Participants: Jim & Mark Howard
Series Code: ABOTB
Program Code: ABOTB00014B
00:01 Welcome back to Books Of The Book.
00:02 Before the break, Mark, we were looking at Acts chapter 12 where 00:07 it said that Herod the king stretched out his hand to harass 00:09 some from the church, even going so far as killing James the 00:14 brother of John with the sword. 00:16 This was the first one of the apostles now who has met with 00:18 death in the new church. That's right. And in verse 3 00:22 something very interesting is brought out. It says, Because he 00:25 saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to cease Peter 00:30 also. So clearly the reason for this was not because of Peter 00:34 doing something wrong but for political reasons. He saw that 00:38 there was favor he was gaining with the Jews and wow if they 00:41 were happy about that well what will they do when we get the 00:44 great apostle Peter. So you continue and it says, Now it 00:47 was during the days of unleavened bread so there would 00:51 be many people around and it said in verse 4, So when he had 00:55 arrested him he put him in prison and delivered him to 00:58 four squads of soldiers to keep him intending to bring him 01:02 before the people after Passover Now four squads of soldiers 01:08 sounds like a lot of soldiers and so I believe that first of 01:12 God allowed it and secondly the Bible points it out because it's 01:16 going to show just how miraculous what is 01:19 about to happen is really going 01:20 to be. Now we get to verse 5 it says, Peter... 01:24 Why would they put four squads of soldiers on Peter anyway? 01:28 That's a very good question. You know we recognize that first of 01:32 all, remember when they put squads of soldiers around Jesus' 01:36 tomb that that didn't work out all that well for them, right? 01:40 We recognize that there are always supernatural experiences 01:44 that are going on in the book of Acts and I believe that they 01:47 knew that they needed to be especially careful and make sure 01:50 that Peter was kept bound. Well his last imprisonment... 01:53 It doesn't tell us what happened to the guards there. It's going 01:57 tell what happens to them here. But he had guards. It doesn't 02:00 tell us how many, but evidently they felt they needed to beef up 02:03 security. Because he showed up in the 02:05 temple that time. Yeah, and the guards had no idea 02:08 They opened the door and he was gone. 02:09 That's exactly right. So as we read verse 5 it says, Peter was 02:13 therefore kept in prison but constant prayer was offered to 02:17 God for him by the church. Now this is a valid and important 02:21 point that we need to stop and pause at. You know, oftentimes 02:25 we hear about things going on that are important and we know 02:29 they're important, but we fail to pray. We fail to take them 02:34 before the Lord. I believe that there are times when we fail 02:38 to bring something before the Lord and as a result the Lord 02:42 does not respond. If we don't have in our hearts the desire 02:46 for the will of the Lord and the outcome that would be glorifying 02:51 to God, then he may not bring it about. He's looking for us to 02:56 show a deep and abiding interest. I think about when we 02:59 do outreach projects for the church and yet we don't stop and 03:02 take time to pray. You know, if we're not going to plead with 03:06 the Lord, if we're not interested enough then he's not 03:10 going to be able to open the door of blessing to us and we're 03:13 not going to be able to recognize it. So this is a 03:17 pattern for us. These early believers were in constant 03:20 prayer and they were offering it to God for Peter because of 03:25 his imprisonment. That's right and you know, Jim, 03:27 it reminds me of a statement in a book you had made reference 03:30 to before called the Great Controversy that talks about the 03:33 history of the church and the author of that book makes a 03:37 statement that says, and I believe it's on page 525 of that 03:41 book, that says that it is part of God's plan to grant us in 03:45 answer to the prayer of faith, that which he would not bestow 03:49 if we did not thus ask. And we see that in different places in 03:55 scripture where when the church prays we find a response. It's 04:00 Jesus who said, Ask and it shall be given unto you. It's James 04:04 who tells us later on, you have not because you ask not. So we 04:09 go on here. The church is praying and the Bible tells us 04:13 in verse 6, When Herod was about to bring him out that night 04:16 Peter was sleeping bound with two chains between two soldiers 04:20 and the guards before the door were keeping the prison. Now I'm 04:24 just blown away by this for a couple