The Bible and Slavery
Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ... Masters, do the same to them, and stop your threatening, knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven.
Ephesians 6:5, 9 |
As we come to this passage today, it is a little difficult to get past the first word. The word bondservant or slave is one which many people have a hard time with. People often wonder how it is that the Bible could seemingly promote servitude. When we hear the word “slave” or Bondservant, we wonder how it is that Scripture seems to be an advocate for bondage.
And this morning, rather than doing an exposition of this passage like we might normally do, I think it is wise for us to take some time to consider that very thing. And the main reason we may do so is polemic. I’d like to help us as a congregation be equipped to speak to the world around us and defend the faith.
One of the most frequent tactics people use to disparage Christianity is the concept of slavery. They will say, “how can you believe in the Bible when it promotes slavery?” Or “I could never follow a God who endorses slavery.”
This is especially true with the prevalence of Critical Race Theory in our day and age. Those who are looking for oppressive systems and a reason to decry them will take a quick look at the Bible, see that slavery was practiced and condoned in the Bible, and then they will write off the faith as oppressive. What’s worse is that they will weaponize that as a means of dissuading people from following the Bible.
We also have the trend of “ex-evangelicals.” Perhaps you’ve heard of people who have started deconstructing their faith. They maybe grew up in an evangelical house and they are apostatizing. And they will talk about how they are trying to take their faith apart and work it out in a more meaningful way. And one of the things that is a real trip up for them is the whole idea of slavery in the Bible.
So, as we come to a passage like this one, it might be good to take a second and think about how slavery fits into the biblical system and what God’s word really has to say about it.
As we consider what Scripture says about slavery, we want to aim at two things. First, we can sort it out for our own minds. I don’t doubt that the whole concept can be a little confusing. Some may wonder why the Bible doesn’t just come out and condemn the whole system. Others may acknowledge the Bible talks about slavery and that bible figures have slaves, and just shrug their shoulders and say, “Well, God must have some purpose for it.”
It would probably be good to have a little better handle on what Scripture has to say about the topic than that. So it will be time well spent meditating on it.
But the other thing that we can do is be prepared to address those who want some reason to write off the Scriptures and criticize Christianity. If we have our ducks in a row, we can give a good defense of the faith and show people that God’s way is not just the best way, it is the only way.
So, then, what can we say about slavery? First, we need to acknowledge that slavery exists because of the fall.
I. Slavery exists because of the fall
This may seem self evident to some of us, but we shouldn’t overlook this fact: God did not intend humans to live this way. Men and women were meant to be free individuals who had God as their master. If sin had never entered this world, there would never be anyone who was subjected to anyone else.
But since sin did enter the world, that changed the way the world was meant to be. It changed the way men and women relate to one another. The fall completely changed the landscape because now people were sinful and they have the desire to oppress one another.
You also recognize that the fall brought about other problems. With sin comes misery. We no longer live in paradise and we have to deal with a world that is broken. And there are problems that arise as a result of this brokenness. For instance, there’s poverty, suffering, sorrow. Slavery, as we will see, is one of the consequences of living in a world which is broken by sin.
Now we begin here because that gives us the proper framework to understand the very existence of slavery. You might say that it gives us some categories by which to judge it. Moreover, it gives us a framework for dealing with those who criticize Christianity over slavery.
You must always keep in mind that those who are critical of Christianity are coming from a particular worldview. They are people who do not believe in the fall and the sinfulness of man. They don’t regard God and his law. Most of these people hold to a secular, materialistic, naturalistic worldview. And these people don’t even have a framework for saying that slavery is evil. They may criticize Christianity, but they really don’t have any ground upon which to stand.
Think of it this way: If man is nothing more than a sac of chemicals with no soul or moral absolutes (as the materialist says), there’s no real reason to say that slavery is wrong. If we are just blobs of flesh, who’s to say that one blob cannot subjugate another blob.
They may shout and cajole us about slavery, but we can brush it all aside by recognizing the fact that their worldview is morally bankrupt. They do not have moral absolutes by which to judge good and evil. Their own life principles do not support the claims they make against slavery.
It is only within a Christian worldview, where you recognize the fall and the commandments of God, that you have any kind of framework for discussing the morality and immorality of slavery.
