Acts 4

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Acts 4 Commentary

by Brad Boyles

As they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple guard and the Sadducees came up to them,  2  being greatly disturbed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead.

Acts 4:1-2 NASB

Why were the Sadducees so disturbed?

The Sadducees

• Opposed to anyone instructing the general public in spiritual matters other than the priests.
• Opposed to anyone making messianic claims and anyone teaching the resurrection of the dead.

The Sadducees were very literal in their translation of Judaism. They were traditional, holding only to the written Torah and rejecting the oral Torah. The Torah is simply the first 5 books of the Bible. In Jewish culture, they are referred to as the 5 books of Moses. Many Jews believed that Moses was given the written law (the written Torah) as well as an oral Torah (an oral version which was a more developed explanation of the written Torah).

One of the beliefs of the oral Torah was the spiritual nature of demons and angels as well as the resurrection of the dead.  The Sadducees, however, rejected the idea of the oral Torah and, therefore, rejected the idea that anyone could be raised from the dead.

Overall, the Sadducees represented a wealthy and traditional group of people within Jewish culture. These uneducated and untrained men, Peter and John, were challenging (1) Their Authority – because they were teaching the people about Jesus (2) Their Doctrine – because they had healed a man in the name of the risen Christ.

Jesus and Sin

The Sadducees wanted control. They wanted authority. They wanted tradition. They wanted prestige. And when their sinful idols were exposed, they had two choices. We always have two choices. They could respond with arrogance or respond with humility.

When Jesus challenges your sin, how do you respond? When he starts meddling in your life and brings confrontation or accountability, how do you respond? Do you make excuses? Do you get angry and blame others? A good indication of how you respond to Jesus is how you respond to others. How do you respond to your wife? How do you respond to your husband? What about other family members? It’s nearly impossible for someone to be obedient to Jesus and then extremely combative to those close to them. So, how are your relationships these days?

In the end, they arrest Peter and John but it’s too late in the day to give them a trial. So, they lock them up overnight. During that time, Luke records this…

But many of those who had heard the message believed; and the number of the men came to be about five thousand.

Acts 4:4 NASB

Though God’s servants were chained, His Word and His Message could not be stopped. In fact, it was thriving. The result of the suffering of Peter and John being locked up in chains resulted in 5,000 men being saved. That number, 5,000, only records men, meaning, the actual number of women and children could have been much greater. When we are faithful to planting seeds, God’s Message cannot be stopped!

And what happens next is a personal and authoritative response from Peter. He’s not speaking on his own. He’s speaking through the Spirit of God.

“He is the STONE WHICH WAS REJECTED by you, THE BUILDERS, but WHICH BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone.  12  “And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.”  13  Now as they observed the confidence of Peter and John and understood that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed, and began to recognize them as having been with Jesus.

Acts 4:11-13 NASB

The Community

And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul; and not one of them claimed that anything belonging to him was his own, but all things were common property to them.  33  And with great power the apostles were giving testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and abundant grace was upon them all.

Acts 4:32-33 NASB

These are the acts of the Holy Spirit. These people exist, not for themselves, but so that they could serve and ignite others with the Good News of our Savior. This passage of Acts celebrates community within the church, but it does so with an end goal to exist as an extension of the Most High God, and to bring Salvation to a hurting and confused world. The miraculous events described here are not done by extraordinary people. They are evidence of a unified body which understood that God would do abundantly more than they could ever hope or imagine if they sacrificed their lives.

We see possessions that were formerly viewed as “mine” are now being used for the Kingdom. My house, my food, my possessions, and my land should all be used to glorify God. Anything that God blessed the early church with qualified for use among the greater body. Why has that changed today?

A really good indicator of the Holy Spirit’s presence or absence in a person’s life is the act of either giving or not giving of material possessions. It really comes down to is a misunderstanding of Jesus’ authority over the things He’s allowed you to have. It’s not your stuff. It’s His.

The Holy Spirit blessed the action and commitment of the early church by drawing the people closer to Him, revealing Himself in a way like never before, destroying their formerly selfish attitude, increasing their worship, and increasing the number of those who were saved. Why would He not do the same today?