Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Slaves

We are all slaves. We all submit ourselves to slavery or service to something or someone. We can be slaves of our jobs, our hobbies, our money or sinfulness. But we can also become slaves for Christ. That sounds kind of funny but becoming a willing slave for Christ frees us to live in his love as he is the perfect master who cares lovingly for us, his sheep, his flock.

I have been praying and thinking a lot about this, this week. You see my interview for the diaconate is coming up on Saturday and I have spending extra time in prayer asking God what his will for me is. This reflection time makes me look back at my life, the good and the bad. The times I am proud of and the times I would like to forget. This morning and I read and prayed over the reading from Romans 6:12-18, I saw myself and realize that I have given myself as a slave of Christ and I must now follow him. From Romans:
Brothers and sisters:Sin must not reign over your mortal bodies so that you obey their desires. And do not present the parts of your bodies to sin as weapons for wickedness, but present yourselves to God as raised from the dead to life and the parts of your bodies to God as weapons for righteousness. For sin is not to have any power over you, since you are not under the law but under grace.

What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? Of course not! Do you not know that if you present yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, although you were once slaves of sin, you have become obedient from the heart to the pattern of teaching to which you were entrusted. Freed from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness.
Then we come to the gospel where it talks about servants and how great it will be for the servants whom the master finds ready when he comes. I realize that I must always be ready. That I cannot give myself over to sinful ways and not be ready for the time when God calls me to himself and to his service. I pray that I will be ready for whatever God is calling me to and to help align myself with His Holy will.

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