“Attempted coverup”

Meditation – Saturday, April 26, 2025

Acts 4: 13-22 (Forward, p. 87) CEV p. 1137

The authorities were in something of ‘a pickle’: a man over forty years old, who’d been born lame and who’d been a regular beggar at the door to the Temple had just been healed by Peter and John in the name of Jesus. The healing was so public and the crippled man such a ‘regular’, that this incident quickly made the rounds around the city and became public knowledge. There was no way the official authorities could quell or put a stop to the rumours. What a pickle.

But this was not all. There was worse to come. The apostles were preaching that the dead would be raised from death, just as occurred with Jesus, which upset the Sadducees mightily because they didn’t believe in such things. Furthermore, this preaching had resulted in many more conversions, a further upset. Not only that, but much of the apostles’ preaching put the onus for Jesus’ death precisely on those authorities, which again would be rather upsetting.

The authorities were somewhat stymied. They recognized that the apostles were just ordinary men, not well educated at all, but nevertheless, not quelled or intimidated at all. They knew that these two apostles had been with Jesus, and that seemingly this made a difference in their deportment. They could not deny what had happened with the lame man, so they tried something else, a kind of coverup. They threatened the apostles and told them to never again speak to anyone about the name of Jesus or teach about it. But here we see something of the boldness, the firm resolve of these two. They replied, “Do you think God wants us to obey you or to obey him? We cannot keep quiet about what we have seen and heard” (verses 19-20).

“Don’t keep it to yourself…give it away”: isn’t there an old church camp song that had words along that line. And indeed, that is part of our story,

part of our mission: we have heard—and sometimes seen—what the Lord can do and has done, and so we can’t keep it to ourselves. Perhaps there are some that would rather it be ‘covered’ up or left unmentioned, but that is their problem, not ours. As with those apostles, ‘we cannot keep quiet about what we have seen and heard’. Thanks be to God.

Forward notes: “We cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard” (verse 20).

“In our Acts reading today, Peter and John (‘though ordinary and uneducated’) have been curing people and preaching and are recognized as companions of Jesus. The council trembles for fear that the word of Jesus might spread. So, Peter and John are told ‘to speak no more to anyone in this name.’

“Though the truth will set you free, it can also hurt, and many times, we are asked to keep it to ourselves. However, on the Saturday after Easter, it is difficult to suppress the joy of the resurrected Christ. As Psalm 118 proclaims, ‘On this day the Lord has acted; we will rejoice and be glad in it.’ We cannot contain our joy that our hope has been renewed. So, we shout, ‘Alleluia!’ and no one can keep us from speaking!

Moving Forward: “When have you spoken out for the truth? How was it received?”