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[0:00] I'd like us to look for a little while this evening just at the transformation, not simply in the Philippian jailer himself, which I realize has been a very popular subject for preachers down through the ages, but I want us to look at the transformation of what we might call his work life.

[0:21] Prior to his conversion that night, when Paul and Silas are in the prison, he himself receives his charge from the magistrates to keep them safe.

[0:34] When they had laid many stripes upon him, they cast him into prison, charging the jailer to keep them safely, who, having received such a charge, thrust them into the inner prison. That would be sort of the kind of dungeon within the prison cell, inside almost no windows probably on it, and a much more inner cell within all the others, the inner prison, and made their feet fast in the stocks.

[0:59] And then later on we find, after he has experienced the earthquake and then said, what must I do to be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. How he then deals with Paul and Silas, think, oh well he's being kind to them then, he's being nice, because now he's a believer, now he's being a Christian, yes.

[1:18] But what I'd like us to notice is that in this kindness, and in this mercy that he's showing to Paul and Silas, he is not at any time failing to, or ceasing to, discharge his duty as a jailer.

[1:33] But the commission laid upon him by the magistrates is that he is to keep those men safely, keep them safely, put them into the inner prison. That was his choice, his desire to keep them safe and make sure he's seen, to keep the magistrate's word.

[1:50] When he brings them into his own house and washes their stripes and feeds them and so on, they are no less safe. They're not escaping, they're not running off anywhere, he's not letting them out of his sight.

[2:01] He is looking after them just as carefully and safely as ever he did before, in fact more so. But it is transformed. His working life and his attitude to prisoners, and to these prisoners in particular, is transformed.

[2:18] The diligence and the mercy with which he fulfills his commission is transformed by the power of what has now entered his life. He doesn't then say, oh well that's it, I'm never going to be a jailer anymore because this is an unworthy occupation.

[2:34] We don't read that he says that. We don't read that he turns to what he was doing and says, no this is a pagan occupation, now I'm going to go and do something else. As far as we know he continues as a jailer.

[2:45] As far as we know he continues in this low level of the civil service of Philippi. He becomes undoubtedly part of the newly planted church there, but he continues in the task, duty and job that he was in.

[2:59] But now his working life is transformed by the power of what has entered his life. The power of God's spirit, the power of the good news of Jesus Christ, the one in whom he has believed, has changed everything.

[3:16] It hasn't changed the outward fact of his employment. It hasn't changed the home in which he lives or the responsibility that he has for the prisoners committed to his charge. That it has completely changed the way that he does his job and his attitude to those under his care.

[3:33] If we can backpedal just for a wee minute and go back to what we didn't read in Acts 16 verse 12. Where we read, they came to Philippi which is the chief city of that part of Macedonia and a colony.

[3:48] And we were in that city abiding certain days. Now a colony in Roman terms meant a city which had been perhaps from scratch or perhaps had been emptied of most of its population.

[3:58] But the basis of that city had been settled with former soldiers. This is how the Romans set up their colony cities.

[4:09] They would give them certain privileges. They would make them a little piece of Rome in terms of its laws and its practices and its civic privileges and so on.

[4:22] And the administration of its town and all that it did, it would make it a little carbon copy of Rome. But in settling it with former soldiers, probably the term was, I'm guessing here, but probably you would serve 20 years perhaps in the army, maybe as a construct, maybe as a volunteer.

[4:41] If you survive all the battles and the campaigns, whatever, let's say 20 years. Let's say you joined the army at, say, 18 or 19, maybe 20, and you served 20 years. You're 39, 40.

[4:53] You're not an old man. You know, you've got all your back, your pay, you've got your pension, you'll get given a certain amount of land or a job to do or whatever, settled in this colony along with a whole lot of other former legionaries and NCOs and centurions.

[5:08] And the officers, the officer class would almost certainly become like the senators or the magistrates and so on. And the lower soldiers would be given occupations or money to start up a business or land to farm or whatever.

[5:23] So that the core, the backbone of that city is loyal Roman citizens who have sworn allegiance to the emperor, who are used to discipline and hard work and who are the core of that city.

