Let’s turn to Acts chapter 4; page 911 in the pew Bibles.
They say it was there all along. One of my favorite childhood movies has to be “The Wizard of
Oz.” And we’re all familiar with the characters – with Dorothy and Toto and Tin Man, Scarecrow
and the Cowardly Lion. Dorothy wants to go back home, Scarecrow needs a brain, Tin Man a
heart, and the Lion, what he lacks is courage, bravery. At one point, the Cowardly Lion says,
“Alright, I’ll go in there for Dorothy. Wicked Witch or no Wicked Witch, guards or no guards,
I’ll tear them apart. I may not come out alive, but I’m going in there! There’s just one thing I
need you fellas to do for me.” “What’s that?” “Talk me out of it!” That’s the Cowardly Lion. He
was a lot of talk, but really he was afraid. But in the movie, by the time the trouble came and by
the time the Lion met up with the Wizard, the Lion had actually shown himself to be brave. It
was there all along. And one person offers this lesson from “The Wizard of Oz” – “The
Scarecrow wishes for a brain, the Tin Man wants a heart, and the Cowardly Lion wants nothing
more than to be brave, but these characters possess these very qualities from the start. If you look
within yourselves, you may be able to pull out the strength, courage, and intelligence you never
knew you had. It was there all along.”
Well as we come to Acts chapter 4 this evening, we come to a passage about boldness, about
courage in the face of trial. But if it came down to boldness that Peter had within himself, to a
boldness that was there from the start, do you know what that might mean for us? It might mean
that we had never heard about Jesus, because for Peter, what was deep down within himself was
fear. And that’s probably true for a lot of us as well. But we need boldness. We need boldness to
live as faithful disciples of Christ in a secular world. We need boldness to be faithful witnesses to
Christ wherever God calls us to go. Not a boldness that is loud or obnoxious or abrasive or
cranky. No, we need a boldness that’s different from that. We need a boldness that’s strong,
that’s firm, settled, resilient and winsome. And for that kind of boldness, we need to look not
within ourselves but to look to God and to look to Christ and to look to Acts chapter 4. As we
look to Acts chapter 4 tonight we’ll see two things. We’ll see, one, the fragility of boasting. And
then two, the strength of boldness. The fragility of boasting and the strength of boldness.
Before we read God’s Word, let’s ask for His wisdom in understanding it. Let’s pray.
Father, we come with boldness even now to ask for Your help and to confess to You that within
us we have no ability to understand Your Word, to know it’s truth and hide it within our hearts,
to apply it to our lives and to walk in faithfulness. We need Your help. And You’ve promised to
give us Your help. You’ve promised to give help to those who ask. So we come to ask You tonight
that You would give us wisdom, give us grace. Show us Your Spirit. Give us Your Spirit. Show us
Jesus. Help us to understand Your Word, to live out Your truth in all of our lives for Your glory
and for our good. We pray this in Jesus’ name, amen.
Acts chapter 4. We’ll read the first thirty-one verses:
“And as they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and
the Sadducees came upon them, greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people
and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. And they arrested them and put
them in custody until the next day, for it was already evening. But many of those who
had heard the word believed, and the number of the men came to about five thousand.
On the next day their rulers and elders and scribes gathered together in Jerusalem, with
Annas the high priest and Caiaphas and John and Alexander, and all who were of the
high-priestly family. And when they had set them in the midst, they inquired, ‘By what
power or by what name did you do this?’ Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to
them, ‘Rulers of the people and elders, if we are being examined today concerning a good
deed done to a crippled man, by what means this man has been healed, let it be known to
all of you and to all the people of Israel that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth,
whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by him this man is standing
before you well. This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has
become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name
under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.’
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were
uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been
with Jesus. But seeing the man who was healed standing beside them, they had nothing to
say in opposition. But when they had commanded them to leave the council, they
conferred with one another, saying, ‘What shall we do with these men? For that a notable
sign has been performed through them is evident to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and
we cannot deny it. But in order that it may spread no further among the people, let us
warn them to speak no more to anyone in this name.’ So they called them and charged
them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered them,
‘Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must
judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.’ And when they had
further threatened them, they let them go, finding no way to punish them, because of the
people, for all were praising God for what had happened. For the man on whom this sign
of healing was performed was more than forty years old.
