I am a slave.
Not because I am being forced to be a slave but because I want to.
Under Deuteronomic law, an indentured servant could choose to be a free man when his seven years of service were up or he could choose to stay and work for his master. If he loved his master and wanted to continue to serve his master as a slave for the rest of his life, his master would take an awl and pierce it through his ear into the door, and he would become his master’s servant for life … willingly … of his own free will. The same would apply to an indentured female slave (Exodus 21:1-6; Deuteronomy 15:17). At the end of seven years, she could leave, stay on as hired help, or willingly and permanently become her master or mistress’ slave.
I am a slave … willingly … permanently. I took a nine-inch nail … like the kind that the Romans used to nail criminals to a cross … and I nailed my heart to the cross of Jesus Christ as a sign that I will serve my Lord and Master … my “Adonai” … for the rest of my life here in this world … and forever in the next.
“The first duty of every soul,” says pastor and author Warren Wiersby, “is to find … not its freedom … but its master” (“The Integrity Crisis.” 1988. Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Inc; p. 22). So true. Let me repeat that: “The first duty of every soul is to find … not its freedom … but its master.”
On the evening of March 23rd, 1743, King George the Second did something no other king had ever done before. He stood up during the Hallelujah chorus of George Frideric Handel’s oratorio “The Messiah.” Standing up in the middle of a performance of a major orchestral and choral work today or in King George the Second’s day is never encouraged. In fact, it would be considered rude and not something a king would likely do without a very compelling reason. King George was a Christian and knowledgeable of the Scriptures. When the singers reached the “Hallelujah Chorus” and began singing hallelujah to the King of kings and Lord of lords, King George knew that the words were referring to his Lord … to a King greater than himself and it was only appropriate for him to stand in the presence of a King far superior to him. The King of kings was the King of England’s superior. Even though he was the king of the English empire, King George knew that he was a mere subject of The King of kings and Lord of Lords. As a Christian, King George understood that his authority and position as ruler over England was bestowed upon him by the divine Creator and Sovereign of Heaven and Earth. If the Triune God were to walk into the same room as the King of England, King George would be compelled to rise and bow in honor of the King of kings and the Lord of lords.
Do you remember the first name of God that we studied last week? That’s right. It was “Elohim” … the Creator God … the Source and Sustainer of all creation. Today’s name, however, is not just a title but a description of the kind of relationship that we are to have with God. “Adonai” … our “Supreme Lord and Master.” Abram was the first one to call God “Adonai” … [read Genesis 15:1-6.]
Did you hear it? Or spot it? Don’t feel bad if you didn’t. It’s found in verse 2. This is why I asked you to bring your Bibles. In verse 2, Abram says “O Lord GOD.” Notice anything about the way that the word “Lord” is written ? It is written with a capital “L” and the rest of the letters … “ord” … are lower case. That a pretty common way for us to designate nouns that are special or unique. It’s also the way that we designate them as a proper noun or a title. A “lord” is a noun … a person … when it’s lower-case … but it is a title or designation when it starts with a capital letter. When the word “president” starts with a lower-case “p,” it is a generic term that refers to any ol’ president. When the word “President” starts with a capital “P,” it refers to a person who holds … or has held … the office of president … President Bush, President Clinton, President Obama, President Trump.
Look at the word “God,” however … what’s different about the way it is presented here? It is all capital letters. Why? Well, if you don’t already know this, I’m going to introduce you to an interesting feature in the Bible.
You may not have noticed this before, but sometimes the word “God” is in all caps … and sometimes the word “Lord” is in all caps … and its done that way for a reason. When you see the word “GOD” in all caps in the Bible, it is a way to let the reader know that the name “God” being used in the English is actually “Yahweh” in Hebrew. When you see the word “LORD” in all caps, it is referring to the Hebrew title of “Jehovah.” When you see the word “Lord” with a capital “L” and the rest of the word in lower case … like you do in verse 2 … it refers to the Hebrew title of “Adonai.”
You got it? “GOD” all caps is referring to “Yahweh.” “LORD” all caps is referring to “Jehovah.” “Lord” with a capital “L” and lower-case “o-r-d” is referring to “Adonai.” So … “O Lord GOD” in verse 2 is, “O Adonai Yahweh” in Hebrew.
The name “Adonai” shares the same interesting feature or characteristic as the name “Elohim.” Anyone care to guess what that might be? Well, as I am sure that you remember from last week, the name “Elohim” is the plural of the Hebrew name of “El” … which means both strong and God. “Adonai” is also plural. It literally means “kings” or “lords.”
