“After [Paul and Silas] had 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 (Acts 16:23–26)”.
By this point in the book of Acts, God is excellent at breaking people out of prison! First Peter and now Paul and Silas are miraculously released from prison. As many of the other apostles in the early church we have studied, they find themselves in a tough and seemingly impossible situation. They’ve been stripped naked, beaten severely, arrested, and then thrown into an inner cell where their feet are put in stocks. They must have been bruised, exhausted, and uncomfortable in that cold, dark prison cell to say the least. But what moves me so much about this story of Paul and Silas is what they do after they are beaten and thrown in jail. I mean, these guys are in pain and have every reason to be discouraged. There isn’t anything particularly hopeful about their situation, yet they choose to respond by praying and singing hymns to God. They approach God with a heart of prayer and thanksgiving before He ever moves them to freedom. And of course, I love that they are singing.
It’s easy to pray and sing together when things are going well. But I’ve confessed how many times I get down or discouraged by the stresses of everyday life and don’t respond with prayer. When things are tough, I don’t always feel like singing. Few of us could ever know what it is like to be beaten and thrown in prison for our faith. But, especially these days, so many of us know exactly what it feels like to feel “beaten” from emotional, spiritual, financial, or health challenges. I don’t usually like to use being imprisoned as a metaphor, but the truth is I know of many who are imprisoned by illness, addiction, sin, or hardship.
I know a friend who was a marathon runner before the pandemic of 2020. He went from running seven miles one day to being unable to walk the next and spent months in the hospital trying to recover. Overnight, illness robbed him of so much that he once took for granted. He talks about how prayer and praise in the face of that despair carried him through the way it did for Paul and Silas. He says that even as the doctors delivered bad news, he found freedom whenever he lifted God’s name in prayer and praise. He discovered that, long before God provided physical healing, he had already embraced the spiritual freedom God brought in prayer. God provided my friend peace even in the most hopeless moments. It made me step back and consider that the spiritual freedom we find in prayer is the first step to God moving in miraculous ways. This challenges me to fully grasp that when I lift my heart to God in prayer—even in the toughest of circumstances—I will find freedom for my soul.
As we see, God moves in this story and frees Paul and Silas from their chains, but it sure seems as if they are already free from fear and doubt long before God brings the violent earthquake that throws open the doors to their jail! I want to embrace that same kind of liberty God offers to me in prayer even when I feel beaten down by what life is throwing my way. I want to learn to pray with praise and singing even when I can’t see the outcome. I want to pray together with others in a way that leads to true and lasting freedom. I want to lift God up for who He is and not only for what He has done.
An excerpt from “On Our Knees” by Phil Wickham
