English Standard Version (ESV)
6 Now when Herod was about to bring him out, on that very night, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries before the door were guarding the prison. 7 And behold, an angel of the Lord stood next to him, and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him, saying, “Get up quickly.” And the chains fell off his hands. 8 And the angel said to him, “Dress yourself and put on your sandals.” And he did so. And he said to him, “Wrap your cloak around you and follow me.” 9 And he went out and followed him. He did not know that what was being done by the angel was real, but thought he was seeing a vision. 10 When they had passed the first and the second guard, they came to the iron gate leading into the city. It opened for them of its own accord, and they went out and went along one street, and immediately the angel left him.
11 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 and from all that the Jewish people were expecting.” 12 When he realized this, he went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many were gathered together and were praying. 13 And when he knocked at the door of the gateway, a servant girl named Rhoda came to answer. 14 Recognizing Peter's voice, in her joy she did not open the gate but ran in and reported that Peter was standing at the gate.
15 They said to her, “You are out of your mind.” But she kept insisting that it was so, and they kept saying, “It is his angel!” 16 But Peter continued knocking, and when they opened, they saw him and were amazed. 17 But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, “Tell these things to James and to the brothers.” Then he departed and went to another place.
18 Now when day came, there was no little disturbance among the soldiers over what had become of Peter. 19 And after Herod searched for him and did not find him, he examined the sentries and ordered that they should be put to death. Then he went down from Judea to Caesarea and spent time there.
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Pizza tastes better when it is
delivered.
As a kid, our house was too far
away from any pizza chain that would deliver, so ordering pizza meant we had to
make the long trek to go pick it up. At
one point, though, an Italian restaurant began a pizza delivery service, and we
thought it was the greatest pizza ever.
It didn’t matter that the pizza didn’t actually taste that good—it was
great because it was delivery, because all we had to do was make a phone call and
an hour later, fresh, hot pizza showed up at the door. We weren’t the ones responsible for picking
it up.
Delivery is a great option in many
cases. Once, at IKEA, our eyes were
bigger than our car and we ended up with more than could fit in the car. Delivery would have been perfect. If you order something from Amazon, you have
to choose delivery—you can’t swing by the warehouse on your way home from work
and hope to pick up your order. Only
delivery can get you what you want.
What is delivery, essentially? It’s the act of someone else to bring you
something that you are unable, or unwilling, to get yourself. To be delivered from a situation is to have
someone get you out of a situation that you could not have extricated yourself
from otherwise.
Which brings us to today’s passage,
the story of Peter’s deliverance from prison.
Peter is in jail, bound by chains.
There is a soldier on either side of him, and two more at the door. All told, there are sixteen soldiers guarding
Peter, who has been arrested on Herod’s orders.
In other words, Peter isn’t going anywhere on his own accord. If this were a James Bond movie, it would be
no problem for James to beat up sixteen soldiers and waltz out while the jail
exploded behind him. Instead, this is
real life, where there is no hope for Peter to escape on his own.
But Peter isn’t on his own. Scripture promises that we are never on his
own, and pretty soon an angel shows up.
Soon Peter’s chains fall off and he walks out of the jail, free as can
be. He thought it was a dream, but when
he was standing in the street he soon realized that this was indeed real
life. Peter had been delivered from
jail.
Now, imagine how smug the Roman
empire had been in the moments before this.
They had Peter trapped in jail, with 16 soldiers surrounding him. There’s no escaping from this, right? What hope did Peter have?
Now, this is an important story,
because each and every one of us is Peter.
Each and every one of us is surrounded by the powers of sin and death,
and they have this smug, false confidence that we are under their power, that
they are in control. Nothing could be
farther from the truth.
The great news is that Peter had a
deliverer. Peter has a God who is
mightier than whatever forces oppose him.
Peter has a God who can deliver him from whatever situation he faces,
even though he may not be able to deliver himself. Peter is set free by the power of God.
Now, we have a deliverer, too. We have a God who is able, who is stronger,
who is bigger than whatever opposes us.
We have a God who wants to free us from the forces that enslave and set
us free into the world. We have a God
who is able to deliver us from death into life.
It’s an amazing story, one that
demonstrates the power of God and his great love for us. But it’s not just about Peter, just like it’s
not just about us.
Because what happens when Peter is
in jail?
Go back to verse 5—the church never
stops praying for him.
The Christian Church, friends,
should be a place where, when one of us is suffering, the entire body rallies
around us. When someone is hurting, we
should all be affected. When sin is
imprisoning and threatening one of us, we need to all be concerned.
This also means that when one of us
is delivered from difficult circumstances, we need to tell the story.
This is exactly what Peter goes and
does. He goes to the house of Mary and
tells his story. It takes him a little
while to get in, on account of the servant’s excitement, but eventually he goes
in and tells his story in the hopes of encouraging the entire congregation.
See, when one person is delivered
through difficult circumstances, this serves as an encouragement to others.
When the story is told, those who are suffering are encouraged, because they
recognize the power of God to deliver them through their own difficult
circumstances.
See, here’s what I believe—there
are two types of imprisonment from difficult circumstances. The first is the type from which we have been
delivered, the type that has stories that we need to tell. The other is the type through which we will
be delivered. This is the suffering in
which people are currently in the midst of.
This is the state of those who suffer with medical problems. This is the state of those who mourn. This is current suffering, but it will never
overcome us. We will be delivered
through it, we just haven’t been yet.
So, when we’re in the midst of this
suffering, we need to hear the stories about people who have been delivered—we
need to hear this encouragement, to be reminded about God’s greatness and
power. We need to be reminded about
God’s ability to deliver us.
This is what Peter is getting at in
verse 17. The story needs to get out, so
that the whole church can rejoice at God’s great love and deeds of power, and
then as we tell the story to others in the world around us, they, too, want to
come and worship this amazing God, the one who has the ability to deliver us
from evil.
So friends, you have a story to
tell. You’ve been delivered from sin and
death. Difficult circumstances in your
life have imprisoned you, and you have a responsibility to share that story to
encourage others.
And if you’re in the midst of
suffering and mourning and pain, may this be a reminder to you that there is a
deliverer who cares about you, and he promises to deliver you through this. It may not be easy, but I promise it will
come, because God has never left someone behind. God does not abandon or forsake us, but
delivers us through sin and death and into eternal life.
Let us pray
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