Review:
When Wicked People Are Ruling the Nation:
- Wicked Leaders bring hard Times. (Acts 12:1-4)
- Hard Times bring hard Prayer. (Acts 12:5)
- Hard Prayer sees God Move. (Acts 12:6-19)
- God Moves and His Kingdom Advances. (Acts 12:20-25)
Psalm 2:1-4 - Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?
The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together,
against the Lord and against his Anointed, saying,
“Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.”
He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.
Psalm 37:12-13 - The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes his teeth at him,
but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he sees that his day is coming.
Psalm 59:7-8 - There they are, bellowing with their mouths with swords in their lips—
for “Who,” they think, “will hear us?”
But you, O Lord, laugh at them; you hold all the nations in derision.
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:00-00:03
Turn in your Bibles with me, please.
00:03-00:05
We're going to be in Acts 12.
00:09-00:19
And this is actually the last sermon in our first stretch through the book of Acts this past year.
00:20-00:30
And we're going to be getting into the next phase of the book of Acts, and we have a lot of incredible things by God's power, by His grace.
00:30-00:34
We're very excited for what's ahead for the next ministry year.
00:34-00:43
So, if you haven't been with us for all of last year, what did we talk about this past year?
00:43-00:50
And really, everything that we've seen in Acts 1-12, it's all summed up in one verse.
00:50-00:56
And that's why we have these banners up here as an image to get this in our head.
00:56-00:58
That's what the book of Acts is about.
00:58-00:59
It's about one verse.
01:00-01:16
Acts 1.8, Jesus told the disciples, "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be My witnesses throughout Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the earth." And that's what we see in the book of Acts.
01:17-01:22
Jesus promised power to His people so that we would be witnesses.
01:24-01:33
The Holy Spirit came to indwell believers, and we saw in Acts 2, they began witnessing and the church grew as many people came to Christ.
01:35-01:39
Well, the religious leaders were constantly trying to stop all of the Jesus talk.
01:40-01:48
And that culminated in the execution of Stephen, a young, handsome evangelist serving in the church.
01:49-02:02
And Stephen's execution caused the church to scatter, but it didn't stop to religious leaders from pursuing, especially a man named Saul, who met Jesus while on the way to arrest some more Christians.
02:04-02:13
Then God opened the door for Peter to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles, changing the course of church history.
02:14-02:17
And in your Bibles today, we're going to be in Acts 12.
02:20-02:24
And my wife will tell you I have a tendency to be a people pleaser.
02:25-02:27
So I'm going to give you an option today.
02:28-02:30
Do you want the short version?
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Or do you want the longer version?
02:33-02:34
Which one do you want?
02:36-02:38
How many people want the short version?
02:40-02:42
A few of you do. I appreciate your honesty.
02:44-02:47
How many of you Bible scholars want the longer version?
02:49-02:49
Okay.
02:51-02:52
Just the short version. Are you ready?
02:53-02:54
Write this down.
02:56-02:57
Do not mess with God.
02:59-02:59
Not ever.
03:01-03:03
It will end very badly for you.
03:05-03:07
Short version - people are dismissed if you like.
03:08-03:08
That's it.
03:11-03:11
You are loved.
03:14-03:14
That's the message.
03:16-03:17
You don't mess with God.
03:20-03:25
For those of you who want the longer version, I'm going to unpack that statement a little bit for you.
03:27-03:37
Acts 12 is all about Herod, who was the king at the time, and how he waged war against God.
03:38-03:42
Alright, now, I'm going to need you to use your imaginations.
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Okay? Are you ready?
03:43-03:45
We're going to use our imaginations.
03:45-03:46
This is going to be difficult.
03:48-03:57
This is going to be very difficult, I want you to do this, because it will help you as we work through this passage.
03:57-04:10
But I want you to imagine - imagine this scenario where there are these politicians, these career politicians, and they are extremely wicked.
04:12-04:14
Is your imagination going?
04:14-04:17
Can you imagine what a wicked politician might be like, hypothetically?
04:18-04:18
Can you imagine?
04:21-04:22
Selfish?
04:25-04:28
Imagine if you were a politician who's murderous.
04:30-04:34
Imagine a politician that's part of a family of politicians.
04:36-04:44
A politician who would pander to worldly people by trying to squash the Jesus people.
