What Happens When We Are Set Free

“One day as we were going down to the place of prayer, we met a demon-possessed slave girl. She was a fortune-teller who earned a lot of money for her masters. She followed Paul and the rest of us, shouting, ‘These men are servants of the Most High God and they have come to tell you how to be saved.’ This went on day after day until Paul got so exasperated that he turned and said to the demon within her, ‘I command you in the Name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.’ And instantly it left her. Her masters’ hopes of wealth were now shattered, so they grabbed Paul and Silas and dragged them before the authorities at the marketplace. ‘The whole city is in an uproar because of these Jews!’ they shouted to the city officials. ‘They are teaching customs that are illegal for us Romans to practice.’ A mob quickly formed against Paul and Silas and the city officials ordered them stripped and beaten with wooden rods. They were severely beaten and then they were thrown into prison. The jailer was ordered to make sure they didn’t escape. So the jailer put them into the inner dungeon and clamped their feet in the stocks.

Around midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God and the other prisoners was listening. Suddenly, there was a massive earthquake and the prison was shaken to its foundations. All the doors immediately flew open and the chains of every prisoner fell off! The jailer woke up to see the prison doors wide open. He assumed the prisoners had escaped, so he drew his sword to kill himself. But Paul shouted to him, ‘Stop! Don’t kill yourself! We are all here!’ 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?’ They replied, ‘Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, along with everyone in your household.’ And they shared the word of the Lord with him and with all who lived in his household. Even at that hour of the night, the jailer cared for them and washed their wounds. Then he and everyone in his household were immediately baptized. He brought them into his house and set a meal before them and he and his entire household rejoiced because they all believed in God.” (Acts 16:16-34) (Also Read Psalm 97; Revelations 22:12-21; John 17:20-26)

Freedom is a gift from YAHVEH inherited through creation. If we are not free; that is, not free to live, to make choices and to be accountable for life; then we are truly in bondage. Our humanness would then be its own incarceration. But, thanks to YAHVEH, we are made by YAHVEH in such a way that life has meaning because we are YAHVEH’s free creatures. Now assuredly, we may choose to give up our freedom by giving in to the forces of evil and sin that intend to ensnare us. Herein lies the human predicament. We seek to be free and responsible, yet in being free we make poor choices that leave us separated from YAHVEH and from others. Recall the dramatic unfolding of our ultimate undoing from Genesis 3. What a tribe we are! Now the good news is that our enslavement is not permanent. In fact, the centre of the Christian gospel is that YAHVEH came to us in the person of His Son to make us free; “free indeed,” Yeshua said. We read a text in this teaching that models the story of our human existence. Paul and Silas, early missionaries extraordinaire, encounter the darkness of the society of which they were a part as well as the darkness of a prison cell from which they were liberated.

I.) Are we in bondage? This text presupposes that at times we are; and perhaps unaware of it. Someone has said, “No one is so much in bondage as he who thinks he is free and is not!” Our pre-conditioning to the prevailing views of existence and our acquiescence to them, makes it neigh to impossible to think as a free person; and even to recognize our limitations. The Jews of Yeshua’s day declared themselves to be free, notwithstanding their subservience to Rome and declared they had never been slaves to anyone. Perhaps we suffer the same malady! Beyond the cultural surroundings that enslave us, the Bible is quite clear to say that we are bound by our sins that so easily beset us. Yeshua said He came as the great physician to heal not the well, those who assumed their own spiritual health, but instead those who were sick; that is, those who recognized their need for forgiveness and a restored relationship to YAHVEH. The self-gratification so evident in our quest for more and more things and the pride that tells us we deserve all we can get; despite the hunger and starvation of millions in the world today; define the basic notion of our sinfulness. The psalmist declared, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked” (Jeremiah 17:9).

II.) Here is the good news: the bondage can be broken by YAHVEH’s power. Think of the story of the slave girl in the text. It was a pitiful situation. Her “power of divination” was used by her owners to make money. She was used and abused for the sport of it all; and to increase the profit margin. Paul’s action here to speak to her the truth, to see her life transformed by the change in her life, to expose her to a new way of living, annoyed some. Speaking to the demon within, Paul said, “Come out of her. Set her free.” This is the word YAHVEH speaks into the most troubled places. To Lazarus in John’s gospel, Yeshua speaks pointedly. Looking to the graveyard where the dead Lazarus was buried, He cries out, “Lazarus; stand up; come here! Be free of the bondage of the grave.” Yeshua continues to speak the message of freedom to each believing heart.

III.) Back to Paul and Silas. As a consequence of Paul’s healing miracle, the slave girl’s owners were angered and had the two missionaries thrown in jail. But the heart of grace is not easily defeated. There in the jail at midnight, Paul and Silas declared their allegiance to YAHVEH and offered their ardent praise. Suddenly an earthquake came, shook the jail cells open, loosed the shackles that bound them and set them free. Or so it all appears. In actuality, these two were already free before the shackles came loose and the doors fell off their hinges. They were free in their spirits, made free through faith in HaMashiach and no human-made cell could change their situation. No magistrate could take away the joy of their lives surrendered. Rome only thought it was in control! YAHVEH is more powerful than the evil of the world. Our first thought might be to run out of a prison when such an opening allowed for it. But not here. Paul and Silas remained in their cell; to the utter amazement of the guard whose job it was to watch them. Fearing for his own life, which could have been required of him for allowing the escape of a Roman prisoner, he first thought about taking his own life. What a marvellous word he heard from Paul, who declared to him: “Don’t do it. There’s no need. We’ve not gone anywhere. We are still here.” Upon seeing the faith of these two apostles, not fearfully seeking their own escape but settled securely and sedately still in their cells, the guard fell on his knees and cried out, “What must I do to be saved?” Evidently he had already heard Paul and Silas share the testimony of HaMashiach. Now he wanted to know the One they knew. He wanted the power and assurance they had.

IV.) Here is declared the greatest good news of all. Paul’s words to him were simple and direct. There’s no confused speech, no garbled words, only the clear word of testimony: “Believe on Adonai Yeshua HaMashiach and you will be saved... and your whole house.” The promise of the Bible is the promise of good news. Believe and you will be saved. That is, belief is the condition upon which the power of YAHVEH is unleashed in our lives. We were never created to be insignificant slaves in the eyes of feeble masters. We were created for intimate relationship with our Creator. When that relationship is discovered, the great freedom becomes ours. Or better still, we are claimed by it. How do we know when we are free? Two things are shown here: we are truly free when we truly praise Adonai and when we truly preach the gospel.