Acts 12 - Accepting Glory That Isn't Yours
Tom Shrader teaches from Acts 12 about King Herod Agrippa I, who accepted praise as a god and was immediately struck down by an angel and eaten by worms. Using both Scripture and historical sources like Josephus, Tom warns against the deadly mistake of accepting glory that belongs to God alone. He emphasizes that God is jealous for His glory and will not share it with anyone, calling believers to redirect praise away from themselves to Him.
“God is a jealous God, and He will not give His glory to another or His praise to idols.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Dumb Mistakes: How to Avoid Them (2004)
Recorded: April 15, 2004
Duration: 42 min
Themes: pride, humility, glory, worship, judgment, authority, power, consequences, struggling with pride, receiving praise, in leadership position, pastor, elder, mentor, seeking recognition, new to authority
Scripture: Acts 12:1-24, Isaiah 42:8, 1 Chronicles 16:23, 2 Timothy 4:11
Theological Themes: divine judgment, god's glory, idolatry, false worship, divine sovereignty, biblical authority, spiritual pride, sanctification
Full Transcript
We all make mistakes. But you don't need to make them over and over again. There's an ability to learn, to grow. And one of the great ways to learn and to grow is to look at other people's mistakes and not repeat them.
Today is a little bit of an unusual lesson, although in this series they're starting to get more and more like this. There's a hugely long introduction, probably 30 minutes, to get to this. The reason is there's so many rich points in this lesson as we prepare for it. So hang in there, and you'll get it. Hopefully you'll enjoy it.
The Story Begins
If you have the Bibles, you can open them to Acts chapter 12, verse 1. We're going to look at a story that involves Peter. But he is not the main character or the main focus of this.
Let me read to you: "It was about this time that Herod the Great arrested some who belonged to the church intending to persecute them. He had James, the brother of John, put to death by the sword. And he saw that this pleased the Jews. He then proceeded to seize Peter also. This happened during the Feast of Unleavened Bread."
So we stop there.
Understanding the Different Herods
This is King Herod. This is King Herod Agrippa I. Now, when you think King Herod, years ago, there was a guy that played for the University of Oklahoma, played football, his name was Tinker Owens. It felt like for 27 years, when Oklahoma would come on, Tinker Owens played. It felt to me like Tinker Owens played 500 years at the University of Oklahoma.
You could have a very similar experience here when you hear Herod. You're thinking, wait a minute. Jesus is now dead. He's risen. The church is growing, developing. Time's passing. How can this still be Herod? Very important to understand. This is a different Herod.
You had Herod the Great. Herod the Great reigned from 38 or so BC till a couple years after Jesus' birth. Remember he was called Herod the Great? Remember why he was called Herod the Great? He woke up one morning and said, "Call me Herod the Great." That's exactly how he got it. "I like the ring of that," he says.
So he's Herod the Great. He's reigning. He's a tyrant. All these guys are bad guys. He's the one who the Magi came to, remember two years after Jesus was born. The Magi came and said, "We're here and we want to see the king of the Jews." And he says to himself, "I thought I was." And they said, "No, we're here to see Him." And he said to them, "When you find Him, come back and tell me. Because I want to go worship Him too." And of course, he didn't.
They went away. The plot was discovered. Jesus fled with His family. This is the Herod that had all the males two years of age and younger killed. So that's Herod the Great.
Then there was a guy named Herod Antipas. He comes along. He's a slimy little dog too. He has a brother. And he, Herod, has a thing for his brother's wife. So he kills his brother and marries the wife.
When we see him in the gospel accounts, he now has a bit of a thing going for her daughter, remember? She comes in and does this little dance. And of course, they're there. They're all drunk. I can really easily see this. I can see him there. He's got all his buddies. He's trying to act like a big shot. He's trying to impress her. He's all liquored up. I can see him going, "Hey, baby, anything you want is yours, baby. I love you. You look great in that thing. Anything you want, anything you want."
So I'm having flashbacks up here as we're going through this. He's thinking money or jewels or something. And she says, "What you want? Head of John the Baptist." So there he goes. That's Herod Antipas.
This is Herod Agrippa. This guy is a bad guy who makes a tragic error that leads within days to his demise. And that's what we're going to look at.