[5:39] They are the loyal, faithful, law-abiding Roman core of that city. There would be other people who would come to the city, Greeks and Jews and others and so on, but this would be the heart of the city.

[5:53] So this jailer is almost certainly a former legionary, an experienced soldier. Which means that in an area like Philippi, which would be used to experiencing earthquakes from time to time, it is not the case. It cannot be said to be the case.

[6:13] He was terrified by the earthquake. And so he thought, oh, what must I do to be saved? The earthquake is somehow tied in with these men and all I want to do is to save my life. Now, it cannot be his own neck that he's concerned about.

[6:27] Not simply because, as an experienced soldier, he would have been a brave man who'd seen many battles, but also, how can he be concerned about his own neck when he's just about to draw his sword and kill himself?

[6:39] He's about to end his own life. So how is he suddenly falling on his knees saying, how can I save my life? It's only Paul's intervention that has prevented him from taking his own life.

[6:51] But something else has happened here. In a city which is not unused to the earthquake variety that goes on in that sort of area, he wouldn't think, oh, no, an earthquake never had one of those.

[7:05] He would think, oh, right, okay, that's an earthquake. We get them from time to time or tremors or whatever it may be. On this occasion, because of the loosening of the walls, because of the shaking and the tremor, the hinges on the doors become weaker.

[7:18] The doors come off. The shackles which would tie the prisoners, which would probably be a bolt, would go through. The wooden stocks that would tie the prisoners to the walls, including Paul and Silas, because the walls are loosened, the bolts would come out.

[7:35] And so this is one reason why, no doubt we read, that the doors were open, everyone's bands were loosed. Because if the walls are loosened, the doors will be loosened, the frames will be loosened, the things that are fastening the prisoners to the walls will likewise break apart, and they might all potentially get out.

[7:52] And of course, the requirement was for a jailer or a guard or whatever, is that if you let any prisoner escape, then what is going to happen to you is what was going to happen to them.

[8:03] So if they were on the equivalent of death row, and they were due to be executed, you'd be executed. If they were about to be sent off to the galleys, you'd get sent off to the galleys. If they were there prior to paying a fine, you'd pay the fine.

[8:16] Whatever they were going to do, and they escape, it's on your head. It's your responsibility. So this is one reason why, seeing that they're about to escape, well, as far as he thinks, they're about to escape, because the doors are open and their bombs have all been loosed, he draws his sword, ready to kill himself.

[8:34] So it can't be the case, as we've said, that as some commentators would say, oh, well, he was just concerned for his life. When he says, what must I do to be saved, he means I don't want to die. Because he was just about to kill himself anyway.

[8:46] He was just about to end his own life. So we can rule that one out. Now, Philippi, we can't say it'd be a small place, it'd be a major city, but in such a city, public floggings would not be so commonplace that it wouldn't be something of a spectacle when they happen.

[9:16] Now, remember that Paul and Silas have been in Philippi certain days, verse 12. And after they've been with Lydia, they've met her, and begun to worship in her house, and so on, we take up where we began at verse 16.

[9:33] Came to pass, as we went to prayer, to the riverside, where prayer was wont to be made, a certain damsel, possessed with a spirit of divination, met us, which brought our masters much gain, but soothsaying.

[9:43] The same followed Paul and us, and cried, saying, These men are the servants of the Most High God, which show unto us the way of salvation. And this did she many days.

[9:56] Now, assuming that she was also doing the divining, and the soothsaying for her masters, and the spirit that was in her, enabling her to sort of see the future, or tell things, or prognosticate for ordinary people who would then pay her masters, every time she saw Paul and Silas and the others, she would shout out, These men are servants of the Most High God.

[10:17] Not of Jupiter, or Caesar, or the other gods that people would worship in a Roman colony, but the Most High God, which show unto us the way of salvation.

[10:28] Salvation means the act of being saved. You know, the name of Jesus, of course, means saviour, or more correctly, it's the Greek form of Joshua, which means Jehovah is salvation.

