EPHESIANS 6:5-9 - Christian Slavery

Introduction

So, by a show of hands, how many people here have a favorite tool? Maybe it’s a trusty hammer that you’ve used for years that’s perfectly balanced, or a garden shovel that’s the perfect length and weight—whenever we go down to clean stalls, we all have a favorite stable fork that we want to use.

Now, what if you came to church one Sunday and the sermon started off with a heartfelt plea to your tools to serve you faithfully! “Dear hammer, you are Steve’s favorite tool—work hard to drive the nails straight, don’t complain when he throws you across the shop because you hit his thumb...” You’d probably see the elders all approaching the platform in a flanking maneuver to go take the pastor away for a nice quiet lie-down somewhere!

But this is the way we ought to read the verses that we have before us this morning. By directly addressing slaves in these verses, the Apostle Paul is doing something almost unheard of—most “household codes” of the day would address how slave-owners should manage their slaves, but would never address slaves directly. Slaves in Greco-Roman times were not considered to have personhood at all—the Greek philosopher Aristotle said that “a slave is a living tool, just as a tool is an inanimate slave”. For Paul to directly address slaves here in these verses would have been as strange and baffling to them as if I preached a sermon to a pitchfork about being a good obedient pitchfork.

According to historical estimates, as many as one-third of the inhabitants of Ephesus in Paul’s day were slaves. Slavery in the Roman empire was an utterly dehumanizing institution that permeated every level of the society. Slaves had no personhood under Roman law; their masters had absolute power of life and death over them. While it was possible in the Roman system for a slave to buy their freedom and gain the rights of a citizen, most slaves spent their lives being treated as property.

It’s no wonder then that as the Gospel began to spread throughout the Roman world slaves were one of the first people groups to respond in faith for salvation. And this created a tension in many churches very similar to the tension Paul wrote about earlier in Ephesians between Jewish and Gentile believers:

Ephesians 2:18–19 LSB

for through Him we both have our access in one Spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household,

If Jews and Gentiles were reconciled together in Christ as one new body, then surely masters and slaves were to be reconciled in the same way! But what did that look like in the church? How should a Christian slave and a Christian master relate to one another in the context of God’s new way of being human?

One of the criticisms leveled against the Scriptures by unbelievers concerns the way Paul addresses slavery here in Ephesians 6—they claim that Paul was endorsing slavery when he wrote in places like Vere 5 “Slaves, be obedient to your masters...” or in the book of Philemon when he directed a slave who had escaped from his master to go back and place himself back into his service (Philemon 12-14). Under their view, Paul should have called for a slave uprising, condemning and abolishing slavery once and for all with his Apostolic authority.

But what we will see here is that, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, Paul did something far more effective.

By declaring the Good News that Christ died for slaves and masters, and that Christian slaves are now brothers in Christ with their Christian owners, Paul is lighting the fuse that would eventually bring down the entire system of slavery.

Because Jesus died and rose again for the forgiveness of the sins of slaves and slave-owners alike, and has brought about the New Birth of the renewed mind to slaves and slave-owners alike, it is no longer possible to treat a fellow believer like property!

Though Paul did not singlehandedly and immediately bring a catastrophic end to chattel slavery in Roman society by freeing all the slaves, he introduced a far more powerful and effective truth:

There is no FREEDOM like SLAVERY to Christ

Paul didn’t just include instructions about slaves, he included instructions to them—another sign that they were equal to the free citizens in the congregation at Ephesus. And in each of the instructions he gives them here in these verses, he brings them back over and over again to the truth that their true Master is Christ Himself. And because Christ is your Master,

I. You are FREE to serve with OBEDIENCE (Ephesians 6:5-8)

Look at verse 5:

Ephesians 6:5 LSB

Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the integrity of your heart, as to Christ;

Serve with obedience, Paul says, because you belong to Christ. And that obedience is to be carried out, he writes

With GENUINE RESPECT (v. 5; cp. Matt. 10:28)

The idea of obeying “with fear and trembling” was one that slaves would know well—after all, their masters had the right to do anything they wanted to them if they did not obey them; have them beaten, starved, mutilated or even executed. They held power of life and death over them. But Paul says that you hold that genuine respect toward “your masters according to the flesh”—your earthly master—as if you are obeying your heavenly Master, Christ Himself. He is the One Who truly holds your life in His hand; every breath that you take is at His pleasure, every step is ordered and protected by His supervision. Respect your earthly master, but remember that all he can do is kill you—

Matthew 10:28 LSB

“And do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

When you are serving your Master Christ with genuine respect, you are free to respect your earthly master.