When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests
and the elders had said to them. And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together
to God and said, ‘Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and
everything in them, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the
Holy Spirit,
‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth
set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against
his Anointed’—
for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom
you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of
Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place. And now,
Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word
with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are
performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.’ And when they had prayed, the
place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the
Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.”
The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the Word of our God endures forever.
First, we have the fragility of boasting. Verse 1 picks up on the story that we left off with last
week at the end of chapter 3. You remember that Peter was preaching to the crowds who had
gathered together at Solomon’s portico after the healing of the lame man. And he preached Jesus.
He preached the resurrection. He preached repentance. And over 5,000 people believed that day.
Chapter 3 verse 26 says, “God, having raised up His servants, sent them to you first to bless you
by turning every one of you from your wickedness.” And then chapter 4 verse 1, “And as they
were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came
upon them.” You see what we have here is the first sign of trouble in the book of Acts. And what
is the reason for that first sign of trouble? It is because of Peter’s preaching. So that’s the context
of this story in Acts chapter 4.
But really, really if we want to see the roots of this story, we have to go all the way back into the
gospel of Luke. Peter, you see, when Jesus told him that Satan had demanded to sift him like
wheat, Peter – what did he say to Jesus? He said, “Lord, I am ready to go with you both to prison
and to death.” And there’s another place in Matthew chapter 26 where Jesus says to His disciples,
“You will all fall away because of Me this night.” What does Peter say? Peter answered,
“Though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away.” He was full of confidence. He
was not afraid to boast of his own commitment, to boast of his own resolve, to boast of his own
ability to stand. But it was just a few minutes later, the words were barely out of his mouth, and
when the priests and the captains of the temple and the elders came upon Jesus, what did Peter
and the rest of the disciples do? They all fled. They all left Him and they fled. They fell away.
They all fell away, including Peter.
But what about a few minutes later, or later on that evening? What about when Peter watched
from a distance as Jesus was arrested, interrogated, beaten and mocked. What did Peter do then?
Well you know what happened. What happened is, he denied he ever knew Jesus. Three times he
denied Jesus. Once to a harmless servant girl and two other times to seemingly random people
passing by. “I do not know Him. I am not one of His disciples. I do not know what you are
talking about.” So much for being ready to go to prison and to die for Jesus. When trouble came,
Peter denied Jesus altogether. And then, there’s that moving scene where the rooster crows and
Peter remembers how Jesus had said he would deny Him and he was devastated by his failure.
He wept. He went out and he wept bitterly. That’s Peter. That’s the context of this story going all
the way back to the gospel of Luke. That’s who Peter was. That’s what Peter did.
But let’s not be too hard on Peter. The other day I was getting a haircut. I know that sounds like
somewhat of a sad prospect! There’s not much to do there; I understand! In fact, it’s the first time
I had been to a barber in several years! But the barber was using all sorts of colorful language, he
was talking about late nights, Saturday nights, and what happens on Sunday mornings after that.
And then he said, “What do you do?” Well, just for a moment I flinched and I said, “I’m a
pastor.” And it was just for a second, but I’m no better than Peter. All this guy had in his hands
were hair clippers with a number 3 guard on them; nothing like these men who had come at Jesus
with clubs and swords and torches. Peter’s life, you see, when the people came to arrest Jesus,
Peter’s life had been legitimately in danger. We have to show some sympathy for Peter in the
gospel story, but we also have to recognize that for all of his confidence, for all of his boasting,
when it came time to back up his words, Peter faltered. Peter failed in a big way. All of his talk,
all of his bold claims, they were really just thin veneer, they were a facade for an underlying
inadequacy. They were a facade for his hidden fears. He was fragile, you see.
And by the way, that’s often the case with someone who talks a big game and is all about self
promotion. It’s fragile. Everything is not as it seems and it’s often a cover for a wounded ego or
a sense of emptiness deep down inside. Those people are not as scary as they may seem to be for
us. We have to remember that. We have to remember that none of us are as strong as we like to
think that we are. And that was the case for Peter too. He had a proven track record of caving
under pressure.
But then, as he speaks to the crowds in Acts chapter 4, and as he faces the opposition of the
authorities, what does Peter do this time? He shows, surprisingly, the strength of boldness. He
shows boldness. The first verses say that, ‘When the priests and the captain of the temple and the
Sadducees came upon Peter and John, the authorities were greatly annoyed and they arrested
Peter and John and put them in custody.” Recognize that these are the same authorities that came
after Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. I’m not talking about a generic, nameless, faceless
mob; I’m talking about perhaps the exact same people. Malchus could have been there. You
remember Malchus, don’t you? Malchus was the high priest’s servant, the one whose ear Peter
cut off with an ill-advised swipe of his sword; the one whose ear Jesus healed. Malchus could
very well have been there in this crowd that came upon Peter and John in Solomon’s portico.
