Men of Israel, listen to these words: This Jesus the Nazarene was a man pointed out to you by God

with miracles, wonders, and signs that God did among you through Him, just as you yourselves know. Though He was delivered up according to Gods determined plan and foreknowledge, you used lawless people to nail Him to a cross and kill Him. God raised Him up, ending the pains of death, because it was not possible for Him to be held by it. Acts 2:22-24

God showed us through Jesus not only His power, presence, and dominion, but that our reality of death is not accurate. God is life and through Him we have eternal life. Our experience here on Earth is to be appreciated, embraced, and celebrated. While we walk this land we are to express, reflect, and sh are Gods love with everyone and everything we encounter.

God raised this Jesus; of this we are all witnesses. Exalted at the right hand of God, He received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father and poured it forth, as you (both) see and hear
Something to think about
Its been said before that love is a verb, not a noun. If this is true, then God being love is exactly that being love, giving love, acting love, pouring out love. In todays reading we witness this love in action within the very cor e of itself the Godhead. Tomorrow is Trinity Sunday. Lets examine some of the insights todays passage brings to one of the greatest mysteries of our faith. God is love deeply, profoundly, relational love. And in these verses we witness the trinity constantly loving and honouring its respective members. Love is not static, there is a constantly active flow continually choosing to honour, exalt, bless, and prefer. Peter tells us that Jesus is raised up and exalted by the Father; and has received from him the promise of an incredible gift the Holy Spirit which he has then poured out. In the wider context of Acts 2 we know that the Holy Spirit in turn has poured out incredible power and gifting on the disciples. Why? So they can testify that Jesus is Lord, and the way to the Father. The raising up has come full circle. Each member of the Trinity is active to move the flow of love and glory to another part and even beyond so that people too can see how wonderful the fellow members of the Godhead are. The Father is glorifying the Son, and sending the Spirit, through him, so that we glorify the Son too. The Son is effectively saying to us come to me and Ill show you the way to the Father, and giving his spirit to provide revelation of himself as the way to do this. And the Spirit reveals Jesus and basically says come, he is the way to the Father. Its a beautiful, holy, mess of love which makes us dizzy if we begin to grasp even a fraction of it. When we as Christians talk about love being at the centre of our faith, Im not sure we always remember that this is the type of love were talking about. Often, if were honest, wed quite like the love to stop with us for a while, and to make us feel good about ourselves, rather than constantly giving it to glorify God, and prefer others. But God calls us to love in action - in our relationship with him, and with others - because we cannot separate the two (1 John 4:20). As we look at our broken world, we know this love is the answer. Can we be part of being, doing and giving it?

Something to do

Take some paper, and draw a diagram using arrows to represent the flow of love from the Father, to the Son, to the Holy Spirit, and then to you. Now extend that flow again from you outwards in all directions to everyone who is in your circle of influence. Include, for example, close friends; family; neighbours; people at church; people in need; your community; colleagues; and those much further away who you can affect with your prayers, giving, campaigning and lifestyle choices. Use the diagram to help focus your prayers for the Holy Spirits help in loving all of these people proactively, practically, and sincerely.

We are witnesses (3:15-16)

In his sermon, Peter proclaimed that he and John were witnesses to Jesus resurrection. Peter then pointed to an example of Gods power to raise up. It was the crippled beggar standing right beside them (3:16). The one who was raised to eternal life, Jesus, had completely healed the beggar (3:16). Peter insisted that the cripple had been cured on the grounds of faith in the name of Jesus (3:16). There is a question regarding the nature of the faith Peter referred to. According to Lukes account, the beggar did not show any particular faith. He had simply asked Pete r and John for money. The possibility of his being healed apparently didnt enter his mind. Seemingly, God bestowed a gracious gift on the man through the two apostles, apart from any work of faith on his part. Once the beggar saw what happened to him, he believed not only in his healing but understood the source of his healing. It was God whom the beggar praised for his good fortune (3:8).

6 Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. 8And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross! 9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father