Sermon: Not the End of the Story

Delivered at Travelers Rest United Methodist Church in Travelers Rest, South Carolina on April 11, 2021, the Second Sunday in Eastertide

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Not the End of the Story

Audio Version

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About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.  Suddenly there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened.  When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, since he supposed that the prisoners had escaped.  But Paul shouted in a loud voice, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here.”  The jailer called for lights, and rushing in, he fell down trembling before Paul and Silas.  Then he brought them outside and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”  They answered, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”  They spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.  At the same hour of the night he took them and washed their wounds; then he and his entire family were baptized without delay.  He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God.

Acts 16:25-34 (NRSV)

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow
Because He lives, all fear is gone
Because I know He holds the future
And life is worth the living, just because He lives

From “Because He Lives” by Bill and Gloria Gaither

Ever since I started attending Travelers Rest United Methodist Church five years ago, I have participated in the TRAIL Class on Sunday mornings.  We have been on a bit of a hiatus lately, but hopefully we will soon start meeting regularly once again.  On one Sunday morning a few years ago, as part of the class discussion, we were asked to consider what the mission statements of our lives might be.  I had not previously considered my own personal mission statement, but somehow I immediately knew what mine was.  I told the class that my mission in life is “to tell a better story than the one I was told.”

For eleven years, I attended a Christian school attached to a fundamentalist church.  At this school, my classmates and I studied all the same subjects that we would have studied at any other school.  We were also taught the Gospel message, and we were taught how to share it with others.  The word gospel is derived form the Old English word gōdspel which means “good news” or “good story.”¹  The good news, as I heard it, was prefaced by such an overwhelming amount of bad news that the good news didn't seem very good at all.  The good news was that I had the opportunity to be saved, but the bad news was that a vast majority of humanity is effectively doomed.  This “Gospel” was not a story I wanted to share with other people.  It did not fill me with hope; it filled me with fear.  It was not, as the title of one movie about Jesus would imply, “the greatest story ever told.”  It was a horror story that would make the most gruesome fever dream of the most twisted independent film director look like Disney cartoon.

One reason I started preaching is that, as I told my Sunday school class, I want to tell a story that is better than the one I was told.  I want to share messages that give people hope and alleviate their fears.  It is with this mission, that I bring you this message today.

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In the Acts of the Apostles, we read that Paul and Silas, two of the earliest Christian missionaries, found themselves in a bit of trouble while they were ministering in the city of Philippi.  In this city, there was a certain slave girl.  In our day, we might say that she suffered from a mental illness²; in her own time, however, she was thought to be possessed by a “spirit of Python” which gave her prophetic powers.³  Python, according to Greek mythology, was a serpent deity associated with the oracle at Delphi.⁴  Still, some people at that time might have thought that the slave girl was possessed by a demon.⁵

One day, while Paul, Silas, and their partners in ministry were on their way to meet with other believers in Philippi for prayer, this slave girl started pestering them.  She followed them around, shouting, “These men are slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation!”  Whether or not she actually received her prophesies from something supernatural, this one happened to be accurate.  The girl's pestering went on for a long time, until Paul had finally had enough.  Annoyed, he turned to the girl and said to whatever had taken control of her, “I order you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her.”  From that point onward, the slave girl was in her right mind.⁶

It has been said that “no good deed goes unpunished.”  Paul's actions doubtlessly brought the poor girl a great deal of relief.  Unfortunately, her masters were not quite so happy.  They had been exploiting her condition and making money off the prophetic power it had supposedly given her.  Thanks to Paul, that power and that source of income were gone.  The girl's masters grabbed Paul and Silas, took them into the marketplace, and started hurling accusations against them, stirring up anti-Jewish sentiments among the crowd.⁷  The city magistrates ordered that Paul and Silas be beaten and thrown into the most secure part of the prison.⁸

While in prison, Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises to God well into the night, while the other prisoners listened to them.  Around midnight, there was an earthquake that shook the prison, loosened all of the prisoners' chains, and opened the doors to all of the prison cells.  When the sleeping jailer awakened, he saw that all of the prisoners had been freed.  Knowing that he had failed in his duties, he drew his sword and prepared to impale himself.  Suddenly, Paul shouted, “Do not harm yourself, for we are all here!”

