Acts 2:23

“Him, being delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you by the hand of lawless men (or ‘by lawless hands') did crucify and slay.”

And they also knew that they themselves were of the people who had caused Him to be crucified and slain. Peter pulls no punches. He will not allow that the Romans should take all the blame. He knew too much of what had happened. Indeed for some of it he had been personally there. He knew that the guilt lay as much, if not more, on the Jews as on the Romans. Nevertheless the Romans are included for they were the ‘lawless men' by whose hands it was done. (Elsewhere Acts again stresses the sharing of the guilt (Acts 4:27)).

‘By the hand of lawless men (or ‘by lawless hands').' This word ‘lawless' can simply refer to those who transgress the Law, or it can refer to those who are ‘without the Law' (1 Corinthians 9:21). Thus here it may refer to the Jews as behaving as if the had no Law, or it may be referring to the Romans as behaving in the same way because they do not have the Law of God. But either way (and both may be included) it indicates rebellion against God and His laws.

Nevertheless, he declares, even before he tells them this, that it was not an accident, or even an unforeseen circumstance. Let them not really think that they have got rid of Jesus. Let them now recognise that Jesus had also been offered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. He wants them to know that God's ways and purposes had not been forestalled, and that this extraordinary event had been of His doing. It had been in accordance with His predetermination that Jesus should die. His death had been the result of God's own counsel and wisdom. This was a concept that had seized the imagination of the Apostles. Now that Jesus had risen they saw all things differently. God was in everything that was happening, and it was happening in accordance with His own counsel as He had foretold (Isaiah 52:13 to Isaiah 54:12). Compare here Acts 3:18; Acts 4:28; Acts 13:29. ‘Did crucify and slay.' The dual description emphatically stresses what they had done. The desire for His death had possessed their hearts.

Peter had good reason to know all this about God's foreordained purpose. Jesus had constantly emphasised that as the Servant of God He must die (Mark 10:45), and while at the time the disciples had avoided the subject, they had now come to see that it was true, just as Jesus had said. For all that He had spoken of had happened, the suffering, the vicious treatment, the trial by the Jews, and the cruel execution followed by the resurrection (Luke 9:22; Luke 18:31; Mark 8:31; Mark 9:31; Mark 10:33; Mark 10:45). Thus to a Spirit enlightened mind the conclusion was clear. This was all in God's plan and purpose. It resulted from His own counsel and predetermination.

Some may then ask, are the perpetrators then guilty? Scripture always answers this question with a resounding ‘Yes'. Regularly through Scripture God's purposes are seen to be fulfilled through men's wickedness, but that never reduces the condemnation on the wickedness. God's Assyrian rod must also come under His judgment for enjoying it and going further than was required (Isaiah 10:5). It is only sinful man who thinks that he can remove his guilt by blaming God. Man does what he does because he is sinful man. God brings it about and harnesses it into the carrying out of His predetermined purposes.,