And that respect is not just for show—Paul goes on to say that it is genuine respect

With INTEGRITY of heart (v. 6)

Ephesians 6:6 LSB

not by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart,

Paul appears to have made up the two Greek words translated “eye-service” and “men-pleasers”. “Eye-service” refers to the hard and diligent work that a person does while his supervisor is watching. As soon as he’s gone, though, the shovel leans back up against the side of the ditch and the poker game resumes. Paul says that as a slave of Christ, you can’t get away with that—mainly because He is always watching. He doesn’t take His eyes off of His slaves; you are never “off-duty”.

In the same way, Paul says that a slave of Christ is not a “man-pleaser”. Paul coined this term to describe the suck-up, the flatterer, the one who is always trying to get in good with the boss, to make sure he is on his good side.

A slave of Christ, though, cannot flatter Him, because a flatterer is always insincere. A flatterer hides his true feelings in order to make the object of his flattery believe he likes them. But it is impossible to flatter Christ—because He already knows your heart! (cp. John 2:24 “But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men”). So, Paul tells the believing slaves, your master is Christ—so act in the integrity of your heart toward your earthly master. With genuine respect, in all sincerity, and

With INTENT to be a BLESSING (v. 7; cp. Col. 3:23)

Ephesians 6:7 LSB

serving with good will as to the Lord, and not to men,

How easy it would be to do your work with a smoldering hatred toward your master; to be as obedient as possible on the outside while wishing evil and calamity on him in your heart. Dreaming about how someday you will “pay him back” for his dominance; thinking about all the ways you might see him go down in flames.

But as a slave of Christ, you are free to seek to bless your master, because you are serving Christ as your master! As Paul put it in his letter to the Colossians:

Colossians 3:23 LSB

Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men,

It may be very hard to work honestly and diligently for a cruel or harsh master. But as a slave of Christ you are free—your hard work and diligent labor is for Him. And Paul gives you one more motivation for working with good will toward a harsh or unfair or cruel master. You can work

Ephesians 6:8 LSB

knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free.

A Christian slave could work honestly, obediently and diligently—even for a wicked slavemaster—because they worked

With ASSURANCE of great REWARD (v. 8; cp. 2 Cor. 5:10)

Working with integrity, respect and goodwill toward your master, working honestly and diligently whether or not you are being supervised, giving 110% in your labor, only to have it ignored or invalidated or unfairly dismissed by a harsh or unreasonable master is immensely discouraging. What’s the point of trying at all, if the only thanks you get for all your labor is an insult or unjust punishment? For a slave who had an unjust master like this, Paul gives this great encouragement: Even if, after all your hard, diligent, respectful work done in goodwill your earthly master treats you unfairly or wickedly—you are promised that your Master in Heaven sees, and will remember!

For the Christian slave, Paul says, the response of your earthly master to your good work is not what ultimately matters—after all, what can your earthly master give you for good work? An extra portion of food, a new tunic, a commendation? As fine as those things might be, how much more will you be rewarded for all eternity by your Heavenly Master, the One Who has the power to reward you with everlasting joy and glory and honor? Whether or not your earthly master ever even gives you so much as a “well done”, your Heavenly Master’s “Well-done, good and faithful slave” will be infinitely better!

