April 13, 2009

Acts 12:5 All the time that Peter was under heavy guard in the jailhouse, the church prayed for him most strenuously.

In this week’s sermon I spoke about the way Acts, chapter 12 (and really, all of Acts), was the sequel to the life and work of Jesus. In Acts the story continues with the disciples living out much of what Jesus lived in his time on earth. In this sequel, as it is told in Acts, Peter and later Paul have the starring roles. But there is a large supporting cast and in this scene the supporting cast has the role of prayer. If I am correct in assuming that the sequel of the Easter story continues to this day and includes us then we can take a lesson from this passage. Prayer is a vital part of the story, and those who pray, though they may be seen as supporting cast by others, have a significant role to play. Maybe we need to learn to pray not that we will be part of God’s continuing story, but that our prayers in and of themselves become part of that story. What if we touched the reality of the resurrection as we prayed? What if prayer became the way we live with God, an end in itself and not a means to something else? May we find the life of the resurrected Jesus in our prayers this Easter season.

Don