A Political Calculation
The Jews like Herod Agrippa for the reason we just saw. He is attacking the church. He's kind of just not really sure. He's a good politician. He's not really sure how far he can go. So he sticks his toe in the water. They like it. He goes a little further. Kills a guy. Likes that. And he says, "Boy, if they like that, I'm going to go after Peter." Peter, James, and John - he's going to go get Peter. And so he arrests Peter.
Now, key here is it happened during the first feast of the unleavened bread. So he's not going to kill him. That would upset the Jews, because that's holy time. So he's got to wait a day or two. So he's got him in jail.
The Elite Guard
Again, lots of little side notes here. Here's the first one. After arresting him, they put him into prison and handed him over to be guarded by four squads of four soldiers. This sounds very familiar to what was left to guard the tomb that they put Jesus in.
When you read that four squads of four soldiers, you're thinking 16 guys. You've got to understand something here. This is not 16 Gomer Pyles. This is not 16 guys going, "Shazam, shazam, look at the tomb." That's not this. These are the rangers, the seals, the green beret, the elite. These are the guys that you put in the case that you couldn't afford to have it blown. These are the best of the best. They don't make mistakes. And if they do, the price is very heavy. That's what you're going to see here.
So they're guarding him. Again, I'm going to digress. I'm all over the map here today, and I understand that. But I digress on this, only to say those were the guys that left to guard the tomb, and their mission was this: Don't you let anybody into that tomb. And they achieved that mission. The problem was He came out on that Easter morning. And that's the key.
Herod intended to bring him out for public trial after the Passover. Now, it's real simple here. It's a public trial to publicly pronounce his guilt, to publicly sentence him to death, and to publicly
execute him. This was not something where they're going out and try to uncover some sort of due process and hire attorneys. It's all done. It's a foregone conclusion. We'll arrest him. We'll hold him, because what am I going to do? Well, he sees that it pleases the Jews, so he's going to kill him. So that's the situation. That's where Peter is. And Peter understands that.
Peter's kept in prison, but the church was, and I want you to remember this, because we're going to come back to it, earnestly praying to God for him. They were earnestly praying, fervently praying, beseeching God. For what? For Peter. For Peter's release. They're saying, God, we want Peter out of here. I'm going to talk more about that in a bit.
The night before, Herod was to bring him to trial. Now, when he brought him to trial, remember, we got a guilty sentence. We got a guilty verdict. We got a death sentence. We're going to kill him. This is all bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. It's all happening all at once.
Peter's Peace in Prison
It's the night before, and Peter was sleeping between two soldiers. Bound with two chains and two sentries stood guard. Now, think about this. You today, I'm talking you now, you, not Peter, you. You know that tomorrow, you're going to be executed. How are you spending that night? What are you setting your sleep mattress for, 45, 47? What do you need for a sound night's sleep? Is this a 78 night, or it's a zero, like being in your mother's womb and falling into this thing? What is it you set this at? Probably we're not sleeping real well.
Why is He sleeping? Here you go. This is real simple. Because Peter's been through a lot. Peter's a wily veteran at this point. He's denied Christ. He's preached sermons. He's stood up to these guys. He's seen his life transform and change. And you know what He understands? He understands that God is God, and that He's in control.
I don't know. Maybe I'm snowing myself. I'm not much of a worrier, I don't think. I try to look at stuff the best I can. But you know what? There's not much I can do about a lot if it is what it is. And I know that frustrates a lot of people around me. But I will say that for you. It is what it is. I can't change it.
The Reality of What We Can't Control
There's just a bunch of stuff you can't change. You just can't change. You can't make a guy write an order if he doesn't want to write an order. It isn't going to happen. A city council is going to do what a city council does. That's what they do. You can't make somebody love you. I learned that a long time ago in relationships.
Relationships are tough. One of the things, and this is always the key in my mind to understanding relationships, is the person who cares least is the one who's in control. That's kind of a rule of thumb. And I've been down that road. I've been pouring my guts out. I love you. I love you. I love you. And they go, whatever. What time is it? Whoever cares, you can't make them love you.
There's just a whole bunch of stuff that's way beyond your control. But it's not out of control. And that's what Peter understands. Peter understands that this thing is way beyond his control, but it's not out of control. It's in God's control. And if God wants him dead, nothing's going to keep him alive. And if God wants him alive, nothing's going to kill him. And that's where He is.
