Acts 16:16-34

As I read this passage, I considered a story I heard about Saint Thomas Aquinas. While walking with a friend in the midst of the splendors of Rome the friend said, “We Christians certainly can no longer say silver and gold have we none.” Saint Thomas responded by saying, “But neither can we say to the lame man, in the name of Jesus Christ rise up and walk.”

On the surface these two events in Paul’s ministry seem problematic for the modern church. These dramatic stories—a slave girl with unique gifts, two advocates of the gospel and a jailer all released from their different forms of imprisonment—are a challenge. Where do we see such power emerging in and through the church? Like Saint Thomas, we may be painfully aware of the lack of life-transforming power in the modern church and its witness.

That may be precisely the reason Luke shares these events with us. Luke calls us to attentiveness to God’s saving power. Perhaps Luke is inviting us to move beyond surface diagnosis of the church’s limitations to a deeper reflection on God’s activity that we can identify and recognize and in which we can participate.

Luke invites us to gratitude for our own salvation and freedom. Most disciples have a story of “being saved.” While we may not have been in a physical prison, we do have our chains. At some point we were lost but were found. In some way, God’s grace penetrated our solitary confinement and we were set free. Disciples are persons who, in the presence of hurt, guilt, and powerlessness, discover the love of a Savior present at the point of needing to be saved.

We are invited to be in touch with this portion of our personal faith history. Our stories can then resonate with the important themes of this story. Luke is firmly convinced that God’s love seeks people out no matter who they are, no matter what their positions in society, no matter the circumstances in which they find themselves. The need for a Savior is a great equalizer. If we can be saved, then so can anyone else. If we can renew our gratitude for God’s work in us, then we can be in touch, once again, with the power described in this story.

We can also be more attentive to the community of faith and the stories of God’s healing and releasing, which we have in common with our brothers and sisters. Luke invites us to move to a deeper level of sharing within the church.

Where have you seen God at work? Where have you experienced God’s freedom lately? These questions move us away from conversations about the accuracy of our theological opinions, our pessimistic worries about the state of our lives, or diagnosis of the state of other persons’ lives. Freed from idle chatter, from prejudices, and unquestioned assumptions, we can be open to experiences of redemption and freedom.

One other important component of this story is the presence of those who are not free. A slave girl and a jailer are prisoners in different cells in the same fortress of fear, oppression, and hopelessness. Paul and Silas, first on the way to a prayer meeting and then singing hymns while chained to a wall, find their lives and experiences intersecting with these two for whom Christ died and rose again. In their freedom they offer the key to unlock the chains of bondage.

It happens to those who pray and worship. God provides people with whom our experiences will intersect in helpful and healing ways. Luke is not describing an event that lives only as the memory of the church. The event of God’s deliverance happens over and over again for the church and through the church. Luke is saying, “Wake up, church! This could happen to you!”