Peter Allison's sermon, titled 'Rejoice Always!', reflects on Acts chapter 16 where Paul and Silas are imprisoned unjustly after casting out a spirit from a slave girl. Despite severe beatings and being placed in stocks, they pray and sing hymns to God, demonstrating the strength and joy found in the Lord amidst suffering. An earthquake miraculously frees them, yet they remain, leading to the salvation of the jailer and his family. Allison contrasts this with the case of Michael Fay, punished for vandalism, who responded with hatred, highlighting how Paul and Silas's joy and praise in adversity opened doors for evangelism. The sermon emphasizes the power of prayer and praise as means to experience God's presence and strength, encouraging believers to rejoice and give thanks in all circumstances. It underscores the sovereignty of God in salvation, as seen in the jailer's conversion, and calls Christians to live in the reality of their union with Christ, finding joy and peace regardless of their circumstances.

Please turn in your copy of God's Word to Acts chapter 16. I'd like to begin reading at verse 20. Paul and Silas have just cast out this unclean spirit of Python from this slave girl. And they brought them to the magistrates and said, These men being Jews exceedingly trouble our city, and they teach customs which are not lawful for us, being Romans, to receive or observe. Then the multitude rose up together against them, and the magistrates tore off their clothes and commanded them to be beaten with rods.

And when They had laid many stripes on them, they threw them into prison, commanding the jailer to keep them securely. Having received such a charge, he put them into the inner prison and fastened their feet in the stocks. But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken, and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone's chains were loosed, and the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoner's head fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. But Paul called with a loud voice, saying, Do yourself no harm, for we are all here.

Then he called for a light, ran in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. And he brought them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?' So they said, "'Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household.' Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house. And he took them that same hour of the night and washed their stripes. And immediately he and all his family were baptized. Now when he had brought them into his house, he set food before them.

And he rejoiced, having believed in God with all his household. Jehovah is near and his commandments are truth. Almighty Heavenly Father, Please seal to our hearts these words of truth by your Holy Spirit, and sanctify my sinful lips that they may proclaim your truth in the power of your Spirit. Preserve me from error. I ask your blessing.

In Jesus name, amen. In 1994, a 19-year-old American man was caned in Singapore for vandalizing cars and stealing road signs. Those over 40 probably remember this case because it received international attention from many, many people around the world, most many in the United States, who thought that caning amounted to cruel and barbaric punishment. Even the United States president intervened in this case. And as a result of the outcry and to preserve good relations with the United States, Singapore even reduced the sentence of this man from six strokes to four.

But of course, this is a very biblical form of punishment actually. Deuteronomy 25 says that if there is a dispute between men and they come to court, that the judges may judge them and they shall justify the righteous and condemn the wicked and then it shall be if the wicked man deserves to be beaten that the judge will cause him to lie down and be beaten in his presence according to his guilt with a certain number of blows. Forty blows he may give him and no more, lest he should exceed this and beat him with many blows above these and your brother be humiliated in your sight." According to the Bible, even adult people who don't listen and do what they are told deserve to be beaten. Proverbs 19, 29 says, Judgments are prepared for scoffers and beatings for the backs of fools. Beatings are for the backs of fools.

A fool is someone who despises instruction, who despises being told what to do, who refuses to obey. And according to God's word, a beating is a punishment for crimes that are not capital crimes, they're not worthy of execution, and crimes for which restitution is very difficult, such as assaults with seriously bodily injury, or public drunkenness, or lewdness of various sorts. So Proverbs also says that in Proverbs 15, that harsh discipline is for those who forsake the way. Actually, flogging and caning were used in the United States, in prisons, well into the 20th century. And it's still used in a number of countries around the world.

Singapore cames several thousand people each year. It's part of their judicial system. See, this kind of punishment is meant to humble the proud and subdue the rebellious. To humble the proud and subdue the rebellious. To humble the proud and subdue the rebellious.

And so Michael Fay received exactly what he deserved. He didn't get more than 40 strokes. He may actually have received less than he deserved. But in an interview after his release, he gave a few more details about the whole process. And he stated that after the caning, he said, quote, at that moment, I really hated the government.

And I just promised myself that I was going to do something about the government when I got out." That hatred is despite admitting that he stole the road signs. And it's despite receiving mercy in his sentence. Contrast this, contrast his response to receiving a just beating and receiving mercy to Paul and Silas' response to being caned far, far, far more severely. And we can look at the message this morning if you want some headings. Could be grouped under three headings.

The Apostles Affliction. Secondly, the God's strength. And thirdly, God's strength. Contrast Paul and Silas' response to their beating with the one that we just described. The first obvious difference is the extreme injustice.

Unlike Michael Fay, they were falsely accused. They had done nothing worthy of being beaten. The demonically driven owners accused them of troubling the city and teaching customs which it is not lawful for the Romans to receive or obey. Well, they certainly were not troubling the city. Though they may have been teaching them things that were contrary to Roman law, they were bringing a message of life and of hope.

They were proclaiming how to escape the eternal torment in the lake of fire. They were undergoing perils, hardships, personal hardships, deprivations of all sorts, beatings, and so forth, simply because they loved the Lord Jesus and desired to bring the words of life to people who desperately needed them, even if those same people didn't want to hear them and didn't receive them. They're falsely accused. Through a demonic influence, the crowd is inflamed against them. It's very hard to reason with a person who is inflamed.

There's no rationality there. But that's easy compared to reasoning with an inflamed crowd of people. We call that a mob. Mobs even in this country, a country that has called itself a Christian nation, and once professed to be a Christian, even in this country, mobs have done shockingly evil things. That's one of the reasons Scripture, of course, warns us not to go with a crowd, not to follow a crowd to do evil in Exodus 23.

And so Paul and Silas wisely choose not to mount any defense at this point. They had some defenses, but they chose not to use them at this point. The crowd was inflamed against them. It was a mob. Thirdly, they are punished without a trial.

They were falsely accused and then immediately severely punished without even a pretense of a trial, without any pretense of justice. Apparently from what I've read, there were lictors, people called lictors, that were bodyguards for the civil magistrates, and they were always in the presence of the magistrates, And they always carried the rods with them over their shoulders. In some cases there would even be apparently an axe in there to symbolize their authority to bring the death penalty. And so what Luke describes here about being brought before magistrates and being immediately beaten seems very consistent with what we know about the Roman world. And so they were caned.

This is a horrific beating with rods. Luke says they received many blows. More likely, far more than the maximum of 40 that Scripture mandates. This is one of three times that Paul says that he was beaten with rods. He told that to the Corinthians in 2 Corinthians.

Michael Fay reported being in pain and couldn't sleep for days. Couldn't sit for a long time. Canings typically leave permanent scars. The Bible here calls them stripes because they literally are stripes. They leave stripes upon the body permanently.

Richard Wormbram, a Romanian minister who was permanently scarred from canings received in the communist prisons, removed his shirt on the floor of the U.S. Senate to show the Senator's first hand, the scars, the stripes, the literal stripes that were still across his back from being tortured for Christ in the Romanian prisons. It's a horrific shock. People have died from being caned in this way. It leaves people in horrific pain.

And in this condition Paul and Silas are then put into stocks. Now stocks are difficult for even a healthy body. And you may not realize just how difficult they are even for a healthy body. Because you can't move in stocks. Think of many times you shift and move.

You move your limbs, you move your feet to get to a more comfortable position. You scratch and itch. You can't do any of that in stocks. Joints get stiff and then painful. Muscles cramp.

Forget about using a restroom. And on top of all that, their bodies were already in excruciating pain with open wounds. Clearly, sleep is completely impossible. So what do we find Silas doing? Where is their strength in this?

They were praying and singing praises. Now just stop and think about that picture a minute. In that condition, in the middle of the night, they are praying and singing praises. You see, the joy of the Lord was their strength. The joy of the Lord.

No human in their own strength could pray and sing in that condition. There isn't any of us in our own strength that could pray and sing like that. See, praying brings us into the very presence of the Father through Jesus Christ. And it is there that we find grace to help in time of need. James says in James 5, is anyone among you suffering?

Let him pray. Paul and Silas were suffering greatly. So they were praying. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing songs.

