Episode 6: Acts 16 Part 2

Let’s start this podcast in prayer. Lord, we give this time to you. We thank you, Lord, for your stories. We thank you for your Word. We thank you, Lord, that you have given us examples of how other believers walk in their faith. We thank you for your Word so that we can learn from it, be encouraged by it, and so that we can wrestle with it. Thank you, that we can discuss it, that we can ask questions about it, but ultimately that we can stand on its truth. I pray that your Holy Spirit would speak that truth to our hearts today and that our lives will be changed because of this time that we spend in your Word. Thank you, Lord, we love you, Amen.

I’ve already recorded Acts 16, Part 1, which means there must be a part 2, right?

Today is Act Chapter 16, part 2. And I’m going to jump right in, maybe halfway through the story. So if you didn’t catch the Acts part 1, you might want to read Acts Chapter 16 to get the whole story here. But today, for time’s sake, I’m just going to read Acts Chapter 16 verses 22 through 34.

The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrate ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods after they’d been severely flogged. They were thrown into prison and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully.

When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken At once, all the prison doors flew open and everyone’s chains came loose. The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew a sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted, don’t harm yourself. We are all here. The jailer called for lights, rushed in, and fell, trembling before Paul and Silas. He then brought them out. Now serves. What must I do to be saved? They replied, believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved. You and your household. Then they spoke the Word of God to him, and to all the others in his house at that same hour, the night the jailer took them and wash their wounds. Then immediately, he and all his household were baptized. The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them. He was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God. He and his whole household.

Alright, I want to talk about two or three things. The first one I want to talk about is when we are bound by our feet in an inner dungeon. It can seem like a hopeless situation.

It can seem dark. How am I going to get out of this one?

I mean, you can imagine. Paul and Silas sitting in an inner dungeon. I’m guessing it’s dark. I’m guessing it’s depressing. Not a lot of light. It’s hopeless. And I want to ask you right now, friends, what is the dungeon in your life?

It could be many parts of your life seems dark. Maybe your life as a whole feels like you are bound in an inner dungeon. Or maybe there’s one part of your life that can never get out of that dungeon. I know in this story Paul and Silas were in physical pain. They had been flogged, beaten. They were humiliated in front of mobs of people as all of this was happening. 

The Bible says—and I think it’s really important to note—that they were bound by their feet. There was no hope of escape in their own power. There no hope of of breaking the chains or standing up and walking out. Their feet were bound. There was nowhere to go. So what do you do?

If you feel like you have no way out of your dungeon, you have no power, no means to leave. I want to suggest to you today that you do what Paul and Silas did in verse twenty five of Acts, chapter 16.

It says, About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the other prisoners were listening to them.

If you are in an inner dungeon or maybe you’re serving or helping people who are in inner dungeons, I want you to be encouraged today to pray and sing hymns to the Lord.

Now, I have to ask you, at this point—does this seem like the answer to your problems?

It might not.

I have to ask you—do you believe that singing and praying could remove the thing that keeps you in prison?

I don’t know, maybe you don’t, but because of the Word of God, I can promise you that this is a powerful tool against your darkness.

God, he is not asking you. Please hear me on this. God is not asking you to find the tools to unlock the bondage in your life. He’s not asking you to find the wedge or the chisel to break those chains or those bondage offer your feet.

He’s not asking you to think through your dungeon, looking around like MacGyver, and trying to figure out how you can break out of that. He’s not asking you to use your resources or your intelligence to climb out of your dungeon right now.

He is suggesting—he’s not even demanding or commanding of you—He is suggesting by this story that you call out to him. And you will see, if you do this, I promise you, you will see what the God of the universe will do to free you from your darkness.

I know it almost seems too simple.

You might be saying now, Arica—you’re telling me if I just sit here in this darkness right now and I open up my mouth and I pray to the Lord—Do you see me God?

Or if I open my mouth right now in this darkness, in this part of my life, and I sing out a song of surrender, I sing out a song of praise, I sing out a song of trusting. That something’s going to change.

And I say, yes, I am.
I know. Yes. It seems simple. I understand that.

But I need you to see today how powerful it is to open your mouth and pray open your mouth and sing songs to God. It’s going to change something. It’s going to loosen something.

In this story, verse 26 lets us know exactly what was loosened when Paul and Silas began praying and singing at midnight. It says in verse 26, suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. 

So you don’t need the entire wall to come falling down. When you open your mouth and sing praise and worship and talk to the Lord, the foundation of your problem starts to shake and then everything else will have to tumble. 

