Friday, 12th Week of Ordinary Time

Acts 16:25-40
Morning Prayer

“What must I do to be saved,” the jailer begs to know from Paul and Silas. But what exactly is it that the jailer perceives that he needs to be saved from? Because salvation is such a crucial theological concept for Christians to grasp, it is easy for us to assume that’s what the Jailer was asking. How can I be saved from my sins? How can I be born again? But are those really the questions running through the mind of the jailer. The Greek word sozo did mean, “to be saved.”

But it could simply mean salvation as rescue from a dangerous situation. And while Paul and Silas keep the jailer from suicide, his life-threatening dilemma remains. Clearly, Paul and Silas’s God does not want these men kept in chains. So of course, he frees them. But as far as he knows, the magistrates will send for the prisoners in the morning, and the jailer was ready to kill himself rather than face the wrath of Roman law. So what does it mean for him to “be saved” this night, not knowing whether he would live to see the next night?

I imagine that in the Jailer’s home, Paul and Silas told him that the One who he just acknowledged as his “Lord” himself had passed through imprisonment, torture and crucifixion, and had come out on the other side of death. And if death was not the final word for Jesus, neither would it be the Jailer and his family. Yes, the jailer was saved that night, from the self-abasement that led him to nearly throw away the gift of life, and the fear of those who falsely claimed the power of life and death.

Two thousand years later; can we speak to the everyday dangers that our neighbors face, not with platitudes, but with wisdom that helps them see beyond their fears to the Lord of life and death?