He's reached that point where he goes, you know what, I might as well sleep. I'll be rested for heaven when I get there. I don't know what he's thinking. He's sleeping soundly because an angel pops in there and that doesn't wake him.
The Miraculous Escape
Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell and He struck Peter on the side and woke him up and said, quick, get up. And his chains fell off of his wrist and then the angel said, put on your clothes and your sandals and Peter did so. Wrap your cloak around you, follow me, the angel told him.
Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea what the angel was doing and that it was really happening. He thought this was a vision. He thought this was a dream. This has to be a dream. This can't be true.
Then they passed the first guards, then they passed the second guards, then they came to the iron gates and now they got past the gates. How are we going to get by the gate? And the scripture says it opened for them by itself. That's convenient. And they went through it. And when they walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.
Then the scripture says, then Peter came to himself, or Peter came to his senses, he pinched himself and said, ow, and discovered he was truly awake. Now I know that without a doubt the Lord has sent His angel and rescued me from Herod's clutches and from everything the Jewish people were anticipating. His death the next day.
Mary's House
When this dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary. Now Mary was a very, very common name. I was just talking to somebody the other day. When I was a young lad in school, we had lots of Marys. In fact, I was just going through, there were just great names. And you don't see any of them anymore. When's the last time you, that's a cute baby, what's her name? Mary. You don't hear that. That's a cute baby, what's her name? Waterfall. Ocean. Saguaro. I don't know. It's all these names. Isn't Mary a great name?
Here's another great name. Jill. Jill's a great name that you don't hear anymore. Kathy's a great name. There's a bunch of these great names that we don't hardly use anymore.
Well this is a Mary. In the scriptures there's a whole bunch of Marys. But Luke, remember Luke's writing in the book of Acts, Luke tells us who this Mary is. This is Mary, the mother of John, who is also called Mark. Now we know this Mark guy primarily from two things. First, he wrote in the New Testament, he
The Gospel of Mark, obviously. That was somebody calling just to give you that answer. Then we know him.
When we get into the book of Acts, Paul goes on a missionary journey. Remember? He takes Barnabas with him. Barnabas says, "I want to bring Mark. Is that okay?" Paul says yes. They bring Mark along. Somewhere in the process, Mark blows out. Mark leaves. He's gone.
Barnabas and Paul are ready for the second missionary journey. Barnabas says, "Can we take Mark?" Paul says, "No, I'm not taking Mark with me. We've been through this before. L-O-S-E-R. Loser, loser, loser. I'm not going to take Mark with me. Mark's a loser. He can't cut it."
Over the years, we've argued about who was right in this process. In my old days, I was a big Paul guy, and now I'm probably a little more of a Barnabas guy. I'm mellowing, which is sad.
Two Teams From One Conflict
Away they go. So now God gets two teams. One is Paul and Silas. The other is Barnabas and Mark.
At the end of his life, Paul, who said "get Mark out of here," writes this. Second Timothy chapter 4. This is the very last of what Paul writes for us that we still have. He's within months probably of his death. He said, "Make every effort to come to me soon, for Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me." Second Timothy chapter 4, verse 11: "Only Luke is with me. Pick up Mark and bring him with you, for he's useful to me for service."
Failure Isn't Fatal
It's a huge sub-point to what we're talking about, and that is failure isn't fatal. Don't be afraid to make a mistake. Go out there. Luther used to say it this way—we might not use this phrase—"Sin boldly." What He's saying is live life with gusto.
I remember years and years ago, I was listening to John Wooden talk after a game, doing an interview. I can't remember who they were playing—somebody that they should have beat by 40. They beat them by 20. Wooden had an interesting comment. Wooden said, "We didn't make enough mistakes tonight."
I said, "That's strange." He said, "We weren't pushing the ball up. We weren't doing anything. We weren't making any passes. We knew we could beat them, and we did. The guys weren't really pushing. The boys weren't really trying stuff, pushing the ball. No turnovers."
I got to tell you, there's something about failure. If you're not making mistakes—I mean really, and I mean this—then you're not doing anything. Some of you made huge errors, and then you say, "You know what? I'm not going to try anymore. I'm not going to risk anymore." At which point, in my view, you've made the greatest failure and mistake of all time, and that is to not risk.