In the singular, “adon” refers to someone who is a “master.” It also means “owner.” “Adon” was usually the title that slaves would use when speaking about or our addressing their “master.” It was also used to address kings.
Like “Elohim,” the plural reference of “Adonai” to God suggests the triune nature of God but I also think that it really underscores the supreme lordship of God over His creation. When we want to say that something is really, really good we use words like “really” or “very.” “This ice cream is very good.” “That movie was really good.” You have the same thing in other languages. For example, you can use the word “tan” … which means “very” in Spanish or the word “mucho” … which means “a lot.” But you can also say, “Este helado esta bien, bien” … “This ice cream is good, good” … which mean it’s better than “good,” it’s really good … it’s good and then good again on top of that. “Adonai” attempts to the make the same point. God is “king, king” … which gets translated as “King” … capital “K” of kings … hear the plural … with a lower-case “k” … or “Lord” with a capital “L” of “lords” … plural with a lower-case “l.”
Another way that “Adonai” gets translated is “sovereign.” The word “sovereign” is made up of two words … “sover” or “sober” and “reign.” “Sover” or “sober” is an old French or Latin word for “over.” “Reign” means “to rule, to dominate, to have power over.” So, “sovereign” literally means someone who “over-rules” or “rules from above.” While a king or queen rules over all the subjects in their kingdom, God rules over everything in His kingdom … including kings and queens … which is why King George II stood up and bowed during the hallelujah chorus of Handel’s oratorio “The Messiah.”
When we call God “Adonai,” we are declaring that He is sovereign … He is the King above all kings … He is the Lord above all lords … He rules over His creation … nothing rules over Him, amen? Listen to how Deuteronomy 10:17 uses three names or titles for God in an attempt to capture His majestic supremacy: “For the LORD” … all caps … “your God is God of gods and Lord of lords” … plural … “the great God, mighty and awesome.” Keeping in mind the use of capital letters and plural references, here’s the sense of the Hebrew in this passage: “For Jehovah your God is Elohim and Adonai, the great God, mighty and awesome.”
Even though Abram called God “Adonai” … Lord of lords and King of Kings … with his lips in verse 2, his heart was filled with doubt. God had promised him a son but all he had was a servant to leave his estate and his possession to when he died. In order to expand Abram’s understanding of what it means to call God “Adonai,” God took him outside and told him to look up. “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them. See those stars, Abram? I, Yahweh, Elohim … Adonai … King of kings and Lord of lords … sovereign over all the universe … promise you that your offspring will be as numerous as all these stars that you are looking at … you know, the stars that I made. You can’t count all those stars but I know everyone of their names. If I can create more stars than you can count in a lifetime, do you think it’s possible for me … Adonai Yahweh … who created not only all those stars but this very planet that you live on … who, in fact, created the very first human being … and could create another human being if He wanted to … out of the very dust that you stand on … do you think it might be possible for me … Adonai Yahweh … to keep my promise to you and give you a child anytime that I want?”
Pay attention. Once Abram is reminded of the bigness of God, Abram “believed the LORD” … all caps … “and Jehovah reckoned it to him as righteousness” (Exodus 15:6) … but Abram is still not there yet. In verse 8 he again questions God. Again pay attention. “O Lord God” … “O Adonai Yahweh, how am I to know that I shall posses [this land]?” Again, Abram’s use of the term “Adonai Yahweh” communicates his commitment to live under the authority of Yahweh, the Sovereign King of kings but, at the same time, he continues to question the Lord’s ability to do it.
Unlike an earthly king, God doesn’t imprison Abram or strike him dead for his insolence. Instead, God seeks to help him understand who He is and enters into a covenant with him. Pretty amazing, when you think about it. The Sovereign King of kings enters into a binding covenant with Abram. After making an offering to Adonai Yahweh, Abram falls asleep and the Sovereign Lord of lords comes to Abram and makes him this promise: “Know this for certain, that your offspring shall be aliens in a land that is not theirs, and shall be slaves there, and shall be oppressed for four hundred years; but I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve” … Adonai Yahweh is speaking about Egypt … “and afterward they shall come out with great possession. As for yourself, you shall go to your ancestors in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age” (Exodus 15:13-15). And then Adonai Yahweh comes back a second time to double-seal the deal: “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates” … which is the Promised Land. When Adonai Yahweh makes a promise, He keeps it, am I right? Four hundred years later, Abram’s descendants cross the River Jordan and occupy the fertile crescent from the Mediterranean sea to the Euphrates River.
