Currently, I'm reading a series of messages concerning The Slave of God. There are a couple of verses that really strike me.
Exo. 21:5-6, "But if the servant plainly says, I love my master, my wife, and children; I will not go out free. Then his master shall bring him to God and shall bring him to the door or to the doorpost , and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him forever."
Isa. 50:4-5, "The Lord Jehovah has given me / The tongue of the instructed, / That I should know how to sustain the weary with a word. / He awakens me morning by morning; / He awakens my ear / To hear as an instructed one./ The Lord Jehovah has opened my ears; / And I was not rebellious, / Nor did I turn back."
Psa. 40:6, "You do not delight in sacrifice and offering; / You have prepared ears for Me; / You do not require burnt offering and sin offering."
1 Sam. 15:22, "And Samuel said, Does Jehovah delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the voice of Jehovah? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed, than the fat of rams."
First, we need to know what is our relationship with our Lord. There are many ways to speak of this: Father & child, Savior & sinner, Beloved & lover, Creator & creature, but we seldom acknowledge this: Master & slave. The concept of slavery (either physical or psychological) is not that prevailing in our society nowadays. Therefore, it is hard to really get into the feeling of being a slave.
However, we need to get the fact right. On one hand, although the Lord is our Master, He is also the Slave. The portions of the Scriptures listed above revealed that Jesus Christ is the Slave/Servant of Jehovah (God). On the other hand, the verses above also played a significant role in understanding our status as a slave whenever applied to our daily living.
The first & only thing that a slave does is to LISTEN to his master. The ears being bored through with an awl at the doorpost in Exo. 21:6 means that our eyes are opened to listen to the Lord's speaking, not to have our own concepts, desires, and intentions. In Isa. 50:4-5, we see that in order to have the tongue of an instructed one to sustain the weary ones with the word, our ears need to be opened to listen to His speaking. In Psa. 40:6, God is delighted whenever we prepare an ear to listen to Him. Then, 1 Sam. 15:22 warns us that the Lord demands our obedience more than what we do for Him
And I believe, the way that we could LISTEN to Him is by reading His word, the Bible because He speaks through His written word. The church pursuing materials are also a good source to avail ourselves to the speaking of the Lord so that we may listen to what He is speaking. Sometimes, the Lord speaks through the brothers and sisters during meetings. So, we can't skip meetings. (Haha... I'm trying to attend the home groups and Lord's Table more frequently).
Anyway, my point is: In the midst of our doing so many things, so-called serving the Lord, do we actually LISTEN to Him? Or do we generate our own ideas and fantasize over them as ways of serving Him? It's scary and abominable to so-called serve Him without knowing what He wants by listening to Him.
Lord, forgive me for my mistake.
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