[10:40] Salvation is the act of saving. Or, if we experience salvation, it is the act of being saved. So, in other words, these men show unto you the way to be saved.

[10:53] Now, it is inconceivable that as this happens from day to day, this she did many days, verse 18, that this would have spread around in the town a bit.

[11:06] This would be, people would become aware that these men who would come and who were with Lydia, the seller of purple, and were spending time there, were beginning to teach and preach, and they're showing us the way of salvation, says this demon within the young girl.

[11:21] So, Paul eventually turned around and says, you know, come out of her. In the name of Jesus Christ, they commanded you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her, and he came out the same hour. And when her masters saw that the hope of their gains was gone, not a case of, oh, she's been healed, wonderful, fantastic.

[11:40] No, as long as this girl is inhabited by an evil spirit, they can make money off her. They're not concerned with what misery she might be going through, or what it's like to be demon-possessed in this way.

[11:52] They're not bothered about that. She's a slave girl. They want to make money out of her. When her masters saw that the hope of their gains was gone, they caught Paul and Silas and drew them, we might say dragged them, into the marketplace, under the rulers, brought them to the magistrates, who would be Roman citizens, and, you know, probably former Roman officers, saying, these men, being Jews, do exceedingly trouble our city.

[12:18] Now, it is quite possible that in teaching and preaching about Jesus Christ and the one true God, the only people that such Romans or Greeks would know who worshipped only one God would be Jews.

[12:31] There were Jews everywhere throughout the Roman Empire, and they would be unique amongst the people groups throughout the Roman Empire, whereas everybody else had their own pantheon of gods, a whole kind of shelf full of gods, so much so that they are all pretty much the same gods, but they gave them different names.

[12:51] You know, the Greeks had pretty much all the same gods as the Romans did, but they gave them slightly different names. I'm just trying to think of examples offhand, but I can't think of the different Greek and Roman sort of examples.

[13:04] The most obvious one is that the sort of leader of all the gods, the Greeks, called Zeus, and the Romans called Jupiter. Anything with the planets, you know, like Venus or Neptune or Saturn, these were Roman gods, and the Greeks would have their equivalent ones who were basically exactly the same gods, but they gave them different names.

[13:25] So, likewise, a lot of the Egyptian gods were very similar, but they gave them different names. So everybody had lots of gods. The only people who had one god alone were the Jews.

[13:37] And in all fairness, as Christianity spread, it would seem to many of these worshippers of many gods that this was just an offshoot of the Jewish religion because they still worship the one god.

[13:47] They worship the god of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the same god as the god of Israel. So they must be sort of Jewish in some way. And, of course, Paul and Silas are actually Jewish. They happen to be Roman citizens as well, but that is something that is kept until later.

[14:04] They brought them to their magistrates, saying, these men, being Jews, do exceedingly trouble our city and teach customs which are not lawful for us to receive, neither to observe, being Romans. Now, you see, they don't say anything about, look, we've lost our game because they've cast a demon out of our slave girl.

[14:21] Some people might think, oh, that's a good thing to do. You know, we all want to get rid of demons no matter what gods we worship. Nobody likes being demon-possessed, but that wouldn't play so well. That wouldn't whip up the mob.

[14:32] The latent curse of anti-Semitism was as ever prevalent there in the ancient world as, sadly, it is nowadays. And it doesn't take much to whip it up in any sort of nationalist kind of society.

[14:46] And here we have Roman nationalism being appealed to. Now, we are Romans, and these men, being Jews, are teaching us customs which are not lawful for us to receive, neither to observe being Romans.

[15:00] They're whipping up racial hatred, really, is what they're doing. And the multitude rose up together against them. Now, once you've got a mob demanding something, the magistrates either have to do the equivalent of sending in soldiers to quell the mob because there's no police force in those days, or they have to give the mob what they want.

[15:22] And so, basically, they decide to go with the flow and give the mob what they want. They rent off their clothes so they're publicly naked at the time when they are publicly whipped.

