Adorning the Gospel: The Theology of Work

• Transformation by Grace [00:01:24 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor explains that Christianity causes a fundamental transformation in identity and behavior, training believers to renounce ungodliness.
• Historical Context of Slavery (Doulos) [00:02:12 ▶️ 📄]
  > Detailed analysis of the Greek word 'doulos' (slave), distinguishing ancient Roman slavery from modern chattel slavery, including methods of enslavement and the possibility of manumission.
• Hermeneutics (Bridge Building) [00:03:46 ▶️ 📄]
  > Application of John Stott's 'Between Two Worlds' concept, emphasizing the necessity of understanding the ancient context before applying it to the modern world, contrasting this with subjective Bible study methods.
• Spiritual Slavery to Sin vs. Christ [00:14:10 ▶️ 📄]
  > Theological explanation of slavery as a metaphor: negatively as being enslaved to sin/flesh, and positively as being owned by and serving Jesus Christ, citing Paul's self-identification as a 'doulos'.
• Slavery and Discipleship [00:16:38 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor explains the biblical concept of being a 'doulos' (slave) to Christ, citing Matthew 10:24 and Paul's self-identification as a slave of Christ in Romans, Philippians, and Titus.
• Greek Lexical Analysis [00:18:39 ▶️ 📄]
  > Analysis of the Greek words 'doulos' (slave), 'diakonos' (servant), and 'huperretes' (under-rower/assistant to a slave) to illustrate the depth of submission to Christ.
• Equality in the Kingdom [00:21:24 ▶️ 📄]
  > Discussion of Galatians 3:28 and 1 Corinthians 12:13, emphasizing that social hierarchies (Jew/Greek, slave/free, male/female) are irrelevant in the Kingdom of God, where all have equal status in Christ.
• Kingdom Mindset vs. Cultural Transformation [00:25:21 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor argues that Paul's primary concern was eternal citizenship in the Kingdom rather than immediate social insurrection or overturning slavery, though the principle of brotherhood eventually led to abolition.
• Submissive Heart [00:28:16 ▶️ 📄]
  > Exegesis of Titus 2:9 and Colossians 3, teaching that slaves are to submit to masters 'in everything' and 'with sincerity of heart,' fearing the Lord rather than just men.
• Excellence and Faithfulness [00:35:34 ▶️ 📄]
  > Introduction of the second aspect of service: being well-pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, and showing good faith, based on Titus 2:9.
• Submissive Heart [00:34:25 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor argues that believers must submit to both good and unjust masters, citing 1 Peter 2:18 and 1 Timothy 6, establishing submission as a posture of the heart rather than a reaction to treatment.
• Excellence and Faithfulness [00:35:34 ▶️ 📄]
  > Using Titus 2:9, the pastor outlines a structure of positive and negative traits, emphasizing that service must be done with excellence (well-pleasing) and without argumentativeness or pilfering.
• Adorning the Gospel [00:44:19 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor explains that faithful service 'adorns' (cosmeo) the doctrine of God, making the gospel appealing and compelling to observers, illustrated by the story of a Christian employee influencing a non-Christian colleague.
• Eternal Reward and Accountability [00:49:02 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor concludes with three principles: all service is to the Lord, service must be with excellence/integrity, and believers work for an eternal reward, citing the Parable of the Talents in Matthew 25.
• Workplace Excellence and Integrity [00:50:52 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor argues that believers must be the most trusted and excellent persons in their jobs, rising to the top like Joseph, Daniel, and Christ, and avoiding being a 'problem person' or 'pebble in the shoe' of their employer.
• Voluntary Service and Mission Alignment [00:51:15 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor emphasizes that since no one is a slave to their job, employees who cannot support their company's mission should leave rather than serve with resentment, ensuring those who stay are fully on board with the mission.
• Eternal Reward and Stewardship (Parable of the Talents) [00:52:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > Using Matthew 25, the pastor explains that Jesus has entrusted believers with resources (talents, time, work) while He is in heaven, and that faithfulness in using these resources now leads to greater responsibilities and joy in the future kingdom.
• Eternal Perspective in Daily Life [00:54:42 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor concludes by citing R.C. Sproul's maxim that 'right now counts forever,' urging the congregation to live with the mindset that their current work adorns the gospel and matters for eternity.

• Sermon Illustration [00:05:21 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor invites the congregation to imagine a time machine journey to ancient Crete, describing the sensory experience of entering a city with no indoor plumbing, smelling waste from chamber pots, observing the short lifespan (mid-60s), and noting the prevalence of slaves in every profession (bakers, doctors) due to the Roman class system.
• Sermon Illustration [00:13:01 ▶️ 📄]
  > A reference to the movie Gladiator, noting that the character Maximus goes from being a great general to being sold as a slave, used to illustrate how status could be lost and one could become a slave.
