...But God raised him from the dead. We are witnesses of this...Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord. ––Acts 3:15b & 18a, NIV
But that was beside the point. The people, in shock, continued to face their wanton stupidity facing the reality of their sin. What is sin, if not the hapless actions of the flesh that grow and flourish into death? Nobody likes death––it seems distant and permanent, an affront to the beauty of life. But death or no death, life is still beautiful––remember that after winter, comes spring.
Yes, their winter came a bit too early and a tad too late, for there was no way out to the guilt humanity shared after murdering their God.
And yet, that same God used Himself to make his own way out.
Hell wanted to make God prisoner of death, as did the humans that avoided him. Their mouths screamed curses and blasphemies, but their hearts wanted freedom from condemnation. Now, as the people of Jerusalem saw a blind man healed inter own eyes, in the same vein their Master would have healed them, they have a chance to receive His forgiveness. Because He is always ready and more than willing to forgive.
But why forgive the people who cursed him, the same humans that avoided him, the same generation that spat on him? Was heaven that much of lonely place that He required a quota of fullness for His ways? He needs no quota––but humans need Him.
And now, He is ready, and more than ready, to forgive. And when He forgives, He sends refreshment. That refreshment becomes the new spring of the heart.