04:44-04:47
Can you imagine such a politician existing?
04:48-04:49
Can you imagine that?
04:49-05:01
I know it's hard to imagine that somebody would be given the responsibility and authority to rule over a people and they would be wicked, selfish, and murderous.
05:03-05:05
That's exactly what we get with Herod.
05:06-05:16
And that's what we're going to see in this passage, that again, if you could use your imagination, we might be able to apply some of these things to our culture today.
05:17-05:17
Maybe.
05:19-05:25
Because today we're going to see what happens when wicked people rule wickedly.
05:27-05:33
With the election coming up - we said October 2nd is like two weeks away.
05:35-05:36
So we're like six weeks out?
05:37-05:37
Something like that?
05:39-05:46
Is there a more timely message for us when wicked people are ruling the nation?
05:47-05:54
I need to remind you, as we go through a passage like this, this is not going to be a political rant.
05:55-06:01
And Harvest Bible Chapel and its officers do not endorse any particular candidate.
06:01-06:02
Okay? It's not about that.
06:02-06:05
We're going to look and see what the Word of God says.
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And the Word of God is very clear.
06:08-06:12
Here's some things that happen when wicked people are ruling the nation.
06:12-06:13
So jot this down.
06:13-06:16
First of all, number one, Wicked leaders bring hard times.
06:18-06:20
Wicked leaders bring hard times.
06:20-06:22
Any one of you could get up and preach this message.
06:24-06:26
But it's my turn today, so look at verse 1.
06:27-06:43
It says, "About that time, Herod the king laid violent hands on some who belonged to the church." I'm going to stop here because you could be reading your Bible and we see Herod in the Gospels early.
06:44-06:45
We see Herod in the Gospels late.
06:46-06:47
We see Herod here.
06:47-06:48
We see Herod at the end of Acts.
06:48-06:57
And you might be like, "How old was this guy?" "Herod lived to be like 200 years old." You understand that there are many Herods in the Bible.
06:58-06:59
Okay?
06:59-07:03
The Herod here is known as Herod Agrippa I.
07:05-07:08
And he reigned from 37 to 44 A.D.
07:08-07:10
Now I'm going to give you some perspective here.
07:11-07:17
This Herod that we're talking about here in Acts chapter 12, his grandfather was Herod the Great.
07:18-07:35
You're like, "Well, which one was that?" You remember when Jesus was born and the Magi came from the east and they said, "We want to find the one born king of the Jews." And Herod was like, "There's not going to be any other king." And he ordered the execution of every Jewish baby boy two years and under.
07:35-07:36
Do you remember that Herod?
07:36-07:37
That's Herod the Great.
07:38-07:38
Herod's grandfather.
07:40-07:40
Okay?
07:41-07:48
And this Herod in Acts 12 is also the nephew of Herod and Tippus.
07:49-07:50
Which Herod is that?
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That's Luke 23:7.
07:52-07:57
You remember when Jesus was on trial and the Bible says they took Him before Herod.
07:57-08:00
And Herod really was interested in Jesus and wanted to talk to Jesus.
08:01-08:03
And Jesus didn't even dignify him with an answer.
08:03-08:05
Jesus just stood before him silent.
08:07-08:08
That was this Herod's uncle.
08:09-08:13
And we're going to see another Herod later on in the book of Acts.
08:13-08:14
It's going to be this Herod's son.
08:15-08:18
So here it's Herod Agrippa.
08:20-08:24
This Herod, like a lot of them, had a shaky relationship with Rome.
08:25-08:26
I'm not going to get into all the details.
08:26-08:28
If you want to talk about that later, we can.
08:28-08:30
But he had some political problems.
08:32-08:38
And he actually gained popularity with the Jews by attacking the Christians.
08:39-08:41
That's how he got popular.
08:41-08:50
He was ruling over Jewish people and this Christian movement was happening, and he found a way to be popular with the Jews.
08:51-09:03
It says here, "Lay violent hands on some who belong to the church." Verse 2 says, "He killed James, the brother of John, with the sword." The Apostle John's brother, James.
09:04-09:06
Herod executed him.
09:09-09:23
And James is actually the first apostle, the first apostle who was martyred, and he's actually the only one mentioned specifically in the Bible about being martyred.
