pick them up, take them with you. All right, now let's get started. We're going to be in Acts chapter 3. Acts chapter 3. Starting a new chapter. Acts chapter 3 verses 1 through 10. Acts chapter 3, verses 1 through 10, and I've titled this sermon, The Primary Purpose of the Church. Before we get into it, I want to pray. Father, thank you so much for this church, and thank you for the grace that you've given us here, bringing us all together, or giving us a heart to know you, to study your word and draw near. Lord, we just ask that you be with us today, that you open this up to us, that you show us more of Christ and more of your glory, and help us to understand as we study today. Help us to see what it is you've called us to do as your people in this world. Lord, we just thank you for all these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, Peter and John were going up to the temple at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer. And a man who had been lame from his mother's womb was being carried along, whom they used to set down every day at the gate of the temple, which is called Beautiful, in order to beg alms of those who were entering the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he began asking to receive alms. But Peter, along with John, fixed his gaze on him and said, Look at us. And he began to give them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. But Peter said, I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, walk. And seizing him by the right hand, he raised him up, and immediately his feet and his ankles were strengthened. With a leap, he stood upright and began to walk. And he entered the temple with them, walking and leaping and praising God. And all the people saw him walking and praising God, and they were taking note of him as being the one who used to sit at the beautiful gate of the temple to beg alms. And they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him. You know, Acts chapter 5 verse 12 says, at the hands of the apostles, many signs and wonders were taking place among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's portico. Many signs and wonders were taking place among the people. And what we're going to look at in today's text is one of those signs. This is one of those signs that was taking place at the hands of the apostles. Well, what would we call that? We call it a miracle. It's a miracle. It's a miracle of healing. But the Jews referred to miracles as signs. In order to understand why they referred to miracles as signs, we need to think about what a sign is. What does a sign do? A sign is something that communicates something to us about something else. We walk outside the building and look around, here we have stop signs. get in our car and drive down to the interstate and go up the on-ramp, we'd see a yield sign that tells us there's oncoming traffic and we need to yield to the oncoming traffic. Let them go first because they're already up to speed. And there's other signs. There's billboard signs as we go down the road that tell us about different businesses or products or whatever, but they're communicating something to us. We all know, without even being told, because we have come to understand this, that if you put anything in a circle with a bar across it, it means don't do that. We just know that. It's a sign and it communicates something to us. Well, the Jewish people have been taught that Messiah was coming. This is something that was promised from Genesis chapter 3. all the way through the Bible. It's promised. There's a Messiah coming. We talked about that as we were coming up to Christmas and we went through Advent series. Messiah was coming and they had been taught that His coming would be accompanied by signs, by miracles, by signs that would testify to who He was. and to his authority. These signs would testify to his identity and they would also testify to his authority. And then in John 3 verses 14 through 16 Jesus explains to Nicodemus how a miraculous event that was recorded by Moses in Numbers 21 was actually a sign. This event, it was a real event that happened to the children of Israel as they're wandering through the wilderness. There's a real event that happened, but it was a sign. And it was a sign that pointed to Jesus. I'm gonna look at that so we can just get an idea of what we're talking about when we're talking about signs. So I'm going to read what Jesus said here in John 3. I'm going to read 14 through 16. Jesus is talking to Nicodemus. He says, As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes will in him have eternal life. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life." Now what is he talking about? He's saying that this, and what's going to happen to me, that there was a sign that pointed to this back in Numbers 21. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Well, if we go back to Numbers 21, so what had happened was the people were, they started to complain because they were on a journey and they were complaining and they were complaining against the Lord. And in Numbers 21, verse six, it says, the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people. so that many people of Israel died. So here's what's happening. They've got a camp, a large camp of people, and they're moving along through the wilderness, and they start complaining, and so the Lord just sends a bunch of snakes, and everybody that gets bit by a snake dies. You get bit by the serpent, you die. So the people come to Moses. And they asked him, in verse 7, it says, the people came to Moses and they said, we've sinned because we've spoken against the Lord and you intercede with the Lord that he may remove the serpents from us. And Moses interceded for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard like a flagpole and hold it up. And it shall come about that everyone who is bitten When he looks at it, he will live. So Moses made a bronze serpent, set it on the standard, and it came about that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived. And Jesus said, everybody's been bit by the