Peter’s Deliverance and Herod’s Judgment Echo the First Passover

Deliverance

Acts 12 opens on a very dark note. Herod the king—that is, Herod Agrippa—arrested a number of the Christians in Jerusalem and executed James, the first apostle to be martyred for the faith (Acts 12:1–2). Then he arrested Peter and planned to execute him too, as soon as the Passover festival was over (Acts 12:3–4). Staging a rescue was out of the question. Peter was guarded day and night by four squads of four soldiers. He was chained to one on his right and one on his left, with two guarding the door; each squad rotated every six hours (Acts 12:4). Humanly speaking, Peter seemed doomed, yet the church was praying to God for him.

And God answered their prayers. An angel of the Lord appeared in Peter’s cell and struck him on the side (Acts 12:7). He woke Peter up and brought him out past the guards, out through the outer door, and then left him there on the street, dazed but free. Only once he was outside did Peter realize that this was not simply a vision but reality (Acts 12:10–11). God had delivered him from the hands of Herod.

Peter saw in all this more than simply a random act of kindness on God’s part. He recognized a pattern here, a pattern that dated all the way back to the time of the exodus.¹ Just as Israel had been in bondage in Egypt and God had sent his angel to deliver them, so also on this particular Passover night, God sent his angel once again to deliver his servant from the hand of God’s enemies. That was why Peter’s statement of his deliverance in Acts 12:11 contained a clear echo of the Septuagint of Exodus 18:4 and Exodus 18:10. When his people cried out to him, God once again answered and brought them—in this case, Peter—out of the house of bondage.

Bringing the Gospel to the Nations

Iain M. Duguid

Following the progress of the gospel and the perseverance of the saints, Iain M. Duguid draws practical lessons from the life of the early church and encourages believers toward gospel-driven mission.

We should not, however, miss the irony of Peter’s words here. God delivered him not only from Herod but also from “all that the Jewish people were expecting” (Acts 12:11). On the night of Passover, of all nights, the Jewish people should have been remembering their deliverance out of Egypt and anticipating the Messiah to come. Instead, having failed to recognize the Messiah when he came, they themselves took the place of the Egyptian oppressors, from whom God had delivered his people. What a tragic reversal!

Once free, Peter went to the house of Mary, the mother of John Mark (Acts 12:12). This was also, probably not coincidentally, the place where many people had gathered to pray. The church in Jerusalem had an enviable commitment to prayer, yet their prayers, like the prayers of many of us, seem to have been offered more in hope than in faith. The evidence of that analysis is the comic picture of poor Rhoda, the servant girl, trying desperately to persuade the assembled prayer meeting that Peter was, in fact, at the door (Acts 12:14–15). No one would believe her news that God had answered their prayers, and all the while Peter was left standing in the street, knocking on the door, constantly in danger of discovery by the authorities. When they finally opened the door and saw that it was indeed Peter, they were amazed (Acts 12:16)—amazed that God could and would answer their prayers! After he recounted the story of his release, Peter left and went underground (Acts 12:17). There is a time for holy boldness and a time for common sense, and this was time for Peter to disappear for a while.

Judgment

That is not the end of the story, though. The Passover was not just about the deliverance of God’s people; it was also about the judgment of God’s enemies. If Herod was acting as the new Pharaoh, oppressing God’s new Israel, the church, then we would expect him to face prompt judgment. Our expectations are not disappointed. Herod finally resolved his long-standing quarrel with the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon. We are not told what the source of the quarrel was, but as is so often the case in politics, economics suggested that a resolution was required. Tyre and Sidon produced valuable timber and were major trading cities, but much of their food came from the orchards and fields of Judea (Acts 12:20). So it would have made sense for them to seek peace with Herod, however difficult he was as a ruler.

On the appointed day, Herod appeared before the people of Tyre and Sidon in all his royal splendor and delivered an eloquent speech (Acts 12:21). The Jewish historian Josephus noted that he wore a robe of silver, designed to sparkle in the sun.² Impressed by this display, the people of Tyre and Sidon credited him with being a god, not a man (Acts 12:22). Herod’s heart was happy to agree with that assessment, but the angel of the Lord struck him, which makes this the second time in this chapter that the angel struck someone (Acts 12:23). Earlier he had struck Peter graciously in order to free him from death (Acts 12:7); now he struck in wrath, delivering Herod over to death.

God in his sovereignty rules all things.

Once again, there is some Old Testament background to this judgment. In Ezekiel 28, the king of Tyre (yes, the same place!) was charged with saying in his heart, “I am a god, / I sit in the seat of the gods” (Ezek. 28:2). The Lord’s response to such an arrogant claim to divinity was to expose its folly, saying in effect, “You claim to be a god, do you? Indeed, you will die and go down to the grave” (Ezek. 28:6–8). This is, of course, the ultimate proof of the king of Tyre’s nondivine status: his death and subsequent decay into the dust. So too here Herod’s claim to divinity was exposed as fatuous in the most graphic way. Whereas normally decay—being eaten by worms—follows death, in Herod’s case the whole process was horribly accelerated and combined. Now decay preceded death for Herod: He was eaten by worms even before he died (Acts 12:23). What kind of god was he now? His true nature under that superficially glorious exterior was exposed and made clear for all to see: a mere mortal under the judgment of God.

What a difference a chapter makes! We started Acts 12 with the gospel under pressure. Herod was triumphing, James was dead, and Peter was in prison. By the end of Acts 12, through the double intervention of the Lord’s angel to deliver and to judge, Peter was free, Herod was dead, and the gospel was triumphing: “The word of God increased and multiplied” (Acts 12:24). Not only was Herod not a god, but he was also not even the sovereign ruler of his own kingdom. God in his sovereignty rules all things, including persecution and deliverance from persecution, and he works all things for the good of his people and of his gospel.

Notes:

Craig S. Keener, Acts: An Exegetical Commentary, 4 vols. (Baker, 2013), 2:1879.
Josephus, Antiquities, 19.344

This article is adapted from Bringing the Gospel to the Nations: Lessons for the Church from Acts 9–18 by Iain M. Duguid.

Iain M. Duguid (PhD, University of Cambridge) is professor of Old Testament and dean of online learning at Westminster Theological Seminary. He is the author of numerous commentaries and articles, including Turning the World Upside Down. In addition to his academic work, he has been a pastor and church planter for over thirty years, having planted churches in England, California, and Pennsylvania.

What Would the Apostles Do? How and When to Use Acts as a Guide for the Contemporary Church

Iain M. Duguid

July 28, 2025

We cannot and should not always do what Jesus did. Jesus healed the sick and raised the dead, exceptional gifts which we have not been given. We live in a different period of redemptive history.

Does the Book of Acts Teach Socialism? (Acts 2)

Brian Vickers

March 14, 2024

One of the greatest challenges in interpreting the book of Acts, one with which every reader must wrestle, is in determining whether the narrative portions of the book are descriptive or prescriptive.