Acts 16:16-34

[INTRODUCTION]

This morning we are going be in Acts 16:16-34. Paul and Silas on their missionary journey to Macedonia.

Before we get into the text, lets do a quick overview of Paul and where we are in the book of Acts.

The book of Acts tells about the early church and the “Acts” of the disciples as they help to share the good news of Jesus Christ and grow the church. So call this book the Acts of the Holy Spirit through the Apostles.

One of the main characters in the first half of Acts is Peter.

Peter is the one gives the sermon in Acts 2 at Pentecost in which about 3,000 believed and were baptized.

Stephen arrives on the scene in Acts 6:5.

He preaches a sermon in chapter 7 and because of his preaching becomes the first known Christian martyr.

Saul, whose name would change to Paul would agree to Stephen being put to death.

Saul would have a unique conversion experience and would come to believe in Jesus Christ.

He would go from being a devout Jew who persecuted Christians to one of the most influential and devout Christians who would ever live.

Paul will be the main apostle throughout the rest of the book of Acts.

Paul was in Asia minor, modern day Turkey and was forbidden by the Holy Spirit to share the gospel. Rather, the Spirit would direct him to travel to Macedonia.

Paul would travel from Asia and sailed from the port city of Troas to Philippi.

While he was in Philippi, he did his normal routine of finding the meeting place of the Jews on the Sabbath in order the share the good news of Jesus.

He met Lydia who was a God-Fearer and she comes to faith.

This leads us to today’s text where Paul is still in Philippi continuing on with his mission work.

Acts 16:16–34 CSB

16 Once, as we were on our way to prayer, a slave girl met us who had a spirit by which she predicted the future. She made a large profit for her owners by fortune-telling. 17 As she followed Paul and us she cried out, “These men, who are proclaiming to you a way of salvation, are the servants of the Most High God.” 18 She did this for many days. Paul was greatly annoyed. Turning to the spirit, he said, “I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her!” And it came out right away. 19 When her owners realized that their hope of profit was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to the authorities. 20 Bringing them before the chief magistrates, they said, “These men are seriously disturbing our city. They are Jews 21 and are promoting customs that are not legal for us as Romans to adopt or practice.” 22 The crowd joined in the attack against them, and the chief magistrates stripped off their clothes and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23 After they had severely flogged them, they threw them in jail, ordering the jailer to guard them carefully. 24 Receiving such an order, he put them into the inner prison and secured their feet in the stocks. 25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. 26 Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the jail were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone’s chains came loose. 27 When the jailer woke up and saw the doors of the prison standing open, he drew his sword and was going to kill himself, since he thought the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul called out in a loud voice, “Don’t harm yourself, because we’re all here!” 29 The jailer called for lights, rushed in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. 30 He escorted them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 They said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” 32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him along with everyone in his house. 33 He took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds. Right away he and all his family were baptized. 34 He brought them into his house, set a meal before them, and rejoiced because he had come to believe in God with his entire household.

[TRANSITION]

The first thing that we are going to see this morning is that In the midst of struggles, speak the name of Jesus. (vs. 16-18)

We see here Paul and Silas, possibly Timothy and Luke as well, heading to a place of prayer in Philippi.

They had been in this town for several days at this point. Coming into the scene is this slave girl who doesn’t appear to be harassing them but instead is speaking truth, but what she was proclaiming may have sounded common to the people of Philippi. What do I mean by that? In order to understand why this wasn’t anything necessarily new, we need to understand more about this spirit filled slave girl.

We know three things about her.

She is a slave.

She has a spirit to predict the future.

She is used to make a profit.

The translation “a spirit by which she predicted the future” is something to look at. This whole phrase in Greek is two words literally translating “spirit python.” But why that? let me tell you.

Philippi was a Roman colony and with that came polytheism, the worship and belief of many gods, one of them being Apollo. The python was a symbol of the one who would give predictions of the future and represented Apollo.

The locals considered such fortune-tellers to be inspired by Apollo and the Python and many would seek out their predictions. This was a large profitable business for the slave owners.

