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Two years ago to the month I wrote an article entitled, Ashamed No More (see Archive). In that article, I celebrated the mind regenerating work of the Holy Spirit in Christians that enables me to look back at slavery without bitterness or shame. While I could wish that slavery never happened, acting as if it did not and burying it as some long ago, tragic event does not bring healing. Facing it, as we should any negative experience in our lives with the help of God does heal, bring encouragement, hope and instruction (Deuteronomy 24:17-22).
In the article I wrote, I also mentioned a healthy coping strategy no doubt many Christian slaves employed without necessarily consciously thinking about it. It was to understand themselves not as slaves to sinful men as a first priority, but to Christ! Indeed, it seems many of Christ´s 1st century apostles and even His brothers James and Jude thought of themselves as His slaves or bondservants (see Romans 1:1; Philippians 1:1; James 1:1; 2 Peter 1:1; Jude 1:1; Revelation 1:1). Where did they get such thinking from; did Christ require it?
No, Christ did not specifically command His followers to be His slaves. In fact, shortly before His suffering, He told His disciples that a man had not greater love than to lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13). He then told them:
You are my friends if you do what ever I command you.
No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not
know what his master is doing; but I have called you
friends, for all things that I heard from My Father I
have made known to you.
John 15:14-15, NKJV
So, where did the apostles of Christ get this idea they were His slaves? First, some of their thinking surely came from His teaching on following His example to live with a servant´s heart before God and toward each other (Mark 10:35-45; John 13:12-17; Philippians 2:5-8). Second, their slave mentality toward Christ most certainly developed in the face of His glorious resurrection where even doubting Thomas exclaimed after seeing Him, "´My Lord and my God,´" (John 20:28, NKJV)! Finally, this attitude of being a slave for life to the risen Christ absolutely evolved from gratitude to Him for His work of saving unworthy sinners as these men under conviction of the Holy Spirit saw themselves (1 Corinthians 15:8-10; Philippians 3:1-11; 1 Timothy 1:12-17).
Truly, only a man that has not been washed in the blood of Christ and brought to new birth by the Holy Spirit could ever reject being His slave! Such a man has not known the incredible joy of release from his sins that bring him constant guilt and shame as well as very real bondage of soul. For every man not a slave to Christ, is a slave to sin! Enslavement to Christ brings righteousness, holiness, life, peace and freedom; enslavement to sin brings more sin, impurity, turmoil, other forms of slavery such as addiction, incarceration and eventually without repentance, eternal death (Romans 6:16-23, 8:6-13; 2 Corinthians 3:17).
I am thoroughly pleased to be a bondservant of Christ and call Him, Master. In voluntary submission, I have given myself fully over to Him and His Lordship in my life; a life that before I met Him is filled with the destructive evidence of my total bondage to sin. Memories of pitiful attempts at self-liberation are laughable now in light of the superior work of deliverance Christ has wrought in me. Thus, I am infinitely freer now as Christ´s slave, than I ever was as a slave to sin. I also understand why the apostles and hundreds of years later, many Christian slaves were willing to endure even death so patiently for His sake!
To be a martyr is to be a faithful witness of Christ until put to death by persecuting enemies of the cross. Stephen is the first recorded martyr of Jesus Christ (Acts 7:54-60). James the brother of John was next to die at the hands of king Herod (Acts 12:1-2). Church history and tradition relate that many of the Lord´s 1st century apostles suffered martyrdom in service to Him. After them, thousands of His bondservants to this very hour have been put to death for their faith in Him. The Lord reveals many more will die for His sake until His return (Revelation 6:9-11, 13:1-18, 14:9-13).
I want America´s children and my own to know that faithful Christian slaves and their believing descendants that have been put to death without just cause as a Christian are Christ´s martyrs right along with our white and other brothers that are so named. For this not to be the case is to perpetuate the historic racism our nation once practiced so severely, blacks were legally defined as a fraction of a person. Therefore, to the end of setting the record straight I call on my brothers at Christian organizations that report such facts and statistics to be more complete in their excellent work and include some legitimate instances of martyrdom by Christian slaves and other black American believers in our nation´s history.
Whether the martyrdom of Christian slaves and other black American believers becomes widely known here and now on earth or not, God knows and I am greatly uplifted by that truth. Another truth is this. All of Christ´s bondservants of whatever ethnicity should be preparing for the foretold night that must unfold before the sudden brightness of His Day dawns. May the faith and courage of all the martyrs of Christ since Stephen including black Christians from slavery onward encourage our hearts. We are victorious in Him (Revelation 7:9-17, 15:1-4, 19:1-20:6, 21:1-22:5)!
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