In a violent explosion, often when we least expect it, that seemingly distant Divine Being crashes through our misconceptions and declares, "I AM GOD! I have always been here!" His power blows away our doubts like a garment in fierce wind and causes them to fade like the light before a restful sleep. In the poem "St. Peter and the Angel," Denise Levertov mirrors one such instance recorded in the twelfth chapter of Acts, the mystery of the release of Saint Peter, and the bigger mystery of the Christian life.

Israel’s ruler, King Herod, in simple spite, decided to persecute influential members of the followers of Christ. One of these was St. Peter. One can imagine the despair Peter felt. Out of nowhere, someone wanted to imprison and possibly murder him for his faith. It must have seemed as if God had failed him. Suddenly, in the night, a supernatural being -- an angel -- came to Peter’s cell. As suddenly as Peter had been forced into chains, he was freed from them. Peter walked through a street with the angel until they reached an Iron Gate -- which opened "of it’s own accord" (Acts 12 KJV).

In the poem, Denise Levertov describes the transition in Peter’s thoughts from believing that the event was all a dream to knowing that it was real. The door to Peter’s cell opened "silently," the street was a "majestic emptiness," and "No one had missed him, no one was in pursuit." When the angel had left, Paul realized that the event "was no dream." Levertov describes St. Peter’s conclusions. "He himself must be / the key, now, to the next door, the next terrors of freedom and joy."

God had used that angel like a key in His hand. Peter was the next key. God had saved him for a special purpose. Levertov describes this as "the ecstatic, dangerous, wearisome roads of / what he [Peter] still had to do."

The last line of Levertov’s poem introduces the idea of "the . . . terrors of freedom and joy." Here Levertov explains Peter’s future and introduces a new mystery. It is a mystery of the Christian life –- how one can be free and have joy in the midst of terror. She continues to introduce this mystery into the mind of the reader as she speaks of Peter having "to resume / the ecstatic, dangerous, wearisome roads of / what he had still to do."

It doesn’t make logical sense that one could be free and joyful in the midst of terror. However, that is exactly the idea that this poem explains. Peter is "Delivered out of the raw continual pain, / smell of darkness, groans of those others / to whom he was chained" and the witness of a supernatural act of God. How could Peter have witnessed this power if he had never been imprisoned? The terror was necessary for the "freedom and joy" to exist. Peter knew after this that he "must" allow God to use him as a "key" that humbly yields to the hand of the One opening a door. He had been blessed. A door had been opened for him. "Others," who were with him, remained at the prison while he had been set free. They knew terror without God. Peter knew terror with God – terror that served as a catalyst to Peter’s well being.