Prayer in the Early Church/Book of Acts Part II

 ”God shapes the world by prayer.” E.M. Bounds

Before we go on to a discussion of the prayers of the leadership of the church in the book of Acts, I want to conclude our discussion on corporate, congregational or small group prayer. And I would like to start with Acts 12 wherein we find the church in Jerusalem praying for Peter who was just arrested and thrown in prison by evil King Herod (see vs. 1-4). Vs. 5 reads, “So Peter was kept in the prison, but prayer for him was being made fervently by the church to God.”

This is one of my favorite occurrences of the word “but” because it helps us see there is nothing impossible with God. In response to these fervent prayers God sends “an angel of the Lord” who walks Peter right out of that heavily guarded prison in such an effortless seamless way that Peter thought he must be dreaming (see vs. 6-11). Peter upon realizing that this all really happened decided to go to Mary’s house “where many were gathered together and were praying.” (vs. 12). Others I’m sure were praying in other places, but Peter was led to this house. They initially didn’t believe it was truly him at the door, which shows at least for some of them their faith was not yet complete or mature. It might also be that their prayers were more focused on Peter’s faith and boldness and protection while in prison than it was on his being released from prison. It also shows that God is so pleased when His people gather to pray that He will mercifully overlook some of the weaknesses of those gathered.

The next time Luke tells us of a group of people praying is in Acts 16, where we find Paul, Luke and Timothy landing in Philippi, wherein they stayed “for some days.” (vs. 12). Vs. 13 informs us, “And on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to a riverside, where we were supposing that there would be a place of prayer; and we sat down and began speaking to the women who had assembled.” Out of this prayer meeting and ensuing discussion and perhaps spontaneous time of teaching came Lydia and her household’s conversion and baptism (see vs. 14,15). Perhaps a day or two later Paul and companions were headed again to “the place of prayer”, because Paul and his companions knew where you find a people praying you will find God working.

While God is pleased when His people gather to pray and while God is pleased to work in response to people praying together, we do have an enemy and he certainly does not sit idle. Any of you who have sought to be faithful in corporate prayer surely know that in the hours or minutes leading up to a time of prayer all hell sometimes breaks loose in an effort to distract or dissuade us from praying. Well in this case with Paul and his companions - evidently most every day when they walked to this prayer gathering by the riverside a demonized slave-girl would engage them and cry out loudly, “These men are bond-servants of the Most High God, who are proclaiming to you the way of salvation.” (vs. 17). Since Luke informs us that “She continued doing this for many days.” (vs. 18) – we know that Paul and companions walked to the prayer time “many days” implying that these folk were praying every day at that riverside.

Now these words of the servant girl by themselves don’t seem bad at all. But vs. 17 says she “kept” crying out probably with a very loud sickening kind of voice and thus after many days of this, “…Paul was greatly annoyed..” (vs. 18) and cast the demon out of the servant girl.  For our purposes though, I want you to see the faithful and consistent pattern of Paul and his companions and these believers in Philippi making corporate prayer a priority. This very likely is one of the reasons why the church in Philippi grew to be such a mature and fruitful church.

The final time Luke informs us of a gathered time of prayer for God’s people shows up in Acts 12:5, “When our days there were ended, we left and started on our journey, while they all, with wives and children, escorted us until we were out of the city. After kneeling down on the beach and praying, we said farewell to one another.” This took place in Tyre, where Paul and gang had just spent seven days with the disciples therein. They quickly bonded and I’m sure were sad to see Paul leave. But they were disciples so they knew His kingdom coming and His will being done was the priority. Because it says they were “kneeling down” I think it is safe to say this was no trite hurried time of prayer. They all knew the most strategic thing any of them could do was to forget about everything else and give themselves to prayer.

So how’s corporate or group or congregational prayer going for you?  May the Holy Spirit re-ignite your passion and practice of regular prayer with the saints. And may you see Him work in mighty ways as a result for His glory in Jesus’s name!!