You can see here, can’t you, how Paul’s teaching to slaves about the hope they have in Christ would completely upend the way they related to their masters—whether their masters were Christians or pagans, slaves who belonged to Christ by faith were free to serve with obedience, because they were fixing their eyes on Christ instead of their earthly master. A Christian slave was free to serve with obedience no matter how unjust or cruel his earthly owner was, because he knew that he belonged to His Master in Heaven!

And in the same way, Paul’s teaching in this passage would have completely upended a Christian slave owner’s world. Because just as a Christian slave is free under Christ to serve with obedience, so as a Christian master

II. You are FREE to live in BROTHERHOOD (Ephesians 6:9)

It would have been shocking—almost indecent—for Paul’s letter to openly address slaves in the congregation as human beings with self-determination. But the next verse would have been utterly over the line for the Christian masters in the congregation:

Ephesians 6:9 LSB

And masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.

Paul had spent the past four verses telling slaves to treat their masters with genuine respect, integrity and goodwill—and then he turns around and tells their owners, You do the same to them—treat your slaves with respect, integrity and goodwill!” As we noted earlier, slaves in the Roman Empire were considered nothing more than “tools with a consciousness”; having no rights or protections under Roman law.

But Paul, under the authority of the Holy Spirit Who inspired him, is telling these slave owners that their slaves are worthy of dignity, respect and honor. They are not to be treated as tools, they are to be treated as brothers. In the letter that Paul wrote to Philemon about his runaway slave Onesimus, Paul wrote that he was sending him back to his master

Philemon 16 LSB

no longer as a slave, but more than a slave, a beloved brother, especially to me, but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.

You can imagine this point in Paul’s letter, where he is saying that slave owners should respect and honor their slaves, that there would be more than a little throat-clearing and shuffling of feet. But Paul is appealing to the same unity in Christ that he demonstrated earlier between Jew and Gentile—Christian slaves and their masters are now brothers in Christ.

And so, as brothers, the first thing Paul commands slave owners is

Do not be a BULLY

Ephesians 6:9 LSB

And masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.

We have seen it over and over again in the history of our world—when there are absolutely no consequences for cruelty to another human being, it is extraordinarily difficult not to descend into cruelty and inhumanity. Slave owners in Rome had absolute freedom to do whatever they wanted to their slaves. On top of that, it was widely believed that the only way to get useful work out of a slave was to constantly threaten them—with punishment, deprivation, abuse, mutilation, and even death. Not only so, but the free population of Rome lived in perpetual fear of slave uprisings, such as the slave revolt immortalized in the movie Spartacus, which took place about a hundred years before Paul wrote Ephesians, but even in Paul’s day there was an enduring fear that if slaves were not regularly threatened and kept in their place, another revolt would flare up and threaten the peace of Rome.

So when Paul commanded Christian slave owners to stop threatening their slaves, he was subverting the entire Roman system. Paul knew that what he was commanding slave owners to do was extraordinary, because he follows that command up with a reminder that

You are a FELLOW SLAVE under Christ (cp. 1 Peter 1:18-19)

Ephesians 6:9 LSB

And masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.

Not only does Paul command masters to respect their slaves, he goes on to say that you are a slave yourself! That you and your slave occupy the same position before Christ! You purchased your slave with silver or gold, but you were purchased by the blood of Christ Himself!

1 Peter 1:18–19 LSB

knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold from your futile conduct inherited from your forefathers, but with precious blood, as of a lamb unblemished and spotless, the blood of Christ.

You have been bought with a price; you belong to a Master over you, Who commands you as thoroughly--in fact more thoroughly--than you could ever command another human being. He owns you, and there is no way to buy your freedom out from under His ownership! Your Master in Heaven commands you to honor and respect your slave as your brother; you must treat him with respect and honor and integrity. You must give him the same dignity that Christ bestowed on him by shedding His blood to redeem him from his sin—do not threaten, do not bully, do not demean this one for whom Christ died.

Paul reminds Christian masters that they and their slaves are fellow slaves to Christ. You are both under the same Master. And so, Paul reminds them, in every way that you relate to your earthly slaves,

Consider the JUSTICE of your MASTER (Deut. 10:17)

Ephesians 6:9 LSB

And masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him.

