THE comparison, which is proposed to be made in this chapter, is a comparison of Peter's addresses as reported in Acts 2, 3, 4, 5. There are four addresses, which are contained in 2:14-36; 3:12-26; 4:8-12; 5:29-32: to which must be added the instruction to inquirers in 2:38-40. Will the reader look carefully through these portions of Scripture? It need not take long. There are only fifty verses in all, and twenty-six of these have already been examined in our three previous chapters. But there should be no hurry. Any length of time spent on them will be repaid. Having gathered what you can by your own perusal, we shall more profitably proceed together.

The first address of the group is the longest, in some respects the most important, and it was delivered on the most remarkable occasion. Having examined its contents in previous chapters, we need not linger upon it.

now claims our consideration (3:12-26). This speech was an answer to the curiosity of the people. They were filled with wonder and amazement. They hastened together, greatly wondering at what had happened. The manner in which they were staring at Peter and John, and their general demeanour, eloquently spoke the questions that were in their minds. What is the meaning of this? How has it happened? By what means have these two men given walking power to a man who had never been able to walk? To these, and all such interrogatories, Peter answered in the first sentences of his short address.

Peter opened his address in a manner calculated to evoke their national sympathy - "Ye men of Israel." In his first speech he named his hearers by their land and by their city - men of Judea and inhabitants of Jerusalem. In this second speech he links them with the honoured name of him who had prevailed with God - Israel.

By his opening question Peter disclaims much that his hearers were already attributing to himself and John. "Why marvel ye at this? or why look ye so earnestly on us, as though by our own power or holiness we had made this man to walk?" We have indeed caused him to walk, but it is not by our own power; it is not by anything inherent in us. We are only agents. The real cause of the cure is high above us.

That cause was the great First Cause - the God of the Jews. "The God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified His Son Jesus." The national and religious feeling is thus further wrought upon. God is mentioned as the God of their forefathers. It is more remarkable how skilfully in the first assertion Peter brings the God of their progenitors into closest proximity with Jesus Christ; the God of our fathers glorified Jesus Christ. Glorified is not a word employed by Peter on Pentecost. But resurrection and exaltation are there; and these in their completeness amount to glorification. Here all is couched in one expressive term - glorified, made glorious.

But what a contrast! He whom God, the God of their fathers, glorified, was by the men of Israel delivered up. Under their disapprobation and ban He was handed over to crucifixion. In Peter's former discourse he had asserted that God delivered Jesus to the Jews. In the keeping of His own people, He ought to have been safe and cared for. But when they delivered Him up to the mercy of uncircumcised and unsanctified heathens, they had done their utmost to dishonour Him.

The charges by Peter against his countrymen follow each other in rapid succession.

1. You delivered Him up.

2. You disowned Him before Pilate when that Governor was anxious to release Him.

3. It was the Holy One, the Just One, whom you thus denied. You preferred a murderer to such a One.

4. You became murderers. Nor was it either murderer or common person whom you deprived of life; you killed the Prince of Life.

The antithesis is marked throughout and must have been crushing to Peter's listeners. God glorified Jesus; the Jews gave Him away. Pilate was eager to release Him; the Jews clamoured for His crucifixion. The Holy and Just One and a murderer were placed before them; they chose to show their favour to the murderer. They killed; but it was the Author of Life whose life they took away.

If the resurrection and exaltation are passed over with briefer statements than on the previous occasion, the guilt of the Jews is more enlarged upon now. It is, however, a relief to observe what precedes and what follows the statements of their dark deeds. God has glorified His Son Jesus, goes before; God has raised him from the dead, follows. God's attitude to Jesus was of the utmost importance. The Son was vindicated and made triumphant throughout.

Self-assertion finds no place in the words of Peter; but there is no shrinking from claiming the true place of himself and John. "We are witnesses." Yet how briefly their own share of work is asserted. It is in as few words as possible, and it is in the same words which he had employed in his previous speech, with the exception of an additional word then to make it emphatically inclusive of the whole twelve - "whereof we all are witnesses." We were eye-witnesses of the unparalleled character and deeds of Jesus; we were witnesses that after having been put to death and having been buried, he was raised again; and we are here to testify of these things and of all we know about Him.

