Messages with Meaning


Sermons delivered at Sanlando Springs by Pastor Jack Parrott

Rescue Me

Acts 12:1-19
Presented on April 20, 2008, © Dr. Jack Parrott
I. Introduction

  1. Third message in a series on "Don't Fake It--Face It!" We've said it is important to face the truth, to honestly look at ourselves, and today, we focus on Almighty God, the Lord who is with us in our daily circumstances.
  2. Herod Agrippa has launched a campaign of terror against the Christians, having arrested James and ordered him beheaded. Now he has Peter arrested ("laid violent hands on") and he was waiting to be executed in the morning.
II. Sometimes we feel controlled by our circumstances
  1. Sometime life seems out of control
  2. Sometimes things seem to be only getting worse
  3. Sometimes bad things happen to people who live for God (remember Joseph, Job, John the Baptist, Jesus, James, Paul, and Peter to mention only a few!)
III. What changes our circumstances?
  1. What about human effort? Was Peter's break-out an inside job? Did someone spring him! Maybe he had bought off some of the guards. Or, perhaps it was sympathizers from outside who broke him out.
  2. What about positive thinking. Will that change our circumstances? Sometimes we escape in our dreams.
  3. In Peter's case it is divine intervention that changes things. Peter says, "I know without a doubt that the Lord..." (What did Luke mean by the term "a light shone in the cell."?)
IV. Prayer Changes circumstances
  1. We see that prayer is offered by the Christians for Peter
    Rhoda interrupted the Christians praying (noticed they prayed fervently, though maybe not expectantly! Sometimes our prayers aren't all they should be but we ought to pray anyway.)
  2. The prayers were received and heard by God. God responds to the prayers of His people: remember how the Hebrews in captivity cried out to God and were heard (Exodus 1)? See also Acts 4:31 and Isaiah 65:24.
  3. The effect of the prayers is experienced by Peter as he gains confidence. Facing prison and death Paul sings (16.25) and Peter sleeps!
V. God comes to our rescue
  1. God keeps us from our circumstances as we pray "deliver us from evil." See the temptation of Jesus and Psalm 91:15.
  2. Sometimes God doesn't deliver us from our circumstances, He carries us through our circumstances. This is the story of Israel.
    The story of Peter was not an escape, but a deliverance. Peter didn't break out, God broke in! The first is an act of man, the second is an act of God. (remember the Old Testament language for deliverance as when God delivered the Hebrews from the hands of the Egyptians)
  3. While God doesn't always deliver us through our circumstances, we believe God is always with us in our circumstances (He says, I will never leave you or forsake you.)
    We see this in the cross of Christ. We may feel forsaken, but God has not left us. The crucifixion is not the abandonment of God, but the greatest demonstration of the love of God known to man.
V. Conclusion
Almighty God stand ready to help you. God says to you: "Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know."


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