The Evidence of the Deity of Christ Part 1

Pastor Mike will be speaking on The Evidence of the Deity of Christ Part 1. He will be reading out of Acts 2:22-36.

Remember Nicodemus? He came to Jesus by night. You remember in the Gospel of John chapter 3, he said to Jesus, we know you’re sent from God. We know you’re sent from God. How do you know that, Nicodemus?

Because of all the signs, miracles, and wonder. This is Hope Worth Having. Pastor Mike here, and I hope you’re ready for today’s program. We’re going to be in Acts chapter 2, verse 22 this time. We’re talking about the evidence of the deity of Christ.

A lot of people deny that Jesus even existed, but there is not only historical evidence but there is also evidence that He was God. Sent from the Father, He was the Son of God, He came to give His life for us.

And so I want to get into learning about that as the Apostle Peter takes time to teach us about this great truth of the evidence of Christ. If you have your Bible this morning, I want you to join me in Acts chapter 2.

Come down to verse 22 and through verse 36. We’ll do our best to cover this. When you think of the book of Acts, you know that it’s titled the Acts of the Apostles. It probably could be better named the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles because literally, that’s what we’re going to see as we go chapter by chapter, which is the work of the Spirit of God that Christ had promised to all who believe in Him that the Spirit would indwell them, empower them, and equip them to do His work.

The Apostles had the responsibility of establishing the church and taking the good news of Jesus Christ across the known world. We’ll later read in Acts chapter 4 that the Apostles literally had turned the world upside down with this message of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The reason that they had been so effective in turning the world upside down is because they’re teaching, they’re preaching, they’re witnessing, always focused upon the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus said, if I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto me.

And what he meant is that every kind of person on this planet from all walks of life, all nationalities, and different nations would come to Jesus Christ. The key in our teaching, preaching, witnessing, and ministering ministry is that we should always focus on and lift up the Lord Jesus Christ.

In Acts chapter two, what you are seeing unfold is a special day called the Day of Pentecost. And on this day in the midst of thousands of people, literally thousands of people, the apostle Peter stands up and preaches the first, what I call the apologetic and evangelistic sermon in church history.

Verse 22 is the beginning of his sermon. And you and I are going to look at this sermon because, in this sermon, Peter is making the case for the evidence of the deity of Jesus Christ. There were many who doubted Christ, and certainly, the Jews that had gathered on the Day of Pentecost, this special feast day, this day where they came to not only offer sacrifices but to make commitments into their hearts, they now were experiencing the falling of the Spirit of God upon the people.

And you know, if you’ve been studying along with us, that as Joel had spoken in verse 17, it shall come to pass in the last day, says God, that I will pour out my spirit. That’s exactly what took place.

The Spirit of God was being poured out. There were questions, there was mocking, there was doubt. So the Bible tells us that Peter stood up and he preached this great sermon about Jesus Christ. And as he gives the evidence of the deity of Jesus, he first teaches us about the life of Christ.

I want you to look at verse 22 of Acts chapter two. Notice what the Bible says, men of Israel hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth. A man attested by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did through him in your midst as you yourselves also know.

How do we know that Jesus Christ was truly sent from heaven? How do we know that he was sent by the Father? Peter is making the case to all his listeners that this is the Messiah. Jesus is the Messiah.

He is the one that the prophets have proclaimed would come. He is the one that is truly sent from God and he is God himself. He is the Son of God. How is it that we know this to be true? Simply by his life.

His life, the life of Christ, the prophetic scriptures. are definitely fulfilled in the life of Jesus of Nazareth. I want you to take your Bible and just go back one page to Acts chapter 1, and I want you to look to verse 3.

Luke is the human author of the Book of Acts. The Spirit of God inspired every word that he wrote down, but Luke is not asking people to jump into darkness or to have blind faith, he is presenting to all who will read these accounts of the life of Jesus that he truly is God.

Look at verse 3 of Acts 1. To whom he also presented himself alive after suffering by many, by many infallible proofs, being seen by them during 40 days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.

Luke, the physician, would never, ever give an account of the life of Jesus in such a way that there would not be evidence. Peter takes that information and he says, looks at the life of Jesus. It is an incredible life.

It is the life of one who was sent by God. Back in verse 22, he said a man attested by God. That is God has proven to you and to me that God has demonstrated to you and me that Jesus truly is the Son of God.

Now, how did he do that? I’m back in verse 22. By miracles, by wonders and signs which God did through him in your midst. The miracles of Jesus. Jesus Christ was performed before the people so that they might believe that He is the Son of God.