• Sermon Illustration [00:18:12 ▶️ 📄]
  > A personal anecdote about a campus Bible study at Texas A&M called 'doulos' (slave groups), which the pastor found to be a fitting name for groups dedicated to being slaves to the Lord.
• Sermon Illustration [00:18:12 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor mentions a campus bible study at Texas A&M called 'doulos' (slave groups) to illustrate the concept of being a slave to the Lord.
• Sermon Illustration [00:19:18 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor uses the analogy of rowers on a Greek trireme ship to explain the word 'huperretes,' describing himself as an 'under rower' or galley slave for Christ.
• Sermon Illustration [00:26:23 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor references William Wilberforce, noting that the principle of brotherhood in Christ eventually grasped him and led to the overturning of slavery, though this was not Paul's immediate thrust.
• Sermon Illustration [00:36:54 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor shares a personal anecdote about listening to a message by Tommy Nelson when he was beginning in ministry regarding doing work well.
• Sermon Illustration [00:36:48 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor recounts advice from Tommy Nelson about being the 'best number two guy' in any role, and references Old Testament figures Daniel and Joseph who blessed their masters through faithful service.
• Sermon Illustration [00:41:49 ▶️ 📄]
  > A story about a missions pastor in Houston who used church credit cards for personal trips and embezzled hundreds of thousands of dollars, resulting in prison time, illustrating the sin of pilfering.
• Sermon Illustration [00:47:07 ▶️ 📄]
  > An anecdote about a Christian man working at a tech firm who, through consistent cheerfulness and diligence, influenced his non-Christian female colleague to ask about his secret, leading to her conversion.
• Sermon Illustration [00:50:14 ▶️ 📄]
  > A reference to the movie 'Chariots of Fire' and the character Eric Liddell, who stated that God made him to run and he felt pleasure when doing so, used to illustrate working unto the Lord.
• Sermon Illustration [00:50:52 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor references the biblical figures Joseph, Daniel, and Christ as examples of rising to the top through excellence. He also uses the analogy of a 'pebble in the shoe' to describe a negative employee who disrupts the business owner.
• Sermon Illustration [00:52:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor retells the Parable of the Talents from Matthew 25, detailing the master entrusting property to slaves, the faithful servant bringing five more talents, and the master's response: 'Well done, good and faithful slave... enter into the joy of your master.'
• Sermon Illustration [00:54:42 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor quotes theologian R.C. Sproul with the saying: 'right now counts forever.'

• Pastoral Charge [00:00:03 ▶️ 📄]
  > Bow heads and pray for the Lord to instruct their minds.
• Pastoral Charge [00:05:21 ▶️ 📄]
  > Imagine being transported via time machine to the island of Crete in the ancient world.
• Pastoral Charge [00:16:53 ▶️ 📄]
  > Reflect on and accept the identity of being owned by and in service to Jesus as the definition of the Christian life.
• Pastoral Charge [00:51:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > Resign from current employment if one cannot support the company's mission, rather than being a disruptive employee.
• Pastoral Charge [00:51:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > Leave a job if one cannot support its mission
• Pastoral Charge [00:51:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > Seek employment at a company whose mission one can support

[00:00:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:00:03] Would you bow your heads one more time? I want you to pray now that the Lord would Instruct your mind as we study God's Word. Would you pray that now?
[00:00:14] And would you pray for your friends and neighbors that God would instruct their minds?
[00:00:25] And would you pray for me that the Holy Spirit would speak through me now as we open God's Word together?
[00:00:40] Heavenly Father, we pray now Lord that you would do the the mystical work of the word as you apply it through the power of the Holy Spirit to our minds and our hearts. And we pray this in Christ's name. Amen. I invite you to open your Bibles to
[00:01:00] Titus chapter 2. Titus chapter 2. We've been in Titus chapter 2, you've noticed, for several weeks, and we've been talking about the transformation that takes place in our lives because of Christianity, what Christ has done in our lives. And what Paul is saying to the Christians
[00:01:24] in Crete is that they are to be different. He's going to say, and we're going to look at this when I come back in August, he's going to say that the grace of God trains us to renounce
[00:01:35] ungodliness and worldly passions, that the grace of God has transformed our lives. It's transformed who we are. It's caused a transformation to take place, and we've studied this, and we've studied this in the lives of older men, in the lives of older women, and younger women, in the lives of
[00:01:53] young men, and we've studied it in the life of the pastor, the minister, Titus. And now we come to verses 9 and 10 to the slaves. Let me read these verses to you. The word that's translated
[00:02:12] bondservant in the ESV is the Greek word doulos, and it's slave. That's the literal meaning and translation of the word. It's translated bondservant because of all the connotations that we have in our nation from 160 years ago from chattel slavery that's why it because the
[00:02:35] reason why it's translated bond servant is because this institution was slightly different than that as we will see and so they make that interpretive choice but i wish that they would have just left it as what the greek word actually means and that is slaves so notice what paul says to the slaves
[00:02:55] slaves are to be submissive to their own masters in everything they are to be well pleasing not argumentative not pilfering but showing all good faith so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of god our savior now as we look at these verses our natural inclination and tendency
