God’s Word for You
Acts 16:34 Up to the house
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Monday, October 5, 2020
34 The jailer brought them up into his house and set food before them. He rejoiced along with his entire household about believing in God.
When we read that the jailer brought them “up” into his house, we do a little wondering. Was there a cave or a cistern? Was the jail below ground? Was there water down there for the baptism? Would his wife ever have permitted a baptism for the family if he had just washed the prisoners’ blood into it? No, the “up,” which is in the verb “brought up,” is probably just a matter of the courtyard of the jail where there was a jar of rainwater, and this “up” amounts to just heading up the steps into his house.
I mentioned in connection with an earlier passage that I experienced a strong earthquake in 2001. Those commentators who imagine that the jailer took Paul and the others down into an underground cistern or into the basement of the jail have clearly never lived through a severe earthquake. In a disaster so violent that chains were breaking loose from walls (Acts 16:26), I for one would not be brave enough to go underground in the same night unless the lives of my children were at stake. The likelihood of an aftershock, or an even more violent quake, would be too great, and then underground and in the dark is not where you want to be when foundations and old stonework is already loose or compromised. You want to be outdoors, with no large objects overhead. So it’s most probable that he simply took the prisoners out into the courtyard to wash their wounds and baptize them, and then, after this was done, he took them back up into the house for a meal.
One more point about going up the steps to enter the house: In 1 Kings 10:5 and 2 Chronicles 9:4, the queen of Sheba is overwhelmed (breathtaken) by (according to the NIV) “the burnt offerings Solomon made at the temple of the Lord.” Certain offerings were called the ‘olah, but in those Old Testament verses about the queen’s reaction to Solomon’s glory, a couple of burnt offerings wouldn’t have seemed all that breathtaking. As a queen of a pagan country, she would have been used to lavish burnt offerings, maybe even more spectacular than the ones in Solomon’s temple (I could be wrong about this—it could have been the temple architecture and number of sacrifices that impressed her). But she also may have been impressed by a special stairway (an ‘olah, an “ascent”) he had built between his palace and the temple, so that he could go and observe the worship every day, or many times during the day. At any rate, one could have “gone up” as a way of describing going into a house, whether the house of the Lord, or a private house like this one.
The jailer rejoiced about being saved, and his family would have followed in his rejoicing. Once a pagan and a lost sinner, now he was found by God, saved. He had heard the message and he believed. What else is there? He had the promise of eternal life. Rejoice today about your faith, and your place in God’s family. You have heard the message, and you believe it. What else is there? You have the promise of eternal life.
“I rejoiced with those who said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord’” (Psalm 122:1).
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.