We don't want for one minute anybody in this world to think that we really care about stuff in this life.
Who cares? Let's live at a level which communicates that we will endure anything in this life for the joy of the life to come. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.
I'm your host, Phil Johnson. For many Christians, maybe for you, the workplace feels very much like a foreign land. With worldly values and a variety of lifestyles represented there, you may even work under a boss who has a completely different set of beliefs from you.
The truth is, where you work is often a challenging mission field. Well, today, John MacArthur helps equip you to be an effective witness in that mission field as he continues his current study, singing the Lord's song in a strange land. Follow along now in 1 Peter, chapter 2, as John begins today's lesson. 1 Peter, chapter 2, and verses 18 through 21. Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable, for this finds favor if, for the sake of conscience toward God, a man bears up under sorrows when suffering unjustly. For what credit is there if, when you sin and are harshly treated, you endure it with patience? But if, when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God.
For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps. Now, as we introduce this particular portion of Scripture, we come to very practical insights into the society in which we live. The instruction that comes to us in this portion of Scripture, then, is very practical.
More practical to us, maybe, than in many other cultures where these kinds of things do not happen as frequently. Now, what Peter basically says is summed up in verse 18. Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect. Again, isn't it amazing how God authoritatively can take an immensely complex social system and reduce the proper conduct to one simple sentence, which is exactly what He does?
Certainly, the issue of insurrection, of rebellion, of protest, of sit-ins and walk-outs and strikes has been debated ad infinitum ad nauseum. There have been panels, discussions, books, and yet, it can all be reduced to one statement. Servants, be submissive to your masters with all respect.
Now, that runs, frankly, cross grain opposite to the world. But it is consistent with what we have already learned in the text. Back in verse 13, Peter said, �Submit yourselves for the Lord�s sake to every human institution, whether the king is one in authority or governor sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and the praise of those who do right, for such is the will of God.� We are called, you remember, to submit to the government. Here we are called to submit to those who are over us, those who are our boss, those who are our bosses, those for whom we work. Our fallenness makes us want to fight back, want to demand our rights, to strike against authorities, to protest, to complain, to be insubordinate, to be unsubmissive, but that is sin.
Now, remember, Peter is telling his readers that they are aliens who live above and beyond the world. And yet, at the same time, we have to be citizens who live in the world submitting to every human institution. And we also have to be employees fitting into the social structure and submitting to those who are over us.
And the reason is to silence the critics and to have access to evangelize them for the cause of Christ. The mandate for submission, point one, the mandate for submission. Servants, be submissive to your masters. With all respect, not only to those who are good and gentle, but also to those who are unreasonable.
The mandate is very simple. Be submissive. Now, let me give you the social background.
I want to give it to you quickly, so follow my thought. The dominant social structure in the Roman Empire at the time of the New Testament was slavery. In very early times, there had been few slaves in Rome, and slavery began with the Roman conquest. As the Romans began to conquer the world, they used their prisoners of war as slaves. Many slaves were loved. Many slaves were trusted members of the family. But in spite of the fact that some were treated well, some were not, a slave was not a person.
A slave was considered a thing. He had no legal rights, okay? There was no recourse. There was no suit possible.
There was no civil appeal. There was nothing a slave could do. He was not a person. He or she was a thing with no legal rights. And so, the Romans, there was nothing in the world they could call their own. They owned little or nothing.
There was no justice for them because they had no court of appeal. Aristotle writes, there can be no friendship nor justice toward inanimate things. Indeed, not even toward a horse or an ox or a slave. For master and slave have nothing in common, he said. A slave is a living tool, just as a tool is an inanimate slave.
Varro, another writer, divides the instruments of agriculture into three classes. The articulate, the inarticulate, and the mute. The articulate are the slaves.
The inarticulate comprise the cattle and the mute are the vehicles. So, there was the dominant factor of life, slavery. In fact, it's safe to say most Christians were slaves. So, how do you know that? Because when the gospel went into the Roman world, Paul writes, not many, 1 Corinthians 1, 26, not many noble, right?
Not many mighty. God has chosen the poor and the base and the nothings, that's the slaves. That is why in the Bible there's so much teaching, particularly the New Testament, addressed at slaves, because they were the dominant force in the church.
And the issues were very clear. The potential issue in the church would go something like this, okay, you're a slave and you become converted to Christ. Your first thought is, well, if I'm free in Christ, I ought to be free of this master that I'm serving, so I'm going to bolt this situation. You feel that you need to run from your master.
