This tape contains the ninth of a series of teachings on the Book of Acts by the Reverend John W. Howe of Truro Episcopal Church in Fairfax, Virginia. The teaching is entitled Worthy of Dishonor and covers Acts chapter 4, verses 23 to Acts chapter 5, verses 42. We're in Acts chapter 4. Believe it or not, I think we're not only going to finish the chapter, we're going to go all the way through to the end of 5 today. At least I am.

Acts chapter 4, we broke off in the middle of a story, and it continues in verse 23. You recall that Peter and John and a lame man whom they had been instrumental in God's healing had been imprisoned, and they gave a tremendous defense, and they were released with further threatenings from the high priest and the party of the Sadducees. Verse 23, when they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.

And when they heard it, they being the whole company of their friends, when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said. And we have here a prayer, and I want us to note what they prayed, both for that occasion and sort of as a model for prayer. It's a tremendous prayer offered in the light of this arrest and further threatenings.

When they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, Sovereign Lord, who didst make the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who by the mouth of our father David, thy servant, didst say by the Holy Spirit, why did the Gentiles rage and the peoples imagine vain things? The kings of the earth set themselves in array, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his anointed. For truly in this city they were gathered together against thy holy servant Jesus, whom thou didst anoint both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel to do whatever thy hand and thy plan had predestined to take place.

And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness while thou stretchest out thy hand to heal and signs and wonders are performed through the name of thy holy servant, Jesus. Wherever it says, thy holy servant, you may have a footnote. It could also be translated, thy child or thy son, Jesus.

let's just look at that prayer for a few moments isn't it interesting the way it begins now the occasion for the prayer is that they're under threat very severe threat and as you recall from last time the group of people threatening them is the highest authority both civilly and religiously this is no mean group of people that they're dealing with they've been threatened they've been ordered not to preach Jesus and they're under this threat And so they begin talking about heaven and earth and the sea and all the creatures that are in it. And you wonder, why are they praying this way? What does that have to do with the threat?

They begin by adoring God. They begin with worship. They're not in any hurry about it.

And I'm very much aware, and I trust you are, of the fact that both when they give speeches and when they have prayers recorded in the scripture, you're just getting a tiny summary, sort of an outline of what they prayed. They begin by praying about the grandeur of God. It's as if what they're doing is deliberately putting this threat in its proper context.

Have you ever seen a little puppy dog when he encounters a big mean cat or maybe another dog and it's threatening him? I don't know if you've ever seen it. I've seen a little picture on television.

A little puppy dog comes running back to his daddy as fast as he can. And sometimes he'll literally stand between the father dog's front feet, turn around and face the adversaries, you know, a big grin on his face, and bark right back at him. As if to say, yeah, you can threaten the daylights out of me until I get in to my father's protection, you see.

and I'm not alone anymore. You want to threaten? Go ahead and threaten.

You know, Dad will take care of you. It puts it in context. We have just been threatened by the highest authority religiously and civilly.

No, they're just a drop in the bucket compared to our God. All right, they don't have any power at all except God allow them to have power. We're talking about the God who created the universe, who spun the stars into space, who holds the worlds in the palm of his hand, who created the sea and all that is in it.

Are we going to turn coward in front of a few Sadducees? Not a chance. So they begin by taking the time to recognize who it is that they're praying to.

And in the light of this God's grandeur and majesty and almighty power, things fall into their proper context, don't they? And then they quote Scripture. and I'm not sure that there's so much quoting scripture to remind God of what he said, although that's a good principle.

God delights to be held to his word, not because there was ever any doubt about it, but because he wants us to know that there's no doubt about it. God is not a man that he should lie. And so it's absolutely appropriate that we would remind God of his word.

But I suspect that even more than that, what they're really doing is in the midst of prayer, they're reminding themselves of God's Word. Do some of you recognize what it is they're quoting? Psalm 2.

Hold your finger here for a moment. I want us to look just very quickly at Psalm 2. Very familiar and very important psalm.

