If you were being persecuted because of your faith, how would you pray to God? Would you ask for relief from your suffering? Would you ask for justice to be done – for your enemies to be punished while you were vindicated?

Well, Peter and John’s prayers were completely different. Oh, they had indeed been warned not to keep preaching about the risen Christ and His power to heal and save (4:18, 21). But when they had been released and had told their friends about their experience, they simply prayed that God would grant them the ability to go on speaking boldly about Jesus (4:29). And they asked that God would confirm the truth of their words with unmistakable signs of His power (4:30). No prayers for deliverance or safety – just prayers that God would keep them faithful.

Why would they pray in this way? Because, as the beginning of their prayer made clear, they knew that God is the Creator of the heavens and the earth (4:24). This indisputable fact put their problems into perspective – why should they fear mere human authorities when they were the agents of Almighty God?

They then went on to note that opposition to God and His people was not unique to their generation. In fact, some 1000 years earlier, David wrote Psalm 2, specifically predicting that worldly rulers would turn against God’s anointed Messiah (4:25-26). The apostles naturally saw the fulfillment of this prophecy in the life of Jesus, who had been put to death by Pontius Pilate at the behest of the same religious leaders who had just arrested and threatened them. But in crucifying Christ, these powerful human rulers had only succeeded in accomplishing God’s plans (4:28).

And it was precisely because the apostles had full confidence in God’s power as well as in His sovereign control over all the events of history that they could pray, not for their deliverance, but for God to give them boldness in proclamation of the Gospel, as well as confirmation of what they said. In other words, from beginning to end, their prayers were focused on God’s glory and on the spread of the good news – not on their own safety or comfort.

What if we were to pray in such a selfless, God-centered way, for faithfulness, for boldness and for God to demonstrate the truth of His Word in our lives? Well, we know God answered the apostles’ prayers by filling all of them with His Holy Spirit (4:31). And we know that God enabled the apostles to demonstrate the power of Jesus by numerous miracles of healing (3:7; 5:12, 15-16). And as a result of their selfless, God-centered ministry, multitudes of people in Jerusalem came to believe that the risen Jesus was in fact the Messiah God had promised them (4:4; 5:14).

Dwight L. Moody once observed, “The world has yet to see what God will do with a man fully consecrated to Him.” What might God do through us if we were just as devoted to Him as Peter and John were?

Acts 4:23-31 (ESV)

23 When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.
24 And when they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them,
25 who through the mouth of our father David, your servant, said by the Holy Spirit, “‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples plot in vain?
26 The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers were gathered together, against the Lord and against his Anointed’–
27 for truly in this city there were gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel,
28 to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.
29 And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness,
30 while you stretch out your hand to heal, and signs and wonders are performed through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”
31 And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.