Roman citizenship afforded Paul and Silas certain legal protections that were ignored when they were stripped, beaten and put into prison. When they were released, the two could have left well enough alone. Their jail story would have still been a powerful testimony. But they used their privileges to confront the injustice done to them.
Now, I probably would have called it a blessing from God. Most of us who don't have a lot of social power know the feeling. If my prison walls suddenly collapsed, I would have thanked the Lord and made my way out. But Paul and Silas stayed put when it happened to them.
The next morning, the magistrates who had wrongfully imprisoned the pair decided they could leave. But Paul wasn't having it. The authorities shamed them publicly. And now they wanted to dismiss them quietly? "Certainly not!" Paul said.
Their potential jailbreak was a story about God's power. What happened the next day is an example of what we can do with God's power living within us. We can do more than escape harm and abuse. We can challenge it. We can challenge the power of the world around us.
Make no mistake. That power will almost never acknowledge its unjustness. Your best bet is to aim for a forced admission. Isn't that the satisfaction of the "You can't handle the truth!" scene from A Few Good Men? The powerful prefer silence and smooth getaways. They will avoid and cover up anything that might lead to scrutiny. 
We don't always have the power, energy or ideas to make wrongs right. But we can use what we have. Paul could have escaped his situation--God had freed him. But his willingness to stay provided an example for others to draw from. To deny Paul his citizenship would have been troublesome for the authorities. For Paul, to deny a public reckoning would be letting power have its way unchallenged.
Stay blessed...john | 
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