[00:03:26] is to immediately begin to abstract principles that apply to our own work, and we're going to do that. But before we can do that, we must first understand what this text is saying and what it
[00:03:46] means. When I was in seminary, I read a book by John Stott, the Anglican preacher, called Between two worlds and he said in a sense every time you preach a sermon you're crossing over between two
[00:04:03] worlds the modern world which is where we are right now in 21st century america and the ancient world the world of 2 000 years ago in which paul wrote this text and before we can really apply
[00:04:19] what the bible says in the ancient in the modern world we first have to understand what it meant in the ancient world and so he used the the picture of a bridge that you have to cross over
[00:04:32] that bridge as best we can to the ancient world and understand what the text meant in its original context. And then, and only then, can we begin to apply it first in our lives. Contrast that with
[00:04:49] the modern Bible study where you're sitting around in a group, you read a passage, what's the question that is often asked? What does this verse mean to you? No, no, no, no. You can't ask that. You
[00:05:05] first have to ask, what did it mean to the original audience when it was given? So here's what we're going to do. We're going to do an exercise. I want you to imagine we have all taken
[00:05:21] a time machine and we are now on the island of Crete in the middle of the Mediterranean. I want you to, it's, it's rocky. There's not many tall trees. You can, you can feel the breeze coming in
[00:05:36] off the coastline. It's, it's very arid and we're walking and we're coming to a Cretan city. And as we approach that city, as we come towards that city, before we even enter it, we begin to smell
[00:05:54] something you see in the ancient world they didn't have indoor plumbing they didn't have sewage systems people would often if they lived on the second floor when they woke up in the morning they would just pour out their chamber pot down into the street refuse and waste would
[00:06:13] be thrown into the streets and so before you even enter the city you begin to smell the city and it's not pretty it doesn't smell good and as you walk into the city you see people all about
[00:06:30] and you notice certain things about the people that are there one of the first things that you notice is by our standard there's not very many old people in fact the oldest people that you see
[00:06:48] might be in their mid-60s. And that's because the average lifespan in this day, you would be blessed if you lived to 70 years old. If you had cancer, if you had a serious health condition, what would
[00:07:03] happen in the ancient world? You died. You died. And so Paul, when he's in his 60s, calls himself an old man. So you don't see very many young people as you're walking through the city.
[00:07:18] but you also notice a few roman soldiers and you notice coming into the city a big aqueduct bringing water down from the mountain into the city and you notice as you come in a temple to the imperial cult to the worship of the caesars and that's because crete had been
[00:07:50] taken over by the Roman Empire in 66 BC. So it had become a colony of Rome. And from 20 BC about to 180 AD, so a period of about 200 years, historians call the Pax Romana, the Peace of Rome,
[00:08:19] that Rome extended its rule throughout the ancient world and in one sense they subjugated the people that they conquered and they were all under the authority and under the iron fist of Rome which was a negative aspect but the positive aspect is the empire observed much peace and
[00:08:40] tranquility it wasn't until the beginning of the fourth century that the Germanic tribes many of whom were descendants of came down and and sacked rome the goths the vandals and conquered rome but it's this period of tranquility and peace and it's this period that allowed the gospel to go forth
[00:09:02] into the ancient world that that people were not having to to fight foreign powers there was time of peace and using the roman roads using the roman shipping lanes paul had come to crete and brought
[00:09:16] the gospel. So in a sense, God used the Pax Romana, the peace of Rome, in order to bring the gospel to this island of Crete. You also begin to notice that there's all these people
[00:09:31] running around. You go to a bakery and you notice that the person behind the counter, the baker, is a slave. You walk by a doctor's office and you notice that the person in the office
[00:09:50] is a slave. In fact, you notice that almost everybody that you see that's not a Roman soldier, everybody running about bustling in the streets is a slave. And that's because one out of every two people in the roman empire on average was a slave so in the roman empire
[00:10:15] you had a class system with roman citizens being at the top of that class and then you had lesser citizens and then at the very bottom of the social structure the very bottom of the hierarchy
[00:10:30] you had the doulos the slaves a slave is someone who was legally owned by someone else and their entire existence was in service to that person that's the basic definition that's an important definition for us to remember that they are owned by someone else and their entire
[00:11:00] earthly existence is then in service to that person now there's several differences from modern slavery that we need to understand the first is is that it was not uncommon for slaves to buy or purchase their freedom so many slaves could earn money by doing various
[00:11:26] task and many slaves would eventually purchase that freedom from their master and some would even choose to stay subjugated choose to stay slaves so slavery in the ancient world wasn't a perpetual institution that you were necessarily bound to it could be but it might not be the other
[00:11:53] difference is, is that there were all sorts of ways that people could become slaves. All sorts of ways. As the Roman Empire expanded and these armies would conquer different regions, by and large, what they would do with most of the citizens of the regions that they conquered