09:25-09:32
Verse 3, "And when he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to arrest Peter also.
09:33-09:35
This was during the days of unleavened bread.
09:36-09:39
So Herod kills James, and the Jews are happy.
09:39-09:43
"Yeah, good for you, man!" And he sees that made him popular.
09:43-09:49
So he's like, "And for my next trick..." He went after Peter.
09:51-09:52
That's kind of dumb.
09:52-09:54
This is actually the third time Peter was arrested.
09:54-09:58
It was getting to the point that Peter had his own cell with his name on it.
09:59-10:03
He was arrested in Acts 4:3, Acts 5, verse 18.
10:04-10:05
But this was Herod's plan.
10:05-10:07
The Bible makes it very clear.
10:07-10:15
He wanted to execute Peter specifically after the Passover.
10:16-10:16
Why?
10:17-10:21
Because all these Jews would have come to Jerusalem for the Passover.
10:21-10:29
And Herod's mindset was after the holidays, before people leave, I'll execute Peter because all these people are going to be in town.
10:30-10:34
and maximum impact with this execution.
10:37-11:01
Verse 4, "And when he had seized him, he put him in prison, delivering him over to four squads of soldiers to guard him, intending after the Passover to bring him out to the people." The Herod says, "Okay, he's not getting away this time." The first two times he was arrested, somehow he got away.
11:02-11:04
This time, he's not getting away.
11:05-11:07
Round the clock guards, after the holiday, were going to kill him.
11:08-11:17
Before we move on, I'd just like to remind you that wicked worldly people act wicked and worldly.
11:19-11:33
And you're like, "Okay, so that's why we're supporting your family, so you can stay home and come up with these profound things?" I think that's more profound than we realize, because sometimes we're so surprised when wicked and worldly people do wicked and worldly things.
11:36-11:43
You mean those people in Washington aren't promoting Christian values?
11:44-11:44
No.
11:47-11:48
Well, why is that?
11:50-11:53
Wicked and worldly people act wicked and worldly.
11:54-12:02
And the more our country wants to approve and celebrate sin, the more politicians are going to endorse it to stay popular.
12:02-12:04
You see, the same thing's going to keep happening.
12:05-12:09
In Herod's day, he's like, persecuting the Christians makes people happy.
12:09-12:09
In our day?
12:11-12:17
In our culture, when people have this appetite, this craving for sin and perversion?
12:18-12:19
Politicians notice that.
12:19-12:21
That's why these laws are getting passed.
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What are you talking about?
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Things like removing Ten Commandments.
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Things like applauding perversion.
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Things like advocating murder of babies through abortion.
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Things like rewarding laziness.
12:37-12:50
On and on and on we can go, but you have to see that much of what's happening from a government perspective is done to cater to people's sins.
12:52-13:03
Like James and Peter found out, and like we are finding out, that it is okay to insult.
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We're the only demographic that it is okay to ridicule.
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We're the only demographic that it's okay to persecute.
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So wicked leaders bring hard times.
13:20-13:23
But secondly, hard times bring hard prayer.
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What's hard prayer?
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When you pray, you pray for the good.
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Pray hard, that's what we're talking about.
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Hard times bring hard prayer.
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Look at verse 5.
13:30-13:47
It says, "So Peter was kept in prison, but earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church." "Earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church." I'm just going to stop here.
13:47-13:49
Hard times bring hard prayer.
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Do you wonder, for the church, do you wonder?
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I'm thinking specifically of John, James' brother.
13:59-14:12
You wonder if you ever had this thought, "Why was my brother killed when Peter wasn't?" Both of these things happening at the same time.
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Isn't that a legitimate question?
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Can we be honest?
14:18-14:23
We're reading this on the page, but imagine being James' brother, or his mother.
14:25-14:26
Why did he die?
14:27-14:31
Yet Peter didn't.
14:33-14:35
Why would God allow James to die?
14:35-14:37
Why would God allow Peter to live?
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And you're sitting there right now and you're like, "Yeah, Pastor Jeff, explain that." Explain that!
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And here's the truth, church, I can't.
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I cannot explain that.
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Because God is God and I am not, right?
14:57-15:00
I have two friends years apart.
15:01-15:03
Both were in a motorcycle accident hitting a deer.
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My one friend is alive and well.
