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You're listening to audio from Faith Church Indy.  This fall we're studying the book of Ephesians,  learning about the new life that we find in Christ.  Now here's the teaching. The comes from the book of Ephesians, chapter six, verses five through nine. If you have the scripture journal, it's on page 26. If you have the black Bible in the seat in front of you, it's page 1,163. Bond servants  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 bond servants 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 bond servant 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." This is the word of the Lord. Keep you seated.  Faith kids, you are dismissed. Well, we're coming near to the end of Paul's letter to the Ephesian church. Two more weeks with instructions about spiritual warfare and prayer, which very much goes together. And then final directions and greetings as pastors Nathan and Pastor uh Jeff take us uh to the end. But today we come to the third category, which is kind of a series within the series on  what the Greeks called household codes.  and the jarring first words  to our sensitive 21st century ears are slaves  or bondservants. ESV softens it a bit, but it's word doulos, doulois, slaves  obey your earthly masters. What is this? Is Paul condoning slavery? Is this a defense  of slavery? Well, I assure you the answer is an emphatic no. In fact, Paul in this text and others in his writings  sowed the seeds of emancipation, that slavery, human bondage is not compatible with the gospel. And yet at the same time, he faced the reality of the world in which he lived and the need to guide believers of whatever stage  in that reality, in the complexity of guiding the Church in a slave culture where slaves and slave owners were coming to faith in Christ and coming together in the Church, the Body of Christ. So you have slaves and slave owners in the Church together. How does the Christian Gospel address this? Well, our text will help us along with other relevant passages, but this is also a more culturally relevant application in our work world today. Times are different. But this relates to all kinds of authority and accountability structures that we all deal with every day, especially in employment. So this is very practical guidance for employees and employers, for workers and bosses.  But first, we need to set the table for how this passage fits in the flow of the letter regarding these household codes. And then I... want to address Paul's approach to the problem of slavery, and then  at the end we'll look at how this fits with our work world today. So I really don't have three points to this sermon. I hope there are at least some points to it,  but  there's three issues that we're going to address  as it  feeds into uh where Paul's teaching is in this passage. So first I want to talk a little bit about the household codes, which covers The section from Ephesians 5.21 through uh Ephesians 6.9, there's three  categories uh of relationships in the home.  What is assumed in a household even today? Well, marriage. Not everybody's married. There are single households, but the general principle is you see a household is made up of a marriage of husbands and wives. and then of parents and children. But there's an additional item here we don't quite know what to do with. It's household workers or slaves. Now household codes are instructions for these relationships. A briefer form is in Colossians 3, 18 to 4, 1, and a different form and order in 1 Peter 2, 13 to 3, 7. wrote this nearly 2,000 years ago, and we all know that structures, family structures have changed. The first two categories still make sense to most of us, though it's changing in our times with family breakdown and redefinitions of marriage and family, but we still see the norm for family as wife, husband, children, parents. That's the category I've known for my entire 75 years, and  And being a Kansas farm boy, the next category is not fully strange to me that the economic factor of labor  and making a living was also in the home, in my case on the farm, but not with slaves.  For most of you, it's not that way. The place where you earn your living is not at home, but you go to work. You might have a home business, but the norm is a business elsewhere or a job you go to somewhere else. So we go to and from work. And even if you work at home, many of you do that, but your job is really somewhere else. You're working remotely. But in the ancient world, certainly the Greco-Roman world of 2,000 years ago, marriage, parenting, and work were all primarily at home, and slavery was accepted  as part of that  normal household. It's not defending of his right. It's just acknowledging that's the way it was. And the gospel, my friends, speaks to that powerfully, as we'll at least introduce today. So here's the issue. How do we live Christianly  in  that world and culture? Well, for us, how do we live Christianly in our world and culture? Now, the Greeks had household codes going back to the times of Plato and Aristotle for each of the systems of that household.  