SPEAKER_02: Violent hands on some who belonged to the church.
SPEAKER_02: He killed James, the brother of John, with the sword.
SPEAKER_02: And when he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to arrest Peter also.
SPEAKER_02: This was during the days of unleavened bread.
SPEAKER_02: So he seized him, put him in prison, delivering him unto four squads of soldiers to guard him, intending after the Passover to bring him out to the people.
SPEAKER_02: So Peter remained in prison.
SPEAKER_02: But earnest prayer was made for him to God by the church.
SPEAKER_01: Now when Herod was about to bring Peter out on that very night, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers.
SPEAKER_01: He was bound with two chains.
SPEAKER_01: The sentries were by the door guarding the prison.
SPEAKER_01: And suddenly an angel of the Lord stood next to him and a light shone in the cell.
SPEAKER_01: The angel struck him on the side and woke him up and said to him, Get up quickly.
SPEAKER_01: And the chains fell off his hands.
SPEAKER_02: And then the angel said to him, Undress yourself, put on your sandals, wrap your cloak around you, and follow me.
SPEAKER_01: And he did so.
SPEAKER_01: He went out and followed him.
SPEAKER_01: Peter did not know that what was being done by the angel was real.
SPEAKER_01: He thought he was seeing a vision.
SPEAKER_01: They walked past the first and the second guard and they came to the iron gate leading into the city.
SPEAKER_01: The gate opened for them of its own accord.
SPEAKER_01: They went out and walked along one street and immediately the angel left him.
SPEAKER_01: Peter came to himself and he said, Now I am sure the Lord has sent his angel to rescue me from the hand of Herod and from all that the Jewish people were expecting.
SPEAKER_02: And Peter knocked at the door of the gateway when a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer.
SPEAKER_02: Recognizing Peter's voice in her joy, she did not open the gate, but ran in and reported, Peter is standing at the gate.
SPEAKER_01: And they said to her, You are out of your mind.
SPEAKER_02: But she kept insisting it was so.
SPEAKER_01: And they kept saying, It is his angel.
SPEAKER_02: Peter continued knocking, and when they opened, they saw him and were amazed.
SPEAKER_02: But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison.
SPEAKER_02: And he said, Tell these things to James and to the brothers.
SPEAKER_02: And then he departed and went to another place.
SPEAKER_01: And when day came, there was no little disturbance between the soldiers as to what had happened to Peter.
SPEAKER_01: And after Herod had searched for him and could not find him, he examined the sentries and commanded that they be put to death.
SPEAKER_01: And then Herod himself left Judea and went down to Caesarea and stayed there.
SPEAKER_01: Now Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon.
SPEAKER_01: So they came together with one accord, and having convinced Atlas, the King's Chamberlain, they asked for peace because their country depended on the king's country for food.
SPEAKER_01: And on an appointed day, Herod put on his royal robes.
SPEAKER_01: And all the people were shouting, It's the voice of a god, not of a man! And immediately an angel of the Lord struck him down because he did not give glory to God.
SPEAKER_01: He was eaten by worms.
SPEAKER_00: Sorry.
SPEAKER_00: Um, okay, hey, I hope you enjoyed that video of students.
SPEAKER_00: We just wanted to give you a little window of what's happening in student ministry, uh, just to be able to show you, because sometimes we get to a point where like, hey, what's happening in student ministry?
SPEAKER_00: What's going on?
SPEAKER_00: Uh here's what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: Students are growing, leaders are intentionally shepherding, and God is allowing us to participate with Him in our student ministry.
SPEAKER_00: It's been awesome to be a part of, and I've actually been in a major uh reflecting mode lately on our leaders specifically, uh, because through my childhood I actually had uh two really amazing uh leaders, but I also call them my aunt and uncle.
SPEAKER_00: Uh my aunt Cindy and my uncle Scott.
SPEAKER_00: Um they cared for me and my sister so deeply.
SPEAKER_00: And they didn't have uh a big program or a study to do with us.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, what they said is for the next four years, we're gonna make sure that Ben and Becca are cared for.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what they did?