15:07-15:08
My other friend died.
15:09-15:11
You're like, "Why is that?" I don't know.
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I don't know.
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You can have - Where one delivers a healthy baby and the other loses the child.
15:26-15:28
How can you explain that?
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You can't.
15:32-15:38
I had two friends with cancer. One beat cancer. The other died from the cancer.
15:39-15:40
You can tell stories like that.
15:41-15:42
But have you ever wondered, like, why?
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Why does this person live and why does this person die?
15:49-15:56
And then another question, when you look at the text here, "Did the church even pray for James?" The Bible doesn't say.
15:58-16:06
I imagine they did when they found out, or maybe these events happened so fast, maybe they happened so fast he was arrested and executed before the church even knew what was going on.
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I don't know, the Bible doesn't say.
16:10-16:11
But here's what I do know.
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It seems that everyone got more fired up for prayer while Peter was in jail.
16:21-16:24
I think maybe, maybe it was because James was killed.
16:27-16:32
Prayer is always serious business, but sometimes God allows circumstances in our lives to ramp it up.
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And that alone is probably a good reason for God to allow hard times, because hard times gets us praying like we should be praying all the time anyway.
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the wicked people ruling the nation.
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What happens?
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Number three, write this down.
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Hard prayer sees God move.
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Hard prayer sees God move.
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Look at verse 6.
16:57-17:03
It says, "Now Herod was about to bring him out.
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On that very night, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, that centuries before the door, were guarding the prison.
17:16-17:19
You think here it was a little paranoid that Peter was going to get out of jail again.
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You see what's happening here.
17:21-17:26
Chained to two guards and guards at the door.
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This is called maximum security.
17:30-17:33
But that's not the thing that amuses me about this passage.
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Here's the thing that absolutely kills me.
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What was Peter doing?
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He was sleeping.
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He was sleeping.
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Let's be honest.
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If that was you, would you be sleeping?
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I'll just speak for myself.
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I would not be sleeping.
17:50-18:01
I'm chained between two guards, and I know that night, or that day, I'm going to hear footsteps coming down the hall where they're coming to take me out and execute me just as they did James.
18:01-18:03
And I'm chained to these two guards.
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I'm doing a lot of things.
18:06-18:08
But sleeping soundly is not one of them.
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That's exactly what Peter was doing.
18:13-18:15
I wonder what the soldiers thought.
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This is the guy that Herod's so afraid of?
18:20-18:21
Sleeping beauty here?
18:21-18:22
Look at verse 7.
18:23-18:31
"And behold, an angel of the Lord stood next to him, and a light shone in the cell." I imagine the guards were sleeping too.
18:31-18:33
Peter's probably pretty boring.
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Just sleeping.
18:36-18:39
Okay, so this angel shows up, shown in his cell.
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Look at the next sentence.
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"He struck Peter on the side and woke him.
18:44-18:56
Then get up quickly, and the chains fell off his hands." So Peter wasn't just like, "Oh, I took a cat nap." He was sleeping so soundly that the angel had to hit him.
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Like, "Hey, hey, get up.
18:59-19:02
Get up, get up." He had to hit him to wake him up.
19:02-19:04
That's how soundly Peter was sleeping.
19:07-19:17
In verse 8, it says, "The angel said to him, 'Dress yourself, and put on your sandals.' And he did so.
19:18-19:25
And he said to him, 'Wrap your cloak around you and follow me.' And he went out and followed him.
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He did not know that what was being done by the angel was real, thought he was seeing a vision.
19:37-19:42
When they had passed the first and the second guard, they came to the iron gate leading into the city.
19:42-19:45
It opened for them of its own accord.
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Like going into Walmart.
19:49-19:58
Just "shhh." And they went out and went along one street, and immediately the angel left him.
19:59-20:12
When Peter came to himself, he said, "Now I am sure that the Lord has sent His angel and rescued me from the hand of Herod." From all that the Jewish people were expecting.
20:14-20:15
That would be his death.
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Stop there for a second.
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So this angel shows up.
20:19-20:20
Peter changes his two guards.
20:20-20:21
Apparently, everybody's sleeping.
20:22-20:26
And this angel shows up and slaps him and says, "Hey, get dressed.
20:26-20:28
Get dressed, you're leaving.
