Peter, by accessing the power of the Holy Spirit inside of him, healed a crippled man – no one could deny that. What were the officials to do? Condemn him of a good deed? Clearly not. So, their alternative was to forbid Jesus’ from being discussed. In the present day, we see a lot of “separation of church and (fill in the blank)”. Governing officials do their best to keep the Lord out of legal matters and everyday lives. But we are called to bear witness! Our loyalty and duties are to the calling that God has placed on our lives. We answer to our Heavenly Father, because we know that our home is in heaven.
Relative truths are often easier to embrace. It’s easier to believe what you want and give good wishes to those who disagree with you. But, if you have accepted Jesus Christ into your heart, you have accepted that He is the one true way to eternal salvation! And to build on that, once you have truly accepted Jesus into your heart, you have accepted the calling to love people like Jesus did. If I genuinely love someone, do I not want to see them in the mass of believers rejoicing at the throne of God in eternity? If you are simply comfortable accepting that you’ve been saved and are secure if your eternity, while flippantly disregarding the eternal path of those that you claim to love, do you really love them?
Earthly trials and tribulations. We will all face them, God told us it was coming. When you’re in the muck of it, are you praying for God to take it away or are you moved to pray for the boldness to press through it? We just saw that Peter and John were reprimanded for acting in faith and serving the calling God placed on their hearts. Did it scare them into a corner and force them to stop performing miraculous acts in the name of God? It sure didn’t! They returned to their own people and joined together with them to pray and ask for boldness to continue. We can speak with this confidence, as we believe in God, the creator of all things and source of all life.
We’re given this beautiful view into the early church. We are reminded that the community prays together. They surrender earthly goods and share amongst themselves. There’s a whole lot of together-ing going on, and it leads them to a whole heap of God’s grace working through them. We should see that our spiritual brothers and sisters are cared for. We will all go through seasons of being the givers and seasons of needing to be the receivers. But through it all, pray. Continue to speak the truth of God’s goodness in what He has done, is doing and will continue to do.