[00:12:17] is they would subjugate them and sell them as slaves. That's why so many of the slaves in the ancient world were educated you might be serving and and you might be living in spain or egypt or
[00:12:31] or one of these places and you might be a doctor you might be a lawyer you might have uh status in the social hierarchy but then when rome came it didn't matter you found yourself
[00:12:44] as a slave or it could be that you did something you were you lived in in in the roman empire and you committed a crime and the penalty for your crime is that you were subjugated to slavery
[00:13:01] remember maximus from gladiator goes from being the the great general sold as a slave becomes a gladiator obviously this is fiction that's not it's not history you could be born a slave if your parents were slaves and you're born into their family you were you would be born
[00:13:25] into slavery if your parents were in debt and it was really bad debt they might sell you into slavery my point is is that there were all sorts of ways that you could end up as a slave and then
[00:13:41] there's means by which that you could buy yourself out of slavery now i think what's fascinating is that the new testament takes this institution that we've just seen that we've just described and it uses it as a metaphor for the spiritual life let me explain first negatively
[00:14:10] the writer of hebrews says that we are enslaved to the devil as unbelievers in the fear of death that's hebrews 2 15 paul says in romans 6 6 that the unbeliever is enslaved to sin you remember the definition that we use for slavery that you are owned by someone
[00:14:40] and that all of your life is served in service to that person so when paul says that you are a slave to sin you're enslaved does that mean that you just sometimes kind of do good things and and
[00:14:58] sometimes you kind of do bad things no what he's saying is you are a doulos to sin you are a slave you serve your sin remember your life as an unbeliever your life was fulfilled in service
[00:15:15] and bondage to your sin paul says in romans 8 12 that the unbeliever is a slave to the flesh the flesh is the part of you as an unbeliever that wars against the law of god he says as an
[00:15:33] unbeliever you are enslaved to those passions those affections the reason why you can't stop sinning that you keep returning to the to the terrible things that you do is because you're enslaved to the flesh you look at these young guys that get addicted to the online gambling what's
[00:15:51] what's going on there they're enslaved to it i want to walk away from it but i keep getting pulled back in because that's deep down what they want to do. You always do what you want to do
[00:16:06] deep down. And the reason is Paul says you're enslaved to the flesh. Peter says false teachers are slaves of corruption. That's what they're about. They're slaves of corruption. So there's negative side of it? The positive side. Jesus says that his disciples are his slaves. You say,
[00:16:38] whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm not sure I like that. But Jesus says that our relationship to him is that of a master and a slave. Think about it. You're owned by someone and all of your life is
[00:16:53] given in service to that person what does that sound like that's slavery and yet that is the christian life jesus said this jot this down matthew 10 24 a disciple is not above his teacher
[00:17:10] nor a slave a doulos above his master so jesus says how are you to think about yourself think about yourself as a mathetase a learner a disciple you're to think about yourself as a slave
[00:17:27] in service to the master so paul references himself over and over and over again if you look how paul introduces himself romans 1 1 paul says paul a slave a doulos of christ Philippians 1 1 Paul and Timothy slaves of Christ Jesus Titus 1 1 what we read earlier when we begin
[00:17:53] this study Paul a slave of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ so Paul took Jesus's word seriously Paul understood himself as a doulos when I was at Texas A&M there was a campus bible study
[00:18:12] called doulos i thought that was pretty good they said we have doulos groups these are slave groups slave slave groups to the lord there's another word that paul uses in first corinthians it's fascinating so there's the the word doulos which means slave as we've been looking at there's
[00:18:39] the word diakonos, which means servant. In 1 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul says this, verse 1, this is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. The word he uses for servants is not doulos, it's not diakonos, it's the Greek word
[00:19:07] huperretes. And if you look up that word, there's several lexicon meanings that are fleshed out.
[00:19:18] One is simply a slave. Another is that you're the, not even a slave, you're the assistant to the slave. You're like the shield bearer. You are so low, you're not even the main slave.
[00:19:35] you're the assistant to that guy that's that's one meaning then if you actually look at the word it's a compound word hooper means under ratez means rower on the greek trireme ships where they have the sails they would have three rows of rowers three levels of rowers and when paul
[00:20:08] saying is that he is a slave on one of those trireme ships and he is an under rower for christ that's how far down he is on the totem pole not just that he's a slave not just that he's a
[00:20:25] second-hand slave but that he is a galley slave an under rower for christ so this is how paul thought of himself. So that's, the New Testament takes this idea of slavery and uses it to describe
[00:20:44] fallen man's bondage to sin, the flesh, Paul says in Galatians 5, bondage to the law, and then on the positive side, this is our relationship to Christ. He is our master and we exist to serve
[00:21:00] him. Now, one of the things that's interesting, I want you to turn with me over to Galatians chapter 3, verse 28. There's one principle that Paul taught in the New Testament regarding status in the kingdom of God. One principle, and he teaches it several places.
