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ENSLAVED BY LOVE
"But if your servant says to you, 'I do not want to leave you,' because he loves you and your
family and is well off with you, then take an awl and push it through his ear lobe into the door, and he will become your servant for life." (Deuteronomy 15:16-17, NIV)
One of the riddles of Scripture is the fact that those who have been set free would yet go around
calling themselves slaves.
"Who does this?" you ask.
The apostle Paul, for one.
In the first of his words to the Romans, he wrote: "Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called as an
apostle and singled out for God's good news…" (Romans 1:1, HCSB). Eugene Peterson has rendered it, "I, Paul, am a devoted slave…"
What provoked Paul, the defender of all freedom in Christ, especially as set against the restraints
of the Law when men attempted to gain righteousness through its weak provisions, to call himself a slave?
It is this Old Testament instruction in Deuteronomy that inspired Paul.
Among the Hebrews, one man would enslave himself to another out of necessity—the weight of debts or
the stranglehold of poverty. After "cashing himself out" in such a way, he was required to work for his master for six years. In the seventh year, God's law required, the master was to set the
slave free. Unless…
There was this provision by which the slave could choose to remain enslaved. The Deuteronomy passage
itself tells us why he might decide to do this: love and appreciation. The slave would recognize not only that he was better off under this master than he would be anywhere else but also that, after
getting to know this master's character and practices, he had truly grown to love his master.
How so much like our relationships with Christ! In the beginning, nearly all of us turn to Him out of
impoverished necessity. We come to realize that our selfish, sinful lives are bankrupt. We need a bailing out. So we "give our hearts" to Jesus.
Sadly, many who take this initial step do not hold to this new Master. They drift from the One who
has rescued them. But those who stand firm, serving the Master of all, come to recognize the kindness of His character and the worth of His ways. They are wooed by His presence in their lives, and they
fall more and more in love with Him. In time, they can think of no old, no new, no better place they would rather be. They have their spiritual ears pierced; they become His bond-servants, His slaves.
Of all people, we golfers should understand what it means to be enslaved by our love for something.
It may now be time to be enslaved by our love for Someone.
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Jeff Hopper
March 12, 2008
Copyright 2008 Links Players International
The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.
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