Do you remember as a child going to the State Fair and walking down the midway? In my childhood Barkers and billboards screamed at you literally and figuratively to turn aside and see the lady with a full beard or the man without a stomach or some other genetic abnormality. They were called "Freak Shows."

The midway was not unlike Californai politics, except that the midway with its Freak Shows seems tame by comparison. I admit that I am not much of a political animal, but was this thebest California can do?

Last summer, Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts, a Democratic presidential hopeful, made a speech before a pro-abortion group. He was talking about nominations to the Supreme Court, and he said this.

"Litmus tests are politically motivated tests; abortion is a constitutional right. I think people who go to the Supreme Court ought to interpret the Constitution as it is interpreted, and if they have another point of view, then they're not supporting the Constitution, which is what a judge does," (First Things, August/September, 03, p. 77).

That sounds like a litmus test to me. It also sounds like the Court could never reverse itself, even if it thought a previous Court had made a mistake, because "people who go to the Supreme Court ought to interpret the Constitution as it is interpreted."

I wonder if Black Americans think the Dredd Scott interpretation of the Constitution should never have been changed. I wonder if the homosexual crowd disagrees with the present Court in reversing the Bowers decision of 1986 and so striking down state anti-sodomy laws. And this man wants to be president. Is this the best the Democratic Party can do?

Let me step away from political campaigning. Have you heard of Snowflakes, a Christian adoption? The Bush administration allocated that agency half a million dollars. It doesn't, however, go about adoption in the ordinary way. Its concern is to provide adoption for frozen embryos.

Hundreds of thousands of frozen embryos exist in this country. But we have a problem. Is a frozen embryo a person or property? The Snowflakes agency has successfully arranged the adoption of 16 frozen embryos that have been born. Calling it adoption makes it sound like the embryo is a person. But if it is a person, it is protected by the Constitution, and pro-abortion groups will oppose the idea, because it might seriously undermine Roe v. Wade.

On the other hand, if the frozen embryo is legally considered a person, then the parent donors cannot be compensated, if they give up their embryo for adoption, because the Thirteenth Amendment says that would be to treat the embryo as property, and you can't do that. So, donor parents have no recourse to get back some of the thousands of dollars they spent on in-vitro fertilization. In any case it seems repulsive to most of us to treat embryos as property and bough and sold as a commodity.

So, is the embryo person or property? Legally, we aren't sure what to do. Culturally, we fight about it. Medically, doctors and couples go on producing "spare" embryos by the tens of thousands with no clear idea of the morality of this technology. Liberal spin-meisters insist that sex is still a private matter. And we all live as though this confused and conflicted state of affairs has no consequences.

There is a famous piece of biblical wisdom that has God saying to His wayward creatures, "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate," (1 Cor. 1:19; Isa. 29:14). The God, who put a stop to the Tower of Babel project, might just be leaving His calling card in the confusion that increasingly besets so much of our political, scientific and cultural life.

Yet, life must go on politically, scientifically and culturally. We can't just stop it. We don't want to stop it, because so much good comes from it. But neither can we deny our confusion, as science and technology outstrip our ability to keep up politically and ethically.

In the face of these mind-boggling puzzles (there are many more of them), we can find hope and comfort in our Christian faith. Acts 3 brings that hope and comfort to bear on the anxietites we feel at the increasingly perplexing issues of our time.

A Bird's-Eye View of Acts Three
This chapter grows around a miracle of healing and Peter's second sermon. One day Peter and John were going to the temple at the time of prayer - at three in the afternoon. Now a man crippled from birth was being carried to the temple gate called Beautiful, where he was put every day to beg from those going into the temple courts. When he saw Peter and John about to enter, he asked them for money.

Peter's famous answer comes in verse six. Then Peter said, "Silver and gold I do not have, but what I have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ or Nazareth, walk." And he did. Verse eight says he was walking, jumping, and praising God. It created quite a stir. Verse eleven sums up the stir. While the beggar held on to Peter and John, all the people were astonished and came running to them in the place called Solomon's Colonnade.

It was time for Peter to speak again. He refused to take credit for what had happened. Verse 12: "Men of Israel, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk?" Verse 13 gives Peter's interpretation of the healing. "The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus."

That opened the door for Peter to talk about Jesus. He began with facts no one could deny. "You handed him over to be killed, and you disowned him before Pilate, though he had decided to let him go. You disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked that a murderer be released to you."

Verse 15 goes to another level altogether. "You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this." We have come again to the dominant theme of apostolic preaching in the book of Acts, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Evidence of this, said Peter in verse 16, was the healing of this crippled beggar.

In verses 17-21 it's decision time, and, according to verse 17, Peter begins on an eunexpectedly conciliatory note. "Now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders." It's a dirty, rotten shame that Christians did not continue to act toward non-Christian Jews with the gentleness of Peter. Instead, a toxic anti-Semitism invaded the Church, and the death of Christ became a stick with which to beat Jews. Jews and Christians are only just beginning to recover from that dark history.

