EPISODE 61 ACTS CHAPTER 16 "So You Think Your Having A Bad Day!"

Welcome to Share the Word. In Acts 16, Paul's second expedition with an expanded team of missionaries was launched around 51 A.D., lasting two years. They traveled at least 2,700 miles and, for the first time, brought the gospel of Jesus Christ to European cities. What happened to Paul and Silas in Macedonian city of Philippi would have stopped any lesser men, but they overcame extreme adversity. Let's listen in. Acts chapter 16.

So you think you're having a bad day? In Leadership Journal, a magazine for pastors, I once read one of those you know you're having a bad day when lists. It made me laugh, although if you've never done my job, you might not fully appreciate these. It said, for example, you know you're having a bad day when you're leading a Bible study and you just can't find the book of Obadiah if your life depended on it. Or, you know you're having a bad day when you reach that point in the service when you step into the pulpit and there's a holy hush of expectation, then you look down and realize you have last week's sermon notes. I hate to admit it, but I've actually had that happen.

I've had some bad days. I'm sure many of you have had worse, but few of us have had a bad day quite like the one we're going to see the apostle Paul and his new missionary partner Silas have in Acts chapter 16. At the tail end of chapter 15, we read that Paul, with Silas, that trusted delegate from Jerusalem who he asked to replace Barnabas, set off on a second important missionary expedition. The year was about 50 A.D., and Paul is approximately 50 years old. This time, they traveled on foot northeast through Paul's home province of Cilicia. Visiting places Paul had first preached the gospel in the years after he became a Christian.

And from there, they headed northwest to the cities of Galatia to see how the churches Barnabas and he had planted there a few years earlier were doing. Do you remember that crazy experience they had at the town of Lystra? That's where they were mistaken for gods by the superstitious townspeople, and things got ugly, ending in Paul being stoned. Well, that was episode 59, if you missed it, you can go back and check it out. Not everything that happened at Lystra was negative. We learn here that one of the converts made in that town during that visit was a young man named Timothy.

And now, when Paul returned to that town a couple years later, he heard such good things about Timothy's character and faith that he invited Timothy to join their team. I can't help but wonder if in Paul's mind, Timothy wasn't a Mark substitute, if you know what I mean. Whatever his motivation, this decision to invite Timothy to join them was one Paul never ever regretted, because Timothy went on to become like a son to him, his number one protégé in the ministry. To the southwest of Galatia was the densely populated Roman province of Asia, with its chief city of Ephesus. That seemed like a great next target city. But in some way, Luke says, God prevented them from going there at this time.

So they headed northward toward the province of Bithynia, but once again, Luke says in verse 7, God made them realize this was not where he wanted them to go. You know, sometimes God shuts doors, and as Christians, we need to be sensitive to that, as Paul was here. So the mission team just kept pushing west and west and west until they finally reached a coastal town called Troas. This is the extreme western coast of Turkey on the coast of the Aegean Sea. So now what? That very night, staying over in Troas, God spoke to Paul in a dream.

And in the dream, he saw a man appealing to him, saying, Come over here to Macedonia and help us. That was further than they had probably intended to go on this expedition, but he felt certain this was the Lord's leading. So the very next day, they booked passage on a ship heading for Neapolis, a port on the coast of northern Greece, Macedonia as it's called still to this day. With favorable winds, they reached Neapolis in only two days. And when they climbed off that ship, Paul was for the first time on European soil. Traveling inland ten miles, they reached an important city in that district, a place called Philippi.

And finally, after all that traveling, we too have reached our destination for this lesson. Notice a detail in the text of chapter 16. Starting at verses 10 and 11, all of a sudden Luke, our author, starts using the pronoun we and us instead of they. It seems like Luke must have joined the missionary team for this expedition. So going forward now, it was composed of Paul and Silas, young Timothy, and Dr. Luke.

