DIVINE: that which pertains to, proceeds from or is of the nature of God.  In Christian circles the word describes the God of the Holy Bible.

SLAVERY: a social system in which human beings are owned as private property.

In Old Testament times God’s chosen people–the Israelites– did not have “slaves” that were bought and sold as commodities to be legally possessed by their purchaser.  Among the Israelites, families members were sometimes placed with a person to whom the head of the family owed money.  The “slave” would work for the calculated amount of time needed to pay off the family’s debt.  At the end of that time period the “slave” was allowed to go free.  Every 50 years came the “Jubilee” at which time all debts were forgiven and those working off debts were freed from their obligations.  In more modern times the practice of paying off debt through labor came to be known as “indentured servanthood.”  The system worked in the same way as did the ancient “slavery” system.

However, such was not the case among some heathen societies whose citizens literally bought and sold human beings as they bough and sold animals.  The enslavement of black people to those outside of their home country began as a world-wide phenomenon in Africa where tribal warfare created a slave system on the local level.  Tribe A would defeat tribe B and take tribe B’s survivors as slaves.  This system resulted in black people enslaving their fellow black people.  Over time black slave owners began selling their black slaves to people of other races.  An international slave system soon developed which brought African slaves into foreign nations where they were sold to slave dealers who then sold them to local people as private property.  Bills of sale were issued as proof that a particular slave legally belonged to a particular owner.

This system was an abomination to the Lord.  In time His modern nations of Israel–England and the United States of America–came to embrace slavery and in so doing brought themselves down spiritually to man’s lowest level until the murder of unborn children became legalized.  In both cases–slavery and abortion–the practices were the brainchildren of  political, commercial and religious liberalism.  Then came the time when clear-minded people demanded freedom for the nation’s slaves.  Liberal slave owners in the southern part of the nation refused to give up what they believed to be their rightful human possessions.  The result was the nation’s most deadly conflict–The American Civil War which eventually brought freedom to African slaves.  England also saw fit to free their slaves.  Modern Israel was once again on sound moral ground.  Then Satan raised his ugly head prompting a political and spiritual war which has been raging since 1973 when women were granted the right to murder their unborn children.  To make matters worse, the killings are taking place with governmental support not only in America, but throughout the world.

Today human slavery is outlawed in both England and the United States.  However, sexual slavery is a multi-billion dollar business in which girls, some as young as 12, are either kidnapped, lured by promises of money, or sold by their parents into a sex-for-hire business that has tenacles stretching throughout the world.  This terrible endeavor is an abomination not only in the eyes of the Almighty, but in the eyes of those whose believe and obey His Rules of Behavior found in His Holy Scriptures.  People who sin are slaves of Satan.  Human trafficing sins are especially egregious in that it utilizes people made in the image and likeness of almighty God.  Which brings us to another type of human slavery–the divine type.

The difference between commercial slavery and Biblical slavery involves the will of the enslaved.  In commercial slavery the subjects were victims of man’s greed and disregard for human life.  Once purchased, the slave belonged to his/her owner as long as he/she lived or until a financial transaction took place which brought about a change of ownership.  Also, the slave was owned only in the physical sense.  One’s spiritual and mental preference was still his/her own.  Also, the slave never became a legal member of his/her owner’s family and did not have the same rights, privileges and possessions as did biological family members.

In Biblical (spiritual) slavery there are no victims in that entrance into the system is totally and strictly voluntary.  One is not forced into the Lord’s spiritual and mental enslavement system against one’s will.  If one voluntarily becomes involved in the Lord’s system and has a change of will, one can exit the system.  Also, in spiritual slavery, every aspect of one’s life is strictly governed.  One’s spiritual and mental wills are owned by the Lord and directed by His Holy Spirit.  And most important, the Lord’s obedient slave becomes His legal child and is awarded all rights, privileges and possessions thereof.

Though the two types of slavery are different in several ways, they are identical in one respect: BOTH SYSTEMS REQUIRE TOTAL SUBMISSION TO THE SLAVE OWNER.  Such a willful submission to the Biblical God is commanded by Him before conversion can be affected.  The true convert willfully submits to God as His slave.  The convert receives the Holy Spirit of God and lives the rest of his/her life.  If conversion then remains through total obedience to one’s Owner, it evolves into spiritual holiness and righteousness, the end result is salvation upon the return of Jesus Christ to earth (Rom. 5:21; 6:22/ Mat. 10:22).  However, those who pledged to be God’s slaves unknowingly are pledging allegiance to the wrong god–“the god of this world”–Satan whose false prophets lead them into his religious system which he has given the title of “Christianity.  Everyone has a god, either the Biblical God or the church god.  Each of these deities has his own rules of participation.  Participants in their church systems are able to remain within their respective systems or to leave.  Within  the Biblical system, one has the Biblical God’s rules written and available in one unified Book.  Within the devil’s system the various sets of rules are subject to the will of the individual.  In his system, the individual becomes the rule maker for his/her private life.  Then those of the same mind-set join together, codify a singular set of rules called church doctrine and live according to those rules.  The insidious aspect of Satan’s system is that it is believed by his parishioners to be the Biblical God’s system of prescribed behavior.  Due to Satan-enforced Biblical ignorance they never come to know the Truths put forth by the Biblical God.  As a result they are “ever learning but never coming to the knowledge of the Truth” (2 Tim. 3:7).  Truth is whatever the group (denomination, sect, cult, order, faith, etc.) determines truth to be.  Forced avoidance of the Biblical God’s “fine print,” which comprises most of the Holy Bible, guarantees that Satan’s converts never come to know God’s Truth.

God’s slaves do the opposite.  They follow His command to “Study to show yourself approved of God” (2 Tim. 2:15).  Their counterparts in Satan’s church are instructed to study only those Scriptural “headline” passages that, when spun, interpreted and revised, appear to confirm his “truths.”  When confronted with God’s contrary statements, Satan’s converts resort to his church doctrine, citing “human experience” as a reason to reject the Biblical version.

The difference between Biblical slavery and church slavery is as stark as the difference between light and darkness, right and wrong, life and death.  Each individual has a will that is subject to its owner.  One either willfully enslaves oneself to the God of the Holy Scriptures or to the god of this world whose scriptures are embodied in the hundreds of different sets of church doctrines.  It all boils down to one question: WHOSE WORD DO WE TRUST?  Few, Jesus said, would trust His Word while many would trust Satan’s word (Mat. 7:23).  L.J.