Peter's testimony to the name of Jesus, in his explanation of the cure of the lame man, is direct and emphatic. "His name through faith in His name hath made this man strong, whom ye see and know: yea, the faith which is by Him hath given him this perfect soundness in the presence of you all." Three points may be noted.

1. His name. See Acts 3:6.

2. Faith in His name. The mere use of the name would not suffice. That was afterwards tried, with results that would not soon be forgotten by those who made the experiment (Acts 19:13-16). The word was not for unholy lips to charm with. Faith in the name was a condition of success in the use of it. Even men who were miraculously endowed, required to exercise faith in order to their utterance of the name being effectual. Said Peter, Our use of the name of Jesus, combined with our faith in that name, has produced this result.

3. Faith by Him. It almost looks as if Peter meant to qualify the faith which he had just asserted, or, at least, to divest it of any appearance of inherent merit. The faith is declared to be by, or through, Jesus Christ. The same thought is more fully expressed by the same writer in his first epistle, chap. 1:21. You "by Him do believe in God, that raised Him up from the dead, and gave Him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God." Christ, by His sayings and doings, had been the cause of their faith. Even for the faith in His name He was to be praised.

Peter had spoken condemnatory things of his countrymen before them. Such speaking could scarcely be without some visible effect. Did the speaker see a change come over his hearers while he was hurling forth his heavy charges against them? Had the look of wonderment and questioning given place to one of sadness or bitterness? For some reason Peter's tone at once changes. He must speak the truth, but he does it with as little cause of offence as possible. He finds the greatest possible extenuation of the reprehensible deeds of his countrymen. "Brethren, I know that through ignorance ye did it, as did also your rulers." They did not mean to throw away their Messiah. They did not mean to oppose High Heaven. They were ignorant of what was involved in their action - ignorant of the importance of their murderous deed. They knew enough to make them veritably culpable, and with their opportunities they might have known much more, for the neglect of which they were also guilty. At the same time their ignorance was such as to have weight in mitigation of their guilt.

Their deeds had also been a fulfilment of prophecy. "Those things which God before had showed by the mouth of all His prophets, that Christ should suffer, He hath so fulfilled. By their deeds of ignorance the prophecies respecting Christ's sufferings had been carried into effect. Their action was of their own free choice, else there could have been no blame and no guilt; but God had prophesied what would be, and He allowed the Jews to carry out their own way, and thus He fulfilled what had been spoken by the mouth of all His prophets. All the prophets are so viewed as linked together, that what is the general tenor of the whole is attributed to all. Every Old Testament prophet has not written of Christ's sufferings; but each one is a part of a homogeneous whole, and all are credited with what is the testimony of some.

High purposes were served, prophecy was fulfilled; but that removed not the sin of the Jews who had killed the Lord of glory. Hence Peter added, "repent ye therefore, and turn again, that your sins may be blotted out." Considerately for them, he had made their ignorance a plea for extenuating their sin; but after all possible extenuation their guilt was great. There was need to resolve to give up their antagonism to Jesus and to turn right round and follow Him.

The Revised Version puts repentance and turning as a means to a threefold end: (1) That sins may be blotted out; (2) That so there may come seasons of refreshing; (3) That Jesus Christ may be sent from heaven. Let us compare this portion with the parallel portion addressed to inquirers on the day of Pentecost.

Acts 2:38 contains Acts 3:19-20 contains

1. Repentance; 1. Repentance;

2. Baptism; 2. Conversion;

3. Remission; 3. The blotting out of sins;

4. The gift of the Holy Spirit. 4. Times of refreshing;

5. The return of Christ.

The first command in each - repent, and the first promise - forgiveness, are alike. But there is a difference in the second command in the two addresses - be baptised in one, be converted, or turn again, in the other; and there is a difference between the second promises - the gift of the Holy Spirit in one, times of refreshing in the other.