20:29-20:38
"Peter, put your coat on. We're leaving." And the Bible says Peter really at this point didn't have any idea what was going on.
20:38-20:39
He was in that deep of sleep.
20:39-20:45
How many people have been in that deep of a sleep that it takes you like 10 minutes to wake up with the aid of coffee and everything else?
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Those first 10 minutes are just an absolute blur.
20:49-20:50
That was Peter.
20:50-20:51
You know, this is all happening.
20:51-20:53
He's like, "Am I dreaming?
20:54-20:55
Or am I seeing a vision?
20:56-21:01
Is this actually happening?" He was like nearly sleepwalking through this whole thing.
21:03-21:14
And then it says he finally woke up, and he's like, "That really did happen?" Well, I probably shouldn't be standing on the street being Jerusalem's most wanted.
21:15-21:26
1st Paul says when he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John, whose other name was Mark, "Many were gathered together and were praying.
21:28-21:34
And when He knocked at the door of the gateway, a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer.
21:35-21:49
Recognizing Peter's voice and her joy, she did not open the gate, but ran in and reported that Peter was standing at the gate." Okay, let's not criticize this poor girl because I can totally see this happening.
21:50-21:52
You know, Peter's in jail.
21:52-21:55
Everybody's praying for him, and then she goes and she clearly hears Peter's voice.
21:56-21:57
She doesn't know what to do.
21:57-22:12
She just runs in and she's like, "Hey, Peter's outside!" I'm like, "Well, did you let him in?" The first 15 says, "They said to her, 'You are out of your mind.'" She kept insisting that it was so.
22:12-22:24
And they kept saying, "It is this angel." There was this old Jewish belief that you had this guardian angel that could assume your form and that's what they thought was going on here.
22:25-22:32
It says, "But Peter continued knocking." "Hello, hello, I just broke out of jail.
22:33-22:38
Somebody, open the door." It says, "When they opened, they saw him and were amazed.
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But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them how the Lord had brought him out of prison.
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And he said all these things to James and to the brothers.
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Then he departed and went to another place.
22:57-23:00
This James obviously isn't the James from verse 2.
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This James is actually Jesus' half-brother.
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They had the same mother, but they had different fathers.
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And this James was actually the head of the church at the time.
23:12-23:14
We'll see that here in a few weeks.
23:16-23:23
Verse 18 says, "Now when day came, there was no little disturbance among the soldiers over what had become of Peter.
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Do you think?
23:25-23:35
Do you think if there's an entire squad of soldiers guarding one guy, two of whom are chained to the guy, and the next morning the guy's not there, do you think there's going to be a little bit of a disturbance?
23:36-23:40
Like, "Hey, where's Peter at?" Yeah, about that.
23:41-23:42
We don't have a clue.
23:43-23:48
And unfortunately for them, and it wasn't going to go well.
23:49-24:03
Verse 19 says, "And after Herod searched for him and did not find him, he examined the centuries in order that they should be put to death." That was it. If you were guarding a prisoner and you lost a prisoner, you died.
24:03-24:04
That was just the way it was.
24:05-24:10
Then Herod went down from Judea to Caesarea and spent some time there.
24:10-24:12
I imagine that was like vacation, right?
24:12-24:26
Like, you know what, I'm going to hit the golf course for a while, maybe hit a couple beaches, because I just had the number one person behind this whole Jesus movement thing that's happening.
24:27-24:29
I had him, and he completely vanished.
24:29-24:31
And now it's time to get out of town for a bit.
24:34-24:39
Before we move on, I want to ask you, how could Peter sleep so soundly?
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And the answer is very clear.
24:43-24:45
He just had a deep trust in God.
24:46-24:49
Again, this was the third time he'd been to jail.
24:49-24:52
He'd already seen God's hand at work in so many huge ways.
24:52-24:58
I think Peter just trusted God to the point of, I'm just going to take a nap until the Lord shows up.
25:01-25:04
Right now, everyone is so worried about the upcoming election.
25:04-25:07
You hear people talking about it.
25:07-25:08
You see it on social media.
25:08-25:09
On both sides.
25:09-25:13
If so-and-so gets in, This country's in real trouble.
25:14-25:20
And if this person gets in, this country is going to be in really bad shape.
25:23-25:26
I'd like to remind you that it doesn't matter how wicked the leader is.
