In light of this new insight and refreshed understanding of who Jesus actually is, and what His Kingdom means, the next most important aspect we would like to discuss is our position or status in His Kingdom and relationship with regard to Him as our King. As much as it is important to understand the Kingship and Lordship of Jesus, it is equally mandatory to understand who we actually are and what our role in His Kingdom is. Without this understanding, the principle of the Kingdom of God is not complete.
In a democracy, if our place and role has to be defined, we can simply term it as ‘citizens’. The democracy has tiers of bureaucracy where nothing is autocratic. There is no one single person who holds sovereignty. Therefore, as citizens, we play an important role in determining the function of the democracy and are eligible for demanding privileges that are due a citizen. It typically functions as defined, “of the people, by the people and for the people.”(1) Basically, the citizen plays a crucial and foundational role in a democracy; whereas, in a kingdom, the scenario is reversed, where the king is the sovereign ruler and foundation of the kingdom. If we live in an absolute monarchy, we can only be ‘residents or people of the kingdom’ with no authority over it. The king owns every property, livestock and human being in his kingdom. Hence, we can utmost be tenants or temporary occupants in the kingdom with no rights to claim ownership over anything. The king decides the fate, life, function, tax payment, occupation etc. of his residents. In simple terms, we are the king’s ‘slaves’ because he is the owner, master and lord of everything. Likewise, in the Kingdom of God, Jesus is the sovereign ruler and King and we are His SLAVES!
Well, this might be shocking and hard to digest and it may look anti-biblical but this is a long forgotten truth and as a consequence we are lost and living outside the Kingdom of God. We often consider ourselves as important members of the church who are serving Him. Some of us, when we possess certain gifts of the Holy Spirit and have the capacity to preach or pastor people, consider ourselves ‘servants of God’, closer to God and hierarchically better than the normal ‘souls’. If you remember in the first chapter, we emphasized that there is no pyramid of hierarchy in a kingdom. There is one king and everyone else simply falls below him in just one same order as ‘slave’. Often, we admire the so called ‘affluent people’, putting them on a pedestal and regarding them far superior than us who are normal regular people. Likewise, we give a similar status to the ‘servants of God’, considering them almost equal to God, having direct communion with Him. We often seek them as primary consultants for solving our problems and obtaining answers to our questions. This is precisely idol worship and a principle that opposes the one of the Kingdom of God. In short, the point we are trying to make here is that no one is a servant in the Kingdom of God. There can be only one category of people in His Kingdom and they are His ‘slaves’. The difference between a servant and a slave can be understood as written below:
Servant – A person who, upon payment of a salary, performs duties for others, especially a person employed in a house on domestic duties or as a personal attendant.
Slave – A person who is legally owned by someone else.
The word ‘slave’ simply identifies the legal ownership without any regard to the role of the person.
Often in our prayers we say, “I belong to you Jesus” but this simply is equal to affirming that we are His slaves. “I belong to you” in fact is another way to say “I am your slave.”
It is by now clear from the above definitions that if we choose to be servants, we simply perform duties as a part of a deal where we expect wages in return for the duties performed. We are merely employees and the employer is in debt with us to pay us back for the chores accomplished. There is no personal relationship between both and it is purely contract based. It is a formal, impersonal and business relationship; whereas, a slave is completely under the legal ownership and guardianship of the master. The relationship is more personal, where the problems, day to day affairs and existence of the slave are the responsibility of the owner. As long as the slave is tied to the particular owner, he/ she needs to do nothing out of his/ her capacity and control to survive, instead is completely dependent on the owner.
Jesus never is in debt with anyone. He does not owe anyone anything for duties performed. Therefore, if we consider ourselves as His servants, it simply means that we are rejecting His Kingdom and Lordship. However, if we consider ourselves as His slaves, then we are His possession and there is nothing that will affect us beyond the master’s control and authority. We are simply at His mercy and abandoned into His hands, under His control and complete rulership.
You may wonder, then why often in the scriptures, Jesus Himself refers to servants working in His Kingdom in His parables. Slavery was a social stigma in the 15th – 16th centuries when the colonials were heavily criticized for the highhanded dominion and brutal slavery they introduced in the countries they ruled. Therefore, at the same point of time, when the Bible was being translated into English, the translators wanted to avoid the word ‘slave’ and rather resorted to more dignified terms such as ‘bondservant’ or ‘servant’ instead of ‘slave’. This becomes evident when we read the original Greek text of the Bible where the word used whenever our relationship with Jesus was addressed, was ‘doulos’ which means, unquestionably, ‘slave’; and whenever ‘servant’ as such was implied for an employee, the Greek word used was ‘diakonos’. Therefore, the original Greek text used two different terms to indicate servant and slave respectively, but in translations over the centuries, to avoid presenting the Bible as harsh, the two terms were merged into one and mellowed down to ‘servant’ or ‘bondservant’, which has inevitably led to dilution of the gospel itself.