reasons. First of all, 04:28 James was just killed, so that tells Peter that there are no 04:32 idle threats here. This is a real and genuine threat. He is 04:37 in the prison very likely to be killed in his own mind and what 04:41 is he doing? He's sleeping and he's not just sleeping lightly 04:46 as we're going to see in a moment. Furthermore he's got 04:49 four squads of soldiers. A squad it says in my marginal reading 04:53 says tetraz, there's four, so there are 16 soldiers. I don't 04:56 know if that includes the guards he's chained between. So before 05:00 there were guards at the door but now he's got a guard and 05:04 he's chained on either side so he can't move without somebody 05:07 knowing it. He's asleep. I have a hard time sleeping when 05:10 I'm away from home in a hotel bed let alone chained to a 05:14 couple of guys. Exactly. Here we have, it says 05:19 in verse 7, Now behold an angel of the Lord stood by him and a 05:24 light shown in the prison and he struck Peter on the side and 05:28 raised him up saying, Arise quickly. And his chains fell off 05:31 his hands. Then the angle said to him, Gird yourself and tie on 05:35 your sandals and so he did. And he said to him put on your 05:38 garment and follow me. Now he struck Peter so it wasn't like 05:41 tap, tap, tap like Peter was lightly sleeping, he couldn't 05:44 sleep well. He was sound asleep. That's how much trust he had in 05:48 the Lord. Hey, if death is where I've got to go now I'm trusting 05:51 everything in the hand of my Savior. Now it's just powerful. 05:55 But the angel strikes him on the side and tells him to get 06:00 dressed and then the Bible says, verse 9, Peter went out and 06:06 followed him and did not know that what was done by the angel 06:11 was real but thought he was seeing a vision. It says, When 06:17 they were past the first and the second guard posts, they 06:23 came to the iron gate that leads to the city which opened to them 06:27 of its own accord and they went out and went down one street, 06:31 and immediately the angel departed from him. Now the whole 06:35 account, I don't know if it happened noiselessly for Peter, 06:38 if he heard clanging or whatever but the bottom line is nobody 06:42 woke up. The squads of soldiers didn't wake up, they went by the 06:45 guard posts and nobody's at attention and the angel escorts 06:47 him out and the Bible says in verse 11, now when Peter had 06:50 come to himself he said, Now I know for certain that the Lord 06:53 has sent his angel and has delivered me from the hand of 06:56 Herod and from all the expectations of the Jewish 06:58 people. Oh what a powerful deliverance. A jail break, a 07:01 divine jail break. Right? That's exactly what it was. 07:04 You know, you look back at verse 11, it says, When Peter had come 07:08 to himself. I mean, this was so miraculous that he was having 07:12 a hard time believing it himself. I mean it says he 07:15 thought he was seeing a vision, this can't be happening and 07:17 finally he comes to himself and he's like no this is happening. 07:20 This is real. His surprise is shared by those that he now 07:27 comes to see. Because if you keep reading it says in verse 07:33 12, So when he had considered this he came to the house of 07:38 Mary the mother of John whose surname was Mark, where many 07:42 were gathered together praying. There they are gathered together 07:46 praying. Which had a lot to do with his 07:48 deliverance. That's exactly right. And as 07:50 Peter knocked at the door of the gate, a girl named Rhoda came to 07:54 answer. When she recognized Peter's voice because of her 07:57 gladness she did not open the gate but ran in and announced 08:01 that Peter stood before the gate. This is a pretty funny 08:06 story. Rhoda comes to the gate and you know she hears Peter, 08:09 and hah it's Peter. Instead of opening to him, he's waiting 08:13 she flies back to talk and tell everybody else about it. But 08:15 he doesn't know what's going on. He's knocking, knocking, no 08:18 response. Makes me think of the woman at the well who left her 08:23 water pot and what grabs me here, Jim, is the joy that comes 08:28 through to God's blessings. God blessed them with this 08:31 deliverance of Peter and I don't think we do enough rejoicing 08:35 for the blessings of God. The woman at Jacob's well in John 4 08:38 left her water pot. She came there to draw water. She forgot 08:41 all about it and she went her way rejoicing and so we see here 08:44 with Rhoda. It reminds me of that song, Turn 08:46 your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face and the 08:50 things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of 08:52 his glory and grace. The things of earth, whatever it is, 08:55 whatever common things they are when a revelation from God comes 08:59 everything else pales in significance. So we see here in 09:03 verse 14 it says that she recognized Peter's voice and she 09:07 ran in to announce that Peter stood before the gate and then 09:10 in verse 15, But they said to her, you are beside yourself 09:14 because they don't believe it either. 