serpent. Everybody. You're all under the condemnation of death. You've been bit by the serpent, and you're gonna die. But if I'll be lifted up, see, that's a sign. What happened to the children of Israel was a sign. It was pointing to something greater. Yeah, it was important to them. It was very important to them at the time, but God had a greater purpose for it. And that greater purpose was to show us the gospel, to show us what was really important, which is Jesus. When he's lifted up, and placarded between heaven and earth for all to see, everyone who looks to Him, although we're under the sentence of death for our sin, if we look to Him, instead of dying, we're going to live. We're going to have eternal life. That's a sign. So when the Bible's talking about signs and wonders, Jesus' ministry was full of signs. all the miracles that Jesus performed. Jesus, do you know that Jesus could have healed everyone in the world? He could have raised all the dead. He could have done away with poverty. He could have done away with all of the suffering in the world that he wanted to. Had he chosen to do that, he is omnipotent God incarnate. But he didn't heal everybody, did he? And He didn't alleviate all the suffering. So those that say that it's always God's will, you know, well, Jesus went around doing good and destroying the works of the devil and healing people and all this. Yes, He did, and feeding people. He did those things, but He did them as signs. They were signs to testify to who He was and His authority. to show that he is the one who is ultimately, he's sovereign over the curse. There's a curse on this world, but he's sovereign over it. And there were signs to testify to that. So that's what's going on. So the Jews referred to miracles as signs because they knew what they were. That's why they continually pestered Jesus, give us another sign. The last one wasn't good enough, we need another one. See, they didn't believe. People don't ever believe because of signs. The signs are what bring people to believe. But the signs testify to the authority, and that's what they were there for. In 1 Corinthians 10 and 11, the Apostle Paul records that the things that happened to Old Testament Israel were written down for our instruction. upon whom the ends of the ages have come." The signs that were recorded in the Old Testament, they all served to communicate to us who Jesus would be and what he would do. The signs that Jesus performed during his earthly ministry all testified to who he was and the work that he was doing in the world. And then the signs that Jesus continued to perform at the hands of his apostles, through his spirit testified to their authority as his witnesses in the work and the purpose of his church in the world. So the miracle of the sign that we're going to look at today, it's a real event in the lives of real people, but it has a purpose that goes beyond Peter and John and the lame man. What it is, is it's a picture, it's a communication to us and to everybody that saw it of the primary work that the Lord Jesus is accomplishing and will continue to accomplish through his church. It's a sign that demonstrates to us what the Lord is doing through his church in this world. So let's look at verse one. Now, Peter and John were going up to the temple at the ninth hour, the hour of prayer. They're going up to the temple. You know, the immediate text doesn't directly tell us why they're going there, but given the context, it's pretty safe to assume that they were going there to preach Christ. Almost everything that you read in Acts, when Peter and John or any of the apostles or Philip or whoever is going anywhere, They're going there to preach. They're going there to proclaim Christ to somebody. It's pretty safe to assume then. And they were going at the 9th hour. The 9th hour would have been between 3 and 4 in the afternoon. The Jews divided the day into two 12 hour periods from 6 to 6. So 6 in the evening to 6 in the morning, that was the 9th. And you read elsewhere where it talks about the night watches. So that 12 hours is divided up into four three hour periods. And in the daytime, you got the same thing. And they had three official prayer times during the day, one in the morning, one at noon, one in the afternoon. And this is the one in the afternoon, the time from three to four o'clock, it's a time of prayer. In the temple, it was an official time that was scheduled for prayer and sacrifice, and so there would have been a lot of traffic in the temple during this time. A lot of people would have been coming to the temple, and it's pretty safe to assume that Peter and John knew that, and they're going there with the purpose to see who they can talk to, to preach Christ. You know, in Mark 1 17, Jesus told Peter, follow me and I will make you become fishers of men. And a good fisherman goes where the fish are. And a fisher of men must go where the people are in order to be successful. So that's what they're doing. They're going up to the temple during a busy time to preach Christ. In verse 2 says, and a man who had been lame from his mother's womb was being carried along. whom they used to sit down every day at the gate of the temple, which is called Beautiful, in order to beg alms of those who were entering the temple. You know, this lame beggar, he's a fisherman also of sorts. And he knows that in order to be successful in his begging, he needs to be positioned in the highest traffic area possible at the time when the most people are going to be coming and going. In this sign that we're looking at for the next few verses, this lame beggar, he represents every human being on the planet who is outside of Christ, regardless of their station in life or their physical condition, their age, prosperity, status, anything, any external measurement that you want to put on someone as to where they're at, this lame beggar represents Every person. Every single person born in this sign. How does he represent us? Well, first, he was lame from birth. Being lame was his normal. He was lame from birth. He'd never known anything different. Not only