“About 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 bonds were unfastened.”
– Acts 16:25–26
As a Chinese Indonesian, I grew up reading some Kungfu comics and watching many Kungfu movies. Not the Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan’s type. But the ones where the guys adorn man buns with long smooth silky hair and the girls always use their big long sleeve to dab dry the droplets of sweat off their foreheads (think Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon movie, but with a much worse visual effect). While Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan have their Wing-Chun or Wushu skill to defend and to attack, the crouching-tiger-type ones would also have their secret move before unleashing an earth-shattering chi-releasing move that will incapacitate their enemies (think Kungfu Panda but without the cute fluffiness).
Well, Acts 16:25-26 records literally an earth-shattering move of Paul and Silas. They had been beaten up with rods and thrown into a deep dungeon with their feet chained. Paul was schooled not in a kungfu academy, but in a Rabbinic education system under Gamaliel. Silas was a prophet and a church leader. So, in that dungeon, kungfu moves would not come to their mind at all. However, they knew some ‘moves’ that would unleash an even greater power. They prayed and they sang. Yup, that’s right. Instead of mouthing some secret magic spell, they talked to God. Instead of screaming, ‘Jiaaat! Haiyaaaa!’, they lifted up scriptural songs and praises to God. Little that they knew, their moves would literally shake the earth, opened all the doors of the prisons, and unfastened all the prisoners’ chains.