It's midnight. Sleeping is impossible. They're suffering and in great pain. And they were praying because Jesus is the shepherd who is with us, even or especially in the valley of the shadow of death. Ed Welch said this of prayer.

In our father's house, there is lots of talking. That is what families do. And when you are needy, and live among needy people, and have a generous father, you talk all the more. When you are needy, you talk all the more. If you think about that, when are you always certain your children will come to you?

When they need money from you? When they have a need, they're going to come. Because that's what families do. That's what fathers are for. So we pray, and He, the Lord, responds with the words of Scripture.

This was an hour of great need. This was an hour of great suffering. This was an hour that they needed the presence and the help of their Father. And so they prayed. See, they were living in the reality of their being united to Christ.

It's a privilege that we all have as believers to be united. We are united to Christ. We're in Christ. We're in Christ like a branch is in a vine. We're vitally connected to Christ.

Like a branch is vitally connected to the vine so that we can receive all the nourishment and sustenance that we need for our lives to sustain life. Seen as the reality of our union with Christ increases as we begin more and more to understand really what it means to be united to Christ, to be in union with Him, to have the lives that are hidden with Christ in God. Then we experience the presence of the triune God in our everyday life, And our enjoyment of the Lord grows each day. See, we're able then to grow and to have joy and peace in times of prosperity and in times of affliction. Now what do you suppose they were praying for?

Heal us? Help us? They might have said those things. They probably did. But I think they were first of all, praising God.

Psalm 34 is a psalm that David wrote when his life was in extreme jeopardy. In great desperation, he had fled to the very nation of whom he had killed his ten thousands, the Philistines. And in great danger, he had fled there because he thought that might be safer than his own country. Which tells you just how dangerous his own country was. His own father-in-law was trying to kill him.

The whole army was after him. And this was his response in Psalm 34 is praise. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. I will bless the Lord at all times.

That included if he's writing this psalm in great desperation. He says, I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all my fears. But the very first thing he says in this psalm is that he will praise the Lord continuously. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. You see, one of the greatest weapons that we can wield against all difficulties is praise.

Praising God is a very powerful weapon. David fought his battles with praise. Psalm 71 is another psalm of someone in danger, in trouble. The psalmist there speaks about God having shown him great and severe trouble. It speaks of enemies seeking his hurt and laying in wait for his life.

And What is the psalmist's response in this situation? He says in Psalm 71, 8, Let my mouth be filled with your praise and with your glory all the day. He says later, I will praise You more and more. The greater the trial, the more I'll praise You. Praise is a powerful weapon.

Psalm 9, Psalm 18, Psalm 56, are a few of the many other examples teaching that the way through fear, the way through great affliction of any sort is prayer and praise. Psalm 18.3, I will call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised. What's the result? So shall I be saved from my enemies. He doesn't say I'm going to wield a sword, I'm going to fight.

He says I'm going to praise the Lord and then I'll be saved. By that means, I'll be saved from my enemies. In Psalm 56, when David was captured by the Philistines and he is battling fear, His constant refrain in the midst of this fear is, I will praise the Lord. He says that three or four times in that short psalm. I will praise the Lord.

So Paul and Silas were praying, And Luke says they were singing hymns. Hymns are a psalm of praise. Praise, you see, turns our focus from our problems to the Lord who is strong, who is able to help, who is able to comfort. You see, there is real peace in His presence. All the beauty, All the peace, all the joy, all the contentment, all the satisfaction, all the love that we long for is found and only found in Christ.

It's only found in Christ. Psalm 16 just says this so beautifully. You probably have this memorized. It says, in your presence, in your presence is fullness of joy. And at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

And Psalm 100 tells us that we enter into His presence with singing. We enter into His gates with praise and thanksgiving. We enter into His presence with singing. When we are hurting, It is then that we most need His presence. And it is then precisely at these times that we most need to praise God.

That's why James can tell us, brothers and sisters, count it a joy when you fall into trials of various sorts. Jonah is another example. He went to Sheol. He died because of his disobedience. Jonah describes his plight in the second chapter of the book of Jonah.

The waters surrounded him, even to his soul. The deep closed over him. Weeds wrapped around his head. He went down to the moorings of the mountains. The earth with its bars closed behind him forever.

His soul fainted. He was in trouble and he knew it. And it was then, he says, that he praised God. But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving. That was his response.

And then the next phrase in that book of Jonah is that God delivered him onto the beach, the sand. You say, well, Jonah was going to thank God. He's going to give thanks. For what? For drowning Him?

Yes, for drowning Him. Because salvation is of the Lord. See, praise and thanksgiving are two very powerful weapons that change our heart and they change our very perspective. Praise and thanksgiving. The joy of the Lord was the strength of the Apostles.

If you ever have time to be around old battle-worn saints, one thing I can't help but notice is how they praise God. No regrets. They give thanks not only in everything, but for everything. Because God works Everything. From the good to the bad to the very worst.

He works everything for good to those who love Him and are the called according to His purpose. So why not? Why can't we Give thanks for the good that He works. Give thanks for the circumstances that are the occasion of the good that God works. Now, the other thing we see is that they were praying and singing such that all the other prisoners could hear them.

This wasn't a private thing they were doing with themselves. They must have been singing and praying loudly. The whole rest of the prison is hearing them. And they had a big impact on the rest of the prison. I'm sure they had never seen people in the condition that Paul and Silas were singing hymns of praise to God.

You see, Paul and Silas' response to suffering opened the door to being able to give the Gospel to this jailer. And this is where we see God's strength. God's strength is made perfect in their weakness. God heard their prayers and their praises, and he responded by sending a great earthquake. But so that everybody would know that this was not just a coincidence, this earthquake was a very special earthquake.

It shook the foundations of the jail but didn't knock the building down. And it broke all their chains and loosed them all from the stocks and chains. Now that's some earthquake. I've lived through earthquakes. They start shaking buildings.

Typically what starts happening is the roofs start caving in and things like that. But chains don't break in an earthquake. Not any earthquake I've ever seen. But that's what happened in this earthquake. Right at this moment.

As they are praying and praising God. And so all the chains of not just Paul and Silas, but all the prisoners fall off. So in other words, everyone could have walked out. But strangely, No one walks out. Now the question is why?

Because what was going on in the prison was more marvelous and wonderful than the freedom that they could have had by escaping the prison. Freedom is a marvelous thing. These are all prisoners. It's the middle of night. Their chains are all off.

But what's happening in this dark, stinky, wretched prison is more marvelous and wonderful than the freedom that they could have had. So they stay. Paul and Silas don't stay simply because it would have been wrong for them to walk out. It wouldn't have been wrong for them to leave the prison. God had removed Peter's chains when he was in prison, and He opened all the prison doors so that Peter could escape.

And He even sent an angel to ensure that Peter left the prison and didn't stay there thinking it was only a dream like he thought. So they didn't not leave because there was some moral obligation to stay there. They had no obligation to stay there. So on awakening and seeing the doors open, the jailer assumes that all the prisoners had escaped. And even though he couldn't see into jail, remember it's night and prisons are not light places, They're dark dungeons even in the middle of day.

Even though he couldn't see into the jail, he was so certain that everybody had escaped, that he was ready to kill himself without even bothering to verify if the prisoners had in fact escaped. He saw the doors open and it was a foregone conclusion that they'd all escaped. You see, he was a hardened man. As a jailer, he'd probably caned prisoners himself. He was hardened to the sufferings of caned prisoners.

He certainly had no qualms of conscience locking prisoners, even recently caned ones, in stocks, with no regard for the suffering that that caused. And he knew the fate that awaited him if prisoners committed to his trust had escaped to his jail, he would receive the same punishment that the prisoners received. And he himself could be killed, or probably would be killed. And so in order to avoid suffering like the hapless prisoners, whom he probably looked down upon as not worthy or less than human, and so in order to avoid suffering like these hapless prisoners in his prison, he proceeded to end his life on his own terms. In other words, he had no hope in anything that he could do to save his life.

A man, he's ready to kill himself, He has lost all hope in anything that he could do to save his life. And that is where God's mercy came to him. God had mercy on him. God humbled him. So the prisoners had not escaped, and Paul calls out, do yourself no harm, for we're all here.

