slavery...

I want to say right off the bat that I do NOT agree with slavery, although sometimes I feel like one thanks to my wife (just kidding). I asked our youth group this question in class last night, “Are you a slave?” and I let them answer without explaining where I was going with the lesson. Some said, “No,” and some said “Yes…to my parents.” One even asked me if it was a trick question. After they answered I asked them to give me a definition of a slave and the best one I got was “Anybody bound by a master.” So with this answer in mind the answer to the question above is YES, we are slaves! I’ll explain why I say that. Romans 6:16 says, “ 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?” You see, we are either a slave to sin, or a slave to righteousness. And if we are a slave to sin, well, then Satan is our master. If we are a slave to righteousness, then God is our master. Get it? Jesus said in Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” Yes, He is speaking about riches but the concept applies to our spiritual lives. We cannot live a life of sin and expect God to be our master. Light and darkness CANNOT dwell together! God is Light and in Him is no darkness (1 John 1:5)…Jesus is the Light of the world (John 8:12) and He shined in the darkness! Darkness is symbolic of sin in the Bible. Sin leads to death (Romans 6:23). Read Romans 6:15-20 for more on this and also check out http://www.biblegateway.com/ or http://www.studylight.org/ to do some research.. Yes, there are times when we do sin, even as Christians, but we do not live our lives in sin. There is a difference. We strive to live according to the scriptures on a daily basis. When we fall short of what God wants from us we have an advocate with the Father (1 John 2:1) and we can ask for forgiveness. If we live our lives on a daily basis not caring what God wants and we deliberately go against His will and live according to the flesh, then we cannot please God (Romans 8:6-16). Like it or not, we all are slaves, either to sin or to righteousness. By the way, when you see the word slave or servant in the New Testament, many times the word in the Greek language is “doulos” which means “a literal slave”. It is used 127 times in the King James and 141 times as such in the New American Standard. Maybe the question I should ask is, “Who is your master?” A slave for Christ…Randy