Third Sunday of Easter

What torment the Jewish audience must have felt when Peter, shaking with the joy of the Risen Christ, addressed them in the Temple. He and John had JUST raised up a crippled man in the name of Jesus Christ, and he was now in the Temple, “walking and jumping and praising God” (Acts 3:8).

Now those astonished Israelites listened as Peter upbraided them for their complicity in the passion and death of the very NAME who had just healed that crippled man, whom they had seen begging at the Temple gate for years.

How it must have stung to hear Peter say, “Now I know that you acted out of ignorance, just as your leaders did” (vs. 17).

That’s the sentence that should land, like an arrow, in our own hearts. Is there any one of us who has not narrowly escaped a life-altering experience which we created out of ignorance, or arrogance, or just dumb youth?

I remember one day from my twenties. Not accustomed to alcohol, I’d been out for “happy hour” with some friends from work. After only one drink I was definitely impaired, but didn’t realize it until I was driving home. I very nearly escaped hitting the car in front of me. Terrified, I pulled into a parking lot and stayed there for at least an hour. Only a few blocks from home, I crept up side streets to my house. I fell on my knees in thanksgiving.

O merciful God, thank you that you have rescued us from our ignorant behaviors. We ask for your merciful Presence in the lives of those whose ignorance has ruined their lives, and the lives of those they’ve hurt.

When did you act out of ignorance, only to fall on your knees in repentance?