They had probably seen each other before. There was a history there. And these were the same
authorities who were responsible for putting Jesus to death. Again, they had names. Names like
Annas and Caiphas and John and Alexander. These were the people who were responsible for
doing what? For crucifying Jesus.
Back in April, one of the doctors in the congregation sent me a copy of an old medical journal
article and it was discussing Jesus’ possible cause of death on the cross from a medical
perspective. The writer gives a seven-point outline of what usually happened in the terminal
hours on a cross. And there were things in that outline, terms that I don’t understand, I don’t
have the medical knowledge to understand it, but as I looked into it and read through the article,
it was describing something that, as we well know, it was unbelievably horrific. There was
intense pain. There was a heart racing out of control. Suffocation. The skin turning blue. Muscles
cramping. Organs failing. And the loss of bodily fluids. All of this would have created a sight
which was scarring to say the least. Peter and the disciples had witnessed all of that, and now
here it is in Acts chapter 4, Peter and John are under interrogation from the same authorities, the
same rulers in Jerusalem. They could have sent Peter and John to Pontius Pilate. They could have
demanded their crucifixion as well. But what happens when they ask Peter and John, “By what
power and by what name did you do this? Well this time, this time Peter did not deny the name
of Jesus. This time, what did Peter say? Peter said that it was “by the name of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth that this man is standing before you well.” And, verse 12, “There is salvation in no one
else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”
Peter was bold. Peter was bold. He was strong. He was fearless, courageous. He did not back
down. He did not falter. He did not hesitate to proclaim the name of Jesus with all boldness.
How? How did he do that? How was it that such uneducated, common men – the word there in
Greek is “——,’ from which we get the word, “idiot.” How could such common, uneducated
men be so bold? Well you know what? We have to go back to the gospel of Luke again to see
what’s going on here and where they acquired such boldness. Because Jesus had told His
disciples in Luke chapter 21 – this is what He told them – He said, “They will lay their hands on
you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons and you will be brought
before kings and governors for my name’s sake. But,” He said, “this will be your opportunity to
bear witness.” And to bear witness not because they had meditated beforehand what they would
say, but this is what Jesus’ promise was to them. He said, “I will give you a mouth and wisdom
which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict. And ultimately not a hair
of your head will perish, and by your endurance you will gain your lives.”
Let’s ask the question again – How could they be so bold? Because Jesus made them bold. He
promised in Luke chapter 21 that He would give them the words when they faced persecution
and here in Acts 4, He fulfills His promise to them and gives them the words to say when they
faced that persecution. Jesus is the key to their boldness. He gives it, He models it, and He is
proclaimed by it. Unfortunately, when we think about boldness, oftentimes what we think of is
something that is loud, maybe combative, or it’s focused on winning an argument. In fact,
sometimes people in the reformed circles can have a reputation for being on the mean side and
thinking that we have it all right.
But that’s not what this is in Acts 4. This is not a person posting on social media with a hottake
on gender or abortion or liberalism. This is not putting it out there on social media or not putting
it out there on a bumper sticker. This is not a culture war warrior being offensive. This is not the
person on the corner of the street in New Orleans berating the crowd walking into a basketball
game as was experienced by my sons and I a few years ago. That’s not what this is. It’s not that
kind of boldness. No, this boldness is much different, and it’s different in at least three ways.
Here are the ways this boldness is different. It’s Christ-given, it’s Christ-like, and it’s Christ-
honoring.
This is Christ-given boldness. Don’t miss that Luke is careful in this passage to point out twice,
two times in this passage, that Peter and John’s boldness came because they were filled with the
Holy Spirit. Verse 8, “Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them…” and then that’s followed
by the comment in verse 13 about the authorities being “astonished by their boldness.” And if
you look down in verse 31, it says the same thing. They were all “filled with the Holy Spirit and
continued to speak the Word of God with boldness.” Those two things are paired together – the
Spirit of God, dealing with the Holy Spirit, and boldness. You see, it’s not their personality type;
it’s the power of God. And it’s not their natural ability; it’s a supernatural gift. Remember, we’ve
talked about this several times in looking at the book of Acts. The book of Acts is all about
Jesus’ continuing ministry to and through His disciples. How does He continue that ministry?
