Acts 16:34

he set meat(Greek, a table) before them He would not leave them a moment in the dungeon, but testify to them, how the dawning of faith had filled him with joy.

and rejoiced, believing in God with all his house The Greek adverb which is represented by the last four words in English would be better combined with the first verb, "and rejoiced with all his house." (So R. V.) The concluding verb gives the reason for the joy, and would be more fully rendered "having believed in God" or "having believed God." "To believe on the Lord Jesus" was the exhortation in Acts 16:31. By this later expression we understand what was implied in the first. The belief on Jesus is to believe what God has revealed concerning Him. This had been explained in "the word of the Lord" which they had heard the word which told how Jesus fulfilled all the prophecies, and by His acts on earth shewed that He was the Son of God.

It is scarcely possible to help being struck in this chapter with the account of the effect of the first preaching of the Gospel in Europe. We see at once its universality and its power. The first notable convert is Lydia, the Asiatic settler, a woman evidently of wealth, position and refinement; then the demoniac slave-girl is made an instrument of proclaiming the presence and power of the Most High God; and last, the Roman jailor, of a class, insensible as a rule and hardened by habit, and also disposed to despise the Jews who were the bearers of the message of the Gospel. The converts of Philippi were types and an earnest of how Christ's cause would make its way.