He didn’t get a name. He was just a beggar, a cripple. On the stratosphere of who is important, the one we focused on in worship last Sunday, the one who was dropped off like a sack of potatoes each day at the Beautiful Gate (in Acts 3) in a scene that to most of us wasn’t beautiful, didn’t make The A List. At all.
In comparison, the text this week? Oh, we have names! Hello, important people! Let’s make room for these prominent movers and shakers!
These prominent movers and shakers didn’t—or wouldn’t—make room for the presence and power of Jesus, however. In fact, as you read this week’s scripture that continues from last Sunday, the in-the-know people wanted nothing to do with the stone [Jesus] who had already been rejected.
As we begin to move toward this Sunday, April 21, think about this stone the builder’s rejected. Think about how you hear and heal from Jesus, the One who is your cornerstone.
The lectionary text this Sunday is Acts 4:5-12. Here it is in the NLT version.
ACTS 4:5-12, NLT
5 The next day the council of all the rulers and elders and teachers of religious law met in Jerusalem. 6 Annas the high priest was there, along with Caiaphas, John, Alexander, and other relatives of the high priest. 7 They brought in the two disciples and demanded, “By what power, or in whose name, have you done this?”
8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers and elders of our people, 9 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? 10 Let me clearly state to all of you and to all the people of Israel that he was healed by the powerful name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the man you crucified but whom God raised from the dead. 11 For Jesus is the one referred to in the Scriptures, where it says,
‘The stone that you builders rejected
has now become the cornerstone.’
12 There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.”
PRAYER:
Let us clearly state that there is salvation in no one else but You, dear Jesus. There is also healing, wholeness and heart strength in us because of Your power.
Continue to fill us with the Spirit the Apostle Peter speaks of so that we, too, can speak of and share who You are.
Amen.