25:28-25:31
It doesn't matter how wicked the actions are.
25:31-25:33
God will not be stopped.
25:34-25:38
And in this passage, very clearly, the church prayed and God moved.
25:41-25:42
This brings another question.
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You notice in verse 16, it says, "When they opened the door and saw Peter, they were amazed." Doesn't that strike you as a little bit interesting?
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What were they doing at the time?
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What were they doing?
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They were praying.
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Okay, what were they praying for?
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Specifically?
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Peter to get out of jail, right?
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So Peter gets out of jail and everybody's completely shocked that Peter got out of jail.
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Everyone was amazed.
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So the question is why are we so amazed when God answers prayer?
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I'll be honest with you, I'm amazed every single time.
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We're talking 20 years into walking with the Lord.
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Every single time God answers prayer, it's always amazing to me.
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And some people say, I wrote some Bible scholars and commentators said, "These people lack faith." "These people lack faith because if they really had faith, they wouldn't have been so amazed when Peter showed up." Really? Do you think that's true?
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I don't believe for a second that being amazed is a lack of faith.
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I don't believe that.
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I don't believe being amazed at watching the hand of God at work - I'd like to remind you that when you pray, I'm going to tell you something now that's going to be revolutionary for some of you.
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Some of you have never heard this.
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When you pray, it is not about the amount of faith that you have.
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It is about who your faith is in.
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Now understand what I'm saying.
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Some people say, "I just don't have enough faith." as if your faith is like this gas tank that you have to have filled up.
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And if your gas tank is full of faith, that means God's going to answer your prayers.
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And if your gas tank is like near "E" on faith, God might not answer your prayers because you don't have faith.
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And that's not true.
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Because it doesn't matter the size of your faith.
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What matters is who you're putting your faith in.
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Okay, so it's wintertime and this little boy was so excited to go out and ice skate on the pond.
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Right? He was so excited.
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But winter was just a couple days old at this point and the kid gets his skates on and he's so excited.
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He's going to go ice skating and he comes running out and he just jumps on the ice and goes right through.
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The pond was barely frozen.
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So he gets fished out of the icy water.
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And over the course of the next week, more snow, deeper freeze, and that pond froze over again.
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But this time, it froze over much deeper so that it was safe.
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And his parents took him down to the pond, and they said, "It's safe to go on the pond.
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With the weather that we've had, that's going to hold you." But this time the kid was so unsure because of what happened the previous week, he didn't just jump onto the ice.
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This time, because of his previous experience, he kind of edged himself onto the ice, sort of tested, and then after a while realized, "Okay, this is going to hold me." Now here's the point.
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Week 1, the kid had a lot of faith, but what he had his faith in wasn't strong.
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Week 2, the kid had very little faith, but what he had his faith in was very strong.
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So you see, it doesn't matter how much faith you have, what matters is what you put your faith in.
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In fact, Jesus said if you have faith like a what?
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Like a mustard seed.
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Jesus said even if you have faith like a mustard seed, the tiniest seed, He says God will do big things in your life.
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Because it's not about your faith.
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It's about the power of God.
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You see, I wasn't at this prayer meeting.
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I can't tell you how deep their faith was, but their faith was in the right person.
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It's okay to be amazed.
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Hard prayer sees God move.
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And finally for today, God moves and His kingdom advances.
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God moves and His kingdom advances.
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So we have a little shift in the scene here.
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Still talking about Herod, but now he went to Caesarea, spent some time, and fast forward a bit, "Now Herod was angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon.
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They came to him with one accord and having persuaded Blastus..." I'm sorry, this isn't in my notes or anything.
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I'm just going to stop here for a second.
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Isn't Blastus a really cool name?
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I was studying it this week, and I'm like, why did my parents name me Jeffrey?
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Why couldn't they have named me Blastus?
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I mean, that is tough!
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I'm sorry, what was I talking about?
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Okay.
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"The herald was angry with people at Tyron's side, and they came to him with one accord and having persuaded Blastus, the King's chamberlain, they asked for peace because their country depended on the King's country for food." Like what in the world is going on here?
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It says, first of all, "Now Herod was angry." Why was he angry? We don't know.
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The Bible doesn't tell us. We don't know.
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But we do know this.