The assumption is that you have a right to freedom. There was a second problem. Let's say you become a Christian and your master becomes a Christian. He's your master, you're a slave, but when you go to church, you teach the Bible study and he listens. Now you've got a difficult situation, because now in the social structure, he's master, you're a slave, in the church you're an elder and he's not, because spiritual gifts have nothing to do with social structure.
So the church was facing some very difficult things. People were spiritually equal, but not humanly equal. Note that, please. Not everybody does have equal rights in a society, not if that society is going to function. Somebody's got to lead, somebody's got to follow, somebody's got to be in charge, somebody's got to submit. That's the way it goes.
That's the way it has to be. So the issues would be very clear. Some people coming to Christ in slavery would say, I have every right to be free and want to bolt that institution or rebel against it.
Others would think, well, because I'm over him in the church, I ought to be over him here in the estate or the home. Since there's spiritual equality, there must be equal rights. Not so. There must be equal rights. Not so.
Listen carefully. Not Jesus, not Peter, and not Paul ever advocated equal rights. Never. And the early church wasn't concerned about that.
They weren't concerned about that. If you're a slave when you're saved, stay a slave. Masters and slaves in the church get along fine. You're one in Christ. In Christ there is neither bond nor free, junior Greek, male or female, spiritually equal.
But when you go back to the social structure, you submit. You say that it didn't bother them? No, it didn't bother them.
Why? Listen carefully. It was the strong conviction of the early Christians that though their fellowship in Christ had brought them into a relationship of equality on the spiritual level, it didn't matter to them what the ordinary social distinctions were. That was immaterial. In fact, the New Testament writers and the early church were content with any natural, ethical, social structure as long as the spiritual dimension was right. So Peter is not a social philosopher. Peter is not a social reformer. He is not saying, all right, you slaves, now you're all free in Christ, bolt, revolt, sit in, protest, strike.
No. He says to them what in verse 18? Do what? Be submissive to your masters. The word servants here, oiketai, basically is the word for household slaves. Most of the slaves were household slaves. That is, they served some homeowner, some estate owner in some way.
Whether they were out plowing fields or doing medicine as doctors or whatever they did, they did it for some house owner, land owner, estate owner. So they're called oiketai. The word oikos means house. Masters is the Greek word despotai, from which we get despot. It's a strong word. It means absolute ownership and uncontrolled power. So he's really talking about controlling people and submitting people. And he says to these household slaves, be submissive.
That's a present participle. Continually be submissive and do it with the right attitude. Look at verse 18, with all respect, with all respect. The word is faba, from which we get phobias. It means fear.
Do it with fear. What are they fearing? I believe it's the fear of God here, not the fear of man.
Peter is really concerned about that. Look at verse 17. He says, fear God. Back in chapter 1 verse 17, conduct yourselves in fear. There too he means the fear of God. Chapter 3 verse 2, he says, as they observe your chaste and fearful behavior, and again it's fearing God. Verse 15 also says that you are to make a defense with gentleness and fear, the end of verse 15. And in each time he uses the word fear, he does it about five times, he has in mind the fear of God. So we are to be submissive to our masters with all due fear of God.
Now why does he say that? Listen to me, because God has set up social order, social structure. The employee-employer relationship is designed by God.
And so they were to submit to that social order for safety, for productivity, for the carrying on of the enterprise of human life. You say, yeah, but you don't know who I have as a master. It's brutal, cruel. You don't know what they do to me on my job.
Well, keep reading. Be submissive to your masters with all respect, not only respect for God who instituted this system, not only to those who are good and gentle but also to those who are unreasonable. You didn't want that to be there, did you?
You wanted out of that one. Good and gentle means virtuous and mild. The Greek term for gentle means reasonable, fair, yielding, ready to forego rights. It even means content to take less than due. This is a magnanimous, generous, kind, gracious person.
It's easy to submit to that kind of person. But also, he says in verse 18, to those who are unreasonable, scoliosis. You've heard of scoliosis of the spine, curvature? That's the word. It means bent, crooked, curved, metaphorically, perverse, unfair, unreasonable is a good translation.
Harsh, hard to deal with, unbending, unkind, ungracious. But in either case, what are you to do? What?
Submit. Now, in our situation, you can always get another job. In that culture, you didn't have that option, right? Because you were owned. And if you walked away and said, I think I'm going down the road to get another job, you couldn't do that.