[15:33] That's what Paul's referring to. They are beating us openly. Now, in the open marketplace, it's a public flogging, uncondemned. They haven't had any trial. They haven't had any, you know, counsel for the defence.

[15:45] They haven't had any real prosecution. They've just gone straight ahead and flogged them publicly, openly, and uncondemned. And for all the crowd to jeer at and to humiliate them, you know, as Paul says elsewhere, says, after we were shamefully entreated, as you know, at Philippi.

[16:03] And the shame and the indignity of what they are exposed to here is part of what Paul then is able to use against the magistrates afterwards.

[16:15] Now, you and I might think this would be the time to say, hang on a minute, we're also Roman citizens. Don't quip us. Don't, you know, condemn us because we're entitled to a trial just like anybody else.

[16:27] And that would certainly have prevented what took place. But they let it go ahead. They submit to this humiliation, to this pain, to this public flogging, and being thrown into prison.

[16:42] Almost as if they are letting it happen, knowing that the magistrates and the Roman authorities are just digging themselves in deeper and deeper and deeper.

[16:53] and by their willingness to take this pain and blood and public humiliation, they are probably securing for the church in Philippi subsequent protection.

[17:08] Because if the magistrates have thus abused, as it now seems at their own risk later on, it seems at their own risk, those who are Roman citizens, they are going to think twice before they mess with the church, which has now been established in Philippi.

[17:25] So Paul and Silas are allowing themselves to undergo this public humiliation. When the magistrates tore up rent of their clothes, commanded to beat them when they had laid many stripes upon them, they cast them into prison, charging the jailer to keep them safely.

[17:44] Now, it is likely that all of this may be just because this is their knee-jerk reaction, it is more likely it is to satisfy the mob, because we got there verse 22, the multitude rose up together against them, and then the magistrates did this.

[18:04] So they are able to say, look, we have not only worked them, we are putting them into prison, keep them safely, make sure they don't escape. The jailer, former legionary, almost certainly private soldier, loyal, faithful, servant of Rome, gets this responsibility, what is the okay, what's the safest place we're going to put them, into the inner prison, so that solitary confinement almost sell, although there's the two of them in there, the inner cell that almost certainly as we said, no windows, sell within cells, a prison within a prison, from which there is no escape, and made their feet fast in the stocks.

[18:40] So they are effectively, you know, they are bound, they're in a windowless dungeon, and their backs would still be raw and bleeding from the whipping, and what do we find, at midnight at the darkest hour, in this windowless dungeon, Paul and Silas prayed and sang praises unto God, and the prisoners heard them.

[19:05] Part of the evangelising effect of the gospel is that those who follow it, if God's spirit is react to circumstances in a completely opposite way from what the world would expect.

[19:25] This is what Jesus did, you know, before Pontius Pilate didn't say a word, in his defence, Pilate marvelled that he didn't plead for his own life. There's what people expect everyone to do, and then there's what Christians do.

[19:38] And this shock fact of, you know, reacting completely the opposite to what anybody is going to expect. This has its own effect. The prisoners heard them.

[19:50] Now, whether at midnight they're chuffed to bits for the fact that people would stop singing and praying out loud or whatever, if they're trying to sleep or whatever, history does not relate. But the witness of it is there.

[20:01] These are the men who have been publicly whipped. They've been thrown into the innermost dungeon. They are considered a threat. They are being, anyone can see, cruelly used. Maybe they deserve it, maybe they don't, as far as the other prisoners are concerned.

[20:14] At least they're not in the inner dungeon. They've got better treatment than Paul and Silas. But here, these guys are busy singing praises to their God and praying publicly and the prisoners heard them.

[20:27] It is in itself a witness, just as Jesus says. You know, if somebody compels you to go a mile with them, in other words, if a Roman soldier grabs you out the crowd and makes you carry his heavy pack for a mile, not only is it going to be out of your way a mile, it's going to be hot, you're going to be tired, it's a burden, and so at the end of the mile, when they put down the pack, that's the law fulfilled, I don't have to do any more, go with him 20.