And most of the time when a psalm or some other similar passage is being quoted, again, either in a speech or in a prayer, you have to understand that really the whole thing is very much being brought to memory. For instance, when Jesus was hanging on the cross and said those fearful words, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? And it's been said by many that Jesus was doubting God at that point, not for a moment.

You go back and check out the psalm that he was quoting, Psalm 22, read it through in its entirety. It's a remarkable psalm that predicts in the most graphic kind of detail what it was he was going through at that moment. Crucifixion is spelled out in incredible detail approximately a thousand years before they began using crucifixion as a means of execution.

And the psalm ends with a tremendously powerful affirmation of his confidence in God. So when he quotes that first opening line, my God, my God, why have you forsaken me? There's no question at all that he has the whole thing in mind.

And similarly, in this prayer, when they quote from Psalm 2, I'm sure that they have the whole thing in mind. It's a very, very familiar psalm. Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain?

The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and his anointed, saying, Let us burst their bonds asunder and cast their cords from us. Whether they know it or not, these authorities who are raging against us are in fact raging against the Lord. And they're raging in fact against His anointed, which is simply another word for His Christ, His Messiah.

They're raging against us, they're threatening us, but in fact that is rage directed against the Lord and against his Christ. And what they're saying is we want to throw off his authority. We want to burst his bonds asunder.

We want to get out from under his rule over us. That's what is really being said in the attack which is directed against us. But he who sits in the heavens laughs.

Does that put it into context for you? This is not a mean and a spiteful laugh. This is the laugh of one who knows how pitifully silly is all this sound and fury signifying nothing.

He laughs. The Lord has them in derision. It will come to nothing.

It is absolutely ridiculous. Then he will speak to them in his wrath and terrify them in his fury, saying, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. My king reigns.

You may not see it. You may not believe it. You may not want it. My king is established and he reigns.

I will tell of the decree of the Lord. He said to me, you are my son. Today I have begotten you.

Now the whole mood has changed. He's now speaking directly to the anointed one. Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession and you shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel.

What will all this come to? Absolutely nothing. Now therefore, O kings, be wise, be warned, O rulers of the earth, serve the Lord with fear, with trembling kisses feet, lest he be angry and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Here's the word of warning.

Because he has spoken thus to his anointed, you better look out. don't rage against him there is no way you can win this battle unless you get on his side and so it ends with this lovely word and here I see the little puppy dog standing between the legs of his father blessed are all who take refuge in him that's our position do you see that when the adversaries rise up against you if you are taking your place between the feet of your father you are blessed you are in a position of refuge that's what they're doing they're reminding themselves of their security the nation's raging okay but they're raging against god and he's already spoken it's not an open question we know how it's going to end so they position themselves as they truly are in their relationship to the lord then thirdly verse 27 they go on to say for For truly in this city there were gathered together against thy holy servant or child Jesus, whom thou didst anoint both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, the very ones who continue to rage. They tried to wipe out Jesus.

They're trying to wipe out us. But you see, we're connected to him. That's our position.

What are they doing here? You remember how they preached. And we've seen this now three times already.

What was the first thing that they preached? what the prophet said, and the second thing was what Jesus has done. Okay?

Do you see a correspondence here to the way they pray? Here's what the prophet said. Here's what's happening.

Just as they preach, the prophets have said thus, and so it is, so also they pray. The prophets have said thus, and so it is. I find it interesting to note that they pray as they preach, and they preach as they pray.

And I wonder if we do. Do we preach what we pray? Do we pray what we preach?

Do you believe what you pray? And do you pray what you believe? That's what they're up to.

They're saying, here's what the word of prophecy says, and here's how it applies. It is happening right now in this situation. We are coming in to the fulfillment of the promise about being blessed by taking our refuge in Him because the circumstances correspond.

Okay? That's where we are. And then, in the light of all that, and I would suspect that that may have taken quite a long time, you know, to really rehearse the glory of God, the grandeur and the majesty and the power and the might and the authority of God.

