Sold Into Slavery - Part 5 Series

The Body Beautiful

Part 5

Sold into Slavery

Today we conclude

This series called

The Body Beautiful

If you have missed any of this series

You need to get the CD and study this series

The conclusion of this series

Amazed me

I didn’t expect the Holy Spirit

To take us to this topic

In today’s world,

Just the word I’m about to say

can cause people to put up defenses

The word for today’s conclusion

To the Body Beautiful is

Slave

Slave” is the word

that almost every English translation of Scripture

has avoided using,

in favor of the term “servant.”

However, the image of a slave

is absolutely critical

for understanding what it means to follow Jesus

as a part of the Body Beautiful

This study has elevated my understanding

of what it means to say Jesus is Lord

and what it means

When I say I am His

Those of us who truly believe

and are genuinely converted

and have at least a understand of the gospel,

can understand

being a slave

and yet becoming a friend

a son

a citizen

and a joint heir

with him –

this is a strange concept

especially to Americans

But it is a new way to understand slavery,

not in terms of the

Abusive African slave trade

but in terms of

being owned by a master

who loves me and wants to provide

everything in his limitless resources

out of that love

to make my life eternally joyful.

This type of slavery

Is easily embraceable

If we could only believe it to be true

2 Corinthians 4:5

“For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants [slaves] for Jesus’ sake.

Being a slave conjures up very negative images …

and for good reason.

Humans have enslaved each other

for thousands of years

treating people worse than animals

No person desires to be

That type of slave

And no person deserves to be treated that way

However,

the Bible speaks about Christians,

as being “slaves” of Christ.

If there is anything in the Bible

that makes this progressive world cringe

its slavery.

In the Old Testament

Slavery is humanely regulated

Through the legal system

and in the New Testament

slave masters are exhorted

to show kindness to their slaves

But listen, nowhere in the Bible

is there anything

which can be interpreted as

a disapproval of slavery.

People of our generation,

Christians included,

tend to have a very hard time with the idea

of God not considering slavery to be immoral.

Part of the problem

is that we have false ideas

about what slavery was like.

Society today has

minds which are brainwashed

by means of Television

In the Old and New Testament times,

The life of a slave was not easy,

but we get an exaggerated idea

of the hardships of slavery

from watching movies

or even by reading historical material

that is written to distort the truths of the time

In most cases

the life of a slave

was not much different

from the life of any lower-class worker.

Those who have been in the military

have experienced something like it

by being legally bound to an employer

and to a job

that one cannot simply “quit” at will,

not free to leave without permission,

subject to discipline if you disobey

And yet we know

that the daily life of a good soldier

is not cruel or especially hard.

This is kind of what it was like to be a slave.

Another problem is,

when we discuss slavery

we have a tendency to relate it

to the horrible manner in which

The black race in America,

Was treated –

And we then confuse slavery with racism

A third reason

why Christians today

have a hard time understanding

the Bible’s treatment of slavery

is that we tend to confuse morality

with political values.

Today everything is politicized

including the Gospel.

In this era of political correctness

“Racism,” “sexism,” “homophobia,”

are the really serious sins

while the principles of ordinary

old-fashioned morality

are downplayed and even denied.

This political correctness

is not merely a fad,

it is a planned result of

the politicization of morality,

a new morality

based upon political ideas of right and wrong.

In recent years the principle of equality

has been raised to the status

of a Religious Doctrine in liberal churches.

This is illustrated

by the following statement

made by an Episcopal bishop

following his church’s decision

to appoint a homosexual bishop

The “Right Reverend” John Bryson Chane

Said this:

When I look at where gay, lesbian, and transgender persons are, they have been excluded from the full sacramental life of the Episcopal Church in the United States — and, in fact, excluded from the full sacramental life pretty much within the Anglican Communion. What I have to say to that is if, in fact, we believe theologically that God created human beings in the good image of God as creator, and if we, in fact, believe that everybody is equal in God’s eyes, then how in God’s name can we say that we don’t have enough theology to work this issue through? And how can we say that a person’s sexuality does not allow them to enter into the full life of this communion? (2)