So that’s where we begin. We begin with God; we begin with Adam, and we begin with the fall of man into sin. And we recognize that things are not as they were intended to be.
Secondly, we should recognize that the bible presents us with different kinds of slavery.
II. It exists in several different forms
You need to recognize that not all forms of servitude are the same. And you need to recognize these different forms of slavery before you go writing off what God has said about slavery in his Word.
You see, what typically happens is that people have one concept of slavery. And what they do is react to the Bible on the basis of the myopic view. And so they make judgments that are not necessarily good.
When you understand that slavery has various ways that it comes to be (and God has different things to say about the different forms), what you will find is that God actually is the only one who has his head screwed on right when it comes to the subject at hand.
So, what are the different ways one may become a slave?
First of all, there is (what the bible calls) man-stealing. This is forced enslavement through something like kidnapping. One of the ways that slavery comes into being is because humans do not respect other’s right to live and exist independently. And they commit a great sin against God and others by taking them captive. Someone may be taken by force or they may be lured into a life of bondage. Either way, a person is stolen and enslaved.
And you should know that the Bible condemns this practice outright. The Old Testament and New Testament are in perfect agreement in this regard. In 1 Timothy 1 Paul condemns “enslavers” right along with liars and those who practice homosexuality. Moses is even more emphatic when in Exodus 21 he says, “Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.”
In the Old Testament, kidnapping was a capital crime. If convicted, you’d be put to death. So you see that there is absolutely no toleration of those who practice man-stealing. And that goes for anyone who may be tangentially involved in the process. Maybe you didn’t kidnap them, you were just transporting them to the slave market. You were just as guilty and, therefore, liable to death.
That, I believe, is very important to understand. God does not tolerate this kind of forced enslavement.
The second way someone might become a slave is by becoming a prisoner of war. You recognize that when people march off to battle, they may end up taking prisoners. They may overtake the enemy or the enemy may surrender. And what do they typically do with those prisoners? Throughout most of history, they either killed them or subjected them to servitude.
Now, you should recognize here that the Bible does permit this. Deut. 20 says that if you go out to lay siege to a city of the Canaanites and, if they surrender, the Israelites were to subject them to forced labor.
You recognize that this is much better than the alternative. The alternative being that the entire city be annihilated. Here they have a chance to live. What’s more, they have opportunity to become Christians. They would become part of different households in Israel, and in those households they would be taught the way of God.
What’s more, the Bible has laws which protected these slaves. The Bible recognizes the dignity of these people and ensured that they couldn’t be left to the whims of their masters. They were not allowed to be whipped and cruelly treated for no reason. They had rights and could go free if those rights were violated.
That’s rather incredible when you compare it to the pagan world. That’s pretty incredible when you compare it to slavery around the world even today. Most people don’t give slaves rights. Most nations don’t seek to protect slaves and recognize their dignity. But the Lord does.
So you recognize that in the case of prisoners of war, God provided a means of life for these people. He provided a way to eternal life. And he provided protections for them that they would not otherwise have.
That gives you a different view of slavery in the Bible, doesn’t it? It doesn’t sound quite so horrible as a lot of people make it out to be.
But we are not done yet. There’s another way one could be come a slave. It is through, what we now call, indentured servitude.
If, in the providence of God, you became destitute, you could sell yourself into servitude. If you were so impoverished that you could not provide for yourself or your family, and you had no way to survive. You and your family could become slaves.
So this was a way of survival. As a servant in someone’s house, you could get your meals, have shelter and clothing, and have the hope of going free someday. That’s because you could only hold these slaves for a period of 7 years. At the end of 7 years these indentured servants were to have the option of going back to their normal life. Some of them chose to continue under their master’s care. They would have their ear pierced with an awl. But they could go free. So it was intended to be for a limited time.
Indentured servitude and the release of indentured servants is not typically on people’s radar. Remember I said that people often have a myopic view of slavery. They don’t understand these different categories, and they are typically writing off the bible because they equate chattel slavery and what happened in America in the 17-1800’s.
That’s not the case at all. In indentured servitude God provided a means of people to live. It was a means of survival and possibly even a means to thriving. Which leads to the fourth kind of slavery in the Bible
In the Old Testament you could also become a slave through the court system. If you had committed a crime and were found guilty, you would have to pay fines. If you could not afford to pay those fines, you would have to work to pay off your debt.
