The Second Outbreak of Persecution Against the Church - Part 1

Let's take our Bible. Let's turn to Acts chapter 5. We're going to be in a big portion of Scripture. We'll cover it all. Last time we were in the book of Acts, we covered a smaller portion of Scripture, verses 12 to 16. But tonight we will start here in verse 17 and go on down to verse 33. Now actually, verses 17 to 42 go together, but I am covering these verses in a part 1 and a part 2. Now before we read our verses and get into our message, I want to quickly remind us of what we have studied so far in chapter 5. In verses 1 to 11, we saw the great and terrible event when Ananias and Sapphira brought sin into the life of the church.

That husband and wife team brought the sin of hypocritical giving into the life of the church. And in a grand way, they pretended to be more spiritual and more sacrificial than they actually were. Well, we know the result. They died. God purified his church. God purged sin and hypocrisy and those responsible for those things out of his church. And it was God who used Peter in that work. And then in verses 12 to 16, we saw Luke's third brief description of the church in Jerusalem. And I say this is the early years, but the later early years. Luke gave us a very colorful snapshot of this church that was full of life.

They were full of the Holy Spirit and they were full of Holy Spirit activity. We saw that they were a congregation characterized by many things. They were characterized by great and miraculous apostolic power and works. They were characterized by great purpose. And that purpose was gathering together in unity or oneness in all things. They were also characterized by purity. Sin and unrepentant believers had been removed. Unity prevailed and non-believers dared not associate with them as if they were believers. And they were characterized by great saving power.

More and more, even great multitudes of both men and women were coming to saving faith in Christ. Well, what was the result of all these things? All these things brought on the second round of persecution from the religious leadership. Only this time, this second round of persecution was more dangerous and it was more forceful. More forceful than the first round. Now a question, should this surprise us? You might say, "No pastor, I kind of know the Bible. I know what's in these verses." And you've already been telling us that this was coming. Well, I'm asking that question from another perspective.

The fact that the religious leaders and the religious establishment broke out in persecution against this church, it should not surprise us. That is because Jesus said this would happen. In John chapter 15, Jesus clearly explained to these very disciples now that persecution would come for them. Listen to what Jesus said in John 15, verse 18 to 20. "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. And if you were of the world, the world would love you as its own. But because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you.

A servant is not greater than its master. If they," that's the world, "persecuted me," that's Jesus, "they also will persecute you." Now I like how Warren Wiersby describes what is taking place here. He says this is the age-old conflict between truth and dead tradition. He's right. But this is much more. And we're going to see that this is much, much more than a clash between truth and tradition. Here in this second round of persecution, we have a conflict, a clash, between what is true and what is false. Jewish religious leaders were not only holding on to tradition, but they were holding on to lies.

They were holding on to that which was false. Now before we get into our verses, into our message, I want to revisit what I said back when we studied the first round of persecution. In America, in the West, we rarely, if ever, face real persecution. And especially in the South, we live in the Bible Belt, isn't that right? There's a church on every quarter. Everybody's a member of a church. So we rarely, if ever, face persecution. We live in a land where Christianity is so widely accepted and even respected from the outside world. So real life and death persecution is foreign to us and our lives and our Christian experience.

But throughout church history, at times the church has endured brutal persecution. And it would do us some good to do some study. Study some church history. Read biography to see how individuals in churches have not only endured persecution, but they thrived. Yes, thrived under persecution. Now when we studied our first round of persecution, I mentioned the story of Richard Wamburand, who was a pastor and a church leader in Romania in the 1950s when great horrible persecution broke out against the church in those Eastern Bloc European countries under communism.

I have a good book about Richard Wamburand's life and the persecution that he and others endured. As a matter of fact, I dug that up today. It's called Tortured for Christ. And I have a brand new copy. If any of you want to use it, read it. As a matter of fact, if you want it, you can have it. It'd be a good one to read and even to share. Now why do I mention that? It's good to study the experiences, even persecution, that other Christians have faced. Now before we get started though, there's a lesson that we need to learn here.

If men like Richard Wamburand and his church, and this church here in Acts 5, can be fully devoted to Christ, if men like Wamburand and this church before us can do the work of the church successfully, faithfully while facing persecution, then what about us? Look church, we must see that there is a real difference between Christians and Christianity that's faithful to face persecution and death and the Christians in the Christianity that cannot be faithful because of things like sports, recreation, family pressures, jobs, and career. Let that contrast sink in. I'm going to repeat that.

