Acts 16.25-34: A Midnight Praise Service in Jail

INTRODUCTION

The story so far—

Paul and his missionary partner Silas, along with Timothy and Luke, were traveling in Asia Minor (now modern Turkey) and had gotten to Troas, a seaport city on the Aegean Sea. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia pleading with him: “Come over to Macedonia and help us.”

So Paul and his companions booked passage on a ship and sailed across the north end of the Aegean and landed in Macedonia, now part of Greece. Now, for the first time, Paul was in Europe.

They came to the city of Philippi. Paul’s first convert was a lady named Lydia who Paul met at a little prayer meeting of Greeks and Jews who gathered to pray by the riverside.

As Paul spoke, we read, “The Lord opened Lydia’s heart to listen eagerly to what Paul said.” Lydia and the members of her household were baptized, and she invited the missionaries to her house. It appears that a little gathering of believers began meeting in Lydia’s house—a “house church" like all churches of that time in history.

Some days went by while Paul and the other missionaries spoke about Jesus in the city and instructed the new Christians at Lydia’s house.

But one day while the four missionaries were going to the place of prayer, they met a slave girl.

She was what the ancients called a “pythoness,” a person possessed by a wild demon that supposedly foretold the future. The superstitious people of Philippi paid good money to the owners of this girl to hear her rave and conjure up the spirits of the dead and foretell the future.

The slave girl took notice of Paul and his friends, and for several she days followed Paul and Silas crying out, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation!”

What she meant by “salvation” probably had nothing to do with what Christians or Jews meant by salvation. “Salvation” was a common idea of the time and meant rescue from the malevolent spirits that filled the air and caused unexplainable disasters to befall people.

Paul didn’t need this kind of publicity and after several days of this harassment, Paul turned around and ordered the evil spirit to come out of the girl.

By curing their slave of her demon, Paul had deprived the girl's owners of the their profit from her affliction. So they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them before the authorities and accused them of disturbing the peace of the city by proclaiming strange gods. They were beaten with rods, thrown into prison and their feet locked in the stocks.

It is here that we will take up the story as recorded in the Bible.

Acts 16: 25-34:

About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s fetters were unfastened.

When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped.

But Paul cried with a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.”

And the jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas, and brought them out and said, “Men, what must I do to be saved?”

And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

And they spoke the words of the Lord to him and to all that were in his house.

And he took them the same hour of the night, and washed their wounds, and he was baptized at once, with all his family.

Then he brought them up into his house, and set food before them; and he rejoiced with all his household that he had believed in God.

I. Let’s imagine we are there that night in Philippi.

A. Paul and Silas had endured a severe flogging with rods. They were bruised and bleeding, and their feet were securely locked in the stocks. They couldn’t get comfortable. They could hardly move. It was a miserable situation.

But rather than moan and groan about their predicament, Paul and Silas were passing the time praying out loud—praying in those days was out loud—and singing praise songs—at midnight!

Think of the jail as one big cell. All the prisoners were in the room together, each one locked in his stocks. It was pitch-dark

The other prisoners were listening to this singing and praying. They were astonished. They were having an interesting night.

B. Suddenly there was a violent earthquake. The doors flew open, the stocks sprung open, and the prisoners were free to leave.

The poor jailer assumed that the prisoners have already escaped, and he drew his sword to kill himself.

We aren’t told why the jailer thought it necessary to take his life. Some point to the fact that if a prisoner escaped, the jailer was executed as the man responsible.

I think that it is more likely that that the jailer saw the earthquake as an act of judgment and thought he was a goner.

Paul quickly called out to him, “Don’t harm yourself; we are all here!” Perhaps the other prisoners, having heard the singing and praying and praising realized that the earthquake was God’s answer and were too awed to use their chance to escape.

C. Anyway the jailer called for lights and ran in and trembling, he fell before Paul and Silas. He said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

Now the jailer didn’t know any more about what Christians meant by “salvation” than the slave girl had. As I said, there were many strange ideas of salvation going around in the ancient world. But he had been frightened out of his wits by the earthquake that seemed to be a response from heaven to the apostles’ singing and praying.

But whatever the poor jailer meant by being saved, Paul took the occasion to tell about what Jesus had done to gain eternal salvation of all who believe.

