"When Pain And Praise Collide"- The Apostolic Connection

now for just a few moments I want to take us to the word of God in Acts chapter 16 and verse number 24. who having received such a charge thrust them into the inner prison and made their feet fast in the stocks and at midnight Paul and Silas prayed and sang Praises unto God and the prisoners heard them suddenly there was a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison were shaken and immediately all the doors were open in everyone's bands were loosed for just a few moments this morning I want to preach to us here and to those watching by way of television and the World Wide Web When Praise and pain collide When Praise and pain Collide you may be seated this morning Paul and Silas have been Faithfully preaching the gospel when a young girl with the spirit of divination begin to taunt their Ministry and begin to taunt and mock them scripture said this she did not one day but she did many days publicly making fun mocking the gospel the Apostle Paul had had enough and so he turned that day and he said in the name of Jesus unclean Spirit come out of her Spirit of divination left that girl she was evidently a very valuable piece of Real Estate because she had Masters that owned stock in her she had made her master's much money by falsely foretelling future events but she loses what little power that she has she's no more than the girl the damsel the Masters seeing that their money was gone pulled Paul and Silas into court and there falsified the charges said they teach Customs that we as Jews need the Romans believe and the Bible says that when they had laid many stripes upon them when they had laid verse 23 many stripes upon them they cast them in prison this word many stripes is to give us the understanding that they exceeded exceeded what the normal Jewish law in the Old Testament said 40 Stripes save one they went beyond anything that had ever been given and they beat them without mercy and they laid many stripes upon their back and then they thrust them into prison with a charge to keep them safely the reason these men gave a added charge to keep them safely is because it had already been well documented that you can't keep these Apostles in prison they somehow find their way to escape out of prison they somehow find a way out praise God they somehow find a way out and so he cast them into the inner prison maximum security and they're not even satisfied with maximum security the Bible said that they put their feet in the stocks one Bible scholar says that this was horribly painful as you said upon a board turned upright your feet were locked into boards and pulled apart it was a position of extreme pain discomfort No Sleep could ever be given to this person you see man in verse 24 was in total control but praise is so powerful I said praise is so powerful because praise actually takes man out of control and praise puts God in control it's kind of like it's kinda like the neutral in your automobile it's kind of like that neutral gear that you have that that transition it transitions you from one to the other it's this time that God has given us that we get to decide are we going to let man be in control of Our Lives or are we going to let God be in control of Our Lives I've got many stripes upon my back my legs are pulled apart and my feet are locked in these boards I'm sitting on a two before set up right this torture is meant to keep me awake and to keep me tortured day and night this torture is meant that if I ever get released I will think twice before I preach this gospel again this torture was meant to alter the behavior of a political radical this torture was meant when you've finally got out of there you stopped doing whatever it was that put you in the there in the first place but verse 25 tells us the reaction of Paul and Silas and at midnight Paul and Silas prayed and sang Praises unto God and the prisoners heard them you see one pain and praise collides something is bound to happen when pain and praise meet together something is bound to take place my reaction is prayer have a problem pray about it my reaction is praise face a difficulty praise God that he'll see us through my my situation is Bleak but I'm gonna pray and I'm going to praise can somebody say Amen verse 24 of Acts has men in control verse 25 of Acts has the apostles taking it out of the control of man you cannot determine my reaction you may determine where I'm at you may be turned you may determine what I'm setting upon you may determine my pain but you cannot you can never determine my reaction and so they begin to pray and they begin to sing praises every praise is to our God every word of worship one Accord every day every praise that's what I'm talking about hey let me tell you something if it can help a little boy in Atlanta Georgia be set free from his captors he can help me and you here today every praise is to our God every word of worship I want you to see this now because verse 24 man is in control verse 25 the uh the the apostles responded to God In Praise and prayer and verse 26 God can't hold back any longer because God is bound by law he is attracted to pain and he is attracted to the call of his name the Bible says that God is nigh to them who are of a broken and contrite spirit automatically if you're in pain today God is gravitating towards you but add something to that the name of Jesus add the name of Jesus to it and all of a sudden something's got to happen Something's Gotta transpire hey if you want to live in your pain if you want to sit on that board if you want to stay in that prison you can but my pain and my praise have collided and there's an earthquake in this prison and suddenly and suddenly there was a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison were loot were shaken and everyone's and immediately the doors were opened and everyone's bands were loosed now I want to go ahead and address a couple of things before I end this today number one this earthquake did not in and of itself necessarily set them free no if you read the whole chapter of Acts 16 you'll find out that when the earthquake hit it not only hit the jailhouse it hit the whole town okay and even the magistrates said put connected the dots and said this is the gods anger with us because of those two that we put in prison and you read acts 16 this is not my point today this is just a point to the point they sent word down there and they said Paul and Silas you can go free you know what Paul did Paul said how dare they how dare they beat me openly and then try to run me out the back door of the jail you tell them to come down and get us out they put us in they can put us out jail had that that earthquake wasn't designed to break those two preachers out of jail it was designed to show us today that God is in control it's what it's designed now I studied this out I studied this out just a little bit do you know that God had got Peter out of jail he got Peter out of jail with an Angel now let's just think for a moment God does everything with a reason right there's always a reason when God does something it's for a reason the angel went down Peter was chained to 16 soldiers he's a pretty dangerous fellow wasn't he and there's a miracle in that he's chained to 16 soldiers going to have his head cut off the next morning and he was asleep that's a sedative message in itself the angel showed up in the prison touched Peter on the side shook him told him wake up told him put his robe on put your shoes on we're getting out of here change fellow Peter walked right out of that prison thought he was having one of the best dreams of his life that's right that's exactly right because when he got out there was a big Iron Gate at the prison that opened up and you went outside it was free if you got on this side of the Iron Gate that was the street when that iron gate opened of its own accord the first it's the first God electronical gate in the Bible to swing open Peter walked out and the Bible said when Peter got on the other side of the Iron Gate it hit him he thought he was having a vision a dream and he was out of the prison now let's go to here because God why didn't you descend that same angel that angel that same Angel did a pretty good job getting Peter out why don't you send that angel down there because God has a reason for an earthquake because there's typology mixed into the Bible see the Bible's written not just as a history book but it's written for us to look at and say okay there's something in this for me so now what happened it was an earthquake do you know why earthquakes happen it's a simple definition that I understand there's all kinds of seismic words that we could talk about in plates that we could talk about but it's just simple when the pressure from within is greater than the pressure from without an earthquake occurs when the pressure under the earth's surface is greater than the pressure on the Earth's surface then the earthquake occurs and what's on top begins to feel what's been boiling in the bottom when your desire is stronger than what's holding you you're going to have your earthquake when you get the Bible talks about a man who was sick of the palsy that's right we need to get sick of what we're in all right when you get sick of the situations where we need to get sick some folks some folks need to understand you're in your 30s and your 40s and you've got all these problems and and my wife made a statement the other day we were in a crowd of people just in out in a town and she said look in the faces of these people there's so much misery in the faces of these people look at the faces of these people the choice of misery and I understand that when I'm walking down USA Street I understand that when I'm outside but those spaces should not should not be the majority in the Church of the Living God because we've got a power within us that says greater is he that is within me than he that is in this world every praise is to our God and they were set free because when you're praised and your pain collide God almighty bound to his word to move on your behalf