Slave
“What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.”
Today’s Text: Romans 6:15-23 (Living Life Daily Devotional)
Before meeting Jesus, I used to offer myself as a slave to sin. I had no notion that I was making a conscientious decision to be a slave to anything. I lived my life as best as I knew how, and within that boundary, I lived as I pleased.
In a sense, I was living as a slave to myself. We all do. It is the most natural thing in the world--like breathing. And so we don’t see that way of living as slavery—just living.
For most people in the free world, slavery is not a thing. In the ancient world everyone knew a slave who conscientiously made a choice to make a living as a slave. And anyone who conscientiously chose a life of slavery had to conscientiously offer themselves to their masters daily.
We are all accountable to the choices that we make. I wonder, though, if people in the past were much more accountable to accountability than we are today. Our loyalties and commitments come with a lot of fine print with a bottom line that reads, “as long as I feel like it.”
And when I no longer feel like it, I can easily find evidence of God’s word leading me down another path of something I feel like doing.
But there’s a strange thing about conscientiously choosing a life of slavery—that is, conscientiously making a wholehearted commitment of loyalty to something. Once you do so, you discover purpose, and you find freedom within that purpose, and a path filled with joy, as you reap the benefits of the commitments made.
Slavery to the “self” will lead to the fruit of the “self.” But slavery to Christ is holiness, joy, and eternal life.
I am a slave of Christ, who is my Righteousness. No longer am I a slave of myself—my “self,” the instigator of all my sin.
Therefore, I will no longer live as my “self” pleases, as best as I know how. Now, I live to please the Lord, as best as I know now. And even if I should sin, I will no longer slavishly serve my “self.”
Father, You know all things, and You know all my sin. Even when I was a slave to sin—my “self”—You pursued me so that I might be made free. Forgive me when I try to serve both my “self” and serve You. Create in me an undivided heart, so that I might serve You and You alone. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