[20:57] Go a second mile, just out of niceness. And he can't exactly beat you up for it, he can't criticise you, but you might think you're a fool, but you'll think, why are they doing this?

[21:09] Why would I have made him do a mile carrying my pack, or carrying whatever I said, why is he doing the second mile? And even if they think you're a fool, even if they can't understand it, this fact of reacting and responding, the complete opposite to what the world expects, is part of the evangelist witness of the gospel.

[21:33] This is the effect that Jesus Christ has on his followers, it makes them expend themselves for the love of those who love them not.

[21:44] Because that is what Jesus did, and that is what he commands his followers likewise to do. So the jailer is not, you know, he's not brutal to Paul and Silas, it's not him who's done the whipping of them, no doubt he thought the problem, they must deserve it, and that's what the magistrates had done, he's just a loyal civil servant, he gets his charge, he puts them in the cell, puts them in the stocks just like he's been told to do, and he does his duty, and that's all he does.

[22:12] But he himself of course goes either to his post or goes to his own house and he goes to sleep naturally because it's midnight, that's one reason why verse 27 we read the keeper of the prisoner, awaking out of his sleep and seeing the prison doors open he drew out his sword and would have killed himself.

[22:30] he's doing his duty, he's doing his job but there's not much joy in it, in fact there's fear in it, because if anybody escapes it's his head.

[22:41] He sees the doors open, he sees that bonds are loosed and prisoners are free and he's about to end his own life. So he cannot be afraid simply for his own life.

[22:53] And Paul cried with a loud voice saying, do thyself no harm for we are all here. Which means that whenever the jailer was, he must have been at least within sight or hearing of Paul once the doors are thrown open.

[23:12] There must have been some kind of light or some indication somewhere that the jailer was nearby and he's about to end himself. He cried with a loud voice saying, do thyself no harm for we are all here.

[23:25] Now that's a pretty confident statement to make, isn't it? Because if the other prisoners' bonds are loosed, maybe they'll be going for it, even if Paul and Silas don't. But whatever keeps them there, when their bonds are loose, maybe they're just as terrified as the jailer is.

[23:39] But Paul declares confident, we're all still here, all your charges are still saved, do thyself no harm. Then he called for a light and sprang in, he comes in quickly, bounding in, and came trembling and fell down before Paul.

[23:56] Paul and Silas and brought them out and said, sirs, what must I do to be saved? Now this verse 30 directly corresponds to verse 17, where the slave girl, demon possessed, these men are servants of the most I got, show unto us the way of salvation, how to be saved.

[24:17] Anybody in a town or a city will constantly be gossiping, and you use anything fresh to be, oh yeah, there's these guys going about the town and this slave girl keeps saying, oh they'll show you the way to be saved, servants of the most high God.

[24:29] He would have known that these servants of the most high God, these men who came with a message of how to be saved, are the very ones whom the magistrates have publicly whipped and humiliated, and who now he has to keep in the prison and make sure they do not escape.

[24:46] This is their message. And when their message comes, people respond. Demons are cast out. And people who depended for their livelihood on the harnessing of demon possession are naturally angry.

[25:01] Although the mob is stirred up, yes, with its anti-Semitic hatred and so on, everybody would know under the surface what was the real reason why they had been whipped and why they didn't put in the prison because people talk.

[25:16] People talk to each other. Maybe everybody thought they deserved it, maybe they didn't, but the point is that he would almost certainly have heard about their presence in the city.

[25:26] He would have heard about their message. He is not a man given to flights of fancy or of fear, either for his life or for his soul naturally. He probably worshipped all the gods of the Romans.

[25:39] He probably burned incense to Caesar. And yet something that night with such an earthquake and such men praying to their God, praising their God in the midst of all that they are suffering.

[25:52] Then there's the earthquake. Then all the doors fly open. He is with an ace of taking his own life and something stops him. And when his life is spared in the midst of all that he witnesses, a greater fear than that of death or that of civil punishment fills his soul.

[26:15] And he came trembling and fell down before Paul and Silas. These men, the servants of the Most High God, would show unto us the way of salvation, the means of how to be saved.