09:15 You're crazy. That's what they told the women who went to 09:19 find the body of Jesus and came back, He's risen? You guys are 09:22 crazy. No he isn't. That's right. 09:23 Exactly. We won't comment on what that 09:27 says about men and their faith sometimes. 09:31 Please don't. No, let's move on. It says, but they said to her, 09:35 You are beside yourself. Yet she kept insisting that it was so, 09:38 so they said, Well, it is his angel. So they're thinking well 09:42 it must be his angel. In verse 16, Now Peter continued knocking 09:46 like when are they going to open up? And when they opened the 09:50 door and saw him they were astonished, but motioning to 09:53 them with his hand to keep silent, he declared to them how 09:56 the Lord had brought him out of prison. So they're astonished 09:59 and they're all excited and he's like shh quiet because of course 10:03 there's still persecution going on here so he doesn't want to 10:07 broadcast the fact that he has been set free. So he gets 10:11 brought in and he begins to share with them the account of 10:15 what happened. Yeah, powerful. And then 10:18 apparently he gives them word to go on and tell the apostles 10:21 who aren't there, the leaders of the church, and he moves on 10:25 to another place. I mean, he doesn't to recoup somewhere 10:27 he doesn't say look I'm going to take a vacation after that. 10:30 My life was threatened, I don't know what to do. He's back out 10:33 preaching the word. That's exactly right. 10:35 It's powerful. He's moving from place to place, Lydia, Joppa and 10:39 just moving right along. Wherever God tells him to go. 10:42 Now we come to verse 19. It says When Herod had searched for him 10:46 and had not found him, he examined the guards and 10:48 commanded that they should be put to death. And he went down 10:52 from Judea to Caesarea and stayed there. Now Herod had been 10:56 very angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon but they came to 11:00 him with one accord and having made Blastus the king's personal 11:04 aide their friend the asked for peace because their country was 11:08 supplied with food by the King's country. So on a set day, Herod, 11:12 arrayed in royal apparel sat on his throne and gave an oration 11:16 to them and the people kept shouting the voice of a god and 11:20 not of a man. Then immediately an angel of the Lord struck him 11:24 because he did not give glory to God and he was eaten by worms 11:28 and died. I don't know if this means that was a progressive 11:32 disease or what but here's the thing that really grabs me. 11:36 An angel of the Lord struck him. Well it was just earlier in the 11:40 chapter that an angel of the Lord struck Peter. But when he 11:44 struck Peter, Peter was awakened and delivered. When Herod is 11:47 struck by the angel he dies. It goes to show us if an angel 11:52 of the Lord, the angels of God, carry out God's will and God's 11:55 will is ultimately that all men would be saved, but men respond 11:59 to God in different ways. Herod has his day of opportunity but 12:03 Herod had turned his heart against God and he finally met 12:06 with judgment. That's right, that's right. Well 12:09 you keep reading. There's a couple more verses here but one 12:12 more specifically that we'd like to look at today and that's 12:17 verse 24. It says, but the word of God grew and multiplied. 12:21 You know, we've heard that before haven't we? 12:23 That's right. It seems to be a keynote here in Acts. 12:26 It's incredible as you read the book of Acts that you have so 12:30 much activity; it is hard to keep up with the book of Acts. 12:35 The thing is they trying to squelch this faith, to put it 12:40 out and they're multiplying. Yeah. They can't stop them. 12:44 You know, in the beginning it talked about how there were 3000 12:48 added in a day, then the number grew to 5000 and continually 12:52 the Lord multiplied them and the word was multiplied, etc. 12:56 Sometimes I look at what happens in our own experiences and I 13:01 think, you know what, we're too satisfied with small successes 13:05 when God wants to do so much more. We need to attempt bigger 13:09 things for God. How about you viewer. We're so thankful that 13:13 you've joined us today but we ask that you would consider 13:16 attempting better things for God. We'll see you next time. |
Revised 2014-12-17