It doesn’t matter what your standing in Roman society allows you to get away with; you may be accustomed to being able to brush off the wickedness of your treatment of your slaves, you may be able to sweep things under the rug about the way you make them suffer. But your position of power and prestige and the universal approval of Roman society toward your behavior with your slaves will not protect you before the Throne of God. You may be able to pull some strings, call in some favors, grease some palms and get away with your behavior here on earth, but one day you will stand before a Judge that you cannot sway:

Deuteronomy 10:17 LSB

“For Yahweh your God is the God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the fearsome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe.

Paul wrote earlier that a Christian slave must not only serve with “eye-service” (when someone is watching)—here he reminds Christian masters that they cannot count on a time when their Master is not watching! There is no dark corner out of His sight where you can threaten your slaves in secret; there is no loophole that your Master will allow you to appeal to when your deeds are evaluated at His Judgment Seat. Even the old game of “It’s my word as a citizen against his word as a slave” won’t work with this Judge—He doesn’t show partiality towards you because you are a master (any more than He will show partiality towards a slave because he is helpless!) The only standard for your Judge is His own perfect righteousness, and whether you are slave or free, master or servant, boss or staff, the only thing that will matter on the Day you stand before Him is not whether you were a better person than your boss, but whether either of you measured up to the absolute perfection of Jesus Christ. So, Paul says, Christian masters must remember that in the way they deal with their slaves—whether or not they are fellow believers!

Here in Ephesians 6, as well as in other places in the New Testament, the Apostle Paul lit a slow-burning fuse that resulted in the eventual destruction of slavery in the Roman Empire. Centuries later men like William Wilberforce stood on these same Scriptures to bring the European slave trade to an end. One of the great and enduring wounds in our national consciousness here in the United States is that slavery was brought to an end not by the power of God’s Word but by a bloody and horrible war; in some ways we have never recovered—and never will until the Gospel does its work in our country.

To be sure, the wickedness of chattel slavery still exists in some parts of the world—drug and sex-trafficking, the targeted abductions of Christians in Nigeria, for example—but the difference is that today those practices are universally reviled, where in the Roman Empire of Paul’s day no one would have given them a second thought. The leaven of the Gospel has done (and continues to do) its work in the world that we live in—we no longer think in terms of “master” and “slave” because of what Christ accomplished on that Cross two thousand years ago.

So if you are heading to work tomorrow morning, you are not going to go to work for a slavemaster—all jokes aside, you are going to a job where you are unquestioningly regarded as an equal recipient of dignity and rights. But just like the slaves who first heard Paul’s letter read there in Ephesus, some of you are going to a job where you are working for a fellow believer. So what does God’s Word call you to do here?

First of all—you are to work for your Christian boss with genuine respect. Paul does not say that being a fellow believer means that you are absolved of your duty to work diligently and respectfully for your boss—you don’t get to presume on your boss’s identity as a brother in Christ in order to take advantage. In fact, Paul shows us that you ought to work more diligently for him because he is your brother. Your job is not to make his job harder; your job is to minister to him as best you can. Don’t presume on his Christian graciousness and figure it’s ok to goof off or take a three hour lunch or not take your responsibilities seriously. He is not just your boss, he is your brother. And he deserves genuine respect, honor and grace.

And that goes for when he is in the room and when he is not. You are not working for eye-service, you are not working as a man-pleaser. But it does mean that you have integrity in the way you talk about your boss when he isn’t in the room. You don’t have to be the suck up that always jumps to his defense whenever someone is letting off steam, but you don’t have to participate, and you don’t have to be the one who starts it!

And if you are a Christian boss with Christian employees, you have a responsibility toward them as well—your integrity and honesty toward them (as well as all your staff) means that you don’t threaten, you don’t bluster, you don’t hold your position over them; you are seeking to bless them. You have the privilege of standing in the place of Christ for them—since He is their Master and yours. And that means that your relationship with them is one of sacrificial service. You work hard to make their work easier. You bless them by taking on difficulties or complications and dealing with them before your staff has to. You spend long hours dealing with disasters and dumpster fires so that those things don’t land on them. You have a Master Who intercedes for you before your Father in Heaven—so you go to bat for your staff with the higher-ups (the ones to whom you are obligated to regard with genuine respect, integrity and kindness!)