The trembling jailer fell down at the feet of Paul and Silas.  He took them aside and asked them, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

Paul replied, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

This morning, I want us to ponder the Philippian Jailer's question and Paul's answer.  What did the jailer mean when he asked what he must do in order to be “saved”?  If he wanted to be saved, then there must be something from which he wanted to be saved.  What exactly did the jailer fear?  How would believing in Jesus, as Paul instructed him, save him from it?

Nowadays, when Christians speak about salvation or about being “saved,” they are often speaking in terms of what happens after death.  If a person is “saved” in this sense, having put her faith in Jesus Christ, then “some bright morning when this life is over”⁹ the person will go to heaven, a place of everlasting bliss, and not to the “other place,” a place of everlasting torment.  The fate from which a person is saved is the eternal punishment she supposedly deserves because she is a sinner.  To share such a message of salvation with other people, one must first convince them that their eternal destiny is in peril and that they need to be saved.  One must first convince them of the bad news before they can share the Good News with them.

I do not believe that, when the Philippian Jailer asked Paul and Silas what he must do in order to be saved, he was at all concerned about what might happen to him in the afterlife.  Remember that, just minutes before he asked his question, he fully intended to end his own life.  He was running as fast as he could run toward the afterlife until Paul stopped him.  Philippi was a Roman colony, meaning that the jailer was employed by the Roman Empire.  The Roman Empire was notoriously cruel.  From the perspective of the jailer, whatever awaited him in the next life would surely be a sweet relief compared to whatever awaited him in this life if all the prisoners escaped on his watch.

The jailer did not need to be convinced that he needed to be saved.  He knew he needed to be saved, and he desperately wanted to be saved.  Indeed he wanted to be saved from hell, but the hell he feared was a living hell.  The jailer wanted to be saved from his own life.

Now compare the perspective of the jailer to that of Paul and Silas.  Paul and Silas had been dragged before the authorities, maligned before a crowd, severely beaten, and thrown into the most secure part of a prison.  Despite their dire circumstances, they prayed and sang praises to God all through the night, thereby sharing their faith with the other prisoners.  Paul and Silas were bound, bruised, and bleeding, but still their hearts were full of hope and joy.  They had every reason to despair, yet still they remained hopeful.  They were so unfazed by their circumstances that they saw no need to flee when the earthquake loosened their chains and opened the door to their cell.

It was as if Paul and Silas were free the whole time.

So who is the real prisoner in this story?  The jailer was supposedly a free man, yet he was a prisoner in his own life.  Paul and Silas had been placed in the most secure part of a prison, and their feet had been placed in stocks, yet, somehow, they were still free.  They were free in Christ, and nothing, not even the might and the cruelty of the Roman Empire, could take their freedom away from them.  Once again, the biblical narrative shows us that not everything is as it appears.  In the words of Bishop Will Willimon, “There is freedom, and then there is freedom.”¹⁰  Willimon writes, “Having the key to someone else's cell does not make you free.  Iron bars do not a prison make.”¹¹

I think that the jailer witnessed the freedom Paul and Silas enjoyed in spite of their imprisonment.  I think that, when he asked them what he must do in order to be saved, he wanted to know how he could rid himself of his own chains and experience the true freedom he had seen in them.

Paul said to the jailer, “Believe on the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.”  Paul restates this instruction in his Letter to the Romans, in which he writes, “If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”¹²  It seems to me that nowadays Paul's instructions are often understood as a type of transaction or contract.  If a person signs off on certain theological statements about Jesus, then God will grant that person entry into Heaven upon death.  I would like to suggest that salvation is not something one receives in return for one's belief in Christ but rather something one experiences as a natural result of one's belief in Christ.  In other words, wholehearted trust in the resurrection and lordship of Jesus Christ has saving power in itself.