Up until this time, the strategy had always been to make their first contact in a new city at a Jewish synagogue because Paul could find an audience there. But Philippi was a thoroughly Roman town and didn't have enough Jews, apparently, to support a synagogue. The first Sabbath in that city, they went out to the river and happened upon a group of worshipers there, a group of women. And Paul began to tell them the story of Jesus. One woman in particular was drawn to the message. She was a Jew, but had had contact with Jews and believed that there was only one true God.

Her name was Lydia, and she was a successful businesswoman. As Paul spoke with her, Luke says, God opened her heart to respond to the message. She believed what Paul was telling her about Jesus. She accepted him as her Savior. In fact, her whole family became Christians. And because Lydia appeared to have a big house, she invited the team to make her home their headquarters while in Philippi.

You know, it's been a little too calm so far in Acts chapter 16. Do you sense something crazy may be about to happen? Right on cue, at verse 16, Luke recalls an unusual encounter they had in that city. One Sabbath, when Paul and Silas were going out to the river where they were meeting with people, apparently become a place of worship for them, they crossed paths with a slave girl who had an evil spirit in her, a demon entity. She began following them through the streets of Philippi, calling out in a weird, mocking voice, These men are servants of the Most High God. They are here to tell us the way to be saved.

The term Luke uses to describe this girl is pythoness. Pythoness. At Delphi in southern Greece, there was a shrine to the god Apollo, who legend had it came down to earth in the misty past in the form of a python snake. There was a large statue of a python at that shrine, and the priestesses there were believed to be able to tell the future when they were indwelt by the spirit of this god Apollo. This girl's unusual power had to do with a snake gall rate, but the serpent was Satan. God's words, by the way, very specifically warn us about fortune tellers and mediums.

It tells us that we should have absolutely nothing to do with them. Some are pure frauds, you know, but others, like this girl, are in fact channeling demons. This young woman was a valuable commodity to her owners, a syndicate of what we would call today human traffickers, who made a lot of money exploiting her. And every time she saw Paul and the other Christian missionaries going or coming in Philippi, she would make that spectacle, saying, These men are servants of the Most High God, and say other things about them. Her owners might have thought that was funny, while it was in fact true, it was not the kind of publicity the apostles were looking for.

Finally, after days of this, Paul had had enough, and moved by compassion for this young woman and anger at the men who were taking advantage of her, he turned and commanded the demon entity to come out of her in the name of Jesus Christ, and the evil spirit had to obey. This is the kind of authority real apostles had, and instantly the girl was free. Then all hell broke loose. The men who had been making money from this unfortunate girl were enraged. She was, after all, in that world, their property, not to mention a very good earner. What right did these foreigners, these Jews, have to interfere with their business?

They seized Paul and Silas and dragged them before the magistrates at the city center. The charges Luke lists here at verse 20 and 21: These men are Jews and are throwing our city into an uproar by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept. Notice they didn't say, These guys messed up our lucrative business by exorcising a demon from our fortune teller. No. They brought a charge they knew the magistrates would listen to, and one the crowd of townspeople who gathered that day at that scene would support. Jews were not popular in this Roman city.

Very recently, the entire population of Jews in the imperial capital of Rome had been expelled by the Roman Emperor Claudius. Over 40,000 Jews, literally, forced to leave their home and businesses and get out of Rome. Now these Jews have showed up in our Roman city, these guys are saying, preaching their offbeat religion, upsetting the peace here. The magistrates were apparently not even interested in hearing any explanations from Paul and Silas. They were interested in law and order and satisfying the complaints of these influential citizens. So, without even asking for the apostles' side of the story, they ordered them stripped and beaten publicly.

The word Luke uses here means beaten with rods. Maybe you have seen Roman coins from this era. They are often engraved with a bundle of rods and an axe. Those things represented to this culture Roman law and order. The axe represented the death penalty by beheading people for capital crimes. The rods, they called fasces, were used for beating people for lesser crimes.

Roman officials, when in public, were often flanked by attendants called lictors carrying such rods. That was a visual reminder of their authority to mete out harsh corporal punishment if they needed to. In this case, the magistrate at Philippi ordered his lictors to tie Paul and Silas to posts, and they were brutally beaten right there in the public square. The blows must have burned like fire as their backs and ribs were flayed. Before they fell unconscious, the magistrate ordered them untied and taken to the city prison. The jailer there, assuming these were serious criminals, pushed Paul and Silas into the inner dungeon, the most secure area, and they were shackled and their legs clamped in stocks.