We must see that there is a real difference between Christians and Christianity that is faithful in the face of real persecution, even death, and the Christians in Christianity that we know can't be faithful because of things like sports, recreation, family pressures, jobs, and career. You can add to that list. And we need to desperately see that if we fall on the wrong side of that comparison, then we need to make some serious hard-and-life changes. Because if we fall on the wrong side of that comparison, then when real persecution does come, we won't make it. We will not make it at all.

So tonight we're going to be in verses 17 to 33 and what I'm calling the second outbreak of persecution. This is a part one. The second outbreak of persecution. Let's read the verses and then from time to time we'll look at the verses again throughout the message. Let's start with verse 17. "But the high priest rose up and all who were with him," that is the party of the Sadducees, "and filled with jealousy they arrested the apostles and put them in the public prison.

But during the night an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out and said, 'Go and stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life.' And when they heard this, they," that would be the apostles, "entered the temple at daybreak." That would be daylight and they began to teach. "So when the high priest came and those who were with him, they called together the council," that would have been the Sanhedrin, "all the Senate of the people of Israel, and sent to the prison that have them," that's the apostles, "brought or brought before them.

But when the officers came, they did not find them in the prison, so they returned and reported. We found the prison securely locked in the guards standing at the doors, but when we opened them, we found no one inside. Now when the captain of the temple and the chief priests heard these words, they were greatly perplexed about them, wondering what this would come to. And someone came and told them, 'Look, the men whom you put in prison are standing in the temple and teaching the people.' Then the captain of the officers went and brought them, but not by force, for they were afraid of being stoned by the people.

When they had brought them, they set them," this is the apostles, "before the council, and the high priests questioned them, saying, 'We strictly charge you not to teach in this name, yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching, and you intend to bring this man's blood upon us.' But Peter and the apostles answered, 'We must obey God rather than man.' The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you killed by hanging him on a tree. But God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.

And we are witnesses to these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him." And verse 33, "And when they," that would have been the Sanhedrin, the Jewish religious leaders, when they heard this, they were enraged, and they wanted to kill them, kill them being the apostles. Now, when we look at how others approach these verses, we see some very easy to understand outlines of these events. This may help you, it helped me in some of my preliminary study. John MacArthur breaks these things down by using three words, persecution, persistence, and productivity.

He points to the persecution of the religious leaders, that's seen in verses 12-28, the persistence of the apostles, that's seen in verses 29-32, and the productivity of the church, that's seen in verses 33-42. Warren Wiersbe's approach is a little different. He points out that the counsel of the Jewish leaders attacked the truth in verses 17-28. Then how the apostles affirmed the truth in verses 29-32, and then he points out how Gamaliel avoided the truth in verses 33-39, and how the church announced the truth in verses 40-42. But that leads me to how I want to approach the verses.

I want to be a little more detailed, so that means I want to make seven observations out of these verses. Now, some of these are short, so when I said seven observations, you probably thought we would be here until nine o'clock. I promise we won't. So let's get started. Number one, I want us to see the arrest of the apostles. We see that in the first two verses, verse 17-18. The arrest of the apostles.

Here Luke tells us that the high priest, who is probably Caiaphas, along with the Sadducees, they were furious and filled with jealousy because the church had great success and influenced the people so that many were coming to faith and coming into the church. And just like we saw back in the first round of persecution in Acts 4.1-4, the religious leaders were determined to stop this new movement and to return things back to normal. The text says they were filled with jealousy. And notice, they did not, they not only, not only did they arrest them, but they put them in prison. The text says a public prison.

This undoubtedly would have been a public jail or some kind of a public prison used for common ordinary criminals. I like how William McDonald expressed the heart and the thinking of the religious leaders. He said, and I'm quoted, they resented any threat to their exclusive role as religious leaders and especially despised preaching concerning the bodily resurrection, which they of course utterly denied. Unable to cope with the apostles other than by force, they had them arrested and imprisoned. In other words, they put them away. So the point here is simple.

