Text: Acts 12:1-17, Title: The Empire Strikes Back, Date/Place: NRBC, 3/30/08, AM
A. Opening illustration: Ignatius Kung was ordained as a Bishop of Shanghai in 1949, shortly after the communists took over China. The Chinese government pressured him to align his loyalties to the "Chinese Catholic Patriotic Association," he refused, choosing to remain loyal to his church’s chain of command. In 1955, the authorities brought he and 200 other priests to a stadium in Shanghai. The government ordered them to "confess their crimes." Instead, Kung shouted "Long live Christ the King! Long live the Pope." In 1988, Wally Magdangal was pastoring an underground church in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He was a Filipino lay pastor of Christian foreign workers wishing to gather for worship. In 1992, soon after the conclusion of the Gulf War, the house church had grown to over three hundred worshipers, the largest church in the country. The Saudi government became alarmed at the positive impact the church was having and Wally was arrested. While he was in prison, Wally was tortured, abused, and eventually falsely charged with blaspheming Muhammad and Islam. He was tried before the Saudi Arabian High Court and was sentenced to death by public hanging scheduled to take place on Christmas Day 1992. Throughout his terrible ordeal, Wally refused to renounce his faith in Jesus Christ. Outcries from several foreign governments and agencies, including President Fidel Ramos of the Philippines, Amnesty International, and members of the U.S. Congress were made on behalf of Wally to the Saudi Government. And then just a few hours before his scheduled execution, Wally Magdangal miraculously was granted a reprieve. The Saudi Government decided to deport him to the Philippines instead. Today, Wally is itinerant preacher, sharing how the Lord delivered him from persecution.
B. Background to passage: The church at Antioch had just experienced a great revival, and sent aid to the Jerusalem church because of an upcoming famine. Meanwhile back at the ranch, the famine isn’t the worst thing coming doing the pike for the church. Herod Agrippa I was in charge, looking for ways to please the Jews because he was on shaky ground with the Romans, so what better way than to persecute the church.
C. Main thought: So in this text we will see the first non-Sanhedrin persecution of the church with the exception of Paul’s persecution from Nabetean Arabia.
A. A Lethal First Strike (v. 1-4)
1. Herod did not necessarily have anything against the church, he was simply out to make peace and political alliances with the Jews who hated the church. But in doing so, he put to death the first of the apostles, James, the brother of John. Just as Jesus had said. And he intended to do the same to Peter, but Peter was delivered. I think Luke puts these to things together for a reason. God delivered one to death and one from death. It does not seem fair, wise, or sovereign. But I would argue all three.
2. Matt 20:23, Isa 45:7-10, Isa 14:24, 27, Eph 1:11, Job 2:10, Rom 11:33-36,
3. Illustration: Al Mohler vs. Junior Sears, “There is no situation so chaotic that God cannot from that situation, create something that is surpassingly good. He did it at the creation. He did it at the cross. He is doing it today.” He replied, "With all this manure in the room, there’s got to be a pony in here somewhere!" Surrounded by wolves, Sam nudged Jed and said, "Hey, wake up! We’re gonna be rich!" Think about the impact of Cassie Burnall from Columbine, or the guy on flight 93 that said, “Let’s roll.”
4. We must be warned about doing things that would normally violate our consciences as well as the word of God to gain acceptance and favor in the sight of others. In our lives sometimes we are delivered from hardship and sometimes into it. And we must learn to accept both. We must remember who we are and refuse to strive against our Maker. Do not import your sense of American justice into your theology of how God must deal with man. I would submit that before God human beings have no inalienable rights. If God wants to count us all as sheep for the slaughter, he can, and yet in all things we are more than conquerors in Christ. Also remember that just because we can’t think of a good reason for calamity in our lives, it doesn’t mean God doesn’t have one. Woe to us who think that we are wiser than God. So when a loved one dies, or when the cancer diagnosis comes, or we loose a job, or experience a debilitating accident, or a divorce, or the bottom falls out of our lives, know that God is right in the middle of it working things out for His glory and your good.
B. A Good Counterstrike (v. 5)
1. Notice the gut reaction of the church was to pray, but not just to pray. Read the text, note the description. The word used to describe their prayer was constant or fervent, Gr. ektenos, which can mean both. Literally it means “stretched out.” The whole church in Jerusalem was praying in small groups. They were specific with their requests on Peter’s behalf. And their prayer delivered huge results: an angel strike!