How can we account for conversion and baptism occupying the same place? Baptism is between repentance and forgiveness in the first instance, whereas conversion is between repentance and forgiveness in the second. It looks as if baptism and conversion were interchangeable terms. Are they so? Is baptism a synonym of conversion? Is one an explanation of the other? Conversion is the turning of a sinner from his evil ways into the practice of those things which Christ, or the apostles of Christ, commanded. Baptism is a burial, or immersion, of one who has confessed sin and expressed his determination to give it up. Every one so baptised is a convert. Nor is it too much to say that all who act according to the New Testament models of conversion, have thus repented and been baptised. Every repenting one who is baptised in the name of Jesus Christ is a convert to Christ; every convert has repented and been baptised. Conversion is a turning; baptism is an action in which the turning takes place. The old life is therein renounced; a new cause is therein espoused. While then conversion and baptism are not equivalent terms, they may, nevertheless, in some cases be exchanged, and the purposes of truth be served thereby.

The gift of the Holy Spirit and the times of refreshing are the two promises that seem to occupy the same place. Are they of equal import? Perhaps not. The gift of the Holy spirit is more definite than seasons of refreshing. By receiving the Holy Spirit, and thus being enabled to speak and act miraculously, seasons of refreshing, enlivening, invigorating, would ensue. Hence the prayer afterward presented, "Lord, behold their threatenings; and grant unto Thy servants, that with all boldness they may speak Thy Word, by stretching forth Thine hand to heal; and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of Thy holy child Jesus" (Acts 4:29-31). By the possession and exercise of miracle power they were made more bold to speak. "They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spake the Word of God with boldness." Thus it was that with great power the apostles gave witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus; and great grace was upon them all. It was such speaking and action that secured hearers and led to conversions. Seasons of refreshing naturally accompanied or followed the gift of the Holy Spirit.

It will be observed that both in the command to be baptised and in the promise of the Spirit there is something more specific than in the command to turn, and in the promise of refreshing seasons. Many might need ask how to turn, in what act they were to turn; but no one would need inquire how to be immersed. There might be reasoning and inquiry as to the seasons of refreshing; but what was meant by the gift of the Holy Spirit would be understood by those who saw the Spirit in operation through the apostles. When Peter was speaking to inquirers who in agony were asking guidance, he gave definite commands, and definite promises were appended; but his hearers in Solomon's porch had not reached that point of anxiety, and were consequently addressed in general terms.

Acts 3:20-26 is all additional matter to what is recorded in Acts 2. It is a sample of the testifying which is averred in chap. 2:40. It is an increase of the testimony respecting Jesus. The Lord of glory is the subject upon which Peter continued to speak.

The return of Jesus Christ is predicted in Acts 3:20. In the record of Pentecost there is no mention of the second advent. Jesus, when on earth, had promised to His disciples to return for them. "I will come again and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also" (John 14:3). At his ascension two men in white apparel had said to the apostles, "This same Jesus, who is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven" (Acts 1:11). And now Peter promises that Jehovah will send Jesus Christ. The time of His coming, and many matters connected therewith, may be untaught questions; but that He will return rests on clear evidence. For further testimony, see Phil. 3:20-21; 1 Thess. 1:9-10; 4:14-18; Tit. 2:13.

That same Christ who was seen ascending, and who will certainly come a second time unto salvation, had been before preached unto the Jews. Abiding by the Authorised Version - "before was preached" - we might turn to the Old Covenant writings for samples of the preaching. Isa. 53 is a striking sample. Jesus is there spoken of in such plain language that it has caused Isaiah to be denominated the "fifth Evangelist." His words are more like a narrative than a prophecy. Past and present tenses are used as if part of the things were already history, and part speedily becoming so. But the future is also there. With a prophet's eye Isaiah looked through seven centuries, and saw as in living reality the life of the Redeemer; and he wrote of it in the vivid, varied-tense form of past, present, and future. To the eye of the seer it was all present.