This is what is sometimes called “peonage.” And, in many respects, it is sort of the brother of indentured servitude.
You’ll note that this is not only a fitting form of justice, but it was a good means of producing a new and better life for the convict. Again, in coming into the household of another Israelite, he would have likely received biblical training and discipleship. He’s also be around people with better character (rather than sitting in prison with a bunch of felons). So in God’s system, there’s probably going to be a good deal of moral reform.
He would also have the chance to learn some life skills. As a bondservant he would have to work and learn to do various trades. And that would benefit him after he had paid his debt and been released. Now, after he’s paid his debt or been released, he can enter society as a contributing citizen. Rather than being a drag on the system or repeating his crimes like a lot of convicts today, he’s put on a path of reform and productivity.
Now, I go through all of this to help you recognize that there are different kinds of slavery in the Bible. And you recognize that not all enslavement is the same. You can’t write God off because you have some preconceived notion of what slavery is. What typically happens is that the critic is the one in the wrong, not God.
And as you consider these different types of slavery, you’ve already begun to hear something of the next point I want to make regarding slavery and the Bible.
We’ve seen that slavery is the result of the fall. We’ve talked about the fact that it takes different forms. The third point we need to understand is that slavery was regulated in the best possible way.
III. It was regulated in the best possible way
In the Bible you read about all kinds of laws pertaining to slavery. We’ve mentioned a few so far. But what you need to understand is that the Bible protects innocent people. The Bible regulates slavery and ensures that the dignity of every possible human (even the lowest of society) is preserved to the highest possible degree.
In every biblical command God is always seeking to uphold the principle of life. Biblical justice is a means of promoting and preserving the life of every innocent individual.
So, as you read through the Old Testament, you will find laws regarding slavery. But you will find that these laws always are making the most of the miserable conditions of the world. And Israel, by its OT laws, would have stood out as a nation. In comparison to the pagan lands around them this was unique. At the very least, as a slave in Israel you would have had it much better than if you were a slave anywhere else.
At least that’s the way it was supposed to be. We recognize that there were abuses. And we see how God still spoke to that by sending the prophets to condemn the acts of those who did tyrannize people and oppress them.
But this leads us to the New Testament. Thus far, we’ve been referring to the OT. When you come to the NT, we have to deal with Rome and its slave system. And this is a completely different beast.
I think it should be enough to say that Rome was a pagan. As a result, it had an unbiblical, pagan system of slavery. And it was a rampant one at that. It is said that one in five people in the Roman empire was a slave. In some places one in every three people were slaves. So there was an incredible portion of the population of the Roman Empire who were slaves.
And if you sweep the NT for some sort of word on abolition, you will be highly disappointed. You won’t find anything. Paul does not come out and say, “Free your slaves; it is wicked to own them.” And there are reasons for that. First of all, Paul has no political pull. There’s no way that Christianity in the early centuries could have influenced the Empire on the macro level. It just couldn’t be done. Christianity was a small, obscure religion with no political clout.
Add to that the social impact of it all. Slavery was behemoth. In the Roman world it was an economic behemoth due to its sheer size. Who would listen to this crazy little Jew spout off about abolishing slavery? Nobody would give him the time of day. And if they did it would be an economic fiasco.
On top of this Paul is not stupid. Calls for abolition could have bloody consequences. It could have caused a stir among slaves. Slave uprisings were not unknown in the ancient world. And in Rome they were put down with severity.
If you know the story of Spartacus, you know he was a slave who escaped and started a rebellion against Rome. He was successful to some degree, but his army was eventually defeated. 6,000 men were taken captive and they were all crucified. Their crucifixions were aligned along a highway which stretched over 100 miles. It was Rome’s way of saying, “Let the slaves everywhere beware.”
Paul probably understands enough to know that raising a fist at Rome and its slavery system isn’t the way to get things done.
So what you find is that the NT undermines the system from within. That’s what we see in the NT regulations regarding slavery. As you can see even from our text this morning, Paul begins to call Masters and slaves to the highest degree of integrity. He focuses on their relationship to one another. Masters and slaves, as Christians, must, in their different places, show honor to one another. They must demonstrate love and respect for one another.