[00:21:24] He teaches it here in Galatians 3. He teaches it also in 1 Corinthians. We'll turn there in a second. But Paul says this in Galatians 3, 28. He says, there is neither Jew nor Greek. There is
[00:21:43] neither slave nor free. There is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
[00:21:53] what he's saying is in a world where your entire existence in life is determined by your social structure in the roman empire are you a roman citizen are you a wealthy person are you a free
[00:22:09] man are you a slave in that world where that determines your entire existence he says none of that matters in the kingdom of God none of that matters you whether you're Jew Gentile slave or free male or female all of you have equal status in the kingdom of God amen that's amazing
[00:22:43] and and we don't understand that as much because we are the land of the free and the home of the brave where we don't like hierarchy it's bad most people's minds but in that world that was
[00:22:57] everything and paul's saying this overturns all of that when we come into the church there's no partiality to the wealthy or to the roman citizens no no sir your status is you are in christ and if you are in christ you have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places and you
[00:23:20] are on equal footing with anyone else and by the way that's the type of church we need to be that is a counter-cultural kingdom-minded church paul says if you turn over to first corinthians 12 same principle verse 13 he says for in one spirit we were all baptized into one body in
[00:23:53] other words every christian everyone who has repented of their sins trusted christ in faith we're all baptized with the same holy spirit you don't have a monopoly on the spirit because you're rich you don't have a monopoly on the holy spirit because you're a roman citizen or because you're
[00:24:11] smarter than other people we've all been baptized he says with the same holy spirit into one body and just to specify to make sure we get it he says jews or greeks slaves or free
[00:24:28] we're all made to drink of one spirit so in the church these hierarchies that exist out in the world when you come into the church to the church's worship those hierarchies must disappear they must we're all one in christ and so what you don't see paul doing it's fascinating because
[00:24:59] because people say why isn't paul more concerned about cultural transformation why isn't paul more concerned about overturning slavery why isn't he going to these cities and saying, Jesus, believe in Jesus, and overturned slavery. Why isn't he doing this? And the answer
[00:25:21] is, it's because he was much more concerned, not with cultural transformation, but with citizenship in the kingdom. And to make sure that everybody that he preached to was at a citizenship, had citizenship in the kingdom that is to come. And so if you don't have Paul's kingdom mindset,
[00:25:43] you're not going to understand the instructions that paul gives to slaves you won't because you're saying why isn't paul advocating for social insurrection for a revolution why isn't paul doing this isn't slavery wrong well paul is laying out these principles and you see it in the in the book
[00:26:05] of philemon where he sends onesimus back to philemon he says you're brothers now yes there's a master, there's a slave. But in Christ, you're brothers. And that principle of brotherhood to our fellow man is what grasped William Wilberforce and others and would eventually
[00:26:23] overturn slavery. But that was not Paul's main thrust, you see. Paul's main thrust was about the eternal kingdom of Christ. In fact, Paul says, jot this verse down, Philippians 3.20. He says, our citizenship is where? In heaven. And from it, we await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.
[00:26:57] So that's Paul's perspective. He has a heavenly perspective, a kingdom-minded perspective.
[00:27:08] Yes, he's concerned about the here and now, but he's much more concerned about eternity and that what we do in life now matters for eternity.
[00:27:19] So it's with that mindset.
[00:27:21] I want you to turn back to Titus.
[00:27:23] It's with that mindset and this background that we can now begin to look at Paul's instructions to the slaves at the church at Crete.
[00:27:35] And by the way, there probably would be many of them.
[00:27:39] You see the worldview that I just articulated to you?
[00:27:42] Do you think that was appealing to slaves in the Roman Empire?
[00:27:45] Absolutely it was.
[00:27:51] So many slaves had been converted to Christ.
[00:27:56] I want to show you now three aspects of a slave's service.
[00:28:04] Three aspects of a slave's service.
[00:28:08] The first is they were to serve with a submissive heart.
[00:28:16] they were to serve with a submissive heart notice verse 9 look at verse 9 slaves are to be submissive to their own masters in everything the verb is hupotasso it's an important verb it's it means to submit oneself and it's used not just for slaves with masters
[00:28:46] it's used for all sorts of people in the ancient world. It's used to describe the wife's relationship to her husband, that she is to submit to her husband. It's used to describe people's relationship to government, that we are to submit to ruling authorities that are over us. We all have different
[00:29:02] people in our lives that we are to submit to. But the important thing to note is that Paul tells Titus to tell the slaves that they are to submit to their own masters. It's not that the masters
[00:29:18] are to make the slaves submit. This is an act of the will on the part of the slaves.
