Abolishing Slavery from the Inside Out

Well, let me invite you to turn in your Bibles to 1 Timothy chapter 6. 1 Timothy chapter 6. we are coming back, this morning to our series to the book of First Timothy. We're, over the last, I don't know, year and a half, we've been, working our way through this book, a verse at a time and breaking it down phrase by phrase and seeing what God wants to teach us and what God wants to talk about and whatever comes next, that's what we talk about because if God wants to talk about it, then We want to hear from, from him regarding everything he says in this book.

And as we continue in our study of this book, we come this morning to 1 Timothy chapter 6 verse 1 and verses 1 and 2 serve as a section, and that's the section we arrive at. Today. Now, we are not today going to do a full exposition of these two verses, for reasons that I will explain to you. The next sermon on 1 Timothy, we will work phrase by phrase through verses one and two and learn some lessons from these two verses about, lessons that we could apply to our role as employees serving our employers in, in the workplace.

but I don't feel like we're really able to do that yet, today because there is an ethical, thorny ethical issue that arises when we come to passages like verses one and two. and this morning I want to try to address that ethical, issue. And if you want to give a title to the message this morning, it would be abolishing slavery from the Inside Out. Abolishing slavery from the inside out.

Obviously, this morning, what we're going to be talking about is the subject of human slavery. Let me read verses one and two. to you, and if you have a copy of the Bible, please follow along with me. If you don't have a copy of the Bible, you can find the words on the screen, behind me.

Paul says this, all who are under the yoke as slaves are to regard their own masters as worthy of all honor, so that the name of God and our doctrine will not be spoken against. Those who have believers as their masters must not be disrespectful to them because they are brethren, but must serve them all the more because those who partake of the benefit are believers and beloved. Teach and preach. These principles.

When you look at verse one, guys, you see the word slaves, and that is a translation of the Greek word that means slave. If your translation says slave, that is the right translation of it. And in verse two, we have the word masters, which is a translation of the Greek word despotes from which we get our English word despot, and that is one of the words that was used in the first century to speak of a master over slaves, a holder. of slaves.

And again, we're not going to break these two verses down, but all I want to do today is just make a few observations from this passage and then we will launch from there to the broader topic at hand. Anyone looking at these two verses would be able to observe these things. Number 1, obviously there were slaves in the Ephesian Church, right? Otherwise, Paul would not tell Timothy, who was serving as a pastor over the Ephesian Church, he would not tell Timothy how to direct slaves if there were not in fact slaves who were members.

Of the Ephesian congregation. We, we shouldn't be surprised at this. There were almost 60 million slaves in the Roman Empire during the first century. And history tells us that about a third of the population of Rome About a third of the population of the city of Corinth, about a third of the population of the city of Ephesus, were slaves.

And so if that demographic held true for the Ephesian congregation, 1 out of every 3 members of the Ephesian church would have been a slave. So obviously there were slaves in the Ephesian church who were under the yoke. As slaves. But another observation that we can make that may surprise some is that obviously from verse two, there were slaveholders in the Ephesian Church.

There were believers that Paul describes as believers, brothers, and beloved who were holders of slaves. They were despots, they were masters over the slaves that, that, that they owned essentially and perhaps even more surprising to some is, and by the way, let me show you this in verse two, those who have believers as their masters. So it's obvious then that there were believers in the Ephesian Church that, that had slaves. More surprising to some may be the third observation, and that is that in this passage, Paul says nothing against the institution of slavery itself.

There's not a whisper of negativity in terms of, Paul speaking against slavery. There's a slight hint in verse one when he says, all who are under the yoke. And that expression under the yoke often did convey someone in circumstances that they might not rather be in, but I don't want to press that too far. The point is that we would observe in these two verses that Paul doesn't take the opportunity to Speak out against the institution of slavery.

And 1/4 observation is that in this passage, Paul doesn't rebuke Christian slaveholders for having slaves. He says, Timothy, here's the counsel I want you to give to slaves. who have unsaved masters and who have saved masters who are believers, but nowhere does he even tell Timothy to give any counsel to the Christian masters, and nowhere is there any instruction to Timothy to rebuke the masters who were believers of, slaves. And when we come to a passage like this, where the topic is handled in this way, it always raises a series of questions.