These are revolutionary concepts in and of themselves. And, in that respect (by these regulations he gives), Paul was seeking to recreate to some degree the kind of “respectable, more dignified slavery” that you would find in the Old Testament.
Now, I go through all of this to make this point: the Bible regulates slavery, and it regulates it in the best possible way. These regulations are not saying that slavery is a good. But these laws do recognize its reality in a fallen world. And all these commands that God gives in regard to slavery aim at providing the best possible means of preserving life and ensuring human dignity.
Does God want slavery to exist? The answer to that question is easy. No. He actually created the world in such a way that it would not. But since the fall has brought the miserable thing into this world, it is a reality with which we must deal. And the Lord deals with that reality. He deals with it by providing the best possible route for its operation and ultimately its overthrow.
Which leads me to the last point I want to make.
IV. Its termination will only come by means of Christ and His Word
How is it that slavery--this wretched thing that came into this world by means of the fall--could ever go away? It is only by the one who delivers us from sin and misery: Jesus Christ and the reform that comes about as a result of His Word having prevalence over us.
Now I recognize that there have been some in history who have used the Bible to defend unbiblical forms of slavery. We recognize that they were wrong. They were not operating on the basis of a thorough understanding of what God says about slavery and humanity. We should recognize that the goal that we ought to be striving for is to overcome the damage inflicted by the fall, slavery being one such example.
On the other hand, we recognize that there have been some in history who have worked for abolition who were not Christians.
For instance, Unitarians were big proponents of abolition in America during the 1800’s. In the early portion of history, a lot of churches became liberal and fell into a form of unitarianism. What happened is that they ended up rejecting Scripture and the Trinity and such. But they were big on moral reform. And we recognize that these people were often on the forefront of the abolition movement.
Now, while we can be thankful for their political advocacy on that issue, we also need to recognize that their worldview does not sustain freedom from bondage.
These liberal Christians actually became proponents of mass enslavement. They were (and continue to be) the ones who advocated for more and more power to be given to the state. They were the progressives of their day (and predecessors to today’s progressives) who are always pushing for a more centralized government. They advocate Marxist ideology, which oppresses the whole populace and bringing more and more people into a state of bondage. They are enslaving Americans through ever increasing, burdensome taxation which we must now pay to our overlords.
We can look around our world today and see many similar things. Slavery is still a huge problem in our world today. It’s been said that there are more slaves today than at any other point in time. And it exists most prominently in countries that are dominated by non Christian worldviews, such as Islam, humanism, and animism.
This is why I say that Christ and His Word are the only hope. There is no hope for freedom apart from Christ. The Bible is the only book that gives us a legitimate basis for human dignity. It is the only book that brings redemption and release to man. Power religions and materialistic worldviews offer no hope in that regard. They actually give a platform for enslavement.
Ultimately it boils down to this: Christ is the only true liberator. He came into this world to destroy sin and its misery. And when you understand what his word says about human dignity, the fall, and slavery, you understand that his design is that people be free.
Satan, on the other hand, he is an enslaver. As the Scripture says, He comes to steal, kill, and destroy. He is the ultimate man-stealer. He loves to rob people of their life and their freedom. And every worldview that is not built on Christ and His Word, it is going to undermine freedom and be an advocate for the enslavement of men and women.
Conclusion:
Next time we are going to begin picking through this passage and thinking more about the principles of honor and dignity that are laid down here. But today we simply recognize that word “bondservants.” We want to simply recognize a little of what the Bible has to say about it. Most specifically, we recognize that the Biblical law order is the means to freedom. It is the only thing that makes men live independently and harmoniously.
So we do not have to be nervous when the Bible talks about slavery. We don’t need to shrink back and be embarrassed when people mock the the Bible because it codifies slavery to a certain degree. We can understand that God’s word on slavery is a word of mercy. It is a word that is very much redemptive. That’s because it lifts man out of his misery: whether it be his poverty, his lack of discipline, or his ungodliness. The Bible gives men a means to life and it seeks to protect.
And contrary to the world around us, we recognize that God’s word provides the basic principles for the eradication of slavery. As we said at the outset of this message, if all we are are blobs of flesh with no absolute standard for morality, there is freedom to enslave. One blob of flesh has no reason not to subjugate another blob of flesh.