Just be lost in who God is. Alright? And then be lost a second time in the trustworthiness of His Word and in our blessedness in the midst of whatever circumstances because we've taken our refuge in Him.

And then, oh yeah, by the way, there's some threatening going on, you see. You almost lose sight of it. But that's the occasion for the prayer.

And when they finally come to it, they pray three things. And now, Lord, look upon their threats, or you may have, consider their threats. Take a look at this, Lord.

Here's what's going on. We call your attention to this, Lord. Consider their threats.

Look upon their threats. And grant to thy servants to speak thy word with all boldness. God bless you.

Think of that. Consider thy threats. Lord, you've got to do something about it.

You have got to stop those guys. Lord, bring in the militia, wipe them out, crush them, destroy them so that we can get on with our job. Right?

Not at all. Not for a moment. Lord, they're threatening.

Our prayer is that you would give us boldness in the light of their threat so that we can go on speaking. Not a word about destroy them, crush them, get rid of them, shut them up. Wipe them out.

Not a word of it. Give us boldness. And thirdly, as we are speaking, would you stretch out your hand to heal and let signs and wonders be performed through the name of thy holy Son, Jesus.

That is one fantastic prayer. It took me a very long time before I could really pray that. But that's exactly what I'm praying.

Lord, they're threatening. We'll do the speaking. you do the healing okay let us speak with boldness let us not be intimidated let us not become cowardly let us not cave in to fear in the midst of this circumstance give us the boldness Lord to go on preaching and as we preach Lord you do the signs and wonders you confirm the word you stretch out your hand and heal amen that is one fantastic prayer I'm reminded some of us were looking at Paul's letter to the Philippians a few weeks ago, and he prays much the same sort of thing. You don't need to turn to it, but in Philippians 1, he says, I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus, this will turn out for my deliverance.

Again, he's being threatened, and in fact, a whole lot more than that, he's under house arrest in Rome, facing possible martyrdom, all right? And he says, go on praying. I know that through your prayers and through the help of the Holy Spirit, this will turn out for my deliverance.

If he stopped there, you might suppose that what he's saying is, I know I'm going to be sprung free from jail and go on preaching. But that's not what he says. I know that this will turn out for my deliverance and I shall not be ashamed, but Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.

What's he saying? What is my deliverance going to be. Deliverance from prison?

Deliverance from beating? Deliverance from martyrdom? Maybe.

Deliverance from fear? Deliverance from silence? Deliverance from capitulation?

Do you catch what I'm saying? I know that this will turn out for my deliverance. And Christ will be honored even if I die in the process.

That's my deliverance, that Christ be honored. All right? It's a little bit different from the way we always pray, isn't it?

Okay, that's their prayer. The grandeur of God, the fulfillment of Scripture, the security of the Christian as he takes his refuge in Christ, that we would be bold to go on speaking His word no matter how they rage at us and no matter what they do about it, that we would be bold to speak His word and that in the process God would stretch out His hand to do mighty works. and when they had prayed thus there's a repetition of Pentecost a little mini version of Pentecost the place in which they were gathered together was shaken okay and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and just as they had asked they spoke the word of God with boldness I'm interested in this.

I thought that these were the people who are spirit-filled. What it says is they were filled. And in fact, there's a pattern in Scripture.

They were filled, and then they were filled, and then they were filled, and then they were filled. Just back a little bit earlier, and we didn't call attention to it, but back in verse 8, when Peter is at his trial, in essence, it says, then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, and he makes his defense. Now, there is a sense in which you either have the Holy Spirit resident inside your personality, making you a new creature in Christ, or you don't. All right?

And in that sense, once filled, always filled. In that sense, which is to say you either belong to him or you don't. But the problem that I have with that doctrine of once filled, always filled, I don't know about you, but I leak. And what I see in Scripture is that when there's going to be a new trial, a new occasion for testing, a new opportunity for ministry, there's a new filling.

There's a fresh filling. And it's very fresh. You don't rely on yesterday's filling for today's needs.