It is fitting for then our text to read “a spirit by which she predicted the future.” This is what the originals readers and hearers would have understood that phrase to mean.

Now this girl has been following Paul and Silas around for days saying in verse 17, “these men, who are proclaiming to you a way of salvation, are servants of the Most High God.”

Now again, does this sound bad? NO! This sounds spot on with what Paul and Silas are proclaiming. And it is. They are going around proclaiming the gospel, that Jesus Christ is Savior and the way of Salvation. But lets remember where Paul and Silas located again, in a Roman colony.

For us when we read “Most High God” we understand who the Scriptures are talking about.

This is the God of the Old Testament.

This is the same God that created everything in existence, who formed Adam from the dust of the ground.

The same God who provided the sacrificial lamb to Abraham.

The same God who spoke to Moses through the burning bush and led the Israelites out of Egypt by a cloud of smoke by day and a pillar of fire by night.

The same God who sent a fish to swallow up Jonah and spit him back up in order to share God’s Word with the Ninevites.

The same God who shut the mouths of the lions to protect Daniel.

This is the same God of the New Testament who would send His own Son to die for us and to be raised back to life. When we read “Most High God,” this is who we think of.

But this is not who the Philippians, who are Roman citizens, would have understood that title to mean. “Most High God” occurs in pagan sources for Zeus. This wouldn’t have been anything new to them and some likely didn’t think much of what they were saying.

Some believe that this spirit withing the girl is reducing the the one true God to another deity among the gods they worship.

I don’t believe that at all. I think the spirit knew exactly who it was speaking about.

In the Gospels, demon possessed people say true things about Jesus and then Jesus rebukes them.

Mark 1:24–25 CSB

24 “What do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God!” 25 Jesus rebuked him saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!”

Mark 5:7–8 CSB

7 And he cried out with a loud voice, “What do you have to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you before God, don’t torment me!” 8 For he had told him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!”

Demons or spirits know who Jesus is and call Him the “Son of the Most High God” so to say that this spirit in Philippi is reducing God to the same status as other pagan gods is false. This spirit is acknowledging who it is that Paul and Silas serve.

This spirit also declares the same message that Paul and Silas declare, “the way of salvation” and the spirit caused the girl to do this for many days.

Why did it take him many days before he responded? Why did he allow this girl to cry out for many days before commanding the spirit to come out of her?

A little before this, Paul and Timothy were in Asia Minor, and we read in

Acts 16:6–10 CSB

6 They went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia; they had been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia. 7 When they came to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them. 8 Passing by Mysia they went down to Troas. 9 During the night Paul had a vision in which a Macedonian man was standing and pleading with him, “Cross over to Macedonia and help us!” 10 After he had seen the vision, we immediately made efforts to set out for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them.

Maybe Paul was waiting for the green light, the authority of the Holy Spirit before stepping out in the power of the Holy Spirit.

What is Paul’s reaction once he does respond? He turns to the spirit and confronts the spirit, not the girl, and in the name of Jesus he command the spirit to leave. He is getting to the root of the problem. The girl is not to blame, nor at fault. She is helpless in this situation. In her helplessness, he speaks the name of Jesus.

We are going to be singing a beautiful song at the end of service called, “I speak Jesus.” Y’all are familiar with it. Some of the lyrics are this

I speak the name of Jesus…cause I know there is peace within your presence.

I speak the name of Jesus…declaring there is hope and there is freedom.

I speak the name of Jesus…to every soul held captive by depression.

Your name is power.

Your name is healing.

Your name is life.

The chorus gets even better.

Shout Jesus from the mountains.

Jesus in the streets.

Jesus in the darkness.

Over every enemy.

Jesus for my family.

I speak the holy name Jesus!

Speaking the name of Jesus is an important thing that we need to be aware of.

I love how the CSB translating gives us the third commandment in...

Exodus 20:7 CSB

7 Do not misuse the name of the Lord your God, because the Lord will not leave anyone unpunished who misuses his name.

The book of Romans teaches us this...