SPEAKER_00: They took us out to lunch, they checked in on us every single Sunday and made sure we were all right.
SPEAKER_00: They opened up their house to be kind of a safe haven from everything else in our lives, and it was amazing uh to just be in a relationship with them, and I love them really dearly.
SPEAKER_00: Which is why in my journey with Jesus, it was heartbreaking uh when my aunt began to have heart issues.
SPEAKER_00: Now, as a family, uh we actually have been able to pray, and God has stepped in and done miracles in such cool ways.
SPEAKER_00: One of our siblings was actually supposed to die, and God did a miracle, and God saved him.
SPEAKER_00: It was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: And we had seen this as a family, but yet it felt like the more we prayed for my aunt, the worse she got.
SPEAKER_00: She eventually ended up being in supported living for a lot a long time.
SPEAKER_00: Sorry, I still get choked up.
SPEAKER_00: And she passed away last month at too young of an age.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure you've been here before.
SPEAKER_00: When we participate in this life with God and we get climactic action, like a miracle happening in someone's life being saved, and yet at the same time we experience painful silence as well.
SPEAKER_00: We wonder why does God allow pain to happen?
SPEAKER_00: Where is he in the midst of the pain?
SPEAKER_00: Why do miracles exist?
SPEAKER_00: And honestly, why can't they just always exist?
SPEAKER_00: It seems a lot easier if that was the case.
SPEAKER_00: But yet, God invites us to participate in advancing his kingdom even in the tension of suffering and miracles.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm just gonna give you a heads up.
SPEAKER_00: There is not a straightforward answer to this, and you will be living in tension today.
SPEAKER_00: But there is a powerful story that Luke shares with us in Acts 12, and this story will actually guide us in how do we participate with God?
SPEAKER_00: What is He inviting us into with suffering and with miracles?
SPEAKER_00: So let's pray real quick and ask God to speak to us.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we want to hear from you.
SPEAKER_00: So in that, may uh we direct our attention to you.
SPEAKER_00: Holy Spirit, share with us what you want us to share, uh what you want to share with us.
SPEAKER_00: Even for yourself, if you want to hear from the Holy Spirit today, we do this with our students.
SPEAKER_00: Tell him, share with me what you want me to hear.
SPEAKER_00: And if you prayed that, then continue praying, saying, Holy Spirit, make me bold to live out what you're telling me to live out today.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you that your word guides us, and Holy Spirit, you guide us.
SPEAKER_00: May we listen today.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: So we get to this part in Acts 12, where we basically went from Antioch and a thriving church in Antioch to a character named Herod Agrippa in Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: So we were just in Antioch, now we're going a pan view to Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: What's happening in Jerusalem?
SPEAKER_00: Herod is there for one, he's the king.
SPEAKER_00: If you know of Herod the Great, Herod the Great tried to kill Jesus and actually had a big massacre happen in Bethlehem.
SPEAKER_00: And the point of the Herods is actually they just love power.
SPEAKER_00: That is, that's what the Herods love, that's their goal.
SPEAKER_00: And Herod Agrippa was working really hard to earn the favor of the Jewish people.
SPEAKER_00: That was his goal.
SPEAKER_00: And Passover was approaching the biggest Jewish festival of the year, and so he sees an opportunity because he knows that there are going to be these Christians that are coming, and they have Gentiles and Jews, and man, Jews don't like that.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna actually play into this so that I can win the support of the Jewish people.
SPEAKER_00: Now, thousands of Jews are in Jerusalem, including many followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Tensions that we saw last week are already high after Gentiles becoming coming to the faith, and Herod decides to move on this to increase his popularity.
SPEAKER_00: Look with me in Acts 12, verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: That's where we're gonna start today.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I love that Dave and Deanna shared this uh just through memorizing, because I think it just lights up the word in a new way that God can share with us.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look in verse 1 at what it says.
SPEAKER_00: About that time, Herod, the king, laid violent hands on some who belonged to the church.
SPEAKER_00: He killed James, the brother of John, with the sword, and when he saw that it had pleased the Jews, he proceeded to arrest Peter also.