The Risk of Love
Let me tell you a secondary issue of this. I will talk to people who've been hurt in love. They've been jolted by a lover. They've been abandoned, whatever the case is, and they've been hurt in this process. I know how deep that hurt is.
Here you are. There's something about how you have been totally vulnerable with this person, and ultimately this person who perhaps said they loved you has now rejected you. That's terrible. That hurts.
I've heard people say, "I don't ever want to hurt like that again, so I'm never going to love like that again. Never going to be that vulnerable again." I'd really encourage you not to have that mindset. When you think that way, when you start with this "I'm never going to love like that again," you're never going to have the rock, the mountaintop experience ever again. The only way you can have that is to risk and be vulnerable.
Living a Risky Life
I am a person who I think in a lot of ways lives a risky life. Not stupid—I don't parachute without a parachute. But I'm willing to acknowledge virtually daily, I don't know what I'm doing in a lot of areas. I find a certain level of excitement in that. I think that's the way to live.
We had a guy literally in one of the studies who just screwed up big time in bad business. He went into Dillard's to buy a pair of gray slacks. He came out after 40 minutes with a salesperson—he could not select the shade of gray. He was paralyzed because He didn't want to make a mistake.
Let me take all the pressure off. You're just going to make a whole boatload more mistakes. That's what life's all about.
Back to Peter and the Prayer Meeting
So here's Mark. They're at the house. Here it is again. Many—this is verse 12—many people were gathered and they were praying. Now do you remember? How were they praying? Earnestly, fervently.
For me, this is Biblical humor at its best. Peter knocked on the door. A servant girl came to the door and answered. When she recognized Peter's voice—so there was something recognizable, she knew Him, she had heard Him. The other day, I just put on one of Larry's tapes and the minute He said "okay," the minute I heard it, I thought, "Okay, there's Larry." So she knows the voice.
She was so overjoyed that she ran back. She didn't open the door. She ran back and she said, "Peter's at the door." And they said, "You're out of your mind."
The Nature of Prayer
Now, I want to give you what I think happens here. This is important. When I was born and raised in a culture where we prayed rope prayers—"Our Father who art in heaven," "Hail Mary, full of grace," whatever it was—there wasn't any freelancing going on in the prayer time. Now I'm around where everything's freelance.
What I discovered is that these prayers get very, very competitive. You sit around and you say, "All right, we're going to pray around the circle."
The Escalation of Public Prayer
Well, once somebody prays, they set the bar and the next guy has to up the ante. I just watch this thing go on. So it'll go something like this. "Father, just thank you for this day. It's a beautiful day. We're so glad that we can be here. Just use this and just use us to touch the community. Thank you. Jesus' name."
"Father, thank you for the beautiful day. And once you've done in the way you use us, not just to touch our community, but to touch the Valley of the Sun."
"Father, thank you for the beautiful day. Not just to touch our community or the Valley of Sun, but from the state from Nogales to Page."
"Father, from border to border, from Canada to Mexico, from California to Florida. Father, thank you that we're not limited to the continental United States, but around the world we go. Father, the Hubble telescope is out in space. We realize you're an intergalactic God."
Isn't that true? I mean, there's some truth to that. But it's because it's true.
The Desperate Prayer of the Early Church
Now I want to recreate this moment here. They're there. They're scared. Peter's gone. They know that Peter is going to be killed. They also know their life is in jeopardy. How do you think they're praying?
I want you to see what's going on. They're praying. I believe something like this. They're saying, "Father, we have watched. The deaf can hear. The lame can walk. The blind can see. God, you can do beyond anything we imagine. Father, we've seen the dead rise. God you are the God that knows no limits, no bounds. You say let there be light and there's light. God you can do anything. Here's what we're asking for at this moment. More than anything else, it's our brother Peter. You know Peter right now, he's over there, he's chained. Father here's what we want, your will to be done with God, we want him released."
The Shocking Answer to Prayer
Peter's at the door. There's no way that's gonna happen. There's no way. He can't, you're out of your mind. God's not gonna answer this prayer. We're just doing this.
I love that whole thing because I honestly believe, and I understand we're a little fast and loose here, can't you see that happening? In fact look at the response. And she kept insisting it was so, and they said it must be an angel. They were more willing to believe that what was at the door was an angel than Peter.
