Prayer Mission with God (Acts 4:13-31)
"When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God." (Acts 4:24)
When Peter and John were confronted by the Sanhedrin and told not to speak or teach at all in the name Jesus, when they received further threats and news of potential punishment, notice how the church responded. They didn’t lobby their local government, they didn’t wave placards on the street corners on account of their rights being denied, they didn’t write letters to the editor, or contact the local news channel, nor did they retreat in fear; they went to a prayer meeting and “raised their voices in prayer to God.” And they prayed, “Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.”
Their prayers focused upon God`s Mission and their heart cry was for God to continue to empower them for His work. In the face of growing and intense opposition to the Gospel, in the face of very real threats, perhaps on themselves or their families or their businesses, they prayed for an even greater boldness and power in carrying out God`s Mission.
And of course the Lord answered their prayer. Luke writes that the Lord filled them with His Spirit and gave them great boldness. Luke adds, “and the place where they were meeting was shaken.” A curious detail? Not likely. Read Exod. 19:18, Psalm 114:7, and Isaiah 6:4. Luke intends to have us know that in this particular prayer meeting the very Presence of Almighty God—once at Sinai, and later in redemptive history at the Temple—is in the midst of this small group of praying believers.
PRAYER
"When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God." (Acts 4:24)
When Peter and John were confronted by the Sanhedrin and told not to speak or teach at all in the name Jesus, when they received further threats and news of potential punishment, notice how the church responded. They didn’t lobby their local government, they didn’t wave placards on the street corners on account of their rights being denied, they didn’t write letters to the editor, or contact the local news channel, nor did they retreat in fear; they went to a prayer meeting and “raised their voices in prayer to God.” And they prayed, “Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.”
Their prayers focused upon God`s Mission and their heart cry was for God to continue to empower them for His work. In the face of growing and intense opposition to the Gospel, in the face of very real threats, perhaps on themselves or their families or their businesses, they prayed for an even greater boldness and power in carrying out God`s Mission.
And of course the Lord answered their prayer. Luke writes that the Lord filled them with His Spirit and gave them great boldness. Luke adds, “and the place where they were meeting was shaken.” A curious detail? Not likely. Read Exod. 19:18, Psalm 114:7, and Isaiah 6:4. Luke intends to have us know that in this particular prayer meeting the very Presence of Almighty God—once at Sinai, and later in redemptive history at the Temple—is in the midst of this small group of praying believers.
PRAYER
- Pray that the Lord will fill us a great boldness for accomplishing His Mission.
- Ask God to convict us to pray beyond the boundaries of our homes and lives, and pray our way into the lives of people, and institutions, and communities He is working to redeem. When we pray this way we begin to see how God uses prayer to invite us to join Him as He does His work.