Acts 4:23-31 - Alliteration and Heavenly Beings

Podcast Transcript (Auto-Transcribed by Apple Podcasts)

Welcome to Tabernacle Talk, a Bible Study Podcast hosted by Bryon Self, pastor of Tabernacle Baptist Church. We hope this time in God's Word will be an encouragement to you. Let's dive right in.

Welcome back to Tabernacle Talk. We've been journeying through the Book of Acts together, and last week we saw Peter and John on trial, not for stealing something, not for causing a riot, but for preaching Jesus.

And specifically because through the power of Jesus, they'd seen a lame man who had been lame for 40 years, who was constantly asking for alms, begging outside of the temple complex.

And Jesus healed him, and he went walking and leaping and praising God. Everyone saw it, everyone knew exactly who this man was.

And the religious rulers of the day were very upset that Peter and John were then proclaiming that this was done through Jesus. It wasn't that they said, just, oh, God has done this thing. Well, all of the religious rulers believed in God.

They would have been happy with that. But the fact was that they said that Jesus was the reason. Jesus was the name.

Jesus was the one that salvation had come through. And we read a great verse last week, verses 19 and 20 of chapter four. Whether it's right in the sight of God, for us to listen to you rather than to God, you decide.

For we are unable to stop speaking about what we have seen and heard. Just an incredible account. And the rulers decided, okay, we can't deny, we can't refute this miracle.

So what we're gonna do is we're gonna tell Peter and John, don't preach anymore about this Jesus, but you can go.

And there maybe could have been some fear or some trepidation in Peter and John that they'd say, man, we got away with it this time, but we remember not too long ago, Jesus was crucified and killed by this exact group of people.

These were the ones that sentenced him to death, that sent him to Pilate, who then had him beaten and mocked and had the crown of thorns put on his head and had him carry the cross. All of those things happened to Jesus.

And I don't think any of these disciples said, I'm expecting a lot better treatment than Jesus got. No, no, no, so there could have been some fear. There could have been, man, we barely got away with that.

But let's see today in chapter four and verse number 23, what their response was. After they were released, they went to their own people, to the other believers, and reported everything the chief priests and the elders had said to them.

When they heard this, they raised their voices together to God and said, Master, you are the one who made the heaven, the earth and the sea and everything in them.

You said through the Holy Spirit, by the mouth of our father David, your servant, why do the Gentiles rage and the people's plot futile things?

The kings of the earth take their stand against, and the rulers assemble together against the Lord and against his Messiah. So here they quote from Psalm 2.

For in fact, in this city, both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel assembled together against your Holy Servant Jesus, whom you anointed to do whatever your hand and your will had predestined to take place.

And now Lord, consider their threats and grant that your servants may speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand for healing and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your Holy Servant Jesus.

When they had prayed, the place where they were assembled was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God boldly.

Man, what a cool interaction this is that the report that they were imprisoned, the report that they were instructed not to speak in the name of Jesus did not ignite in them fear. It ignited in them prayer and power and Psalms.

That also starts with a P, so I kept all the three P's there, prayer, power, and Psalms. All of that stemmed from what could have been a scary situation. Now, why did it ignite this response in them?

My natural response, if I'm telling everyone, is hey, I'm really scared. Or maybe if I'm feeling particularly spiritual, I'm saying, oh man, that was so cool, guys.

Last time I preached, I got 3,000 people to accept Jesus, and this time, 5,000 people accepted Jesus. But there is no remarks on hey, we did this great thing, or even look how God used us. No, no, no, all the focus here is on Jesus.

It is what He has done. It is on who He is. I see they have as the basis of their prayer, they're in verse number 24.

They say, God, you are our master. He is the one that's in control. What He says goes.

It's not that they have their own agenda and God has His agenda, and maybe if it aligns, that'll be great. No, no, no, no. We are at the beck and call of our master.

They say, Master, you are the one who made the heaven, the earth and the sea and everything in them. Back in these times, that encapsulated everything. So heaven here, you could also read the skies above.

That would include both what we would now call the sky as well as space in the imaginations of people of this time. All of the stars and planets were kind of the heavenly beings.

So how we would now think about angels and demons, a lot of times they pictured those constellations, those planets, those stars as the heavenly beings. And they thought there was an extent to which you could see them.

And so there they have the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them. They say everything in the spiritual realm, in the earthly realm, in kind of the chaos realms where no person can long live like the sea or the wilderness.

They say, God, you are in charge of it all. You made it all. There is no other creator.