Romans 10:9–13 CSB

9 If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 One believes with the heart, resulting in righteousness, and one confesses with the mouth, resulting in salvation. 11 For the Scripture says, Everyone who believes on him will not be put to shame, 12 since there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, because the same Lord of all richly blesses all who call on him. 13 For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Paul, in the right moment, spoke the name of Jesus over the slave girl and healed her.

[APPLICATION]

How often do do we find ourselves trying to fix something on our own only to mess things up further.

Do you turn to a self-help book?

I’m sure there are many in this room who call themselves a “Jack of all trades, master of none.” You can fix , to a degree, most things. But at some point you likely got a little too ambitious and caused a bigger problem than you had before.

We may a try a quick fix to cover up the real problem rather than addressing it. And this could be in any area of life. Maybe you have been struggling with loneliness, business, depression, anxiety. What God wants us to do in each situation in life is to turn to Him and rely on Him.

Psalm 55:22 CSB

22 Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you; he will never allow the righteous to be shaken.

Many times this is needed to be done with others, maybe seeing a Christian counselor. Maybe visiting with a close brother or sister in Christ.

Galatians 6:2 CSB

2 Carry one another’s burdens; in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

The law of Christ is to love God and to love others.

[TRANSITION]

The second thing that we are going to see this morning is that in the midst of our struggles, we must worship God. (vs. 19-25)

Now that Paul has freed this girl in one sense, her slave masters are quite upset because their source of profit, their revenue stream has run dry. And the owners response is to immediately retaliate.

The greed of the slave owners is in contrast with the generosity of Lydia from the beginning of chapter 16. Lydia was the first convert in Philippi and she shared her house with the missionaries and the Philippian Christians.

The slave owners are fed up with Paul and Silas and so they seize them and take them to the marketplace. This was a big open courtyard in which civil cases would be disputed and the prison located right across the street from the courtyard. Think of Fountain Mall on Baylor’s campus. This today would be like bringing someone into the middle of Fountain Mall on Baylor’s Campus. It was a public place that everyone could gather and see what was going on though this marketplace wasn't as big as Fountain Mall.

The slave owners accuse Paul and Silas of three other issues rather than their real problem. They could have argued for property damage but that likely would not have gone very far because it was a spirit filled slave girl, so instead they accuse them of...

Disturbing the city,

According to the text, it appears it was the slave girl who was causing disturbance.

Being Jews

Paul and Silas were both Roman citizens but Paul doesn’t mention that until vs. 37.

Unlawful customs as Romans.

It wasn’t illegal at this time to proselytize, or share about the Christian faith. What the issue was the laws or practices of Scripture would oppose some of the Roman laws or practices. It was more of an economic and political opposition to Rome.

Paul and Silas are then taken and severely beaten with rods likely to the point of having open wounds. They are not given a fair trial, the crowd is against them and joins in on the beatings.

Being arrested, beaten, and imprisoned was normal for alien, or foreigners, but not Roman citizens. It was potentially dangerous to do this to their own citizens.

After being beaten, they are thrown into prison and the jailor is given specific orders to “guard them carefully.”

So what does the jailor do, he is going to put them into the darkest and deepest part of the prison. This was general used for the worst of criminals but also at night, they would put everyone in the prison into the inner prison for added security.

Inside this inner prison was filthy with no bathrooms, and no ventilation of any kind. It would have been hot and miserable.

And remember, they had been beaten so to be lying on the filthy floor would have been uncomfortable. There was a risk of infection. It wasn’t unheard of for prisoners to die because of the conditions.

The stocks they had been put in were made of wood and secured to the floor or wall with multiple holes in it to stretch your legs into severely uncomfortable position.

But what is the response of Paul and Silas while they are in this extreme discomfort.

Paul and Silas turn to God and worship Him. In the midst of their pain, suffering, they begin praying and singing to God.

In the midnight hour when everyone would normally be asleep, they are awake praising God. They probably couldn't sleep because of the extreme discomfort. Even still, they pray and praise God.