Here are three of them. Why didn't Paul rebuke Christian masters for having slaves? He has the opportunity. Come on, Paul, this is your chance to, to rebuke them for being slaveholders.

Also, why didn't Paul condemn slavery when he had the chance? Here's the topic of slavery. And if the institution of slavery is evil, then Paul, why don't you condemn slavery now that the topic has come up? And backing away from maybe how Paul addresses the subject in his various epistles, it raises the broader question and that is why does the Bible not outright condemn the institution of human, slavery.

The Bible actually has much to say by way of regulating slavery, both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, but nowhere is there an outright condemnation of the institution of slavery. Now, these are questions that even believers studying the Bible might ask themselves as they're studying a passage like what we're looking at here in 1 Timothy 6:1-2. But I'm sure many of you are aware that non-Christians who are antagonistic to Christianity and antagonistic to the Bible, they seize upon opportunities like this to find fault with the Bible, and they ask the same questions with the intention of trying to expose the Bible as an untrustworthy book that we should not trust and follow today.

In fact, listen to what one writer says.

that I came across about 4 years ago. He says, why didn't God tell his people, thou shalt not own, buy, sell, or trade slaves and say it as often as he needed to. Why was God not clear about this in the Bible? Nothing in Christian theology remedies the appalling deficiencies of the Bible on what is perhaps the greatest and the easiest moral question our society has ever had.

to face. That's a charge that he's leveling against our God and against the book, the inspired book that we live our lives being guided by. And he says, nowhere does God condemn slavery. This should seem like a no brainer.

But nowhere does this happen in the Bible. And then he makes this statement that nothing else in the Bible, nothing else in Christian theology, remedies the appalling deficiencies. Of the Bible on this particular subject. Well, I disagree with him.

And I don't believe he's really read all that the Bible. Say, especially on the subject of slavery, but I would like to take our time this morning to address this subject and, in terms of how the Bible approaches the subject of slavery, and here's how we'll structure the message from this point on. I want to, I want to give you six suggestions to help you appreciate the Bible's approach to the institution of human. slavery.

This will not be exhaustive, but just 6 things that I would offer to you to think about, to ponder, to study further that I think will actually help you by the time we're done this morning to really appreciate how the Bible does handle, slavery. Yes, indeed, the Bible does not condemn slavery anywhere, but it handles it, I believe, quite well. as is typical of God, our Creator. so 6 suggestions to help you appreciate the Bible's approach to slavery.

And the first of those suggestions is not really a point from the Bible. As much as from history, and that is you need to be careful to remember that there is a difference between American slavery that we have in our own history and the slavery as it existed in Paul's day. We have to be careful, guys, when we're reading the Bible to not, to not project our own recent history upon something that was written 1900 years ago. we have our own history here in the United States and And we had an institution of slavery here, that was, by all accounts evil and abusive, but we need to be careful to not automatically read all of that back into the slavery of Bible times to where when Paul uses the word slave and master that we automatically think that he's condoning or even supporting the institution of slavery as it existed in our recent history.

In fact, consider the contrast. I'm gonna give you guys a bunch of information here and I'll try to do this quickly. Consider the contrast between American slavery and slavery in Paul's day. this is from Timothy Keller in his book The Reason for God.

American slavery, he says, was systematically and homogeneously brutal. It was a slavery in which the slave's whole person was the property of the master. He or she could be raped or maimed or killed at the will of the owner, and that often happened. A master could murder his slave and there would be no legal consequences to that.

African slavery was race-based. It was racist, race-based, and its default mode was slavery for life. Also, the African slave trade was begun and resourced through kidnapping. So if you want to make a list by way of identifying what slavery was in American history, you can make this list.