part of my homeschooling experience. A few years ago, I read for the first time Plato's Republic. I have one of those homeschool students here today,  and we had two total, and then we closed Kingswood Academy down for good. But Plato's Republic, I had never read it, and I was shocked at what he has to say about family and raising kids and how you get children and such things. I was horrified, frankly. It really is the seeds of socialism that we have today, and I want nothing to do with that. But  Paul,  in that kind of culture, sets forth what it means for Christians. How do we live under the lordship of Christ in the cultural context of our times? Now,  in the previous sermons from Mark Dunker, Jeff Schultz, and two weeks ago from Pastor Curtis Costin, was emphasized that  Paul, and appropriately so, that Paul  lifts up the value and dignity of those considered in society to be the lesser or the weaker. He lifts them up when they're considered lesser in the power structures of that culture. Wives and children are given the value and dignity of being addressed directly by the apostle, not talked down to, but addressed directly and lifted up, treated as free moral agents made in the image of God. that stamped on them just as fully  as husbands and fathers.  And husbands and fathers are instructed to  love their wives and acknowledge their children as free moral agents, image bearers to be treated with respect and kindness, not cruelty. And so it is here with slaves and masters. But, There's a common factor that goes with all three that comes from Ephesians 521, submitting  to one another  out of reverence for Christ. Now it's really important to get the context here. Chapters 1 to 3 are the theological foundations. Chapters 4 to 6, it's important to see the flow of how that goes from where it starts in chapter 1 up to where we are now. Chapter 4, we are to act as one body with one Lord.  Chapter 5, We're to walk in love as Christ loved us and gave Himself up for us. And we are to worship together as one  unified  body, addressing one another lovingly, respectfully in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody  as a body, making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything. to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Worship is not just the sermon. I don't want to denigrate the sermon. I think it's critically important, but it's not just the sermon.  It's God's people gathering together, declaring God's praise,  and in singing together, we actually take the truths that come from Scripture that are proclaimed in sermons,  and we sing those truths,  and that's what really locks them into our hearts. What we sing. is what really  connects with us, and so we need to have songs that really  build into us richly. And then  it said, submitting to one another  out of reverence for or in the fear of Christ. And then without skipping a beat, Paul dives right into the household codes. Now, one of the debates in the modern church is the focus of this submission.  Is it Mutual submission verse 21 we're looking at is it mutual submission? everyone giving in to everyone else somewhat like the golden rule Whatever you wish that others would do to you do also to them And I would say yes, that's a proper application that we don't demand our rights but surrender our rights and wishes and preferences to  in every relationship within the body of Christ. To do otherwise is to abuse  those God-given structures of authority. But that's looking backward to where we've come, up to verse 21, now going forward from verse 21, as Paul applies this principle in the Christian development of the household codes. It is not mutual submission. These are  There are divinely ordained structures of authority, and on each of these three applications,  it is a  directional submission. Wives to husbands, children to parents, slaves to masters. And that is highly, highly offensive in our culture. But this directional submission  is what Scripture teaches for family relationships. But my friends, you may think that's radical. That's not what's radical about this text. What's radical about this text is that in all cases, husbands, parents, and masters are commanded to love sacrificially like Jesus. That is to put the other's needs above his own, to not provoke too anger, not to abuse authority, to not bully and threaten, but to recognize that every person is under authority and accountability to Jesus Christ who does not favor the strong over the weak in any relationship, and that, as our text says, there's no partiality with Him. So these household codes are radically altered to reflect the way of Jesus in all our relationships, marriage, parenting, and our work world. And as we consider how this applies in our work world, focus of today's text, we can't ignore the proverbial elephant on the table. Is Paul excusing slavery? If not, then why does any come right out and condemn it with force for the evil that it is? So let's talk about it. The problem of slavery in the Greco-Roman world. That's our second issue for the day. Estimates vary widely as to how many slaves were in the Greco-Roman world. Some say up to 30 % of the population, even higher in Rome. Estimates of around 60 million slaves in the empire. And  some try to soften what Paul says in that slavery in Rome was really not all that bad. Gee, you hear the same arguments about slavery in America, and that's bogus as can be. But they say it's not as bad as the American South, and  there may be  some limited truth to that. Some slaves in  that time 2,000 years ago were  educated,  some were in medicine and business, professions. oh Slaves weren't prevented in that culture generally from getting an education, from being able to read,  as in the American South, many prevented them from that, lest they rebel. It's a way of keeping them illiterate to keep them down. Slavery in Rome was not a race thing.  