MARTYRDOM OF JAMES
1, 2. This Herod Antipas was the grandson of the King Herod reigning
when our Savior was born, and notorious for slaying the infants of
Bethlehem, and even himself, while the innocents were bleeding, and
Jesus safe in Egypt, summoned to stand before God and account for his
diaboli... [ Continue Reading ]
PETER'S MIRACULOUS DELIVERANCE
3, 4. When Herod beheaded James, the Jews took great courage,
congratulating themselves that their good king will soon exterminate
that vexatious heresy in blood. Herod is more than willing to purchase
popular favor by killing off the apostles; consequently he arrests... [ Continue Reading ]
Peter is sound asleep, flat on his back, chained to a soldier on
either side, the stilly hours of dulcet slumber treading slowly on,
anticipating the day of his bloody martyrdom. He must have had perfect
rest in Jesus, or he could not have slept. The soldier on either side
of him, and the other four... [ Continue Reading ]
Peter thinks he is in a trance and sees a vision. Now they pass by the
first and second guard and come to the great iron gate that leads out
into the city. Peter is soliloquizing:
“Though I have escaped from the prison and passed the guards, what
shall I do? It takes twenty men to open the great ir... [ Continue Reading ]
Now they have passed the gate and come to the first street. The angel
disappears. Peter diagnoses his environments and locates himself, and
goes at once to the house of Mary, where the saints are all praying
through the long night for his release, and now utterly incredulous at
the report of the enr... [ Continue Reading ]
When Peter is admitted, he at once takes command of the uproarious
crowd, beckoning silence with his hand. He has no time to waste. He
must run away and hide from Herod and the soldiers before daylight, or
he will be killed. Therefore, commanding silence, he briefly relates
his wonderful deliverance... [ Continue Reading ]
At day-dawn the soldiers missed Peter, to their infinite
consternation, and submit to their awful fate-the merciless penalty of
the cruel tyrant-for letting their prisoner escape. Herod has them all
hung.... [ Continue Reading ]
DOOM OF THE TYRANT
20-23. For reasons not here specified, the king was exceedingly mad at
the people of Tyre and Sidon, those great mercantile cities on the
Mediterranean coasts. He was not allowed to make war on them, because
they were all under the Roman Empire. Immediately after the escape of
Pet... [ Continue Reading ]
_“Immediately the angel of the Lord struck him, because he did not
give the glory to God, and, being eaten with worms, he gave up the
ghost.”_
Here you see the soul-sleeping heresy, _i. e_., that you have no soul
separate from the body, is unanswerably refuted, as you see the soul
of Herod left his... [ Continue Reading ]
By this time Barnabas and Saul have completed their tour to Jerusalem,
bearing benefactions to the poor saints, and returned to Antioch,
having brought with them John Mark, the subsequent amanuensis of
Mark's gospel. He was the nephew of Barnabas, (Colossians 4:10), who
was very anxious to make him... [ Continue Reading ]