But the law order that God says otherwise. It says that we have a master in heaven who we need to honor. And one of the ways we honor that master is by providing the highest degree of honor to our fellow man.
And this morning, rather than doing an exposition of this passage like we might normally do, I think it is wise for us to take some time to consider that very thing. And the main reason we may do so is polemic. I’d like to help us as a congregation be equipped to speak to the world around us and defend the faith.
One of the most frequent tactics people use to disparage Christianity is the concept of slavery. They will say, “how can you believe in the Bible when it promotes slavery?” Or “I could never follow a God who endorses slavery.”
This is especially true with the prevalence of Critical Race Theory in our day and age. Those who are looking for oppressive systems and a reason to decry them will take a quick look at the Bible, see that slavery was practiced and condoned in the Bible, and then they will write off the faith as oppressive. What’s worse is that they will weaponize that as a means of dissuading people from following the Bible.
We also have the trend of “ex-evangelicals.” Perhaps you’ve heard of people who have started deconstructing their faith. They maybe grew up in an evangelical house and they are apostatizing. And they will talk about how they are trying to take their faith apart and work it out in a more meaningful way. And one of the things that is a real trip up for them is the whole idea of slavery in the Bible.
So, as we come to a passage like this one, it might be good to take a second and think about how slavery fits into the biblical system and what God’s word really has to say about it.
As we consider what Scripture says about slavery, we want to aim at two things. First, we can sort it out for our own minds. I don’t doubt that the whole concept can be a little confusing. Some may wonder why the Bible doesn’t just come out and condemn the whole system. Others may acknowledge the Bible talks about slavery and that bible figures have slaves, and just shrug their shoulders and say, “Well, God must have some purpose for it.”
It would probably be good to have a little better handle on what Scripture has to say about the topic than that. So it will be time well spent meditating on it.
But the other thing that we can do is be prepared to address those who want some reason to write off the Scriptures and criticize Christianity. If we have our ducks in a row, we can give a good defense of the faith and show people that God’s way is not just the best way, it is the only way.
So, then, what can we say about slavery? First, we need to acknowledge that slavery exists because of the fall.
I. Slavery exists because of the fall
This may seem self evident to some of us, but we shouldn’t overlook this fact: God did not intend humans to live this way. Men and women were meant to be free individuals who had God as their master. If sin had never entered this world, there would never be anyone who was subjected to anyone else.
But since sin did enter the world, that changed the way the world was meant to be. It changed the way men and women relate to one another. The fall completely changed the landscape because now people were sinful and they have the desire to oppress one another.
You also recognize that the fall brought about other problems. With sin comes misery. We no longer live in paradise and we have to deal with a world that is broken. And there are problems that arise as a result of this brokenness. For instance, there’s poverty, suffering, sorrow. Slavery, as we will see, is one of the consequences of living in a world which is broken by sin.
Now we begin here because that gives us the proper framework to understand the very existence of slavery. You might say that it gives us some categories by which to judge it. Moreover, it gives us a framework for dealing with those who criticize Christianity over slavery.
You must always keep in mind that those who are critical of Christianity are coming from a particular worldview. They are people who do not believe in the fall and the sinfulness of man. They don’t regard God and his law. Most of these people hold to a secular, materialistic, naturalistic worldview. And these people don’t even have a framework for saying that slavery is evil. They may criticize Christianity, but they really don’t have any ground upon which to stand.
Think of it this way: If man is nothing more than a sac of chemicals with no soul or moral absolutes (as the materialist says), there’s no real reason to say that slavery is wrong. If we are just blobs of flesh, who’s to say that one blob cannot subjugate another blob.
They may shout and cajole us about slavery, but we can brush it all aside by recognizing the fact that their worldview is morally bankrupt. They do not have moral absolutes by which to judge good and evil. Their own life principles do not support the claims they make against slavery.
It is only within a Christian worldview, where you recognize the fall and the commandments of God, that you have any kind of framework for discussing the morality and immorality of slavery.
So that’s where we begin. We begin with God; we begin with Adam, and we begin with the fall of man into sin. And we recognize that things are not as they were intended to be.
Secondly, we should recognize that the bible presents us with different kinds of slavery.