[00:29:27] They are to lower themselves underneath their own masters, and notice the qualifying phrase at the end in everything not just some things now obviously paul understood that they were not to disobey christ who is their first master they weren't to that that it's understood that they're
[00:29:53] not to disobey christ in order to obey their earthly master but what he's saying as much as you can, slaves, under the lordship of Jesus Christ, you are to submit yourselves to your earthly master. Now you ask, how can Paul say such a thing? How can he say such a thing? Well,
[00:30:18] he tells us. Turn over to the left to Colossians 3. These are the verses we read. He tells us exactly why they are to submit to their earthly masters he says slaves obey in everything those
[00:30:37] who are your earthly master sounds like the same thing he just said not by way of eye service as people pleasers but with sincerity of heart that that you do this truly that you truly submit to
[00:30:52] your masters, and notice this, fearing the Lord, not fearing your earthly master, fearing the Lord.
[00:31:04] You see, who are you really a slave to? Christ, right? Verse 23, whatever you do, whatever you do, work heartily as for the lord and not for men wow so you're a slave to christ and you are to
[00:31:32] understand you're stationed as a slave you're serving that master but who are you really serving you're serving christ you're serving him in your work not men we're not just going for the add a voice we're going to please christ and then look at this verse 24 see what i'm talking about
[00:32:03] with a heavenly mindset look at this knowing that from the lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward you are serving the lord christ so he's saying you have to serve you have to live
[00:32:17] in in light of your future reward that you're serving this master but you're serving the lord and your eye is on eternity where where you will be rewarded for your work that is given to christ
[00:32:34] there's several other texts turn over uh again to the left to ephesians chapter six verse five almost exactly the same as colossians three but he says slaves obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling in other words it's complete obedience with a sincere heart notice
[00:33:11] it's not just outward action it's from the heart we tell this to our children all the time it's obedience is not just you do what we say it's you do what we say from the heart
[00:33:22] you ever have a child that they you tell them to do something you know they're doing it but it doesn't really look like they're doing it paul's saying you're to obey and you are to obey from
[00:33:35] the heart as you would christ not by way of eye service as people pleasers but as here it is as slaves of christ doing the will of god from the heart rendering service with a goodwill as to the
[00:33:54] Lord and not to men. So we're called to do this work as slaves of Christ, rendering our service to Christ and not to men. That's Paul's instructions to slaves. And this is replete in the new testament you can also look at first timothy 6 verse 2 listen to what peter says
[00:34:25] this is first peter 2 18 jot this down first peter 2 18 peter says slaves be subject to your masters with all respect and then he qualifies it not only to the good and gentle but also to
[00:34:47] the unjust. So you mean the way that my master treats me doesn't infringe upon how I am to be obedient? It's exactly what Peter is saying. He's saying you serve with both the good and the gentle
[00:35:07] and with the unjust. Paul says in 1 Timothy 6 that you are to serve both the believing master and the unbelieving master. So it's a posture of a submissive heart. That's the first aspect that Paul brings their attention to. The second aspect is that they are to serve
[00:35:34] with excellence and faithfulness. Excellence and faithfulness. So if you would, turn back to Titus.
[00:35:43] titus 2 verse 9 he says they are to be well-pleasing not argumentative not pilfering but showing all good faith let me show you the structure here so it's positive negative negative positive so he gives a positive trait two negative traits and a positive trait now
[00:36:20] the the first two the first positive and the first negative deal with the excellence of the work that they are to do notice he says positively they are to be well pleasing in everything That means that they are to do what their master wants them to do.
[00:36:43] They are to accomplish the tasks that they have been given.
[00:36:48] I remember when I was beginning in ministry, I listened to a message that Tommy Nelson did.
[00:36:54] And he said, what you want to do is you want to be the best number two guy that you can be wherever you go.
[00:37:01] If you're a discipleship guy, if you're a children's guy, if you're a youth guy, a college guy, what you want to do is you want to be the best in that.
[00:37:09] and you want to make the the pastor that's over you you want to make his ministry flourish as best you can and god will honor that and that was such great advice and and you look especially in
[00:37:23] the old testament you look at figures like daniel in nebuchadnezzar's court he had something special with daniel didn't he he had this trusted wise advisor and because of that nebuchadnezzar ended up being blessed simply because this Jewish slave had come over and was in his court. He was blessed
[00:37:49] because of Daniel. You look at Potiphar. What happened with Potiphar? Everything he had was blessed because of Joseph, because of Joseph's faithfulness. What does this look like? Do you think it's just doing the bare minimum? Do you think it's just doing what my master said for me
[00:38:05] to do A, B, C, and D. That's what I did. I did A, B, C, and D. I'm done. You think that's what it is?