From the Greek Bible dictionary:
Doulos – A slave. Properly, someone who belongs to another without any ownership rights of their own. Ironically, ‘doulos’ is used with the highest dignity in the New Testament – namely, of believers who willingly live under Christ’s authority as His devoted followers.(2)
We can understand this concept better from the following verse by using the original literal translation from Greek in place of the current one.
Matthew 6:24 “No one can serve (be a slave to) two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve (be a slave to) God and mammon.”
If we consider this verse from the aspect of ‘servant’ as in our current translation, it loses its whole meaning because a servant is not bound to one master but can serve two or more of them. He/ she can work for as many employers as possible. But a slave can have only one owner. No two masters can own the same slave. In this perception, if we read the above verse, it makes sense when Jesus says that we cannot be slaves to both Him and mammon and that when we are His slaves, we are owned by Him totally. Consider the following verses again using the original literal translation from Greek, where Paul, James, Peter, Jude and John address themselves in their letters.
Romans 1:1 Paul, a bondservant (slave) of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God.
James 1:1 James, a bondservant (slave) of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad: Greetings.
2 Peter 1:1 Simon Peter, a bondservant (slave) and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained like precious faith with us by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
Jude 1:1 Jude, a bondservant (slave) of Jesus Christ, and brother of James, to those who are called, sanctified by God the Father, and preserved in Jesus Christ.
Revelation 1:1 The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants (slaves) — things which must shortly take place. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant (slave) John.
In all of the above mentioned verses, most of the English translations use the word ‘bondservant’ instead of ‘slave’, but the original Greek word used in its corresponding place is actually ‘doulos’. The disciples of Jesus were very clear on the principle of His Kingdom and their role in it. But most amazingly, we can see that Jesus Himself took on the form of a slave.
Philippians 2:5- 8 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant (slave), and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.
Jesus, the son of God and being equal with God, took on the form of a slave which is actually the form of every man. He did not hesitate to bring Himself to the standard of men, thereby, setting an example of how we ought to be and importantly making apparent what our form is. Unlike us, who consider taking the form of a slave as something demeaning, Jesus humbled Himself to the lowest point to make us His’.
BEING MADE A SLAVE
How did we become slaves or why are we slaves of God? In answer to this, let us consider how an earthly slave market functioned and draw parallels as to how it applies to the Kingdom of God. Anyone who wanted to buy a slave undertook the following procedure:(3)
1. Go to the slave market – in our case the ‘sin market’.
The world is the devil’s fortress. We were bound by Satan and were sin’s slaves.
John 8:34 Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.”
Jesus came into this ‘slave market’ to redeem sin’s slaves from the ruler of this world. It is important to underline that the word ‘redeem’ is a commercial term that means “pay off, buy back for money.” Redemption is basically a transaction, where someone buys back an object for himself/ herself from another person.
2. Choose the slave you want – “I came to call sinners,” “I chose you.”
Jesus saw us in the ‘slave market’ and chose to purchase us for Himself. Therefore, we have not ‘accepted’ Jesus as most of us think. We did not have any rights or capacity to accept Him as we were pathetic slaves bound by Satan and sin. It was purely His mercy and grace that He chose us for Himself.
John 15:16 “You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you.”
3. Pay for the slave with money – He paid with His blood.
Once you choose a slave in a market, you need to pay a ransom to redeem the slave. Jesus the Christ gave His blood as this ransom to God. The price fixed to purchase the slave from the sin market was Jesus’s death and blood. This is the meaning of the blood of Jesus the Christ – one that redeemed us from sin.
1 Peter 1:18,19 knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
4. You own your slave – He is the Lord and owner.
Once a slave is purchased in a slave market with a price by a new owner, the slave is not set free to go out and live his/ her life. There is purely only transfer of ownership from one owner to the other. The new owner, redeems the slave from the old one, hence, the slave now has a new owner. The slave at no point has the capacity to act independently. Therefore, when Jesus purchased us from the ‘sin market’ of our past owner, He through His blood made us His slaves instead. The yoke of sin and Satan was removed through His blood and the yoke of Jesus has been placed upon us. Jesus untied us from Satan and has tied us to Himself. Therefore, whenever we pray for the blood of Jesus, we basically acknowledge this concept and truth.