When we come to the Gospel of John, the Gospel of John is a compilation of the seven high points of the miracles of the Lord Jesus Christ. And at the end of the Gospel, John says in this apologetic Gospel, he teaches us that these signs were performed that you might believe.

God doesn’t ask you to believe blindly, but God says look at the evidence that I have given you and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Not everybody believed. When we come to John chapter 15 and verse 24, Jesus said, if I had not done among them the works.

that no one else did. They would not be guilty of sin, but now they have seen and hated both me and my father. Jesus performed these miracles. They stood before God. They stood before God without excuse.

They were guilty of their sinfulness, and they were guilty of rejecting the Savior. Jesus compassionately and mercifully presented to them works, miracles, signs, and wonders to authenticate that He truly was the Son of God.

Now think about this. Some of you are worried about your children. Some of you are worried about your family members. Some of you are worried about your neighbors and about their eternal destination and their salvation.

And sometimes we take upon ourselves the guilt of somehow the reason they are not saved. But I want you to know that Jesus Christ, there’s no better witness. There’s no better teacher. There’s no better Savior.

There’s no better miracle worker than the Lord Jesus Christ. And yet, as He walked among men, as He walked among women, there were people who refused to believe in Jesus Christ despite the evidence. And so that’s why every heart has to make its own decision for God.

And that’s why you have to understand that our job is not to save anybody. Our job is just to plant the seed, make the case, and present and lift up Jesus. Amen. What people do with Jesus is between them and God, but it certainly ain’t my fault that somebody doesn’t believe in Jesus Christ.

You raise your children in church. You teach them the good things. You show them the right way. You pray with them. You teach them all that you can to live for God and love God, and they grow up, and they have to make their own decision for Jesus Christ.

If I could guarantee that by raising your kids in church, your kids would turn out to be wonderful people and love God all their lives, there wouldn’t be enough buildings that I could build to hold everybody.

Do you understand that? I mean, if I could guarantee that, but I can’t, why? Every child has to make their own decision. The only thing I’m accountable for is the circumstances that I make available for my children, but I am not accountable for their response to God.

Not accountable for anybody’s response to God. My job is to preach Jesus unto you this morning. And as I do that, your response is between you and God. If you walk away and say, I hate Jesus, that’s between you and Jesus, that’s on you, not me.

If you walk away and say, I love Jesus, it’s on you, not me, because it’s your personal response to God. But what I want you to see is Peter is making this great case. And he is doing it by helping them to see that Christ, as he lived before them, he performed miracles.

Now what are the purpose of miracles? Write these three things down because so many believers are misled about this miracle stuff. And they are kind of caught off guard. I want you to understand why Jesus performed miracles.

I want you to understand why the apostles performed miracles. The first reason is to substantiate the messenger, to validate that the messenger is truly from God. The working of miracles was a confirmation of the coming of the Messiah, and that Jesus is the fulfillment of all that was prophesied, all that was proclaimed by the prophets, that he truly is the Messiah.

Remember Nicodemus? He came to Jesus by night. Do you remember the Gospel of John chapter 3? He said to Jesus, we know you’re sent from God. We know you’re sent from God. How do you know that Nicodemus?

Because of all the signs, miracles, and wonder. Nicodemus is like, yeah, we know you’re sent from God because there’s something unique. The second purpose of miracles is to substantiate the message. It’s not just to substantiate the messenger, but the message.

God never sent out a special messenger without giving them the power necessary to prove that the message was from heaven. A supernatural proposition is required to have supernatural proof. This was something that was turning the heads of the Jewish religion, turning everything upside down on its head, if you will, and it was helping them to see that even though God was working in a new way, the Old Covenant was coming to a close and the initiation of the New Covenant was upon the people and the pouring of the Spirit was upon those who believe in Christ.

It was to substantiate the message to all. The signs and the wonders were needed to confirm that the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ was true. The third reason or purpose of miracles is to demonstrate the power of the glory of God.

It is to demonstrate the power and the glory of God. We see this attitude in the life of our Savior as you look at John 11, verse 40. It was as if the master raised Lazarus to life. It was for the glory of God.

Nicodemus understood it was for the glory of God and that is that every one of us as we experience. the miracles of God, we know it is for His glory. It is not for our glory, but it is for His glory.

But also that people might see the manifestation of the power and the authority of God. Please remember, that as Jesus performed miracles, He demonstrated that He had authority over diseases. As He healed people of their ailments, some of them were born with these ailments, some of them perhaps experienced accidents or had diseases in their life and there was no answer in the medical community for their disease, but Jesus came along and He healed them.

Demonstrating that He has authority over all diseases. He has authority over demons. You remember the man who was out on an island and he lived in the graveyards and he was filled with legions of demons.

And that when Jesus asked him to identify himself, the demon spoke up and said that his name was Legion, probably referring to the fact that there were multitudes of demons living in this one individual.

I want you to know that the demonic world is a real world. And that if you do not believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you can be possessed of a demon. There are times you and I watch the news or we read about stories and we say how in the world could anybody ever do that?

Let me tell you how they could do that. They are possessed by the devil. There is a demon within them that is leading them to do things that are even unnatural to a world that does not believe in Christ.

We wonder about all this craziness that is going on. There are demonic forces and principalities. The Bible teaches us that are orchestrating. and they are working even with political and world leaders to bring about the demise of the kingdom of God.

But you be encouraged because Jesus said the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church. The church will not stop. They may get rid of our physical buildings. They may take our property and they may get rid of our PowerPoint.

But I’ll tell you one thing, they’ll never get rid of the word of God. They’ll never get rid of the prayer of God’s people. They’ll never get rid of the Holy Spirit that works in and through us and around us.

The church will march on in whatever form that it needs to. Jesus told us the gates of hell shall not prevail. Amen, go ahead. Now, Jesus not only has authority over diseases and demons, but he has authority over death.

You see, what distinguishes the miracles and the signs and the wonders of Christ is unlike the charlatans who are just playing on your emotions and your hope, Jesus stepped in, interrupted funerals, and raised the dead.

Jesus not only stepped in the middle of a funeral procession and raised a little girl from death, but four days after the funeral service, four days after the memorial service, Jesus showed up at Lazarus’ tomb, his family thought he was incredibly late, but I tell you, God is never late when he shows up, amen?

He’s never late, and he raised the dead. He raised Lazarus to life. You see, now why would God do that? To show that he has authority, whether it’s early, imminent, in the moment of death, or it is several days after death, God has authority over death.

And to cap it all off, as if to say, well, anybody could do that, or perhaps they weren’t even really dead, pastor, Jesus himself who hung on a cross, Jesus who suffered death himself as he was bearing the sins of mankind upon him, the Bible teaches us that three days later, he rose again.

Three days after death, he rose again. Again, some skeptics may question it, but let me give you this. The Bible says, as we just read in Acts chapter one, that he walked on this earth 40 days after his death.

The apostle Paul said he was seen by over 500 people. The Bible says that wherever there are two or three witnesses, let every word be established. That is when… we have two or three witnesses, then we can discover what the truth is.

And the truth is that God always works in such a magnanimous way and he always is overflowing and he always does more than what is ever required and our cup is always running over and surely his goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our life that this God, this great savior did more than what any court would ever require and he had over 500 witnesses say, yep, I met Jesus after his resurrection.

And so I want you to understand that he has authority over death and that this is the life of our savior. This is what the apostle was saying, the apostle Peter in verse 22 of Acts chapter two as he is teaching us about the life of Christ and his miracles, his wonders, and his signs that he had done among the people.

Then I want you to see the death of Christ. For not only is the life of Christ the evidence of his deity, but his death. We know in verse 23 that You say pastor if you keep going at this rate, we’re never going to get through this sermon Hang in there.

Okay, we’re going to fast-track verse 23 him referring to Christ being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of god You have taken by lawless hands have crucified and put to death Jesus’s death is a matter of god’s sovereign plan I want you to note that in the bible Being delivered by the determined purpose and foreknowledge of god That the death of christ was already planned out in eternity past Within the trying godhead the plan was that he would come and that he would live a sinless life among us He would prove the authenticity of his messiahship and lordship And his message of salvation to repent and believe in Christ all that would be authenticated by his miracles and wonders But it would continue in this sovereign plan that would escalate to the point of his death on the cross The bible teaches us in Romans 5a that god commended his love towards us or he proved it He demonstrated it in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.