could he not walk, he didn't know what it meant to walk. how it felt to walk, how to walk. He'd been lame from birth. There was no strength at all in his feet and ankles, which means he's utterly and completely enslaved to his disability. And he's absolutely helpless to do anything about it on his own. Lame from birth. You know, that's a picture of the condition of every single human being on the planet. All of us have this one great universal problem, and it's worse than COVID, it's worse than cancer, heart disease, physical disabilities, mental illness, poverty. Anything you can think of, we have a condition that we're all born with that's worse than anything you can come up with, and that condition is sin. Every single one of us, according to Psalm 51, 5, David said, I was conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity. Every single one of us were conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity. We're children of Adam. We're natural born sinners. R.C. Sproul said it very well. He said, we're not sinners because we sin. We sin because we're sinners. That's who we are. We all have this problem. We were lame from birth. We're born enslaved to sin and alienated from God. We don't have any idea what it's like to not be enslaved to sin. We don't even have a concept of what it's like to not be enslaved to sin until Christ redeems us from some sin. And then we start to see it. We experience it. You want to talk about where the joy comes from? Because you can't overcome it on your own. It's normal to us, just like being lame was normal to the beggar. And we've got absolutely no strength or even inclination to do anything about our sinful condition. It doesn't mean we don't want to overcome a bad habit or not be enslaved to something that we can see as hurting us or whatever. That's not the same thing. But we are in natural rebellion against God. We want our will above His. And that's true of every single human being. Humanity was created to glorify God through joyful communion with and dependence on Him, today and forever. But we can't do that because we're alienated from Him by our sin. Ephesians 2 describes those outside of Christ as being without hope and without God in the world. So we spend our lives trying to find fulfillment and satisfaction through the alms that the world has to offer us. Let me repeat that. We were born and we spend our lives, we're outside of Christ, we're without hope and without God in the world. And because of that, we spend our entire lives trying to find fulfillment and satisfaction through the alms that the world has to offer us. Let's look at verse 3. So the man is sitting there. It says, When he saw Peter and John about to go into the temple, he began asking to receive alms. So the lame man is sitting in his post, he's by the entrance to the temple, and Peter and John come along and so he sees them coming. He sees them coming and he calls out. Now realize something as I was studying this, he's not calling out directly to them in particular. He's not looking at them. He's just like a street vendor. He's like a guy at the baseball game hollering out, you know, hot dogs, popcorn. When he sees somebody that's there, he wasn't calling out before he saw them coming. And when he sees somebody that's coming, he starts calling out, hey, alms for the poor. He's making it known. He's making it known that he's there and available. to receive alms. Why wasn't he making contact with them as he was calling out? Well, it's kind of hard to say. There could have been other people present that he was looking at instead of them. That's not likely because the text seems to indicate that the reason he started calling out is because he saw them coming. What's more likely is that he never made eye contact with his benefactors. Probably because of shame and being considered to the lowest class. You know, in their society, they believed that if you were poor or disabled or whatever, that God didn't love you. You're disfavored by God. If you, and you're unrighteous. Because if you were righteous, God would favor you, and if you were favored by God, you'd have money. You'd have good health, like we do. It must be because there's something wrong, why you have that disability or whatever. And they had good reason to believe that because, you know, according to the law, this guy was not, there's a reason why he sat outside the gate. He's not allowed to go in the temple. His disability excludes him from the presence of God. They had good reason to believe that. He's excluded from the temple. He's excluded from the presence of God. Well, you know what? Our sinful condition excludes us from the presence of God. We're outside the temple. Verses 4 and 5, it says, But Peter, along with John, fixed his gaze on him and said, Look at us. And he began to give them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. So when the man called out, Peter and John stopped and engaged him first. He was making his presence known and asking for alms, but he wasn't actually directly engaging them. They stopped and engaged him. It's our job to intentionally engage the lost and hurting people of the world. That's our job as the church. What they did is, whatever they were planning to do at that moment, they put it on hold until after they engaged this man that the Lord's put in their path. Because they were going into the temple. He's outside, but they stop and engage him. And it's possible, you know, that their agenda was just to engage the first person that showed interest that they came across. It's possible. But the text says they were going into the temple and when he called out, they stopped and engaged him. And you may be wondering why I'm belaboring that. Well, I find it pretty convicting personally. Because much of the time, I'm prone to follow my agenda or schedule rather than putting it aside and engaging the person that the Lord has put in front of me. See, I have a planning. I've gone out witnessing and evangelizing before and passing out gospel tracts and I have a certain plan. It's going to go this way and I'm going