SPEAKER_00: This was during the days of unleavened bread.
SPEAKER_00: And when he had seized them, he put them into prison, delivering him over to four squads of soldiers to guard him, intending after the Passover to bring him out to the people.
SPEAKER_00: So Peter was kept in prison.
SPEAKER_00: But earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church.
SPEAKER_00: So we get to this scene where before Passover even begins, Herod grabs James, the brother of John, one of Jesus' three closest disciples, and executes him.
SPEAKER_00: He sees that they really like this, so he goes, Oh, why don't I find Peter too?
SPEAKER_00: And he finds Peter next and puts him into prison.
SPEAKER_00: He knows, he's fully aware that Peter has already been able to get out of prison before, and so he sets up 16 soldiers to actually watch him, two in chains, probably two at the door, and another 12 somewhere else.
SPEAKER_00: This guy is really guarded.
SPEAKER_00: Like he really wants him to stay here during Passover, but of course, Herod wouldn't execute him during Passover because he's a man of the people, right?
SPEAKER_00: So he's gonna wait.
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna wait after Passover, uh, because that's so gracious of him.
SPEAKER_00: And at this point in the story, it looks like he is winning and that the church is losing.
SPEAKER_00: But Luke tells us something so subtly that changes everything in this story.
SPEAKER_00: He says this, so Peter was kept in prison, but earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church.
SPEAKER_00: You see, while Herod is making plans, the church is actually praying.
SPEAKER_00: The controversy between Jews and Gentiles then fade to the background.
SPEAKER_00: Faced with suffering, the church doesn't divide, it actually unites in desperate prayer for James and Peter.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, yeah, this is awesome, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then, and we don't know, right, if Herod literally grabbed James and then just executed him then, or if he did it a little bit later, it does not say, I highly doubt that there was not prayer for James and only Peter.
SPEAKER_00: There's actually a reason why Luke specifically highlights Peter, and we'll talk about that in a second.
SPEAKER_00: But the Peter, I definitely think the people were praying for James and Peter, and yet James dies.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'm still learning how to be a leader, uh, but I don't know about you, but this is a pretty bad leadership plan because you're pouring all of your time and energy into these three guys very deeply so that you can send them out.
SPEAKER_00: Once you send them out and you're actually leaving, you and you know that they're about to die, right afterwards, it's not a very good leadership plan.
SPEAKER_00: Like, talk about a poor way to impact the entire world with the goodness of God coming down and setting his people free from sin than having one of the three that were closest to Jesus die so quickly.
SPEAKER_00: Unless you view suffering and the kingdom of God differently than how everyone else views suffering and the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: While there's not a clear answer to why James dies, we do get insight into this reality in this passage that God advances his kingdom when we participate by surrendering our suffering.
SPEAKER_00: That's where everyone goes, oh gosh, okay, here we go.
SPEAKER_00: To me, this is one of the hardest pieces I think of following Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm so glad the Bible is honest about this, even though I don't always want to be honest about this.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the Bible is really honest about unanswered prayer.
SPEAKER_00: You look in the Psalms, there's tons of Psalms of people crying out and they never get an answer.
SPEAKER_00: We have a whole book called Lamentations, where they're literally lamenting for what could be.
SPEAKER_00: We get 400 years of silence that God is, the people are waiting for a Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: And then above all, I think this one's the most important.
SPEAKER_00: We get Jesus at the Garden of Gethsemane.
SPEAKER_00: He is on his knees, he is crying out to God, he has blood dripping from his face, and he asks God, can there be a plan B?
SPEAKER_00: Like if it is your will, if it can happen in your will and not have this occur, I would love that.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what God says?
SPEAKER_00: Silence.
SPEAKER_00: Now, given God did strengthen Jesus here.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: At the same time, he didn't receive an answer to this.
SPEAKER_00: God Himself, who is connected so deeply with the Father, did not get an answer.
SPEAKER_00: The word for earnest that the church uses is actually the same one that's used for Jesus in that passage.
SPEAKER_00: Yet that silence, that silence actually becomes the answer for our and your sin problem.
