Acts 16:25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them.
Paul spent 25% of his missionary journey in prisons. Paul and Silas were stripped, severely flogged and thrown into the “underground prison” for delivering a girl with a spirit of divination (fortune telling). The conditions in the prison were miserable. Ancient Roman imprisonment was a bloody ordeal; they were stripped naked, flogged and humiliated. The prison quarters were cramped, with poor sanitation and living conditions. The flogged prisoners were left mutilated and bleeding in their stinking stench until their hearing. Furthermore, the feet of Paul and Silas were fastened to the stocks. In those unimaginable miserable conditions Paul and Silas were making melody in their hearts and music in their lips.
Singing is not the result of external comforts but internal conditions. Imprisonment, insult or injustice could not get to the heart or head of these apostles. In that pathetic condition, with hungry stomachs yet happy hearts they were able to make music and sing praises to the Lord. When faith on the inside is stronger than the facts on the outside; even suffering will tune itself into a song.
Three tips to turn our prison into praise palazzo:
1. Ignore: Ignore the facts and cruise on faith until our faith becomes facts. “Faith is acting like it is so, when it is not so, so that it might be so, simply because God said so” – Tony Evans. Paul and Silas ignored the physical pain to move into the spiritual plane. Paul was a highly educated, politically influential and wealthy man who had two citizenships. He was a Jew by birth and he also had Roman citizenship which was granted only to the elite. Yet, he ignore the social stigma, physical and mental torture and started praising God. The song swung open the door of the prison.
2. Incite: The conditions of the ancient Roman prison was indescribably poor that many prisoners begged for early execution or even committed suicide. The conditions were to incite emotional trauma together with physical suffering however, the wretched conditions only provoked praise and not pain to the faithful apostles. The best way to repay the devil for the disgrace, damage and dread he inflicts is to praise in the dungeon. Anger doesn’t change the situation, it only damages our peace. So, sing your way out of the prison of disappointment, deprival and suffering.
3. Induce: The other prisoners in the underground prison were listening in awe at the songs, hymns and praises of the two new entrants. The singing induced a sweet perfume of the goodness, kindness and faithfulness of Jesus in the stinking stench of blood and sewage. Rather than complaining, mourning and groaning the beaten, bruised and baffled disciples exhibited gratitude, praise and singing. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose (Acts 16:26). The singing broke the spiritual, emotional and physical chains supernaturally in the natural as well as in the spiritual realm.
Patience is a bitter plant that produces sweet fruits when watered with praise. Praise is the only key that will open the prison door of addiction, compulsion or emotion. Taking our eyes off the reality will open our vision into the sovereignty, supremacy and splendour of our Lord God Almighty.
1 Peter 3:17 For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God’s will, than for doing evil.
Prayer: Heavenly Father, help me to take my eyes of the facts and figures and focus on your faithfulness. As I praise, the emotional, social and psychological prison doors that are keeping me captive will fling open. Amen
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