◄ What Does Acts 2:23 Mean? ►

Though He was delivered up according to God's determined plan and foreknowledge, you used lawless people to nail Him to a cross and kill Him.

Acts 2:23(HCSB)

Verse of the Day

The book of Acts in general is a history book that bridges the pre-Cross Scriptures of the Old Testament and Gospels (when the gospel of the kingdom was the main focus of teaching), and the post-Cross period when God's full revelation to man had been given through Christ Jesus (when the gospel of the grace of God became the main focus of God's good news to all men).

The book of Acts in general is a history book with minimal doctrinal content, because the full revelation of God to man, through His written Word, had not yet been fully penned and finalised by God's appointed prophets and Christ's chosen apostles. Nevertheless, it is a book that opens our understanding to God's glorious plan of redemption and His wonderful purpose of the ages.

Too often, unbelievers and uninformed Christians consider the Cross of Christ to be a sad occasion when evil triumphed over good, or a time when a good moral teacher was delivered up and His life cut short, causing God to have to quickly think again about how He was going to sort out the mess that man had left Him, following Calvary!

But although Jesus was certainly delivered up by the Jews into the hands of the evil, lawless Gentiles to nail Him to a cross and to kill Him, this was part of the foreknown, divine plan that had been purposed in the council chamber of God, before the worlds were created.

God is omnipotent and knows the end from the beginning, and it was according to God's foreknown and predetermined plan that Christ was nailed to a cross and crucified - for the innocent had to be slain for the guilty if the fallen race of man was to be redeemed from its sins.

Shocking though this miscarriage of justice was, when the children of men slaughtered their Creator, they actually performed a major part of God's determined plan of redemption - so that whosoever believed on the Lord Jesus Christ would not perish but have everlasting life.

The crucifixion of Christ was meant for evil, but God caused this heinous act to become the most glorious point in the history of man to be used for GOOD - your good and mine - and for all who trust in the Lord Jesus as Saviour.

My Prayer

Heavenly Father, how I praise Your name that You take evil and turn it to good. Praise Your name that Your plans and purposes can never be interrupted by evil men, but that You use all things to work toward Your eternal and glorious destiny. In Christ's name I pray, AMEN.