He slammed the iron door behind them and left them in the darkness. Try to imagine this. They had just been on their way out to the river to worship and meet with some people who wanted to know more about Jesus when they came across this victimized girl and did what they needed to do to help her. And for that, for that, they are accosted and dragged before the authorities, and without being given a chance to even explain, for that, they are beaten severely and chained up in a dungeon. And we think we've had bad days? How would you have reacted here?

I have to ask myself that question. Where in the world would my head have been at that point? Well, later on that night, other prisoners and the jailer as well heard singing. Yes, singing coming from deep inside that prison. That was so unusual, I'm sure they couldn't help but listen. And as they listened, they heard these two singing praises to God.

I'd like to know what exactly they were singing. Maybe Psalm 34: I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise will continually be in my mouth. My soul will make its boast in the Lord. The humble will hear us and be glad. And then maybe they break into harmony on this part. Oh, magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together.

We sought the Lord, and He heard us and delivered us from all our fears. Some of the songs they were singing were Christian songs about being saved through faith in Jesus, maybe like one old hymn I know that says, Glory, I'm saved, I'm saved, my sins are all pardoned, my guilt is all gone. Glory, I'm saved, I'm saved by the blood of the crucified One. That's the kind of thing they were singing that night, although I don't know the exact songs, but that's the kind of thing that the others heard coming from the inner dungeon. That girl was right. These men were servants of the Most High God, telling others the way to be saved.

Remember, saved is a term the early Christians used meaning being made right in God's sight by the Savior Jesus. We shouldn't shy away from that term, by the way. Jesus was not a psychoanalyst who came to help us cope with life a little better. He's a Savior who came to seek and to save those who are lost. Just at midnight, as Paul and Silas were in full voice, the ground under that prison felt like it moved. Then suddenly the earth violently shook from an earthquake.

It only lasted a couple moments, but when it was over, the prison doors had sprung open, the prisoners' shackles had broken free from the walls. The jailer ran to the entrance of the prison, and once he realized what had happened, he was certain all the men inside had escaped, and he drew his sword and was going to kill himself. That might seem like an extreme reaction, but if prisoners escaped on his watch, he knew he'd be held responsible. To that ex-Roman soldier, in this crisis, in this panic, that's what he was about to do. But then he heard, Don't harm yourself. We're all still here.

The jailer got a torch, and he came into the inner prison where Paul and Silas were. He was visibly shaking. This is how I know what they'd been singing about, because straight away what the jailer wanted to know was, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? Whatever you've got, I need that. And they told him what I think Paul and Silas were always telling people: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved. Salvation, remember, all that it means to be made right with God is a matter of coming back to Him through faith in Jesus Christ, the Savior.

Luke keeps reminding us of this one way and another, just as John did in his Gospel. While having their wounds cleaned that night, by the way, and bandaged at the jailer's home where he took them, Paul and Silas explained to him and to his whole family exactly how Jesus' death on the cross could save them. And that night, they all accepted Jesus as their Savior and Lord. Man, that's quite a story. It's full of many lessons too. Besides reiterating the Gospel message, maybe one of the biggest lessons is about how Christians ought to respond to adversity.

How could Paul and Silas react the way they did after what happened to them in Philippi? Were they just irrepressibly happy guys? I don't think so. Let me offer three suggestions quickly why I think they could respond the way they did. Number one, they accepted that adversity was not something foreign to God's will for their lives. If we imagine that adversity is not something God would ever have for us, then the very best we can do is respond to it with resignation.

But if you realize that adversity is part of following Christ, who faced more than His share of it, then that changes your perspective. The Bible says this: Whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy, for when your faith is tested, your endurance has the chance to grow. If I'm following the Lord to the best of my understanding, and He allows adversity to come into my life, there's a good reason for it. Every great hero of the faith we read about in Scripture faced adversity. Doesn't mean that you're on the wrong track necessarily. It may mean you're exactly on the right track, as Paul and Silas were here.

