Acts 12:1-24

What is the point of this story?

• It explains why Peter was forced to leave Jerusalem and hand over leadership to James.

• It shows us that Jesus is King and nothing can stop the gospel from spreading – not the death of a leader or the imprisonment of another.

• It underscores the importance and power of prayer.

5 So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.

“Help" is a prayer that is always answered. It doesn't matter how you pray – with your head bowed in silence, or crying out in grief, or dancing.

– Anne Lamott

6 The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance.

3 You will keep in perfect peacethose whose minds are steadfast,because they trust in you.

12 When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying. 13 Peter knocked at the outer entrance, and a servant named Rhoda came to answer the door.

14 When she recognized Peter’s voice, she was so overjoyed she ran back without opening it and exclaimed, “Peter is at the door!”15 “You’re out of your mind,” they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, “It must be his angel.”

16 But Peter kept on knocking, and when they opened the door and saw him, they were astonished.

Luke allows us to see the early church for a moment not as a bunch of heroes and heroines of the faith, but as some kind of muddled, half-believing, faith-one-minute-and-doubt-the-next sort of people as most Christians we all know.

– N. T. Wright

If you can do anything, do it. Have a heart and help us!"23 Jesus said, "If? There are no 'ifs' among believers. Anything can happen.”

24 No sooner were the words out of his mouth than the father cried, "Then I believe. Help me with my doubts!"

20 "Because you're not yet taking God seriously," said Jesus. "The simple truth is that if you had a mere kernel of faith, a poppy seed, say, you would tell this mountain, 'Move!' and it would move. There is nothing you wouldn't be able to tackle."