SPEAKER_00: That silence, that unanswered prayer and suffering is the answer for us to receive salvation.
SPEAKER_00: That matters.
SPEAKER_00: They pray for James, but he still dies.
SPEAKER_00: They pray but receive silence from God.
SPEAKER_00: There isn't an intervention.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't intervene.
SPEAKER_00: And I know for myself, all of the unanswered prayers that I have are part of this walk with Jesus that honestly sometimes just do not make sense.
SPEAKER_00: And at times I do think it's really easy to assume that God does not have a plan in the midst of this, and yet we serve a God that grabs these broken pieces that we leave or other people leave from us, and he creates something beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: Something we see here is no answer does not mean no opportunity.
SPEAKER_00: God may be able to do more in the silence than actually in the action.
SPEAKER_00: He may be able to do more in our non-healing than he could in our healing.
SPEAKER_00: This guy's name's Pete Gregg, he's the founder of 24-7 Prayer, and so obviously they're praying all the time, and he has witnessed tons of miracles.
SPEAKER_00: He really has, through prayer that God has done.
SPEAKER_00: And yet at the same time, his wife is dealing constantly with a chronic health issue despite years of faithful prayer.
SPEAKER_00: After being asked countless times of how does he see all of these miracles, and yet his wife is experiencing all of this pain, he actually wrote a book for her and for other people called God on Mew.
SPEAKER_00: His conclusion in it is that prayer is less about getting the results we want and more about participating with God and aligning ourselves with his will.
SPEAKER_00: He even said in interviews that he has learned more about God through his unanswered prayer than actually he has learned from all of the miracles that he has witnessed.
SPEAKER_00: And I think we empathize with this story because we've experienced this ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And it helps to know that other people have as well.
SPEAKER_00: This passage, though, takes a step further into suffering in this point.
SPEAKER_00: Suffering with surrender opens opportunities for God's kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you examples of how this specifically gets played out, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We looked at the ten martyrs, uh, ten different martyrs last week in students.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so you want to talk about a buzzkill to the morning, they got it, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And here's what happened to some of the martyrs that I want us to hear.
SPEAKER_00: Stephen was stoned, Jim Elliott was killed by a cannibalistic tribe, Jesus himself was crucified, James was killed with the sword.
SPEAKER_00: And last week I love it because a student came up to me and goes, Ben, that was a really dark Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, you're so right.
SPEAKER_00: Unless you see suffering differently.
SPEAKER_00: Unless you see that suffering with surrender actually opens up opportunities for us.
SPEAKER_00: This is powerful.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, Stephen died, and yet because Stephen died, the gospel spread everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: You want to talk about, like, I always wondered, I'm like, why would you ever want to leave Jerusalem when there's no need and everyone has everything in common?
SPEAKER_00: That sounds amazing.
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't want to leave Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: God needed them to leave, He needed them to go to Samaria and to Antioch.
SPEAKER_00: And so this actually happened for that reason so that that could occur.
SPEAKER_00: And Stephen was willing to be a part of that.
SPEAKER_00: Jim Elliott, he got a mission from God to share the gospel with an unreached tribe.
SPEAKER_00: And eventually they actually show up, and the tribe shows up with bows and arrows.
SPEAKER_00: They have ways to arm themselves, they're coming at them and they surrender themselves.
SPEAKER_00: That is the way that they go.
SPEAKER_00: There was something different about that guy.
SPEAKER_00: Another group comes later on in faithfulness, and I don't know how they showed up after that.
SPEAKER_00: And the people came to Jesus because they saw Jim's example.
SPEAKER_00: His, what he sacrificed opened up this opportunity.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus himself died, and yet because of it, we get to experience salvation to the full.
SPEAKER_00: So we get to James.
SPEAKER_00: James is captured and he is put to death.
SPEAKER_00: But here's what's crazy: James is being executed before Passover, and because of that, it lights a flame in the church.
SPEAKER_00: A desperate and intense prayer session starts happening that continued for six days because Passover was actually seven days long.
SPEAKER_00: James' death assisted in the Jews and Gentiles not stepping into a controversy, but actually stepping into prayer together.