to do this. But what I need to be able to do is just, if the Lord puts somebody in front of me, no matter what I've got going on, it's my job to engage that person with the gospel. Right then. And that's what they did. They stopped and they put aside their schedule and they engaged this guy. And Peter tells him, look at us. See what sort of men we are and pay attention to what we have to say. And so he does. He looks at them and he begins to pay attention because he expects to receive money or food or whatever he can get from them that will bring him temporary comfort and satisfaction. That's all there is to it. That's why he's paying attention. He's looking to them for what he can get from them right now that's going to give me a little temporary relief. And we've got to understand and not be surprised that that's how the world views the church. Because they don't know anything else. They don't know there's anything else. People of the world expect the church to either provide a religious crutch that helps you deal with or escape from reality, or they expect the church to be a humanitarian organization that's dedicated to the relief of physical suffering. Or what's more common is they just expect a combination of the two. The church kind of helps you cope and helps alleviate some physical suffering. And you know, the ironic truth is that the church does more than any other group in the world to alleviate suffering and to help people cope with life. But neither of those things are the primary purpose of the church. They're side effects. They're not the primary purpose. Verse 6 and 7, but Peter said, I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, walk. And seizing him by the right hand, he raised him up and immediately his feet and his ankles were strengthened. Peter said, I'm fresh out of band-aids, brother. That's what he said. I'm not here to offer you a little bit of temporary comfort or to help you ignore or just live with your real problems. Silver and gold have I none. But what I do have is much more precious than that. But I do have that I freely give to you. Jesus Christ, the Nazarene. Can anything good come from Nazarene? He's the one despised and rejected of men. You know, we had a conversation Wednesday. Someone was asking me a question because people were saying that Jews and Muslims worship the same God as Christians and arguing for that. The Jews despise Jesus of Nazareth. Those that practice that religion, that religion looks to a God that does not have a son. A God that doesn't recognize Jesus as God in the flesh, as the Messiah. Does that mean we don't love Him? No, it doesn't mean that, but what I'm saying is there's only one way to God. There's only one source of life. We talked about that over in the Sunday School this morning. You can't have communion with God outside of Jesus Christ. Period. No matter what your religion is, Any religion that doesn't come through the Lord Jesus Christ is idolatry. You're worshiping a God that you can't get to, doesn't exist. Jesus Christ, the Nazarene, the one that men reject. He's the only one that can free us from our helpless condition. This man is helpless. There's no hope for him. He's sitting there, crippled, and he's never going to walk. He's never going to truly live. And the Spirit of Christ reached through Peter, grabbed that beggar's right hand, raised him up, stood him on his feet, healed him, and set him free from the bondage that he'd been under all of his life. And that's the gospel. When we preach Christ and His sheep hear His voice, that's what is happening. The Spirit of Christ is reaching through us and He's grabbing ahold of His people and He's pulling them out of that bondage, setting them free. This is the purpose of the church. The church is not here primarily to help people have a more enjoyable or less miserable time in this temporary life. That's not the primary purpose. The church is here to point people to the one who can give people life. The one who is life, who has life in himself. I heard a story when I was listening to Mark Lloyd Chalmers preached on this text, and he told a story that one of the popes was giving Thomas Aquinas a tour of the Vatican. As they walked through the halls looking at all the opulence and wealth, the pope said, as you can see, Thomas, the church can no longer say silver and gold have our name. And Thomas responded, yes, I can see that. I can see more than that. She can no longer say rise and walk either. There's only the material goods and distractions and the things of this world, they don't have life in them. Only Christ has life. He is the purpose of the church. Now, don't hear what I'm not saying. I'm not saying the church shouldn't strive to meet the temporal needs that people have. I'm not saying that. We absolutely do those things because life in Christ is joy. It's contentment. God takes care of His children. He gives us a new heart that loves Him and loves each other and loves other people and we want to care for people. And we're going to see as we continue on through Acts that this early church, they did much to care for the poor, to feed people and to meet needs and alleviate suffering. The church does those things, but that's not the church's primary purpose. The point is that people's temporal needs are not their primary need. An empty stomach is not my primary need. A dead heart is. That's my big problem. The problem is I'm separated from God. The church's purpose is to deal with people's first need first. And the first thing that lost humanity needs is Jesus Christ the Nazarene. If we remember that, LIFTING HIM UP AND PROCLAIMING RECONCILIATION TO GOD IN HIM AS OUR PRIMARY PURPOSE, I BELIEVE THAT OTHER ASPECTS OF MINISTRY WILL HAPPEN AUTOMATICALLY. I BELIEVE IF WE LIFT CHRIST UP AND WE HOLD HIM HIGH AND EXALT HIM, THAT THE REST OF IT WILL FOLLOW ALONG AS A NATURAL OUTWORKING of having new hearts and loving the Lord our God and loving our neighbor as ourselves. Verse 8, with a leap, he stood upright and began to walk. And he entered the temple with him, walking and leaping and praising God. This