Today we see a leader, Herod, killing and attempting to kill to gain favor with the Jews and the quell the spread of what we know were now being called the “Christians”.  He kills James, which is James the brother of John and not James the brother of Jesus and author of the book of James, and then he puts Peter in prison to kill him.  But, as Peter is laid up in prison, and angel of the Lord appears to him and rescues him, and this completely infuriates Herod, so Herod orders his guards, these sentries, killed. Then we see Herod’s death as we close the chapter - which was interesting.  Herod has consolidated his power and gained peace over these few neighboring countries, and everyone is essentially praising him and he takes the credit as his own, as opposed to giving glory to God, and we are told that he is immediately struck down by God and that he was eaten by worms.  What I find interesting though, is  that the Jewish historian Josephus records how Herod celebrated games in Caesarea in honor of the Emperor, which were attended by the leading men of the kingdom. When Herod entered the theatre, clad in a glittering silver garment, his flatterers addressed him as a god: ‘May you be propitious to us, and if we have hitherto feared you as a man, yet henceforth we agree that you are more than mortal in your being.’ The king accepted their flattery. Then looking upward he saw an owl perched on a rope and took it as a symbol of ill fortune. At the same time he was seized by violent internal pains and was carried into his palace where he died after five days of illness (Jos., Ant. 19:343–350). It is clearly the same story which Luke tells us here.  That is just really cool to me, how non-Biblical writings like this are so often found that substantiate what’s being said in the scriptures that we read...it places things in the right historical timeframe and it really validates so much of what we have in our hands in the Bible.

The thing that MOST stuck out to me this morning though was really in the study notes from this chapter.  The author makes a huge effort to explain how historians have varying opinions about how Peter could have possibly escaped, and some go so far as to way that some of the story could have become a little more fantastic in time, and that some of the angel of the Lord appearance stuff could have eventually been written into the story.  In a sense, they are discounting the fact that the story could have really had this miracle in it.

Here’s my thing...all we have is what is written here by Luke, and that’s fine.  And I am a fan of historians working to understand the text.  What I tend to find most interesting though is how people will accept the resurrection and the reject this miracle, or Jonah and the whale, or Noah’s Ark, or the Parting of the Red Sea.  Think about it...if God raised a man from the dead, and if God created the universe, what real problem could we have logically with God performing a miracle to get Peter out of jail?  I mean, come on!

So, for me, today, I am just reminded that I have to avoid the temptation of placing my logical limits on God.  I have to suspend trying to put God in a human box, subject to the reasoning that I understand, because He is way bigger than that.  God rescued Peter, and God made a point out of Herod - I don’t need more explanation than that!