Consider what these truths about Jesus would have meant for the jailer.  There can be only one Lord, so, for the jailer, to confess that “Jesus Christ is Lord” would be to also confess that Caesar is not Lord.  It would be to proclaim that it is not the Roman Empire who holds his fate but rather Christ himself.  This would indeed be good news for him, because Christ is not like Caesar.  To believe that God raised Christ from the dead is to believe that death itself has been defeated.  For the jailer, this would mean that the very worst thing the Roman Empire could do to him would not be for him the end of the story.

In the Gospels, we read that the Son of God took on human flesh and dwelled among us as a man known as Jesus of Nazareth.¹³  He was the embodiment of God and the embodiment of love.  He healed the sick, freed people from their demons, raised the dead, fed the hungry, touched the untouchable, befriended the friendless, gave hope to the hopeless, and proclaimed the coming of a Kingdom that is “not of this world.”¹⁴  Everything Jesus did was an act of love, yet there were people who considered Him a threat.

Jesus, throughout His ministry, regularly clashed with the religious leaders of the day, but, on one fateful week, He put Himself on a collision course with the powers that be.  One Sunday, He rode into Jerusalem on a donkey,¹⁵ as if He was some long-awaited king reigning in an age of peace,¹⁶ lampooning the imperial procession that was also happening that day.¹⁷  The next day, He barged into the temple, turned over the tables of the people doing business there, drove everyone out, and condemned the hypocrisy that had infected the religious system,¹⁸ lamenting that the “house of prayer” had been reduced to a “den of robbers.”¹⁹  Jesus had gone too far.  On Friday, the religious leaders colluded with the political leaders to have Him sentenced to death by crucifixion, a most heinous form of execution used by the Roman Empire to punish insurgents and to terrorize other would-be revolutionaries into submission.²⁰  Jesus died on a cross, seemingly forsaken by God.²¹

The Cross was not the end of the story for Jesus.  A couple of days later, on Sunday, His followers went to His tomb and found it empty.²²  Jesus had been resurrected from the dead.  He appeared to His followers and commissioned them to spread His message of hope throughout the world.²³  Then He ascended to Heaven to take His place as the true Lord of this world.²⁴  For nearly two thousand years, the worldwide community of disciples that is the Church has, by the power of the Spirit, shared the story of Jesus, carried on His work of love, and striven to follow in His ways, waiting for the Lord to return to set all things right in the world.

On a Friday that seemed anything but “good,” love was seemingly defeated by fear, hatred, violence, and cruelty.  On Sunday, love emerged from the tomb as the true victor.  Through the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, Christ showed the world that things like violence, oppression, fear, hatred, sin, shame, and even death are not the end of the story.  Paul and Silas had so internalized the Gospel story that, even while they were locked in a prison cell, they knew that their circumstances were not the end of their story.  They had a freedom that could not be taken away by a prison sentence, a hope that could not be quenched by fear, and a life that could not be snuffed out by death.  They had a peace that, in Paul's words, “surpasses all understanding.”²⁵  This, I believe, is the salvation the jailer wanted.  This, I think, is something all of us want.

The Gospel story is often summarized with a single Bible verse: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”²⁶  Eternal life is not just life that lasts forever; it is abundant life from God that cannot be threatened by the circumstances we face.  It is not only life after death but also life after life.  When we proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord and affirm that God indeed raised Him from the dead, we are not simply signing off on theological statements.  We are boldly proclaiming that the things we fear in this life will not be lord over us, because Jesus Christ is our Lord.  We are proclaiming that, in the same way that the cross Christ bore was not the end of His story, the crosses we bear are not the end of ours.

Maybe you have made some mistakes in your life for which you are still suffering the consequences.  Maybe you still haven't forgiven yourself.  Maybe you hurt people you hold dear, and, as a result, you are still estranged from them.  Maybe you feel like an outcast in your own community, or maybe you have an addiction you just cannot seem to overcome.  Your mistakes are not the end of the story, and neither are the consequences of your mistakes.  You do not have to live your life defined by these things.  The Gospel shows us that, in Christ, things like repentance, forgiveness, reconciliation, and redemption are indeed possible.

