, yeah. Yeah, so somebody I don't know. Let's just take that somebody I don't know. So I was thinking about this. I was thinking about Aerosmith Steven Tyler. One of the things that I would ask him is about his voice. Did you know that the very popular and most popular song they sing dream on right. Did you know that was the very first time that Steven Tyler used his high voice ever, And everybody told him, well, according to his interviews, is that everybody told him that don't use that voice. It wasn't didn't It didn't sound like his normal voice. So that's why at the beginning of the song he actually sings pretty low register. If you listen to all his recent hits, he stays up in that speech kind of a thing. Well, that's the reason why that song sounds so different. When he starts, he starts in low register. Then he went up and he used it and became such a hit. It became his sort of trait, his sgnature. And he lived in that well, so and saw him in concert. And this guy's at the Palace in Detroit, and he was probably sixty six years old. Wow. And I was actually with a friend of mine, Brian bell Knapp, who had like front row center tickets, kid you not, And so he was literally standing right next to me as close as you are to me. We're sorry for saying your name, Brian. We don't know if you want to be associated with Chris or not, but. Yes he does. Yeah, he's my good friend. Okay, So anyway, you do that all the time, you say people's names. I'm like, I hope they don't mind was saying their names. Yeah, well I know Brian, So anyway I know people too. Go ahead. In other words, he's not gonna mind. So anyway, Steven Tyler is as close to me as you are, and he's singing dream On and he has his microphone look in his handheld, yeah, giving him a rose. He had a huge microphone stand right, ok, like scarves on it, and he's singing dream On and he's holding it out like this out of the stage and it's literally right above me. So I'm looking up and he's But here's my point. My point is he's sixty six and he still hits every single note. So one of the things I would ask him, what is your voice? What is your what is your training? What's your regimen? What are your rules? How do you do that right? Because I'm very concerned about my voice sometimes I don't, you know, treat it well, my vocal courts, and so I would ask him that. Well, okay, so if you are thinking Chris Starbaugh is a lot like Stephen Tyler, and you want to learn everything you can learn about how connect those like Tyler? Like wants to learn about Tyler, then send an email to info at the Bible guys dot com. That's not what I meant And yeah, yeah. Yeah, So you just want to learn interesting things about Chris Arbo? So, right, what would you ask to somebody? Oh? You know what, I so, I'm terrible at that. I don't really think through those kinds of questions very often. But I was with a guy here recently who has established like fourteen different ETFs and uh, you know, he struck the gavel like seven times at the Dow Jones thing. Really great investor, been very successful investing, and I just couldn't get enough of asking questions and talking to him about investing and stuff like that. I'm not good at it. I'm not you know, I'm not an expert investor. But I'm just very intrigued by the kind of courage and the strategy behind that. So I asked him a bunch of questions that it was really interesting. So I was just interested into finding out how does he do what he does right? And I think that's what you're asking, right, is send in funny questions. Anything funny questions, fun questions, Hey, why do you do this? How do you think about this? Or could it be serious as well? Yeah? Yeah, and mail bag kind of questions. So we already have the stump the pastor serious Bible questions, so this would be different from that. Right, So, if you want to do the stump the pastor, send in in your in your the subject the subject line stump the pastor, and that would be like a tough by question. But if you just wanted to ask a fun, goofy question, ask a mailbags question. Yeah, in the subject we get to know your question. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we took a long time on that, but just kind of establish it. We'd like to have this be a segment, So send it to us. Send us those things and I think it'll be fun. Take the time. Okay. So we are in Acts chapter four, and this is a continuation of the previous story where Peter and John heal this guy that has been crippled for a long time and then there's a big crowd and so they get up and they begin to preach the gospel during this crowd. So then in verse in chapter four, the authorities get involved with this, going, Hey, this shouldn't be going on. So here's where we are. In verse one, we're reading from the New Living Translation. It says while Peter and John were speaking to the people, they were confronted by the priests, the captain of the Temple Guard, and some of the Sadducees. These leaders were very disturbed that Peter and John were teaching the people that through Jesus there is a resurrection of the dead. Sadducees didn't believe in the resurrection. So you joke. Yeah, they were sad. You see, that's why they were sad. You see, that's right. So it's very good. Remember I said, I said, you knew a lot of lame jokes. They arrested them and since it was already evening, put them in jail until morning. But many of the people who had heard their message believed it. So the number of men who believe now totaled about five thousand. The next day, the council of all the rulers and elders and teachers of religious law met in Jerusalem. Annes, the High Priest, was there, along with Caiaphas, John Alexander, and other relatives of the high priests. They brought in the two disciples and demanded, by what power or in whose name have you done this? Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, rulers and elders of our people, are we being questioned today because we've done a good deed for a crippled man? Do you want to know how he was healed? Let me clearly state to all of you, into all the people of Israel, that was healed by the powerful name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the man you crucified, but whom God raised from the dead. For Jesus is the one referred to in the scriptures where it says the stone that you builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. And he makes a very clear statement. He said, there is salvation in no one else. God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved for now. The members of the council were amazed when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, for they could see that they were ordinary men with no special training in the scriptures. They also recognized them as men who had been with Jesus. But since they could see the man who had been healed standing right there among them, there was nothing the council could say, so they ordered Peter and John out of the council chamber and conferred among themselves. What should we do with these men, they asked each other. We can't deny that they've performed a miraculous sign, and everybody in Jerusalem knows about it. But to keep them from spreading their propaganda any further, we must warn them not to speak to anyone in Jesus name again. So they called the apostles back in and commanded them never again to speak or teach in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John replied, do you think God wants us to obey you rather than him? Cannot stop telling about everything we've seen and heard. The council then threatened them further, but they finally let them go because they didn't know how to punish them without starting a riot, for everyone was praising God for this miraculous sign, the healing of a man who'd been laying for more than forty years. You know, I think this story fits my personality. Yeah, it does every time that I hear this story. And by the way, we covered this way back in February. That was a very long time ago. But every time I hear this story, I get rebbed up, I get charged up. It makes me want to charge all the square gun. It makes me want to Like, as long as i know that I'm doing what's right and I'm standing up for what is right, then I'm not afraid to say anything. And you know, listen, I've been through my series of events, even in the last couple of years, where I've said some very tough things to some people who you know, had leverage over me, and I was never afraid to say them, which is part of my problem. Yeah, well there is that, But if you know it's right and you do it in a way that is like obviously here Peter is just being bold. He's not being disrespectful, right, So he's not being he's not he's not he's didn't call them a bunch of names or anything. What he's really doing is is he's saying, hey, listen, we're not careful, we're not going to calculate our answers, we're not going to fear you politically, even though this were probably some of the same council members that put Jesus to death, right, so now he's looking at them from the same thing about this from the same people that Peter ran from. You know, just when Jesus was crucified just a few chapters ago. In terms of timeline, right. Now, he's looking at them directly. Months later, months later, it's a few months. He's caught in their crosshairs. Now it's him, but after everything he's experienced, these. Guys could get Jesus killed. They can certainly get Peter killed. Yes, And so he looks at them and says, we're not even careful. Let me. I love it because he says this, let me be clear, I'm gonna speak slow so all of you can understand what I'm about to say. I'm gonna enunciate. And then when they threaten him further, then he says, do you actually think that God wants us to obey you rather than him? We're not going to do it. So just before you let us go, I'm announcing to you we're not going to do it. It's amazing to me. Well, let's say set the stage here. So it says that while they're preaching there, they're preaching that message that we talked about yesterday. While they're preaching this message, they're confronted by the priests. These would have been probably these priests would have been probably relatives of the high priest. That's that's how that all worked anyways. And then the captain of the Temple guard, the captain of the Temple guard would have been the most powerful military quasi military guy engaged with the priests and the Pharisees, the Saducees, and then it was also the Sadducees. So the Sadducees, you remember, there were two different sects. There were the Pharisees, and the Pharisees were very religious and very wholly acting in their life. The Sadducees were very secular, very worldly, very Romanesque in the way that they live their lives. And they were the ones who had compromised and stood to gain financially from the Roman government by cooperating with them. So they had They were a small group, but they were very powerful, and they didn't believe in the resurrection. So it's incredibly embarrassing that they