It was abusive or brutal, as Keller says, and that brutality was, was condoned. It was also race-based. A particular race was targeted for slavery. So it, it embodied this view of another ethnicity as being inferior.

to other races and that they are to be subjected to slavery, whereas other races are not. And also, the institution of American slavery was resourced through the institution of the stealing of human beings, through kidnapping. So that's slavery as it existed, not only in the United States but also in Great Britain and in other countries in the 18th and 19th centuries. However, slavery in Paul's day.

was a little different. Listen to what Timothy Keller says. He says when the New Testament was written, there was not a great difference between slaves and the average free person. Slaves were not distinguishable from others by race, speech, or clothing.

They looked and lived like most everyone else and were not segregated from the rest of society in any way. From a financial. standpoint, slaves made the same wages as free laborers and therefore were not usually poor. Also, slaves could accrue enough capital to buy themselves out.

Most important of all, very few slaves were slaves for life. Most could reasonably hope to be manumitted or freed within 10 or 15 years or by their late 30s. At the latest. in fact, history tells us that slavery in the Roman Empire was actually beginning to wane by the first century.

Partly through the, there were three major slave revolts, the last of which occurred in like 73 to 71 BC led by a guy named Spartacus. You heard of him? And after that revolt, masters started looking at their slaves a little differently, and they started actually being more careful in their treatment of their, their slaves. Those revolts began to get into the psyche of, of the Romans and began to affect not only the way they just on their own, of their own volition treated their slaves, but even, some of the legislation that came to pass.

In terms of just what was happening in slavery, during this time period, listen to this fact by Kent Hughes, in his commentary, slave owners were releasing slaves at such a rate that Augustus Caesar Intro introduced legal restrictions to curb the trend. Despite this, almost 50% of slaves were freed before the age of 30 anyway. So masters were letting their slaves go. And so much so and so quickly that the emperor of Rome was like, Man, we've got to put some restrictions to slow this, this flow of slaves from slavery to freedom.

But even still, he could only restrict it to a place where 50% basically of slaves were freed by the age of 30. The Emperor Claudius, about 15-20 years before First Timothy was written, passed a law that was to govern the way that masters treated their slaves, especially those that were old or those that were sick. centuries earlier, if a master had a slave that became so old that really wasn't very valuable or became sick and wasn't getting any better, a master could, he could legally kill his slave because the slave was merely his property, a tool that he could do whatever he wanted with.

But by the first century, that's not the way that masters viewed.

their slaves and treated their slaves by and large, and even the emperor of Rome passed a law saying if you have a slave, you need to take care of that slave, even when that slave is old or when he's sick and he's not going to get any better. You are responsible to take care of him. And if you euthanize that slave in those conditions, you are guilty under Roman law of murder. Also, some other quick facts about slavery in Paul's day is slaves could own property, including other slaves.

It actually often happened that a slave owned other slaves who worked for him. Slaves in the first century and even before could invest money and become quite rich. In fact, that actually created something of a scandal amongst the old money people in. in the Roman Empire, a lot of slaves were making a whole lot of money and saving that money up and then purchasing their own freedom and going on and making a lot more money.

And there were slaves who were reach, former slaves that were reaching the upper class, and the old upper class didn't like all of these ex-slaves doing so well. It was not uncommon to see a slave who was essentially, the CEO of a business enterprise or even a government official, many slaves live separately from their masters, just like many of us live separately from our places of employment, and then they each day would go to where it was that they would be employed by their master.

And the net effect was this. Listen to what Timothy Keller says.

Often, only the slaves' productivity, their time and skills were owned by the master and usually only temporarily. That's beginning to sound a lot like the employee-employer relationship. When someone signs a contract, when they get a new job, they're basically saying for 40 hours a week from this time to this time, I will give you my time, I will give you my energy, I will give you my skills. in whatever ways that you would have me to serve, your purposes, and often the net effect is that's basically what the setup was for many of the slaves in the Roman Empire.

