Cliff Loesch May 20, 2007 Songs in Prison Acts 16:16-34             Paul and Silas sat inside their prison singing songs into the night.  On the one hand there’s really nothing so strange about that.  They had almost no control over their situation.  Fate had them by the throat, it seemed, so why make a fuss about it?  Just find something to do—and this unpleasant experience will pass eventually.  They were chained up.  They didn’t know anyone else inside that prison—and probably didn’t have a whole lot in common with the others.  There had already probably been plenty of time for talking, and possibly for praying.  So why not sing?  It probably seemed like the logical thing to do at the time.  So they sang.             On the other hand, singing songs in prison at night makes very little sense at all.  What’s the point?  Wouldn’t the time be better spent in other ways?  I’m sure they were in pain, for one thing.  Physical pain.  They had been beaten with rods.  And a commentary that I read long ago on this passage in Acts said that the stocks that were used were a type that spread the prisoners’ legs out to the point that the prisoner felt constant pain.  There was also the emotional strain of it all.  To be in prison in a foreign country must have been stressful.  They were still in the Roman Empire, of course.  But they were far from home.  And they must have wondered how they were going to get out of there.  Presumably, Luke and Timothy were traveling with them—and those two were still on the outside.  Hopefully Luke and Timothy would be able to figure out whom to talk to and be able to argue their case to get them out of jail.  But it really was a predicament they were in.  I do not see how they could possibly have felt like singing.  Maybe having a strategy session would have made more sense.  You know, talk about what they’re going to do tomorrow—see if they can think of anything they can do: maybe talk to the jailer and see if he’ll let them talk to their friends or somebody on the outside to see if they can clear up this mess.  Or maybe just getting some rest is what they needed.  Not that sleep would be easy—but it had been a rough day.  They needed rest.  Staying up singing into the night did not make sense.             Or did it?  Maybe it did make some sense after all.  You can, obviously, debate it both ways.  But there’s something about music.  Music has a way of lifting our spirits.  Music has a way of helping us through the drudgery and the difficulties of life.  Music speaks to us in ways that words never could.  Really, their example is not such a bad one to follow: when hope is gone, sing a song.  If we see nothing else in this passage, perhaps we should see and appreciate the way it builds a case for the value of music in our lives.  Music inspires, lifts, even transforms.  Indeed, singing in prison was possibly one of the wisest choices they could have made that night.  One of the sanest choices.  And it was a choice that they made.             Marshall Rosenberg tells about moving to Detroit in 1943 when he was a boy.  He says, “The second week after we arrived, a race war erupted over an incident at a public park.  More than forty people were killed in the next few days.  Our neighborhood was situated in the center of the violence, and we spent three days locked in the house.  When the race riot ended and school began, I discovered that a name could be as dangerous as any skin color.  When the teacher called my name during attendance, two boys glared at me and hissed, ‘Are you a kike?’”  Rosenberg says, “I had never heard the word before and didn’t know some people used it in a derogatory way to refer to Jews.  After school, the two were waiting for me: they threw me to the ground, kicked and beat me.”  [Non-Violent Communication, 1-2]              We could have a debate about the basic nature of humankind.  Are we primarily good?  Or are we basically evil?  Are we in need of only a little reform?  Or are we in need of a complete transformation?  The answers to these questions are really more complicated than you might expect—although many people offer simple explanations.  But on the one hand you simply cannot deny the reality of evil in our world—and the human capacity for evil.  On the other hand, simple observation also shows you that people are capable of great acts of kindness and compassion.  Even some people you might not expect are capable of acts of mercy and goodness.  Personally, I like the historic Quaker approach to this problem where the reality of evil is clearly seen—and our need for a total transformation by Christ is emphasized.  Yet on the other hand, rather than focusing on the evil nature of people, we try to look deeper and see the good, and call forth the good—we attempt to see that of God in others.  After all, we were created in God’s image.  Something of that image is there.  And Jesus Christ reaches out to us with his transforming grace to bring to us the transformation, the hope, the salvation that we need.  And, like George Fox (the founder of the Quakers) may we hear that voice that says, “There is One—even Christ Jesus—that can speak to thy condition.”             Yet all humans, whoever they are, have the capacity for both: evil or good.  Marshall Rosenberg, reflecting on his personal experiences as a child in Detroit—the race-related riots and killings in his neighborhood where he and his family stayed inside a locked house for three days, and his experience of getting beat up simply because he was Jewish—through these experiences he started asking some questions.  What happens to disconnect people from their compassionate nature?  What leads “us to behave violently and exploitatively?  And conversely [he asks] what allows some people to stay connected to their compassionate nature under even the most trying circumstances?”  [ibid., 1]  And he mentions the different ways that people respond to the evil around them.  For example, he noted that Etty Hillesum somehow retained her compassionate nature even while imprisoned in a Nazi concentration camp.  She wrote in her diary that, even there, she realized she was dealing with human beings, and that she must try as hard as she could to understand everything anyone does.  And she wrote about a Gestapo officer that yelled at her—and she wondered to herself what was going on in his life that had filled him with such anger.  In her compassion she wondered if he had had an unhappy childhood, or if he had recently had a fight with his girlfriend.  [ibid. 2]  You can well imagine that most all the other prisoners were not having kind and compassionate thoughts toward that angry Gestapo officer.  How was Etty able to remain connected to her compassionate nature?              And how were Paul and Silas able to sing songs in prison?  God was certainly a factor.  They were so filled with Christ and so full of faith that they knew they would make it through.  I suppose that’s the case.  Nevertheless, many people who live with a deep faith in God would have trouble singing if they were in that same situation.  Many of us would find it to be difficult.             Last night LaVonna and Parker and I went to the Wranglers game and the Riverfest fireworks show to celebrate Greg and Rhonda’s graduation.  Afterward it took forever to get out of the parking lot.  There were only two exits.  And the streets were already full of Riverfest traffic, so it took a really long time.  As we were sitting there and, once in a while, creeping forward just a little I thought about asking if anybody wanted to sing a song.  To say that I didn’t feel like singing at the time would be an understatement.  Yet I was thinking about Paul and Silas singing in prison.  The parking lot wasn’t much of a prison by comparison, but it was annoying.  And we were kind of trapped.  And there wasn’t anything I could do to change the situation.  I did not break out into song.  And I also have to say that I don’t think this passage is necessarily giving us a pattern that we ought to follow all the time.  But it does show us that even in the most difficult circumstances we can still have faith (if we so choose) and we can have patience (if we so choose) and we can simply choose to make the most of—or to simply endure—those bad situations in life that we otherwise cannot control.  We also see in this passage that, as with the earthquake that opened the prison doors, sometimes God steps in and transforms our world in ways we never would have imagined.  As we face our prisons in life, may the Lord give us the power we need to make those positive choices, and may God step in with extra help at all the right times.