Of course, Paul said much more than simply, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your household.”

We read, “They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.”

Paul explained who Jesus was and how he had died on the cross for sins and been raised from the dead and was still alive. The risen Christ was calling sinners to a new life of faith and obedience.

The jailer’s first act as a new believer was to wash Paul’s and Silas’s wounds. Then he and his household—his wife, children, elderly parents, slaves, and whoever else may have lived in that house—were baptized.

Then, we read, the jailer brought Paul and Silas up into his house and served them dinner and everyone rejoiced in their new found salvation.

D. The next day, after the apostles were released, they returned to Lydia’s house where, we read, they encouraged the brothers and sisters, and after that departed.

It appears that Paul left Luke and Timothy behind to minister to the little congregation that met at Lydia’s house, because in the next story we read only about Paul and Silas continuing to the next city.

II. Let’s consider what we can learn from this story.

A. First of all, notice that something good came out of something bad. It was bad that Paul and Silas were arrested and beaten and locked up. But this was God’s opportunity to work dramatically to catch the jailer’s attention and lead him to faith, along with his family.

B. Paul’s answer to the jailer’s question: “What must I do to be saved?” “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your house.” sums up in a few words what it means to come to Jesus for salvation.

The angel had told Joseph before Jesus was born: “You are to call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

The name “Jesus” literally means “Savior,” and “Savior” is a grand concept in scripture.

Jesus is the Savior because he forgives sins and wipes out the barrier that keeps us from God.

Jesus is the Savior because he sets us free from the power of sin in our lives and gives us a new life of hope and love.

Jesus is the Savior because he fills our life with meaning. Even the bad things have meaning for us because God can make all things work together for good for those who love him.

Jesus is our Savior because he is our constant companion; in all our troubles and all our joys we can turn to him, for he is always at our side.

Jesus is our Savior because he fills our life with hope. We need no longer fear the unknown future.

Jesus is the Savior because he takes away the sting of death, assuring us of eternal life with Jesus, a glorious future that lasts for ever.

CONCLUSION

Let me tell you about my friend Jim.

Jim was a hard-core offender. He had been locked up 9 times. He had a rap sheet with more than 40 offences on it. He was a crook. He was violent. He was a loser.  He was a hopeless alcoholic.

He become so despondent he tried to kill himself.

He became deeply depressed because of the way he had treated his wife and his two daughters—and how he had treated his second wife and his son.

He realized that the whole world would be better off if he had never been born.

In his despair, he decided to kill himself.

He tied a rope to the top bunk of his prison cell, made a noose and put it around his neck. He leaned into it until he passed out.

He woke up in the psychiatric ward of Davenport Hospital. An elderly lady in a nurse’s uniform was sitting in the room knitting and rocking. She was on suicide watch.

Here it is in his own words:

“It was humiliating. I felt like the world’s biggest loser. I lay there and looked at the ceiling and said, ‘God, if you are real, do something with me. I quit. If something doesn’t change inside my head, inside my heart, I’m just going back the joint and kill myself.’ There was no lightning flash, no angels. But it just seemed like a load had lifted off me. I had just given it up.”

He started reading the Bible. He told himself. “If I’m going to be a man of God, I need to find out about it.” He began to pray—just talking to God.

He read the New Testament through, he remembers, in three days.

Shortly after that he was transferred to the prison in Mt. Pleasant where I met him, about three months after his conversion.

I had a Wednesday night Bible study there. Jim really knew his Bible. He fed on it. He tried to live it. He talked about what he learned to the other inmates. He was, he laughingly recalls, a “Jesus freak.”

That was more than thirty years ago. Jim is an old man now. He’s not well. But he’s not lost his grip on God.

He works in his church. He and his wife Ginny open their home to ex-convicts who have no place to go when they are released from prison. They stay with Jim and Ginny until they can get on their feet.

Until recently—until they closed the jail he visited—he went every Wednesday and held two Bible studies—one for the women and one for the men.

Jesus became Jim’s Savior. He saved Jim from death and despair. He saved Jim for a life of usefulness.

Every story is different. We come to Jesus by different routes.

But there’s always a change—from sin to grace—from sorrow to joy—from fear to faith—from living for self to living for God—from serving my own interests to serving others—from a dark future to a glorious future.