Maybe you are thinking to yourself, “I’m in the midnight hour. It’s so dark. I feel trapped, locked in, with no way out. I don’t know what to do.”

What I say to that is in the midst of your suffering, as difficult as it maybe, as uncomfortable as it may be, worship God.

It may be hard to do that, but this is what God wants from us. He wants us to turn to Him in our suffering and worship Him in our suffering.

In those moment, God can deliver and will deliver you in his own way, but you must turn and worship Him.

Romans 5:3–5 CSB

3 And not only that, but we also boast in our afflictions, because we know that affliction produces endurance, 4 endurance produces proven character, and proven character produces hope. 5 This hope will not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

There are people who are Christians that are watching you and observing you when you are in your darkest moments. They are going to be curious how you are going to respond. They want to see what is going to happen in your life when things are shaken up. People need to see what you do in that midnight hour. In that midnight hour, as difficult as it may be, worship God, it could lead to the saving faith of someone watching.

Psalm 119:61–62 CSB

61 Though the ropes of the wicked were wrapped around me, I did not forget your instruction. 62 I rise at midnight to thank you for your righteous judgments.

[TRANSITION]

The last point is this, in the midst of struggles, we have a deliverer. (vs. 26-34)

We move to our last section of the text this morning. During that same midnight hour that Paul and Silas are praying and singing to God, there is suddenly an earthquake.

Earthquakes are common in Greece. They experience earthquakes almost daily but most of them cannot be felt. So to have large severe earthquakes us not uncommon.

But this earthquake is different. It was unique in that it caused the doors of the prison open and for the chains to just come loose. This earthquake could have caused the the rocks overhead to crush those in prisoners but rather the building shakes and path is opened up for to freedom.

Paul could have easily thought “Let’s get out of here. God surely has made a way for us to leave. I guess He doesn’t want us here anymore.” That’s not what happens, rather, Paul notices the guard.

Remember the guard was given a special command to “guard them carefully,” so that’s why they were in the inner cell of the prison. The guard was asleep when the earthquake happened. For a prison guard to lose their prisoners was punishable by death. It was considered more honorable to take your own life than to be humiliated and killed in public.

Assuming the prisoners have escaped, that’s what he decides to do.

Paul, and the other prisoners are all still sitting within the prison, and Paul, being a Roman citizen, likely understands this custom of having a more honorable death. He probably can’t see the jailor and so he shouts, “Don’t harm yourself, because we’re all here!”

Paul, instead of thinking about himself and trying to escape, he thinks of the jailor who doesn’t know the Most High God.

The jailor runs inside with falls before Paul and Silas, brings them out of the prison and asks this beautiful question, “Sits, what must I do to be saved?”

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

I love the interaction between the jailor and the missionaries. The jailor must have heard everything that was said that night in the prison before he fell asleep. He observed these men in the their midnight hour, in a times of difficulty, stress, and pain. In all of that they continued to praise God and the jailor now wanted that.

The jailor then takes the missionaries to his own home and washes the wounds of Paul and Silas. The jailor then gets washed clean in baptism. The dynamic between these character changes from a prisoner/jailor relationship to a brother in Christ relationship.

God’s intent on this occasion was not the physical deliverance of his servants, but the spiritual deliverance of the jailor and his family.

Our text ends so beautifully.

Acts 16:34 CSB

34 He brought them into his house, set a meal before them, and rejoiced because he had come to believe in God with his entire household.

[CONCLUSION]

I don’t know what season of life you are in at the moment. Maybe things seem to be going well. Great! Praise God!

Maybe you are nearing or in that midnight hour and you just don’t know what to do.

We have the Most High God who wants you to turn to Him and worship Him because this is the God who can deliver you from anything and everything you will go through.

We are going to have a time to respond. If you need to come and pray down here, its open, if you need to prayer with someone, I have asked some deacons to join me down here, Susan is here. If you need to give your life to Christ just like the jailor did, then don’t wait anymore, come to the Father, He is waiting for you.