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Scripture Reading: Acts 5

I’d like to talk today about my all-time favorite Super Hero, if you could call Him that.  His name is Jesus Christ and He’s the best example of our topic today, “Faith Obeys.”

I can’t think of anyone who epitomizes obedience more than Jesus on the night before He died when He prayed:  “…not My will, but Yours be done” (Luke 22:42).

But just because Jesus was the Son of God, it doesn’t mean that He didn’t agonize over the choices He made, just like the rest of us do.  Luke says that Jesus was in such anguish over His decision that night that, “His sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground” (Luke 22.44b).

I guess it’s not really fair to compare Jesus to other Super Heroes like Superman or Spider-Man, because Jesus was the Son of God.  He had access to powers they could never have imagined.  But at the same time, Jesus was also fully human―more real, and more like us, than Superman or Spider-Man ever were.

The Bible says that Jesus had real flesh and blood (Hebrews 2:14), was born as a baby (Luke 2:7), was scolded by his parents (Luke 2:48), and grew in wisdom and stature (Luke 2:52).  He experienced love (John 11:5), anger (Mark 3:5), joy (Hebrews 12:2), betrayal (Luke 22:48), temptation (Hebrews 4:15) and pain (Matthew 27:46).  He bled (John 19:34), He cried (John 11:35), He suffered (Hebrews 13:12) and He died (Mark 15:39).

The more that I can envision Jesus as a real human being, the more I can envision that I can really do what He did, as He said I could do when He said, “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in Me will do what I have been doing” (John 14:12).

That includes being obedient to God, regardless of the consequences to us personally. Peter and John found that same strength to obey God, even when threatened with death, as we can see in Acts chapters 4 and 5.  After calling on the name of Jesus to heal a man who had been crippled for over forty years, Peter and John were commanded by the religious leaders to stop speaking or teaching at all in the name of Jesus.  Peter replied,

“Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God.  For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard…We must obey God rather than men!” (Acts 4:19-20, 5:29). 

When faced with death, Peter and John had to make a choice.  These weren’t idle threats.  The religious leaders had already shown their resolve to follow through on their threats by putting Jesus to death.

But Peter and John also knew what Jesus had called them to do.  They had just seen Christ perform a miracle through them when they called on His name.  So they responded with the only response that made sense to them:  “…we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.”

If God is calling you to stop a relationship that you know is destroying you, stop it, even if it seems too hard or too complicated.  If God is calling you to stay in a marriage that you’d rather get out of, stay in it.  If God is calling you to another job, take it, but if He’s calling you to stay in your current job, don’t leave.  If He’s calling you to stop a bad habit that’s killing you, stop it, and if He’s calling you to start a good habit that will save you, start it!

God gave Peter and John the strength to do what they needed to do, just like He gave Jesus the strength to do what He needed to do―just like He’ll give you the strength to do what He wants you to do, when you put your faith in Christ.

Prayer: Father, help me to do all that You’re calling me to do today, to obey Your will, not my own, and not the will of others, but Yours alone. In Jesus’ name, Amen.