Acts 4:23-35

Recap:

• What did you take away from the story of Peter & John and the lame man in Acts 3-4 (in last week's Connect Group Study and sermon)?

  • Have you had any opportunities to share about your faith in the last week or so? If so, how did it go?

Immediately following their release, Peter and John went to be with their friends, where they had an impromptu prayer meeting:

Read Acts 4:23-31

• What are your first impressions of Luke's summary of their prayers?

  • What did you notice they prayed about?

  • Was there anything that confused you or surprised you?

• See if you can describe the shape of the prayer, line-by-line. How do the themes and ideas all link together?

They quote the opening lines of Psalm 2 - but it is worth reading the entire Psalm, which was originally written for King David, but can also be read prophetically as pointing to the Messiah, Jesus...

Read Psalm 2

• How do you think the Christians would have felt about this Psalm if they read it during this prayer meeting?

  • How should we read this as Jesus' followers today?

Look again at Acts 4:29-30

• Why do you think they prayed for boldness?

• Why do you think they didn't pray for persecution to stop, or for their persecutors to be punished?

• Do you think you would've prayed this way? Why/why not?

Read Acts 4:32-35

• What do you think is the link between their boldness and their care for the needy?

  • How can we keep this same balance in our witness about Jesus, not being 'all words' or 'all actions'?

Spend some time praying together.

You might like to use the themes found in Acts 4:23-31 to form the basis of your prayer for one another, and for our church:

• God's sovereignty

• God's word

• God's enabling to make us speak boldly

• God's hand of power to heal and perform signs in the name of Jesus

• The infilling of the Holy Spirit