Welcome again to our Wonderful Day in the Lord broadcast. As we start out another week, we are still on the theme of the riches we have in Christ and all the treasures that are ours in Him. This week we are going to look at several things that you might not realize are great riches, especially the first two.
The first one is the fact that you are a slave of Christ. That sounds pejorative in our world today. Slavery has a very negative connotation and rightly so. Especially from our perspective in the western world and modern times, the ugliness of slavery doesn’t leave a good taste in our mouth. It is not particularly surprising that the English Bibles that we use normally translate the Greek word doulos in happier terms, let’s say. It usually translates it as bond-servant, or just servant. Rarely do you find the Greek word doulos translated as slave which is its normal intent. The Legacy Standard Bible that I have been using for many of these broadcasts is a new publication put out by the Master’s Seminary in California. One of the things they have done consistently in this translation is to translate the word doulos as slave. I think that gives us a better understanding of what is being meant here
When we read passages, such as Romans 1:1 it says, “Paul a slave of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle.” Paul didn’t mind calling himself a slave. Neither did any of the other writers of the New Testament Scriptures. As a matter of fact, I have jotted down how many of the epistles begin with identification of being slaves of Christ: Philippians, Galatians, Romans, 2 Corinthians 4:5, Titus, James does the same thing in its opening verse, 2 Peter, Jude, Revelation 1:1. The writers of the Scriptures, virtually all the New Testament authors, identify themselves as the doulos or slaves of Christ. They saw no negative in that. As a matter of fact, they were very happy and proud to be called the slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ . . .
