Paul and his associates are in Phillipi, in Macedonia. Their hostess is Lydia, a local merchant.
16 One day on our way to the place of prayer, we were met by a slave girl. She had a spirit in her that gave her the power to tell the future. By doing this she made a lot of money for her owners. 17 The girl followed Paul and the rest of us and kept yelling, “These men are servants of the Most High God! They are telling you how to be saved.”
18 This went on for several days. Finally, Paul got so upset that he turned and said to the spirit, “In the name of Jesus Christ, I order you to leave this girl alone!” At once the evil spirit left her.
19 When the girl’s owners realized that they had lost all chances for making more money, they grabbed Paul and Silas and dragged them into court. 20 They told the officials, “These Jews are upsetting our city! 21 They are telling us to do things we Romans are not allowed to do.”
22 The crowd joined in the attack on Paul and Silas. Then the officials tore the clothes off the two men and ordered them to be beaten with a whip. 23 After they had been badly beaten, they were put in jail, and the jailer was told to guard them carefully. 24 The jailer did as he was told. He put them deep inside the jail and chained their feet to heavy blocks of wood.
25 About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing praises to God, while the other prisoners listened. 26 Suddenly a strong earthquake shook the jail to its foundations. The doors opened, and the chains fell from all the prisoners.
27 When the jailer woke up and saw that the doors were open, he thought that the prisoners had escaped. He pulled out his sword and was about to kill himself. 28 But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! No one has escaped.”
29 The jailer asked for a torch and went into the jail. He was shaking all over as he knelt down in front of Paul and Silas. 30 After he had led them out of the jail, he asked, “What must I do to be saved?”
31 They replied, “Have faith in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved! This is also true for everyone who lives in your home.”
32 Then Paul and Silas told him and everyone else in his house about the Lord. 33 While it was still night, the jailer took them to a place where he could wash their cuts and bruises. Then he and everyone in his home were baptized. 34 They were very glad that they had put their faith in God. After this, the jailer took Paul and Silas to his home and gave them something to eat.
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“What annoys you?” I asked my husband. “What annoys you, besides me?” I was trying to be funny. He answered, “I really can’t think of anything else.”
What annoys you? A traffic light that won’t turn? A cough that won’t go away? Day after day of cold, cloudy weather? Political rhetoric? People who don’t agree with you? People on cell phones?
The Sunday School version that I remember of this story emphasized that Paul and Silas did not run away from prison and that the jailer and his family and servants became Christians. But more than half a century later, in a different time, a different society, I am most struck by the servant girl. Likewise, some of my resources also wonder about the servant girl, the girl who was possessed with some kind of clairvoyance, some ability to see the future.
I’m going to quote heavily from my sources today, because they reflect what I was thinking as I read and reread this text.
My biggest concern is this: the slave girl. Remember she is a slave, not a friend or a family member. She is valuable to her owners only because of her gift of being able to tell the future. They charged people to hear their futures from her. If she had not had that gift, perhaps she would not have become a slave.
Here I share some musings from Rev. Janet Hunt, who writes a blog called “Dancing with the Word.” She asks these questions about the slave girl:
–I wonder, for instance when her ‘spirit of divination’ was first discovered. Was it something she always had or did it only become apparent when she was a little older?
-I wonder how it was that she was sold into slavery. Did the certainty that she was ‘possessed’ by something frighten her family and as a result, were they at least a little bit relieved to see her go?
-Or was their financial situation desperate and so they sold her in order to benefit from whatever the ‘going rate’ was for girls such as her?
-Oh, I would imagine that in that time and place it must have been her father’s decision to sell her in this way and I wonder if her mother grieved this always.
-Or perhaps her father did this at her mother’s urging.
-Or maybe her parents had both died and she had no other way of supporting herself except for this unthinkable way.
-Or maybe slavery was simply a generations old reality for her family and her particular ability simply made her valuable in a different way to those who owned her.
-And I wonder what her life was like as a ‘slave.’ Did her owners only take advantage of her seemingly supernatural ability to discern the truth or was there more to her enslavement? This certainly was bad enough, but it could have been more and perhaps was.
I am bothered by the fact that Paul evidently removed the demon that gave her her powers, not because he felt compassion for her, but because she annoyed him. This makes me wonder how we treat those who annoy us. Do we seek simple solutions to shut the person up, to remove them from our sight?
My first thoughts turn toward the people who use government programs to supplement their income. Ironically, most of us use government programs to supplement our income or, at the very least for our own benefit. Government programs I’m thinking of are the Department of Transportation and the roads that are built and repaired; and the Department of Education and the free education provided to most of us.
And my meanest joke, ever: How do you starve a farmer? Weld his mailbox shut. And my own personal favorite government programs—IPERS and Social Security.
But we are also—and this is cruel and shallow—we are also annoyed by people who benefit from food stamps and medicaid and fair housing aid. That is an awful thing to say, but it’s true, according to some of my friends, according to conversations I overhear in restaurants. It seems those of us who have been born into the right families, have been able to hold down jobs, have been able to play by the rules, are annoyed by those who are not able to hold down a job, who can’t feed their families or afford medical care.
