Prison Break in Philippi

Acts 16: 16 – 34

 

Preached on May 19, 2019

 

If you spend any time looking for information on line, you know that you can find just about anything on the Internet.   A few days ago I found an interesting bit of information on line.  I discovered that every year in this country, a whole week is designated for procrastination: a whole week set aside for putting things off.  National Procrastinators’ Week is intended to encourage people to put off serious tasks and enjoy more leisurely activities like reading, cooking, and walking outdoors.

 

The date of National Procrastinators’ Week is always announced to the public.  But nobody is surprised when the organizers make a follow up announcement like this one.  The announcement went, “We were going to observe National Procrastinators’ Week this week, but we decided to put it off till next week!”

 

If you’re the sort of person who tends to put things off, you might think there’s a lot to be said for procrastination.  And in our passage for today from the book of Acts, it looks as if the apostle Paul is doing some procrastination of his own.  He’s in the city of Philippi with Silas and other followers of Jesus.   A young woman, kept as a slave by a couple in the city, has been following Paul and Silas around as they share the message of God’s love in Jesus.  The young woman has a gift for telling fortunes, but she’s also in a lot of inner turmoil.  In Philippi in those days, people said she was possessed by an evil spirit.  Today we’d probably say she was suffering from mental illness.

 

Following Paul and Silas around, the woman almost seems like a publicity agent for them.  As they walk through the streets of the city, she calls out for everyone to hear, “These men are working for the Most High God!  They’re laying out the road of salvation for you!”  This goes on for a few days and Paul doesn’t interfere; he puts up with it.  But finally his patience wears thin and he commands the evil spirit to leave the woman.  At Paul’s word, the evil spirit leaves her.  To everyone’s relief, she is restored to her right mind.

 

As he and Silas continue their street ministry, free from the noise of the young woman’s shouting, Paul may be thinking his troubles are over.  In reality, though, his troubles are just beginning.  There are rough times ahead.  In spite of those rough times, or maybe because of them, this story of Paul and Silas in Philippi is a good one for us to reflect on today.  Why?  Well, this story invites us to think about the life of faith in a way we may not often think about it.  Often we think of the life of faith as a life of discipline.  The life of faith means taming our tendency to think of ourselves first.  The life of faith is learning to follow Jesus even when it means denying ourselves.  And that is true.  Self-denial is part of the life of faith.  But this story shows that the life of faith is also about breaking free.

 

Take another look at the young woman.  She is enslaved by her masters, yes, but she is also enslaved by evil spirits, tormented by inner demons.  Paul frees her from those inner demons.  By doing this, he shows that the life of faith is about breaking free.  The life of faith is about breaking free from whatever might diminish us as children of God, breaking free from whatever might be holding us back from knowing God’s love in Christ.  The young woman was a captive, bound to a life of torment.  Paul frees her for a new life, a life where she can become the person God created her to be.

 

When Paul commands the evil spirit to come out of the woman, you’d think he’d be praised by cheering crowds.  But instead of being praised for his good deed, Paul is thrown in prison.  You see, the woman’s gift for fortune telling has been bringing in good money for her masters.  She’s been earning a good income for them.  Now her masters are furious.  Their lucrative little business is suddenly bankrupt.

 

The woman’s masters come after Paul and Silas and rough them up.  They drag them before the authorities and have them arrested.  The authorities accuse Paul and Silas of being dangerous agitators.  They accuse them of subverting local law and order.  Paul and Silas are beaten and put in prison, thrown into the maximum security cell, the darkest of all dungeons.  Their legs are locked into leg irons.  And the prison door slams shut.

 

Paul and Silas are bruised and sore from the beatings they’ve endured.  They could have been filled with despair.  But they aren’t discouraged.  They begin to pray and sing at the top of their lungs.  Suddenly at midnight an earthquake happens and they break free of their chains!  The walls shake; the prison doors burst open.  The way is clear and they can escape to freedom.

 

The life of faith is about breaking free, breaking the bonds of whatever has diminished you as a child of God.  The life of faith is about breaking free from whatever holds you back from knowing God’s love in Christ.  But as Paul and Silas are freed from their chains, they show us something else about the life of faith: something very important.  The life of faith is also about helping other people break free.

