Ministry, Opposition: is this from God?
Acts 5:12-42
December 9, 2007

How do you react to the presence of grandma? Of your best friend? Of a police cruiser?

How do people react to the presence of God?

Continuing Ministry v 12-16

Signs and wonders as authenticating signs to the truth of the gospel

God raised up Jesus, the Christ, as the savior. He freely grants repentance and forgiveness of sins through faith in his name. He is the savior that we been waiting for.

Reaction to the ministry
Some followed (Acts 5:12, 14; 2 Cor. 2:15-16)

Shied away, with respect (Acts 5:13)
Some opposed v 17

The accusation v 28
You are preaching the name; we commanded you not to.
You have filled Jerusalem with your teaching; contrary to our command.
You have sought to bring this man’s blood upon us; we don’t like that.

Peter preaches the gospel to them. V 29-32
Issue of authority (Which comes first, the sovereign or the sinner?)

What was their reaction?
Fury

Advice of Gamaliel

Jesus claims to be someone, Romans killed him.
His followers should disperse and come to nothing.
Unless this is true, then you would be fighting against God.

Apostles rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name
(Luke 6:22-23; Matt 5:10; Gal 6:17; Col 1:24; 1 Peter 4:13)

How do you react to the evident presence of God?



The Christian and Persecution
David Martyn Lloyd-Jones (1899-1981)
“Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” — Matthew 5:10

What, then, does this Beatitude mean? Let me put it like this. Being righteous, practising righteousness, really means being like the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore they are blessed who are persecuted for being like Him. What is more, those who are like Him always will be persecuted. Let me show this first of all from the teaching of the Bible. Listen to the way in which our Lord Himself puts it. “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you. If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you” (Joh 15:18-20). Now there is no qualification, it is a categorical statement. Listen to His servant Paul putting it in this way, “Yea,” says Paul, writing to Timothy, who did not understand this teaching and was therefore unhappy because he was being persecuted, “Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution” (2Ti 3:12). It is again a categorical statement. That is why I said at the beginning that I sometimes think this is the most searching of all the Beatitudes. Are you suffering persecution?

Do we know what it is to be persecuted for righteousness' sake? To become like Him we have to become light; light always exposes darkness, and the darkness therefore always hates the light. We are not to be offensive; we are not to be foolish; we are not to be unwise; we are not even to parade the Christian faith. We are not to do anything that calls for persecution. But by just being like Christ persecution becomes inevitable. But that is the glorious thing. Rejoice in this, say Peter and James. And our Lord Himself says, “Blessed are ye, happy are ye, if you are like that.” Because if ever you find yourself persecuted for Christ and for righteousness' sake, you have in a sense got the final proof of the fact that you are a Christian, that you are a citizen of the kingdom of heaven. “Unto you,” says Paul to the Philippians, “unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake” (Phi 1:29). And I look at those first Christians persecuted by the authorities and I hear them thanking God that at last they had been accounted worthy to suffer for the Name's sake.
May God through His Holy Spirit give us great wisdom, discrimination, knowledge and understanding in these things, so that if ever we are called upon to suffer, we may know for certain that it is for righteousness' sake, and may have the full comfort and consolation of this glorious Beatitude