Not only do you rule us, but you rule everything. And then he says, you said through the Holy Spirit by the mouth of our father, David, your servant. So here they go back to scripture.

They say, God, we know who you are and we know what you've said. And they quote here, why do the Gentiles rage in the people's plot, futile things?

One of my favorite studies that I have done so far is looking at just some of the first chapters of the first Psalms in the Book of Psalms.

Psalm chapter one talks about how happy is the one who does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of the mockers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord.

And in his law, he meditates day and night. And that word meditates is the same word that's here in Psalm two that they quote, why do the Gentiles rage in the people's plot? Futile things, it is to meditate.

Why do the peoples try and think over and over and over again how they can counteract God? This was what the chief priests and elders had done for years. This is what they continually thought about.

This was something that Herod had thought for years, that he tried to silence God's voice through John the Baptist.

And then he heard about Jesus, thought it was John the Baptist to come back from the dead, and he thought about how he could silence God's voice.

Yet again, and the chief priests and elders were not content simply with crucifying Jesus, but they thought to themselves again, how can we shut people up about Jesus? For us, do we think about how we can ignore God's plans?

Do we think about how we can shut out God's voice in our life or are we actively looking to hear from God? That's what these people were doing. They had read Genesis to know that it was God that created everything.

There weren't a bunch of different creator gods that had made different portions of the earth that were all in fights against one another. No, there was one God that created everything.

They would have read Genesis and many other portions of scripture that they would know that they had sang and read Psalm 2, that they would know this passage of scripture that they're talking about. They wanted to hear from God.

These were disciples, these were the apostles, these were the ones that had spent time with Jesus every day most often for three, three and a half years. For us today, are we seeking to hear from God?

Or are we seeking to counteract or circumvent his plans and his voice, his desire for our life? It's a terrible thing to fall into the trap of the nations and the rulers of this earth to try and ignore what God has said.

Instead, we must like the disciples, like the apostles, whether it's good times or bad times, if we're arrested, if we've seen 5,000 people saved, we're gonna turn to the Lord and hear what he has to say.

I love in verse number 27 and 28, Herod Pontius Pilate, the Gentiles and the people of Israel. So Herod representing kind of the Idomians was the nation that he was from. He wasn't an Israelite himself.

He was taken from the country of Idomia, kind of a descendant-ish of Edom. So he was not a Jewish person. So you have the nation of Idomia, Pontius Pilate representing Rome.

You have the Gentiles, which is all the not God's people and the people of Israel. So all of these various places and nations represented, verse 27, assembled together against your Holy servant, Jesus, whom you anointed.

I want to point out real quick that phrase, Holy servant, Jesus, we've read it several times already in the Book of Acts.

The reason they call him this is because he is the suffering servant from Isaiah 52 and 53, some other sections in Isaiah that you would read about, the servant of the Lord who sacrifices himself for the people, the one that serves, the one that is

killed and yet continues to see God work through him and through what he's done. We just read today at our church in our time of communion, Isaiah 53, which talks about this servant and that's who Jesus is.

Your holy servant Jesus whom you anointed to do whatever your hand and your will had predestined to take place. Jesus' crucifixion was no accident. Jesus' death and suffering for your sin and for my sin was not a plan B.

This was always the intent that he came to save all of mankind. And what a comfort that is, that your salvation was always on God's mind. It was predestined to take place.

God didn't just one day say, All right, I was I was planning on not loving, on not dying for, on not redeeming Brian. But but today I think I'll join him in to no, no, no, no, no.

This was always the plan that mankind would have Christ's payment for sin available as a free gift. And so that's an incredible comfort to me that I'm not an afterthought to God.

This was something intended, predestined to take place that God loved me. And he sent his son to die.

And I think it's wonderful in verse 31, when they had prayed the place where they were assembled was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God boldly.

Prayer always to motivate us to action that if we pray to God, if we say, God, I believe that you can. God, I believe that you will save. God, I believe that you will name it.

After they've prayed, after they've exalted God, they went and they spoke the word of God boldly. Can I encourage us today, we're going to interact with people, we're going to see people, we're going to spend some time online.

Can I encourage us, let's speak the word of God boldly.

Let's do it with that humble heart that doesn't say, hey, look at me, I'm really great, but let's have the same heart that the apostles and the disciples did, that there is prayer, there is power, and there are Psalms.

Going back to that alliteration at the front, I encourage you, let's make sure that we spend time in prayer.

When they had prayed, the power of the Holy Spirit was there, and when the power of the Holy Spirit was there, it motivated them to speaking the word of God. I hope God's word will have spoken to you today. Hope you have a wonderful day.