WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.960 Today's theme is the church unleashed in power. So as we look at this story from Acts chapter 3, 00:00:08.339 --> 00:00:15.140 let me ask you a question. At what point in the story do we see God's power show up? 00:00:16.660 --> 00:00:21.519 Now I think the obvious answer to that question is that we see God's power most explicitly at 00:00:21.519 --> 00:00:27.060 the point where this man, and we're not told his name, this man who's never been able to walk, 00:00:27.059 --> 00:00:37.200 is told by Peter to get up in the name of Jesus, and he does. It's a miraculous healing, it's humanly 00:00:37.200 --> 00:00:44.000 impossible. It's harder to find a clearer manifestation of God's power than that. 00:00:45.439 --> 00:00:51.820 But I want to suggest that there are three words in this story that can be easily overlooked. 00:00:51.820 --> 00:01:02.500 And it's when Peter says to the man, look at us. It's easy to miss because there's more in that 00:01:02.500 --> 00:01:09.659 simple exchange than first meets the eye. First, it tells us something important about the situation 00:01:09.659 --> 00:01:15.900 in which we see God's power manifest. From the point of view of the man who gets healed, 00:01:15.900 --> 00:01:23.120 think what's going on here. Now we're not told his name, but we are told that he's never been able 00:01:23.120 --> 00:01:30.480 to walk since the day he was born. We're also told that he was carried here every single day of his 00:01:30.480 --> 00:01:39.140 life so that he could beg. That's his reality. He's never known anything different. Peter says to him, 00:01:39.140 --> 00:01:47.980 look at us, because although he's asking for money, he's clearly not looking at Peter as he makes that 00:01:47.980 --> 00:01:55.840 request. He's become so accustomed to his situation, so entrenched in it, that it's just a way of life 00:01:55.840 --> 00:02:02.280 that he's resigned himself to. So now he's just on automatic pilot. He just sits there every day, 00:02:02.280 --> 00:02:10.420 waiting for people to go in and out of the temple, trotting out the same words without making any eye 00:02:10.420 --> 00:02:20.000 contact. The humiliation has long since been eroded. It's just what happens. So he doesn't even look at 00:02:20.000 --> 00:02:29.580 Peter as he talks to him. I want to suggest there's something representative here about the world in which 00:02:29.580 --> 00:02:37.080 we're called to be channels of God's power. Like that man sitting there begging, we live in a world 00:02:37.080 --> 00:02:45.220 that has simply gotten used to things as they are. It's understandable that like that man, the world 00:02:45.220 --> 00:02:54.700 goes on autopilot. So many people have simply become resigned to the version of reality that is presented to 00:02:54.699 --> 00:03:03.299 them daily. There's no expectation of a radical healing. The bar of expectation was lowered a long 00:03:03.299 --> 00:03:12.179 time ago. But God, of course, sees things rather differently. And he calls us to do likewise. 00:03:14.199 --> 00:03:19.259 And we see this modelled in Peter here. He takes one look at this guy sat there in his resignation, 00:03:19.259 --> 00:03:26.699 and he refuses to take the easier options of either walking straight past or just dropping some cash in 00:03:26.699 --> 00:03:37.959 his box. He believes in more than that. He says, look at us. The bar of expectation is raised. Peter 00:03:37.959 --> 00:03:45.840 refuses to see this man as a category, as just another person on the streets begging. In making eye contact, 00:03:45.840 --> 00:03:54.640 he's seeing him as a fellow human being. Now, how often do we see people as categories? Because we 00:03:54.640 --> 00:04:01.620 just don't know them. We haven't looked at them properly and made the connection with them as Peter 00:04:01.620 --> 00:04:10.020 does here. You know, I've heard it said by psychologists that when you're driving a car, one reason why it's so 00:04:10.020 --> 00:04:17.980 easy to be provoked into anger by another driver is that you see the vehicle, not the person in that other 00:04:17.980 --> 00:04:27.740 vehicle. If you're on the road and someone narrowly misses bumping into you or overtakes you, it's much more 00:04:27.740 --> 00:04:35.720 likely to invoke an emotional response than would be the case if you were walking on the pavement and another 00:04:35.720 --> 00:04:44.740 pedestrian narrowly misses walking into you or overtakes you on foot. See, seeing the other person, 00:04:44.840 --> 00:04:51.600 and especially when you see them face to face, makes all the difference. That's why talking with someone 00:04:51.600 --> 00:04:59.080 in person is almost always more helpful and productive than engaging in written communication. 00:04:59.079 --> 00:05:06.759 If you've ever got difficult conversations that you need to have, you know, it's much better to have 00:05:06.759 --> 00:05:13.000 those difficult conversations face to face than by exchanging, say, emails or texts. 00:05:14.219 --> 00:05:19.279 The bottom line is we're much more connected as human beings when we look at each other, 00:05:19.479 --> 00:05:26.599 and that's what Peter does right here. He knows that God is powerful, and he knows that if God's power 00:05:26.600 --> 00:05:34.320 is going to be shared with and experienced by others, then it requires an act of human courage and 00:05:34.320 --> 00:05:41.420 vulnerability on his part. He needs to get involved. He needs to stop what he's doing and get alongside 00:05:41.420 --> 00:05:49.120 this man and properly connect with him. Now, there's a challenge to each and every one of us. 00:05:49.120 --> 00:05:59.319 As a church, we're called to move in God's power, not in our own power, and that starts with us being 00:05:59.319 --> 00:06:06.100 willing and ready to place ourselves in risky and vulnerable situations, daring to come alongside 00:06:06.100 --> 00:06:15.120 and stay alongside others. We need to be willing and ready to reach out in our own humanity to connect 00:06:15.120 --> 00:06:22.840 with others in theirs. Peter shows us what happens when we dare to do that in the name of Jesus. 00:06:24.399 --> 00:06:31.420 And remember, God's power is real, very real, and it's too easy to forget that. 00:06:33.100 --> 00:06:40.480 Every year since 1890 in Pasadena, California, there's a big New Year's Day carnival called the Rose Parade. 00:06:40.480 --> 00:06:46.400 Horses, marching bands and carnival floats make their way around the streets of Pasadena, 00:06:46.700 --> 00:06:53.240 and hundreds of thousands of people come out to watch. Many of those floats represent various 00:06:53.240 --> 00:07:00.620 commercial companies. On one occasion a few years ago, the whole parade was ground to a sudden halt 00:07:00.620 --> 00:07:08.960 because one of the floats spluttered and stopped. It had run out of petrol. Everything stood still 00:07:08.959 --> 00:07:14.879 while someone had to go off and get a can of petrol. It was pretty embarrassing for the driver. 00:07:14.879 --> 00:07:22.379 But what made it even more embarrassing was the fact that the float represented the standard oil 00:07:22.379 --> 00:07:28.279 company. With all its vast oil resources, its truck was out of fuel. 00:07:30.299 --> 00:07:34.959 J.B. Phillips paraphrases Ephesians 1 verses 19 to 20 in the following way. 00:07:34.959 --> 00:07:41.680 It says, how tremendous is the power available to us who believe in God? 00:07:43.199 --> 00:07:49.959 Like Peter, we need to be ready and willing to be available to connect with others by daring to look 00:07:49.959 --> 00:07:57.279 them in the eye, to come alongside them and stay alongside them. And we also need to be ready and 00:07:57.279 --> 00:08:04.859 willing to make firm our connection with God so that his life-renewing power may flow through us. 00:08:04.959 --> 00:08:11.359 When we do that as a church, then we truly are unleashed.