In verse 18 Peter repeats the understanding he had expressed in Acts 2:23. "But this (your treatment of Jesus) is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Christ (His Messiah) would suffer." Peter put divine foreknowledge and human responsibility side by side, didn't diminish either, and didn't try to reconcile the mystery of those two orders or reality.

The action step opens verse 19. "Repent, then, and turn to God." Think about that for a minute. Peter was not speaking to irreligious pagans. He was speaking to Jews, who acknowledged God. If he had just said, "Repent," we would understand; but "Turn back to God?" It seems to me that Peter means something like this.

"You, who acquiesced in Jesus' death, need to change your mind about God. Your old ideas of God are not adequate in light of the fact that God raised Jesus from the dead. So, change your mind about God. Turn to Him as the God who raised Jesus from death to indestructible life." Such repentance has a good outcome.

First, it wipes the slate clean. Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out. On top of that it makes it possible that times of refreshing may come from the Lord. That almost certainly refers to God's deliverance of Israel from its oppressors, Rome in particular. The final result is that (God) may send the Christ (the Messiah), who has been appointed for you - even Jesus."

Verse 22 offers a particular Jewish message. Jesus is the true Messiah, and Israel will enjoy the full blessings of the Messianic Age, when Israel repents and turns to the God who raised Jesus from death to an indestructible life. Verse 23 on the other hand is a particularly human message of hope and comfort, and this is where I'd like to focus for the rest of the sermon.

The Restoration of All Things
"He (Jesus) must remain in heaven until the time comes for God to restor everything." . . . until the time comes for God to restore everything. Everything. It is what John means in Revelation 21:1: Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. It is what Paul means in 1 Corinthians 15: 53: The perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. I'd like to take this grand hope of the restoration of all things and unpack it.

Peter is saying here that this restoration of everything is bound up with Jesus Christ. When He leaves heaven to return to earth, the restoration of everything will take place. Acts three gives reasons for such hope.

Verse 15 gives us the reason that sustains our hope and all other reasons for our hope. You killed the author of life, but God raised him from the dead. The Church confesses, "On the third day he rose again from the dead." The deterioration, death and decay of the body no longer have the last word. They have been defeated in Jesus.

Do you recoil at the deterioration of your body? It is okay to recoil, but remember: The deterioration no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus. Do you rage at death for taking from you the ones you love? It is okay to rage, but remember: Death no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus. Do you fear death, its approach and its arrival? It is okay to reaf, but remember: Death no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus.

Why do we gather Sunday by Sunday to worship our God? Because death no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus. Why do we celebrate the death of Jesus? Because death no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus. Why do we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus?  Because death no longer has the last word. It has been defeated in Jesus. That is where our hope rests.

Acts three gives our hope another cause to be steadfast. Doesn't the miracle at the temple do that for us? When that beggar, crippled from birth, walked and jumped his way into the temple, praising God, he became a poster child for the restoration of all things. It was as if God was saying to his human creation, "Look! Here is an example of what the restoration of all things is like. Let your imagination go wild. If I can do this, think what else I will do, when I completely and finally defeat death."

And remember Peter's insistence on who should get the credit for that healing. Just before the healing, Peter said to the paralytic in verse six, "In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk." Afterwards, he said to the wondering crowd in verse 12-13: "Men of Israel, why does this surprise you? Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus." The author of life had given life back to those impotent legs - a harbinger of what He will do, when He comes again to the earth to restore everything.

The Pastoral Center of Gravity
In his second letterto the Corinthian church the Apostle Paul said something that takes what I have been saying and makes it quite personal and relevant to our human lot. Listen to this. We do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (2 Cor. 4:16-19).

That state of mind is possible for people whose deepest conviction is that God has raised Jesus from death to an indestructible life, and some day will send Him back into our world to restore all things.

Outwardly we are wasting away. We watch it happen politically and laugh in disbelief and wonder, "Is that the best we can do?" We watch our own scientific and technological achievements baffle us by their consequences, until we wonder if anyone is wise enough to keep us legally, never mind morally. We fight agin, and one day realize that we are not iimmortal.

Yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. Of all people, we who believe that God raised Jesus from death to indestructible life, and some day will send Him back into our world to restore all things - we of all people will not become escapists. We will not become so heavenly-minded that we are no earthly good. Au contraire!

We know that the restoration of all things will come some day, and we are determined now, in this present age of deterioration, death and decay to live in such a way as to anticipate the restoration of all things by working here and now to restore things as much as possible.

Humanity can't do it alone, but God has entrusted us with the governance of His creation. So, until He sends Jesus to restore all things, He expects us to trust Him and work hard in our corner of earth to make earth a better place and to prepare for the day when His kingdom comes on earth as it is in heaven.

Let us not retreat into our shell. Let us not belittle those whose labor on the frontlines of politics, science and theology to wrestle with our besetting problems. Let us not stop calling people to faith in Jesus Christ with whom the hopes of all humanity rest. Let us not lose hope or courage. Christ died. Christ has risen. The gates of hell will not prevail against the Church. And for us to live is Christ and to die is gain.