Just put your name there Christ died for you Jesus christ died for you and the thought of the fact that he would do this willingly Obediently that this was not some kind of a reckless religious leader who had kind of lost control of the circumstances and everything Got to the point where he finally just died on a cruel cross, but rather this was pre -planned in the of God that he had chosen that the way that he would redeem mankind that he would rescue us from our sins is that he would send us a Savior who would live a sinless life as already stated but he would die on that cross and on that cross suspended between heaven and earth the sins every sin you committed every sin that you thought every sin that you had in your attitudes or your motives was placed upon Christ and rather than you and I being punished for our sin Jesus Christ was punished for our sins Jesus gave up his life for your salvation the Bible teaches us in Romans 8 32 that he spared not his own son referring to God the Father but delivered him up for us all how shall he not with him also freely give us all things do you think that God would withhold What is necessary and good in your life when he has already demonstrated his love towards you by sending his only begotten son to the cross?

Do you doubt that the goodness and grace of God will follow you wherever you might go? Do you doubt that God loves you? If you do, my friends, look to the cross. Our identity is in our relationship with Christ.

Our meaning and purpose is found in our relationship with Christ. And when we come to the foot of the cross, that’s where we find forgiveness. That’s where we find grace. That’s where we find hope. And that’s why we continue to see that there is victory in Jesus Christ.

And we cannot glory in the philosophies of this world. We cannot glory in the wisdom of mankind, but rather we glory in the cross. Because that’s where our redemption is. Each one of us was born in sin.

You don’t become a sinner, you’re born a sinner. And if you doubt that, just have children. And that’s how simple theology is. Sometimes people say, I gotta read this book or that book and I just tell them to have some children and you’ll understand the simplicity of mankind.

You don’t train children to have a meltdown at Walmart. You don’t train them to be selfish. You don’t train them. There aren’t any seminars to train our children who go out onto the playground out here and all the playground drama that goes on out there.

You just wouldn’t believe it. Sally wouldn’t talk to Sue. You know what I’m saying? Billy hit Johnny, okay. Now I have my own personal opinions on how to deal with that but it would not be politically correct and I’d probably send the entire ministry into a tailspin.

But anyways, we’re sinners. Guilty before God. is one, his name is Jesus, who will acquit us of all of those charges against us if we repent and believe in Jesus Christ. Can God’s people say amen?

Yes. The third thing, we’re tracking well because I only have four points. So the third is the resurrection of Christ. What is the evidence that Christ is truly sent from God? Peter teaches the people that it’s the life of Christ, it’s the death of Christ, it’s the resurrection of Christ.

Look at verse 24 of this text, whom God raised up, having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible that He should be held by it. So the resurrection of Christ is a poignant evidence that Christ is truly sent from God.

Now in verses 25 through 28, Peter is referencing the Old Testament, he is pointing out that when David died, his body did decay. But yet the Bible says that it would not decay. But it is referring to the seed of David, which would be Jesus Christ and Jesus’s body never did decay.

So I want you to note again in verse 25, for David says concerning him, referring to Christ, I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is at my right hand, that I may not be shaken, therefore my heart rejoiced, and my tongue was glad.

Moreover, my flesh also will rest in hope, for you will not leave my soul in Hades or hell, nor will you allow your holy one to see corruption or decay. You have made known to me the ways of life. You will make me full of joy in your presence.

So this is a prophetic reference to the seed of David, and that is Jesus Christ. Paul taught us in the book of Romans that he is the seed of David. The Gospel writers, Matthew and Luke, show us the lineage of Christ that he truly came from Abraham and David, the lineage that was prophesied.

This is just more, more evidence that he truly is the Messiah. God proved by many infallible proofs to verify that Christ’s triumph over death was real. There is no religious leader who has authenticated his message by rising from the dead.

There are many religious leaders who claim to be God, to be sent from God, to be the Savior, to be the Messiah, to be Jesus, and even today there are charlatans who continue to proclaim that they are the one, but not one of them has ever risen from the dead.

Sometimes, people call the book of Acts the Acts of the Holy Spirit or the Acts of the Apostles. Either way, all of the book of Acts really points us to Jesus Christ, particularly how he is the fulfillment of prophecy and that he is the true Messiah that the prophets talked about would come.

And that all culminated in his resurrection. So, that is the true evidence of his deity, and I hope that you are growing, you are learning, and you are feeling that God is working in your heart understanding who Christ is, and being equipped to articulate what exactly you believe about Jesus.

Don’t forget to check out our website, HopeWorthHaving .com, that is HopeWorthHaving .com, a lot of resources, and a lot of material. Don’t forget to sign up for our newsletter. I know that it will be an encouragement to you, so take advantage of those opportunities.

This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ there is hope. worth having. you