Choosing Our Master

Choosing Our Master Carefully

There is a story of Abraham Lincoln visiting a Southern slave market. Supposedly, Lincoln walked up to a young African girl on the auction block and looked her in the eye. She looked back in anger at her presumed purchaser. The future president did pay her price, and she reluctantly stepped off the stage. Lincoln tore up the ownership title and told the girl she was free. As he walked off, she followed. He turned and questioned what she was doing. She told him she was going with him because he freed her.

Whether this is an actual Lincoln story or not, it illustrates the principle of freedom we have in Christ because He paid our price. In the NT, slavery was a widespread phenomenon, very familiar to the Greeks, the Romans, and the Jewish people. In the ancient world, one became a slave by:

1) Being captured and conscripted during wartime

2) Being born to a slave mother

3) Selling or yielding yourself to another

Paul uses the slavery metaphor in Romans 6:16-18 in the sense of selling yourself out of desperation or being sold involuntarily. Hear the text:

16 Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness? 17 But God be thanked that though you were slaves of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. 18 And having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

We have submitted ourselves to a slave master and became enslaved to sin in its many manifestations. Whether we wanted to or not, we were serving the Evil One. But in Jesus Christ, we are set free and submit ourselves to obeying Christ as our King!

Satan is a master of illusion. He appears to give us freedom and says things like, “Follow your heart” and “Don’t endure the hardships of God’s commands. Follow me for freedom.” He deceived Adam and Eve in this manner when he asked Eve, “Did God really say you must not eat the fruit from any of the trees in the garden?” He went on to explain away God’s directives, offering them freedom from God and covertly ensnaring them in sin. He continues the process with us today.

Scripture teaches freedom is more than the freedom to choose; it is the freedom to choose to serve God. Choosing our master is critical. Notice how our early Christian leaders described themselves (emphasis added).

Romans 1:1 – Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God

2 Peter 1:1 – Simeon Peter, a slave and apostle of Jesus Christ

James 1:1 – James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ

Jude 1 – Jude, a servant of Jesus Christ

Let’s go further and listen to Paul’s description of a church leader in the first century. This is an example for our leaders. 2 Timothy 2:24-26 (NKJV):

24 And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, 25 in humility correcting those who are in opposition if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, 26 and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.

Compare your church leaders to how Paul describes a leader in the early church. He refers to a leader as the “Lord’s slave” and their work as that of helping lead to repentance of those who are trapped by Satan to do his will. Paul is using this familiar image of spiritual warfare, where people are being taken captive and forced into slavery against their will. The Kingdom of God is the opposite of what we typically experience. Here, in a remarkable reversal, the slaves of God are those who work to free the slaves of Satan from the snare of the devil.

Are your church leaders “slaves” or” dictators”? Are they tirelessly working for your freedom in Christ or protecting their image and power? You can tell by their actions. Suppose your church leaders’ primary role is to sit in a room making decisions instead of coming alongside you in your day-to-day challenges. In that case, you might have a conspiracy of dictatorial oligarchs instead of shepherds who “smell like sheep.”

Jesus referred to Himself as the Good Shepherd. Listen to His description of Himself and those leaders who imitate Him.

11“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep.

14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, 15 just as my Father knows me and I know the Father. So I sacrifice my life for the sheep.