 

After the earthquake, Paul and Silas’ chains are broken.  There’s nothing to stop them from taking off and getting out of Philippi before the sun comes up.  But they don’t leave.  They could escape, but they stay put.  The jailer wakes up to find the doors of the prison wide open.  He’s terrified.  He’s got good reason to be terrified.  According to the laws of the time, as the jailer he’s personally responsible for keeping the prisoners locked up.  If they’ve escaped, he’ll have to pay for it with his life.  Imagine the panic that takes hold of him as he comes running into the prison.  He’s terrified that all the prisoners have escaped.  He’s ready to fall on his sword.

 

But Paul runs up and stops him.  “Don’t do that!” he says.  “We’re all still here!  Nobody has run away!”

 

The jailer is astounded.  Nothing like this has ever happened to him.  Prisoners who stay put when they can escape?  It’s impossible.  The jailer is astounded and he asks, “What do I have to do to be saved?  What do I have to do, to be able to live like you do?”

 

“Believe in Jesus,” they reply.  “Then you can begin the life that God has created you to live; not only you, but your entire family.”   If you want to live like we do, believe in the Lord Jesus.  Look at Jesus, who freely gave his life so that we could be saved.  If you want to live like we do, look at what Jesus did.  He faced the worst the world could do.  He suffered the agonizing death of crucifixion.

 

We don’t know exactly what Paul and Silas said, but I imagine it went something like this:  Jesus could have come down from the cross.  The power of God was fully available to him, and he could have climbed down.  He could have climbed down and walked away from it all and lived.  But he stayed on the cross.  He stayed put so that the world would know that nothing can separate us from the love of God.  He stayed unto death to free you and me from fear and hopelessness.  He endured death on the cross so we would know that nothing, not even death, will stop God from loving us.

 

Paul and Silas shared the story of Jesus with the jailer.  And, you know, it’s striking here that even though he’s the jailer, he’s the one who needs to be set free.  He may have spent his life locking people up, but all the time he’s been in a prison of his own.  He’s been imprisoned by fear and hopelessness. He badly needs the faith that sets us free:  the faith that frees us to enjoy God’s love in Christ.  When Paul and Silas share the story of Jesus, the jailer is overcome with joy!  He and his family are baptized.  They throw a party that goes on all night.

 

The story of this prison break in Philippi is a story of people who have been enslaved breaking free.  Several people need to break free, need to break the bonds of whatever holds them back from the joy of knowing God’s love in Christ.  The young woman fortune-teller is enslaved by her masters.  She’s also a slave to the evil spirit who has possessed her.  And, as Methodist pastor Cecile Adams points out, in a way, the young woman’s owners are also slaves.  They are slaves to the money the girl generates with her fortune-telling.  The jailer is a slave too: a slave to the prison system.   The jailer is a slave to the system that keeps him bound by fear.  (Adams, Upper Room Disciplines, 2016).

 

But now the jailer has heard the good news of Jesus.  He and his entire family are baptized.  They welcome Paul and Silas into their home.  Everyone in the family has found the life of faith: the life that is about breaking free. Paul freed the slave girl from her inner demons.  He and Silas were freed from their chains.  And the jailer was freed from his prison of fear and despair.  The life of faith is about breaking free.  It’s also about helping other people break free, free from whatever might be holding them back from knowing God’s love in Christ.

 

Many people today are also held captive.  Some are held, tightly held, not by prison walls but by the bonds of addiction, to prescription painkillers, opioids, and heroin.  Some are held fast by the bonds of addiction to alcohol.  Others are held captive by an overwhelming sense of hopelessness, a hopelessness that saps their desire to go on living.

 

The life of faith is about helping to break those bonds.  The life of faith is about sharing the good news of God’s love, helping others break free, so that nobody will be held back from the new life God wants for all of us.

 

Not long ago, in Portland, Maine, a ministry called Grace Street Ministries celebrated its tenth anniversary: ten years of street ministry, bringing the good news to people there.  In Grace Street Ministry, pastors Mair Honan and Bob Ross talk with homeless people and listen to their concerns.  When somebody asks them, “Where is your church?”  They reply, “We are a walking ministry; our church is here.”  They visit the local homeless shelter and pray with the residents.  They celebrate communion in the garden of a downtown church.  They hold services for homeless people who have died.

 

Those pastors are walking in the footsteps of Paul and Silas, helping others break free from addictions, from fear, from hopelessness.  The life of faith is about breaking free, breaking the bonds of whatever has diminished you as a child of God.  The life of faith is about breaking free from whatever keeps you from knowing God’s love in Christ.  And the life of faith is about helping other people break free, so that nothing will hold us back from the new life God wants for all of us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rev. Elva Merry Pawle

May 19, 2019

Fifth Sunday after Easter