God’s Word for You
Acts 16:25-29 Don’t try suicide
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Thursday, October 1, 2020
25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and sang hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.
Beaten and bloody, and only perhaps bound with bandages, the Christians in the prison began to pray. Luke doesn’t record their prayer, but there are many Psalm verses that would have been appropriate: “My flesh trembles in fear of you… do not leave me to my oppressors. Ensure your servant’s well-being. My eyes fail, looking for your salvation” (Psalm 119:120,121-122). And again: “Arise, O Lord! Deliver me, O my God! Strike all my enemies on the jaw; break the teeth of the wicked” (Psalm 3:7). And again: “I take refuge in you, save and deliver me from all who pursue me, or they will tear me like a lion and rip me to pieces with no one to rescue me” (Psalm 7:1-2). On and on, the Psalms lend themselves to such prayers, and as the words of the hymns that the men sang.
Singing lifts the spirit. Singing grabs everyone who can hear and carries them along with the words and the emotional value of the tune. When Paul McCartney woke up one morning in 1965 with the tune for “Yesterday” in his head, he knew right away that it was special. The other Beatles began calling him Beethoven. He was careful not to just throw any old words onto it, and for a long time he just called it “Scrambled Eggs” to match the rhythm of the first notes. It’s been called the most important song in modern music, because the melody, harmony, words, arrangement and performance are so exquisite. It’s difficult not to really listen to it without coming to tears. A great many of our Lutheran hymns do the same thing (it’s no mistake that George Harrison kidded Paul by using a Lutheran composer’s name: Beethoven). One of the greatest of these is “God’s Word is Our Great Heritage.” The tune was written by the organist of the church I serve today, Fritz Reuter. I can see the house he lived in (he died in 1924) from my office window on a fall day like today. The words, written fifty years before, are memorable, but set to Reuter’s tune, they’re unforgettable. How many of your favorite songs come leaping into your mind and onto your lips just by hearing the opening bars of the music? It’s as if a door in the mind is flung open by the music, and words and memories come spilling out and filling us up with joy. That’s what music can do to the heart.
It was a perfect way to while away the hours in prison for Paul and Silas and the others. Best of all, Luke remembers, “the prisoners were listening to them.” Our actions and our words get noticed at all times, by many more people than we think.
26 Suddenly there was an earthquake so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken. Suddenly all the doors fell open, and everyone’s chains fell away.
In 2001, my family and I experienced an earthquake in Washington State. It was the last day of February (Ash Wednesday), a little before 11 in the morning, and the main quake lasted about a minute. The first thing we noticed was the sound: a huge, loud, shaking sound that reminded me of my childhood, the way a train sounded when I would sit under the railroad bridge half a mile from my home. Then the whole house began to shake. Things slips from tables and counters. Bookshelves emptied themselves. Pictures tumbled off the walls. Neighbors lost cupboards full of dishes. Some schools had basketball backboards come crashing down. In our home, the hanging light fixtures kept swinging for half an hour after the quake was done, and there were a couple of aftershock rumbles. During the worst of the shaking, my wife and I each grabbed one of our (then) two sons and just held them. We didn’t really care about anything except protecting our little children in those terrifying moments.
That, the Nisqually Quake, registered 6.8 on the Richter scale, and it was the last or most recent big earthquake in Washington. I imagine that this quake that shook the foundations of the Philippian prison was at least that violent, or worse. Luke remembers that the doors of the cells fell or flew open (as the door jambs twisted and shook), and that their chains fell away. By this he probably means that the chains fell from the walls or the supporting columns where they were secured; the chains might have remained fastened to the wrists and legs of the prisoners.
27 When the jailer was roused out of his sleep and saw that the prison doors were open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, thinking that the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul shouted out, “Do not harm yourself, we are all here!” 29 Then the jailer called for lights and rushed in. Trembling with fear he fell down before Paul and Silas.
The Roman way was that if a jailer lost a prisoner, he suffered the prisoner’s fate. Usually that meant a shameful death by the sword after torture. We see three different conclusions in the Bible. The guards at the tomb of Jesus were bribed to lie about what happened (Matthew 28:15). The jailer here at Philippi decided to take his own life. And we also see guards during a shipwreck who chose to kill their prisoners rather than let them escape (Acts 27:42, although Paul persuades them not to). Death as a quick way out of a mistake was the Roman way of thinking. God’s will is that we confess our errors and our mistakes; that we keep from falling into suicidal despair, which was King Saul’s failing (1 Samuel 31:4; 1 Chronicles 10:4). Suicide is a victory for the devil, but we can’t say that every suicide means damnation. Some who lose themselves in despair are caught up in a frame of mind that has them confused, frightened, not thinking straight at all. They can better be said to have died of depression or despair rather than by their own hand. The devil despises Christians, and when he can kill one of us (Mark 9:22), or so coax and confuse one of God’s children to end their life through an act of desperation, it is a shame and a tragedy, but we must lay the judgment of their eternal soul at the feet of the Lord Jesus and not to our own opinions. Theirs is a case where it is good and right for us to plead with God on behalf of their soul, bearing witness to their good confession of faith before the disease of depression did its terrible, cancerous work. Then, like David, we can get up and return to our life of worship, leaving to God’s hands what only God can judge or do (2 Samuel 12:20).
The jailer in Philippi was spared from his suicide by Paul’s cry. We see him falling down, trembling in fear. In the verses to come we will see what the gospel does to a broken heart like his.
God’s Word is our great heritage
And shall be ours forever;
To spread its light from age to age
Shall be our chief endeavor.
Through life it guides our way,
In death it is our stay.
Lord, grant, while worlds endure,
We keep its teachings pure.
Throughout all generations. (Text: Nikolai Grundtvig)
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Ulm, Minnesota. To receive God’s Word for You via e-mail, please visit the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church website.