2. James 4:2-3, 5:16-18, Luke 18:1, Jer 29:11-13, Heb 5:7, Eph 6:18,
3. Illustration: “prayer is the force that moves the muscles of omnipotence,” “Prayer is not a passive act on our part. Prayer is AN AGGRESSIVE, ACTIVE MINISTRY. You are putting your shoulder to the wheel and moving the forces of heaven.” Hybels book Too Busy Not to Pray, “You were praying out loud?” “Yes, I was.” The officer said, “Show me. Pray right now.” So the young man got down on his knees and prayed. When he finished the officer dismissed the charges. “Because,” he said, “nobody can pray like that unless they have been practicing.” Piper calls prayer “a wartime walkie talkie for spiritual warfare, not a domestic intercom to increase the comfort of the saints…when we turn it into a civilian intercom to increase our material comforts, it malfunctions, and our faith begins to falter,”
4. Admonition to leaders, when problems come, first reaction is always to pray, like Moses. But not only to leadership but to the church. There is not just a select few on the prayer chain or prayer ministry that have the call to pray, although some may be more gifted in this area. “We are talking here about ordinary Christians who meet together with such expectancy and fervency of prayer, and vision – or desperation – that the Spirit is poured out, and people are added to the church daily, and witness is bold, and missionaries are called out and sent, and prison doors are opened.” When a situation came, the church gathered in its small groups, or house churches and prayed. They had an all night prayer meeting. But we are too busy to come to one hour on Wed night, let alone pray all night. You need to be about the work of prayer. I think some of us really don’t believe it works. What if all your prayer was answered in five minutes, or five business days? Some of you could come mornings at 6 am. Some could come on Wed nights. Some of you need to pray with your spouses and children. Some of you who pray in the service need to practice—P. T. Forsyth says that he believes that one of the primary reasons for disbelief in prayer among Christians is “the slipshod kind of prayer that men hear from us in a public worship is often but journalese sent heavenwards, or phrasemaking to carry on.” You need to be involved in a small group. You need to cut away all the lame excuses and silly reasons for not being there. If you aren’t good at prayer, get that way. Read about it, study about it, practice it, talk with others about it, pray about it, then do it!
C. Somebody Needs to Be Striked (v. 11-17)
1. So, after the angel came and got Peter out of the jail, Peter went to announce his deliverance to the church. And they mustered up all the faith that they could, and told the servant girl Rhoda that it couldn’t really be him, maybe it was his angel. They really thought Herod was going to kill him. And had no confidence that Peter might be delivered. Maybe they weren’t even praying for deliverance--that would never occur to most American evangelical Christians.
2. Matt 21:22, John 15:7, 20:27, Heb 4:16, 1 John 5:14, 3:22, Mar 9:24, Luke 11:9-10
3. Illustration: George Mueller illustration attached page, She said, ‘No, I’m struggling.’ She said, ‘My mom was baptized today. I prayed for her every day for almost 20 years. The reason I’m crying is because I came this close to giving up on her. At the 5-year mark I said, “Who needs this? God isn’t listening.” At the 10-year mark I said, “Why am I wasting my breath?” At the 15-year mark I said, “This is absurd.” At the 19-year mark I said, “I’m just a fool.” But I just kept trying, kept praying. Even with weak faith I kept praying. Then she gave here life to Christ, and she was baptized today. I will never doubt the power of prayer again.” Story about the guy who was praying for someone that he didn’t know and ran into him later in the day and led him to Christ, see attached page, tell about us praying for help for our church plant, and almost refusing the help when it arrived,
4. You must remember and fix your mind upon the truth that God is able to do whatever He wants. There is no obstacle too difficult, no person too stubborn, no circumstance too large or impossible for him. But how often do we really pray expecting God to show up right then, and do something God sized? In fact, how often do we pray for God-sized things? The church in America needs to be struck! New River Baptist Church needs to be struck. Many of you need to be struck! I need to be struck! We need to be struck with a fervency and expectancy that leads to and flows from a deep faith that God is listening, and we are praying in His will (another whole question itself), and that He is moving in accord with His pleasure and our pleading. We need to pray the prayer of the man who brought his son to Jesus. We need to make war against unbelief in our own hearts and minds. I am not saying we need to adopt a “name it, claim it” theology, nor am I suggesting that your faith or lack of it, thwarts the plan of God, or that God is bound to only respond to our faith. Just that we are called on to exercise faith in the One who answers all prayer in powerful ways, and live our lives and pray our prayers and speak to others as though we believed that! The Lord delights in the prayer of the saints, and delights in sending forth powerful answers.
A. Closing illustration: Read the quote from Pleasures of God, p. 228-9, (Mona Claren, The Washington Times, 1997) “LAI MAN PENG WAS A 22 YEAR OLD CHINESE CHRISTIAN EVANGELIST. IN 1994, AT A MEETING OF ONE OF CHINA’S HOUSE CHURCHES (A NON-GOVERNMENT-SANCTIONED PRAYER MEETING), HE AND FOUR OTHER EVANGELISTS WERE SEIZED BY AGENTS OF THE PUBLIC SECURITY BUREAU, CHINA’S KGB. IN FRONT OF THE CONGREGATION, MR. LAI & THE OTHERS WERE SEVERELY BEATEN. THE SECURITY OFFICERS NEXT HANDED THE TRUNCHEONS TO THE CONGREGANTS & ORDERED THEM TO BEAT THE PREACHERS, ON PAIN OF BEING BEATEN THEMSELVES. MR. LAI WAS SO BADLY INJURED THAT THE SECURITY TEAM FEARED HE WOULD DIE IN THEIR PRESENCE (LEAVING TOO MUCH TO EXPLAIN), SO THEY RELEASED HIM. HE CRAWLED & HOBBLED FOR SEVERAL MILES ATTEMPTING TO REACH HIS HOME, BUT FINALLY COLLAPSED & DIED ON THE ROAD. SUCH PERSECUTION IS COMMONPLACE IN CHINA. AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL REPORTS CASES OF CHRISTIAN WOMEN HUNG BY THEIR THUMBS FROM WIRES & BEATEN WITH HEAVY RODS, DENIED FOOD & WATER & SHOCKED WITH ELECTRIC PROBES.” Therefore we must pray like “Praying” Hyde prayed, Pleasures of God, p. 205-6
B. Recap
C. Invitation to commitment
Additional Notes
• Is Christ Exalted, Magnified, Honored, and Glorified?
