-Marshall Jones Jr.
bondChristian\’s latest: How to refuel when serving sucks you dry

Great post! Sorry to see so many trivial ‘hair splitting’ comments on this great content.

I personally love the label of being a slave to God and think it really simplifies life. Having thought I understood what submitting to Him actually entailed growing up, it isn’t until now, when I take the role of slave to wait on His lead and direction that I’m experiencing more freedom than I have at any other time in my life.

My marriage is better for it, my joy is growing and the sacrifices and difficult learning experiences to get to this point are all worth it! Plus, the peace and confidence that comes when following His clear lead is worth everything!!

Keep up the solid content and don’t worry about offending people with your views. Those that are offended need to be and those that aren’t are who you’re writing for.

My best,
-Josh
Josh\’s latest: Why You Should Kill Your 401k

-Marshall Jones Jr.
bondChristian\’s latest: The 7 benefits of serving others

1 Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord? 2 If to others I am not an apostle, at least I am to you; for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.

3 My defense to those who examine me is this: 4 Do we not have a right to eat and drink? 5 Do we not have a right to take along a believing wife, even as the rest of the apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? 6 Or do only Barnabas and I not have a right to refrain from working? 7 Who at any time serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat the fruit of it? Or who tends a flock and does not use the milk of the flock?

8 I am not speaking these things according to human judgment, am I? Or does not the Law also say these things? 9 For it is written in the Law of Moses, “YOU SHALL NOT MUZZLE THE OX WHILE HE IS THRESHING.” God is not concerned about oxen, is He? 10 Or is He speaking altogether for our sake? Yes, for our sake it was written, because the plowman ought to plow in hope, and the thresher to thresh in hope of sharing the crops. 11 If we sowed spiritual things in you, is it too much if we reap material things from you? 12 If others share the right over you, do we not more? Nevertheless, we did not use this right, but we endure all things so that we will cause no hindrance to the gospel of Christ. 13 Do you not know that those who perform sacred services eat the food of the temple, and those who attend regularly to the altar have their share from the altar? 14 So also the Lord directed those who proclaim the gospel to get their living from the gospel.

15 But I have used none of these things. And I am not writing these things so that it will be done so in my case; for it would be better for me to die than have any man make my boast an empty one. 16 For if I preach the gospel, I have nothing to boast of, for I am under compulsion; for woe is me if I do not preach the gospel. 17 For if I do this voluntarily, I have a reward; but if against my will, I have a stewardship entrusted to me. 18 What then is my reward? That, when I preach the gospel, I may offer the gospel without charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel.

19 For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, so that I may win more.

Praise the Lord that we have become His slaves instead of sin’s.

To be precise, I’d say bondservant or bondslave. That’s actually where the name for bondChristian came from. Starting in Deuteronomy 15:12, it talks about how bondservants are servants/slaves who choose to be slaves. And I love that.

That’s really what I’m getting at with all this. The process is always a choice. “Top 10 reasons to become a slave”… if we had no choice, the article wouldn’t even make sense – it would just be a fact instead of a “ought to take” option.

“Bondservant” actually translates over more to “slave” than “servant.” The original King James Bible didn’t use slave because… well, no one likes slavery, and they didn’t want to link Christianity with slavery… just the way you’re saying too. So yes, I totally get where you’re coming from.

Using the term “slave” has the downside of linking to the slavery we all have heard of, but I think that can also be an advantage, which I why I like it.

I try to use “slave” in place of “servant” for some of the reasons I outlined in Slavery 101. A few that come to mind…

-Slaves have zero rights (servants might have some)
-Slaves are owned (servants might be hired)
-Slaves depend on their master for their quality of life (servants might clock out on weekends or whatever)

Something to think about… especially since this perspective isn’t considered too often.

-Marshall Jones Jr.

-Marshall Jones Jr.

As Patricia said above a slave has no choice but a servant chooses whom and how to serve. It’s about developing a servant heart not a slave heart – God doesn’t ask us to follow him blindly.

You use the servant word many times when expanding on a point – this to me shows that it is also what you really mean. I’ve written on this a couple of times but more from teh same perspoective as Terry Nance’s books on becoming “God’s Armour Bearers”.