Obey God Rather Than People — Acts 5
May 6, 2026
This week's message worked through Acts 5 — a chapter that opens with Ananias and Sapphira's deception inside the church and moves to the apostles facing the religious authorities outside it. The high priest and the Sadducees rise up, jealous, and arrest the apostles for publicly preaching Jesus. When they're dragged before the council and told to stop, Peter gives the line the chapter hangs on: "We must obey God rather than people."
God over human authority
The early church didn't fold under pressure. Threatened with prison — and worse — they kept preaching anyway. Their loyalty had an order to it: God first, then everything else. When the two genuinely conflict, the choice is already made.
God is in it with them
Locked in a public jail, mocked and humiliated — and then an angel of the Lord opens the doors at night and tells them to go right back to the temple and keep speaking "all the words of this Life." The point isn't that following God removes the hard circumstances; it's that He doesn't leave you alone in them.
Preaching the whole truth, unedited
Two things stand out. First, no obstacle is bigger than God — the apostles simply couldn't be silenced. Second, they preached the full counsel without flinching: the risen Christ is still the Prince and Savior who offers repentance and the forgiveness of sins. They didn't soften the message to make it easier to hear — and neither should we.