We’ve been going through Acts and especially noticing God’s POWER at work…in healings, breaking Peter out of prison, supernaturally directing Peter to Cornelius, etc. Whenever such stories are considered, along with reports that such miracles are still going on, the inevitable questions come: why wasn’t my friend Roy Fitzwater healed, for example? He was a man of God and was prayed for by some of the most devout, faith-filled people I know.

Part of the answer might be in Acts 12. The chapter is known best as another prison break for Peter followed by the amusing account of his going to the house where the believers were praying for him and being left to stand on the sidewalk. (See Acts 12.6 – 17) But that’s not how the chapter starts:

About that time Herod the king laid violent hands on some who belonged to the church. He killed James the brother of John with the sword. (Acts 12.1, 2, ESV)

James dies; Peter lives.

Is that the answer to the question or does it just introduce more mystery? The bottom line is this:

God’s POWER is for God’s purposes.

End of story. I might be an Air Force pilot (I’m not, and I wasn’t!), and the Air Force might equip me with the latest fighter jet. But it’s not so I can fly to Hawaii for a vacation. The Air Force, following orders from the President, tells me how and when to use that fighter jet.

And when Peter saw it he addressed the people: “Men of Israel, why do you wonder at this, or why do you stare at us, as though by our own power or piety we have made him walk? (Acts 3.12, ESV)