Slaves And Masters, Part 3 (Ephesians 6:5-9)

Introduction

A. Preliminaries

Welcome: Please turn with me in your Bibles to the sixth Chapter of Ephesians, beginning in verse 5. Our text this morning will be verses 5 thru 9 of Chapter 6, which you can find at the top of page 1163 in the navy blue Bibles found in your pews.

Ephesians 6:5–9 (ESV)

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man, knowing that whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he is a bondservant or is free. Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

B. Review

This is now the third and final week we will be in this particular passage. I think it really has been worth the time, to consider some verses here in Ephesians that often get rushed over because they put forward some principles that make us rather uneasy.

Our modern world thinks that microwave-speed revolution is the answer to all injustice. God tends to be more patient, with solutions that are more deeply rooted, take more time to grow, and are, therefore, last through generations.

God also seems to value earthly hierarchies and respect for authorities far more than we do. We tend to look for ways to excuse ourselves from honor of authority, and it almost seems in a passage like this that God maximizes our opportunities to honor authorities.

C. Transition

We have already discussed (twice now) some of the complexities in this passage.

In short, we are dealing here with bond-servitude, which in the ancient world was typically used in desperate circumstances, to work off some kind of debt. Keep in mind that there was no social safety net in first century cultures. So if you had no other way to pay off your debts, you might have to make arrangements like this, though they were usually temporary and not lifelong.

We have talked about how Paul does not call for the abolition of slavery here, but addresses slaves and masters in such a way as to sow the seeds for the eventual destruction of the institution.

And that might make us uncomfortable because we are impatient people, and generally speaking, Reformation takes too long. We want quick fixes for ourselves or our marriages or our children. God is far more patient than we are, as he knows that quick fixes are usually fixes that don’t last long.

So then what do you do, if you are Paul, and your writing contains in it the seeds of destruction for the institutions of slavery and servitude, but not calls for their immediate destruction?

How do you direct the people of God who are living inside these institutions to behave in the meanwhile?

The answer is that you

Understand what God has made Understand the temptations Understand the responsibilities

I. Understand What God Has Made

One of the most fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith is the total Lordship of Jesus Christ over everything in the universe, and everything means everything.

Psalm 24:1 (ESV)

The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein,

The earth belongs to God, the total fullness of it, and everyone who dwells there.

And God has organized men and women into societies that run on the engine of authority. In the Reformed Tradition, we take this concept all the way back to the fifth commandment

Exodus 20:12 (ESV)

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

We start out from our earliest days with two authorities named Mom and Dad. And from there, we learn how to respect and honor all our other earthly authorities.

Anarchy or despising of authority is bound up in the human heart but God is not an anarchist.

Anarchy is destruction of authorities. A world without rulers. And every time it has been tried in history, when the rulers have been destroyed, the first thing the destroyers do is…set up new rulers.

That’s because authority is something sinners both need and hate.

My first point is simply that you understand what God has made. God has made a world with authorities. God created the relationship of man and woman, of husband and wife, and so it makes sense to us that he gets to decide how it works (that’s Ephesians 5:22-33). God created the relationship of children to parents and parents to children, so it makes sense to us that he gets to decide how it works (that’s Ephesians 6:1-4).

But now we arrive at our text and Paul says

Ephesians 6:5 (ESV)

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ,

And he also says Eph 6:9

Ephesians 6:9 (ESV)

Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

God created marriage and family. God created Kingship. God created churches and congregations and elders and deacons. God created brotherhood. But we should remind ourselves that God did not create the slave/master relationship in the same way. The relationship of slave and master is not a creation ordinance. It is an invention of man. And yet, the Holy Spirit, speaking through the Apostle Paul still makes use of it (as a coherent authority structure) to glorify God and to clarify responsibilities.

What does this tell us? It tells us that God is not an anarchist, he cares about the way he has structured and valued and protected authority in this world, and it should tell us that it is our job to understand what God has made and respect it.

Now it is no secret that we—as a people—are suspicious of authorities. We don’t need no education, and we tell the teachers to leave the kids alone. And that is (in part) because we have seen authority go wrong or sour. Which can be catastrophic. But the abuse of a thing never determines its proper use. We see here in this text that an important principle is in play and it is important that we understand that principle. That is, that

Everyone answers to someone and everyone is responsible for someone.

Now I know some of you children in here right now are wondering “That can’t be right, Pastor. I’m not in charge of anybody!”