II. It exists in several different forms
You need to recognize that not all forms of servitude are the same. And you need to recognize these different forms of slavery before you go writing off what God has said about slavery in his Word.
You see, what typically happens is that people have one concept of slavery. And what they do is react to the Bible on the basis of the myopic view. And so they make judgments that are not necessarily good.
When you understand that slavery has various ways that it comes to be (and God has different things to say about the different forms), what you will find is that God actually is the only one who has his head screwed on right when it comes to the subject at hand.
So, what are the different ways one may become a slave?
First of all, there is (what the bible calls) man-stealing. This is forced enslavement through something like kidnapping. One of the ways that slavery comes into being is because humans do not respect other’s right to live and exist independently. And they commit a great sin against God and others by taking them captive. Someone may be taken by force or they may be lured into a life of bondage. Either way, a person is stolen and enslaved.
And you should know that the Bible condemns this practice outright. The Old Testament and New Testament are in perfect agreement in this regard. In 1 Timothy 1 Paul condemns “enslavers” right along with liars and those who practice homosexuality. Moses is even more emphatic when in Exodus 21 he says, “Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him, shall be put to death.”
In the Old Testament, kidnapping was a capital crime. If convicted, you’d be put to death. So you see that there is absolutely no toleration of those who practice man-stealing. And that goes for anyone who may be tangentially involved in the process. Maybe you didn’t kidnap them, you were just transporting them to the slave market. You were just as guilty and, therefore, liable to death.
That, I believe, is very important to understand. God does not tolerate this kind of forced enslavement.
The second way someone might become a slave is by becoming a prisoner of war. You recognize that when people march off to battle, they may end up taking prisoners. They may overtake the enemy or the enemy may surrender. And what do they typically do with those prisoners? Throughout most of history, they either killed them or subjected them to servitude.
Now, you should recognize here that the Bible does permit this. Deut. 20 says that if you go out to lay siege to a city of the Canaanites and, if they surrender, the Israelites were to subject them to forced labor.
You recognize that this is much better than the alternative. The alternative being that the entire city be annihilated. Here they have a chance to live. What’s more, they have opportunity to become Christians. They would become part of different households in Israel, and in those households they would be taught the way of God.
What’s more, the Bible has laws which protected these slaves. The Bible recognizes the dignity of these people and ensured that they couldn’t be left to the whims of their masters. They were not allowed to be whipped and cruelly treated for no reason. They had rights and could go free if those rights were violated.
That’s rather incredible when you compare it to the pagan world. That’s pretty incredible when you compare it to slavery around the world even today. Most people don’t give slaves rights. Most nations don’t seek to protect slaves and recognize their dignity. But the Lord does.
So you recognize that in the case of prisoners of war, God provided a means of life for these people. He provided a way to eternal life. And he provided protections for them that they would not otherwise have.
That gives you a different view of slavery in the Bible, doesn’t it? It doesn’t sound quite so horrible as a lot of people make it out to be.
But we are not done yet. There’s another way one could be come a slave. It is through, what we now call, indentured servitude.
If, in the providence of God, you became destitute, you could sell yourself into servitude. If you were so impoverished that you could not provide for yourself or your family, and you had no way to survive. You and your family could become slaves.
So this was a way of survival. As a servant in someone’s house, you could get your meals, have shelter and clothing, and have the hope of going free someday. That’s because you could only hold these slaves for a period of 7 years. At the end of 7 years these indentured servants were to have the option of going back to their normal life. Some of them chose to continue under their master’s care. They would have their ear pierced with an awl. But they could go free. So it was intended to be for a limited time.
Indentured servitude and the release of indentured servants is not typically on people’s radar. Remember I said that people often have a myopic view of slavery. They don’t understand these different categories, and they are typically writing off the bible because they equate chattel slavery and what happened in America in the 17-1800’s.
That’s not the case at all. In indentured servitude God provided a means of people to live. It was a means of survival and possibly even a means to thriving. Which leads to the fourth kind of slavery in the Bible
In the Old Testament you could also become a slave through the court system. If you had committed a crime and were found guilty, you would have to pay fines. If you could not afford to pay those fines, you would have to work to pay off your debt.
This is what is sometimes called “peonage.” And, in many respects, it is sort of the brother of indentured servitude.
