A lesson in faith from the early church during the Days of Unleavened Bread.
Transcript
[Darris McNeely] We’re in the midst of the Days of Unleavened Bread, the annual festival that commemorates God bringing Israel out of Egypt and all of us today, examining our lives and putting sin from our lives and using the help of God and His Holy Spirit to accomplish that. It’s an interesting period of time. I was teaching about this in a class recently, as we were going through the book of Acts, and we came to Acts chapter 12, and a significant event that took place at that time in the story of the church. It’s in Acts chapter 12, beginning in verse 1, and it happened right at the period of time of Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread, when the king, whose name was Herod, at that time, it says, “stretched out his hand to harass some in the church” (Acts 12:1) – create problems and persecute the church. And what he did was, “he killed James the brother of John,” it says, “with the sword” – put him to death. “And because he saw that it pleased the Jews, he proceeded further to seize Peter also” – one of the apostles. And, “it was during the Days of Unleavened Bread.” So it’s during this period of time set aside as a holy season to observe the festivals of God, which we are doing today and continue to do in our lives, that this particular event took place. And he had Peter arrested, he put him in prison intending, it says, “to bring him back before the people after the Passover”, which encompassed the entire season of Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread (Acts 12:1-5).
So here was a significant event – the death of one of the chief leaders of the church, one of the apostles, James, put to death because of his faith and because of the desire of the political authorities to make a point of the church and to harass them. That’s a very, very powerful thing. We don’t normally think about that in our walk in the church today, or that happening today, because of our modern world in which we live, but persecution has a way of raising its head in many different forms, and as we obey God and keep the Days of Unleavened Bread, I think a good question is, what is it that saw them through and what sees us through? It’s constant prayer.
When you look at what the church did after the death of one of their chief leaders and another being put in prison, just because of who they were and what they believed, it says, “Peter, as he was kept in prison, constant prayer was offered to God for him by the church.” Constant prayer. Taking it to God. Being mindful of what God’s power can do, far beyond what we might ourselves be able to accomplish. Their backs were against the wall. They could only answer the power of the sword put upon them, and the power of people that set against them and using the means of government and the power that was there, the only thing the church could do was to pray.
That’s a good lesson for all of us to learn for every day of the year, especially as we observe God’s Holy Days – that it’s prayer, it’s contact with God, that’s going to give us the strength to deal with whatever challenge is put before us.