The Jewish religious leaders were filled with anger and jealously at the success of the church and how they were influencing the people with the message of Jesus as the promised Messiah and how so many were joining what they saw as this new and false movement. So they arrested, jailed the apostles. And then number two, I want us to see the miraculous intervention of God, the miraculous intervention of God. That's in the next two verses. Verse 19, 20. Excuse me. Look back at the verses. But during the night an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out.

That would be the apostles and said, go and stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life. Now, just like before in that first round of persecution, the attack, opposition and persecution brought on by Satan, it didn't work. MacArthur says that Satan's attack backfired. That's a good phrase. Backfired. You know what it means for something to backfire? If I have a gun and I'm aiming it at someone or something, well, I desire to bring about harm on what I'm shooting at. Isn't that right? Well, if that gun backfires, well, the harm doesn't go on them. The harm comes on me. Now, right here, I want us to see two details.

First, what God did. Now, all the translations that we normally refer to tell us that an angel of the Lord opened the prison door. Now, this is rather ironic since the Jewess sect of the Sadducees, who are prominent right here in this persecution, they didn't believe in the existence of angels. But we need to see something in the language. This phrase, angel of the Lord, in the original, it reads angel of Yahweh. Yes, this speaks of the angel doing the work of God, but this speaks of the very presence of God in the work. This speaks of the very presence of God in working to free these men. So we see what God did in freeing the apostles.

He said it was angel to free the apostles, but he was in the work so that it was God who freed them. I thought about a great example. I don't want to get political, but it fits. We know that our president, Donald Trump, recently had the military bomb certain nuclear plants and facilities and locations in Iran. Well, our president, Donald Trump, is getting blamed for bombing Iran. Well, who bombed Iran? It really wasn't Donald Trump. It was those men in the planes, right? So who bombed Iran? Well, Donald Trump did because he gave the authority to do it. I think you get the comparison. Second, notice what God said.

And notice that he said two things. Here in verse 20, we see that God, through the angel, commanded the apostles to go back to the temple into preaching the words of life to the people. One commentator pointed out that this word stand here. It means to stand. It means to take a stand, stand firm, to stand and to hold your ground. The commentator pointed out that God was calling the apostles to possess a dogged steadfastness and to stand and to hold their ground against their threat of persecution and to preach and continue to teach. So God called them to stand and to stand firm, to take a stand and preach.

Now, a question here, an application. When we face opposition to the gospel, do we take a dogged stand against that opposition and for the declaration of the gospel? Notice, I didn't say persecution. We don't face persecution. When we face opposition, not persecution, when we face opposition to the gospel, do we take a dogged stand against that opposition and for the declaration of the gospel? Shame on us if these men can face persecution and have a dogged stand to share the gospel and we can't even share the gospel with those who will still like us. And they won't stone us. And listen to what verse 20 says in the legacy standard Bible.

Go stand and speak to the people in the temple, the whole message of this life. Here we see that God called them to preach the whole message of life, the entire message of life, every part of the message of life. And this would have consisted of Jesus as the promised Messiah of God, the death, the burial, the resurrection and the ascension of Jesus, salvation found in Jesus and the new life found in Jesus. Now, there is a question, a lesson here. When we witness, do we share the whole message of life? Do we share the entire message of the gospel or do we just share part of the gospel? You do know that half the gospel message is offensive.

We can leave certain facts out of the gospel and make it more acceptable. Do we share part of the gospel or do we share all of the gospel? We need to see that there are a thousand and one ways we can share only part of the message of Christ and the new life in Christ. So God called them to preach the whole message of life. So here in verses 19 to 20, we see the intervention of God. Not only did God free the apostles, but he freed them and he called them to go back to the temple and to stand their ground in preaching the entire message of life or the entire message of Christ.

Now, I have made some personal application throughout this part of the message, but before I continue, we need to see how this applies to us as a church. As a church, there are and will be pressures from the world to alter the message of God's word in the gospel. And we must see that it is our church's mandate from God to stand and to take a dogged stand so as to preach the unadulterated gospel in the entire message of God's word. Now, I know what I'm going to reference is not a part of the gospel message, but it is a part of God's word. The world would pressure us to change that part of the Bible that says homosexuality is a sin.

