5So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.
6The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance.7Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. "Quick, get up!" he said, and the chains fell off Peter's wrists.
8Then the angel said to him, "Put on your clothes and sandals." And Peter did so. "Wrap your cloak around you and follow me," the angel told him. 9Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea that what the angel was doing was really happening; he thought he was seeing a vision. 10They passed the first and second guards and came to the iron gate leading to the city. It opened for them by itself, and they went through it. When they had walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.
11Then Peter came to himself and said, "Now I know without a doubt that the Lord sent his angel and rescued me from Herod's clutches and from everything the Jewish people were anticipating."
King Herod was persecuting and harassing Christians to boost his popularity. He arrested James and Peter. James was mercilessly executed, and believers could see that they couldn't simply expect God's protection for the apostles and themselves. It was an anxious and uncertain time for the church. You can imagine the believers' thoughts, Where is God in all of this? When will He intervene? (I think we can all identify with thoughts like these)
So they responded by praying(v5). Their current plight didnt diminish God or the fact that He was in control.
They trusted him.
Prayer is the most natural and normal response for a heart that is dependent on God. If you are truly counting on Him to do something, you will pray about it. If you are not counting on God, you will not call out to Him.
Oswald chambers said,"We have to pray with our eyes on God, not on the difficulties."
Part of my QT devo. If you're using ODJ it's May 14th's (: go have a read.
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Thanks wax and kimmie for pointing me prayer for my issues and planning retreat really gave me an opportunity to submit. <3
Just a random thought. you know sometimes we want to run away from work and responsibility because we want more time to do things we like, we don't want to be stressed out. we just want to keep as much time as we can to ourselves to have fun. But by doing that, we're depriving ourselves of sooo much. being stressed, having lots of work gives us opportunities for us to put into practice what we've learnt. about trusting, dependency, purpose...i dont know. sooo maannyy thingsss. If we dont practice what we learn, we'll just end up having a brainful (i made up a new word(: ) of head knowlege. Head knowledge is nothing if it's not translated to the heart and the hands.
head. heart. hands
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2. I was walking home today and i saw people walking their dogs, logs from trees that were being chopped down and i just thought. Aren't dogs supposed to be free in the wild? Aren't trees supposed to be part of vast, beautiful, lush forests? What has it become??? You almost never see wild dogs anymore. They're all pets in chains and leashes ( sorry maomao.)!
I imagined how things were in the beginning and...it's beautiful, stunning, imperfectly perfect. Yes i know we need to cut down trees for housing, for education, a livelihood but i think we're taking it too far that we neglect what God has entrusted us with. We forgot to take care of the plants and animals God has granted us. but then again, many people can't be bothered with God so...i'm feeling kind helpless towards this. So much so much sooo much suffering, corruption and evil everywhere and i cant do anything. i guess we can only hope for a better place when Christ comes again. This world is way too corrupted.