Moses came face-to-face with “Adonai.” When God appeared to Moses in the burning bush in Exodus 3, He did so as “Yahweh” … another name for God that we will explore in another sermon. Standing before the burning bush, Moses seemed to understand that God was the eternal, ever-changing, self-extant One … but still struggled to submit to God’s authority. God gives Moses an assignment and he doesn’t want to do it. His response in Exodus 3:10 is very forthright and candid: “O Adonai, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since You have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.” Like Abram, Moses addresses God as “Lord” and “Master” … thereby acknowledging that he is nothing more than a servant… but he still attempts to excuse himself from obeying God … which reveals the limit of Moses’ understanding of God’s Sovereignty as King of kings and Lord of lords.
In verse 12, God says, “I will be with you … you know, Yahweh … the eternal, ever-changing, self-extant One … and you will know that I am not only your Adon … your Lord and Master … but the Sovereign King of kings and Lord of lords when you see what I do to the Egyptians and they set you free. Then you and all the people will worship me as ‘Adonai’ right here on this mountain where we’re standing.” And still, what does Moses do? He argues and makes another attempt to avoid answering Adonai’s call. “O Adonai, Master, send someone else to do it.”
God’s anger burns against Moses because he confesses that God is Adonai on one hand … then contradicts his confession with his lack of obedience to “Adonai” on the other. Before we judge Moses, we need to take a look at ourselves first. Don’t we do the same thing? Don’t we call God “Lord” … “Adonai” … on the one hand and then go and live the way we want to on the other? Jesus put it this way in Luke 6:46: “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ and do not do what I say?” If we affirm God’s ownership over us by calling Him “Lord and Master,” shouldn’t we also respond as His slaves and obey what He commands? Jesus Himself said that it was not enough to just go around calling Him “Lord, Lord” with our lips and not mean it in our hearts. “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father in Heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
Ezekiel had the right understanding of what it meant to call God “Adonai.” He uses the title of “Adonai” over 200 times. For him, the name “Adonai” not only established Yahweh’s lordship over the nation of Israel, it also signified His lordship over ALL the people of the earth … whether they recognized and acknowledged that fact or not. Ezekiel understood that all creation existed to serve the Sovereign King of kings. When Adonai speaks, the forces of nature heed His commands ... the sea and wind obey … the stars and planets follow the courses that He has laid out for them. I hope and pray that you feel the same way as Ezekiel. He was 100% right … all of creation was created to serve the Lord and to fulfill His good pleasure and not the other way around, amen?
The meaning of “Adonai” as Sovereign Lord continues on into the New Testament. The Greek version of “Adonai” is the word “Kurios.” “Kurios” is used over 700 times to describe Jesus. In the Book of Acts, for example, Luke refers to Jesus as “Kurios” 92 times but only calls Him “Savior” twice. Over time, however, I’m afraid that we’ve emphasized Jesus’ role as Savior at the expense of His Lordship when, in fact, they are both quite equal and quite inseparable. You cannot accept Jesus as your Savior without also submitting to Him as your Lord, amen?
In his book, “The Gospel According to Jesus,” John MacArthur examines this notion of making Christ the Lord of our lives in detail. “Jesus is Lord of all,” he says, “and the Biblical mandate to both sinners and saints is not to ‘make’ Christ Lord but rather to bow to His Lordship” (2008. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan; p. 213). In other words, whether Jesus is Lord or not is not up to us. He is not the Lord of one person’s life and not another. He is Adonai … Sovereign Lord and King over all … Period! … Whether we acknowledge it or not, amen?
The Book of Revelation tells us that the Lord of All Creation and the Master of All that He Has Made will one day return to rule over us and His creation for all eternity. He has never relinquished His rightful place of ownership. He is our “Adonai” … our “Master.” He owns everything … and that includes us!
Look. I understand that the idea that you belong to somebody … that somebody owns you … that you are somebody’s slave might make you squirm around in your seat. Images of Kunta Kinte and “Roots” probably come to mind … where slaves were considered property … like livestock. The slave’s owner completely controlled the relationship. The slave had no rights and no say in what happened to them. The master had complete control over every aspect of their lives … from where they would live … who they would mate with … what they ate … to what they wore. Their children could be taken away from them and sold to other masters. The master could even take their lives without much repercussion.
Ownership of another person is frightening, and understandably so. Absolute control of one person by another can be impulsive and unpredictable. Masters were … and still are … often intentionally cruel to their servants. Our twisted sin nature can derive pleasure from abusing our power … treating other people as toys for our amusement. Fairly recent examples would include Saddam Hussein and his two sons, Uday and Husay, and North Korean leader Kim Jung-Kim, who inflicted pain on their subjects simply because they could … displaying the power of their positions for personal satisfaction. As sinful people living in a sinful world, we understandably fear the thought of being under the absolute control of another human being … and that fear can often extend to God.
