Last night many slept when they ought to have wept.
It was so with the rugged jailer of ancient Philippi. His hardened heart felt no pangs as he led his beaten, bloody prisoners into the dungeon. The Apostle Paul and his helper Silas were his newest charges.
Read the story in Acts 16. Verse 24 pictures the keeper adding to the misery of his suffering prisoners by clamping their feet in the stocks. Hymns of praise and prayers soon echo through the prison corridors, but the jailor cares not. He sleeps the sleep of the carless, the spiritually dead.
“Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake,” that rocks the very prison foundation. The doors stand ajar, and even the chains dangle freely on the prisoners’ limbs — the staples being loosed from the walls.
“The jailer woke up,” and he supposes the prisoners are escaped and in terror is about the commit suicide. He is like so many men who live without any vital spiritual life. They are helpless when God brings the earthquake or sounds the warning trumpet to sleeping conscience. Sins in all their ugliness march before the mind’s eye.
To escape, the jailor “would have killed himself.” Some men who would not think of suicide fly to vain pleasures, plunge themselves into business, struggle for popularity, or sink in the mires of intemperance. Anything to stop the troubling voice of God!
“Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!” is the word from the preachers in the prison.
Hear the strange word of the Philippian as he implores Paul and Silas, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” Possibly he has never before uttered such words. What has he ever cared about his sins!
Many there are who have joined the devil’s conspiracy of silence. They never talk of or think of being “saved.” The return of Jesus Christ to judge the world and establish the Kingdom is in the Bible (II Timothy 4:1) but it is not in their thoughts. But suddenly the tide of trouble rolls in and they are caught without God and without hope.
Now, a man trembling on the brink must have a definite answer. Paul’s answer was right to the point: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household,” (verse 31). This is God’s way of salvation for you. If you would come to God and be right with Him, this is how you must come. No matter how weak, distraught, guilty you may be — COME! Note carefully the following:
I. SIMPLICITY OF THE WAY
Do not try a lot of house-cleaning, etc., first. God says you must believe. Sink or swim, you will now be resting your soul’s eternal welfare and destiny upon the Lord Jesus Christ. No longer will you be left standing upon your own reputation, you will believe INTO Him! That is, you call on him to be your Savior, and this One who died and rose again for you will be your Representative before the Great Throne.
Now, someone will say, “But that is too easy.” No, it is not easy. It cost Him His Life! Maybe you have even blasphemed God or utterly neglected Him. Remember how God in mercy saved and changed the blasphemous Saul unto the Apostle Paul. Read I Timothy 1:12-15. It is true that those who go on in sin will be lost, but it is also true that those who believe in the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved and all the past wiped clean, (I Corinthians 6:9-11).
II. SUFFICIENCY OF THE WAY
Those who believe in Christ WILL BE SAVED, according to our text. This is because the Savior bore OUR sins in His body on the cross, (I Peter 2:24). What more needs to be done? How can we doubt!
Look what happened in the jailor’s life. The next verses picture his washing the stripes of the apostles. The prisoners became his guests. (So it always is when one is truly converted. His circle of friends is changed!) The scowl is changed to joy. Unbelief to belief. He is a new husband and father. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” (II Corinthians 5:17).
You who read these words, have you personally believed in Jesus Christ? Open your heart to Him just now in prayer. Seek Him while He may be found.
“Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.”