Now I say that because you may be here today praying for something, and as you're going through this motion, you're saying to yourself, "You know there's no way, God, you're gonna answer this prayer. There's no way you're gonna do that." Am I saying yes? No, I'm not saying two or three agree, whatever. I'm just saying you pray and pray and pray and pray your guts out. Don't be surprised if He does it. Don't be disappointed if He doesn't. That's all. He's God. Why you got your shorts in a knot over all this stuff here? He's God. There's nothing you can do. Don't be surprised if He fixes it. Don't be disappointed if He doesn't.
It's Peter at the door and he comes in and he says to them, "Shh, go tell James and the brothers," and he left. In the morning there was no small commotion—that's because there was a big commotion—among the soldiers as to what had become of Peter. And after Herod had a thorough search made for him and did not find him, he cross-examined the guards and ordered them to be executed.
The Reality of the Resurrection
I want to go back to the grave on Easter morning. See, those guys understood that if that grave was empty, they were dead. These were the elite guys. We just went through this, obviously, because of the calendar, but I'm telling you, this was a great year. Because in the past, periodically, you'd argue with somebody about, "Well, did Jesus really die?" The Mel Gibson movie seems to put that to rest, no pun intended. But it's like, well, we don't even argue that. Yeah, Jesus died.
You know what? I don't think there's much argument over the empty tomb either. I just don't think there's much argument about it. It's empty. Now, we got all these goofy theories. The swoon theory that He was just, He kind of went into a coma and He shook it off and got Himself out, or that the Jews stole the body, or that the Romans stole the body.
Here is what happened. He died, and on the third day, He arose. And that's it. And that's what separates it from everything else. That's what separates Christianity from everything else.
Objective Truth vs. Subjective Experience
We periodically get people who are here in a study like this, and you come maybe out of interest, or maybe even antagonistically, or you come and you say, "You know what? My religion, your religion, they're all the same. They're all equal. As long as we're sincere, it doesn't really matter. As long as we really have faith, it doesn't really matter."
Well, yes, it really does matter, because God is an objective, not a subjective truth. Subjective truth would be like temperature in the room. If I said to you, "How many think it's cold in the room?" There's probably somebody, probably of the female persuasion who thinks it's cold right now. "Or is there somebody hot?" Well, there's somebody just right. It's all subjective truth.
But if I say, and I can't make it any—two plus two is five, how many think it's five? Well, you're wrong. It's four. Two plus two is four. Always has been four, always will be four. And no matter how sincere you are, no matter how adamant you are, no matter how much you argue that, it doesn't matter. It's four. And if you mark five, you're wrong, even if you're sincere.
The Non-Negotiable Truth of the Gospel
And it's the same with God. God's an objective truth. If you say that Jesus was just a good guy and a great prophet, but not the Son of God, you're wrong. If you think Jesus died on the cross, but you don't know why, or He died just to be a good role model, you're wrong.
Here's what the scripture says. Jesus died, why? For our sin, and then He rose again on the third day. Now, what does that mean? That means that—
His sacrifice was acceptable. You can't get any more conclusive evidence than that. When we talk about faith, it's not us just closing our eyes and taking a blind leap. It's us looking at the facts and saying, "You know what? I put my faith in the facts. I put my faith in it because they're true."
Jesus died. That's a fact. When He died, the scripture tells us it was for our sin. And the tomb's empty. How'd it get empty? He arose. How do we know? Because Peter saw Him, the twelve saw Him, and five hundred saw Him. I don't know what more evidence you need. There it is. That's a big deal. Those guys were sent there on that Easter morning to guard Him. If He was gone, they were dead. That's what happened.
Dumb Mistake Number Seven: Herod Agrippa
Now, that's all introduction. Dumb mistake number seven. We get to Herod Agrippa. Herod went from Judea to Caesarea and stayed there a while. Here's what happened. Judea is where they would come for holy holidays. These Roman governors hated coming here. It was like this arid desert place. They didn't like going down there. They'd go down for the holy days because they needed to be there in case there was a problem. But as soon as it was over, boom, they're out of there to Caesarea. That's the seaport.
So literally, in language we could understand, Herod went from Mesa to Newport Beach. That's what he did. He's at the Ritz. And now these people want to come and see him.
On the appointed day—we're in Acts 12, verse 21—"On the appointed day, Herod, wearing his royal robes, sat on his throne and delivered a public address to the people. And they shouted, 'This is the voice of a god and not of a man!' Immediately, because he did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died."