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Herod's region supplied food for the region of Tyre and Sidon.
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They were a food supplier.
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Even though Tyre and Sidon weren't in his jurisdiction, they exported food to them.
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Well, Herod was mad at them for something.
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My guess is something irrational He seemed a few fries short of a Happy Meal, if you know what I mean.
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Well, they wanted to make peace with Herod, and they realized what an unreasonable man he was, so they said, "We need to find somebody with an awesome name to get on our side, to help us." "Oh, the King's Chamberlain, his name is..." "What was his name?" "Oh, come on, say it right." "What was his name?" "Blastus." Alright, verse 21 says, "On an appointed day, Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered an oration to them." So see, Herod had power over them.
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And he decided with these delegates from Tyre and Sidon in town, that he was going to put on a display of the majesty that he thought he had. I was reading this week of what some of the early church historians said about this event that they actually met at an amphitheater that Herod the Great built - this Herod's grandfather.
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But interestingly they said these robes that are mentioned here were actually silver and that he actually came out before the people early in the morning. The sun was reflecting off of his silver robes.
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And they said it was such this dazzling, glorious display as he came out reflecting the rays of the sun.
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Verse 23 says, "Immediately, an angel of the Lord struck him down because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and breathed his last." What?
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Does your Bible say that?
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Well, interestingly, this is the second time an angel shows up in this passage, but this time it's not for a jailbreak.
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This time he shows up and says he struck Herod down.
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It says he was eaten by worms.
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What's that all about?
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I did some study this week.
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literally refers to the head of a tapeworm.
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So what probably happened was Herod had specifically what's called a dog tape.
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And this was a tapeworm that was common in places where sheep and cattle were raised.
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And they say what happens is the sheep and the cattle have them, and they transfer them to the dogs, and then the dogs usually transfer them to the people.
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But if you get one of these dog tapes, one of these tapeworms, it is absolutely horrible.
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What happens is these cysts form on the liver and in the abdomen, and these cysts form and grow and form and grow, and then they rupture, and they say that when they rupture, they can release upwards of 2 million of these little worms into your abdomen.
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And that rupture, in many cases, and certainly in Herod's case, that rupture caused death.
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One early historian said that Herod lived for five more days in absolutely horrible pain.
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And then he died.
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Verse 24 says, "But," everybody say "but." Circle that in your Bible.
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"So Herod breathed his last, but the word of God increased and multiplied.
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And Barnabas and Rusal returned from Jerusalem when they had completed their service.
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Remember, back in chapter 11, verse 30, Barnabas and Rusal were taking relief because of the famine from Antioch down to Jerusalem.
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Now they are heading back to Antioch.
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It says, "Bringing with them John, So they deliver the supplies and you know what kind of guy Barnabas was, such an encourager, such a kind man.
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I can kind of hear this conversation in my head where Barnabas says, "You know what Saul?" Actually Mark was Barnabas' cousin we find out in Colossians 4.10.
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But I can see Barnabas saying, "You know what Saul?
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This is my little cousin, this is my little cousin." and I think he's got a promising future as a missionary, and I think it would be good if he went with us back to Antioch and was like, "What's the absolute worst that could happen, right?" Hold that thought.
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The point here is, Herod died, and the church lives on.
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And that's the way it's always going to be.
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whether it's the Herods, whether it's the Hitlers, whether it's the Hussain's, they've all come and gone.
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But the church lives on.
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You know, Herod committed a lot of sin.
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He was violently going after the church.
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He killed James. He imprisoned Peter.
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But the Bible makes it very clear that none of these things were the real sin that he committed.
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Saul did these types of things.
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Why didn't Saul get eaten by worms?
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I want you to look back again.
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Herod's real sin - his ultimate sin.
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Look at verse 23.
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It says, "An angel of the Lord struck him down because..." See that next phrase?
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"He did not give God the glory." That's the sin.
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And church, you don't have to be a king to do this.
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You don't have to wear shiny robes or have a throne.
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You don't have to have a claim.
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You just have to withhold glory to God.
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You see, it got in Herod's head, didn't it?
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Verse 22 says, "The people were shouting, 'The voice of a God and not a man!'" He was eating this up.
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He got to the point in his life where he sort of had a role reversal with God.
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That he thought he was worthy of glory, and God was not.