The master could take your life because you'd be a runaway slave. You remember in the case of Onesimus who ran away from Philemon, he ran to the city of Rome, ran right into Paul. Paul led him to Christ, sent him right back. Read Philemon, sent Onesimus right back to Philemon. He said, Onesimus, you're a Christian, go back to the man who owns you and serve him with all your heart. And then he wrote that marvelous little epistle to Philemon says, accept Onesimus back. He's become a Christian. I send him back with love.
If he owes you anything, put it on my account. And Paul upheld that the slave was to submit to his owner, even though the owner and the slave were both brothers in Christ. The system stands.
The system stands. So in any case, whatever kind of boss you have, you are to submit. You say, well now, what if my boss is cruel? Look, God will take care of your boss, right?
Just like David said. By the way, Scripture condemns the oppression of slaves, Exodus 21, 26, and 27, Deuteronomy 23, 15, and 16, Leviticus 25, 39, and 43. Very clearly, God condemns the oppression of slaves. God even instituted a seven-year release of the slaves and then the 50-year Jubilee release of the slaves. But God did not condemn people working for other people. And he did call us to submission. In Ephesians 6 and verse 5, slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh with fear and trembling.
Again, fear of God, because God has established this social order in the sincerity of your heart as to Christ. What he is saying is you should serve your master as if you were serving whom? Christ.
Christ. Look at verse 7, with good will render service as to the Lord. He says it again because they probably wouldn't have believed it the first time, and not to men. And knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free. And masters do the same thing to them and give up threatening, knowing that both their master and yours is in heaven and there's no partiality with him. And he warns the masters that God's going to deal with them if they're unfair. So Paul there is reinforcing what Peter says. We're to do it in the right attitude, sincerity of heart as if we were serving Christ. The mandate then, no walkouts, no strikes, no holdouts, no protests, no mutiny, submission. Why?
Why? In order that, verse 15, you may silence the ignorance of foolish men and give a Godly testimony, a testimony that says patiently and humbly, I take whatever you give and I serve you with all my heart. And not only that, I commit myself to God who will properly reward me and you for how you treat me.
That takes us secondly to the motive for submission, the motive for submission. And he simply says it in verse 19, for this finds favor, for this finds favor. What does God expect out of us in the workplace? This is it.
This is it. He expects us to submit and not with a grudging, cantankerous, ugly, sullen spirit. But back to Ephesians 6, with fear and trembling, that is fearing God's chastening on you if you don't do it right.
Can I introduce a thought into your life and your thinking? You're having problems. You can't figure out why. It may not have anything to do with, quote unquote, your spiritual activity. It could be the chastening of God because you're such a griping, complaining employee. Ephesians says that you are to do it with fear and trembling. That is, you have a healthy fear of God who will chasten those who do not have a right attitude.
You are to do it, your obedient service as a slave of your master, whatever kind of master they might be or he might be or she might be, in the sincerity of your heart as if you were serving Christ. And he says, not by way of eye service. What does that mean? Doing good when they're watching you, eye service. What does that mean? Doing good when they're watching.
Busy, busy, busy, happy, happy, happy, as long as they're looking. As soon as they turn their back, doing it as slaves of Christ. And then this statement, Ephesians 6, 6, doing the will of God from the heart. Did you know this is the will of God? This is the will of God. Do it from the heart as if you're doing it for the Lord and know that the Lord will pay you back. That's Ephesians 6, 5 to 9. What a great passage.
Be submissive. You say, well, the end result of this is what? Well, the Lord will pay you back for all your effort. Number two, that kind of life, particularly under an unreasonable, unfair boss, will act as a constant rebuke to his wickedness and a constant testimony to the grace of Christ in your life. It will silence the critics and perhaps even lead them to the knowledge of the Savior.
We can respond properly. I remember as a little boy, my father telling the story about a young soldier who was weak and for some reason didn't fare well soldiering. He found a certain sergeant who was his boss who abused him greatly. He was unable to fulfill a particular performance in the training and when he'd lie on the ground, prone and unable to continue, the sergeant who had been so hard on him came up and with his boots pummeled his body, kicked him.
He was in so much pain he had to be carried back to his bunk. The next morning when that revelry blew and the soldiers got up, the sergeant awake and reached down to put his boots on and found them shined to a glisten. When he asked who shined his boots, he was told the man he had kicked the night before. He went to him and said, how can you do that? He said because Christ has given me a love for you and he went on to give his testimony.
As my father told the story, the sergeant became a Christian. It's a profound thing we do when we respond in a godly way to ungodly treatment. That's the mandate. We need to live it. Some of you are going to have to take a stand very soon.