The Historical Account from Josephus
Remember who's writing this? Who's writing the book of Acts? Luke, the physician. Wait, did he get this backwards? Did he die and then he was eaten by worms? Because isn't that how the process goes? No, you die and then things deteriorate in your body. At this moment, God does an extraordinary thing.
He gives us a historian named Josephus. Josephus is writing in 70 AD. Josephus is not trying to write something that we are going to include in scripture. He's a historian. He's writing on this very account. Obviously it's almost 2,000 years old—lots of verbiage. But he gives us the account of what happened that day. Let me read it to you:
"On the second day of which shows, he put on a garment made entirely of silver, in texture truly wonderful, and came into the theater early in the morning, at which time the silver of his garments, being illumined by the fresh reflection of the sun's rays upon it, shone out after a surprising manner, and was so resplendent that it spread a horror—that's a terror—over those that looked intently upon him. And presently his flatterers cried out, one from one place, another from another place, that he was a god. And they added, 'Be thou merciful to us, for although we have hitherto reverenced thee only as a man, we shall henceforth own thee as superior to mortal nature.'"
He comes in, and he has this magnificent garment on, and the light hits it, and these people are mesmerized by it. He speaks, apparently, with some level of eloquence, and they say, "This is a god," and they're shouting this from one to the other.
God's Swift Judgment
"Upon this, the king did neither rebuke them, nor reject their flattery. But as he presently afterwards looked up, he fell into the deepest sorrow. A severe pain arose in his belly, and began in a most violent manner. He therefore looked upon his friends and said, 'I, whom you call a god, am commanded presently to depart this life, while Providence'"—capital P, speaking of his higher power, God—"'while Providence thus reproves the lying words you just now said to me. And I, who was by you called immortal, am immediately to be hurried away by death. But I am bound to accept what Providence allots as it pleases God.' And when he said this, his pain became violent.
"Accordingly, he was carried into the palace, and the rumor spread everywhere that he would certainly die in a little while, when he'd been quite worn out by pain in his belly for five days—a long haul. He departed this life, being in his 54th year of age and the seventh year of his reign."
Now, here's what I'm saying to you. This is a historical fact. Why did that happen? Well, the scripture tells us. "Immediately, because"—and this is Acts 12:23—"because he did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms."
Our Minimized View of Sin
Wait a minute, because we're calling that dumb mistake number seven. Are you telling me that if I don't give praise to God, I'll be struck down and eaten by worms? I'm not saying that. I'm just saying you should be. I'm saying that's what's supposed to happen.
It's the same thing that we saw with Ananias and Sapphira. Are you saying to me, if I don't give Him that money, I'm going to die? No, but you should. Do you see what we're looking at here? We're looking at the mercy of God and the justice of God. How long do you want God to wait?
I can hear a bunch of people gathering around saying, "Why wouldn't you give this guy another chance?" The guy's 54—my age, interestingly enough. The guy's 54. How many chances should he get? How long is God supposed to sit there and say, "Well, I know he's not responding. I know he's not responding. I said, you know, he deserves death."
Here's what we get at each and every time: our view minimizes sin. Our theology, as we've said to you a thousand times, our theology does not descend low enough in its view of man or ascend high enough in its view of God. Even when we sin, what do we say? "I'm not making excuses, but..." and then we make an excuse. "I can't explain my behavior, but I know I was wrong, but..." I'm listening to all the guys on talk radio and they're saying, "Why don't they just acknowledge that they made a mistake and just go on from there?"
I don't know—that's what we do with sin. God has a different view of sin, and God makes in Herod's life a dramatic point. I guess especially in this series where we're trying to learn by looking at other people's lives, you ought to get this point: God is very serious about sin, and God is very serious about sharing His glory with anyone. Immediately Herod was struck down.
What's going on in the church, by the way? Acts chapter 12 verse 24 says, "But the Word of God continued to increase and spread," even in the midst of persecution.
The Church Thrives Under Persecution
I listened to the tape of when we talked about this last time—it was six years ago—and I was quoting Dr. Barry Asmus at the time. In some conversations that Barry and I had, we were talking about all this money: where's all this money going to go? This money has to land somewhere. The stock market's going to go to 12,000, 15,000, 20,000, 25,000—who knows? It was certainly climbing when all of a sudden we had September 11th and all that went with it.
