You will hear from the recording that this was not so much a sermon, but a series of questions I was posing to my listeners.

I gave some background about which particular King Herod it was, shared some scriptures then we discussed the questions. Better heard then read I think.

Acts 12 v5 [ 37:06 ] Play in Popup | Download

Sermon Acts 12:5

So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.

Prayer was a presumed practice for a follower of Jesus.

The phrase often repeated by Jesus was, “when you pray.” See Matthew 6:6

But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Jesus taught prayer

Matthew 6:9

This, then, is how you should pray:’Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,

Jesus modelled prayer

Matthew 14:23

After he had dismissed them, he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone

Public prayer by religious leaders was not an unusual sight.

Luke 20:47

They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. Such men will be punished most severely.

Devout people prayed

Acts 10:1-3

At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment. He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly. One day at about three in the afternoon he had a vision. He distinctly saw an angel of God, who came to him and said, Cornelius!

The Church Prayed Together

We do not know why or when they first started to pray corporately. This is the first record of the new church of Jesus together at prayer.

Acts 1:12-15 (after the ascension)

Then they returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day’s walk from the city. When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James.

They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. In those days Peter stood up among the believers (a group numbering about a hundred and twenty)

See also

Acts 4:24

When they heard this, they raised their voices together in prayer to God. Sovereign Lord, they said, you made the heaven and the earth and the sea, and everything in them.

And Acts 4:31

After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

About Herod’s life

King Herod Agrippa I, grandson of Herod the Great and son of Aristobulus. He was nephew of Herod Antipas, the one who beheaded John the Baptist (Matt 14:3-12), and tried Jesus just before his crucifixion (Luke 23:8-12).

Herod Agrippa: Jewish king, ruled 37-44. Because of his good connections in Rome, he was the last to unite the Jewish territories.

The Jewish king Herod the Great had many sons and one of them was Aristobulus. However, Aristobulus the prince and the king were not on speaking terms; after two trials before the Roman emperor Augustus, Herod had his son executed in 7 BC. Aristobulus’ son Agrippa, named after Augustus’ friend Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, was spared. He was then only three years old and was sent to Rome, where he received a Roman education with the princes of the ruling dynasty, the Julio-Claudians. Among his companions were the later emperors Caligula and Claudius.

While Agrippa was growing up King Herod died and was succeeded by three of his sons: Herod Antipas ruled Galilee and the east bank of the Jordan as a tetrarch (A Roman governor of the fourth part of a province). Philip was to be tetrarch of the Golan heights in the north-east, and Archelaus became the ethnarch (‘national leader’) of Samaria and Judaea.

For most of his life, Agrippa lived in Rome. He spent all his money, went bankrupt and had to flee from his creditors at the beginning of the thirties.

In 33AD, we find Agrippa in Idumea, the southern part of Judea. Later, he was official in Tiberias, the capital of Galilee founded by his uncle Herod Antipas. However, Agrippa fell out of favour, went to Antioch, where he quarreled with the Roman governor, spent some time in Alexandria, where he encountered troubles too. A a rich man named Tiberius Julius Alexander (the brother of the philosopher Philo) gave money to Agrippa’s wife. In his despair, he decided to return to Rome, where he hoped his friend Caligula would solve his financial problems. He had to borrow money and was unable to pay for the passage of his family.

Things did not turn out as he had hoped and he even spent some time in prison. The emperor Tiberius died on March 16, 37AD. Caligula became emperor and almost immediately restored the principality of Syriah. AS king of Syriah he appointed his loyal supporter Herod Agrippa. He was the first to be called ‘king’ since his grandfather, Herod the Great, who had died almost forty years earlier.

In January 41AD, Caligula and Herod Agrippa were in Rome. Caligula was by now showing signs of complete insanity. On the twenty-fourth, the emperor was murdered, and the Jewish king played a very important role during the accession of Claudius. Claudius was so grateful to Agrippa that Judaea and Samaria were added to Herod Agrippa’s realm. He was now king of all the territories that had once been ruled by Herod the Great. Jerusalem was again the capital of Palestine as a whole and received new city walls. Agrippa’s entry in the city of David and Herod was a triumph.

Like his uncles and grandfather, Agrippa was both a Hellenistic and a Jewish ruler. His building program was essentially Greek; for example, he constructed a theatre, an amphitheatre, baths and porticoes in Beyrouth, a ‘pagan’ city. On the other hand, he did a lot for the temple in Jerusalem, repaired several buildings, and finished an aqueduct that had been ordered by Herod the Great and continued by Pontius Pilate.

After these successful attempts to please people, a strange incident took place in 44AD.

It is recorded in Acts 12.19-23

After Herod had a thorough search made for him and did not find him, he cross-examined the guards and ordered that they be executed.

Then Herod went from Judea to Caesarea and stayed there a while.

He had been quarrelling with the people of Tyre and Sidon; they now joined together and sought an audience with him. Having secured the support of Blastus, a trusted personal servant of the king, they asked for peace, because they depended on the king’s country for their food supply.

On the appointed day Herod, wearing his royal robes, sat on his throne and delivered a public address to the people. They shouted, This is the voice of a god, not of a man. Immediately, because Herod did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.

But the word of God continued to increase and spread.

That was the story according to Luke, the author of the Acts of the apostles. The same story is told by Flavius Josephus:

Now when Agrippa had reigned three years over all Judea, he came to the city Caesarea [...] There he exhibited shows in honour of the emperor [...] On the second day of the festival, Herod put on a garment made wholly of silver, and of a truly wonderful texture, and came into the theatre early in the morning; at which time the silver of his garment was illuminated by the fresh reflection of the sun’s rays upon it. It shone out after a surprising manner, and was so resplendent as to spread a horror over those that looked intently upon him. At that moment, his flatterers cried out [...] that he was a god; and they added, ‘Be thou merciful to us; for although we have hitherto reverenced thee only as a man, yet shall we henceforth own thee as superior to mortal nature.’

Upon this the king did neither rebuke them, nor reject their impious flattery. But as he presently afterwards looked up, he saw an owl sitting on a certain rope over his head, and immediately understood that this bird was the messenger of ill tidings, as it had once been the messenger of good tidings to him; and he fell into the deepest sorrow. A severe pain also arose in his belly, and began in a most violent manner. He therefore looked upon his friends, and said, ‘I, whom you call a god, am commanded presently to depart this life; while Providence thus reproves the lying words you just now said to me; and I, who was by you called immortal, am immediately to be hurried away by death. But I am bound to accept of what Providence allots, as it pleases God; for we have by no means lived ill, but in a splendid and happy manner.’

After he said this, his pain was become violent. Accordingly he was carried into the palace, and the rumour went abroad that he would certainly die in a little time. But the multitude presently sat in sackcloth, with their wives and children, after the law of their country, and besought God for the king’s recovery. All places were also full of mourning and lamentation. Now the king rested in a high chamber, and as he saw them below lying prostrate on the ground, he could not himself forbear weeping. And when he had been quite worn out by the pain in his belly for five days, he departed this life, being in the fifty-fourth year of his age, and in the seventh year of his reign.

[Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 19.343-350]

Acts 12:5 Some questions:

  • Why did they start praying?

  • What belief system did they have that might have motivated them to pray,?

  • What experiences had shaped them, that might have influenced them to pray?

  • Why did they not see that the problem insurmountable?