Devotional: We Are All Here

Prison Paintings 16 by Gülsün Karamustafa (1972)  Location: Tate Museum, London

In Prison Paintings 16, we see the face of injustice through women and children behind bars. Their posture is worn, their presence quiet but unignorable. These are not nameless figures. They are real people, drawn from the artist’s own experience of political imprisonment in Turkey. There is no spectacle here—just stark truth. Pain is present. Injustice is visible. But so is dignity.

This image mirrors the story in Acts 16, where Paul and Silas are imprisoned for freeing a young girl from spiritual and economic exploitation. They are beaten and locked away in the deepest part of the prison—not for doing harm, but for disrupting the flow of profit. In the middle of the night, they begin to pray and sing. And then: a divine disruption. An earthquake. Chains break. Doors open.

But they don’t flee. Neither do the others. They stay.

Their freedom becomes an act of presence, not escape. And in doing so, they save the life of a jailer who was moments away from ending his own. The words Paul speaks—“Do not harm yourself, for we are all here”—echo across time. They are words of radical solidarity, of faith-in-action, of compassion that refuses to abandon even the ones tasked with keeping them confined.

Psalm 97 proclaims, “Light dawns for the righteous, and joy for the upright in heart.” That light may not always arrive as quickly as we want. But it comes. And sometimes, the most powerful thing we can do is stay with the pain long enough to help someone else survive it. Not all resurrection moments look like empty tombs. Some look like prisoners staying put. Some look like women and children behind bars refusing to be forgotten. Some look like us—praying, showing up, remembering.

Because He rose, we stay. Because He rose, we sing. Because He rose, darkness cannot win.

🙏 Prayer

God of the imprisoned and the forgotten, Thank You for being present in the places most people avoid. When we feel confined by sorrow, by shame, by systems we cannot change—be our light. When we are tempted to run from suffering—teach us the power of presence. Help us remember those who are still waiting to be seen. Let our worship shake the foundations of injustice. Let our compassion unlock the doors of despair. And let Your resurrection power live in us, even here. Because You rose, we believe: chains can break, hope can rise, and darkness will not win. Amen.