SPEAKER_00: And during Passover, they have this Seder dinner in which we take, we this is where we get communion from.
SPEAKER_00: And I imagine that they are taking this dinner, this Seder dinner, and they're taking the wine, and they are taking the blood representing Jesus' sacrifice for them, and also seeing the sacrifice in Exodus, and they are praying for God to give Peter an Exodus out of prison.
SPEAKER_00: I think they are begging God to do so.
SPEAKER_00: James's death led to the desperate prayers of the church for Peter.
SPEAKER_00: And we get to believe, and we must believe, that suffering opens up opportunities with God, because other words, our suffering means nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And there are certain things that I have not seen happen yet, and it crushes me.
SPEAKER_00: I've seen certain things for our students, and I'm praying into with them, and it is not changing, and it crushes me.
SPEAKER_00: But I hope this at least gives you some excitement and knowing that God is going to do something through our suffering and through these opportunities.
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of times, I'll be honest, we won't get to see the opportunities.
SPEAKER_00: But luckily, God gives us in this story, He allows us to see the opportunity here.
SPEAKER_00: What is the opportunity that opens up from James?
SPEAKER_00: Death, an angel fetches Peter because the Christian's prayer fetched the angel.
SPEAKER_00: You see, Peter is sitting in prison, he's attached to two prison guards, and in verse 7 it says this.
SPEAKER_00: And behold, an angel of the Lord stood next to him, and a light shone in the cell.
SPEAKER_00: He struck Peter on the side and woke him.
SPEAKER_00: I just, I love that because I'm like, I just imagine, like, really, right?
SPEAKER_00: And think about it, he's chained up.
SPEAKER_00: Like, that's God's grace right there, that he's even sleeping, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because he's chained up, he's in this spa.
SPEAKER_00: It's nuts, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Anyways, it's funny.
SPEAKER_00: He he woke him up, okay?
SPEAKER_00: It's okay to laugh, right?
SPEAKER_00: This is a good laughing point, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and he woke him, saying, Get up quickly, and then the chains fell off of him.
SPEAKER_00: Peter gets up, he's waiting for his next command, and the angel told him, Dress yourself, put on your sandals, and he did so.
SPEAKER_00: And he said to him, Wrap your cloak around you and follow me.
SPEAKER_00: And he went out and followed him.
SPEAKER_00: He did not know what was being done by the angel was real, but thought he was seeing a vision.
SPEAKER_00: I got stunned.
SPEAKER_00: I just feel like the Holy Spirit revealed something I've never seen in this passage before, because I get so focused on this miracle that I don't realize what Peter's actually doing here.
SPEAKER_00: And it's really interesting when we see it, okay?
SPEAKER_00: This amazing miracle is happening, and what does the angel ask him to do?
SPEAKER_00: He says, Hey, can you put on your clothes?
SPEAKER_00: Can you put your sandals on?
SPEAKER_00: Can you wrap your cloak around you?
SPEAKER_00: And now just walk and follow me.
SPEAKER_00: Man, talk about the most boring, mundane thing to ask him to do.
SPEAKER_00: Like, if I was to do Hollywood in this moment, I'd be like, all right, Peter, get up and he gets up and right, like boom, clothes on, sandals on, transported out of jail, you're welcome.
SPEAKER_00: Like that would be way more epic.
SPEAKER_00: And he would remember that.
SPEAKER_00: But that's not what happens.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Why would God want the angel to tell him this?
SPEAKER_00: Because God advances his kingdom when we participate through mundane obedience.
SPEAKER_00: You see, Jesus multiplied fish and loaves, yet the disciples afterwards had to gather the baskets together.
SPEAKER_00: Jairus' daughter is raised from the dead, and yet she still needs to get food to eat afterwards.
SPEAKER_00: Lazarus was raised from the dead, but he had to walk out of the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: And I think of Peter like two or three years later, as he like gets up in the morning and he's getting his clothes on, he's getting his sandals on, he wraps his cloak around himself and starts walking out the door.
SPEAKER_00: I actually think he is visually and remembering this moment that he had with the angel where God set him free.