Because once you understand at a foundational level that God is your rescue, God is your power. God is what will loosen the chains in your life. Once you understand that at the foundations, everything else will come falling down. 

It says a violent earthquake happened, that the foundations of the prison were shaken and that once all of the prison doors flew open and everyone’s chains came loose, that’s how powerful our God is.

You see, not only did Paul and Silas’ prison doors open, not only that their chains came loose, but I want you to know that when you open your mouth and when you sing praise and worship to the Lord, when you talk to the Lord—there are people around you who can hear that.

And because you are willing to do that, their chains will also be loosened around you.

And maybe that’s another thing you need to climb out of this darkness.

This is how powerful the simple act is.

That is why you shouldn’t be quiet when you are worshipping.

I know it’s going to be hard.

And it it’s discouraging when such a simple thing is even hard to do. But I cannot tell you today in this podcast, I cannot stress enough how important and how powerful it is to open your mouth, and sing praise of the Lord today.

The second thing I want to talk to you about is because of the prayer and worship that we’re talking about, walls were torn down. Paul and Silas were very scary prisoners to the government at that time, so the magistrate told the jailer do not let these two guys out of jail. That’s why they put them in the inner dungeon, locked their feet down, because these were on lockdown sort of prisoners.

So when the jailer woke up and he realized that all the prison doors were open, he was afraid that the prisoners had left and he was gonna be in big trouble. The jailer actually drew his sword ready to take his own life because I’m thinking he might know what would have happened to him because he didn’t follow the orders of the magistrate at that time. He was ready to take his own life.

Paul stopped him and said, no, we’re all here. You’re good. We’re all here and the jailer ran down to Paul and Silas. I’m guessing in shock. The jailer asked them, what must I do to be saved? What must I do to be saved?  I feel like maybe he meant physically what should I do to be saved? I think maybe he realized that I’m in big trouble here physically right now. Friends, we are faced every day with people in our lives and it might even be ourselves who are asking, what can I do to be saved?

Day after day people around us are choosing death in their life. In the actions and in the words that are coming out of their mouths, they’re choosing these things that bring death and darkness into their own life. They are desperately wondering, what can I do to be saved? I want to encourage you today if you’re a follower of Christ don’t give them the answer the world would give them.

Paul and Silas could have said, all right, here’s what you need to do. We’re going to stay right here. You need to go get the magistrate. You need to show them that this is not your fault, that we have not escaped. He could have come up with ten different worldly scenarios of how this jailer could have been saved.

Instead do you know what Paul said? He said, believe in the Lord, your God.

That’s what we need to say to people when they are asking how can I be saved. They might be asking, what should I do about my marriage? What should I do about my children? What should I do about my job? 

When they ask you these questions, as humans, we tend to want to give them the worldly answers. With your children, you need to do this or teach obedience and discipline. With your job, you need to make a pros and cons list. Instead I want to encourage us as followers of Christ to lead out with believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and then everything else will fall into place. 

That’s our job, friends.

Our job is to let people know that no matter what the physical worldly problem is, we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s what we do. Now, I understand that physical needs will need to be met. I mean, even the jailer in this story washes the wounds of Paul and Silas. He brought them to his own house and fed them a meal. So I do know that when people are asking us, what do I do, what do I do about it? There are physical things we need to do to help them, but I want to encourage us today to lead out with believe in the Lord.

Believe in the Lord because that is what’s going to change everything for them, if they believe in the Lord.

All right.

I got a little excited in this podcast and sorry about that, if this is a little too much for you, but I get so overwhelmed by how simple it is to use God’s power in our life, that all we have to do is make that choice. We have to open our mouth. We have to lead out with belief in God. That’s it. And then we do that. Walls will fall, chains will be broken. Freedom will happen for not only you, but freedom will happen for those around you.

And that’s good news, friends. It’s good news.

Acts Chapter 16. It is an awesome story.
Honestly, these were like the four things I think that I brought out from this story. But there is so much more that I could talk about.

It’s a great, great, great, great story and Acts chapter 16. So I encourage you to read it. I encourage you to wrestle with the details of the story. I’m going to be praying for you guys today. I really felt that dungeon today when I was talking. So I want you to know that if that is you in that dungeon trying to climb out, then be praying for you today that you can open your mouth and sing and pray to the Lord.

I’m praying for you today. The Lord loves you.

Are you looking for someone to speak at an event or share God’s Word at an upcoming company devotional? I’d love the opportunity to talk to you about this.

Please visit my website at AricaRobinson.com or send me an email at hello@aricarobinson.com — I look forward to speaking with you.