When the power of God flowed through Peter to publicly heal a lame beggar, it also at the same time, supernaturally arranged the situation so that the event itself could become an undeniable witness to the deity of Jesus (Acts 3:1-10). The lame man was someone who had been lame from birth, as well as someone who was recognized by everyone who witnessed the marvel. These important details made it difficult for naysayers to challenge the authenticity of the healing, or of the Messianic point Peter made of it. But that didn’t stop them from trying.
The skeptics made their challenge after Peter used the event to preach about the identity of Jesus as the Messiah, along with Jesus’s resurrection as confirmation of that claim. This annoyed both the priests and an influential Jewish religious group called the Sadducees (Acts 4:1-4). The day after that sermon, those religious elites gathered to try and dispute the healing, but the evidence was so solid that they could not deny it (Acts 4:14-16). It was obvious to everyone, including the religious leaders, that a man who had been lame for more than 40 years had been healed! Still, they felt it necessary to try and prohibit teaching in the name of Jesus out of a fear that the truth would spread among the people (Acts 4:17-22). Notice that they made no effort to adjust their position in light of the evidence. Instead, they entrenched themselves, at least publicly, even more.
There could be many reasons for this. Likely, the sin of pride played some role in their posturing – no one, afterall, likes to be wrong about an idea for which they have publicly invested much time and resource. Or perhaps they feared persecution and loss of status at the hands of other members of their elite ranks who would attempt to hold them to a false narrative. Maybe they reasonably feared retribution from a city of people who were becoming convinced that the Messiah had been murdered by their religious rulers. Or most probable, they reacted the way they did for the same reasons that so many people reject salvation when it is explained to them – they don’t want to look at their own personal evil in the holy light of Jesus, because exposing it in that way and recognizing Jesus as LORD would require personal humility, a rejection of a lifestyle they had embraced and come to enjoy, and an abandonment of a way of thinking that had allowed them to justify the evil they loved (John 3:19-20).
When Peter was being questioned by those leaders, he made it a point to quote the prophetic Psalm 118:22. In doing so, he accused them of rejecting Jesus as the most important stone in the building they as the builders were supposed to be constructing (Acts 4:11-12). All theological frameworks and practices of church and religion are to be based on Jesus – a divine man the religious leaders were blind to, in part, because of how they constructed and practiced their religion (Ephesians 2:19-22 and 1 Peter 2:4-8).
Who is Jesus to you? How do you see him? Is he the cornerstone of your practice? How and when have you rejected him, and why?
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