SPEAKER_00: How much cooler is that?
SPEAKER_00: Like, usually we're looking for these like mountaintop experiences, right, that we can get once in a while.
SPEAKER_00: And I actually think God uses these mundane moments to do something even cooler.
SPEAKER_00: We participate with God through mundane obedience, not just the unique moments, but man, all of these small moments, what does that mean?
SPEAKER_00: That means if I want to see God move, I and I don't like this reality, I need to partake in doing the dishes.
SPEAKER_00: If I want to hear God's voice, I also need to change diapers.
SPEAKER_00: And Tim had shared last week about early childhood.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I just want to bring this to light to you guys again that we have a ton of kids in early childhood and we have enough for ratio, but we do not have enough volunteers.
SPEAKER_00: We just don't.
SPEAKER_00: And that's not a guilt trip.
SPEAKER_00: It's honestly just the reality of our moment in this church, and I think you guys need to be aware of it.
SPEAKER_00: I think all of us need to be aware of it as family.
SPEAKER_00: If you want to experience God at work, do not overlook the ordinary.
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's very easy to look at early childhood and go, oh, that's ordinary.
SPEAKER_00: God wants to work in the ordinary.
SPEAKER_00: Leading in early childhood isn't for people who just love little kids.
SPEAKER_00: It's for those that want to help lay down the foundation of faith in the next generation because that's how God often works.
SPEAKER_00: Through mundane obedience, through stepping out and changing a diaper, through holding a crying child, through laughing with the toddler because they put a banana in the microwave and thought that was hilarious.
SPEAKER_00: That's how God works and meets us.
SPEAKER_00: The hard part is I don't think we always believe that.
SPEAKER_00: We need the radical experience, not these mundane ones.
SPEAKER_00: And thank God he shows up in the mundane.
SPEAKER_00: And then Peter's story continues, and it just gets better.
SPEAKER_00: It gets more funny, to be honest.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 10, when they passed, the first and the second guard, and I mean, he could keep going, the third, the fourth, until he gets to the 16th guard.
SPEAKER_00: Then they show up to an iron gate, this huge gate in the city, and it just opened for its own accord, and they went out along the street, and immediately the angel left him.
SPEAKER_00: And when Peter came to himself, which I'm like, were you like too tired?
SPEAKER_00: What is I don't know what that means, but he came to himself and he said, Now I am sure that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from the land of Herod and from all that the Jewish people were expecting.
SPEAKER_00: Peter experiences an exodus from jail during a holiday that is celebrating the exodus of Israel from Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: How is that so cool?
SPEAKER_00: And in the midst of this miracle, he didn't even believe that it was real.
SPEAKER_00: He thought it was a vision.
SPEAKER_00: Most recently, he had a vision of pigs, and he just assumed it was probably just another vision of God trying to share something with him, and he gets guided out.
SPEAKER_00: And what's crazy is the he's not believing, but the angel doesn't go, hey man, uh I know you don't believe this is true, so I'm gonna actually ask you to put those shackles back on.
SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe just sit back down.
SPEAKER_00: Let's just try it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe we'll try again, we'll see.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And that sounds silly, but how many times do we pray miracles and then in the back of our heads we have doubt, and we assume, because we have a little bit of doubt in the back of our head, that God will not do what he wants to do.
SPEAKER_00: God won't act based on our doubt.
SPEAKER_00: God will act based on his will.
SPEAKER_00: That's the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what's crazy?
SPEAKER_00: I know that's true because it doesn't end with Peter, it continues with the praying church.
SPEAKER_00: Peter gets let out from 16 guards, from chains, from gates, and he literally shows up to this prayer meeting and he can't even get inside.
SPEAKER_00: Where they're praying for him to be inside.
SPEAKER_00: It's so ironic, it's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Look what happens in verse 12.
SPEAKER_00: When he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John, whose name was Mark, where they were gathered together and were praying.
SPEAKER_00: And when he knocked on the door of the gateway, a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer.
SPEAKER_00: And not even seeing him, mind you, recognizing Peter's voice in her joy, she did not even open the gate.