And there are all kinds of pressures against the church to change that message or just leave that out. But that's not what God's word says. As a church, we declare all of God's word. So the intervention of God, and this was much more than just opening up prison doors. Number three, the response of the apostles. We see this at the beginning of verse 21, the response of the apostles. Look at the verse. And when they heard this, what did they hear? They heard what the angel said. When they heard this, they entered the temple at daybreak. That would have been dawned and begin to teach. I like what John MacArthur says here.

He says they were freed not to hide, but to go and to preach and they chose to boldly obey God and leave the consequences to God. As a matter of fact, I thought about it like this. It doesn't even appear that they went home for a nap. He goes on to say that the courage of the apostles was a defiant courage. I will add to that by saying that they possessed a defiant courage that was also an obedient courage. And this leads me to make a few short but much needed observations here. Notice the apostles defied the religious leaders, but then the apostles obeyed God. Now this leads me to a question or two that we have to wrangle.

This is a tough one for Christians. When do we disobey authority that God has placed over us? Do we ever disobey authority that God's placed over us? Romans 13 says we should subject ourselves to authorities that are placed over us. Listen folks, we disobey authority when that authority commands us to disobey what God has already said. You see, we disobey authority when that authority commands us to disobey what God has commanded and said. In this case, the governing authorities commanded the apostles not to preach the gospel, but God said otherwise. So the apostles defied and disobeyed the religious leadership and they obeyed God.

Notice they ignored the threats of the religious leadership. Notice they treasured the commands of God. Notice they had no fear of man. If they did, they crucified it. And then notice they demonstrated a true fear of God by obeying God. So the response of the apostles, they were obedient to the call and the command of God. They boldly went straight back to the temple at daybreak and began preaching the whole message of God and eternal life. Now a question and application. Are we declaring the gospel in the public arena as we should? As a church and as individuals, we should always be asking that question.

Then number four, the realization of what happened and the rest of the apostles. The realization of what happened and the re-arrest of these apostles. We see this in verse 21 to 26, and although this is a larger block of scripture, we will be quick here. Let's read verse 21 again and notice how it changes. And then verse 22 to 26. "And when they," that's the apostles, "heard this, what the angel said, they entered the temple at daybreak and began to teach.

Now when the high priests came and those who were with them, they called together the council, all of the senate of the people of Israel, and sent to the prison to have them the apostles brought. But when the officers came, they did not find them in the prison, so they returned and reported. We found the prison securely locked in the guard standing at the doors. But when we opened them, we found no one inside. Now when the captain of the temple and the chief priests heard these words, they were greatly perplexed about them, wondering what this would come to.

And someone came and told them, 'Look, the men whom you put in prison are standing in the temple and teaching the people.' Then the captain with the officers went and brought them, but not by force, for they were afraid of being stoned by the people. Now here there is only two basic things that are important for us to see. Here we see that the religious authorities realized what had happened. They were perplexed. I would have been too. They sent for the apostles, but they were not there. They found that the apostles were not in the prison. They were free.

And not only were they free, they were right back preaching the people there in the temple. So they realized that the apostles were free and back to preaching the gospel. So they re-arrested them. But notice how they arrested them. Verse 26 says that they brought them in, but not by force. That is because they were very afraid of the people. Simply God had given the apostles great favor among the people. So the religious leaders were afraid that if they forcefully arrested the apostles, the crowds would turn on them. And notice they were afraid that they would have a riot even that they could be stoned.

Now this reminds me of a lesson that we have learned more than once. God can cause people outside the church to view the church with great respect and favor, but that s God s business. And we should not be about courting the world or courting lost people or even courting government officials to somehow gain their respect and favor. We should be about preaching the gospel and preaching the totality of God s Word. And if the world respects us or hates us, we stay true to our responsibility to preach the gospel in God s Word no matter what. And then number five, notice the interrogation of the apostles.

Verses 27 to 28, the interrogation of the apostles. And when they had been brought in, they set them before the council. The high priest, scholars believed this was Caiaphas, questioned them, saying, We strictly charge you not to teach in this name. That would have been the name of Jesus. Yet here you would fill Jerusalem with your teaching and you intend to bring this man s blood upon us. Now I want us to see three things about this interrogation. First, the high priest avoided using the name of Jesus. Now we may not see this unless we really, really pay attention.

