Acts 5:17-42

What is “this Life” the angel is talking about?

In this passage, we see several defining characteristics of “this Life”.

It’s a life of persecution

The apostles were persecuted by the high priest and Sadducees, who were the religious leaders supporting him. And the Bible clearly says that it was because of ζῆλος, from which we get the word ‘Zeal’. In this context, ζῆλος is a key term in Judaism for religiously motivated rage. It’s a zeal that comes from wanting a pure faith.

Why did the apostles inspire such zeal from their opponents? It wasn’t because they performed miracles and healed the sick. It wasn’t because they cast out unclean spirits. It was because multitudes of new believers were being added to the lord (Acts 5:14).

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I wonder, why do I not face persecution? The Bible talks about disciples being persecuted, but I don’t have people attacking me or slandering me. But I think it’s mostly because I didn’t talk to people about the words of this Life.

The Lord Jesus commanded us not only to stay put, but to evangelize. And it is evangelism that invites persecution.

In the world we live in, most communities are ok with whatever faith you want, so long as you don’t try to share it with others. Our mission is to do precisely that. And that’s going to inspire zeal from those against Jesus.

It’s a life of purpose

So they seize the apostles and put them in jail. But an angel comes, opens the prison doors, and brings them out. And the angel says to go to the temple and speak to the people all the words of this Life.

The Christian life is a life of purpose. The angel didn’t set them free for the sake of freedom or human rights. The angel set them free for the express purpose of fulfilling their mission.

But what happens if we forget our purpose? John the Baptist had a mission, but he got distracted in politics and landed himself in prison. And he began to question if Jesus was really the Messiah. He lost his purpose, and no angel came to set him free.

The freedom that we have today is granted to us by the grace of God for a purpose. Please believe that God allowed us to wake up this morning and every morning for a specific purpose, to tell the people about this life.

It’s a life of perseverance

So the apostles head back to the temple and continue to preach the Word of God. The high priest and religious leaders hear about this, and confront them, and this time it says they were enraged and wanted to kill them.

But a Pharisee named Gamaliel stands up in front of the Sanhedrin Council, and he reminds them of the many religious movements that fizzled out. He talks about a man named Theudas, and another man, Judas of Galilee, who started their own movements. And Gamaliel says that the Jesus movement is probably the same.

If it’s not from God, it will fizzle out. Give it a couple of years.

But if this Jesus movement is truly from God, they better not interfere.

And so they whip the disciples and command them not to preach the Gospel, and they set them free. And what happens after that? Did the disciples stop doing their mission? They persevered. They went back to the temple every day, and they went from house to house, teaching and preaching that Jesus is the Christ.

Gamaliel had no way of knowing about this, but two thousand years later, the Jesus movement would be alive more than ever before, with millions of believers all across the globe.

From the Jews in Jerusalem, Christianity spread to the Gentiles throughout the Roman empire. Then it spread to Europe, North Africa, and parts of Asia.

And because the disciples of Christ persevered relentlessly in their efforts to evangelize, we stand here today, worshiping the true God.

Our faith is a faith inherited from the disciples we read about in this morning’s passage, because they overcome the persecution, they remembered their purpose, and they persevered in their mission. Their freedom was not for freedom’s sake, but for service to God. Why? Because the Son of God did not use His freedom for Himself, but to serve us.

What are we going to use our freedom for?

So let us pray this morning that God will give us the grace to stay focused and to overcome all distractions and obstacles in our way. Let us have at least one person in mind that we want to evangelize, and pray for that person this morning. And finally, please pray for our HORA conference in KL and Atlanta, that it will be a time of passing our faith to the next generation.