were part of getting Jesus killed. They knew he resurrected from the dead, they just didn't believe in it. It wasn't part of their system. And so it's this group that goes, hey, you can't talk about the resurrection. If they were just talking about Jesus, they wouldn't have cared. But they're talking about we saw him rise from the dead. That's what was in chapter three. And so now they're coming back going, whoa, dial it back here, guys, you're teaching some other god other than the Roman gods, and you're teaching this resurrection idea. You can't do that anymore, and so he goes. So when they're confronting them, Peter goes, are we in trouble for doing a good thing? Is that we hear guys? Right? Which is such a cool way to confront them. Are we here because we healed a crippled guy? Is that the issue? Of course, that's not the issue. What you're wanting to know is how did we do it? Well? Let me be as clear as I can. It was the mighty power, the name of Jesus Christ. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So the great thing is here is that it indicates that the reason why they let them go is because there was power in the people. Yeah, And it says they didn't know how to punish them without causing a riot. Right, And so if you think about it, the irony of Peter and John not wanting to play politics at all, right, and and ye, at the same time, the reason why they were let go is because the council were now the ones behind the politics. They're the ones afraid of the politics. Right. So I think it's just really ironic and almost like a sense of like the tides have turned because Jesus has risen from the grave and all of a sudden, now the power is sort of given back to Peter and John in this moment. Any I think it's very cool. So they say, he's the man that you crucified, but God raised from the dead. So they keep driving this even though they're being told not to talk about it. They drive that issue in verse ten, and then by verse twelve he says there is salvation. And no one else. God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved for a lot of people. That seems really narrow minded, right, But this comes from and he's only just quoting Jesus from John chapter fourteen, verse six. For Jesus, I'm the way the truth in life. No one comes to the Father. I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me, right and he now Peter is essentially saying the same thing. Jesus is the only way. And for a lot of people who want to be, you know, very open minded, they would say that's a very close minded thing. But Christianity didn't establish this. Peter wasn't the one who establishes. Jesus is the one who declared it. So either Jesus is who he says he is or he's not right. But Jesus said I'm the only way, which, by the way, there's another time when Jesus said broad is the way to Hell, narrow is the gate to Heaven, right, right, And what he's saying is He's the only way. Yeah. So I think I said this with Wesley back when we did podcasts the other week with him, but I took this actually from Andy Stanley. He says that people think that Christianity is narrow minded, but when you consider all of the other world religions, he said, Christianity is the is the only world religion that can claim these three things. Number One, everyone is invited. That's not the case with a lot of other world religions. Right. Number Two, everyone can meet the requirements everyone and then number three, everyone gets in the exact same way. So it's not based on performance, it's not based on anything else. So no other religion and system that you can find anywhere else that people buy into can claim those three things. So in that sense, it is the most inviting and inclusive not exclusive invitation of all time. Yeah, so everyone's invited, everyone can meet the requirements. Everyone gets in the exact same way. I was just at the second one of the holiest I think they claim it to be the second holiest Hindu temple in the world in Katmandu, and there was a place where we from that point on, since we weren't Hindus, we weren't. Allowed to go into. Right it was isolated. Oh sorry, you're not Hindu, and we were treated like second class citizens. We weren't allowed to come in in that. I was in Dubai and they let us know, this is the mosque that non Muslims can visit, but you can't visit these other mosques. Right, So there were mosques. Was very clearly stated it's not for you. You can't come into this mosque. You can go into that one instead. But that just doesn't exist. The concept. Jesus doesn't say, well, I'm for these Jewish people, or I'm for these European people, or I'm only for these Central Asian people. Jesus is available to everybody all the time. He doesn't isolate and treat some like second class citizens and others insiders. It's for everybody. It reminds me of that Billy Graham clip. And he says, Jesus belongs to the world. Yeah, that's right, that's right, nineteen seventy one, Chicago. Yeah so great, Yeah, that was great. So I was just gonna mention real quick that Peter quotes Psalm one eighteen twenty two when he says, Jesus is the one who referred into the scriptures when it has said the stone that you builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. And so at the very beginning of the podcast, I said, tongue in cheek he calls people names. It's really not name calling. What he's really doing is is he saying, by the way, you were the you were the enemies, you know, way back in the Psalms, when the scriptures that by the