Father, I would pray for a wave of cool refreshing water, direct from Your wellspring. May it revitalize me, giving me a renewed passion for using the gifts You have given me to reach the world. Amen.
Acts 16:23-34(<<click here to read the passage)
How many of us as children (or adults, for that matter) coming face to face with pending punishment, have pleaded for a way to get out of our predicament without actually having to go through the punishment itself?
Maybe we broke a cherished family heirloom in the house while playing where we weren’t supposed to play.
Maybe we took something that wasn’t ours.
Maybe we smacked a sibling hard enough to leave a welt on their back.
Maybe we got caught cheating on an exam.
Maybe we neglected an important responsibility at work and are now being called on the carpet.
In today’s passage, the jailer dutifully did what he was commanded to do. He had placed Paul and Silas in the most secure area in the prison – the inner dungeon – and for good measure clamped their feet in the stocks. v24
Through no negligence on the part of the jailer, but entirely through the intervention of Almighty God Himself, a massive earthquake shook the prison to its foundations. As a result, all the doors immediately flew open, and the chains of every prisoner fell off! v26
We have to understand that in the culture of the day if any prisoners under the jailer’s care escaped, his life was forfeit! That’s why he was on the verge of taking his own life before Paul called out, “Stop! Don’t kill yourself! We are all here!” v28
The text then reads, The jailer called for lights and ran to the dungeon and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. Then he brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” vs29-30
I read through a bit of commentary on this and one, in particular, shared that the idea of individuality wasn’t actually part of the mindsets of people in that day and age. Skip Moen, in a word study entitled The Text in Cultural Context, wrote:
Perhaps his question isn’t about his personal salvation at all… Perhaps he’s asking something else, like, “What’s going to happen to me and my family?” “How are we going to escape the consequences of this event?”
It wasn’t his fault, but he was caught on the wrong side of something he “somehow” should have been able to prevent. So, he pleaded for a way to get out of his predicament without actually having to go through the punishment itself.
In another word study of Moen’s (Paul’s Laws), he shares that when [Paul and Silas] replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, along with everyone in your household.” v31 NLT that it wasn’t necessarily a “Get Out of Jail Free” card for the jailer but instead set him on the right path that regardless of the outcome of events he and his entire family had a security that no one could take from them. For nothing would be able to separate them from the love of God. (Romans 8:35-39)
We simply cannot avoid the awful things in life, but we can have the security that is only found in a relationship with God!
May 29th, 2022, Sun, 7:43 pm