man had never walked in his life. He didn't even know what walking was. personally, and when God puts life and strength in him, he leaps and he begins to walk. Period. There's no such thing as a person who's been made alive by God and they don't begin to live. You understand that? You know, James was talking about it in the Sunday School this morning. Salvation is not a ticket. to get you into heaven. It's not a ticket. Well, you know, I've got my ticket stamped, so now I get in. It's live. It's being made alive. It's not something that, it's not something that you, you know, it's not like a piece of paper that you have or a contract that you've got with God. You were dead and now you're alive. And when a person who is alive, they begin to live. They begin to move. You've got the Spirit of God in you. When Jesus was talking to Nicodemus, and he's talking about how when a person is born again, born from above, the Holy Spirit comes and he said, the wind blows. where it wishes. And I'm going to paraphrase him. He said, you can't see where it comes from or where it's going, but you can see the results. I heard a preacher say one time, if there's no movement, there's no win. Where the Spirit of God is, He always produces that fruit. He always produces, not the same amount with everyone, But there's always a change. Where there was death, now there's life and movement. All this man's life, he'd been excluded by his condition from entering the temple. He was outside the gate. You know, the temple represents the purpose of the temple. It was a sign. It represents the presence of God on earth. Jesus said, when I, you tear this temple down and I'll rebuild it, talking about his body. But you know why? Because God was on earth. Guess what? The church is God's dwelling place on earth. Everyone you know that is outside of Christ is excluded. They're alienated from the presence of God because of their sinful conditions. It's not because God has said, I'm going to put everybody out there and hold them out and they can't come in. God didn't push Adam away. Adam went and hid. Do you understand that? And humanity always does that. We're willfully alienated from God. We don't want to be in the presence of God unless He gives us a new heart that desires to be in His presence, unless He moves and acts and draws us to Himself. Humanity is alienated from God. because of their sinful condition. And Jesus is the only way that we can be restored to Him and come into His presence. By His name. What did Peter give this man? Yeah, he's walking. He's walking. He's got life. And where'd the life come from? It came from Jesus. Christ. And where he's outside the temple, he can now go in because he has the life of God. His legs are strengthened. They're healed. When this man comes into the temple, he comes in walking and leaping and praising God. He couldn't be contained. His legs were dead, but now they're alive. He once was enslaved to whatever alms the world wanted to give him. You know, that's where you were at. Before you come to Christ, you're enslaved to whatever alms the world wants to give you. But now you're free. If you're in Christ, now you're free. You're free to live your life for the glory of Christ. That's what this man is. He was enslaved to sit outside the gate and just receive whatever alms the world would give him. But now he's free to live his life for the glory of Christ, because he's healed in Christ's name. And all the people saw him walking and praising God, and they were taking note of him as being the one who used to sit at the beautiful gate of the temple to beg alms. And they were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him. Now you see why Paul says, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creature. The old things passed away, behold, new things have come. Behold, see for yourself. The people in the temple see this man who has been very publicly lame all his life. All his life it's been obvious that he can't walk, he's lame. His legs are dead, and now he's walking and he's praising God. This is the power of the gospel, and though they don't understand it, the world can see it. The man who used to sit at the gate and beg for alms doesn't do it anymore. The man who used to live his life for whatever temporary satisfaction he could get from the world is now walking with the apostles and praising God. Can you see that? The person who used to be dead in sin And then Christ comes through the gospel and gives them life. They're now walking with the apostles. They now want to know God. And they're now praising God. And I promise you, the world is amazed. They're amazed when they see that change. Even the ones that mock and scoff are amazed. And this is the primary purpose of the church. You think it's a miracle that a guy that hadn't walked gets up and walks. You know what's really a miracle is that a person who's been dead in sin from birth, from the time they're born, they're enslaved to sin, is suddenly set free. And they're now going a completely different direction. They are moving and they are a new creature and they love God and they love people and they're no longer living for themselves or the alms that the world gives them and offers them. They're living to know God. That's why we're here. We're here to proclaim Christ and watch Him set the helpless free to walk and leap and praise God. Amen. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the grace that life that you've given us in your son. Oh Lord, we just ask that you Just help us to see these truths and apply them to our hearts and help us to enter into them daily. I know it is so hard for me. I know the truth, but as I go through daily life, I don't enter into it so much of the time. Lord, I just pray that you so work in us that we have this truth before our eyes as we go about our walk this week, that we are intentional about engaging people, exalting the Lord Jesus, and being your church, fulfilling our purpose in this world of being a lamp. that shines the light of Christ on everyone we meet. Lord, we thank you for all these things, in Jesus' name.