way, you know, and you have memorized, you know, and you realize that there are people who reject the cornerstone. Well, the cornerstone was you know, everybody knows, any builder knows that the cornerstone is the most important piece because it sets the right angle for the entire building right right, and without at. The score, and brings the two walls together. Yeah, and brings the two walls together, and without that stone being number one, perfect has to be absolutely perfect. But also it's foundational, and so the cornerstone is the foundation and perfection for our religion. That's who Jesus is. And so you know, for someone to reject the cornerstone would mean you know, it would mean everything, honestly, And that's what Peter's trying to say to the Pharisees. So then when he says there's salvation and no one else, that salvation is available to everybody, but it's only through Jesus, then it says in verse thirteen, the members of the council were amazed when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, for they could see that they were ordinary men with no special training as Christians. Remember just a few days ago we were talking about when the Holy Spirit came on them. They're all preaching, all these languages and they're going, these guys are from Galilee. Yeah, yeah, the abilities of Israel. And in this one they're going, there's no special training. Because you got to remember the priests, Sadducees. These guys were elite. They were the best educated in the country, right, And they're dumbfounded by these ordinary uneducated men, right, and they're going, we can't beat them. They what what? So these guys are quoting scripture, they're walking around in the power of God. It's funny how elite people will set themselves up because of their pedigree or because of some people they have on the wall. And Peter and John did not have any of those things. They just happen to have the power of God on them, and they knew God's words, and the Holy Spirit just gave them this authority. You don't have to wait around for somebody to give you some kind of pedigree. You don't. I think that there's there's there's it's a good idea. To demonstrate that you have the character to fulfill your responsibilities and your duties, certainly with regard to education. But your power does not come from a piece of paper on the wall, and it doesn't come from some ordination council or some group that finally approves of you. Right, it comes from the Holy Spirit. So these guys who are uneducated step up, and the power Holy Spirit confound the smartest intelligentsia in Israel at the time. And then they go on and say, it's really clear that the whole country can see that this man has healed and he's standing right here. How do you fight that results speak for themselves? That's right. Well, when I read verse thirteen when it says they were amazed because they realized that they were unlearned and ignorant men, it reminds me of that scene in Goodwill Hunting when the genius of Matt Damon and then Robin Williams says he's from Southee. He's like right here, from Southee, right. In other words, like no genius could ever rise up from this area, right right right, And that's really what it is. Yeah, you're describing the exact same sort of scenario. So Paul says later in his writings, which we'll get to injected through this series as soon as we get in Paul. But Paul says that God delights in using the simple things of the world that confound the wise. Right, that's great, and God loves that. He uses the weak ones to defeat the strong ones David and Goliath. He uses the simple ones to confound the wise ones. God delights in. So if you feel like you don't have what it takes, you're the perfect kind of person God wants to use if you're just surrendered to him, right, and let God's spirit work. In you and through you. So you have that. And then they say get out of the council and no longer, okay, you can go around. They didn't say you can't do any more miracles. Isn't it interesting They don't say, hey, stop healing lame people. They don't say that. They just say, you can't teachers speak in Jesus name anymore, right, right. Because we're trying to squash the movement that we tried to squash when we kill. Them, right, right, So stop it right. This is about ready to get out of hand, is what they're so stop talking about Jesus. And isn't that amazing how many of us feel intimidated at work or at school. We feel like we can talk about any topic, topics that in historically have been taboo are perfectly acceptable to talk about in school now, but you just not talk about Jesus. Topics that you would never have thought would come up in your work environment. Those are now, there's seminars about them. You have to sit in through these things, but you just not allowed to talk about Jesus. And I would say, in all of those things, have the boldness, be willing to have the boldness of Peter and John. Make sure you're walking in the power of the Holy Spirit. But then they just speak up and say, do you think God wants us to obey. You rather than him? We cannot stop telling about everything we've seen and heard. If you've seen how Jesus changes lives, if you've heard about the good news of the Gospel, then you cannot stop talking about these things. So don't be afraid of the threats. Just keep moving forward with the good news of the Gospel of Jesus. Well, that's a good place to stop and obeying God rather than man. Yeah, so we'll see you next time. As with the Bible, guys,