I remember in that discussion saying that won't be good for the church. We don't do well really in times of prosperity. We do well in times of persecution. Herod unleashes this persecution on the church, and the church just explodes. Within a couple of decades, there are a hundred thousand Christians in Jerusalem.
There were some sweet, dear people no longer living who were known to a lot of people in the valley—David and Mary Lamb. Mary Lamb was among the last people on the last boat out of China before the communists locked it down and took it over. At the time, there was an estimate of about five million Christians in China. When they opened up China and no missionaries could get in there, they asked—there are now somewhere around a hundred million Christians, in the midst of just incredible persecution.
Our Prosperity Problem
We've got none of it. I've got to tell you—I mean, I know it's an election year and all this, and I know I'll wear you out—but I'm sick of hearing how bad stuff is. I mean, I've got to wait 20 minutes to pay $20 for two people for a breakfast. There's money all over. I really am sick of it. I don't buy it for a second.
Now, are there people hurting? Sure there are. If you're out of work, please—you don't need to come up and give me your individual story. I understand that, and I hurt for you. I'm just saying we as a nation—I don't know how much you want. We're pursuing this stupid thing called the American dream, which to my knowledge I can't seem to find anywhere. It must be material in its nature, and if it's material in its nature, we're never going to achieve it.
How much is it? It's not just a car—it's the right kind of car. It's not just a house—it's the right kind of house. It's not just food—it's the right kind of food. That's not good for the church. It's not good for us. We don't know how to handle that. We're good when things are tough, when things are difficult. The Word spreads. The Word of God spread and increased.
God's Jealousy—An Overlooked Attribute
We saw last week God was spreading it, but the focus here is on one of the attributes of God. We've got seven minutes here. One of the attributes of God—we talked about the attributes of God. I say, "Give me the attributes of God," and you're going to give me holiness and justice and love, omnipotence, omniscience. You're going to give me all those. But here's an attribute of God we rarely talk about: God is a jealous God.
In Isaiah 42 verse 8, God says this: "I am the Lord, that is my name, and I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols." God is a jealous God.
Now that word kind of messes us up because when we think of jealousy, we typically think of our own jealousy, which is usually—or oftentimes—in a male-female relationship and usually is an ugly thing to see. When Susan and I—and I don't have time to develop the whole story here—but when Susan and I were first dating, we were kind of dating. She was dating me, and we were—I never dated anybody that I didn't date seriously. I was in love with everybody I ever went out with, so I was a mess.
So we're dating, and I guess we're not dating exclusively, although my dance card didn't have any other names on it, so I'm dating exclusively. She's dating this other loser. We've got this thing going, and this is an ugly thing. Long story short, I end up—when I think of jealousy, I think of that. I think of what I felt. I despised this guy, and I didn't even know him. I despised him, and I didn't even want—here's what's really sad—I didn't even want what was best for Susan, because being with me was not what was best for Susan. I don't know what I thought was best for me.
God's Jealousy Is Different
But we think of God's jealousy that way. God wants what's best for you ultimately, and what's best for Him, and that is that He alone receives His honor and glory. He said, "I'm not going to compete with a bunch of idols."
Now when we talk about idols in our culture, we tend to think of material idols. We don't burn candles and bow to houses, but He said, "Here you go"—false gods. So I'm watching PBS. I'm watching the Wayne Dyer junk. I'm watching this guy up there, and I haven't got—first of all, I haven't got the foggiest idea what he's talking about. I'm not stupid, and I'm not a genius, but I can't track this at all. You've got sources and inner sources and what's in you and God's in the way and all this other stuff. That's a false God. That's an idol right there.
You go into some church and they're talking to you about a God of love—"I got love and I got love and I got love"—but they don't talk about justice. That's a false God. This is hardcore, isn't it? We've got a whole boatload of idols floating around. We just haven't called them that. Anything other than the one true God is a false God. It's an idol.
So my suspicion would be that we—
We've got people in this room who are praising false gods. We've got people in this room who are praising gods - for example, I've met with them - "I'd never, some of you, a loving guy would never send anybody to hell. There's no way there's hell. There's no way there may be a hell." I shared with a guy who's a director of vocations for one of the huge denominations here in Phoenix, and he said to me, "God created a hell, but nobody ever goes to it."