It was not a black-white thing. It was based on class,  not race. But no matter how you try to minimize slavery in Paul's day, you can't take that very far. The indignity of slavery,  one person being owned by another, was the same evil. Aristotle called slaves  living tools,  diminishing their value as made in the image of God. Slaves could be abused, even killed. sexually assaulted without recourse.  As you look at this whole  section,  chapters four and five, and I read on Ephesians 5, 3 to 5, everyone who is sexually immoral has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. At least taking advantage of slave sexually, which was so common,  is very much a part of what Paul is condemning. So knowing how evil it was,  what was Paul saying here? Why did Paul say, slaves obey your masters? Why didn't he condemn it outright? Well, there's a number of issues you might ask why he didn't condemn outright. Why didn't he condemn abortion outright? Or the practice of infanticide, leading unwanted children to die along the side of the road or in the woods?  Why didn't he champion attacks on the  evils of the day? the societal ills and sins of the day. I'm intrigued by these questions as I've wrestled with it on a number of issues over the years, what the church's role in society is.  If Paul, in his context with the fledgling New-Young Church, had openly condemned abortion and was on a crusade to make it illegal in the Empire, he would have failed. If he had campaigned to end slavery and called for freedom of slaves across the empire, he would have not only failed,  but put those slaves, the people he wanted to help, in grave danger. rather than  an open campaign to transform the culture. What the gospel does, what the church  does, what Christians did  was  undermine the culture with biblical truth and with practical activities such as rescuing those babies left to die in the woods and preaching the dignity and value of all persons,  undermining the culture. is what brought radical change. And what he did here in this passage and others was to  lay the foundation for human dignity that did protect the sanctity and dignity of life and eventually  brought about the possibility of political activism that was not possible at that stage of the church, what it never could have accomplished. The biblical and gospel foundations had to be laid before minds could be changed. and laws could be enacted to end such evil. So what did Paul do to address slavery? Well, he addressed slaves  just as he did wives and children as  equal imagers of God. And how to move forward in the best way at that time?  He concluded, slaves, obey  your earthly masters. In other words, the best way forward in this context is to do your job,  do it well, see it as working for God, trusting God. Wow, at the same time, he boldly spoke to masters, slave owners who came to faith in Christ. He said, stop your threatening. knowing that he who is both their master and yours is in heaven and there's no partiality with him. What are you doing? Revolutionary, pushing the edge, Paul clearly taught the spiritual equality of slaves and masters in Christ,  and slavery cannot survive such a view as that. In Galatians 3 28, there's Jew nor Greek. That's the main issue, the separation between Jews and Gentiles in the first three chapters. Come back to that in a moment. There's neither slave nor free. We don't acknowledge that category. There's neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. Paul's short letter to Philemon, a slave owner who became a Christian, his slave Onesimus became a Christian too. It's the only example in scripture we know of in which both slave and slave owner both came to Christ and now they're Christian brothers. What do do with that? Paul, Anesimus was gone. He's often considered a runaway. There's different views on actually  what was going on with Philemon. I don't know for sure.  Paul sent anessimus back to Philemon. He might recoil at that. What? Send us a slave back to his cruel master? Fugitive slave law? No.  What did Paul say in the letter to Philemon, the slave owner? I'll kind of summarize it and crunch it together a bit here, but here's the essence of it. I appeal to you, Philemon, on the basis of love. I appeal to you for my  son, Onesimus. who became my son while I was in chains.  I'm sending him who is my very heart back to you." Paul's not holding back with Philemon. He's giving it to him. Perhaps he was separated from you for a little while, however that happened, I don't know. Separated from you for a little while that you might have him back for good, no longer as a slave. but as a dear brother. both as a man and as a brother in the Lord. That's strong language. Now we don't know what Philemon did. We don't know the rest of the story, but if he was truly born again, I can't imagine but that his heart  melted to receive Onesimus as a brother in Christ and no longer kept in bondage. And somebody reminded me after first service,  you remember what he also wrote in that letter? says,  and have a guest room ready for me. In other words, Paul's not done with Philemon. He's got more to say. He's going to follow up with this. He's going to make sure Philemon heard what he said. as he visits him personally in his home. Paul doesn't do a cultural frontal attack on slavery in a political sense, which if he did, would have backfired and brought harm to slaves. But with gospel truth, Paul attacked slavery at its foundation,  where the image of God in all people was being sacrificed for the sake of personal advancement and greed, and he said no. That's not acceptable. Now how does that apply today? Well, certainly the curse of slavery is still alive in the world today, and tragically the rise of anti-Semitism is right, raises its ugly head in our culture. Black, white, brown racism seems to be resurgent in parts of our country, and  we can and must speak out boldly against such great evil. uh We can address these things, as Paul did, as a matter of changing hearts, but we can go beyond that because of the cultural context in which we live, of enacting laws in ways the early church could not.  