This was Abram’s understanding of the term “Adonai” in today’s scripture reading. Abram was a the “adon” … the “master” … of a vast household. He had many possessions … livestock, tools, housing, utensils … and he also had many servants and slaves. In the same way that Abram possessed his household, he saw himself as possessed by God.
I want you to stay with me here! I realize that this is a stark picture of God’s Lordship over His creation but we must keep in mind that He made it … He keeps it going … He has the absolute right to claim it as His own … He has the right to command it as He sees fit … even the right to initiate or end life as He sees fit. Just as He spoke the creation into existence, Adonai can just as easily speak it out of existence. Whether we like it or not, He alone has TOTAL control over His creation … He is the absolute Sovereign King of kings and Lord of lords over everything and everyone in His creation. And if God is Adonai … the Sovereign King of kings and Lord of lords over all His creation, guess what that makes us, amen? You can yourself a “subject” if you find the word “slave” too much to swallow but it doesn’t change the relationship that we have with Adonai or that He has with us.
Listen to what the Apostle Paul had to say in 1st Corinthians 6:19-20: “What? Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and” … listen up … “and that you are not your own? For you were bought” … did you hear that? … “for you were bought with a price.” Think about what Paul is saying? You are not your own … you were bought with a price. Bought by whom? Jesus Christ. The price? His blood, His life given for us on the cross. Bought from whom? From Satan. So … whether we like the term “slave” or not, guess what? We are all slaves. The question is: Slaves to whom or what, amen?
But God is so much more than a human “master.” You see, the master may “own” his servants or slaves … but he is also responsible for them. Ownership comes with responsibilities … with obligations. If I buy a car, yes, I own it … which means that I am also responsible for putting gas in it … for keeping up the maintenance … I have to have insurance … I have to fix it when it breaks down. The same goes for everything else that I own … I am responsible for its care and upkeep.
Masters who owned servants had duties as well. I know that this is going to sound strange to us today, but there was often a close relationship between master and slave during the time that the Bible was written. Remember how Potiphar, the jailer, and eventually the Pharaoh put a slave named Joseph in charge of their most important possessions and operations?
Now, the distinction between a “hired hand” and a “slave” was important. A “hired hand” was just that … someone who was hired to do a specific job or task. They were “hired” or “contracted” and as such could come and go as they pleased. Slaves, on the other hand, were not “hired” or “contracted.” They were considered to be part of the family. Abraham circumcised his entire household as part of the covenant he made with God … including his servants and slaves … which meant that they belonged to God as much as any other person or thing that Abraham owned … but it also meant that everyone in Abraham’s family … including his servants and slaves … got to receive the blessings and benefits that came from that relationship. In other words, the requirements and the rewards of Abraham’s covenant with God extended to his family and his servants and slaves as well.
Yes … the master owned the slave. He had the power of life and death over them. But he was also responsible for their health … their protection. He provided them with food and shelter. He guided and directed them. He helped them in their time of need. The master would suffer and do without to meet his obligations to his servants and slaves who were dependent upon him. I know that this is very difficult to imagine given the concept and images that we have of modern-day slavery.
Trust me … it’s weird to be extolling the virtues of slavery but we have to keep what we’re talking about in context. More importantly, we have to keep in mind who were talking about this morning. God’s lordship isn’t like our human lordship. God’s lordship is perfect … based on perfect love. Our lordship over other human beings is broken and twisted by sin. God completely fulfills his responsibilities to us, His servants. Even before Abram called God “Adonai,” God told him to fear not, for “I am your shield; your reward shall be great” (Genesis 15:1). In the covenant that God made with Abram in verses 7 through 21, He took all the responsibility upon Himself. Abram may have prepared the covenant by sacrificing the prescribed animals … but it was God who “signed” the bottom line … promising that Abram would be fruitful despite his old age and that his descendants would become a nation that would produce great kings.
God is truly “Adonai” in the fullest sense of the term. He has every right to claim possession of all that exists because He created it … and He takes careful, loving care of it. And in return, what response does Adonai desire?
The first is to recognize His rightful ownership … followed by our complete submission. Submission is an act of the will … it is a conscious decision. Submission does not change reality … it only changes our experience of reality. We are not relinquishing our freedom when we submit to Adonai, we are only accepting things for the way that they really are. Submission is the mental act of placing ourselves at God’s disposal … relinquishing our hold over our own lives and accepting His rightful claim on us.