[26:28] Verse 17. Sirs, what must I do to be saved? You're showing people the way of salvation. What must I do to be saved?

[26:42] You know, remember how when soldiers and tax collectors came to John the Baptist and said, what shall we do? Whether he might say, well, give up your profession. Stop being tax collectors.

[26:54] Stop being soldiers. No, he taught them how to do their job faithfully, how to do their job properly, how to do it honorably.

[27:05] When the fear of the Lord and the love of his truth fills men and women, he makes of them better citizens, more faithful employees, more diligent in their tasks and duties and all they do, but not just more diligent in the doing of it.

[27:22] You know, there was nothing undiligent about him keeping them in the inner prison, giving them the charge that he'd been given. He was being diligent. He was being faithful. He wasn't being particularly kind or particularly merciful, but that wasn't his job.

[27:36] But what is he doing now? And he says, what must I do to be saved? They could easily have said, well, first of all, you have to let us go. Whoever else you don't like, you've got to let us go.

[27:49] You know, because we're the servants of the Most High God. Let us go and God will smile on you, brother. They could have done that. They could have said that. But they don't. They just say, no, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and I shall be saved.

[28:02] And thy house. They're not concerned for their own safety. They're not concerned just now with the indignities that have been deep for men. They're only concerned with the need of this soul.

[28:14] This soul who comes trembling, wanting to know the way to be saved. Because the Lord has put the fear of God into his soul.

[28:26] Not the earth point itself. Not all that he's seen and heard or experienced, but the Lord has used all these little pieces of the jigsaw to come together to present to his mind, to his soul, his spirit, this picture of salvation on the one hand and the fearful alternative on the other.

[28:46] Perhaps with all the gods to whom he has paid look service, he has never in his life experienced the power of God as he did that night.

[28:57] So, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and I shall be saved in thy house.

[29:10] Of course, never having known the Lord Jesus Christ, he can't say, okay, that's me, I'll do it, pick the box. They spake unto him the word of the Lord and to all that were in his house.

[29:21] Because he wants his family to be saved too. Whatever has gripped him, he wants them to get the benefit of it too. And when he receives the word of God, what does he do? He took them the same hour of the night and washed their sweats.

[29:35] He can't bandage them up. He doesn't have bandages. He doesn't have medicine. He doesn't have ointments. But he takes them to where the water is. He soothingly washes away the blood, the stickiness and any potential infection that might be there.

[29:50] Maybe he gives them clean clothes to put on. We don't know. But he washed their stripes, washed their wounds. The soothing, the cooling, the mercy of that alone would be worth quite a lot to them.

[30:03] And he was baptized. He and all his straightway. First of all, he washes away their wounds. Then he has his sins outwardly washed away with baptism.

[30:15] We see the mercy, the servant heart now with which he acts. This is, if we can say it, the meekness that now fills the heart of a man who would have been a tough, hard-bitten ex-soldier.

[30:33] They wouldn't make wooses the jailer of a colony city. This would be a hard-bitten ex-legionary who would know that what being tough was.

[30:46] And he is turned into this meek, humble servant who washes the wounds of prisoners and is baptized. He and all his straightway.

[30:56] And when he had brought them into his house, and his house almost certainly would be next to the prison or connected directly with the prison, he set meek before them. This is in the middle of the night, remember. And rejoiced, believing in God with all his house.

[31:11] This is the effect the gospel conversion has on the heart. It fills the heart with joy. There was no hint of joy for all the diligence with which he did his job before.

[31:21] He was diligent. He was obedient. He was a faithful civil servant, this ex-soldier. But there wasn't joy in what he did. But now his work life is transformed.

[31:35] His treatment of prisoners. His faithfulness is just as diligent as it was before. But that faithfulness is tempered now with mercy and with a servant heart.

[31:48] Which is not, you know, easy-ozy and just sort of, oh, let all the prisoners go, wouldn't that be nice? No, he's doing his job. He's being faithful in his job. He's being more faithful in his job now.