And they were filled with the Holy Spirit. Now, it does not say in this particular instance that they spoke in tongues. They may have.

It does not say so. It says that they were filled with the Holy Spirit, and it is therefore a moot point. If you think that being filled with the Holy Spirit always inevitably means speaking in tongues, then you read that into the account, but it doesn't say so.

What it does say, and I call this to your attention, is that whether or not they spoke in tongues, they spoke boldly in their own language. And I want to remind you again that the point of the power is proclamation. You begin to hear that.

This is going to run all the way through. The point of the power. When you have received, you shall be my witnesses.

The point of the power is proclamation. Now, there may have been other things that attended this filling, this fresh filling with the Holy Spirit. There may well have been speaking in tongues.

It does not say so. What it does say is that the result was their prayer was answered and they spoke the word boldly. Now, we've already touched on the subject of the Christian community that was emerging in the city of Jerusalem, so I'm going to skip over the next section and pick up the story at verse 12.

that community had both a great attractiveness and a certain liability to it and I'm just going to leave that at what we said a few weeks ago chapter 5 and verse 12 it says now many signs and wonders were done among the people by the hands of the apostles and they were all together in Solomon's portico and none of the rest dared join them but the people held them in high honor and more than ever believers were added to the Lord multitudes both of men and women so that they even carried The community is under this same threat. It's continuing, and yet in spite of that, it's growing by leaps and bounds. I suspect that by this point, we're approaching something on the order of 20,000 adults.

And Jerusalem is not that big a city at that point. This is no little tiny quiet club hiding in the corner somewhere. This is the majority of the people in the city of Jerusalem.

Can you imagine what this is doing to the priests in the temple? They're doing this proclamation and most of the healing is right there in the temple. And the whole city is very much aware of it.

Now to move very quickly. The high priest says, verse 17, enough is enough. And he has them arrested all over again.

With him, the party of the Sadducees, they're filled with jealousy. They arrested the apostles, not just Peter and John this time, but apparently at least the twelve and perhaps others, and they put them in the common prison. But at night, an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out miraculously and said, better get out of town, they're after you.

No. Go and stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life. And when they heard this, they entered the temple at daybreak and taught. Now the high priest came and those who were with him and called together the council and all the Senate of Israel and sent to the prison to have them brought.

But when the officers came, they did not find them in the prison, and they returned and reported, We found the prison securely locked, the sentries standing at the doors, but when we opened it up, it was empty. We got the picture. Just how they did it, I don't know.

spirited them away, got them right through locked doors, we don't know, but they were miraculously set free. Now, if you've not been there or seen pictures, this may be kind of hard for you to picture. You've got to imagine in your mind's eye a temple and a temple courtyard unimaginably large, huge, okay?

So that if they're in Solomon's portico at this point, which is where they typically gathered, they're on the eastern side, okay? And the Sanhedrin met, as we saw last time in the Chamber of Hewn Stones, on the southern side, and that is far enough apart that they wouldn't necessarily even be aware of it. Okay, it's a very great distance.

There could be huge crowds meeting in the temple area and somebody else in another part of the temple not even being aware of it. So they're gathering there, they're ready to have them brought out, and meantime, they're right around the corner preaching again the very same message. Just terrific dynamics of this thing.

So they're not aware of it until somebody, we're not told who, someone, verse 25, comes and tells them, the men who you put in prison are standing in the temple and teaching the people. The captain with the officers went, brought them, but without violence, for they were afraid of being stoned by the people. And when they brought them, they set them before the council, and the high priest questioned them, saying, we strictly charged you not to teach in this name.

Yet here you have filled Jerusalem. You get that? You have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and you intend to bring this man's blood upon us.

If you missed it last week, Peter repeats it for your sake this time. But Peter and the apostles answered, we must obey God rather than men. Do to us what you will.

We're going to obey God. The God of our fathers raised Jesus whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.

And we are witnesses to these things and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him. One more thing we want to cover just very briefly, a turning point here, concerning the witness or the comment of Gamaliel. Gamaliel is a great teacher and a great leader.