SPEAKER_00: And she ran back and reported to everyone that Peter was standing at the gate.
SPEAKER_00: And they said to her, You are out of your mind.
SPEAKER_00: But she kept insisting that it was so, but they kept saying, It is his angel.
SPEAKER_00: What's really funny is you're having this whole scene while Peter's standing over here, like, so uh, does God need to intercede for this door to open too?
SPEAKER_00: Am I gonna get taken back to Jerusalem again?
SPEAKER_00: I don't really know what to do here.
SPEAKER_00: But he can obviously continue knocking in verse 16.
SPEAKER_00: And when they open it, notice they open it all together, because they're thinking this is soldiers coming to get them, they saw him and were amazed.
SPEAKER_00: But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them of how the Lord brought him out of the prison.
SPEAKER_00: And he said to them, Tell these things to James and to the brothers.
SPEAKER_00: And then he departed and went to another place.
SPEAKER_00: When I first read this, I thought he was talking about the James that just died, and I'm like, dang, that is an awkward moment.
SPEAKER_00: Like, uh, he's dead.
SPEAKER_00: We can't.
SPEAKER_00: He's not talking about James that just died, he's actually talking about James, the brother of Jesus, who did a lot of ministry in Jerusalem because he was going to be there.
SPEAKER_00: And he's like, hey, let James know what happened.
SPEAKER_00: I have to leave.
SPEAKER_00: Now notice, he gets to experience this miracle and still becomes a fugitive.
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't get like fully released, he's then still has to endure something.
SPEAKER_00: But let's talk about this praying church.
SPEAKER_00: What do they show us here?
SPEAKER_00: That God advances his kingdom when we participate through desperate prayer.
SPEAKER_00: I love what this church does.
SPEAKER_00: Faith for this church looks like praying out loud, even if we doubt that it could happen.
SPEAKER_00: This church shows us the power of prayer and the importance of the intensity of prayer that God would do something.
SPEAKER_00: They clearly care about this because they show up and they pray for six days straight for Peter to leave.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what the church did: they carved out time and attention to pray together with intensity, even while doubting.
SPEAKER_00: And talk about dedication and intensity of prayer in a very hard circumstance.
SPEAKER_00: For me, I think it is.
SPEAKER_00: I've only experienced this kind of prayer a few times, and I'm sure you are the same.
SPEAKER_00: But we see in the Bible that when people carve out time and attention to talk to God and ask him to cooperate with them, amazing things happen.
SPEAKER_00: So, you know what participating with God looks like?
SPEAKER_00: It looks like carving time and attention to pray not by yourself, but with people around you together.
SPEAKER_00: This is the model of participating when we want to see God's intervention.
SPEAKER_00: We want to see a miracle or healing to happen, this is how we do it.
SPEAKER_00: If we want clarity on a potential job, this is how we do it.
SPEAKER_00: If we want God to do something in our city or in our church, period, this is how we do it.
SPEAKER_00: And Encounter Night is next week.
SPEAKER_00: I love showing up to Encounter Night because I know that the people who are showing up want God to do something awesome.
SPEAKER_00: They want and are desperate for God's kingdom to advance, and so we're all coming to Him because we know that there is power to bringing God into the equation, to our circumstances, with our city and personally.
SPEAKER_00: In that, why does any of this matter?
SPEAKER_00: Why does any of this matter?
SPEAKER_00: Why do any of those three things matter?
SPEAKER_00: While we don't last as human beings, while suffering doesn't actually last, while our church may not last, you know what will last?
SPEAKER_00: God's intervention.
SPEAKER_00: God's word brought life into this world.
SPEAKER_00: God's word will continue to last past any suffering or person, which is what Luke really wants us to catch at the end of this story, and it's the whole reason why he writes this story in general.
SPEAKER_00: He talks about Herod, and here I'll just give you a very brief thing about Herod, because it's not actually about Herod, it's way more about God.
SPEAKER_00: After Peter escapes, Herod kind of freaks out a little bit, and his whole world is shattered.
SPEAKER_00: He leaves Jerusalem to Caesarea, he leaves the Jews to then basically become Roman, where it's a Roman city.
SPEAKER_00: He puts on these royal garbs.
SPEAKER_00: Josephus tells us that the sun was shining on it and it was beaming to everybody else.
SPEAKER_00: And he delivers this grand old speech, which is very Roman, and the crowd shouts, the voice of a God and not of a man.
SPEAKER_00: And then in this moment he receives that and he gets worms.
SPEAKER_00: It's pretty gross.
SPEAKER_00: Josephus, in his history, tells us that he dies five days later.
SPEAKER_00: I think he immediately got the worms.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the reason why this is important that the man who looked glorious on the outside was rotting on the inside because of pride.
SPEAKER_00: Not just like not participating, but a full stepping away from participating, stepping into pride and wanting nothing to do with God.
SPEAKER_00: The king who thought he was untouchable dies, but Luke does not end with his death.
SPEAKER_00: Instead, he ends with one sentence, but the word of God increased and multiplied.
SPEAKER_00: That's the point.
SPEAKER_00: James dies, Peter's rescued, Herod falls, but the word of God keeps advancing.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, for us, we participate, God multiplies.
SPEAKER_00: We participate, and God multiplies.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Kyle talked a lot in our Roman study of how do we do the math between suffering and miracles when looking at our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And out of our whole lives here and in eternity, what will actually last?
SPEAKER_00: Church, let's do the math.
SPEAKER_00: James' life didn't last.
SPEAKER_00: Herod's power did not last.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's miracle didn't last forever.
SPEAKER_00: Even Lazarus, who got raised from the grave, yes, then died.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't last.
SPEAKER_00: Miracles are incredible, but they are temporary.
SPEAKER_00: Suffering is painful, but it is temporary.
SPEAKER_00: What lasts forever is what God multiplies from our participation with Him.
SPEAKER_00: We participate, God multiplies.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't know about you.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to be in Herod's shoes.
SPEAKER_00: I really don't.
SPEAKER_00: But I'll tell you what, participating does take action.
SPEAKER_00: It actually does take doing something.
SPEAKER_00: And that doesn't mean that our suffering or our miracles, they don't matter, they do.
SPEAKER_00: But when we do the math of eternity, both suffering and miracles are temporary.
SPEAKER_00: What lasts forever is the kingdom of God and his promises of his word.
SPEAKER_00: That's why communion is so powerful.
SPEAKER_00: And we're going to take communion in a second because Jesus entered our suffering.
SPEAKER_00: He surrendered himself to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: Even though he wanted a plan A, he stepped into obedience.
SPEAKER_00: Through his broken body and his shed blood, accomplished the miracle that would actually last forever because it was God's uh multiplying through it.
SPEAKER_00: Because of his sacrifice, our sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: We receive the Holy Spirit, and we are welcomed into this life of God now and for eternity.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're actually going to come to the table into communion today and partake in the same way that we are reading here.
SPEAKER_00: We're actually going to do what James and Peter, but especially the early church, does during Passover.
SPEAKER_00: We are participating with God.
SPEAKER_00: So in a second, you're actually going to receive the cup and the bread, and you can come forth and do that when I dismiss you.
SPEAKER_00: But I want you to also bring him what you're carrying in today and participate in something.
SPEAKER_00: Decide to do something today.
SPEAKER_00: I would ask you if you're with other people, take it together because that's actually what the church is doing here.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have a prayer meeting of individual prayers, they had a prayer meeting together over specific things.
SPEAKER_00: And I hope the Holy Spirit revealed something in these three things.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's surrendering the suffering that you're holding on to as you were enduring it, going, God, you got something there.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's offering him the mundane obedience he's calling you into.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's doing the dishes, changing diapers, stepping into EC as a leader.
SPEAKER_00: Like it might be something like that that he is telling you, respond to it.
SPEAKER_00: It may be offering him the miracle you've been praying for and inviting others into that to do that.
SPEAKER_00: During this time, I would just love for us to stand, receive communion, and remember the one who endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: You guys can stand and come and take communion.