But probably the Revised Version gives the accurate idea - He "hath been appointed for you." Jesus Christ had been appointed for His great mission of salvation, and the appointment was for the benefit of the Jews. The Saviour's mission for the Jews was pre-arranged by God. It is another way of asserting "the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God" of chap. 2:23, with an added thought in the words "unto you," to you, or for you. The Jews were specially, or, at least, first in view.

Christ had not only been appointed by the Father as the Saviour of the Jews - He had not only been preached to them - He had come and gone. He had come into the midst of His own possessions - the creatures that he had made, and His own people did not welcome Him (John 1:11). The Jews had rejected Him in His first and humble advent, and for long, weary years and generations, they would need wait before He returned in glory. Heaven must retain Him until the times of restitution. Men would not have Him, but God received Him. On earth He humbled Himself to the position of a servant, and was despised and rejected; in heaven all authority in the universe is vested in Him - He is the anointed King. Temporary sufferings have been exchanged for enduring pleasures. The cross has given place to the crown. Heaven has already retained Him for eighteen hundred years. How long He will yet remain at God's right hand is one of God's unrevealed secrets (Mark 13:32).

But, assuredly, times of restitution are in store for our sin-cursed earth. The disobedience of Adam not only

the earth itself has been placed under a curse. Unto Adam God said, "Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee" (Gen. 3:17-18). The whole creation groans and travails in pain along with man. Creation is waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God which shall take place in the resurrection state. Then the creation itself shall partake of the liberty of the children of God (Rom. 8:19-23). But the restoration of all things need not be expected in one moment, or hour, or day. These are times of restitution. The renovation will be by stages. It will be carried on in successive periods. It is on the principle of now a little and then a little. In this way God has always wrought. Creation was spread over six days. The promises respecting the coming of the Saviour were given one at a time, and the giving of them extended through the patriarchal and Mosaic dispensations. Those dispensations served their time and disappeared. Christianity has succeeded, and for eighteen centuries and a half has been in operation. But the times of restoration which are contemporary with the coming of Christ have not yet dawned. The history of man and of revelation is the history of successive phases of God's great plan. In due course will come complete restoration from the blight of sin; but it will come in successive steps, and not all at once.

The prophets have foretold the restoration, as they have foretold the sufferings of Christ. The sufferings and the subsequent glory are alike subjects of prophecy (1 Pet. 1:11).

Further testifying of Jesus, Peter gives a quotation from Deut. 18:15-19. "Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you." The 'for' which begins this verse (Acts 3:22.), is omitted in the Revised Version. There is no immediate connection with the preceding verse such as would be implied by the presence of 'for.' It is not now of the yet future coming of Jesus Christ, and the restoration, that Peter is speaking; he has reverted to the coming of the Messiah which already has taken place. The Prophet like Moses had appeared. Moses and Christ resemble each other (1) in being prophets; (2) deliverers; (3) lawgivers; (4) in each introducing a new dispensation; (5) in mediating between God and men. Both were to be heard and obeyed with the reverence due to a divine messenger.

The voice on the holy mount declared the authority of Christ. Said God, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him" (Matt. 17:5). New Testament teaching is replete with the thought of His unqualified authority. A heavy penalty is consequently attached to neglect of His words. "Every soul that will not hear that Prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people." In Deuteronomy the words are, "I will require it of him." In the more explicit language of the New Testament we have the following declarations:- "He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God" (John 3:18); "If ye believe not that I am He, ye shall die in your sins" (John 8:24).

Peter next applied the prophecies to the time then present, and then to the people there gathered. "These days" of the twenty-fourth verse, of which the prophets had spoken, were the days in which Peter and his listeners were living - the days of the preaching of the Gospel. And as the audience was composed of the descendants of those to whom the promises had been made, Peter asserts the fulfilment of the promises by God in the sending of the Saviour. The promise to Abraham, that all the nations would be blessed in him, was being realised in Jesus having come in the first place to the Jews with the comprehensive aim of rescuing them from the power of sin.

Peter and John had not finished their testimony concerning Jesus to the people in Solomon's porch when they were interrupted, not by the populace, but by the rulers - not by those who had been listening to them, but by those who were enraged because others listened. "As they spake unto the people, the priests, and the captain of the temple, and the Sadducees, came upon them, being grieved that they taught the people, and preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead" (chap. 4:1-2). In the impotent custody of those unworthy leaders and rulers we must leave the two apostles, while we summarise the points of resemblance in Peter's two discourses - the one on the day of Pentecost and the other in Solomon's porch. The following five points at once suggest themselves:-

1. Defence (2:14-15; 3:12). In the former address Peter defended himself and his companions against the charge of drunkenness; in the latter, it was a defence of their real position as men and servants of God, but it is by a repudiation of power that did not belong to them.

2. Explanation (2:16-21,33; 3:13-16). In both addresses the explanation was of something before the beholders that was perplexing them; and on both occasions it was a display of miracle power. On the former occasion it was the miraculous speaking of the apostles; on the latter, the miraculous cure of the lame man. The two explanations substantially coincide - the exaltation of Jesus in the one, the name of Jesus in the other.

3. The theme of preaching (2:22-36; 3:13-26). Jesus Christ was the subject of discourse. In the defences made there was a preparation for the all-absorbing theme - Jesus of Nazareth; and in the explanations given the theme was entered upon - Jesus, or the glorification of Jesus, was the solution of the wonders. In the presentation of his theme the speaker represents Christ as between two opposing forces. The Jews were antagonistic to Him; the God of the Jews was His ally approving of Him and vindicating His claim from beginning to end.

4. Commands (2:38; 3:19). 'Repent and be baptised' is represented in the second address by 'repent and turn.' The former is specific, in reply to eager inquirers; the latter is generic, explicit enough to give a general idea of what was required.

5. Promises (2:38; 3:19-20). The remission of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit in the one, become blotting out of sins and seasons of refreshing in the other. Here, again, the difference is that between specific and generic. The gift of the Holy Spirit is a specific promise, and the seasons of refreshing generic. The promise of the Lord's return has nothing corresponding to it, either in the earlier address or in the instruction to inquirers.

The similarity of the two addresses throughout is such that we should be tempted to attribute both to one man, irrespective of the declaration to that effect.

were necessarily more brief. The rulers were not there to be taught, and teaching was not likely to profit them. They were sitting as judges; the apostles were on their defence. The aim of the rulers, moreover, was to suppress speech; they did not wish to elicit evidence. Their low nature was content to bolster up their own authority. Notwithstanding their brevity, the two addresses to the rulers, recorded in the fourth and fifth chapters of Acts, closely resemble the two earlier addresses to the people. The apostles defended themselves, gave explanations of what had taken place, and preached Jesus. These three things are accomplished in very few words. With skill and brevity more than human the three are blended into one. The authoritative name of Jesus is at once their defence, explanation, and theme of preaching.

1. To Christians. In public speaking and in other efforts to spread the truth, let Christians imitate Peter in the prominence given to the name of Jesus of Nazareth. There is no salvation in any other name, and there is no power to induce men to turn to God apart from the truths about Jesus. The world may count the story of the Nazarene stale, there may be a clamour for something novel, and Christians may be tempted to pander to unhealthy tastes by speaking on all kinds of subjects and discussing all kinds of doctrines. But Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God today as He was eighteen hundred years ago. He is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. Be careful not to veer away from Christ and Him crucified.

2. To opponents of Christianity. Be warned by the folly of the rulers never to attempt to suppress the truth or to evade it. Every effort of opposition which the rulers made only exposed the weakness of their own case and goaded themselves into desperation. God's Truth cannot be permanently suppressed. To attempt to smother it is as impracticable as it is foolish and wicked. Any apparent success must be followed by humiliating discomfiture. Success against the truth means eternal failure.