Attached to, it's not absolutely clear if he's a member of the Sanhedrin or sort of a counselor to it. As you're aware, I said last time, the Sanhedrin is predominantly Sadducees. Gamaliel is a Pharisee, a very, very highly respected Pharisee.

And as a matter of fact, he's the one who did the training or the tutoring of Saul of Tarsus, who becomes St. Paul a little later on in the story. Gamaliel stands up in the midst of the council, and this has to be from God. Because you're aware of the fact that whilst the Sadducees denied the resurrection as a tenet of faith, the Pharisees proclaimed resurrection as a tenet of faith.

And Gamaliel could well have stood up and gotten into a head-on theological argument. But that's not what he does. He argues from a very pragmatic point of view.

That's a very interesting thing he says. He says to them, verse 35, fail. If God is not in it, it's going to collapse anyway.

Okay? So you don't need to be after them. If God isn't in it, it's going to collapse.

But if it is of God, there's no way you can win. You will not be able to overthrow them. You might even be found opposing God.

So they took his advice. When they called in the apostles, they beat them and charged them again a third time not to speak in the name of Jesus and they let them go. Now the Jewish form of beating was not as severe as the Roman form.

When the Romans beat you, they did it with a cat of nine tails and that was literally nine pieces of leather and in the ends of the leather tied to the ends of the leather were bits of bone or stone or broken glass and they would just flay you away and more often than not you were killed in the process it would just literally destroy you the jews were somewhat more humane than that they did not have those kinds of of implements in the end of the whip and they had a limit to the number of it it was 39 lashes that was it that's bad enough that's pretty awful that would lay your back wide open but you usually didn't die from that kind of a beating and it was it was to stop short of capital punishment so that's apparently what they did. They flayed them 39 times. 40 lashes save one is the way it's often expressed.

They beat them, charged them again not to speak in the name of Jesus, and they let them go. And they left the presence of the council, and I want us to end on this note, they left the presence of the council rejoicing, rejoicing, you know. It wasn't a matter of if God is in this, how in the world can He have allowed this to happen to us?

You know. It wasn't a matter of some sort of Pollyanna view that deliverance means we're going to escape all suffering. We're going to get out because God is on our side.

That's not what they were saying. If God is with us, He'll give us boldness in the midst of this circumstance. And He did.

And they left rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name. his name for the name of Christ worthy of dishonor it's an interesting phrase isn't it this is the first time blood has been shed on behalf of Jesus he shed his blood for us this is the first blood that was shed on his behalf and they went out rejoicing that God had counted them worthy of the dishonor humanly speaking of being so identified with Christ that as His blood was shed for us, so ours would be shed for Him. And every day, every day, in the temple and at home, they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.

Can I end on this note? Some folks, I think, wish on one level of their personality that they would have such an opportunity, you know, that God would consider them worthy to suffer and, if need be, to shed their blood and to die. And then something else in them rises up in great fearfulness.

You know, I know that I couldn't make it if that ever happened to me. I would probably capitulate. May I say to you, it's a calling.

Nobody that I read about in the New Testament sought that experience. They were willing should it come. And if God should call any one of us, we've got simply to believe that he would give the same kind of an anointing and the same kind of strength to be able to cope.

That in fact is a promise. 1 Corinthians 10, God is faithful and will not let you be tested above you are able, but with the testing will provide a way of escape. If you say to me, I know I could not do it, the answer is no, you could not do it unless God called you to do it.

And if He called you to do it, He would equip you to do it. Your strength is not your own. If it's your own, you will fail.

But if you, like the little puppy dog, run and take your place between the sturdy legs of your Father, He will equip you to give you the boldness. May God equip us to be faithful in whatever the circumstances are. That whether they like it or don't like it, whether they rage or accept it, that we would speak His Word boldly, graciously, attractively, and that as we do so, He'd stretch forth His hand to heal, to do signs and wonders, to exalt His Son, Christ.

Let's thank you.