Paul and Silas Do Big Things [Easter 7C - Acts 16:16-34]

 The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Acts 16:16-34

 

Paul and Silas Do Big Things

St. Paul’s, Keeseville, NY

 

Life is full of surprises.  One never can tell what twists and turns might be just around the corner.  One morning, Paul and Silas set off in the direction of their place of prayer.  Nothing about that day’s journey was in any way noteworthy.  It was normal; something they did.  But on one particular morning, the one noted in our reading from Acts, something in their routine changed.  On the way, on that day, they met an enslaved girl.  And that too would be unremarkable except that she decided to make a scene.  Now, these things do happen; loud and obnoxious people do exist.  And they do sometimes make life uncomfortable.  But this meeting, it turns out, was more than that, more than a singular disturbance.  This meeting would forever change each individual life.  This meeting would even shift the trajectory of salvation history.

 

You see, this didn’t happen only once: it kept happening.  Paul and Silas kept walking to their place of prayer.  And the girl kept yelling.  Day after day, she made the same unpleasant scene.  Until one day, Paul, very much annoyed, put a stop to the madness.  A prayer on the way to the place of prayer forever changed the girl’s life.

 

And, it turns out, forever changed some other lives as well.  The text does not give us the details, but at some point, this girl became a victim of human traffickers.  It was in their best interest that the little girl remained unwell.  Her spiritual bondage made these scoundrels good money.  As Christian readers, we welcome Paul’s prayer and the incredible effect.  Paul set the girl free and that is Good News; but, as the story reminds us, not everyone enjoys the Good News.  That spontaneous salvation had financial implications for the girl’s owners, and probably for the local economy too.  And if you want to know how people feel about acts of liberation that affect their personal economic bottom line, just see the American Civil War.

 

It should probably go without saying that people who own other people are never the good guys in the story, but the magistrates take the side of the traffickers.  Because these unseemly have a great deal of money.  And because they very deftly decide to appeal to a timeless, cynical strategy: jingoistic xenophobia; they cast suspicion on the “outsiders”.  In their accusation before the court, the owners of the girl don’t mention the prayer or the girl’s miraculous healing.  Instead they say, before the magistrates and the combustible crowd: "These men are disturbing our city; they are Jews and are advocating customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to adopt or observe."  They are not like us.

 

That was enough for the judges.  That was enough for the people.  Now we will find out later in the book of Acts, in the verses that follow this morning’s lectionary selection, that Paul and Silas are actually Roman citizens – as Roman as their accusers.  But hatred has little time for fact checking or due cause.  And so, for the crime of saving a girl’s life, Paul and Silas are attacked, stripped, beaten, and thrown into prison.      

 

This was a terrible and traumatic experience for our heroes.  They are treated badly for doing good.  They are publicly shamed and ridiculed.  They are victims of an unjust system – a system that protects evil and abuses those who practice mercy. 

 

And yet, despite their punishment, they continue to do good.  Despite the hideous consequences they persist in showing mercy.  They choose not to pursue revenge, though justified.  Instead, they do the very thing that got them into trouble in the first place: they pray.

 

And they sing.  Two people against the world.  Or better said, two people with a world against them.  They pray and they sing.  And that doesn’t seem like much…until the ground begins to shake.

 

Jesus promised, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.”  Paul and Silas makes two – three if you count the narrator of the story.  That is not a lot of people.  But it is enough.

 

That small group was not small because Jesus was among them.  And with Jesus among them, they liberated an enslaved girl.  They shook the foundations of a prison.  They slipped their stocks.  They saved their jailer’s life.  They baptized an entire household into the Body of Christ.  They starred in a chapter of the great salvation story.

 

And you, St. Paul’s, are called to carry on the legacy of your patron.  You are small, but you are more than two.  You are small but Jesus is among you.  You are small but you are enough.

 

Your prayers are powerful.  Your songs can defeat the shackles of bondage and the power of evil.  The good you do will change lives.  The mercy you show will overcome injustice and undermine the violence of our times.

 

Paul gives us a pretty simple blueprint for growing the Church.  The jailer and his household came to Jesus because Paul modeled persistence in prayer, the beauty of worship, the power of goodness, and the tender touch of mercy.  And it was irresistible.  The man risked his life to know that Jesus, the Jesus he saw in Paul and Silas. 

 

They were just a couple of guys.  But Jesus was among them.  And together, they did big things.