It was entirely probable that not every slave that heard Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus belonged to a Christian master. And in the same way, not all of you will go to work for a boss tomorrow who is a believer. You may have a boss who has no fear of God, doesn’t believe he is accountable to Him (or anybody), who in fact is really good at threatening and manipulating. What do these verses have to say to you in your situation?

First—your duty toward your boss is not dependent on his character. See again in Verse 5: You are to have genuine respect— “fear and trembling” toward your boss in your integrity. His lack of integrity toward you does not excuse you to lack integrity towards him. If you belong to Christ, then the honor and respect and compliance you render to your wicked boss will be received by Christ as obedience to Him!

And that means that your hard work for a lazy boss, your honest work for a lying boss, your good will towards a boss who has no good will toward you is all counted as faithful obedience to your Master in Heaven. God placed you in this job with this boss; it is His will that you relate to your boss with respect, honesty and good will no matter whether you think he deserves it or not.

It is a hard thing to do—it is a massively difficult thing to do—to drive into work every day knowing that you will be working for a terrible boss. But Paul reminds you of one more thing in this passage: Whether slave or owner, whether supervisor or employee, God sees and remembers everything. He sees the good that you seek to do for your wicked boss, and He sees everything your boss is doing to you. And He remembers all of it. And the Day will come when you will both stand before His Judgment Seat and be rewarded for what you did—good or bad. And that Judge is utterly impartial.

Revelation 20:11–12 LSB

Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sits upon it, from whose presence earth and heaven fled away, and no place was found for them. Then I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, and books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life. And the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds.

Whenever you have to deal with the unfairness, injustice and harshness of your terrible boss, remember that there is a Judge Who sees and will judge him for it. And the very next thought in your heart needs to be the realization that, when your boss stands before that Judgment Seat someday, you will be standing there too. The Day is coming when you will receive your final performance evaluation; you won’t really care how your earthly master does on that Day, because all you will be able to think of is what you will hear. Will you hear,

Matthew 25:21 LSB

“Well done, good and faithful slave. You were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.”

Or will you hear

Matthew 7:23 LSB

“I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’

There is only one way to know that you will be able to stand on that Day—and it’s not because you were a good employee for a nightmare boss, it’s not because you owned a business where all of your staff became millionaires; you will not be graded on a curve—you will not be able to say, “Well, I may not be perfect, but at least I’m a better person than he is...” When your every word and every thought and every motivation and every deed is laid open and bare before the all-powerful and all-knowing and impartial Judge, there will be no chance to “explain yourself”, there will be no way to blame anyone else. All there will be will be your deeds (all of them—not just the ones you hope God will see, but all the ones you hope He won’t)—your deeds, and God’s infinitely righteous standard of judgment.

The only way you will stand on that Day is if you have been purchased by the blood of Christ as His slave. The only way to know that you will be welcomed into the eternal joy of God’s presence is if you have trusted in the death of Christ as the satisfaction of God’s wrath against your sin. When the books are opened on that Day and all of your works are reviewed by your Judge, your only plea will be that you are a slave of Christ, bought by His blood for the forgiveness of your sins.

God’s Word offers you this hope this morning. Romans 10:9-11 promises you

Romans 10:9–11 LSB

that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, leading to righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, leading to salvation. For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes upon Him will not be put to shame.”

If you want to know for sure that you belong to Christ by faith; if you want to be absolutely certain that you are His slave and that His blood has taken away the wrath of God against your sin, come and see me after the service this morning. Come and talk to Steve or Bruce or Jeff (brothers, raise your hands); let us show you from the Scriptures how you can know that you belong by faith to your Master in Heaven, Jesus Christ!

BENEDICTION

Jude 24–25 LSB

Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, might, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen.