Acts 12:6 - And
when Herod would have brought him forth, the same night Peter was sleeping
between two soldiers, bound with two chains: and the keepers before the door
kept the prison.
In this account we find that Herod had
already killed James and had now imprisoned Peter with the intention of doing
the same to him. Peter was shackled with chains and kept under close watch by
several armed guards. Herod’s plan was to bring him out and brutally murder him
the next morning. What would we expect that Peter’s last night, before his
execution, would look like? Would he be writing letters to his loved ones or
would he be praying and preparing to meet the Lord face to face? Would he be
frantic and worried about all those whom he was about to leave behind? No! We
find him sleeping. Was he sleeping because he was so despondent that he had
lost all will to survive? Was he sleeping because he was so fatigued from all
of his labours for the Lord? I don’t think so.
We have the record of another night, several
years earlier, when Jesus was in the garden of Gethsemane. That night Jesus had
asked Peter to watch and pray with him, but instead Peter was found sleeping.
Jesus was not pleased with the fact that Peter could not stay awake and pray
for at least one hour. That night in the garden Peter surrendered to the sleep
of apathy, the sleep of hopelessness, and the sleep of fear, but the night of
his imprisonment Peter slept for a different reason. Peter may have been
rebuked for one type of sleep but he is to be commended for this other type, because
in this case he was sleeping the sleep of faith. A man that is in an austere
prison, bound between two soldiers and awaiting his execution, usually, would
be wide awake. But Peter was sleeping so soundly that the angel had to jostle
him out of his grogginess.
Why was it that Peter could have such peace
at this time? One reason could be something that Jesus had said to Peter just
before his ascension, gave him a rock-solid conviction of his future. Jesus had
told Peter that when he was old, someone would take him where he did not want
to go. ‘When he was old’. Peter was told by the Lord that he would indeed be
murdered for his faith but it was to happen when he was old. I can imagine
Peter that night in the prison saying to himself, ‘I am not old yet, so I
cannot die yet. The Lord has a plan to deliver me from this situation.
Therefore I am going to sleep’. Someone has once said that until you have
fulfilled the will of God on earth, you are invincible.
This account of Peter reminds me of another
story recorded during World War II. London was under a period of intense
bombing and almost every night the sirens went off and people would run to the
shelters for safety. One of those that ran to the shelter each night was an
older lady, who lived on her own. One night it was noticed that she was missing
and it was assumed that she had been caught in the explosions and was injured
or worse. Shortly after she was seen on the street during the day and was asked
if everything was alright and that people were concerned about her. She
responded by saying that she had been reading in the book of Psalms and came
across a verse that stated, ‘He that keeps Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps’
so she had decided if God was continually awake, then there was no point in
both of them losing sleep, so she just went to bed each night and slept soundly
through the incessant air raids. Maybe Peter thought the same. Maybe we should
think the same. There are different times and seasons and situations in life
and not all require the same response. Sometimes we may need to be aggressive
in prayer but at other times the greatest act of faith may be to simply go to
sleep, resting soundly and trusting fully that we are being kept safe by the
power of God through faith. God has got you covered, and under the covers is
when we sleep best.
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