But in verse 28, the high priest said to the apostles, and I m putting it in my words, we commanded you not to teach in this name, but he did not mention what name. It s simple. The high priest avoided the name of Jesus. Now right here we need to see that just the name of Jesus, just the name of Jesus is either a great blessing or a great stumbling block. See, to the redeemed, to true Bible Christians, the name of Jesus is a great blessing. When we hear the name of Jesus, it should move us to praise and worship and adoration and great humility because we know that it is Christ. It was Christ who saved us.

But to the lost, it is a great stumbling block because to the lost, even the name of Jesus is a reminder of their sin and their rebellion against God. The second he acknowledged the preaching success of the apostles, here the high priest said, and I m putting this in my words as well, we commanded you not to preach in this name, but instead you would fill the city with your preaching. I like what William McDonald says here. He says this was an unintentional compliment, an unintentional compliment to the effectiveness of the apostolic ministry of preaching, and it was. In Luke Church, this should be an example to us.

We should fill our city with the preaching of Jesus. We should fill our own personal world with the preaching of the gospel and Jesus. And I want to ask you, how are you doing at filling your personal world with the gospel and the word and the preaching of Jesus? It starts with your children. Third, he accused the apostles of assigning guilt to them. Here the high priest accused the apostles of blaming the death of Jesus on them, and it was true. Now yes, it was true that the apostles blamed the religious leaders for the death of Christ. Peter boldly blamed the religious leaders of this end many times.

He blamed them in Acts 2.23, Acts 2.36, Acts 3.15, and in chapter 4 verses 10 to 11. And yes, it was true that they were guilty, along with the Roman authorities. The Jewish authorities had crucified Jesus. The Romans performed the actual crucifixion, but it was from the pressure and the coercion of the religious leaders and even the crowds of Jews. I like what MacArthur says here, and I'm quoting him. He says, "The high priest conveniently forgot, however, that he and his associates had said to Pilate, 'His blood be on us and on our children.'" And he's referring to Matthew 27.25.

So here we have the interrogation of the apostles by the high priest and the rest of the religious leaders. And in their interrogation, we see that they inadvertently bragged on the ministerial success of the apostles, and they acknowledged their own guilt in the crucifixion of Jesus because they were forced to. Then number six, we see the declaration of the apostles. We see the declaration of the apostles. We'll see it's Peter on the forefront, but he's speaking with and for all the apostles. Look at verse 29 to 32. "But Peter and the apostles answered." We see Peter's leadership. "We must obey God rather than men.

The God of our fathers raised Jesus, whom you kill by hanging him on a tree, and God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins. And we are witnesses to these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him." Now there's quite a lot here. If the religious leaders expected the apostles to be cowards and the coward down, well, they were shocked. Peter, along with the other apostles, but Peter, as their leader, he steps up and he speaks up, and notice what he declares. First, he declared their allegiance was to God and not to man.

Peter and the other apostles had demonstrated that they obeyed God and not man, but here Peter declared it. He declared their allegiance to God, to their face. And then second, he declared the entire message of the gospel. One Bible scholar, Jim Boyce, points out that Peter's short sermon before the religious leaders contained what the New Testament commonly, here the Bible scholar Jim Boyce points out that Peter's short sermon before the religious leaders contains what is commonly seen all throughout the New Testament.

Boyce goes on to point out that this message, it is a fixed structure of the gospel message, and it's seen in almost all of the New Testament presentations of the gospel in the book of Acts. And this gospel message, these gospel facts are easily seen. Christ's death on the cross for sin, the burial of Christ, the resurrection of Christ, and his bodily ascension back to heaven, and his appearing in his resurrected body and form to certain witnesses of these things. Now, what is the point? Peter preached the entire message of the gospel and he continued to do so all throughout the book of Acts and we see it all throughout the New Testament.

And notice what he preached. He preached the crucifixion of Christ in verse 30. He preached the resurrection of Christ in verse 30. He preached the ascension of Christ in verse 31. And he preached that they were witnesses of these things in verse 32. Now, what is my point? Along with the other apostles, Peter boldly preached the entire message of the gospel straight into the face of these religious leaders, no matter the consequence. Then third, he declared their personal guilt. And we see that Peter not only preached the entire message of the gospel, but he declared their personal guilt in all of these things. We've already seen this.

