Acts 12:6-10 (NIV)
The 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. Suddenly 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.
Then 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. Peter 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. They 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.
Peter was scheduled to be executed in the morning, but the night found him sleeping soundly, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. The four soldiers assigned to him for that part of the night were vigilant, dutifully guarding the sleeping man, one chained to each of his arms, and two outside the cell door.
But God heard the prayers that were even then rising before His throne, and He dispatched a messenger with heaven’s glory shining all around him, although the guards didn’t see a thing. They were not completely blinded, but just prevented from seeing what was happening right in front of them.
The angel woke Peter and urged him to get dressed quickly. The chains fell from his wrists and clattered to the floor. Peter looked up quickly at the guard on either side of him, but the two men simply looked straight ahead as if nothing unusual was going on. This was all so surreal that Peter thought he was experiencing an unusually vivid dream.
The door to the cell swung open, and Peter followed the angel past the other two guards stationed outside, both of which continued their vigilance, completely unaware that their prisoner was walking right past them, his way lighted by a brightly glowing companion. Finally, they reached the steel gate that opened onto the street. The gate swung open by itself, and the pair passed through.
As they went out into the dark, silent street, the cool fresh air hit Peter’s face, making him wonder if this was a dream after all. And after they had gone a single block, the angel suddenly vanished without a word, leaving Peter staring around himself in awe.
Peter had given himself up for lost. He figured that this was the moment when he would fulfill Jesus’ prophecy of his death (John 21:18-19), which spoke of how, but not when. And he was fine with that. But the Church had not given up. Even though it was the middle of the night, they were all still awake, praying intently for God to intervene. And that made all the difference.
Father, sometimes we grossly underestimate what fervent prayer can really do. Thankfully, the Church in Jerusalem did not, and their petitions reached Your throne and unleashed Your power to save. Lord, inspire our prayers, even today. We face many difficult, sometimes impossible, situations, but our tendency even then is to try to fix things on our own. We fail to pray consistently or passionately, so You allow us to do what we can ourselves. But that’s not the way You set things up to work. You designed us to work like Jesus, to turn to You immediately and to rely on You for the answers we need. Help us to do better, today and every day. Amen.
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