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But the high priest rose up, and all who were with him (that is, the party of the Sadducees), and filled with jealousy they arrested the apostles and put them in the public prison. But during the night an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out, and said, “Go and stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this Life.”
– Acts 5:17-20 ESV

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The angel didn’t just release the apostles from prison, he gave them a charge to go and stand in the temple and speak all the gospel to everyone there.

Just like in Exodus, when God said, “Let my people go so that they may worship me”, God doesn’t just free people to do whatever they want. He gives them a mission. He frees us for the sake of his worship since he’s the only thing truly worth worshipping.

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I have not just been justified from my own sin by Christ’s righteousness to do whatever I want. That’s not freedom anyway, since “whatever I want” got me into the sinful mess in the first place. God did better than that. He has charged me with the message of the Life we’ve received through Christ.

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Lord, you’ve put me in a specific place in a specific time and given me a clear direction to tell everyone I can about the gospel. Please give me the courage to obey this. To disobey would be to fall back into my own “whatever I want” farse of freedom, which will enslave me all over again. Help me find true freedom in doing what you say empowered by your spirit to love others the way you’ve loved me.

This post is part of my Weekly REAP series. I’m posting these from my personal journal to share what God is teaching me, and to give some practical examples of the REAP method.  I didn’t write any of these with publishing in mind, so forgive me if they don’t always wax eloquent. Here is some more information on the REAP study method.