OUR LORD WHO WAS KILLED IN TIME BUT ROSE TO OCCUPY ETERNITY

Acts chapter 4 verses 9 - 10 record the words spoken by the apostle Peter to the leaders of Israel when he and John had been detained for proclaiming Jesus as the ressurection and for healing a man who was born lame. The passage goes like this;

If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a man who was lame and are being asked how he was healed, then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed.

The statement, made while Peter was filled with the Holy Spirit, was a withering indictment of the conduct of the leaders of Israel. They had plotted to kill Jesus and having succeeded, were confounded to find that Jesus was continuing to live through Peter and John and many more people as they stepped forward boldly with the gospel of Jesus and demonstrated the same healing power that Jesus demonstrated.

They were informed that Jesus, whom they had killed, was raised from the dead by God and it was through Him that the  lame man in front of them was restored.

This should have brought a sense of dread over the temple  leaders in the same way that crashing your car into a police car would bring dread to you. The leaders of Israel had been free to mistreat anyone who inconvenienced them with no consequences but now, they were finding out that it was God Himself  whom they had abused and mistreated. 

They did not count on what happened after they had killed Jesus.

Jesus, as a solitary man, could only minister to a limited number of people while he lived on earth.

However, those who killed Him, did not understand that they were actually releasing Him into eternity from where He, through the Holy Spirit, could reach out to all people at any time and live through hundreds and thousands and  millions and even billions of people  concurrently.

This why it  the scriptures say in 1 Corinthians 2 verse 8, "None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory."

Bless our Lord who died to redeem us and also,  because He rose from the dead into eternity, is now able to meet every one of us where we are geographically and  where we are in time. 

Amen.