About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken. And immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone's bonds were unfastened. When the jailer woke and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, supposing that the prisoners had escaped. But Paul cried with a loud voice, "Do not harm yourself, for we are all here." And the jailer called for lights and rushed in, and trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas. Then he brought them out and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household."
-- Acts 16:25-31, ESV
Chuck Colson had to go to prison to find peace with God. He was Ivy League smart, but his intellect drew him away from the Lord. He was U.S. Marine tough, but his heart was hardened to the Gospel. He was a successful Boston attorney, but you know about that camel through the eye of a needle thing. In 1969, he had an office next door to the Oval Office of the president.
Power corrupted Colson. In 1973, he became the first Watergate conspirator to serve time in prison. On the way to incarceration, a friend gave him a copy of the Bible and "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. He read both, then penned his own, the first of over 30 bestsellers, entitled "Born Again." It details how it took prison for him to find peace with God.
There are different kinds of prisons -- those we build to lock up other people, and those we build for ourselves. The first you understand, and may even know the system in the Roman Empire was especially arduous. Even the guards were put under enormous pressure. They had a peculiar custom that required a guard who let a prisoner escape to assume that prisoner's sentence, even capital punishment.
That's why the jailer was going to kill himself after the apparent jailbreak. Convicted murderers had potentially escaped, and he knew what that meant for him, so he decided to just do the job himself. Paul stopped him. The earthquake had opened doors, but none of the prisoners escaped.
The prisons we build for ourselves do not come with steel bars, but with unhappiness, unholiness, and uncertainty. The Philippian jailer was unhappy, working the midnight shift, seldom seeing his family. I know he was unholy, an unbelieving Greek working for the pagan Romans. And by his own confession, he was uncertain, not knowing how to be saved from the prison he had built for himself until he encountered Jesus Christ through the witness of Paul and Silas.
There are different kinds of people, too, only two, lost and saved. There are lost people who do not know they are lost, which is the vast majority of people. They don't believe in God, or at least don't believe that belief in God is something that should govern one's life, not when there are more important things to do on Sundays and the other days of the week.
Then there are lost people who do believe in god with a little "g." They've bet on the wrong horse, and they still think he is going to win. This is true today for the vast majority of people, who are very religious but don't know our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
Then there are the lost people who know they are lost, like the Philippian jailer. This is the kind of lost person you would want to be, only not for long. This kind of lost person has been touched by the Gospel, convicted by the Holy Spirit, and cannot rest until they get the answer to the world's greatest question, "What must I do to be saved?"
There are different kinds of saved people in the world, as well. There are people who are superficially saved, meaning they are actually lost. There are people genuinely saved, yet yield little fruit and bear almost no witness. Then there are saved people who show it, and share it, like Paul and Silas.
The jailer witnessed Paul's and Silas' witness and believed, and we know he believed. For while a person is justified by faith alone, saving faith is never alone. It is accompanied by repentance, witness, and perseverance, which can all be witnessed in this new, born again, Christian.
Real peace requires prison. People must be convicted of their sin, be served the Gospel, then truly believe in order to be free. It is a freedom that lasts forever.
Chuck DeVane is the pastor of Lake Hamilton Baptist Church. Call him at 501-525-8339 or email [email protected].