Thoughts From Ephesians 6 - Part 2

 Slaves, be obedient to those who are your earthly masters, with fear and trembling, in singleness of heart, as to Christ; 6 not in the way of eye-service, as men-pleasers, but as servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, 7 rendering service with a good will as to the Lord and not to men,  Eph.6:5-7

          Obviously, I don't have any slaves in my household, but there are people under me in regard to positions of authority and I am under people in the same way. What does Paul tell us about both of these stations in life?

       First of all if you are under someone's authority as a child, student, or employee for example there are several principles to follow. First, remember that God sees everything. You might think you are getting away with stealing, cheating, slacking when the boss isn't looking but God is. It's easy to justify all those behaviors and believe me I have. You think, they are treating me unfairly, they don't pay me enough, everyone else is doing it, they are making so much money off me etc. but remember - you operate on a higher standard than everyone else and there is an authority above that authority that you answer to and He sees everything.

        Another principle that's like the first is that in everything we do, we are serving Christ, so if we are working a job, we are supposed to pretend our boss is Jesus. What would Jesus require of us - our best. Just as I respect, honor, revere, fear God, so I should project that onto my authorities and treat them the same way. Just as I live to hear "well done my good and faithful servant. You've been faithful in the little things let me put you in charge of more...", so also, we should long for and strive for that praise from our authorities. We may not get it, but we know we will receive it someday if not in this life but the life to come. Also, we look to expand God's kingdom here on Earth and likewise we should be such good and effective "underlings" that our authority's kingdom flourishes. If our boss is making so much money off of us - isn't that a good thing? If our teachers are getting bonuses because of our success in the classroom - isn't that what we want?

        This passage says we should be serving out of good will. This is how we serve the Lord, right? We serve Him out of love not because we have to. In the same way, serving our authorities should be not because "I got to" but rather "I get to". If you went to work or school today with that attitude you would blow everyone away. Everyone around you would flourish and it could even become contagious. Why not try it!