How Have You Missed The Messiah?

The following excerpt was taken from our "Acts of the Holy Spirit" series, November 2012.

“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?”  (Acts 2:37)

Dennis the Menace the movie tells the story of a good-hearted boy named Dennis who just can’t keep himself out of trouble particularly with his elderly neighbor Mr. Wilson. All of Dennis’ mischief seems to fall on the head of poor Mr. Wilson. In this movie Mr. Wilson has a flower garden that he has put years and years of work into. In his garden he has one of the world’s rarest plants that he planted 40 years prior. Believe it or not this plant blooms only once in 40 years. Once. It blooms when the moon is full; it blooms at night, and it blooms quickly. And just as quickly as it blooms it withers. So if you had this plant growing in your garden for 40 years; you tilled it and care for it for 40 years of your life,  you could very easily completely miss its blooming if you were not prepared. You could know that it bloomed only once in 40 years and if you were one day off on its blooming calendar you could completely miss its bloom and never again get to see it.

Imagine the disappointment and frustration you would feel if the plant you had waited 40 years to see bloom you missed altogether. Well watch Mr. Wilson as he prepares for his plant’s special minute. Pay particular attention to 3:11-5:50 as this video cannot be shortened by me;

Can you imagine Mr. Wilson’s frustration? I can’t imagine it.

In this same way I don’t think we can fully imagine the disappointment, frustration and pain of the question that is asked in Acts 2:37 some 2,000 years ago: “Brothers, what shall we do?”

These people had looked for their Messiah all of their lives. Every prayer, every synagogue service, every feast day expressed the national longing for the Messiah’s coming

The Messiah was going to be their salvation. He was their hope. The Messiah was the one their ancestors had been waiting for for centuries. He was the One the prophets spoke of.

He was the One Who would restore the kingdom to Israel. He was the One Who would end all of their pain and suffering. Jewish people dreamed about the day their Messiah would come, especially in times of hardship. They talked about that day. They wondered what He might look like. They pondered what they might do if they got to meet Him.

Peter tells us that the Prophets who spoke of the coming of the Messiah “searched intently and with the greatest care, trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow…Even angels long to look into these things” (1 Peter 1:10-12).

If there was one question every Jewish man and woman wanted to know it was, “When is our Messiah coming?” And now the Apostles, by the power of the Holy Spirit, in this first Gospel sermon of Acts 2, announce in a most undeniable way that they missed the One they had prepared their lives to see. Worse than that…they even killed Him. Can you imagine the pain of that realization!!!?

I believe the greatest challenge the Holy Spirit faced in building the church in Jerusalem was getting these deeply spiritual people to accept the fact that they missed their Messiah. It is not easy to deal with that much pain.

Indeed many in Jerusalem would say, as to Dennis, “Get out of my face, I don’t want to know you.” Others, however, will desperately ask, “Brothers, what shall we do?” (2:37).

And here’s the Good News! Even as we cannot imagine the frustration and pain of murdering our Messiah, neither can we fully imagine the feelings of relief that must have flooded their souls when Peter answered: “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (2:38).

There was hope! Praise God that the terms of forgiveness were not beyond the reach of any of them; all of them could repent and be baptized!

Let me ask you today, how have you missed the Messiah in your life?

Getting Back Our Prerogative

In government and law there is a word that is not spoken of much today called "prerogative". Prerogative is basically "the power to act according to discretion for the public good, without the prescription of the law and sometimes even against it" (John Locke). Citizens give their rulers the power of prerogative in the judicial process because it is impossible to foresee all accidents that concern the public. There cannot be a law for everything and so judges are given freedom to make decisions for the public good where there is no stated law.

Prerogative is a good and necessary thing in the hands of good and selfless authorities. Place prerogative in the hands of a fool, however, and it becomes a weapon for submission. It becomes a king's tool for controling the population: "I will decide this..." (for my own benefit that is).

An evil steward of prerogative will be given less prerogative over time. Afterall, no one wants to give a selfish, power-gorged ruler the freedom to do just anything he wants to do. A good steward of prerogative, however, will be given more and more of it. The more the people's trust of their rulers increases, the more freedom they are willing to give them in the enforcement of the laws. Think about it; a boss gives his best employees the most freedom because he trusts them. They have proven, through character, diligence and honesty, they are worthy of more and more freedom. He gives them prerogative to make decisions for the welfare of the company without having to run it by him first. He trusts them.

Our Heavenly Father has all the prerogative one can ever have. He needs no one to sign off on His decisions. He needs no counsel from mortals, no help in deciding mercy or law. If the Lord needs something (He obviously needs nothing) He does not come to us. Psalms 50:12 says, "If I were hungry, I would not tell you; For the world is Mine, and all its fullness." The Father gave the Son, Jesus Christ, all power of prerogative. Jesus was well-pleasing to the Father and therefore the Father put all authority in His hands (see Philippians 2).

Our Heavenly Father has all the prerogative in the world and we are happy for it to be that way. Why? Because we trust Him. We want Him to have all the authority. We want Him to make the decisions. We want Him to do exactly what He pleases when He pleases to do it because we know Him to be good with a capital "G". Whatever our Lord wants to do we will follow because we know He knows best. He is the "Good Shepherd" (see John 10).

My wife and I give each other an incredible amount of freedom in our relationship. If I fail to call to inform my wife of my tardiness she does not gripe at me because she knows, deep down, that I have the Lord Jesus in my heart. And because I have the Lord Jesus in my heart she knows that I have her well-being, and the well-being of our children, always in my heart also. Over the years she has given me increasing amounts of freedom, and me to her. She has given me prerogative to make decisions without her even though we nearly always make decisions together.

I want to venture to say that in America we have lost the power of prerogative in almost all our relationships. Nobody trusts anyone anymore. Handshakes used to be enough; now we need attorneys, notary's and eyewitnesses. We used to give each other the freedom to mess up because we knew deep down that we had each other's best interest at heart. If you scratched my car I did not need an insurance company because I trusted that you had my best interest in mind and would resolve it just as soon as you could. I did not need to demand my rights because I knew you were thinking about my rights already. I was willing to give you the freedom to make things right, without 3rd party pressures, because I trusted you as a person. Now we are so individual that we are lucky if we know 3 people's persons.

Politics is such a heated subject today because no one trusts a politician. Politicians used to be the best of the best among us. They were the ones crawling up on the altar of service to be slain living sacrifices to God and for people (Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, etc.). Now we call them crooks. Politicians are supposed to be the people the nation gives prerogative to. They have a long road to recover our trust...and, sadly, so do our church-leaders.

Over time it has become clear to me that in many instances our flocks have wandered away from us. I attended a home-group bible study recently (not with BCC) where a heavy portion of the conversation between members was about keeping Pastors accountable. It sounded to me like Pastors had led them astray in the past and hurt them. Church leaders (myself included), I am finding that in many instances our people have ceased giving us prerogative to make decisions for their welfare. Perhaps they have doubted that we had their welfare in mind at all.

Men. Fathers. Elders. Deacons. Preachers. Let me challenge us to begin again to live up to the authority given us. Let us examine our hearts and ensure that every act in every day is motivated by the welfare of the people we serve. Let us not ask what is best for us; let us ask what is best for the people God has given us. Let us make decisions carefully, considering all of the people our decisions will impact. Let us pray religiously. Let us build our lives so completely around Jesus that everyone on the perifery of our lives is well taken care of. Let's lead our families, our churches, our communities and our nation forward by being imitators of our Lord Jesus Christ. When we do this our people will again give us the prerogative to lead on their behalf and they will follow without constant questioning. Let us lead the way and pray that our politicians will follow.