Human Doing or Human Being?

I listened to a sermon the other day and the pastor said that we are called to be slaves. We have a hard time with that slave/master mentality in our culture. Still, I'd rather have the church full of slaves of Jesus Christ, than full of people pleasers or the "It's all about me" crowd.

Think you're not part of those two crowds?

As Christians, we often confuse serving the Lord with "doing for the Lord." The word servant comes from bond-servant as seen in Romans 1:1, which says, "Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the Gospel of God."

Bond-servant derives from the word slave, which means "to bind." Believers who volunteer to be servants of Christ willingly renounce their rights and their personal will. They vow to do only the will of God. So, then, although they have a RIGHT to do something... Paul said everything is lawful, but not all things are expedient, we lay aside that RIGHT when we choose to be a bond-servant of Jesus Christ.

This is one way servants of Christ are bound to Him, and they are also bound to the Lord’s care because He promises to care for His servants. By definition of the word servant, service cannot be a substitute for submission. Pure service to the Lord is motivated by submission to His will–and nothing else.

And so, we don't work for the Lord to pay Him back... truth is, He paid the debt and we can never repay it. But, we bow to HIS will and we let HIM make the decisions and lead the way. In the same way a cat or dog will roll over and expose his belly to the master, we roll over and, in trust, allow HIS way to dominate us.

On the outside, service can look like we are doing good to earn brownie points. It is the motive that matters to God. Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.

Being a slave is never easy. Choosing slavery. Well, that's absurd, isn't it. And yet, there it is in black and white in that book you are reading. The manual for Christianity. The Bible. Amen.