Real quickly, one writer says selling oneself into slavery was commonly used as a means of gaining Roman citizenship and gaining entrance into society. In other words, it was a step up. You may be surprised to know that being a slave in the Roman Empire in the 1st century was not the lowest position. on the social ladder to be a day laborer was the lowest position.

the people that stood on the street corners and hoping someone would come by who needed them to do some work so they can make a little bit of money that day. to be able to have food for themselves and for their family. That was a very insecure lifestyle. They lived from day to day, hand to mouth, and there were many people in such a situation, they're technically free.

Who would then give themselves to someone as a slave for a period of 10 years or so where they would have security and shelter would be provided for them, food and, and provision and clothing would be provided for them. And so there were many who became slaves who were free but willingly became slaves as a way of stepping up the social ladder and stepping into Roman society. Now, I want to be careful to say that all of these things being true, I think we can clearly see that the institution of American slavery was a little different than slavery as it existed in Paul's day, right?

That doesn't mean that there were no abuses in first century slavery, but there were also abuses.

that happened amongst free people abusing and injuring other free people. There were abuses everywhere and some of those abuses showed up. inside the institution of first century Roman slavery also, but I give you this information to just help that when you read 1 Timothy 6:1-2, that this is basically the environment that Paul is writing in. This is what slavery often looked like for most of his readers.

Of a book like First Timothy or Ephesians or some of his other epistles where he addresses slaves and masters directly. All right? So if you want to appreciate how the Bible handles slavery, first of all, just understand that slavery as we know it in our recent history is not exactly the same thing as slavery as it existed during the time that Paul was writing. A second suggestion that I would give to you.

Is this to observe how the Bible would categorically condemn resourcing slavery through the sin of kidnapping. I firmly believe that if Paul were living in the 1800s, 1820s for example, and he were writing a letter to the, to a Christian church in America, he would speak differently about what was going on. He would speak differently to masters and to Slaves than he does in the various epistles in the New Testament. He would address concerns like this because the institution of slavery in America was based on the theft of human beings, stealing people via kidnapping.

In fact, look at what God says here in Exodus 21:18. It says, He who kidnaps a man, and by the way, you might want to make a note, that word kidnaps, the, the, the Hebrew word that is translated kidnaps is the Hebrew word for steal. It's exactly the same word that shows up in Exodus 20:15 when God says you shall not steal in the 10 Commandments, OK? There are actually some writers, I don't necessarily agree with them, that actually believe that when God in the 10 Commandments says you shall not steal, the primary thing in God's mind was you shall not steal human beings.

And again, I don't necessarily agree with that, but certainly it would include that God in giving that command is saying more than, you shall not take coins from your mom's purse. yeah, don't do that. But of all the things that God is prohibiting in that command, one of the things that he is prohibiting is you shall not steal another human being. You shall not kidnap another human being and take him away from his wife, and from his children, and from his culture.

In fact, look at this. God says if you do this, if you steal another human being, he doesn't just say you're gonna have to pay a fine or get a slap on the wrist. He says, he who steals a man, whether he sells him or is found in his possession, and by the way, back in this day, anytime anyone stole a human being, it was for the purpose of enslavement. Either enslaving him for one's own benefit or selling him to another for the purpose of enslavement to another.

He who steals a man, whether he sells him for slavery, or is found in his own possession as a slave, that man who stole that person shall surely, absolutely be put to death. You die. For this theft. If you look in the context of Exodus 21, you observe that God is giving a series of sins or crimes that are equated with the sin of murder, like cursing one's parents, striking one's parents, and there's a number of sins there that get the death penalty.

and this is one of them, and God is saying, you steal a human being, what you have done is tantamount to murder. Because you steal a man away from his wife and from his children, and take that man 200 miles away, forever away from his family, you have just turned that woman into a widow, and those children into orphans who will never see their father again. You have just killed a husband, de facto, and a father, de facto. God says, this is, this is an act of murder.

It's not just a small sin. This is equated with the sin of murder, and you shall die for this stealing of human beings. And the institution of slavery in America was, was resourced by this theft. of human life, hundreds of thousands of people.

were stolen from their homeland. And the whole industry of slavery was built upon it. This is one of the darkest evils in our nation's history. There's a third suggestion I would give to you if you want to appreciate the Bible's approach to slavery, and that is observe how the Bible prohibits the physical and verbal abuse of slaves.