It’s through the gift of the Holy Spirit. And now it is through that same power, through the Holy
Spirit, that they were made bold. Peter and John and all of their friends, they recognize that.
They recognize that it wasn’t on their own ability. They recognize that it was given by God.
That’s why they prayed. And down in verse 24 they say, “Sovereign Lord, you said that the
nations would rage, you said that the peoples would plot in vain, you said that this would come.
Now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to Your servants to continue to speak Your Word
with all boldness.” They had boldness because they asked for boldness. They knew that they
didn’t have it in them, but God gives good gifts to those who are in Christ Jesus and the gift of
the Holy SPirit, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead, is the power which gives His
apostles boldness in Acts chapter 4. Their boldness starts with a dependence upon the Lord and
not on their own abilities. It’s a Christ-given boldness.
And then we notice also that it is a Christ-like boldness. Let’s just highlight some of the aspects
of their boldness in this passage. Number one, it was a respectful boldness. They were respectful.
Peter addressed the rulers and the elders as rulers and elders. Verse 8 says, “Peter, filled with the
Holy Spirit, said to them, ‘Rulers of the people and elders…’” He recognized their place of
authority. And what they were being accused of was not about some act of insurrection or
rebellion. No, it was about a good deed that was done to a crippled man. They were honorable to
their authorities in their boldness.
And then, they were truthful. They weren’t dealing in soundbites or clickbait or loaded
questions. They merely spoke what they had seen and what they had heard. They spoke about
Jesus and they spoke about His death and His resurrection and about how it was by Him that this
lame man now stood before them well. They spoke to witness to what had happened, and not in
any way to sort of manipulate the other people, to manipulate the situations for their own benefit.
They were just truthful. They spoke of what had happened, what they had seen, what they had
heard.
So they were respectful, they were truthful, and they were obedient. They were obedient to God.
Look at verse 19. “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than God, you
must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.” They would be obedient
to God no matter what man said to them. Their first allegiance was to God and to God alone. It
didn’t matter. It didn’t matter what kind of pressure, it didn’t matter what kind of threats they
were facing. It didn’t matter what the cost was to them. They would continue to teach and to
preach in Jesus Christ the resurrection of the dead. Why? Because Jesus had charged them to do
that very thing.
So they were respectful, truthful, obedient, and then they were also guided by the Scripture and
submitted to God’s will in prayer. They understood their situation and they responded to their
situation. They responded to their accusers by looking to God’s Word. Verse 11 is a reference
back to Psalm 118. “This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you the builders which would
become the cornerstone.” Verse 24 points to Genesis chapter 1, “In the beginning, God created
the heavens and the earth.” Verse 25 comes from Psalm 2, “Why do the Gentiles rage and the
peoples plot in vain?” You see, they filtered everything that was happening to them and their
response to those things through the lens of God’s Word. And then they prayed. They prayed not
to avoid trouble. They prayed not to have the threat removed from them, but they prayed in order
to be bold in those threats and in that trouble. They looked to the Word and they looked to God
in prayer.
So there’s more that we could say about their boldness, but we can say at least this about it – that
it was respectful, it was truthful, it was obedient, it was Scriptural, and it was prayerful. In other
words, their boldness was a lot like Jesus because when He was reviled He did not revile in
return, neither was deceit found in His mouth. He said that it was His food to do the will of His
Father. He was obedient to the point of death, and everything He did, He did so that Scripture
might be fulfilled and it was His custom, it was His regular practice to withdraw, to separate
Himself, and to pray. “Not My will be done, but Thy will be done.” Jesus’ boldness was all of
these things that we see in Peter and John, and as such, He is a model of true boldness. It is a
Christ-like boldness that we see in Acts chapter 4.
So it’s Christ-given, it’s Christ-like, lately it’s Christ-honoring. We’ll be brief on this one, but we
can’t miss that the whole purpose of the apostles’ boldness was to point to Christ. It wasn’t about
defending their rights; it wasn’t even about them being right. It wasn’t about a political agenda. It
wasn’t even really about them defending themselves. Again, and simply, it was about Jesus.
