SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 9/25/2017 7:59 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 “Be Obedient to God
at All Costs”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Acts 4:14-22
Message of the verses: “14
And seeing the man who had been healed standing with them, they had nothing to
say in reply. 15 But when they had
ordered them to leave the Council, they began to confer with one another, 16
saying, "What shall we do with these men? For the fact that a noteworthy
miracle has taken place through them is apparent to all who live in Jerusalem,
and we cannot deny it. 17 “But so that it will not spread any further among the
people, let us warn them to speak no longer to any man in this name." 18
And when they had summoned them, they commanded them not to speak or teach at
all in the name of Jesus. 19 But Peter
and John answered and said to them, "Whether it is right in the sight of
God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; 20 for we cannot
stop speaking about what we have seen and heard." 21 When they had
threatened them further, they let them go (finding no basis on which to punish
them) on account of the people, because they were all glorifying God for what
had happened; 22 for the man was more than forty years old on whom this miracle
of healing had been performed.”
Now as I look at this
passage, and how the Jewish leaders handled this situation I realize that it
was the Lord who was surely in control as there was nothing done to Peter and
John. Yet as we move forward in the book
of Acts we will see that the next step by the Jewish leaders was to have some
of the apostles beaten, and then the next step was to have the apostle James
(not the Lord’s brother) killed and Peter would escape with his life as an
angel let him out of prison. This was
the beginning of the persecution of the church that has gone on since this
time, and yet the church, the real church still lives on in spite of much
persecution. The real church tells the
truth, the truth that Jesus came into the world of man to die for the sins of
the world so that all who believe in Him, realize that they are sinners and in
need of a Savior can find forgiveness in Him.
The world hates this message and has done and will continue to try and
stop it, however it will fail and one day the hope of the church will be
realized and that is the rapture of the church as found in 1 Thessalonians
4:13-18 “13 But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who
are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. 14 For if we
believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those
who have fallen asleep in Jesus. 15 For this we say to you by the word of the
Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not
precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from
heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of
God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive and
remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in
the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. 18 Therefore comfort one
another with these words.” Paul also
wrote to Titus that this is our hope.
Peter and John knew this hope and that is why they did what they did,
that is why they were obedient to God at all costs, and why so many others
since the church began have done the same, and will continue to do the same
until the Lord comes to take us to be with Him.
The Jewish leaders had
seen the results of this miracle, as the people were giving glory to the Lord,
and this is similar to what happened when our Lord was on earth doing miracles
that were noticed by everyone in Judea at this time. Now these apostles of Jesus were doing the
same works of God and these same Jewish leaders were having the same
problems. I think that the biggest
problem they had was that they were losing power, power to control the
people. As I have been studying 2 Peter
chapter two which speaks of apostates I can see that these so called religious
leaders of Israel at this time were nothing but apostates, apostates who were
not willing to lose power over the people, but at this point did not know what to
do about it other than to tell these apostles not to speak in “this name”
again.
John MacArthur writes
“Peter and John did not vacillate but immediately answered that they would
refuse to obey the Sanhedrin’s command.
They appealed to a higher court by asking the question of ‘whether it is
right in the sight of God to give heed to men rather than to God’ before the
supreme court of Israel (cf. Acts 5:29).
Which court is higher? By such an
appeal to the divine judge the apostles impaled the Sanhedrin on the horns of a
dilemma. They certainly did not want
Peter and John to continue to speak, yet they could hardly tell them to obey
men instead of God. Peter again
indicated them for being the enemies of the God they professed to represent.”
We will pick up on the
subject of believers obeying their government, which goes along with what we
are talking about here, in our next SD.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: The more that I study the Word of God the
more I understand that mankind will do what they want to do in order to make
themselves look good as this is a part of the sin nature we all received from
Adam. It is a spiritual fight that every
believer has in one part of their life or another. All I can say is that I am thankful to the
Lord that I know the truth and will grow in my faith as I stay in the battle.
My Steps of Faith for Today: Trust the Lord to give me wisdom as I begin
to prepare my Sunday school lesson for this up coming week.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question:
“Christ” (Colossians 3:1).
Today’s Bible question: “In
order to teach, Jesus entered into whose boat?”
Answer in our next SD.
9/25/2017 8:39 AM
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