[00:38:11] No, it's applying wisdom that you do the best job that you possibly can over and above the expectations. And by the way, that's what America was built on. It's called the Protestant work ethic that we work unto the lord and not unto men that we are well pleasing to those
[00:38:38] to which we serve but ultimately to the lord and then he says the negative so we're it's excellence not argumentative and and this this word means to speak back that you're you're speaking back to to the master jb phillips paraphrases it they are not to answer back and obviously you never
[00:39:03] want to be a yes man you ever hear that that's so that an employee's just a yes man the boss says this yes sir and and and you say this this is you jump this is how high i'm going to jump he's not
[00:39:13] he's not talking about that no obviously we don't want to be yes men we want to look out for the people that we work for he's saying of course slaves you look out for the the well-being and the
[00:39:24] service of your master. But what you don't want to do is every time your master says something, to be that person that says, I can't do it. It can't be done. Let me push back on that a little
[00:39:38] bit. Let me give you a different perspective. And there's a spirit here in this word that the literal meaning is someone who speaks back, but there's a spirit in this word that would be described as rebelliousness undermining the work that's taking place you ever be in a in a in a job
[00:40:03] place and you go over to the to the coffee machine or the water cooler and people are talking in hushed tones and you kind of lean in and what they're talking about is their boss they're saying
[00:40:17] bad things about them they're saying bad things about the business oh this this this this this this is the way they're treating, you know, this is, this is terrible. And, and what they're doing is they're sowing seeds of discord within that business. By the way, do you think that can happen
[00:40:35] in churches? I mean, this is how most churches in America split up as people just undermining the leadership of the church. You don't want to get involved with a Cassius or a Brutus, people that are working to undermine the leadership. That's the idea. So first is in
[00:41:01] terms of the excellence of the work. And then second, Paul speaks to the faithfulness in which it is to be done. He says, verse 10, not pilfering, but showing all good faith. Not pilfering means
[00:41:21] skimming you're taking money off the top your master gives you some money to go buy bread you go down to the bakery to buy bread he gave you 10 denarii it costs nine you pocket the other
[00:41:37] one you go back and you said it costs 10 here's the bread and you're and you're you're skimming a little bit off the top there was a church in houston it was all over the news that's the reason
[00:41:49] why i even tell you about it there was a church in houston the missions pastor big church was using the church credit cards to purchase all these trips for hundreds of people going on mission trips all over the world in the church and what he would do is he would occasionally
[00:42:06] purchase a little something for himself and budget it into one of these trips and he did this for years for years hundreds of thousands of dollars he stole from the church do you think your sin finds you out of course it does and he ended up going to prison it's all over the news
[00:42:30] in houston so paul's saying you don't do that you walk in integrity and you walk in faithfulness And that's the meaning of this next phrase, where he says, showing all good faith.
[00:42:49] He uses that word pistis, which means faith, but sometimes that word should not be translated faith, it should be translated faithfulness.
[00:43:00] And that's the picture here, showing all good faithfulness.
[00:43:04] He uses that word good, that it's a faithful service that's good.
[00:43:09] in the Marine Corps, we had a phrase, the slogan of the Marine Corps is semper fidelis, Latin for always faithful, always faithful. And that's the idea, that you're always faithful.
[00:43:27] You can be trusted when no one's looking, that you're doing the right thing, that you're where you're supposed to be, you're spending the money the way it's supposed to be spent, that you're stewarding the resources that the master has given, that you are a faithful and trustworthy
[00:43:44] servant. So here's the overall picture. So from these first two aspects, it's a slave who willingly submits their life to the master as to Christ, and they do so with excellence, and they do so with faithfulness. Now here's the third aspect, and this is the kingdom aspect,
[00:44:19] and this is why this is so important. You're saying, well, why is Paul saying this? Because Paul's a kingdom mindset. Look what he says. The third aspect is this, that the slave's work beautifies the gospel. It beautifies the gospel. We sang earlier about the beauty of Christ.
[00:44:44] The Roman world was not a beautiful world. It was not. It was a dog-eat-dog world.
[00:44:52] Do you think in that world, do you think slaves diligently served their masters? Do you think that was the case absolutely not you think slaves were skimming off the top hundred percent they were it was a world that was violent we talked about earlier it was a world that stank it was
[00:45:09] not a beautiful world but here's the interesting thing here's here's what he says verse 10 here's the purpose clause so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of god our savior the word adorn greek word cosmeo it's where we get our english word cosmetics what is a woman who who
[00:45:37] use i hopefully a woman right for that type of church we what does a woman do who uses cosmetics in the morning. What's she doing? She's beautifying herself. She's putting on some glitter and some frosting and things to make her look more excellent, right? Jewelry, adornment.
[00:46:07] It's things that you put on that beautify. And so notice what Paul's saying. He says, slaves if you do this if you have this otherworldly kingdom mindset where you serve your masters you submit to them and everything that you serve with excellence and faithfulness you adorn
[00:46:32] the gospel of god our savior the doctrine of god yes the doctrine of god is sweet it's wonderful but now you're bringing it into living color you're making it appealing you're making it compelling to people. You're making it seem wonderful to be a Christian. Isn't that what
[00:46:53] we want to do? We want people to look at us and say, there is something different about that person. What is it? I was talking to a couple who was in the process of joining our church,
[00:47:07] and I asked them, how did y'all meet? And they said, well, we were both working for a tech firm, and the husband, obviously not married at this point, they didn't know each other, was a Christian.
