Acts 4:29-31

29 And now, O Lord, hear their threats, and give us, your servants, great boldness in preaching your word. 30 Stretch out your hand with healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus.” 31 After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness.

With the dawning of a new year comes the planning and resolutions, all the things we say we want to do. Things like exercise more, spend more time with family, spend less money, get out of debt, deal with that addiction, the list could go on and on. Is prayer on your list, where does it rank? As we step into a new year and discover what God has for us why not put a bold prayer life at the top of the list? One of the boldest prayers in the Bible occurs in the fourth chapter of the book of Acts. Peter and John had been arrested after the dramatic healing of a lame beggar at the Gate Beautiful. This man had been lame from birth, for more than forty years he had begged and was known by those who frequented the Temple. His complete healing had caused a big stir and a large crowd gathered so Peter and John began to preach about Jesus. If the healing caused a ripple then the preaching caused waves, they were arrested and given a complimentary overnight stay in jail. The next morning they were questioned by the Jewish elders and high priests, the very men who had arranged for the crucifixion of Jesus, Peters response:

“Let me clearly state to all of you and to all the people of Israel that he was healed by the powerful name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the man you crucified but whom God raised from the dead.” …. There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4:10, 12)

Again he boldly preaches the truth and even though they were amazed at the boldness of Peter and John they were not really moved. They said among themselves; “What shall we do with these men? When they should have been saying “what shall we do with the truth of Jesus?” They couldn’t deny that a true miracle had taken place yet they had no problem denying the one who made the miracle possible, Jesus. So they commanded Peter and John not to speak or teach anymore in the name of Jesus and, threatening them, they released them because they were afraid of the people. They were more concerned with what people thought than what God did, it is a sad day when we are more afraid of people than God.

So Peter and John returned to the other believers and told them everything that had happened and the response was prayer. “When they heard the report, all the believers lifted their voices together in prayer to God” Acts 4:24. They ended their prayer with this:

29 And now, O Lord, hear their threats, and give us, your servants, great boldness in preaching your word. 30 Stretch out your hand with healing power; may miraculous signs and wonders be done through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”

How different these disciples are from the ones that walked with Jesus, gone was their fear and trepidation. The fear had been replaced with fiery power and fierce boldness, what had happened? Everything changed on the morning of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit fell filling them to overflowing. Peter had preached with power then and he was still preaching, they were no longer cowering in the dark denying Christ. Now they were in the thick of things, healing the sick, preaching the gospel, adding to their numbers daily, turning their world upside down.

As I look at their prayer life I marvel at what they asked for and what they didn’t. They didn’t ask for protection or for God to remove the opposition, instead they requested greater courage and more boldness to speak God’s Word. Their antidote to threats was courage and boldness. Then they asked for two more things that would get them into even more trouble. They asked for more healings to occur and signs and wonders to take place. It was the healing of the lame beggar that got them arrested and yet they pray for more healings, why, because their prayer life wasn’t about them. It wasn’t about their comfort or convenience, it was about their concern for others. They were willing to be hurt so others could be healed.

God heard their prayers and His response was one that could be felt by all present. “After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness.” Acts 4:31 God’s response to their prayer was an immediate and powerful endorsement, I wonder if the shaking was His applause? After their prayer meeting they rushed out into the world and threw themselves into God’s work with phenomenal results. Huge numbers of people were saved and many people were healed. They continued to get arrested, jailed, flogged, and even killed. They were persecuted terribly but they wanted the advancement of God’s kingdom more than they wanted their own safety. What is our prayer response, does prayer move us to go?  You don’t pray for courage so you can cower!

This is exciting stuff and the book of Acts goes on for 29 chapters filled with pure excitement, yet the other side of the prayer is counting the cost of courage. Satan is not going to sit idly by, there will be a fight but the early followers of Jesus thought it was worth it. Today there are still followers of Jesus throughout the world who think it is worth it, who are praying for power and paying whatever price they have to pay. Will you join the battle this year? If you have some fire in your belly and you don’t mind a good fight then pray the prayer. Pray because we need to be shaken out of our slumber and hear God’s applause, this world needs the results of prayer now more than ever.

Matthew 2:19-23

19 After Herod died, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt 20 and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who were trying to take the child’s life are dead.”21 So he got up, took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. 22 But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning in Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there. Having been warned in a dream, he withdrew to the district of Galilee, 23 and he went and lived in a town called Nazareth. So was fulfilled what was said through the prophets: “He will be called a Nazarene.”

Happy New Year – The old year is gone and the new has come. As we take our first steps into the New Year I am reminded not only of the possibilities but the predictions. At end of every year psychics get busy predicting events for the coming year, here are a few of the predictions they made in 2011 for 2012

• Gold $2,000 an ounce and oil $130 a barrel.  Gold hovered around $1,800, but never hit $2,000 and oil didn’t hit $130, not even for a single day.
• Earthquake in Mexico City destroying most of the city.  Did not happen.
• A Stock Market crash like 1929 worldwide.  This prediction was false.

There were many more predictions and most never came to pass even though they were predicting something in the near future. Four times in the Christmas story we read the phrase “that it might be fulfilled.” Jesus coming to Bethlehem was predicted, not by psychics, but by prophets, and not a few months before, but centuries before.

Isa 7:14 (740 B.C.) – Born of a virgin – “Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.”

Micah 5:2 (710 B.C) – Born in Bethlehem – “But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village among all the people of Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel will come from you, one whose origins are from the distant past.”

Psalm 72:10 (1000 B.C) – the visit of the Magi – “The western kings of Tarshish and other distant lands     will bring him tribute. The eastern kings of Sheba and Seba will bring him gifts.”

Jer 31:15 (606 B.C) – The slaughter of the innocents in Bethlehem – “This is what the Lord says: “A cry is heard in Ramah deep anguish and bitter weeping. Rachel weeps for her children, refusing to be comforted for her children are gone.”

Hos 11:1 (740 B.C) – The flight into Egypt – “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and I called my son out of Egypt.”

Jesus didn’t just “happen” to come into the world, his birth was not an “accident” it was a fulfillment of century old prophecies. Not just His birth, but the details His life, death, and resurrection were all prophesied and fulfilled. Prophecy after prophecy, scores of them specifically fulfilled, why? Because God wants you to know that He is true, that He is the Truth. Jesus came not only to fulfill prophecy, but to fulfill us, He said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.” John 10:10 He came to make us complete and fulfill us. He said in John 15:11, “These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.”

As we move into the New Year and away from Christmas, we will take down the tree and box up the decorations to be put away until next year. The kids will lay down some of those gifts they received and may never pick them up again. We return to work and fall back into a routine, the holiday is over. But do we really feel fulfilled or are we back running on the treadmill of life wondering what’s missing? The sad truth of Christmas is that God sent His Son to fill our lives with light yet for many we will stumble into the darkness of a New Year empty and unfulfilled.

Joseph had another dream, and the angel tells him to get up and take Jesus and Mary back to Israel so he arose, no questions and no arguing, because it was time to come home. Just as God had led His people out of Egypt 1500 years before and brought them into their own home, now He was leading Joseph home.  On the way home Joseph was again warned in a dream, he was told to head to Nazareth in Galilee. This fulfilled what was spoken through the prophets: “He will be called a Nazarene.” Who will I follow and listen to this year? Why not make it the one whose predictions all came true. Jesus came to make his home among us that we might be fulfilled. This year what if instead of trying to fulfill resolutions in a vain attempt to change our lives we come home to Jesus and let Him fill us?