Acts 16:16-34 is the First Reading for the 7th Sunday of Easter in the Year of Luke. It is a story about freedom aptly positioned near the celebration of Memorial Day in the U.S. A number of people are freed: a slave girl, the apostles, and, through faith and baptism, the jailer. It will be the preacher's task to preach this freedom to all who listen.
(The following questions are fashioned to help the exegete understand the function of the Word in the text, a fundamental concern of Law and Gospel preachers. These questions are not meant to be exhaustive, but are best used in conjunction with other fine sets of exegetical questions. For more on this method and on Law and Gospel preaching in general, see my brief guide, Afflicting the Comfortable, Comforting the Afflicted, available from wipfandstock.com or amazon.)
1. How does the Word function in the text? The Word announces freedom throughout the story. In verse 18, the spirit of divination is ordered to come out of the girl, and does. In verse 26 we have God, through natural causes, freeing the apostles from their chains, and in verse 31 Paul announces to the jailer what he must do to be freed from sin and judgment. These are all Gospel functions. The Word also lifts up the attitudes and practices of the owners of the slave girl. Their vile comments before the magistrates and the punishments that follow for the apostles are all evidence of the world's need for a Savior. This is the Word functioning as Law.
2. With whom are you identifying in the text? It is always advisable to identify with those to whom the Word is addressed, so in this case we identify primarily with those who are freed. We can choose if that is the slave girl, the apostles, or the jailer, or perhaps all three.
3. What, if any, call to obedience is there in this text? The call to obedience is the Word functioning to invite us to live in response to God's work. There is nothing explicit here, but we might note the example of the jailer who, after hearing God's word, binds up the wounds of the apostles and sets before them food and hospitality. Faith produces gratitude and generosity.
4. What Law/Gospel couplet is suggested by this text? Using the terms in the text we can imagine several couplets: bound/freed; slaves/free; condemned/forgiven.
5. Exegetical work: In one of the ironies of this text on freedom, the apostles are named by the slave girl as "slaves of the Most High God who proclaim to you a way of salvation." As it turns out being slaves of the Most High is another definition of being free. We see this in the reaction the apostles have to the earthquake which breaks their chains. Even though they have been unjustly accused, spoken of in vile terms, beaten brutally, and cast into a jail cell, it is they who are singing hymns and making prayers to God in the night. It is they who, though free to do so, refuse to slay their jailer in his sleep, or even run away when the opportunity presents itself. The ones who purport to be free - the slave owners, the magistrates, and the jailer - are the ones in bondage to greed, power, and fear, in that order. As William Willimon states so well in his commentary, "At Philippi it was demonstrated that there is freedom and then there is freedom." (Interpretation series, Acts, p. 141).
6. How does the Crossings Community model work with this text? In his recent analysis, Jonas Ellison, allegorizes the jailer as one who is in bondage to the Law. His predicament is the futility of salvation through the Law. What Christ offers, according Ellison's analysis, is "unfettered freedom." Go to crossings.org/text-study for the entire analysis.
Blessings on your proclamation!
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