See, the jailer is all immediately humbled. There was nothing he could have done in this situation, but God humbled him to the point where he was changed. He immediately calls for a light and he runs to Paul in silence and he falls down at their feet crying, what must I do to be saved? Now obviously this is more than just being saved from death at the hands of the Romans because that has already been averted. He's asking for more.

He's been brought to the point of no hope, because that's where God brings those whom He's saving, to realize that we are completely unable to do anything to save ourselves. And I think that this is the real reason that no one escaped. When God delivered Peter from prison in Acts 12, the guards were all put to death. What was the difference between these guards, this jailer, or those guards in Acts 12 that were guarding Peter that were all put to death? What's the difference between them and this jailer?

Nothing. Nothing at all is the difference between them. It was the mercy of God to save this jailer. And it's only His mercy That is the difference between the prison guards of Peter in Jerusalem who were executed because God broke Peter out of jail, and the prison guard of Paul in Philippi who was saved, spared. God's mercy, God's undeserved good favor on that jailer and not on the others.

That's why Nobody escaped. God was showing him mercy. The Philippian jailer wasn't more deserving to be saved than the jailer's guarding Peter. In fact, if anything, he could say he was less deserving. He had treated Paul far more harshly than the guards treated Peter.

You see, God is sovereign in who He elects to everlasting life and who He doesn't. He's sovereign in who He humbles and draws to Himself in who He doesn't. And this is a beautiful example, a beautiful example of God's strength being made perfect in our weakness. There was nothing that Paul and Silas could do in their condition to do anything, to save anyone. But God used that weakness and He made them strong with the joy of the Lord.

And His strength, God's strength, was made perfect, was made complete in their weakness. Paul and Silas being humiliated, beaten, bloody, suffering, would not have been in any position to influence a hardened jailer, to cry out, what must I do to be saved? But because the joy of the Lord was their strength. And they used prayer and praise as the weapons in their suffering. No one fled the prison and the door was open for the Gospel to come to this jailer.

See, how many times have we lost any chance to witness to somebody by our poor response to situations, by failing to count it a joy when we fall into various trials. I know more times than I would want to admit. We walk away thinking, well, I could never witness to that person now. See, it's easy to praise God in prosperity, and we should. We should.

But we are also preaching a message to everyone around us by our response in trials and afflictions. You know, even if we don't respond negatively to affliction, like Job's wife or other people, even if we don't respond that way, Do we respond in praise? Do we rejoice always in everything? Give thanks? You know, if Paul and Silas had simply suffered in silence, and in their heart, praise the Lord, the other prisoners would never have heard.

They wouldn't have been nearly as affected. They probably wouldn't have stayed around when the doors broke open and their chains were loosed. Prayer and praise are the great weapons that we have against every trial and affliction. And they usher us into the presence of God the Father, where there is the fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore. Now I had prepared here to go on for a couple more verses, But I think we'll pause here.

And next week, Lord willing, pick up this wonderful account of the salvation of this jailer. There's just some amazing things. But I think it would be best to wait for next week. So let's pray. Almighty Father in Heaven, how we thank You that we have been crucified with You and that the life that we now live in the flesh, we live by faith in the Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us.

That we have died, and our lives are now hidden with Christ in God. Help us Father to set our minds on things above, not on the things on this earth, for we have been raised with Christ And He is now seated at the right hand of the throne of God. And so we ask for Your grace to set our minds on things above and not on things on the earth. We ask, Lord, for faith to believe Your words. Your word.

You have given us an account in Hebrews 11 of the great men of faith, Men who were all sinners, men who all failed at various times, but who by faith overcame and won great victories. Men who were weak, but who saw your strength made perfect in their weakness. Men of whom the world was not worthy, who lived in caves, dressed in sheepskins, who were sawn in two, who suffered unspeakable afflictions, but who overcame, because they believed in Jesus Christ, the Almighty Son of God, in whose presence is the fullness of joy. So Lord, we ask That you would enable us to rejoice always and to give thanks both in all circumstances and for all that you do. For you are a good and just and gracious God.

And we ask that your praise and your glory might be in our mouth all the day. Through Jesus Christ, Amen.