The Boldness of the Church (The Book of Acts #7)
Back in the stone ages — before Roku and Apple TV and Fire sticks, when those of us living in the early 2000s had to get our television over the airwaves — there was a show called Lost.
I was serving as a young adult pastor and also helping lead a city-wide young adult ministry, and every young adult I knew was talking about Lost. But we had little kids at home and no time for television.
Then I found out that ABC, for the first time ever, was putting its shows on the internet. So my wife and I engineered a date night: get the kids in bed, open up my big clunky laptop, and slowly catch up with everyone else.
And they were right. The show was riveting. Every week ended on some kind of cliffhanger, and you’d spend the next seven days wondering where the writers were going.
At the height of its popularity, I heard a pastor lamenting that the people in his church were more excited about Lost than about Scripture. And he started wondering whether there was a way to teach that would create scriptural cliffhangers — so people would come back desperate to hear what happened next.
If you were here last Sunday, you heard me say that in our study of Acts I was skipping a section — jumping ahead to the end of chapter 4 — and deliberately saving this passage for today.
My pastor friend would hope that created a cliffhanger. That you had this Sunday circled on the calendar, arrived early, and were sitting here with Acts 4 already open, waiting with bated breath.
I’m not going to fool myself. None of you did that, because all you had to do was go read the section I skipped. In fact, by announcing that I was skipping it, some of you probably ignored last week’s sermon entirely and read ahead to figure it out yourselves. Thankfully I talked for thirty-five minutes, and it doesn’t take that long to read.
But we’re going back to it today, because there are things here that are not only more compelling than an episode of Lost — they’re genuinely life-changing.
What We Pray For
Last November the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion published an academic study on prayer. They surveyed people about demographics, frequency, and duration — but also about the content of prayers. They asked whether people prayed about specific topics always, most of the time, sometimes, rarely, or never.
Combining “always” and “most of the time,” the number one topic was praying for the well-being of others. I was genuinely impressed by that — that we as Americans pray more for others than for ourselves.
Number two was praise to God, which I’d assume includes thanksgiving and gratitude. Then came guidance, forgiveness, health, relationships.
Only two things surprised me. I didn’t expect praise to land as high as second — I thought we were a little more selfish than that. And I was surprised that finances came in dead last. I’ve known people going through genuine financial crises, so I expected that to rank higher.
Everything else was exactly what I’d have predicted, because it’s what I hear in my own prayers and in the prayers of others.
But when we get into Acts 4, we discover something sadly missing from that chart. And I’ll be the first to confess it’s also missing from my prayers. And knowing most of you, I suspect it’s missing from yours.
A Word to the Graduates
Before we go there — the reason I saved this passage for today is that I wanted to speak directly to our five graduates. I didn’t want them to miss it, and the other section felt more fitting for Mother’s Day.
That doesn’t mean the rest of you should tune out. This is every bit as much for you.
But graduates: next week most of you walk across a stage, receive a diploma, get recognized for years of work, and step into the next chapter. And what we’re going to see today has the potential to radically change your life.
You have dreams. You have ideas about what you want to do. Nothing here requires you to change those dreams. But I think it will change how you pray about them.
Where We Left Off
Two weeks ago we covered Acts 3 and half of chapter 4, because it’s one continuous story.
Peter and John were heading to the temple to pray when a lame beggar asked them for money. They didn’t have any on them — but Peter knew that spare change would only help short-term. He wanted to help the man long-term. So he said, “In the name of Jesus Christ, rise up and walk.”
And the man’s legs became strong. He stood, and he was so overwhelmed that he started leaping and praising God.
As Peter and John made their way into the temple, he followed them, still worshiping — and it caused a commotion. A crowd gathered. So Peter began preaching, explaining that the man wasn’t healed by their power but by Jesus, who died on a cross and was raised from the dead.
About a thousand people put their faith in Christ that day.