And so  William Wilberforce in England, decades  that it took for England finally to wake up and realize this is a gospel issue that can't be ignored. And slavery was eventually outlawed in England and in America took longer. But there were those strong, outspoken abolitionists in the North, along with former slaves, Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and then such writers as Harriet Beecher Stowe, by the way, sister to the founder of Second Presbyterian Church over here on Meridian, Henry Ward Beecher. President Lincoln met Mrs. Stowe,  authored Uncle Tom's Cabin, and called her the little lady that started the Great War. Thousands of Americans convinced by the gospel finally led to the end of slavery in America, and my countenance, great, great, great, great grandfather, who lived about halfway between  Muncie and Newcastle, was very much a part of the Underground Railroad to provide safe refuge for slaves escaping from the South. part of the Quaker movement in Indiana, as friends. And in my lifetime, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., and others,  so many others, had an impact to end  the evils of segregation and change came,  but the challenge remains  in sadly new efforts to go backwards.  We go back to segregation arising. And just as the Jew-Gentile tension was the challenge of the early church, so racism and divisions based on ethnicity are a challenge today. What's Paul say about that in the church? Well, Paul's application on our text today is based on what he wrote back in chapter two about Jew-Gentile separation. Look at chapter two, verse 13, but now in Christ Jesus, you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one, has broken down in his flesh that dividing wall of hostility that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two. So making peace.  In Ephesians 4, again leading up to our text today, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, this is the fruit of the Spirit in the language of Galatians 5. Eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace, there's one body and one Spirit, just as you are called to one hope. that belongs to your call, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. The hope for change is in the power of the gospel of Jesus Christ to change hearts. And as Paul says in verse 9, knowing that He is both their master and yours who is in heaven, there's no partiality with Him. Those are not the words of a defender of slavery. Now our third topic, our work world today. How does the passage apply today? Human slavery has no place in Christian practice, but legitimate structures of authority are vital  in church, home, government, and workplace that are to be honored, and verses 5 to 9 apply very practical to our work.  so God's call to workers is verses 5 through 8, and the first thing He says is obey, obedience. obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling. When you take a job, you place yourself under the authority of your employer, under the authority of your boss, and you are to obey. Unless you're  asked to do something immoral or against your conscience as a Christian, you're to respond with obedience. Next thing Paul says about this submission to your boss is that it is to be  in  fear and trembling. Now, the actual Greek words you will recognize as they come into English, uh phabou and traumou, phobia and trauma. But careful, leaning into English words that come from Greek can get us seriously off track. Fear, for example, in Scripture has a lot of complexity to it, the way it applies in different contexts. We are to fear God. 1 Corinthians 2, verse 3, and I was with you in weakness and fear and much trembling. Philippians 2, 21, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Same word choice that Paul uses now here with workers to obey their bosses. Ephesians 5, 21, we're to submit to one another in the fear. of Christ. And the meaning ranges from  fear that's almost  at the edge of terror perhaps, to reverence or respect. It's not that we're to live in terror of our bosses,  but there's a danger that we tame it too  much and treat this casually. Now, my first boss was my dad. And the scripture tells me to obey Him because He's my dad, and I was also to obey Him because He was my boss on the farm. And I obeyed Him with fear and trembling. I was afraid not to obey Him, and that was a good thing. I wasn't worried that he was going to beat me. I wasn't worried that he was going to abuse me. I knew he loved me. I knew he cared for me, but I also knew there would be consequences for rebellion. That served me really well, not only then,  but when I got a job in town so I could get some money instead of just work for boardroom, uh so I could afford to go to college. And so I served my boss with fear and trembling too, assuming if I didn't I'd be fired. I found out that wasn't necessary. A lot of guys didn't fear him at all. They just did what they wanted to do, worked a little bit. But I couldn't justify that kind of behavior. Fear and trembling. Even more, this submission calls  for integrity. Look at how integrity is described in these verses with a sincere heart, literally,  singleness of heart, not a divided heart, as you would obey Christ. In other words, give