30.07 | The Boldness
Acts 4:1-31
‘Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.’
Acts 4:13
In 2007, I took Nelson Mandela’s autobiography—A Long Walk to Freedom—with me to South Africa. A part of my reason for going was to study ideas and theology that had emerged out of South African during the overthrow of apartheid. I read the book on planes and in airport lounges, in a bunk bed in Durban and in the guest room of some friends in Cape Town. I read it after visiting Robben Island—where Mandela was incarcerated for much of his 27 year imprisonment, bringing to life his description of pointlessly breaking up rocks in the dazzling sun, a dehumanising regime looking to dismantle the souls of its opponents.
But there was one thing that stood out for me with Mandela’s story particularly.
Boldness.
The courage of speaking out; the courage of the sacrifice; the courage of a life relentlessly lived in the direction of change.
Toward the end of the book, Mandela writes these words:
“Time and again, I have seen men and women risk and give their lives for an idea. I have seen men stand up to attacks and torture without breaking, showing a strength and resilience that defies the imagination. I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. I felt fear myself more times than I can remember, but I hid it behind a mask of boldness. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”1
As we begin to immerse ourselves in the character of the Early Church movement, it is the very same theme that leaps off the pages. The Early Church was strikingly courageous.
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John.
They were courageous in their healing of the sick man. They were courageous as they testified to the resurrection of Jesus in the faces of those who, but weeks before, had shouted for His crucifixion. They are courageous as they are brought out of prison, to proclaim afresh the Lordship of Jesus before the very religious leaders who convicted their Lord.2 They are courageous as they defy these leaders with the declaration that they will most certainly continue to speak boldly of their King.
And then, as they are released, they go back to their friends. And they pray.
And guess what they pray for?
Boldness.
And … the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of the Lord with
boldness.
Boldness is an outcome of the renewed mind, formed through the interaction of our will and the Spirit.
The renewed mind believes that which is true. Jesus is risen. There is power in Jesus’ Name. Salvation is found in no one else. We are bearers of the exclusive truth that can heal this broken world.
The will mobilises this into little choices. Speak up rather than to be silent. Say yes to the opportunity rather than keep hiding. Leave the house. Talk to the stranger. Make the phonecall. Hug the hurting. Say sorry. Courage defiantly rejects the small life, embracing in ten thousand little decisions the life of the coming age.
And yet, the passage makes clear the Spirit is deeply involved.
As Peter and John made their defence, the Sadducees recognised that they had been with Jesus. Courage is a mark of those who have been in His presence.
And as they leave this 24 hours that, to us, seems drenched in courage, they simply go and pray for more of it.
And they are filled with the Spirit. And they speak boldly.
And round they go again.
Further up and further in, my friends. All heaven awaits a people in our age who will step up in consistent, daily, Holy-Spirit fuelled
boldness.
Reflect:
What decisions now feel like a battle between courage and fear.
What would it look like to choose fear?
What would it look like to choose courage?
Bring Him your will, and invite the Spirit to come and fill you too with boldness.
Pray:
Father,
Would you shake this room
And fill me with boldness.
You see my timidity,
You see my reasons to hide,
You see my fear that leads me to the small and to the safe,
And yet,
I don’t want my life to be dictated by my fears.
I want to speak with the truths that you teach me
And love with the heart that you grow in me
And serve with the gifts that you give me
And oppose every enemy you put before me.
And so, loving Father,
I give you my little choices
Unto the way of boldness,
And I ask you,
Shake this room;
Fill me with your Spirit;
And help me and my community
Live with the boldness that comes
When the ordinary and uneducated
Have been with Jesus.
In His Name,
Amen
Old Testament:
For those also reading the Old Testament this year, your additional readings are here:
Jeremiah 25-26 | Proverbs 20:5-13
Nelson Mandela: A Long Walk to Freedom, p.748
The Sadducees, named here, were the religious group known for their denial of all possibility of the miraculous, including bodily resurrection.