But the commotion drew the temple authorities, who felt so threatened that they arrested Peter and John, threw them in jail overnight, and hauled them before the Sanhedrin — the Jewish high court — the next day.
And their questions weren’t curious. They were accusatory. They put enormous pressure on these men and ultimately ordered them to stop preaching in this name.
Which is when Peter said this, in Acts 4:19–20:
Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard.
That incensed the leaders, and they threatened the two of them further before finally releasing them.
What Would You Pray?
Graduates, imagine what that must have been like.
I’ve never been persecuted that way. I’ve had people refuse to listen to me. I once found out a man considered my views dangerous — I still don’t know how. But I’ve never been physically and emotionally threatened like this. (I did get punched in the back of the head once when we lived in Venezuela, simply for being a white American Protestant. That’s a story for another time.)
But think about it. What if you were hauled before an authority — police, a government body, even something at your school — and instead of curious questions you got interrogation? Real pressure. Real threats. Threats to your relationships, your time, your freedom. Possibly your life.
What do you pray?
Most of us would pray straight off that chart. Protection. Strength. Maybe wisdom.
Now watch how they prayed.
When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, ‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’— for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
“And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness, while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”
And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.
Did You Catch It?
It’s a long, ornate prayer — the longest in the book of Acts. They open by describing who God is. They’re theologically careful, noting that David wrote the psalm but the Holy Spirit spoke through him.
So I understand if it slipped past you. Let me show you the answer — your teachers would never do this, but I’m nicer than your teachers.
Go to verse 29.
They’ve just been interrogated and threatened. So do we hear, “Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants safety”? No.
“Look upon their threats and grant to your servants wisdom”? That would be a good prayer. It’s not what they pray.
“Look upon their threats and crush them under your righteous thumb”? Tempting. No.
What they pray is: “Look upon their threats, and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness.”
Sit with that for a second. Boldness is what got them arrested in the first place. And now they’re asking for more of it. Not just more — all boldness.
This is the exact opposite of what you’d expect if the early church had hired a PR firm. I suspect a public relations advisor would have said: Guys, you need to dial back the resurrection rhetoric. And you have to stop assigning blame to the religious leaders and the people — cut that entirely. Here’s my advice: preach the love material. Jesus said plenty about love. Pull some of that out. And you’ve been doing miracles, so why not do another feeding of the five thousand? People like food. That’ll placate everyone. Let this blow over for a few months, and then you can get back to the resurrection.
Thankfully nobody was blowing that smoke at them. They saw the threats, and it drove them to pray for boldness.
Why Would They Pray That?
I’ll confess I’m a wimp — this would never have crossed my mind. Protection, wisdom, strength, yes. Boldness, no.
I think the reason is right there at the start of the prayer, in verse 24. They open with two words: “Sovereign Lord.”
They go on to describe what He did through that sovereignty — creating all things. But that adjective is the key.
Sovereign, used as an adjective, means possessing supreme or ultimate power. In Christian theology, the sovereignty of God means He is over all things — the authority in every arena of life, and nothing happens outside His awareness. He knows all. He controls all.
So when Peter and John and the thousands in this church pray, they’re saying: God, our arrest was not a surprise to You. You are sovereign. You are in control.
Psalm 2 Fulfilled in Front of Them
After describing God’s sovereignty in creation, they quote Psalm 2. Everything they’ve just endured before the Sanhedrin brought this psalm to mind.
Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his Anointed.
When the original writer — traditionally David — wrote that, he understood “the Lord” as God and “his Anointed” as the king, meaning himself.
But Jesus had taught His disciples that all of the Hebrew Scriptures ultimately pointed to Him. So they see this psalm in a new light: yes, it’s about God and His king — and it’s also about God and the ultimate King, the descendant of David, the true and better David.
Which is why verse 27 reads: for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel.
Do you see it? Kings against God. Rulers. Nations raging.
They’re treating Psalm 2 as a prophecy written a thousand years earlier and fulfilled right in front of them. And that gives them enormous confidence — because if God can declare what will happen a millennium in advance and it happens, that reveals His sovereignty.
Which is exactly what verse 28 says: they did whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
The Uncomfortable Part
And that leads us into a doctrine many people find deeply unsettling.
Because what they’re saying is that God planned for Peter to notice the lame man. Planned for his heart to be moved to heal him. Planned for the man to follow them and create a commotion, which drew the crowd. Put the words on Peter’s lips. Opened the hearts of more than a thousand people.
And also allowed the Jewish leaders to arrest, persecute, and threaten them.
And if you study church history, you find that Peter is eventually crucified for his faith — refusing to be crucified the same way as his Savior, because he doesn’t believe he deserves it, so they crucify him upside down. And John is exiled to an island so he can’t cause further trouble.
And God’s sovereignty allowed all of it. Planned for it.
So — are you saying God predestined that murder? That child’s abuse? The cancer? The job I lost? The person I buried?
I know people who have left churches over this. I know people who have left the Christian faith over it. Because if God is supposedly so good and so powerful, how could He ordain such evil?
I understand the objection. The problem is that we’re seeing it only from a human perspective, not an eternal one.
The Back of the Tapestry
Graduates, do you know what a tapestry is? It’s a work of art made not with paint but with thread, woven to create an image.
Have you ever seen the back of one?
It’s a disaster. An absolute mess. It looks nothing like the front. Even if you trim the loose threads, the image looks twisted and wrong.
Nobody displays the back of a tapestry. You turn it around and put the back against the wall so the beautiful side can be seen.
The trials, the pain, the difficulty, the persecution — that’s the back of the tapestry.
In Genesis we meet Joseph. He’s sold into slavery by his own brothers. Back of the tapestry. He’s thrown into prison because his master’s wife lies about him. Back of the tapestry. He shows kindness to fellow prisoners, and when they’re released they forget him entirely. Back of the tapestry.
And yet Joseph credits every thread of that weaving to God — because he eventually gets out, is made second in command of Egypt, learns a famine is coming, and prepares the nation for it. Which puts him in exactly the position to save his own family when the brothers who sold him arrive looking for food.
Which is why he says in Genesis 50:20: As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.
Everything he went through was ugly and messy and awful. And when it was finished, he could see God weaving something beautiful. Had God not allowed those things, he would not have been in place to rescue his people.
That’s why his words echo what the early church prays here. They are comfortable with a God so sovereign and in control that even the terrible things are not a surprise to Him.
An Important Distinction
Don’t misunderstand this. God is pure and righteous, and He is not the one actively doing evil. He has an adversary. Satan comes, as Jesus said, to steal and kill and destroy.
In the book of Job we meet a righteous, wealthy, well-loved man. Satan claims Job only worships God because God has blessed him. God says, no, I know his heart. And Satan is granted permission to ruin Job’s life. He loses his family, his wealth, his reputation, and his health.
The uncomfortable truth is that God allowed it. Satan did it — but God permitted it.
From our perspective, watching Job sitting in ashes covered in sores, having lost everything, you think: what a cruel God.
And if you keep reading to the end, the tapestry flips, and you find God has restored everything to him. Because God can always undo what Satan intends.
The story is not finished.
I have no idea why your tapestry looks the way it does from the back. All I know is that if you’re still breathing, God is still weaving. So keep going. Hang on.
Graduates, I don’t know what your next chapter holds. There may be ugly, difficult moments. There may be people who come against you and against your faith. But keep seeking God and let Him keep weaving. You don’t know what He’s doing.
If That’s Not Enough, Look at the Cross
Maybe Joseph and Job and Peter and John aren’t enough to convince you of God’s sovereignty. Then look at the cross.
All through the Old Testament there are whispers — through the stories, through the prophets — pointing to Christ. Pointing to God taking on human flesh, living a sinless life, and dying a cruel, horrific death in order to free people from sin.
It was right there in front of everyone. It just didn’t fit the narrative they had in their heads, so they couldn’t see it. And now, looking back, so many of us can see exactly how clearly God was working.