Submission is not bondage but freedom. We no longer have control over our lives. Submission means that we recognize God’s claim over us and we give our lives … the lives that He created in the first place … over to Him and let Him direct everything about our lives. It’s not hard and it’s not that much of a stretch. If God knit us together … if God chose the date that we would be born … where we would be born … how tall or how short we would be … what color eyes and hair we would have … what gender … then why can’t we trust all of God’s other plans and purposes for our life?
Submission requires our obedience. If I submit to God but continue to do my own thing and go my own way, well, guess what? Doesn’t seem like I’ve submitted to Him, amen? As we have discussed already, there are many people who claim that God is their “Adonai” … their Lord and Master … who argue and disagree with God’s way of doing things and fight the yoke that they claim they have willingly submitted to.
We must become slaves and not hired hands. Hired hands negotiate the terms of the contract … the hours … the wages … how much has to be done. When the job is over, their obligation and their relationship with the person who hired them is over as well. They can quit any time that they want. All along the way, they work with the goals and interests of the person who hired them so long as it satisfies their goals and interests. Many Christians today see themselves more as hired hands than slaves, amen?
Slaves, on the other hand, have no say. They seek only to accomplish their master’s purposes. They fulfill the duties that the master has assigned to them. They no longer have a life or an agenda of their own. This is a transfer of ownership … not a negotiated contract. It is a relationship that requires a “service” mentality on our part. Our obedience becomes God-centered. We exist to perform at His good pleasure … we become profitable to and for the Master. It is no longer about making God a part of our lives but becoming a part of His greater plans and purposes, amen?
If you think this notion sounds crazy, extreme, or out-of-line, where did I get this notion of becoming a slave for God? I got it from Jesus Himself. Jesus told us, face-to-face, that He came to serve and not to be served (Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45). He was obedient to the plans and desires of His Father even though it meant suffering and death … a shameful, public death on a Roman cross. Everything He did was to fulfill His Father’s greater plans and purposes and not His own (Luke 22:42).
Adonai’s lordship means complete possession on the one hand … and complete submission on the other. But here’s the secret … are you ready to hear the “secret”? When you recognize God’s ownership of your life … when you completely submit your life to Him … you ready for this? You will find joy and freedom in your servanthood.
Think I’m crazy? Let’s ask Abram what he thinks. He was 99 years old … 99 years old! His wife, Sari, was 90. There was no possibility … I mean NO possibility that they were going to have a child unless God intervened, amen? Just wasn’t any other way that that was ever going to happen, amen?
And yet … God takes Abram outside and tells him to look up to the heavens and promises him that he will have as many descendents as there are stars in the heavens and then makes a covenant with him. Proof that God kept His word was a baby boy by the name of Isaac. Abram’s descendants may not be as numerous as the stars in heaven or the grains of sand on a beach, but there are over 14 million of Abram’s descendants alive today creating more descendants all around the world, amen?
We were made to be servants. When we try to take Adonai’s place, we only get frustrated because our abilities, our power, our authority, our reach, our wisdom is limited. I don’t know about you, I have found that trying to be the lord and master of my little corner of the universe is very exhausting and frustrating and futile work … and it’s an illusion. I can no more control the universe or the world around me than I can pick up a mountain and throw it into Lake Fontana, amen? Freedom comes when I realize that I am not in charge of the universe … God is … and I let Him do His job and I do mine … which is to be an attentive and obedient servant of the Lord and Master of the universe. He takes care of the universe, He takes care of me … and in return, I do whatever humble tasks He commands me to do. I have found that when I understand this … when I stop trying to micro-manage my own life … when I give up the job of being the “adon” … the lord and master … of everyone around me … I have found such peace … a peace that is the result of the simplicity of my relationship with God. He is God and I am not … He is my “adon” … my lord and master … He is “Adonai” … King of kings and Lord of lords … and I am but His humble and grateful servant … and I have found that to be a beautiful way to live.
So … who is the “adon” … the lord and master … of your life? Is it you … or is it Adonai … the King of kings and the Lord of lords? Who is running your life? Right now? Today? Who’s calling the shots? You? Or Adonai? Do you tell God what to do? Or do you wait expectantly for Him to tell you what He wants you to do? When you are asked to serve, how do you respond? Do you protest and whine like Abram? Do you make up excuses like Moses? Is your life filled with frustration and anxiety? Then stop trying to fill God’s shoes. You would be surprised at how many people there are in the world who actually think that they can do a better job of running the universe than God ... and all you have to do is look around to see how good a job they are doing, amen? How about you let God … Adonai … Elohim … Jehovah … do His job and you do yours, amen? Trust me … it works for me and I know it will work for you.
