It Is His Angel

Acts 12:15 And they said unto her, Thou art mad. But she constantly affirmed that it was even so. Then said they, It is his angel.

I love the story in Acts 12. Peter is in prison, and he was getting ready for his execution. Herod had just killed James the brother of John, and it says that he was ready to "bring him forth" to be executed. He even had Peter sleep between two soldiers, with two chains, and then some more on the outside of the door. Herod wasn't messing around - tomorrow was Peter's day of death.

My thought today is this: I'm really glad that the principle of, "IF we ask in faith in the name of Jesus, THEN He will answer" is not true in the inverse, "IF we do not ask in faith, THEN He will not answer." Because, it says in verse 5 of that chapter that "prayer was made without ceasing of the church unto God for him." And even when Peter is finally released miraculously by the angel (if you're not familiar with the story, read it!), he goes to the house where people are in the middle of a prayer meeting. These people were praying fervantly for Peter!

But, what happens when their prayer was answered? Well, Rhoda hears Peter's knock on the door and goes and tells everyone else. Out of her excitement, she failed to even open the door for him. So, these prayer warriors, who did not cease to pray for Peter, when God gave them the answer to their prayers, what did they say to her? "Thou art mad." And when she insisted that he was there? "It is his angel." These people were more ready to believe that Peter's angel (whatever that may mean... another day's post) was standing at the door, than that God had freed Peter from prison as an answer to their prayers.

The moral of the story? We really should pray in faith, expecting God to answer, when we're asking things for God's sake. But, when we really don't think that God is going to answer the prayer - we ought to keep praying anyway. These people prayed without ceasing, yet deep down inside, they did not think that God was going to answer. They were expecting to have Peter's funeral tomorrow night, but they kept praying.

Pray without ceasing.

Just a thought...