You’ll note that this is not only a fitting form of justice, but it was a good means of producing a new and better life for the convict. Again, in coming into the household of another Israelite, he would have likely received biblical training and discipleship. He’s also be around people with better character (rather than sitting in prison with a bunch of felons). So in God’s system, there’s probably going to be a good deal of moral reform.
He would also have the chance to learn some life skills. As a bondservant he would have to work and learn to do various trades. And that would benefit him after he had paid his debt and been released. Now, after he’s paid his debt or been released, he can enter society as a contributing citizen. Rather than being a drag on the system or repeating his crimes like a lot of convicts today, he’s put on a path of reform and productivity.
Now, I go through all of this to help you recognize that there are different kinds of slavery in the Bible. And you recognize that not all enslavement is the same. You can’t write God off because you have some preconceived notion of what slavery is. What typically happens is that the critic is the one in the wrong, not God.
And as you consider these different types of slavery, you’ve already begun to hear something of the next point I want to make regarding slavery and the Bible.
We’ve seen that slavery is the result of the fall. We’ve talked about the fact that it takes different forms. The third point we need to understand is that slavery was regulated in the best possible way.
III. It was regulated in the best possible way
In the Bible you read about all kinds of laws pertaining to slavery. We’ve mentioned a few so far. But what you need to understand is that the Bible protects innocent people. The Bible regulates slavery and ensures that the dignity of every possible human (even the lowest of society) is preserved to the highest possible degree.
In every biblical command God is always seeking to uphold the principle of life. Biblical justice is a means of promoting and preserving the life of every innocent individual.
So, as you read through the Old Testament, you will find laws regarding slavery. But you will find that these laws always are making the most of the miserable conditions of the world. And Israel, by its OT laws, would have stood out as a nation. In comparison to the pagan lands around them this was unique. At the very least, as a slave in Israel you would have had it much better than if you were a slave anywhere else.
At least that’s the way it was supposed to be. We recognize that there were abuses. And we see how God still spoke to that by sending the prophets to condemn the acts of those who did tyrannize people and oppress them.
But this leads us to the New Testament. Thus far, we’ve been referring to the OT. When you come to the NT, we have to deal with Rome and its slave system. And this is a completely different beast.
I think it should be enough to say that Rome was a pagan. As a result, it had an unbiblical, pagan system of slavery. And it was a rampant one at that. It is said that one in five people in the Roman empire was a slave. In some places one in every three people were slaves. So there was an incredible portion of the population of the Roman Empire who were slaves.
And if you sweep the NT for some sort of word on abolition, you will be highly disappointed. You won’t find anything. Paul does not come out and say, “Free your slaves; it is wicked to own them.” And there are reasons for that. First of all, Paul has no political pull. There’s no way that Christianity in the early centuries could have influenced the Empire on the macro level. It just couldn’t be done. Christianity was a small, obscure religion with no political clout.
Add to that the social impact of it all. Slavery was behemoth. In the Roman world it was an economic behemoth due to its sheer size. Who would listen to this crazy little Jew spout off about abolishing slavery? Nobody would give him the time of day. And if they did it would be an economic fiasco.
On top of this Paul is not stupid. Calls for abolition could have bloody consequences. It could have caused a stir among slaves. Slave uprisings were not unknown in the ancient world. And in Rome they were put down with severity.
If you know the story of Spartacus, you know he was a slave who escaped and started a rebellion against Rome. He was successful to some degree, but his army was eventually defeated. 6,000 men were taken captive and they were all crucified. Their crucifixions were aligned along a highway which stretched over 100 miles. It was Rome’s way of saying, “Let the slaves everywhere beware.”
Paul probably understands enough to know that raising a fist at Rome and its slavery system isn’t the way to get things done.
So what you find is that the NT undermines the system from within. That’s what we see in the NT regulations regarding slavery. As you can see even from our text this morning, Paul begins to call Masters and slaves to the highest degree of integrity. He focuses on their relationship to one another. Masters and slaves, as Christians, must, in their different places, show honor to one another. They must demonstrate love and respect for one another.
These are revolutionary concepts in and of themselves. And, in that respect (by these regulations he gives), Paul was seeking to recreate to some degree the kind of “respectable, more dignified slavery” that you would find in the Old Testament.