They got into this situation because their lives were making a difference, and the enemy didn't like it. When the adversity came, they made a choice to respond to it with joy, with rejoicing, counting it a privilege to suffer for the cause of Christ. That was a deliberate choice, not a response born in their feelings and emotions. It came out of their faith. Second, Paul could respond the way he did because Silas responded the way he did, and Silas could respond the way he did because Paul responded the way he did. Wait a minute, Paul, don't talk to us in riddles.

I'm not. I'm saying no problem is ever as dark when you have a real friend to face it with you. That's why being connected in a network of strong Christian friends is so valuable. That's why Jesus sent out His followers two by two. If you could have heard the conversations leading up to the concert that night at the prison, I bet you would have heard Paul picking up Silas and Silas picking up Paul, encouraging each other, praying for each other. They reminded each other of God's promises, His power, His goodness.

And soon they were singing duets. Do you have any close Christian friends like that? If not, chances are when serious adversity comes your way, you'll struggle with it. You'll struggle alone, and it may well get the best of you. God doesn't want any of us to be alone in our faith walk. We need people to encourage us in our times of adversity and trouble.

This is one big reason the church exists, by the way. And thirdly, and I know this is a very spiritually mature perspective, but Paul realized that for a Christian, all trouble here is temporary. By that I mean, no matter how severe it can get, how bad it gets, how much difference will it really make 50 years from now, or 100 years from now, or 10,000 years from now? 10,000 years from now, come on. No, I really think that's how he looked at it. He later wrote in one of his epistles, I consider that our present suffering is not worth even comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

It's Romans chapter 8, verse 18. In another of his writings later, 2 Corinthians chapter 4, he says, These momentary light afflictions are preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparisons, as we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things that are unseen, for the things that are seen are transient. But the things that are unseen are eternal. Wow. This is next-level Christian thinking right there. By glory, he means heaven, eternity.

How big of a deal will our adversities now seem then? Where we are then, looking back. When we were down in Florida once, where we took our kids to theme parks, one of them was called the Islands of Adventure. There were big chickens about riding on the scary rides. They get that from their dad, by the way. But for some reason, I took them on a ride which ran through a long, darkened tunnel, and all these scary dinosaur-looking things were coming out of the walls and ceilings.

It seemed like they were going to devour us. I'm sure it was absolutely terrifying for my little kids at that time. But the ride was like two minutes long, and then it was over. Paul understood that's the reality of things. There will be some scary parts to life following Christ, but it's all over pretty quickly when you measure it against the backdrop of eternity. He honestly believed, as Jesus promised, that anything he lost or suffered for the sake of Christ here, God was going to make up to him a hundred times over in eternity.

Taking God's promises seriously made all the difference in the way he could deal with life's worst adversities. Because they accepted this adversity in Philippi through the lens of their faith, many others were very positively affected that night and going forward. When their chains broke off out of the wall and the doors of that place fell open, Paul could have said, Hey, Silas, let's skedaddle out of this town. But he didn't. Why? It had to be because he was thinking about his impact on others.

Hadn't God led them to this very town, to this particular city, to share the gospel here? This unexpected adversity, in that light, was actually an opportunity. And because the apostles reacted to it with faith and courage, they were able to lead the jailer and his whole family to Christ that night. And soon a Christian church was planted in Philippi. Which all begs the question, so how do I react to adversity? Maybe you're thinking, but those guys knew they had a real connection with God, and they knew their lives were engaged in something very important.

That's why they could react the way they did. Exactly. Exactly. And our lives can be too. Thanks for listening. This is Paul for Share the Word.

Thanks, Paul. You know, I'm not sure I could have done what Paul and Silas did. Come to think about it, I'm just going to listen to that episode again. If you're a first-time listener, check out sharetheword.org. There's so much there, and it's all free. You won't be sorry.

From all of us at Share the Word, our blessings and prayers go out to all of you.