The Most Heinous Slavery Ever Known To Man

The most heinous slavery ever known to man is not the human trafficking of young girls, the enslavement of Christians by Muslims, the enslavement of Africans by Westerners, the enslavement of American Indians by those of other tribes, or any of a number of other periods when one peoples enslaved another people.  Read on and you will find out the enslavement that underlies all others and thus is the most heinous unknown to most men.

Perhaps you have notice that people will sacrifice much in order to achieve freedom and stability.  It may be in some kind of transaction, it might be in relationships, it could be in some emotional issue, it might be in a health issue, it could be in any of a number of other venues in life that people seek freedom and stability.  Some have even referred to it as closure.  This is such an important issue that many will even suffer the loss of materials goods, physical capability, position, etc. in order to find the peace of freedom and stability.

The reason may well be found in the word tension.  In fluid and changing situations there is a loss of control and an attendant loss of freedom and stability.  That need for stability creates a certain tension and often that tension is found to be difficult if not intolerable.   Of course knowing that to be so, there are those who for some pathological reason or another, go about seeking to disrupt and control others by creating and fostering tensions in the various relationships venues of their lives.

Yet there can be a solution to the instability and tension and it is all found in two questions or conditions.  First is the question of the trustworthiness of the person with whom one is in relationship.  The second is in the type of relationship one has with that person.  Of course the most trustworthy relationship is a genuine relationship and such a relationship can be no more genuine than when it is with Jesus Christ as Lord.  Be aware that there are a number of facsimiles but only one genuine.

Then assuming it is a genuine relationship, the question then is what is the quality of that relationship?  For it to work properly, the relationship must be one of implicit trust. 

The epitome of a trust relationship is to give another complete control of one’s life, material goods, relationships, and even the internal faculties, to include beliefs, attitudes, and thought processes. 

 The only place that such a relationship can be found to be completely and totally trustworthy is in one’s relationship with Jesus Christ.  It is as the one who comes to Him humbles himself, surrenders to Him as Lord.  The actual word is for Lord in the Scriptures means master or one who has supreme or ultimate authority.  Now to name Jesus Christ as Master means to acknowledge Him as an owner and, well you guessed it that makes the genuine, real deal, follower of Jesus that which He owns.  Said another way the follower becomes His slave—the slave that He bought with the sacrifice of His own life.  Thus we have the reason for His sacrificial death on the Cross.

Is this a mystery or what?  Just to think that Jesus, who is described as God living among us in our humanity, gave His life in order to buy us back from our own enslavement to sinfulness and evil.  Such is beyond our comprehension.  Some would argue what me enslaved?  Yes, for our measure is against a culture that is enslaved and thus it is normal and therefore other than the condition is unknown to us.

So here is the genuine pathway through instability and tension.  It comes when we do not own ourselves but are owned by the benevolent Master—the one who cared so very much for each of us  with a genuine love--a selfless love that He left His place of royalty and came to earth, became a man, lived among people like us, and then gave His life to pay for our sins and failures.  In doing that He redeemed (bought back from slavery to sin) each who would name Him as Slave Master and commit to be His slave.

So what is the most heinous slavery?  It is the slavery that underlies all that is evil, all that we see that is wrong with culture, religion, relationships, etc.  This enslavement to sinfulness is indeed unknown to most for man is so surrounded by sinfulness that it is the norm, not the exception.  It is the slavery that enslaves those who have not found the freedom that is available to the one who has become a slave of Jesus Christ.

"Disquieting Truth"

C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity observes,

“If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end:  if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth—only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin with and, in the end, despair.”

If you were to sum it up, then I suppose you would have to call genuine Christian truth, disquieting.  How can it be other when one seriously and honestly considers one’s life and then compares it to the genuine truths of the Divine?  Indeed, one cannot help but be disquieted.  For one to be otherwise is to be naïve or deluded.

Even to the one who thinks it possible to explain away much of the Scriptures, there still will remain much which challenges one’s life and thinking.  Two current examples will testify to and illustrate the point.

I know of a person who often refers to Jesus words, “Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.”  My suspicion is that the focus is upon the former part of the statement and not the second part, the command portion. 

How could one possibly “soft soap” a command not to sin anymore?  In that day and time the weight of the Old Testament Law rested upon the shoulders of all who would follow God.  Jesus’ words that He came to fulfill, not to abolish the Law apply here.  How impossible the task to not sin.  Of course then as now there were those who either redefined sin or look past the inconvenient truths of the Bible.  In doing those things they presume to make it possible to conform one’s life to the same.

The other example to consider is the use of the word “love.”  Over and over one hears that we must love one another.  To be sure one can find comfort in the notion of being loved.  Yet, if one takes time to read and ponder the Scripture’s description of love, and then put that description into practice it become quite another matter.

Thus I go back to say that true and genuine Christianity is disquieting as it should be for in the spiritual disciplines of life we are brought into contact with the One who is described as Truth and genuine truth is always disquieting to our fleshly nature and its insatiable demands. 

Those things that we read in the Scriptures, what we discover as we ponder the words of Scripture, what the Holy Spirit reveals to us in prayer, and what we hear from the pulpit should be disquieting.  Why?  C.S. Lewis points out that unless we believe we are sick we do not receive the advice of the physician.  If we do not see ourselves as not measuring up to Great Physician, we simply do not see ourselves as spiritually diseased and disquieted and thus heed the commands of the One who became flesh and who lived among us.  This is the great lie which has deceived man in general and many who claim Christ in particular.

The truth of the matter when compared to the eternal and immutable truths of the Bible, is that I am not okay, You are not okay!  The beauty of it all is that when the Christian knows this he is afforded the opportunity to take action but not just any action.  It is the action in which Christ's provision of strength to live according to His Words--Words of Truth is afforded to the believer.  And in those areas of which one is not aware?  This is where God's grace enters into the life of the beliver.