SLAVEDRIVERS

Have you ever thought about how your life may be controlled by “slavedrivers”?

When God’s people were slaves in Egypt, their lives were controlled by their taskmasters. They cried out to God and He responded like this; “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slavedrivers and I am concerned about their suffering. So, I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land….” Exodus 3:7, 8.

God sent Moses to rescue His people because He had heard their cry and seen their suffering; however, they came out of Egypt with their slave mentality still intact. All they had known was the dehumanising cruelty of their Egyptian masters. They had been treated like machines, only valuable because they made bricks. Their dignity had been assaulted by their slavedrivers who thought they had the right to take their wives, their property and even their lives with no recourse to justice. And so, in their immaturity, God’s people were treating each other as they had been treated.

God called them into an intimate relationship with Himself at Mount Sinai and, through His Word, began to teach them how to live in freedom from fear, guilt, and shame and how to care for one another and to treat one another with dignity and humanity.

Many of us have never lived in literal slavery although some have. Worse than the misery caused by people who oppress us is the misery that the Evil One subjects us to because of the internal ”slavedrivers” that hurt us. Emotions like guilt, fear, anger, jealousy, envy, and coveting keep us captive to the people who ensnare us. What about addictions like gambling, alcohol, drugs, food, sex, cigarettes and pornography? We think that we can get free whenever we want to, but we know in our hearts that we are enslaved.

The apostle Paul said, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.” (Galatians 5:1, NIV). Jesus bought our freedom at a great price. He still hears the cries of those who are oppressed by slavedrivers. How can we be set free? The children of Israel cried to God. The first step to freedom is to acknowledge that you are in bondage and to cry to God. Just as He heard His people long ago, He will hear you. It takes humility and courage to be honest about what is driving you, but it’s a small price to pay for freedom.

Jesus claimed Isaiah’s prophecy as a picture of Himself. “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners. He gives beauty for ashes….” (Isaiah 61:1, 3, NIV)

The second step is to forgive…forgive all who have ever hurt of demeaned you. Addictions are pain-managing ways to mask your pain. Forgiveness is the only way to free yourself from those who ”own” you by your anger, resentment, and hatred. When you cancel the debt of those who hurt you because Jesus has cancelled your debt and theirs, freedom is the prize.