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And I want to say to you, to anybody who's listening, that this applies to, you don't want to give God the rightful place that He deserves in your life, Is that you today?
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Is there somebody sitting here saying, "I don't want God to be the King of my life." Well, God created you.
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He sent His Son to die for you.
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And that tells you nothing about your greatness, but it tells you everything about God's greatness.
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He alone deserves the glory.
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You don't want to give God glory.
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You want to make much of yourself.
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You want to rule over your own life and refused to allow God to be your God, ask Herod how that worked out for him.
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You think that you're so exalted that you're beyond your Creator?
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You look at what the Bible says about the grace and love and mercy of God, and you would spit in His face?
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It is not going to go well for you.
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As I close, anybody here that knows my wife and I, knows this, we love to laugh.
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And do you know the Bible says that God laughs?
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Do you know the Bible says that God laughs?
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Well, it's not at cat memes or videos of people falling off ladders.
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The Bible tells us in three separate places that God laughs.
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We need to pay close attention because it's always at the same thing.
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Do we have those verses?
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This is from Psalm 2.
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"Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?
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The kings of the earth set themselves and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed - that's Jesus, ultimately - saying, 'Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.'" Do you see what that's saying?
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"God doesn't tell me what to do!" And how does God respond?
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"He who sits in the heavens laughs.
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The Lord holds them in derision." So if you're sitting here today and you're like, "God doesn't tell me what to do!
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I'm the king of my own life!" Do you know what God's doing?
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He's laughing at you.
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God's like, "Really?
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It just happened to me on Friday.
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I had some parenting discipline issues.
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I won't get into detail.
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But one of my children - I won't mention his name, but he's the younger one - he was grounded from television.
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He was not happy at that sentence.
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He came up to me and he said, "Who do you think you are?" I thought that was hilarious.
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I'm like, "I don't think I'm anybody.
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I know who I am. I'm your father." See, that's the attitude that God has.
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When people are like, "Who do you think you are telling me what to do, God?" God's like, "Seriously?
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Who do I think I am?
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How about the Almighty?
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How about the Everlasting to Everlasting?
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How about the One who speaks worlds into existence?
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That's who I think I am.
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Who do you think you are?" God thinks that's pretty funny.
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Psalm 37, verses 12 and 13.
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Let's see if we pick up a theme.
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"The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes his teeth at him.
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But the Lord laughs at the wicked, for He sees that His day is coming." You know, for the people that not just hate God, but hate God's people and plot against God's people, what's God doing once again?
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He's laughing.
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God's like, "I know how this story ends, bro.
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I wrote the book!
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Do you think you're going to change that?
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God thinks that's hilarious.
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One more.
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Psalm 59, verses 7 and 8.
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It says, "There they are, bellowing with their mouths with swords in their lips, for who, they think, will hear us?" There again.
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God's not going to tell me what to do.
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But you, O Lord, As your Bibles say, "Jehoi Lord, laugh at them." You hold the nations in derision.
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So you can oppose God, but it's pointless.
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He will laugh, but He won't be stopped.
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As the worship team and our ushers come up, we're going to continue in worship by receiving the Lord's Supper.
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You know, as we look at just one picture here in God's Word of an enemy of God who was defeated, coming to the Lord's table reminds us once again that victory has already been won.
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We are not a people that hopefully someday - hopefully someday we will experience the victory that is Jesus Christ.
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And here are people who are living in that victory today.
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Because sin and death have been defeated.
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Guilt and shame and condemnation are no longer a thing for God's people.
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And when we gather around the table, we're reminded of the awesome price that was paid so that our sins could be forgiven.
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So our worship team is going to lead us in a verse and a chorus while the elements are passed out.
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And I would ask that you hold on to them sign of unity in our fellowship, we'll take a pause from singing and receive the Lord's Supper together.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Acts 12:1-25
Why did God let James die, but delivered Peter? How would you have explained that had James" mother asked you? Is it even OK to ask "why" in cases like this?
What was Herod’s crime against God (Acts 12:23)? How does someone commit that crime? Does this still happen today?
Imagine a coworker opens up to you, saying how worried they are concerning who is going to be the next president. "If (whatever candidate) gets in there, we are in big trouble." In light of what we read in Acts 12, what would you say to this person in response?
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.
