¹⁸Now when day came, there was no small disturbance among the soldiers as to what could have become of Peter. ¹⁹When Herod had searched for him and had not found him, he examined the guards and ordered that they be led away to execution. Then he went down from Judea to Caesarea and was spending time there. ²⁰Now he was very angry with the people of Tyre and Sidon; and with one accord they came to him, and having won over Blastus the king’s chamberlain, they were asking for peace, because their country was fed by the king’s country. ²¹On an appointed day Herod, having put on his royal apparel, took his seat on the rostrum and began delivering an address to them. ²²The people kept crying out, “The voice of a god and not of a man!” ²³And immediately an angel of the Lord struck him because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by worms and died.

The curtains are pulled back momentarily so we can see what happened after Peter’s release from jail. There was “no small disturbance” (to make an understatement) to the guards of the jail where Peter had been imprisoned. How in the world, from Herod’s point of view, was it possible for the prisoner to escape when four Romans squads of soldiers were guarding him, two of them even being chained to him at all times? Incompetence, neglect, or both must have been the answer. Unlike with Paul’s later imprisonment in Philippi on his second mission tour, where the jailers were saved from execution, no mention here is made of a similar mercy.

Herod was an unrelenting, narcissistic despot; he was grandson of Herod the Great, who had the Bethlehem children killed as he searched for the new-born Jewish king. The record of the Herodian dynasty in Israel makes for fascinating historical study. Luke focuses our attention on his character, his ego-centric mind. While his angry dealing with the people of Tyre and Sidon was not unique in the annals of the ancient world, neither was his presenting himself as a glorious magistrate. Whatever he did to invoke it, the people responded with worship and praise. And Luke points this out as pertinent to the story of Christianity’s expansion.

Herod, who had Jewish blood running in his veins, knew full well what was happening: a breaking of the most fundamental of all Jewish laws, the first of the Ten Commandments of Moses: “I am the Lord your God . . . You shall have no other gods before Me” (Ex. 20:3). Further, the God of Israel had made it clear: “I am the Lord, that is My name; I will not give My glory to another” (Isa. 42:8). Herod’s demise was a reminder to God’s people that the Christian movement was about God’s glory, and nothing could stop it.

Lord, I will give glory only to You, and I will worship and praise no other!