Now, I go through all of this to make this point: the Bible regulates slavery, and it regulates it in the best possible way. These regulations are not saying that slavery is a good. But these laws do recognize its reality in a fallen world. And all these commands that God gives in regard to slavery aim at providing the best possible means of preserving life and ensuring human dignity.
Does God want slavery to exist? The answer to that question is easy. No. He actually created the world in such a way that it would not. But since the fall has brought the miserable thing into this world, it is a reality with which we must deal. And the Lord deals with that reality. He deals with it by providing the best possible route for its operation and ultimately its overthrow.
Which leads me to the last point I want to make.
IV. Its termination will only come by means of Christ and His Word
How is it that slavery--this wretched thing that came into this world by means of the fall--could ever go away? It is only by the one who delivers us from sin and misery: Jesus Christ and the reform that comes about as a result of His Word having prevalence over us.
Now I recognize that there have been some in history who have used the Bible to defend unbiblical forms of slavery. We recognize that they were wrong. They were not operating on the basis of a thorough understanding of what God says about slavery and humanity. We should recognize that the goal that we ought to be striving for is to overcome the damage inflicted by the fall, slavery being one such example.
On the other hand, we recognize that there have been some in history who have worked for abolition who were not Christians.
For instance, Unitarians were big proponents of abolition in America during the 1800’s. In the early portion of history, a lot of churches became liberal and fell into a form of unitarianism. What happened is that they ended up rejecting Scripture and the Trinity and such. But they were big on moral reform. And we recognize that these people were often on the forefront of the abolition movement.
Now, while we can be thankful for their political advocacy on that issue, we also need to recognize that their worldview does not sustain freedom from bondage.
These liberal Christians actually became proponents of mass enslavement. They were (and continue to be) the ones who advocated for more and more power to be given to the state. They were the progressives of their day (and predecessors to today’s progressives) who are always pushing for a more centralized government. They advocate Marxist ideology, which oppresses the whole populace and bringing more and more people into a state of bondage. They are enslaving Americans through ever increasing, burdensome taxation which we must now pay to our overlords.
We can look around our world today and see many similar things. Slavery is still a huge problem in our world today. It’s been said that there are more slaves today than at any other point in time. And it exists most prominently in countries that are dominated by non Christian worldviews, such as Islam, humanism, and animism.
This is why I say that Christ and His Word are the only hope. There is no hope for freedom apart from Christ. The Bible is the only book that gives us a legitimate basis for human dignity. It is the only book that brings redemption and release to man. Power religions and materialistic worldviews offer no hope in that regard. They actually give a platform for enslavement.
Ultimately it boils down to this: Christ is the only true liberator. He came into this world to destroy sin and its misery. And when you understand what his word says about human dignity, the fall, and slavery, you understand that his design is that people be free.
Satan, on the other hand, he is an enslaver. As the Scripture says, He comes to steal, kill, and destroy. He is the ultimate man-stealer. He loves to rob people of their life and their freedom. And every worldview that is not built on Christ and His Word, it is going to undermine freedom and be an advocate for the enslavement of men and women.
Conclusion:
Next time we are going to begin picking through this passage and thinking more about the principles of honor and dignity that are laid down here. But today we simply recognize that word “bondservants.” We want to simply recognize a little of what the Bible has to say about it. Most specifically, we recognize that the Biblical law order is the means to freedom. It is the only thing that makes men live independently and harmoniously.
So we do not have to be nervous when the Bible talks about slavery. We don’t need to shrink back and be embarrassed when people mock the the Bible because it codifies slavery to a certain degree. We can understand that God’s word on slavery is a word of mercy. It is a word that is very much redemptive. That’s because it lifts man out of his misery: whether it be his poverty, his lack of discipline, or his ungodliness. The Bible gives men a means to life and it seeks to protect.
And contrary to the world around us, we recognize that God’s word provides the basic principles for the eradication of slavery. As we said at the outset of this message, if all we are are blobs of flesh with no absolute standard for morality, there is freedom to enslave. One blob of flesh has no reason not to subjugate another blob of flesh.
But the law order that God says otherwise. It says that we have a master in heaven who we need to honor. And one of the ways we honor that master is by providing the highest degree of honor to our fellow man.