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The next day the rulers, the elders and the teachers of the law met in Jerusalem... They had Peter and John brought before them and began to question them: \u201cBy what power or what name did you do this?\u201d Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them: \u201cRulers and elders of the people! If we are being called to account today for an act of kindness shown to a man who was lame and are being asked how he was healed, then know this, you and all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. Jesus is \u201c\u2018the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone.\u2019 Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.\u201d (Acts 4:5, 7-12)

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Just the day before, Peter and John had brought a taste of the kingdom to a man born with challenges that left him unable to walk. It had become a spectacle that drew a crowd. It also drew the ire of the religious leaders.

Peter and John were seized and put in jail, then put on trial before the powerful in Jerusalem. The question put to the Apostles was simple: \u201cBy what power or what name did you do this?\u201d The religious leaders felt a threat, a threat that came with power. But whose?

Jesus\u2019 kingdom, through His empowered witnesses could not but clash with the kingdom built by Rome, or in this case, the kingdom built by the religious leaders. But the clash that comes is markedly different than the usual clash of kingdoms. Peter and John did not fire an opening solvo at the religious establishment as officers in the Lord\u2019s Army. They simply witnessed in the name of Jesus to the healing that comes through the kingdom of God. It was then that they were called to account. \u201cFor an act of kindness.\u201d

Don\u2019t get me wrong\u2014Jesus kingdom, through the Spirit and through these witnesses is wielding real power, but not the power of an army: not the power of death or the power to force, control, abuse, or destroy. These witnesses are wielding the power of the life-giving Spirit in Jesus\u2019 name. First\u2014using that power to lift up a man in kindness, and second, using that power to speak the life-giving word of salvation in Jesus\u2019 name to the crowds gathered in response, through which \u201csins may be wiped out, and\u2026 times of refreshing may come\u201d (Acts 3:19). They used what they had with them: their deeds and words, the Spirit empowered tools of witness in the kingdom of God.

Brought before the Sanhedrin on trial and faced with the question \u201cby what power or name did you do this,\u201d they answered: in the name of Jesus in whom life and salvation are found. They sought none of this out. They uttered no threats. They forced no violence. But their witness brought their hearers to a point of decision and response: will you reject this name of Jesus, or accept it?

The Apostles did not set out to be witnesses that day, they simply responded in the name of Jesus and in the power of the Spirit to the situations they encountered along the way. We are also empowered by the Spirit and carry the life-giving name of Jesus Christ wherever we go as \u201cChrist\u201dians. So the question for us: how might you bear the name of Jesus in your deeds and words in the situations you face today?

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