Ephesians 6:9

And ye masters, do the same things unto them, and forbear threatening: knowing that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no respect of persons with him.

This is the oracle of God that turned the world upside down. All obligations involving human beings are a two-way street. Slaves have duties, but so also, do their masters! What an earthshaking concept that was, and IS! Toward their slaves, masters were commanded: "Give them the same good will, love and loyalty that you hope to receive from them."[14] Behind a commandment like this lay the infinite dimensions of those tremendous new value judgments which were brought to mankind from above by Jesus Christ the Lord. The infinite value of human life! Who ever heard of such a thing? It had never been heard of until the apostles of Christ preached it in the heathen darkness, having themselves received it of the Lord. The mighty corpus of the ancient empire trembled under the impact of a shot like this verse which Paul launched from the end of a prisoner's chain; and when a shaft of light such as this penetrated the darkness, people knew instinctively that a new age had dawned.

However, it should be noted that it was not the truth alone which could change the world; it was the truth in Christ the Lord! The duty of masters to their slaves, fathers to their children and husbands to their wives, etc., was not just splendid theory. The living Christ at the right hand of God would require of every man an accounting of his deeds at the judgment of the Great Day. No man would escape it!

Shallow and unperceptive persons of our own times tend to be critical of New Testament teaching because no hard, definitive commands are uttered demanding the abolition of slavery; but it was clear to Christ and the apostles that laws never made people better; only an inward change could accomplish such a purpose as that. Paul's instructions here did not free slaves; but, as Dummelow said, "It freed slavery of its evils,"[15] and set in motion forces that would ultimately destroy, not only slavery, but other evil institutions as well.

In this connection, the resurgence of humanism in these times should be noted. Turning away from God, people are obsessed with the notion that, in themselves, they can make everything all right, with their laws, social gains and planned programs of all kinds; but it is no more possible to accomplish worthwhile human societies away from God than it is to produce a crop of apples from uprooted trees. "The New Testament presents the demands of the kingdom of God as prior to those of a utopian society on this earth ... Love of God is still the first and great commandment, love of neighbor second. Worshipping and serving the creature more than the Creator, however, drowned the pre-Christian world in debaucheries; and, if indulged, it will do it again!"[16]

[14] Francis W. Beare, op. cit., p. 735.

[15] J. R. Dummelow, op. cit., p. 966.

[16] Theodore O. Wedel, The Interpreter's Bible, Vol. X (New York: Abingdon Press, 1953), p. 733.