Even for those who were threatening them, their main message to those authorities, to their
accusers, the message they were speaking to them was about salvation in Christ. Verse 12 says,
“And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men
by which we must be saved.” You see, their boldness was to tell these rulers who had crucified
Jesus and who were holding them there in custody that the way of forgiveness, the way of
salvation comes through Christ and only through Christ. And it’s in this confrontation, as they
spoke, they spoke in such a way that it would be for the ultimate good of their opposition; that
they would see Jesus. That directed all the things that they said in their boldness. That’s what
real boldness is – it’s Christ-given, it’s Christ-like, it’s Christ-honoring.
And I love what the second half of verse 13 says. It says, “They recognized that they had been
with Jesus.” Don’t you love that? They recognized that they had been with Jesus and they boldly
spoke about Jesus. That’s a far cry from what had happened before when they recognized that
Peter had been with Jesus and he boldly denied it. And now here it is, they recognize that Peter
had been with Jesus and they boldly confessed the name of Jesus. He was bold. And it’s this
boldness that really sets the course for the whole rest of the book of Acts because it’s not just
about Peter and John and their friends who were bold, but it’s Stephen as the first martyr and it’s
all those who were spread about because of the persecution that came upon them. And it’s Paul
as Paul goes before the synagogues and the pagans and the governors and kings. This is how the
word about Jesus spreads from Jerusalem to Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. How?
Because of boldness. It was all boldness.
I wonder, I wonder if Theophilus got the message. Remember why Luke wrote the gospel to
Theophilus. The gospel of Luke, it says, the purpose statement in it is that he wrote to
Theophilus so that “he might have certainty concerning the things that he had been taught.” What
do you do with that kind of certainty? You take up the Word with all boldness. I wonder if we
get the message? I wonder if we get the message tonight? Do we need boldness when the barber
asks you what you do? Do we need boldness when our friends make fun of us for not going
along with the way they talk or the way they mistreat others or the way they handle dating and
relationships? Do we need boldness to stand apart and help our friends do what is right? There
was some boldness going on in the children’s devotion tonight. As one child was trying to get
her friends to come along and do what’s right. That takes some boldness. Do we need boldness
to treat the Lord’s Day differently, differently from the other days of the week, differently from
the way our peers treat the Lord’s Day? I wonder if we need boldness to take a friendship, take a
conversation with someone at school or at work in the direction of Jesus and the Gospel? I
wonder if we need boldness to face death with courage and hope?
Of course we need boldness, and not the kind that is loud, angry, offensive and rude. We need
the kind that is Christ-given and Christ-like and Christ-honoring. We need that kind of boldness.
That doesn’t mean that we are going to be soft or silenced. It means that we will be tough and
firm and strong and maybe even confrontational if that’s what it calls for. But to do it in a way
that is like Christ and that points to Christ so that others would see us and recognize that in a
very real way, that we have been with Jesus.
I wanted to end with a story of boldness, maybe a story about Luther – “Here I stand. I can do no
other. So help me God.” Or maybe about John Knox, “Give me Scotland or I die!” But the more
I was reading about Luther and Knox and others, even those who were sympathetic with those
men and with their lives will tell you of their complicated personalities and how Martin Luther
could show extraordinary intemperance and how John Knox had a ruggedness and a want or lack
of taste to him, and sometimes he was the enemy of all refinement. And we don’t want to be too
tough on those men either, of course they lived in extraordinary times and we don’t want to view
their lives through revisionist history lenses. But you know what? We could say the same thing
about Peter as well, because what does Peter do later on in his life? He withdrew from the
Gentiles in Antioch. Why did he do that? Because he had fear of the circumcision party. Here is
Peter who is so bold, and yet he can show such fear later on in his life.
All that to say, let’s not look to Luther or Knox or even to Peter, but to Christ and to look to the
Savior Jesus Christ and to what He has done for us in all of our faltering and all of our failures
and He has redeemed us and saved us from our sins and given us life in Him – a freedom, a
confidence, a gift of the Holy Spirit. And let’s not stop seeking to be bold for Him in whatever
opportunity Jesus gives us to do so, and to ask God for that boldness, for the boldness that we
need, and to submit to God’s way for us in whatever He calls us to do.
Let’s pray.
Father, we thank You for this Your Word and for this example of boldness in the face of trial.
And we thank You for the way in which it points us to our all sufficient Savior. We rest in Him,
we go in Him, and we look to be bold and glorify Your name in all that we do. We pray this in
Jesus’ name, amen.