Some of you are old enough to have seen the movie Hook, with Robin Williams as Peter Pan and Dustin Hoffman as Captain Hook. At the end of the movie, Peter gives responsibilities to all the Lost Boys. And he says “Each one of you look after the ones younger than you.” And the very youngest, littlest lost boy raises his hand and says “Who do I look after?” And Peter thinks for a moment, and then says “You look after all the bugs in Neverland (he calls them Never-bugs). Especially the little ones.”

And it’s meant for a laugh but it does resonate with this reality that we all have something or someone under our care. If you have a younger brother or sister, they are in some sense under your care. They are first of all under Mom and Dad’s care, but they are under yours too, you are an example to them, and you help to teach them, whether you realize it or not, which is a fantastic responsibility that you must take seriously. They might not think you have a responsibility to them, and they might treat you with slightly less than zero respect sometimes. You still have responsibilities.

So this is what Paul is saying throughout our passage—your circumstances do not remove your responsibilities. We tend to think that hardship makes sin excusable. That’s not even a little bit true. Hardship makes sin more enticing, but not more excusable.

Paul is addressing slaves and masters. And the point he is making is that responsibilities are in play, regardless of behavior of the other.

II. Understand the Temptations

So the realities are realities. God really has made a world with husbands and wives, with parents and children, with pastors and elders and congregations, with bosses and employees, with masters and servants. With Older siblings and Younger siblings. With little ones and littler never-bugs.

This does not excuse the sins of the highers or the sins of the lowers. That is one of the most important points of this passage. The higher position and the lower position are both defined according to their responsibilities to each other before God.

These realities are in play and we have to learn how to live in accordance with them. But the realities come with attendant temptations. Position of high authority come with temptations. And positions of service and giving honor to authority also come with temptations.

We know that all positions of authority and power come with temptations. The moment you give a fallen sinful person power or authority, they will be tempted to misuse it, or to fail to exercise it properly, or to abdicate and fail to exercise it at all. All three of those would be sinning against the work God has given them to do.

But one of the most powerful temptations of authority is to think yourself to be untouchable or un-crossable. In other words to be God. This is the temptation that has been with us since the garden. It’s the temptation of fathers, husbands, bosses, masters, and older brothers. And Paul understands this temptation, as he also understands that the only man fit to exercise authority is the man under authority himself.

That’s why Paul says

Ephesians 6:9 ESV

Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

Paul knows that the only way authority will be properly exercised is if the one exercising it is himself under authority.

We tend to read stories of the abuse of authority as proof that the authority shouldn’t exist or that we just shouldn’t talk about authority so much. What that has given us is a generation or two or three that in many ways absolutely despise authority itself. But God’s answer is to make sure that the bosses have bosses, the governors have governors, and the authorities answer to someone.

This is why Paul says “stop your threatening.” In other words, stop leading in such a way as to keep those who work for you in a perpetual state of terror. The only person who has the right to rule by threat is God, and even he doesn’t do it most of the time. When God threatens, he does it in proportion to sin and its consequences. When men threaten it is often because they are angry that someone has threatened their sense of control. And when he does so is usually guilty of the sin of partiality. That is, the sin of treating people differently based on what they can do for you.

Why do we love the idea of giving food to a homeless man, but sneer at the idea of helping mom do the dishes? Because we are often guilty of the sin of partiality. We want our good works and our service to make us feel good, not to make us feel like servants.

Charles Spurgeon put it best when he said “If God has called you to be his servant, don’t stoop to be a king on earth.” (Source Unknown)

Now I would also love to see more kings of men be servants of God at the same time, but the point is still clear—that we are so tempted by earthly titles and accolades and having a sense of power and a sense of importance, and what we have forgotten is a day will come when all our titles will be stripped away and we will stand before the only one with everlasting titles. King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And we will laugh (if we do no at first cry) at how we protected our sense of importance with such reactive insecurity.

So we started by clarifying what God has made. A word with duties and hierarchies and responsibilities. Then we talked about temptations. So now, we will talk about responsibilities.

III. Understand the Responsibilities

So God gives responsibilities to the servant. He says

Ephesians 6:5 (ESV)

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ,

And he gives responsibilities

Ephesians 6:9 (ESV)

Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and that there is no partiality with him.

In framing in this way, Paul has made both servants and masters into servants of Jesus. And has taken away their supposed right to be embittered (in the case of a servant) or harsh (in the case of a master).

What Paul has done here is he has removed the “sinful sweetness” of their vocation.

Well, I am a master. That means I get to do whatever I want.

Wrong.