your best at work as if you were working for Jesus, because you are! Verse six, not by way of eye service as people pleasers, but as bond servants, slaves of Christ doing the will of God from the heart. Do you only put forth your best at work when the boss is watching or when you know you have to produce a certain amount by the end of the day or you're going to be in trouble? Do you work just as hard when the boss is gone  as when he's present? Which leads to the ultimate issue of your work, your employment, your career, your work in the home, service to God. Faithfulness to God,  serving God means  doing the best you can on your job. In verse 7, rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to man. You can't divide your life between the secular and the sacred. I'm not saying there's no distinction between secular and sacred, but  in terms of your work, which is for the Lord, it's all sacred. You can't make one part spiritual and one part unspiritual. And your ultimate  accountability on your job where you get your paycheck is to Christ knowing that verse 8, whatever good anyone does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether he's a bond servant, a slave, or is free. And so that's instruction for workers. And then Paul switches to the boss, the employer, the manager. God's called the managers, verse 9. Masters, bosses, employers, supervisors, managers do the same to them. Stop threatening. Stop threatening, knowing that He who is both their master and yours is in heaven, and there's no partiality with Him.  The word translated masters here is actually the Lord. Exact same word that we see in the Lord Jesus Christ. He is our ultimate Lord, but bosses are Lord's underlords in a narrower sense, and what does God say to them? What are they to do? Treat them, your workers, your employees, in the same way. What way? With respect and honor. Recognizing their value as persons, as fellow image bearers of God,  above their value to the company. The bottom line. Because the real bottom line for both of them, both employee and employer, is serving God. Get your head down to the Bible for a moment. The whole text, I want to walk you through it now, and I want you to notice that all five of my verses assigned today  have this emphasis on serving God, that God is the focus. Verse five, look at it, as you would Christ. Verse six, doing the will of God from the heart. Verse seven, as to the Lord, and not to man. Verse eight, whatever good anyone does, he'll receive back from the Lord. Verse 9, both their master and yours is in heaven. When we come to faith in Christ, when we acknowledge that Jesus is Lord, Master, it changes everything. In marriage, in parenting, in our work, no matter what your social status. Bo Nix,  Denver Broncos quarterback, uh didn't play last week in the NFL playoffs, or the Broncos would probably be in the Super Bowl next year. Nick Shuse broke his ankle the week before at end of the game after beating the Bills. He played one play too many. And how did Bonix sneak into my sermon? Because I did a little research on Bo Nix, and I knew he was a believer,  and I found out what he declared his favorite Bible verse or life verse, what Paul wrote to slaves 2,000 years ago, is embraced today by a multimillionaire NFL quarterback. This is text. It's the parallel text in Colossians. It applies to every Christian believer, whatever you do. Whatever you do. Work hardily as for the Lord and not for men. Knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. Colossians 3, 23 and 24. Mark it down. Focus on it. Make it your verse in your work world. Well, it's not lost on me and I hope not on you that the salvation story of the Old Testament is a story about slavery. A story about redemption from slavery, Israel coming out of Egypt released from slavery by the blood of the Passover lamb  as a foretelling of a far greater redemption for us from slavery to sin. made possible by the blood of Jesus,  our Passover lamb, the basis for our salvation in Christ. The word redemption comes up a number of times  in the New Testament. It really always points back to the Exodus and then to the cross.  Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God  and are justified by His grace as a gift through the redemption, deliverance from slavery that's in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 1-7, in him we have redemption, deliverance from slavery through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace. Colossians 1-13 and 14, he's delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved son in whom we have redemption, deliverance from slavery, the forgiveness of sins. Let's bow our heads and prepare our hearts to celebrate with thankfulness this gift of redemption,  deliverance from slavery through our Lord Jesus Christ.  Oh God, our Father, thank you for sending us your Son that he might be.  propitiation of our sins, to take our sins upon Himself and to suffer what we deserve in our place, to be our substitute, that we might be justified, that we might be declared righteous  based on the righteousness of Jesus, not our own, and that we might be delivered, that we might be redeemed from slavery to sin, into the freedom of the sons and daughters of God. Lord as we take these  elements of the bread and the cup, may it drive us back to the cross  and see Your great love for us  there. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. Thank you for engaging with our community by checking out this podcast.  If you would like more information about our Church and ministry, you can find us at faithchurchindie.com.