Acts 12:5-10\u00a0<\/b>\u2013 So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.\u00a0 6\u00a0The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains,\u00a0and sentries stood guard at the entrance.\u00a07\u00a0Suddenly an angel\u00a0of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. \u201cQuick, get up!\u201d he said, and the chains fell off Peter\u2019s wrists.\u00a0 8\u00a0Then the angel said to him, \u201cPut on your clothes and sandals.\u201d And Peter did so. \u201cWrap your cloak around you and follow me,\u201d the angel told him.\u00a09\u00a0Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea that what the angel was doing was really happening; he thought he was seeing a vision.\u00a010\u00a0They passed the first and second guards and came to the iron gate leading to the city. It opened for them by itself,\u00a0and they went through it. When they had walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cSo Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him<\/i>.\u201d\u00a0 Peter was in prison for several days as Herod Agrippa was waiting for the feasts of Passover and Unleavened Bread to end.\u00a0 Herod would then put Peter through a mock trial.\u00a0 Again, he had the power to execute Peter without a trial, but He wanted a display to galvanize some support for himself.<\/p>\n
People can be good at clouding the issues.\u00a0 They want us to consider supposed facts that are a sham. Don\u2019t be deceived by pseudo intellectuals on bogus documentaries on supposed scientific or history cable stations.\u00a0 Don\u2019t even watch them.\u00a0 They display people with titles to muddy the minds to not see what is clear to see.\u00a0\u00a0 This situation is clear.\u00a0 It is black and white.\u00a0 It is evil versus good.\u00a0 It is Herod Agrippa being used by the devil to attack the church of Messiah Jesus by arresting with the intent to kill one of Jesus\u2019s top Apostles.\u00a0 Herod with the spirit of Satan on him and Peter doing the will of the Lord.\u00a0 Plain and simple.\u00a0 Also the church was doing God\u2019s will and praying for Peter.\u00a0 Evil versus good.\u00a0 Herod had the worldly power.\u00a0\u00a0 The church was depending on God. Who would win?\u00a0 Family, that is easy.\u00a0 God always wins.\u00a0 We should never doubt that!\u00a0 However, because we don\u2019t understand the outcome of matters we sometimes wonder if evil has prevailed.\u00a0 Never does evil prevail, it only thinks it did.\u00a0 Let us not concentrate on a tree so intently that we never see the forest surrounding it.<\/p>\n
Some might say that evil was the winner when James was killed.\u00a0 Yet, who are we to say the full effect of the martyrdom of James?\u00a0 Let\u2019s consider how the Lord responded to Job in\u00a0Job 38-42<\/b>. \u00a0God drove home to Job the point that He alone knows all and Job, and we, know so little.\u00a0 He knows everything from eternity past, into creation and beyond creation into eternity.\u00a0 He knows what happens with every living person and animal.\u00a0 At the end of Job\u2019s interrogation by God, Job is humbled and realizes that no man is able to know the full reason for things.\u00a0 Only God knows.\u00a0 It is arrogant for any person to think that they can judge God in any way.\u00a0 Don\u2019t we want all the facts before we can make big decisions?\u00a0 Family, we never have all the facts, we can only gather what is known.\u00a0 But God has all the facts.\u00a0 Let\u2019s always have faith in God and not doubt.\u00a0 Whoever does not have faith but doubts, that person sins (Romans 14:23<\/b>).\u00a0 It is foolish to have limited knowledge about something and want to argue with someone who has all the facts and all the wisdom.\u00a0 Yes, James was killed and yet we know that God is good all the time and that He can be nothing but good.\u00a0 It is who He is.\u00a0 Also, we know that God loves us all the time and He will always love us (Jeremiah 31:3<\/b>).\u00a0 That being true, what do we hold onto?\u00a0 Is it what we can deduce from our limited knowledge or is it our knowledge of God and trust in Him who is unlimited in knowledge, goodness and love?\u00a0 Family, let everyone decide their understanding and faithfulness to God.\u00a0 \u201c\u2026as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD<\/i>.\u201d (Joshua 24:15<\/b>) I refuse to believe beings that God created, who are vastly inferior to him (including myself) instead of believing God.\u00a0 No, our faith is in God and it is in Him we believe with unwavering faith.\u00a0 This is not ignorant faith. \u00a0This is informed faith.\u00a0 We needn\u2019t know all the facts of worldly happenings (and we never do).\u00a0 Even the best of our knowledge is not full.\u00a0 We know the facts of the ineffaceable goodness and love of our God.\u00a0 So we can depend on the partial truth of our understanding or on the perfect truth that God is good and He loves us.\u00a0 Our decision to trust God rather than man is the most informed decision!\u00a0 Let the world look at what they can deduce from the happenings of the world.\u00a0 We will look at the infinite and complete Truth, we look to God and embrace Him.\u00a0 Praise God!\u00a0 Let the world count us fools and God call us wise and His own.\u00a0 We don\u2019t want to please people, we want to please God (Galatians 1:10<\/b>).<\/p>\n
The church was crying out to God to save Peter.\u00a0 Would God save him from death at the hands of Herod?\u00a0 Or would Peter die as James did?\u00a0 Family, whether Peter died or lived had nothing to do with the eternal truth of God\u2019s innate goodness, love and His ability to bring about His will.\u00a0 That is what we know.\u00a0 However, God is kind and has decided in His beyond-us-wisdom to make our prayers matter.\u00a0 He has, by His own will, often worked through the prayers of the saints.\u00a0 The prayers of saints who are perpetually having their hearts, minds and wills changed to become more like Him and His will.\u00a0 We shall see how worldly power matters not, the outcome of the matter belongs to God.\u00a0 We should never stop having the motto, in spite of those who know nothing, \u201cIn God we trust.\u201d\u00a0 Praise God!\u00a0 Family, read the Book, in the end, we who love and serve God will receive the eternal rewards of God.\u00a0 We receive them through Jesus.\u00a0 May our faith never waiver and it never does by the power of Him who is able keep our souls that are committed to Him (2 Timothy 1:12, Philippians 1:6<\/b>).\u00a0 God is good all the time and He loves us.\u00a0 We know nothing more than that to the glory and praise of God!\u00a0 Praise God!<\/p>\n
Psalm 150:6<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.\u00a0 Praise the Lord!<\/i><\/p>\n
Micah 7:7<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0But as for me, I watch\u00a0in hope\u00a0for the\u00a0Lord, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n
Micah 6:8<\/b>\u00a0–\u00a0He has shown You, O man, what\u00a0is\u00a0good; And what does the\u00a0Lord\u00a0require of You but to do justly, to love mercy, And to walk humbly with Your God.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Acts 12:5-10\u00a0\u2013 So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.\u00a0 6\u00a0The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains,\u00a0and sentries stood guard at the entrance.\u00a07\u00a0Suddenly an angel\u00a0of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1192],"tags":[82,1969,99,1849,2186,94,1871,17,10,2036],"class_list":["post-1666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devotion","tag-acts","tag-galatians","tag-jeremiah","tag-job","tag-joshua","tag-micah","tag-philippians","tag-psalm","tag-romans","tag-timothy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1666"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1666\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1667,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1666\/revisions\/1667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.Bob4God.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}