Well I am a servant. That means at least my whining and grumbling is justified.

Wrong.

You have no right to harshness, and you have no right to whining.

And so we see the applications for us.

We have a Master who has called us his children. And he has called us his bond-servants. And in calling us bond-servants of Christ, he has humbled us before Christ and he has (in a sense) exalted the role of the servant, because if that is what we all are, then we don’t get to treat a servant like they are beneath us or of less value.

So what do good bond-servants do? What is the responsibility? They stay at their post and they remain faithful to their work, and respectful of their master.

So what has God called you to do? He has called you to stay at your post and remain faithful and respectful to your master. And in the midst of all of it, pursue joy.

Are you a business owner? Stay at that post, and be a godly example to all those who work for you and with you. Don’t treat them poorly. Not saying you can’t ever fire a lazy workman (that might be the kindest thing to do for a lazy workman) but don’t treat them poorly or harshly. If there’s some crisis, and people are panicking...when you walk into the room, do people say “Oh, thank goodness, he’s here.” Or do they say “Oh, great. Everything is about to get a whole lot worse.” Do this with faithfulness and keep your head up. You’re a bond-servant. With a good master.

Are you a mom at home with a whole hoard of kids, and you feel overwhelmed with all your responsibilities? Stay at your post. Do the work. Trust the Lord. Notice your sins. Repent quickly. Set a joyful tone. Respect your husband. With cheerfulness. You’re a bond-servant with a good master.

Maybe you’re a dad, and you’ve been at it awhile and you feel discouraged by some failures and mistakes and sins. Perhaps you’re seeing your own sin patterns in your kids. Is there anything more terribly humbling? Stand up straight. Repent of that sin out loud. Trust the Lord. Cultivate faithful steadiness. with cheerfulness. You’re a bond-servant with a good master.

Are you working at a really hard job? There’s nothing unbiblical about seeking alternative employment. Pursuing a different course. But until that course is before you, what do you do? You stay at your post, and you be a godly example to all those who work for you and with you and over you. With cheerfulness. You’re a bond-servant. With a good master.

Maybe you’re in a later season of life. Retired. Or empty nest. Sometimes those occasions can produce a sense of a lost identity. If I don’t have this sort of work before me, I’m helpless or worthless—don’t buy that silly idolatrous nonsense. You have opportunities before you to serve family and community and church. With cheerfulness. Don’t stoop to wallowing in self-pity. You’re a bond-servant. With a good master.

Maybe you’re just stuck right now. So ask yourself “What is the good work God has given me to do? Are there people who answer to me? I need to seek to bless them. Are there people I answer to? I need to seek to be a blessing to them.” You’re a bond-servant. With a good master.

Stay at your post and be faithful

That is the nature of our calling, wherever we are and whatever we are doing. Vocations bring with them responsibilities. Responsibilities of attitude and mindset. Responsibilities of service and humility.

From the Reformed Expository Commentary Series, the Volume on Ephesians, by Bryan Chapell

Preacher and author Bryan Chappell in his commentary on Ephesians recounts the story of Gary and Mary Jane Chancey and their faithfulness at their post in 1993, when they were riding on an Amtrak train in Mobile, Alabama, when it plunged off a railway bridge into a bayou.

The Chanceys were traveling with their eleven-year-old daughter Andrea, who had cerebral palsy and required a wheelchair. As their train car sank into the bayou, and water rushed into their train compartment, the two parents combined their efforts to lift Andrea to a rescuer. The water pressure then overwhelmed them, pushed them deep into the darkness of the train cabin, and they were gone.

They gave their lives to lift their child to safety.

God gives all Christian parents a similar kind of calling. He gives to all Christian leaders and authorities a similar calling.

Bryan Chapell comments:

“Under what is sometimes intense pressure and pain, we are to lift those in our care to the Lord. By the ways we model the Lord and mold others’ perception of him, we discern the love we require as well as the love we must give. By lifting others to the Savior we become like him, and thus discover more of the love of the Savior who lifts us to heaven by his sacrifice.”

This is how Christian authorities are to remain at their post. With a sacrificial love. To rule by serving well, and to serve by ruling well.

Because this is how we have been loved. We follow Jesus Christ our master, who was not afraid of service. He was a servant who never ceased to be ruler of his people, and a ruler who never ceased to be a servant of his people.

He even today, as our King invites us to his Table where he himself is both the host and the waiter and—in a most holy sense—the food and the drink that we receive together.

Let us therefore gather and keep the feast.

In the name of Jesus, Amen.