The Bible provides protection for, slaves. Look at this in Exodus 21, verse 28. God says this, if a man, I'm sorry, verse 26, if a man strikes the eye of his slave and destroys or injures it, he shall let him go free on account of his eye. And if he knocks out a tooth of his slave, he shall let him go free on account of his tooth.

That's an amazing provision that's in the Old Testament law. If you strike your slave and use so much as cause him to lose one tooth, You are no longer a master to that slave. That slave goes free. Over just the tooth.

And over an eye. And by the way, God is not trying to say here, I've written the law this way because there's just something about the eye that I really treasure and the tooth that is valuable to me. You can damage a slave in any other way, but don't mess with his teeth and leave his eyes alone. That's not what God is trying to indicate here.

He's citing the eye and the tooth as a representative sampling. that represents all injury to the body of one slave, and God says, you're not allowed. I absolutely prohibit you from abusing your slaves in any way. And if you do, That slave automatically goes free.

And then even beyond that, the New Testament says to masters in Ephesians 6:9, masters, stop threatening. So not only does God prohibit masters from physically abusing their slaves in any way, but even forbids masters from verbally intimidating or threatening any injury in any way, shape or form to their slaves. And Paul is saying, if you are a master in the Ephesian Church and you are doing this in any way, my command to you is to stop. Don't abuse your slaves and don't even use the threat.

Of abuse to intimidate your slaves in any way, shape or form. So if you want to appreciate how the Bible handles the issue of slavery, observe how the Bible prohibits the physical and verbal abuse of slaves. There's 1/4 suggestion that I would offer to you, and that is to understand that social institutions like slavery are not the primary problem. The human heart is.

I'm not saying institutions are not a problem. I'm just saying that they're not the primary problem. The primary problem is the human heart. Jesus says from within, out of the heart of man proceed evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.

All these things proceed from within. The message of Hollywood. is follow your heart. Jesus says, if you follow your heart, it will lead you straight to hell, it will lead you into sin.

It's out of the heart of man, that all of this wickedness comes. We are defiled because of the sin and the wickedness that is in our hearts. And you take unredeemed men and women, and you put them with the this heart in any institution, good or bad, and they'll corrupt it. I love what John MacArthur says.

He says human systems are never the root cause of human problems. The issue is always the heart of man, which when wicked will corrupt the best of systems and will find ways to oppress others regardless of whether or not there is actual slavery. Throughout history, including in our own day, working people have been oppressed and abused by economic intimidation that amounts to virtual slavery regardless of the particular economic, social, or political system. Isn't that true?

we live in a society that is largely, not entirely, but largely capitalistic. Are there abuses? Is there oppression? Within Our capitalistic system?

Yes. Do we then say with Michael Moore, aha. It's because capitalism as an institution is evil. And it should be replaced.

That's what many would say. When capitalism by itself is not evil, but people who are inside of a capitalistic system, they have fallen human hearts that are sinful. And there's greed and selfishness. And so the solution of some is, well, the institution of capitalism is evil, so we need to replace it with socialism.

We need to redistribute wealth and in redistributing wealth, who's going to do that? Well, the government. So we will give the money to the government and let them wisely distribute wealth to those to whom it needs to go. What's the problem with that?

The problem with that is that those who are in government are human beings also who have the same heart problem. So capitalism by itself is not the cure-all for evils, and neither is socialism the cure-all for evils. The thing that makes both of those systems flawed is the people that populate them who have a heart problem. And even with evil institutions, we need to realize that though those institutions are often a problem, and we need to speak against them.

And if we live in a society that accommodates our voice, let's speak out and try to get laws changed. But even as we do that, understand that the passing of laws, while valuable, does not change hearts. The passing of a law has never changed a heart. guys like William Wilberforce and John Newton and others, they fought so hard, decades-long battles.

Through many ups and downs to get the slave trade abolished, and finally they succeeded in that endeavor in 1807. The slave trade became outlawed and basically the law said you are not allowed to do slave trading anymore and the law said if you do and we catch you. And we catch any slave that you're transporting, you will have to pay a fine of £100 per slave that is discovered. Well, did that law stop the slave trade in Great Britain?

Sadly, no. Many slave traders continued doing what they were doing, thinking it's a big ocean out there. The likelihood of us getting caught is not very high, and we know from the records that a lot of slave captains, what they did. is they just continued with the slave trade, transporting slaves, sometimes 600 on a ship in really deplorable conditions.

And if they saw a British naval vessel approaching and they knew we're busted, what slave traders would do is they're thinking, I don't want to pay a $100 or 100 pound fine for each slave. So they had the slaves thrown overboard and drowned in the sea before the naval vessel arrived to them. In order to avoid having to pay that fee, see, a great law which represented a great stride forward was passed, but human hearts did not change. Slavery in America was outlawed near the latter part of the Civil War.

and that was a grace from God that he granted that grace and wisdom towards the passing of that law, but unfortunately, as great as it was, it didn't change hearts. Martin Luther King Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial 100 years later, and he said these words, 100 years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. 100 years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land.

Because the message of a lot of white people In writing and verbally was you may be free, but you will never be equal. And so abuse continued, sins against African Americans continued to be tolerated. Through the efforts of men like Martin Luther King Jr. and others, another stride forward occurred with the passing of the Civil Rights Act, but we all know that even that as great as that was, and the protection that it legitimately provided for many, it by itself does not change hearts.

There's still racism. And prejudice that continues on all sides. Something needs to address the heart problem. And so we just need to be aware that while we want to use the energy and the voice God gives us, To push for the changing of laws that we believe are wrong.

We know to not put all of our eggs in that basket. Because we realize that laws once passed could be undone. And the real problem is the heart, and laws cannot change the heart, and I feel sorry for people that give their lives wholeheartedly to politics, and they fight sometimes noble battles to get a law passed, and they finally succeed. And then another president comes on the scene a few years later who with a stroke of his pen.

Erases the previous executive order, replaces it with his own executive order that completely undoes what people fought for a few years earlier. And what would one think who put all their energy into the passing of a law to see it undone by the next Congress or the next president. Yes, let's, let's, let's address social evils and institutions of evil in our culture, and if we can be used by God to help change laws for the betterment of our country, then let's do that. But let's understand that laws by themselves do not change human hearts and that social institutions are not the primary problem.

The primary problem is the human heart. The Bible teaches us this. There's a 5th suggestion I would give to you guys to help you to appreciate how the Bible approaches the issue of slavery, and, and that is this, to observe how Paul plants inside the hearts of slaves and masters, the seeds of slavery's ultimate demise, at least in Western culture. Observe how Paul plants inside the hearts of slaves and masters the seeds of slavery's ultimate demise.

You got a big tree in your front yard, how are you going to get rid of it? Well, you can take an ax to it and try to chop it down, or somehow you inject something into the tree that over a year or two kills it from the inside and it's easy to take down. It dies from the inside. That's Paul's approach.

The latter approach. He injects seeds into the institution of slavery. He literally comes inside the institution of slavery in his epistles, and he goes to slaves and he says, I have some seeds I want to plant in your heart. And then he goes to masters and he says, I have some seeds I want to plant in your heart.

And then Paul backed away and let those seeds bear fruit and do their work. Look at this, we see this in Ephesians 6. This is the same church that Timothy is pastoring. This was written about 4 years prior to the writing of First Timothy, as Paul writes to the Ephesians in Ephesians chapter 6.

He comes to slaves and says, here's some things I want to say to you. Here's some things I want to plant in your heart. I love this. He says, slaves be obedient to those who are your masters as to Christ, not by way of eye service as men pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart with good will, render service as to the Lord and not to men.

He's saying, what, don't serve your master because legally you have to. Don't serve your master because your master forces you to serve your master willingly, happily from the heart, voluntarily, serve your master the way that you would serve Jesus Christ. Verse 8, knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free. You're going to get paid a handsome sum.

Paul says, by the Lord, who ultimately is your master, when you stand before him at the judgment. So he comes to slaves and says, here's what I want to plant in your heart. Jesus is really your master. Yeah, legally you got an earthly master, but ultimately your real master, you're really owned by Jesus.

And this master tells you to serve your earthly master voluntarily and from the heart and to treat your master the way that you would treat Jesus. See, just those seeds planted in the heart of a slave, a Christian slave, abolishes slavery from the heart of that person. Because a master comes to a Christian like this and says, I'm gonna force you to serve me. And this Christian slave says, actually, you will not force me to serve you.

I'm gonna serve you because I want to. Voluntarily. I will serve you happily from my heart. I'm going to serve you the way that I would serve Jesus.

Instantly that slave is liberated from the institution of slavery in his heart. And he serves his master in obedience to his heavenly master. And then Paul comes to masters and says, Here, let me plant some seeds inside your heart to Christian masters. He says, and masters do the same things to them, your slaves.

That's an amazing thing. Just like I've told your slaves to serve you as they would Jesus, I'm commanding you to serve your slaves the way that you would serve Jesus. Treat them the way that you would treat Jesus, give up threatening you are not to abuse them, or even verbally threatened to abuse them in any way, shape or form, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven. Hey, Master, you actually are a slave.

And your master is Jesus, and he's the same master of the one whom you call a slave. You both are servants. You're both servants of the same master. And there is no partiality with God.

In other words, you're equal before God. God doesn't give you any higher standing before him. than he does your slave. So Paul plants these seeds.

He says the masters, you and your slaves have the same master, that's Jesus. You and your slaves are equals before God. You will be judged by Christ for how you treat your slaves. So serve your slaves as if you're serving Christ.

When you look into the eyes of your slaves, Realize, I want you to look at it this way, you're looking into the eyes of Jesus, and how would you treat Jesus? Let that be your guide and how you treat your slaves. Instantly in the heart of this such a master who would embrace this. The institution of slavery dies in his heart.

In fact, we have indication that there were masters who did exactly this to such a degree that if you look in 1 Timothy 6:2. We have indication that, here's this master being so loving towards his Christian slave as if he's an equal before God and being a brother to the slave, that masters were doing this so effectively that the Christian slave started getting overly familiar and say, yeah, you're a brother in the Lord, and yeah, he'll give me allowances and, he'll let me get by with stuff, and, and they began to serve their Christian masters with less passion.

Because their Christian masters were being so brotherly towards them, and Paul has to say, whoa, wait a minute, you Christian slaves, you that have a Christian master. Yes, your master is being all of this way, he's being brotherly towards you and loving towards you and treating you as an equal, but you need to show respect.

And actually, you need to serve your Christian master with even more fervor than you would if he were a nonbeliever, because he's beloved, and he's a believer in God. So Paul plants these seeds in the hearts of slaves, Christian slaves and masters, and after planting those seeds and those seeds bear fruit, it radically alters the nature of the relationship between the Christian master and slave. Once those seeds are planted, In the hearts of enough people, the institution of slavery will not endure forever.

It will give way to this new gospel ethic, and that leads to the 6th suggestion I would give to you if you want to appreciate the way the Bible approaches slavery, and that is understand that the gospel is specifically designed to abolish the institution of slavery inside of human hearts.

That's where it needs to die first, right? It's got to die in the human heart first. And the Bible or the Gospel teaches us that Jesus Christ died on the cross not only to obliterate the hostility between us and God and reconcile us to God, but he also died on the cross, according to Ephesians, to obliterate the distinctions, the ethnic distinctions, the social. distinctions that once divided us outside of Christ, and he has brought us together in himself.

And we are brothers and sisters in the family of God, equal to one another. And that's what we see when we look at each other. We see brothers, we see sisters, we see Jesus, and that eliminates those old distinctions that the institution of slavery fed off of, and would thrive off of. Colossians 3, Paul says, To Christians, he says, I want you guys to be careful how you speak to one another, be loving in your speech towards one another, lay aside all the bad stuff that you guys used to say to one another, and put on the new self which is being renewed.