[00:47:22] He'd already grown up in a Christian home.
[00:47:24] He was a believer.
[00:47:26] Wife was a non-Christian.
[00:47:28] And she said, every day when I came into the office, he was there and he was happy.
[00:47:36] He was cheerful and he was diligent and he did his work with excellence.
[00:47:45] And she watched him do this day in, day out, day in, day out, day in, day out, until one day she had enough. And she said, what's your secret? He said, stay after work and I'll tell you. He said, my secret is I'm a
[00:48:08] Christian. I love Christ. He's changed my life. That's who I serve. And they went to a little church up the road called Grace Community Church, probably in the 70s. She was saved, converted, and ended up getting married. See, that's a life that adorns the doctrine of God,
[00:48:39] our Savior, that makes it compelling. So what are the principles that we can glean from this?
[00:48:49] We're now ready. We've come across this bridge, and we're now back to 21st century America. What are the principles that we can glean from this, that we can take home? Let me give you three.
[00:49:02] First, all of our service in this life is first and foremost service to the Lord. It's service to the Lord. I don't care if you own your own business. Guess what? You're not your own boss.
[00:49:24] You're a slave of Christ. I don't care if you work a day job, minimum wage, you have a harsh boss, guess what you really work for christ you serve him in every capacity and it's to him that you
[00:49:43] will one day give account everything that you do is ultimately for him so that affects everything you do doesn't it if it's for christ does that mean that we have to do it it means that we give
[00:49:57] it our all and that means that when we do a good job it's pleasing to christ one of my favorite movies growing up was chariots of fire remember eric little he he says a line in the movie he
[00:50:14] says god made me to run and when i run i feel this pleasure that should be our work that whatever you do even if you're retired are you still are you still supposed to work yes we work for the lord
[00:50:31] we work to advance the kingdom there's no like five hour work week all of our lives are to be given for Christ. Second, this means in every sphere we are to serve with excellence and
[00:50:52] integrity. Every sphere, everything that you do, you should be the most trusted person and you should be the most excellent person. You should rise to the top like Joseph, like Daniel, like Christ. Everything that you do should be done with the intentionality of excellence. And that
[00:51:15] you shouldn't be the person in your business or job that's the problem person. Listen, last I checked, nobody here is a slave, right? Nobody's making you show up and do that work. If you're not on board with the mission of your business, you should leave and not be a problem in that
[00:51:35] business. You don't want to be that pebble in the shoe of the owner of the business that you work for. If you can't support the mission, go work for a different business or company where you can.
[00:51:51] But if you're there, you need to serve with excellence. And then third and finally, I want you to turn over to Matthew 25. Matthew 25. And the third principle is this, is that remember that you are working for an eternal reward. You are working for an eternal reward. If you look
[00:52:35] verse 14 of Matthew 25. This is in the Olivet Discourse. Jesus says, describing the kingdom, he says, for it will be like a man going on a journey who called his slaves and entrusted to
[00:52:52] them his property. Who's that? That's us, right? Where has he gone? He's gone to heaven. He's on a journey. He's coming back. Jesus is in heaven. We're his slaves, and he's entrusted to us his
[00:53:05] resources. To one, he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. And he goes on and talks about how they stewarded those resources and how Jesus rewarded them with more talents in his future kingdom. Verse 19, it says,
[00:53:28] now after a long time, the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them.
[00:53:32] and he who had received the five talents came forward bringing five talents more saying master you delivered to me five talents here i have made five talents more his master said to him well done
[00:53:46] good and faithful slave bond servant you have been faithful over a little i will set you over much enter into the joy of your master so that's the idea faithfulness faithfulness and stewarding the talents the resources the time the work that god has given you now and based on that
[00:54:16] faithfulness and he keeps going with the two talents and one talent so forth you will be rewarded in Christ's heavenly kingdom and given more responsibilities in the future. So we live with that mindset that what we do now in life matters for eternity. There was a saying, I'll
[00:54:42] close with this, R.C. Sproul used to say, right now counts forever. Heavenly Father, Lord, we want to live for your kingdom we want our work to matter we want to serve you and not mere men we want to
[00:55:03] serve with excellence we want to serve with faithfulness and lord we want to adorn the gospel so that others might see the work that we do and ask what is different and in so doing
[00:55:19] that the kingdom might advance help us to live in light of the eternal rewards that you promise us based on how we steward our life here.
[00:55:31] Lord, give us this eternal perspective.
[00:55:33] May we be a church with an eternal perspective of the kingdom of God.
[00:55:39] We pray this in Christ's name.
[00:55:41] Amen.