This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.
Lesson 11: “Practicing Supreme Loyalty to Christ”
COLLEEN TINKER
Problems with this lesson:
- The biggest problem with this lesson is the underlying Adventist worldview that doesn’t understand that the new birth is a completely NEW creation.
- Then lesson approaches the issue of masters and slaves, parents and children, as the subject of moral lessons instead of living in a new reality.
This week’s lesson addresses the passage in Ephesians where Paul admonishes fathers not to provoke their children to anger and tells masters to treat their slaves as standing on an equal footing before the Lord. The lesson, however, expounds on proper behavior: it explains why harsh treatment of a person in authority over a person in service or subjection is harmful. Ultimately, the lesson encourages parents and masters to treat those under their authority with common respect.
While the advice is not “wrong”, the underlying reality that makes this passage powerful and revolutionary is the new birth.
When a person trusts in Jesus and His finished work, recognizing one’s own sinfulness and need of a Savior, he passes at that moment from death to life (Jn. 5:24) and does not come into judgment. This new birth, this passage out of darkness into LIFE is a change of kingdom (Col. 1:13).
Paul is not instructing the Ephesians how to behave in a more enlightened, civilized manner, recognizing fellow Christians as sharing a membership in a club of sorts, but he is explaining how to live as completely new creations.
It has long bothered people that Paul didn’t denounce slavery when he wrote these passages. In reality, Paul wrote something far more powerful: he explained how the new creation that we become when we believe changes our existence in every situation.
The resurrection life of Jesus which brings our dead spirits to life when we believe is different from the dead-in-sin life unbelievers still have. When we are made alive, we are transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of the Beloved Son (Col. 1:13). Our lives are then hidden with Christ in God (Col. 3:3), and we are literally different people than before.
This new birth makes us equal before God and in the reality of our existence with every other believer. If a believing master has a believing slave, they are literally, in New Testament terms, brothers in Christ. They share His eternal life, and they share equally in His blood. Moreover, they are both equally adopted by the Father and are equally co-heirs with Christ (Rom. 8:14–17).
This new life is tangible and real, and believers know when they are born again. They recognize the Holy Spirit in each other, and they are bonded with more than a moral constraint to be nice to each other. They are literally family. They are equally parts of the body of Christ.
This new reality makes masters spiritually equal to their slaves (or servants or employees), and they are obligated to treat each other with the care and respect of family. First Corinthians 12 and Romans 12 explain that believers are like body parts of Christ’s body, that when one member of the body suffers, the entire body suffers. A born-again slave or a born-again master understands this truth; their placement in Christ’s body and their obligation to one another as equally Christ’s overshadows their social assignments.
Parents and children, likewise, are brothers and sisters in Christ if both believe.
If a master or a servant does not believe but the other one does, the believer is still obligated to treat the unbeliever with the same respect. The believer ultimately does not serve other people primarily but serves the Lord. Our service to the Lord is the fruit of our trust and our life in Him. As believers, our treatment of those in authority over us or in submission to us is to reflect our submission to Christ.
The lesson explained from a social perspective that Paul was outlining new behaviors for Christians, but it failed to explain that these behaviors are NOT modifications we do because it is correct. Rather, the modifications we make in our behavior are the outflow of the life of Jesus in us.
The more we trust Him and believe His word, the more our treatment of others will reflect His compassion and mercy, His justice and protection.
The lesson does not explain its summary statement, “With the believers in Ephesus in the first century, we have the privilege and responsibility of applying the values of the gospel to our relationships.”
Within Adventism, these words just indicate good ideas, desired objectives. They never explain to their Adventist readers what it means to “apply the values of the gospel”. What is the Adventist gospel, after all?
The real gospel, however, that the Lord Jesus took our imputed sin into His own body on the cross, that He endured the wrath of God for it, that He died and was buried and rose again on the third day—breaking the curse of death because His sacrifice was sufficient for ALL humanity—this gospel is never defined within Adventism as the whole gospel!
Adventists use right words to talk about these things, but as long as they deny the nature of man—that we have literal immaterial spirits which can separate from our bodies and which are born dead in sin—they cannot understand the gospel.
We are born dead in sin and need—not improved behavior—but LIFE from death! When we understand that because of Jesus we can have eternal life and literally pass from death to life when we believe, our responsibilities to our bosses, our employees, our children, and our parents suddenly look different. We are not obligated merely to treat them respectfully; we are obligated to treat them as if our interactions are directed toward Jesus Himself.
It is hard to remember, when we are confronted with difficult people, that our obligation is to Jesus. This fact is what Paul is teaching. When we see that it is just Jesus we honor, our honor and respect and love for these “imbalanced” relationships change because in Christ, we are all on an equal footing.
In Christ we are siblings, adopted by the Father and alive with Jesus’ resurrection life. We care for one another as we care for ourselves when we see that we are inseparable because of Jesus. †
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