10:3,4
Immediately after telling the disciples to ask for the Father to send out workers Jesus commands the seventy two to go. Being servants of the Lord in the world is not a choice, it is obedience to the command of God. Yet so often in our Western mindset we see it as a “choice”, just as we see believing the gospel as a “choice” in the sense of it is “my choice”. No it isn’t! We need a change of mind, a renewal of our thinking (Rom 12:2). Now with our western thinking we might react against this, but actually it is liberating. For when we live with a “my choice” mindset we effectively make everything dependent upon ourselves and we are back in the fall in Eden. When we view life as being part of God’s plan, ultimately dependent upon Him and not on ourselves we become truly free.
And part of the reason why this is so important is that we sent out “as lambs among wolves”. For a long time we have been so fortunate in the West in that we have had a Christian culture which has been broadly favourable to Christianity. Now things are changing and our societies increasingly view Christianity with suspicion and consider many Christian views to be wrong or even criminal. This is the situation that is perfectly normal for many of our Christian brothers and sisters throughout the world, and has been so throughout history. But we have not chosen to go out as sheep among wolves, we have been sent out by the Lord as sheep among wolves. There is a crucial difference, we have absolute security in the Lord.
As before (Luke 9:3) they were to travel light, they were also not to greet anyone on the road. Ie their mission was urgent, and they had to be focused.
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