TODAY’S SCRIPTURE Acts 4:23-30
In Acts 4, because of the early preaching of Peter and John, the Jewish leaders are growing nervous over this growing group of believers in Jesus. The group is growing at an alarming rate and, in the leaders’ eyes, causing a disruption of the services that are being conducted in the temple. They have arrested Peter and John and commanded them not to preach about Jesus any longer (Acts 4:18). Peter and John respond with words that all Christians need to remember in the face of persecution and ordered silences. They say, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard” (4:19-20). After this defiant stand, Peter and John return to the other believers, and they turn to God in prayer. It is how this prayer begins and what the prayer contains that helps us see another great truth about our Sovereign God.
The prayer begins, “Sovereign Lord, who made heaven and earth and the sea and everything in them…” (4:23). The prayer continues with a recap of Old Testament stories which remind them of God’s sovereignty. It ends with a bold request in 4:29-30 that we would do well to remember today, which reads, “And now Lord, look upon their threats and grant to Your servants to continue to speak Your word with all boldness, while You stretch out Your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of Your holy servant Jesus.” While we today do not have the ability to do miraculous wonders like the Apostles and certain members of the early church, it is their request for boldness anchored in the Sovereign Lord that we need to be remembering and seeking through prayer today.
Today, I will…turn to God in prayer and acknowledge Him as the sovereign One over the universe.