I said, "You got to be kidding me. That's what you really believe? You honestly believe that?" With him was a guy from New Orleans from the same church. He said, "I agree too." I said, "You guys are really whacked. You don't even agree with your own church." That's a false god. That's not a real God.
You see, this is serious business. We read "false idols" and we think of people running around with little grass skirts and all this other stuff, burning candles to some tree. I'm telling you, we can drive up and down around the community with a yellow pages. They're all churches. We can go in and spend a little time - I'll show you false gods all over the joint. We've got to be really careful.
God Expects to Be Glorified by His People
Dumb mistake number seven is to fail to understand that God expects to be glorified by His people. Here's what First Chronicles chapter 16, verse 23 says: "Sing to the Lord, all the earth, and proclaim His salvation day after day. Declare His glory among the nations, His marvelous deeds."
As you work your way through Scripture, there's this little idea that God keeps mentioning to His people: remember, remember, remember. When your fathers remember when they came across and all of a sudden boom, the Red Sea parts - remember, remember, remember these great deeds.
Now we come into the New Testament. I don't know what the great deeds are - you got a whole list of great deeds - but the greatest of these deeds is sending His Son to come into this earth to die so that you can have eternal life.
Why Jesus Had to Die
April 12th, Time magazine cover story was "Why Did Jesus Have to Die?" On the inside of it, they actually changed the question a bit. On the inside they said, "Why Did Jesus Die?" Those are two different questions.
Why did Jesus die? Jesus died for our sins. Did He have to die? Yes and no. He didn't have to, and the choice - when Adam sinned and plunged all of us into death, Jesus did not have - God did not have to save you. God could have left you where you were. You understand that? He could have left you there.
But once God - and I don't know how you put this in language, this is inadequate because I don't know God's decision and time and all that - but once the decision was made that "I'm going to save some," at that point Jesus had to die. There was no other way. That's why Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me."
This is a very narrow, very hard way. That's why anything other than - and I've got it here now - fundamental, orthodox, biblical Christianity, anything other than that is a false religion. That's why, as long as we talk about God, everybody's "Yeah, yeah, amen, give your body to God," and all that endless junk. But the minute you start to define it like this, it's a little lonely.
I'm not talking to a bunch of people where we're just sitting around talking about God. Everybody: "Oh, this is great. You know, I have a spiritual thing and I have a relationship with God. I go to Sedona and I see God. I see God in a red rock." I do too, if I drink enough, but I've got to slam it down pretty hard to see God at Red Rock. Once I say, "No, it's Jesus," at that point we start to part company.
Accepting Praise That Belongs to God Alone
Dumb mistake number seven is to accept praise that's given to Him and Him alone. I doubt you're going to have somebody come up to you and say, "You're incredible. You're not a man, you're a god." I doubt that's going to happen to you. It might. I don't think so.
Well, you are going to have people who are going to come up and want to somehow take those things that God has given you and make them being somehow generated by you, for you, from you. "You're an incredible guy. You're an awesome guy. I don't know how you do it. You're really gifted. You're really something. You're really this." Here you go: "You're really beautiful."
Well, you don't have anything to do with that. You got lucky at the gene drop. That was an easy deal. "You're really tall." I can guarantee you don't have anything to do with that. I've stretched every way there is. That's just the way life is. You don't have anything to do with that.
You start accepting that and believing that, and you fail to give praise or direct praise away from you, but to Him. Dumb mistake number seven. And it's a doozy.
Closing Prayer
Let's pray. Father, thank You for this truth. And that's hard stuff, and I know it. And for those who may be here for the very first time, and they're saying, "We've never heard anything like that. That is so narrow. That is so hard. That is so dogmatic." God, help them see that that's what You said. It's not what I say. It's what the Bible teaches.
In a world that wants to be all everything to everyone, You provide us a very narrow way, and it's a very hard way. And You are not going to share that glory with anyone else. God, we thank You for King Agrippa. We thank You for the dramatic way in which he left this world, and God, that should be a wake-up call to us, to take a look at our own life, to see if there's anything in there that's displeasing to You, to confess it.
Father, we love You. Easter and Good Friday, we're reminded so freshly that You died, Your Son died, and rose from the dead. And that makes You different than every other god. You are the one true God. Father, help us see that. We pray that to You in Jesus' name. Amen.