They were guilty of the death of Christ. They had blood on their hands. And notice how Peter does this. In verse 30, Peter tells the religious leaders that they killed the English Standard Version. The legacy standard of the New American says, "Put to death." He says they killed, they put to death Jesus. And this term, "Put to death," in the original, it comes from a word which means to use the hands to take in the hand. So Peter was truly saying that by their own hands, they killed Jesus. They had not simply put Jesus to death by scheming with the Roman officials. God saw that they had truly, by their own hands, put Jesus on the cross.

And a question. In a very real way, by our own sin and sinfulness, did we not crucify Jesus with our own hands? By our own sin and sinfulness, do we not have blood on our hands just like these religious leaders? Yes. If Jesus died on the cross for our sin and sinfulness, if he truly was, first John 2, 2, the propitiation or the atoning sacrifice for our sins, then we are guilty of putting Christ on the cross. And for those who were born again, when we hear that, that moves us to great praise and worship and adoration. It moves us to great thanksgiving. Why? Because we put him on the cross and he still loved us and even saved us.

But for those who were lost and outside of a saving relationship to Christ, that shows them their guilt before God. So we see the declaration of Peter and the other apostles before the Jewish religious leaders. Representing the apostles, Peter preached the full message of the gospel and he declared their personal guilt before God. And then number seven, we see the anger of the religious leaders in verse 33. The anger of the religious leaders. Look at verse 33. It's a short verse.

"And when they," that's Caiaphas, the high priest, all of the religious leaders, "when they heard this, all that Peter said and the other apostles, they were enraged and they wanted to kill them." Now this is simple, but this reveals the work of Peter's preaching, their obedience to God and the work of the gospel. When the Jewish religious leaders heard what Peter preached, they were enraged. They were mad enough to kill them. And this literally means that they were mad enough to plot and to plan and to kill them if someone in something or not stepped in. We'll see that next week. And this is where we will pick up next week with the part two.

But there is a very, very valuable lesson here that we need to learn. When we witness, and when we make personal application of the gospel, it's been a while since I used that phrase, personal application of the gospel. We need to understand what that means. When we share the gospel and we personally apply that gospel, when we use the personal pronoun you, there will be times when people will be infuriated at us. I've said this before. I'll say it again. I'll never forget the second time someone shared the gospel with me. It was someone in my family and they shared the gospel and they said you, they said you're lost. They named my sin.

They said you were going to hell. They presented the gospel, but they explained my personal guilt. They personally applied the gospel. I tell you, I was mad. I used words I can't repeat. And when we share the gospel and when we make personal application, just make sure we remember that we may make some enemies. We may make some enemies. Now as I close, I want to revisit some questions that I ask us back when we studied the first outbreak of persecution against the church. Four in particular. First question, is it wrong that we live in a place in a time where we do not experience persecution? Well, no.

And there are Christians that can be confused here. Like it's our fault. Like we're doing something wrong because we don't face persecution. We believe in the providence of God. By God's providence, I was born in America while other Christians were born in North Korea or maybe even Iran. Second question, if persecution is good and it is and we are learning that, should we do anything to bring it about? Well, the answer to that is no. We've learned what we do. We preach the gospel. We do the work of the church. We declare the word of God anywhere and everywhere we go.

We go on mission even around the world and we let God take care of the persecution or the blessing from the world. And then third, what should the church do? What should we do while not experiencing persecution? Oh, that's probably the best question I could ask here. You see, while we have freedom, while we have peace, we should be busy about doing the work of the church. Preaching the gospel, sharing the gospel, evangelizing even around the world. And then the last question, how should we react to brothers and sisters in churches that we know who do face, could face persecution? First, we should pray for them.

Second, we should support them in any way that we can. Now, when we know a people who are in dangerous places, it's really best to be very, very careful what we say and what we do. Oh, listen church, be very careful with your social media. Be very careful what you may text in a text message. You could endanger someone who is in a difficult place in the world. What should we do? How should we react when we know brothers and sisters who are in places where they're persecuted? We pray for them. We encourage them. We love them. We help them in any way, but we don't cross the line whereby we could endanger them.

So, the second outbreak of persecution against the church. This is a part one. And next week we'll pick right back up with verse 33 and we'll move on down to verse 42.