[31:59] Because before he was asleep on the job. Now he's not letting the prisoners out of his sight. He is yet filled with joy. Believing in God with all his house.

[32:10] And when it was day, the magistrates sent the sergeant saying, let those men go. You know, well, they just thought, what else can we do with them now? Well, the mobs died down a bit. Let those men go. And the keeper of the prison told this, saying to Paul, the magistrates have sent to let you go.

[32:24] Now, therefore, depart and go in peace. Sure, it filled his heart with joy even more. He'll say, now you can go. Great, good news. But Paul said unto them, that is to the sergeants, they, the magistrates, have beaten us openly.

[32:38] They have publicly whipped us in the sight of all the jeering mob, uncondemned, no trial, no defense, no conviction, being Romans.

[32:50] We, Roman citizens, just like the magistrates, have you any idea where we could take this, how we could deal with this, where we could go with this, and cast us into prison?

[33:03] And now, do they thrust us out privily? You see the contrast here in verse 37? They have beaten us openly, publicly, uncondemned. Now they want to make us go away privately, so that even if they now know it was a mistake, they just want it done quietly inside.

[33:18] They say, no, no, no, no. It's like somebody, you know, who's publicly libeled by a newspaper in a big, big headline, and then the apology when it comes to like page 17 down in the bottom.

[33:30] No. If they're going to have done the crime publicly, then let them come themselves publicly and invite us out. But let them come themselves and fetch us out.

[33:42] And the sergeants told these words to the magistrates, and they feared when they heard that they were Romans. And they came and besought them and brought them out and desired them to depart out of the city.

[33:55] And they went out of the prison and didn't just leave the city there and then because that way they looked like they were chased away. So they just take their time, their measure. And when they had seen, entered into the house of Lydia, when they'd seen the brethren, they comforted them and departed.

[34:10] You see, we could see, and some commentators have pointed out, that you've got some of the different strands of society here. You've got Lydia, the seller of purple, who's rich, you might have said, in the upper class of society in Philippi.

[34:22] You've got the slave girl, who'd be right at the bottom, who if the demon is cast out of her and she's no longer any use to her masters, maybe for all we know, she too became a believer and followed the Lord.

[34:33] We don't know that for sure, but it's possible. And the jailer here would be this sort of staunch, yeoman, middle class, civil service level. In the middle classes don't really matter nowadays so much in society.

[34:45] But we've got the different levels of society there, all being drawn in, in different ways. But the work life of this man is transformed, just as the work life of each and every one of us is transformed.

[35:04] Whether your work is peeling potatoes or scrubbing steps or whatever it may be, however menial, however servant it may seem to be, it is transformed when it is done as for Christ.

[35:18] Our faithfulness, our diligence, our obedience, our mercy, our kindness in what we do is transformed because we're doing it now, not as unto an earthly master or for an earthly market, we're doing it as unto Christ.

[35:32] And that changes everything. See how the jailer is before. See how the jailer is afterwards. He's still a jailer. He's still a Roman.

[35:44] He still has all the experience that he's had in the past. But now, not only is he transformed, but because he is transformed, his home is transformed.

[35:55] His life is transformed. His work is transformed. The way he does it. The way in which he fulfills his tasks, his duties, his employment.

[36:07] Because this is the effect of the gospel. It is not just as a cynic might say, pie in the sky when you die. It is something which is for the here and now as well. Something which begins to affect people's lives in the real world.

[36:22] And it changes real lives, here and now. It changes home life. It changes relationships. It changes the joy in one's heart.

[36:33] And it changes your life in the workplace. Life, work is transformed by the presence of the living God in the heart.

[36:44] This is part and parcel of the good news of the gospel. It's not just what must I do to be saved at last. But when we have what we need to be saved, it begins to save and change and transform us right now in all that we do, in every task, in every duty, in every employment.

[37:06] It may be the same work we do, but it is yet completely different. because we are completely different. Because it's not that we have become a different person.

[37:19] It is that finally in Christ, we have become the person we were always meant to be. let's pray. Let's pray. Let's pray.

[37:31]  Let's pray. Let's pray.