Maybe you are reminded daily, when you open your newspaper or turn on the news, how seriously messed up everything in the world seems to be.  Maybe, because of the pandemic, the racially motivated violence of the past year, and the deep political divisions in our country, you've spent hours “doomscrolling” through news sites and social media apps.  Maybe, because of the bigotry in our society, you personally find yourself oppressed, persecuted, and beaten down daily.  The state of the world and the oppression you face are not the end of the story.  The Gospel shows us that God has not given up on this broken world.  It assures us that Christ is, even now, putting the world back together and making all things new.  Someday all wrongs in this world will be set right, and things like bigotry, injustice, and oppression will be banished from this world.

One reality we cannot ignore forever is that all of us will have to face death at some point.  We will lose loved ones in this life, and we will all inevitably come to the end of our own lives someday.  The Gospel shows us that even death is not the end of the story.  Though we grieve when we lose people we love, we grieve with the hope that Christ is, in Paul's words, “the first fruits of those who have died,” meaning that the Resurrection of Christ will be the first of many resurrections.²⁷

 

Death is a reality I personally had to face recently.  Nearly six months ago, my father died suddenly.  His health had not been good, but his death was not expected.  I'm grateful that I had been speaking with Dad regularly at the time of his passing, but our relationship was not good.  In fact, we hadn't been close for a number of years.  Right now, I'm holding on to the hope that someday, when Christ has made all things new, I will see Dad once again, in perfect health, and that the things that had come between us will be no more.

Paul and Silas had received eternal life in Jesus Christ, so they knew that their mistreatment and imprisonment were not the end of their story.  They were able to pray and sing praises God in spite of their circumstances.  The Philippian Jailer saw this abundant life at work in Paul and Silas and the freedom it had brought them, and he wanted these things for himself.  He wanted salvation from the chains that had bound his soul.  By offering the jailer the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, Paul and Silas offered him the same salvation, the same eternal life, and the same freedom in Christ they had been given.

Is there something form which you need to be saved?  Whatever it is, know that it is not Lord, because Jesus Christ is Lord.  Know that it is not the end of the story, because Christ has triumphed over all things, even death itself.  Christ came to offer us salvation, freedom, and abundant life, if we will only receive His gift.  Our mistakes and our circumstances do not have to be the end of the story, because Christ offers us life beyond these things, life that cannot be taken from us.

Praise be to God.  Amen.


Notes:

1. Lexico: “Gospel”
2. William Barclay.  The Acts of the Apostles, Revised Edition.  1976, Westminster Press.  p. 124
3. The Greek Phrase translated into English as “spirit of divination” in the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible is pneuma pythōn.
4. Wikipedia: “Python (mythology)”
5. William H. Willimon.  Acts (Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching)  1988, John Knox Press.  p. 138
6. Acts 16:16-18 (NRSV)
7. Willimon, p. 139
8. Acts 16:19-24
9. taken from the hymn “I'll Fly Away” by Albert E. Brumley
10. Willimon, p. 136
11. Willimon, p. 140
12. Romans 10:9 (NRSV)
13. John 1:14
14. These acts of Jesus are recounted throughout the four Gospels.
15. Matthew 21:1-11; Mark 11:1-11; Luke 19:28-40; John 12:12-19
16. Zechariah 9:9
17. Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan.  The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus's Final Days in Jerusalem.  2006, HarperOne.  p. 32
18. Borg and Crossan, p. 49
19. Matthew 21:12-17; Mark 11:15-19; Luke 19:45-48
20. Borg and Crossan, p. 146
21. Matthew 26:47-27:56; Mark 14:43-15:41; Luke 22:47-23:49; John 18:1-19:37
22. Matthew 28:1-10; Mark 16:1-8; Luke 24:1-12; John 20:1-10
23. Matthew 28:16-20; Luke 24:36-49; John 20:19-23
24. Luke 24:50-52
25. Philippians 4:7 (NRSV)
26. John 3:16 (NRSV)
27. 1 Corinthians 15:20-23 (NRSV)
    

The image featured in this blog post was taken from Scenes from the Life of St. Paul and Their Religious Lessons by J.S. Howton.  No known copyright restrictions exist.