And yet the back of that tapestry is hideous. The Son of God — the only sinless human ever to live — was brutally murdered. It is as ugly as anything gets.
And through it God wove the most beautiful artwork the universe has ever seen: the forgiveness of sin, and reconciliation between God and man.
All because He planned it. He predestined it. He made it happen for you.
And when you realize God is so sovereign that nothing happens outside His control, that becomes a source of comfort, confidence, and boldness — because you know that whatever comes at you, your God is still with you, still for you, and not finished. Even when Jesus was in the grave and the disciples were certain it was over, the story wasn’t done.
Look at the cross. It’s a historically verifiable event. Even if God gave you no other evidence of His love, the resurrected Jesus is enough.
Let Me Be Realistic
It’s one thing to hear about boldness. It’s another to actually do it. And I’ll admit: I’m a chicken. There have been times people asked me genuinely difficult questions and I had no idea how to answer. Times I stumbled into someone’s story and didn’t know what to say.
Graduates — as you head to college, or into the workforce, or into whatever’s next, you will encounter well-reasoned arguments for atheism, or for another religion, or for ideas that seem to contradict what you’ve been taught here or at home. And that will create doubt. You won’t be sure how to respond.
Twenty years ago — I realized yesterday it was exactly twenty — I was planning a retreat for college students and wanted to address some of these hard questions. And in the process I ran into questions I’d never faced before.
There I was, a brand-new young adult pastor leading a ministry and helping establish a city-wide one — and I was losing my faith. I came close to concluding there is no God.
Which is honestly why I’m not especially worried about the deconstruction happening in our world right now. If God could carry me through that season, He can carry you through yours.
I do not believe God calls you to blind faith. A faith that can’t be questioned is no faith at all.
Look at the cross and the empty tomb. It’s true. It happened. It can’t be explained away — historians have tried and can’t do it. And because you know that is true, you can begin to trust the rest as true. That’s what gives you the confidence to stay bold, and to be sure of God’s love for you and for the people around you. Even if the nations and the peoples around you rage against your faith, God can handle it.
One Clarification and One Tip
The clarification: boldness does not mean being a jerk.
You can be bold and kind. Bold and respectful. Bold and still asking questions. Boldness doesn’t require volume, and it isn’t achieved by burning people down. Boldness is simply confidence.
Peter himself — the man we’ve been reading about — wrote this in his first letter:
In your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect.
If your life is in Christ — if you call yourself a Christian — you’re identifying with His life, death, and resurrection. You honor Him in your heart. And when people come to you with questions and pushback, you’re to be ready to make a defense. Be bold.
You don’t need every answer. At minimum you can point to Jesus: I don’t know everything about that. I can’t answer that question. What I do know is that Jesus died on a cross and rose from the dead, and it has made all the difference in my life.
And notice how Peter says to do it: with gentleness and respect. You can be confident in who God is and still reflect the character of Christ.
The tip: don’t just pray for boldness — partner with other Christians who want to be bold.
In our story we don’t read about Peter or John. We read about Peter and John. When Jesus sent His disciples out across Israel to preach the kingdom, He sent them in pairs, two by two.
If you find yourself alone, I hope you’ll still be bold. But it is enormously easier with someone beside you.
So if you’re headed to a college, find a campus ministry — a place that points to Jesus, encourages you, loves people, respects the Scriptures, and helps you be bold. If you’re headed into the workforce and staying local, go deeper here. If you’re going somewhere else, find a church that will do the same: help you follow Christ, centered on the gospel.
The more of those people you have in your life, the easier boldness becomes. Yes, you can do it alone. It’s just foolish to. You’re graduates — don’t be foolish. Find people to partner with, and let them pray for you and with you.
Because the Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them, is able to look upon the threats and pains and difficulties that come against you — and grant you all boldness to stand firm, and to handle it with grace and wisdom and strength.
All you have to do is ask.
