Escape Artists

I remember when I was ten years old and how much I wanted to be a magician. My friend and neighbor, Ricky Miller, had an uncle who was a professional magician. I made my own tricks like adding a flap to an old popcorn box and stuffing in my sisters’ silk scarves (they were a bit annoyed that I “borrowed” them). I even had my own homemade wand and a bow tie for looks. There were basic card tricks and a few other items to fill out my “act.” I did perform at a grade school talent show and had a good time doing it.

To me, some of the most remarkable feats in this field were done by escape artists. That is an entertainer expert in getting out of handcuffs, ropes, chains, trunks, or other confining devices. Harry Houdini was perhaps the most famous. I saw the 1953 movie about him starring Tony Curtis and was amazed at the discipline it took to get out of such seemingly impossible, fabricated situations.

The term “escape artist” is also used of inmates in a prison who have a reputation for being able to escape confinement. When I worked as public information officer for the territorial prison on Guam, it was my job to report on escapes. We did not have one escape artist, but inmates would sometimes turn up at their parents’ homes on weekends after getting past corrections officers.

Getting out of Satan’s Prisons

The Bible clearly shows that God is all good and that the Devil is all bad. Satan ensnares and confines people in physical, mental, and spiritual prisons. God is in the business of setting them free. That is why He sent His Son, Jesus Christ.

Luke 4:17,18:
And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written,
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised.

Good ministers of Jesus Christ are to do the same.

I Timothy 4:6:
If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things, thou shalt be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine, whereunto thou hast attained.

II Timothy 2:25,26:
In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth;
And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive by him at his will.

Escaping Physical Attacks: Jesus Christ’s Example

Although the Devil’s prisons are often mental and spiritual, he also wants to physically kill people. That is especially true of those who reveal his dark and twisted lies.

John 10:10:
The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.

John 3:19,20:
And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.

Shining the light can be a very dangerous occupation. Jesus Christ learned that very quickly when he began his ministry. Satan tried to talk Jesus into jumping and killing himself. But Jesus was filled with the spirit and also full of the Word of God he had studied for nearly thirty years. He did not take the Devil’s bait!

Luke 4:9-12:
And he [Satan] brought him [Jesus] to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the temple, and said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence:
For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee:
And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.
And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.

After declaring his amazing and life-changing mission to those in his hometown synagogue, Jesus was physically attacked by those who worked for the Devil. They tried to kill him. But God made a way to escape.

Luke 4:28-30:
And all they in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled with wrath,
And rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong.
But he passing through the midst of them went his way.

Jesus was able to escape attempts on his life more than once. When he boldly told religious leaders in Jerusalem that he was the Messiah that Abraham looked forward to, they tried to stone him to death.

John 8:59:
Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.

When Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, they tried again to kill him.

John 10:39:
Therefore they sought again to take him: but he escaped out of their hand.

Escaping Physical Attacks: Old Testament Examples

The Old Testament is full of true records where God Almighty bared His arm and helped faithful believers escape the Devil’s prisons. This included attempts on their lives by the edge of the sword and other murderous means (like a den of lions).

Hebrews 11:32-34:
And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets:
Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,
Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.

King Saul was jealous of David and tried to kill him on several occasions. Yet God helped David to escape every time!

I Samuel 22:1:
David therefore departed thence, and escaped to the cave Adullam: and when his brethren and all his father’s house heard it, they went down thither to him.

I Samuel 23:13:
Then David and his men, which were about six hundred, arose and departed out of Keilah, and went whithersoever they could go. And it was told Saul that David was escaped from Keilah; and he forbare to go forth.

David knew that it was God Who always helped him to escape.

Psalms 18:29:
For by thee I have run through a troop; and by my God have I leaped over a wall.

Psalms 41:11:
By this I know that thou favourest me, because mine enemy doth not triumph over me.

God can work miraculously with mighty signs and wonders to help His people escape. He can also work in people to help in the deliverance. David’s wife, Michal, helped him escape from her own father, King Saul.

I Samuel 19:9-12:
And the evil spirit from the Lord was upon Saul, as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand: and David played with his hand.
And Saul sought to smite David even to the wall with the javelin; but he slipped away out of Saul’s presence, and he smote the javelin into the wall: and David fled, and escaped that night.
Saul also sent messengers unto David’s house, to watch him, and to slay him in the morning: and Michal David’s wife told him, saying, If thou save not thy life to night, to morrow thou shalt be slain.
So Michal let David down through a window: and he went, and fled, and escaped.

The Apostle Paul: Escape Artist Extraordinaire

There is a similar record in the New Testament of someone being lowered down from a wall at night.

Acts 9:23-25:
And after that many days were fulfilled, the Jews took counsel to kill him:
But their laying await was known of Saul. And they watched the gates day and night to kill him.
Then the disciples took him by night, and let him down by the wall in a basket.

Saul of Tarsus, a former “hit man” for the religious leaders in Jerusalem, had become a Christian and began to preach “the faith which once he destroyed” (Galatians 1:23). That’s why they took counsel to kill him. These were the same men who had jealously attacked Jesus Christ and had him put to death. This attack on Paul’s life was the first of at least twenty-five that are recorded in the Book of Acts.

See the attached chart for all twenty-five records. It shows where these murder attempts occurred, who was behind them, and how God delivered Paul from death. He lived what he boldly declared in I Corinthians 10:13:

There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.

Paul later described some of the things that he went through.

II Corinthians 11:23-33:
Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I am more; in labours more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths oft.
Of the Jews five times received I forty stripes save one.
Thrice was I beaten with rods, once was I stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;
In journeyings often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren;
In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.
Beside those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.
Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?
If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern mine infirmities.
The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is blessed for evermore, knoweth that I lie not.
In Damascus the governor under Aretas the king kept the city of the Damascenes with a garrison, desirous to apprehend me:
And through a window in a basket was I let down by the wall, and escaped his hands.

Although Paul did suffer, he had supreme confidence in God’s ability to help him ultimately escape the Devil’s attacks.

II Timothy 4:18:
And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom: to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Escape Artists for the Father

Today we can walk with God and He will help us to escape from the adversary’s physical attacks and mental prisons. Like Old Testament believers, Jesus Christ, and the Apostle Paul, our heavenly Father will deliver us from the snares of hurt and evil.  Even in this dark world, we can have our own exciting “escapades” as we boldly shine as lights in this world.

Philippians 2:15,16:
That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world;
Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain.