“What are we going to do with these men,” they asked. “Everybody living in Jerusalem knows they have done an outstanding miracle, and we cannot deny it. But to stop this thing from spreading any further among the people, we must warn these men to speak no longer to anyone in this name.” Then they called them in again and commanded them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John replied, “Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God. For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” (Acts 4:16-20)
Well, the kids are back at school and that means it is time to think about ways to stop the spread of that school stuff that wants to come home and live with you! The CDC has posted the following recommendations: frequent hand washing, avoiding close contact and staying home when you are sick. Okay, am I the only one who thinks the germs from school laugh when they read this list? They manage to infiltrate no matter how hard I seek to stop the spread!
As I read this passage in Acts, it sounded like the Sadducees were employed by the CDC! These self-protective agnostics were also trying to stop something from spreading! What were they trying to stop? Peter had seen a crippled beggar and in an act of kindness healed him in the name of Jesus. It was the spread of the “Jesus germ” that the Sadducees sought to stop. Their strategy was to get the apostles to stop speaking–the thought was that if they could quiet the apostles this spreading kindness–this spreading healing might also stop! Does that strike you as odd? With previously uncharacteristic boldness, the apostles responded to the Sadducees in effect, “It’s too late, we’re sorry, we are already infected and we can’t help but spread this!”Â
R. Kent Hughes shares an account from our own history of a man who was spreading the same germ!
Peter Cartwright was a great circuit-riding Methodist preacher in Illinois. An uncompromising man, he had come north from Tennessee because of his opposition to slavery. One Sunday morning when he was scheduled to preach, his deacons told him that President Andrew Jackson was in the congregation. Knowing Cartwright was used to saying whatever he felt God wanted him to say, regardless of how people might react, they warned him not to say anything that would offend the chief executive. He stood up to preach and said, “I understand President Andrew Jackson is here. I have been requested to be guarded in my remarks. Andrew Jackson will go to Hell if he does not repent!” The audience was shocked. They wondered how the President would respond to this, but after the service the told Cartwright, “Sir, if I had a regiment of men like you, I could whip the world.” (( R. Kent Hughes, Acts The Church Afire, Crossways Books, 64))
Interestingly enough these Spirit infected Jesus followers were on a world mission–not to whip it but to win it for the Jesus that they had come to devotedly adore! This “thing” that the Sadducees tried to stop is unstoppable–it is not something–it is someone–the Sovereign Lord of the Universe who is on mission!