And then he says, a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jews, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian and scythian slave and free man. But Christ is all and in all. In Galatians 3:28, in the midst of gospel truth, Paul says the upshot of this is that in terms of enjoying salvation privileges and equal access and sonship before God the Father, there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free man. There is neither male nor female, for you are all one.

In Christ. What the gospel does is it kills the institution of slavery inside the human heart. And that's where it must begin. Let us speak out against unjust laws.

Let's speak out against social nationwide oppression as we see it. And if we succeed in changing laws, then, then that's, that's great. But let us realize that what our society needs most is not changed laws as much as it needs the gospel of Jesus Christ. You want to impact this culture?

You want evil institutions to crumble, at least in the lives of people that you have influence upon, preach the gospel, live the gospel, be a living embodiment of the gospel, and you will see hearts change. Let me just say this and we'll, we'll close. John Newton wrote Amazing Grace, right? Many of that John Newton was the captain of a slave ship.

He was a slave trader and spent years doing that. In 1748 he thought he was converted, but then in 1750 he said, no, it's now that I'm really converted. and, but what a lot of people don't know is that after being converted, he continued as a captain of slave ships for 4 years. He continued in the slave trade for 4 years as a believer.

But he says as he did this over that 4 year period, he began to, there developed within his heart this growing sympathy and understanding for the plight of the slaves that were on his ship. He came down with a serious illness and ended up quitting the slave trade altogether as a result of that illness. And years later, Listen to what he wrote. He wrote a pamphlet called Thoughts on the Slave Trade.

Here's the work God had done in his heart. He says it will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me that I was once an active instrument in a business at which my heart. Now shutters. Wow.

Something happened to his heart. Law didn't change his heart. A law being passed, didn't change his heart. But Jesus came into his life, the Spirit came into his heart, the gospel came into his life and began to do a work.

It began to produce fruit and reshape his heart to where years later, Newton found his heart shuddering at things that years earlier, he didn't think twice about. His heart was changed. That's the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. There's so much more we can say, but what guys, that's what I appreciate about.

the ministry of the pregnancy resource center that we're focusing on in the month of, of April. I, I'm sure they would love at this ministry center to see laws regarding abortion changed. maybe that day will come, but in the meantime, what they're all about. They're all about sharing the love of Jesus, the gospel of Jesus Christ with women, with unwanted pregnancies and the men and their lives.

And just last year, over 150 individuals, this ministry was able to lead to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Gospel seeds are being planted. And hearts are being changed. That is the primary and the most powerful weapon that we use in our assault on institutions of evil in the lives of people and that exist in our culture.

Well, let me ask you to bow your heads. We're going to forego the closing song because we're out of time. I'm going to have our ushers get ready for the offering. We're going to give you an opportunity to give, Of your offerings to the Lord as the Lord leads you to give.

And let's, let's pray together. God, we, we stand in awe of the beauty of your word. I, I, I stand in awe of the power of the message of the cross to bring transformation, to tear down strongholds. what, the gospel bears fruit, it gives life, it transformed, but the gospel also ruins things.

It ruins things like slavery. It ruins strongholds in the lives of people. It ruins strongholds of guilt. It ruins strongholds of of sin and addictions in the lives of people.

It ruins bondage. It's a destroyer of these things. And may we allow the gospel to be fully wielded in our own lives. That our hearts may be changed.

That it would root out any prejudice in us, any arrogance, superiority in us. And change us and may we be a living embodiment of this gospel to others and speak it to others and plant these gospel seeds in the hearts of others, Lord, that lives may be changed. Souls may be delivered through the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Thank you for these things we've learned from your word, Lord, and we thank you for the opportunity to give of our offerings to you.

Receive these funds that we give and do much with them for the glory of Jesus Christ. OK. We ask all of these things, Lord, in the name of Jesus. And all God's people said, A in While the offerings being, taken up,