You should do it with joy. The Lord will honor you and the Lord will take care of those who are treating you unfairly. I'm not saying that sometimes the employee's concerns are not justified.
Sometimes they might be. But I am saying that God requires that our attitude be right and that we simply commit it to God and don't take vengeance ourselves and don't demand our rights. And God will take care of it. There's one other pervasive reason. Folks, we don't want for one minute anybody in this world to think that we really care about stuff in this life.
Who cares? Let's live at a level which communicates that we will endure anything in this life for the joy of the life to come. And we will never send out a message that we're going to get all exercised and upset the system and lose our testimony to get something here which will perish anyway.
Right? And if we live that heavenly life, we'll have the right perspective. Let's bow in prayer. Help us, Lord, to be submissive to all, to maintain a purity of testimony, a high performance of work that is in the category of excellence. Help us to serve our earthly employers as if we were serving Christ the Lord, not only with duty that is proper but with attitude that is proper. And when we are abused and mistreated and maligned, may we commit the resolution of those things to You and never take them into our own hands and stoop to rebellion which has no part in the life of a Christian. Use us, Lord, with those who oppress us to show the love of Christ, the grace, the great faith we have in God who will make all things right, and our detachment from the world around us. May the world know that we are most concerned to live a Christlike life in humility and love that we might reach even those who treat us unkindly.
Use us, Lord, in that way in Christ's name. That's John MacArthur here on Grace to You. Along with teaching each day on the radio, John is a pastor, author, and chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary, both in the Los Angeles area. His current study is titled Singing the Lord's Song in a Strange Land. You know, John, something we often say about messages like today's, they're personal, they speak right to the listener one-on-one, but they're also the means of taking biblical truth beyond just the individual.
The letter you have there gives a story like that, so take a minute and read it. Yeah, this is a letter from Chad in Houston, Texas, and he writes, After hearing you on radio several years ago, my wife and I began consuming your sermons pretty regularly. This all started early in our marriage, and along with our local church became the means by which we started to truly hunger for the Word of God and seek expository Christ-centered teaching. Grace to You has been a tremendous influence on our lives.
Today we find ourselves listening to your new sermons all the way back to your old stuff from the 1970s. We so appreciate the faithfulness of Scripture that has marked your preaching ministry. We are now with five children, the oldest of which is about to leave home, and my wife and I are so thankful for the faithful exposition of the truth that is being passed along to the next generation. Your preaching has accompanied us on countless family road trips, business trips, in my wife's and my devotion times, and in sharing with others the biblical treasures that you have unpacked so faithfully. Words cannot express the eternal impact of your faithful teaching, not only on your own flock, but also on other churches across the country and even around the world. So we praise the Lord for the consistency of your ministry, and we pray that we are able to excel still more in our ability to use the truths that have been exposited to us to teach and serve in our local church. Wonderful letter from Chad.
Thank you, Chad. Think about those who listen to these broadcasts, dads and moms and kids, Sunday school teachers, prisoners who lead Bible studies with fellow convicts, all sorts of discipleship relationships. And by God's grace, we're using radio, the internet books, MP3s, and television as well to reach individuals with God's truth.
In turn, those individuals teach that truth to others and ongoing multiplied impact. And you have a part in all of that when you pray for grace to you and support our work financially as you're able to do it. So thank you for standing with us.
That's right, friend. Thank you for your support. It really is people like you who help us take messages like the one you just heard, teaching packed with eternal hope to men and women around the globe. To partner with us in ministry that changes lives, contact us today. You can mail your tax-deductible gift to Grace To You, Box 4000, Panorama City, California 91412, or call us at 800-55-GRACE. You can also express your support online at gty.org, and thank you again for all you do to support Verse by Verse teaching. And a special thanks if you're a grace partner. Again, to help us continue to bring biblical truth to God's people, call 800-55-GRACE or go to gty.org. And as John mentioned, if our current series, Singing the Lord's Song in a Strange Land, is helping you understand how to honor the Lord in your workplace, or if you've benefited from a recent blog series, or if someone you know has come to faith in Christ after hearing John's teaching, we'd love to hear your story. So email us at letters at gty.org, that's letters at gty.org, or you can write to Box 4000, Panorama City, California 91412. Now for John MacArthur and our staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Thanks for starting your week with us, and be back tomorrow for more practical instruction on how to honor Christ and stand out in a secular workplace. It's another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth one verse at a time, on Grace To You.