And you know what? That attitude separates and excludes and humiliates and alienates the people who are supposed to be the focus of our love and support.
I witnessed this as a classroom teacher. Some of my students owned only one pair of jeans. I know one family who washed a load of jeans every night—one pair for each kid, so that they would always have clean clothes to wear. What’s wrong with that? Nothing! But there were classmates who made fun of them for wearing the same pair every day. For some reason, they found it annoying to be in the same room with someone who had only one pair of jeans.
We are annoyed by people who don’t march to the same beat as us. We are annoyed because, in our hearts, we want everyone to have a comfortable life. We’re annoyed because we want everyone to have a fulfilling life, whether it be making quilts or raising cattle or teaching children or waiting tables or analyzing data or preaching sermons. So we deal with that annoyance, by getting rid of it.
Sometimes, a few choice words will encourage a person to move on. Sometimes, the annoyance is more than we can handle. I bring up the idea of what we call “welfare,” because I think we have a very efficient way of dealing with the annoyance that not everyone is as lucky or as smart as some of us. I think we use entities like the Carrol Assistance Center or the North Scott Food Pantry to get rid of those annoyances.
Here’s the thing: our consciences annoy us. We know that Jesus loves people no matter where they live, how they live, where they work, where they buy their food. So, deep in our hearts, we know we should love our neighbor, each neighbor, with equal generosity. But we’re annoyed by some and at the same time our conscience annoys us. So, to quiet our conscience, to stop that prophetic voice in our hearts, we donate a couple cans of food, a bottle of Spic and Span. And then we ignore the persons who use our donations.
Paul was annoyed by the slave girl, who, ironically, seemed to be sharing the same message he was trying to preach:
17 The girl followed Paul and the rest of us and kept yelling, “These men are servants of the Most High God! They are telling you how to be saved.”
So he took away her gift, shut her up, silenced her. And then he walked away. What happened to her? Did he invite her to join their group at Lydia’s house for worship? I have a feeling once she was no longer annoying him, he ignored her.
Again, I quote from Rev. Hunt:
-Once she was freed from that which so benefited her owners, did they actually let her go or did they keep her for other purposes?
-And if they did set her free, was she able to return home?
-And if she did return home, was she welcomed there?
-Was she able to return to any semblance of a normal life?
-Or was she forever damaged, forever changed by the experience of having been sold into slavery and living as such for who knows how long?
Once we donate a can of corn, a package of paper towels, even $200, is our responsibility over? I will grant you that the taxes you pay also help families survive. Do you resent that use of your taxes or are you grateful that you can share with someone who is, in your eyes, lazy, manipulative, freeloading?
We do what we can. But I think about that slave girl. Was she abandoned? She was no longer annoying. But did she walk alone? I wonder if we use our donations to silence people, so that we don’t have to see them, we don’t have to think about them. I wonder if there is a way to establish a relationship that is more than a hands-off, feel good donation. I wonder if Paul and Silas invited the slave girl to accompany them. I wonder if there is a way that we can walk with the people we help with our donations.
The longer I live, the more I admire people who can survive under unequal conditions, denied advantages, unseen burdens and roadblocks. The longer I live, the more I realize that people are annoying for a reason. No one is annoying on purpose.
The girl was annoying because she had a gift. Do we overlook the gifts of those who annoy us? Paul set her free from her demon, but he did not set her free from her slavery. You might remember a song from the sixties, “Me and Bobby McGee,” written by Kris Kristofferson and sung by Roger Miller, later by Janis Joplin. The first line of the chorus could be the theme song for the life of the slave girl: “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.”
Was she set free or abandoned?
The same Paul who was annoyed by the slave girl wrote these words in one of his letters to the congregation in Corinth:
1 Corinthians 13 Contemporary English Version (CEV)
What if I could speak all languages of humans and of angels? If I did not love others, I would be nothing more than a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. What if I could prophesy and understand all secrets and all knowledge?
And what if I had faith that moved mountains? I would be nothing, unless I loved others. What if I gave away all that I owned and let myself be burned alive? I would gain nothing, unless I loved others.
By extension: What if I cast out demons? I would be nothing, unless I loved others. What if I donated 500 gallons of milk and 3,000 cans of soup? I would be nothing, unless I loved others. What if I paid the rent for a family of five? I would be nothing, unless I loved others.
I don’t think Paul loved the slave girl. I think Paul thought only of himself. In the best of all possible worlds, I want the slave girl to join Paul and be as important as Lydia and Silas. I want the slave girl to know the freedom that Paul preached. Maybe we can be satisfied that the slave girl knew Jesus as Savior. Maybe we can be satisfied that Jesus loves the people who annoy us.
Is there away to go beyond salving our consciences with a can of creamed corn to inviting and walking with slave girls, the lazy, the unlucky, the addicted, the struggling, the different, the strange, the lost? God, show us the way. Amen.
Some Kind of Faith 