Matthew 11:28-30 “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
5. You control, discipline, feed, clothe, protect, teach and reward your slave.
Once the new owner has bought the slave, he takes him/ her home under His control and takes care of him/ her. We are very apprehensive and averse to the word ‘slave’ because we associate it with tyranny and negativity as we have seen or heard of only evil masters of this world who treated their slaves ruthlessly. But by definition as seen above, ‘slave’ is simply a neutral term that denotes our ownership by someone and we being controlled and influenced by that person. It could be either good or evil.
Either we can be owned by Jesus the Christ or by Satan. There is no state of independence for us. If we accept Jesus’s Kingship and Lordship and acknowledge that we are His slaves, then His blood will unite us with Him and make us His sons and daughters and members of His Kingdom. If we reject this basic principle, then we are free, free to be slaves of Satan outside the Kingdom of God. The choice is not of being a slave or being free. The choice merely is to decide either to be a slave to Jesus the Christ or to Satan. Since Jesus is a good master, He through His rod of correction will discipline us to steer us away from the habits of the bondage that we were used to and bring us under His yoke and start exerting His influence over us. As long as we focus on seeking only His Lordship and Kingdom, the rest of the materialistic things we need will eventually not be our primary concern. The good master knows to give us exactly what we need and not necessarily what we desire.
Matthew 6:31 - 33 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”
ATTITUDE OF A SLAVE
Jesus sets us a guideline as how an attitude of a slave should be. In Luke chapter 17, in the 5th verse we can see the disciples asking Jesus to increase their faith and we see Him give this strange answer below:
Luke 17:7-10 “And which of you, having a servant (slave) plowing or tending sheep, will say to him when he has come in from the field, ‘Come at once and sit down to eat’? But will he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare something for my supper, and gird yourself and serve me till I have eaten and drunk, and afterward you will eat and drink’? Does he thank that servant (slave) because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not. So likewise you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, ‘We are unprofitable servants (slaves). We have done what was our duty to do.’”
If we consider ourselves as slaves of God, then we should not expect the reward of a servant. Unconditional submission should be the attitude of a slave. Often, we want praise and results for the sacrifices or services we make. If we remember that we are mere slaves in God’s Kingdom and we are entirely at His disposal, then praise, glory or recognition belong to Him and not to us. Being a slave is our character and basic obligation. It is not a job. Therefore, we are just unprofitable slaves. This attitude of blind abandonment and unassuming nature is what reflects as our trust in Him. As Paul says in Philippians 2:5-7, which we read above already, Jesus the Christ made Himself of no reputation by taking the lowliest form of a slave. This is the mind of Jesus that Paul exhorts us to have.
PRIVILEGES OF A SLAVE
So far we have seen what it means to be slaves, but now, let us see what this relationship status implies with regard to our new King and Lord Jesus.
A. The highest privilege and honor for a slave in a kingdom is to stay at the presence of the King and to see His face. Likewise, if we are slaves of Jesus the Christ then the only one thing that should matter and be our pleasure is to seek His presence and see His face as already discussed in the first chapter.
1 Chronicles 16:11 Seek the Lord and His strength; Seek His face evermore!
B. Indeed, the scripture mentions that we are the children of God, heirs and co-heirs with Jesus and we are His friends but none of this will become feasible unless we make the first and foremost commitment to Him as His slave. Being His slave is what makes us eligible for the following:
1. To become His friends
John 15:14,15 “You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants (slaves), for a servant (slave) does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I have made known to you.”
2. To become citizens of His Kingdom and part of His family
Ephesians 2:19 Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.
3. To become His children
John 1:12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name.
4. To become heirs and co-heirs with Christ
Romans 8:16,17 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.
Being slaves and acknowledging Jesus as Lord and King are two sides of the same medal. If we reject the first, we are automatically rejecting the second. In fact, as discussed in the first chapter, the word ‘Lord’ means owner and there is no Lord (owner) without slaves (owned); implying that if Jesus is Lord, then we are His slaves.
In conclusion and to make it plain and simple, refusing our (privileged) condition of slaves is refusing Jesus as Lord and Christ.