Acts 23:12-35 | When God's Promises Are Hard to BelieveНамуна

When Threats Challenge God’s Promise

Sometimes God’s promises can be hard to believe. Sometimes his promises are so big, they just seem outside the realm of possibility. Other times, life seems to scream the opposite, and it looks like there’s no way God’s promises are in fact coming true.

God’s promises get challenged from every corner. Our doubts erode confidence in them. Fear makes us hesitant to believe them. Life experience leads us to wonder whether we actually understand them. People we meet dismiss them. The cultures we live in may even deride them. It’s never more true than when we find ourselves wrapped up in situations where we’re being challenged – even threatened – for believing them, and find ourselves at risk if we don’t back down from them.

We see challenges and threats like these again and again in Acts. Because following Jesus doesn’t remove opposition. Sometimes it attracts hostility. Yet again and again, Acts shows us that God is faithful to his people and faithful to his promises.

We just saw that Paul made it to Jerusalem, was spotted, and before he knew it, found himself being attacked by an angry mob. It got so ugly that the Romans had to come and save him. In the tumult of it all, Paul finds himself standing before the mob and then the Sanhedrin, giving his defense and giving a testimony to the promise of God, namely, Jesus the Messiah and his resurrection. It got so violent that Romans sequestered him in their barracks for his own protection.

Today, the story picks up, and things seem to be getting worse. Luke tells us that the next morning, some Jews – more than 40 of them – formed a conspiracy and bound themselves with an oath that they would not eat or drink until they killed Paul. Yet just the night before, Jesus promised him, “Take courage! As you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also testify in Rome” (Acts 23:11, NIV).

Would it happen? Would Jesus’s word come true? How could it? I think many people in Paul’s shoes might wonder, “Did I really hear Jesus last night?” “Did he really mean it?” “Maybe Jesus didn’t mean I would actually go to Rome, but that falling in with this lot and getting murdered by their hands would be heard there and ‘testify’ to Jesus.”

And others might ask, “Why is this happening to me? Isn’t following Jesus supposed to make my life better?”

Threats will always come along that challenge your faith in God’s promises. And God’s promises can seem distant when danger is immediate. In those times, you have to choose whether to believe Jesus’s words or fear the plot.

Prayer

Ask God for courage in the face of opposition. Ask him for faith to believe him when things feel overwhelming.