I have been conducting this poll for some time now, and I have decided to close it. The results weren’t all that surprising, except for the slave section. This is a surprise to me that it would come in second. The child of God selection was completely expected though. Most “Christians” today believe they are children of God and we are. Don’t misunderstand me, I know this, and accept it. We are children of God, blessed, highly favoured, imputed with the righteousness of Jesus Christ and delivered from damnation.
But we cannot dismiss the reality that the Christian is described as doulos, or slave. We have been bought with a price, we are not our own. Once we have been saved by the sovereign hand of God, we give up our rights, identity and lives and we become His property. We become His slaves. How many times do you remember Paul calling himself a bond servant? The word is slave in the Greek. We are children of God, heirs to a promise, but we are most importantly slaves of Christ Jesus.
I think it’s important that we keep perspectives where they should be. Keeps first things first, and always remember where we have come from and who we are now. Keeping this in line will help us understand our rights and privileges as Christians. It will also keep us from getting puffed up and arrogant thinking we are something greater than we are.
And for the one vote who thinks he is an extension of the godhead, I have one piece of advice: Be afraid, be very afraid…
I think that in our current culture we forget that it is the responsibility of the child to bring honor to the Father and it is not until a child learns to uphold the responsibilities of the family he was born into that he is allowed to walk in the privileges of the family he was born into. A parent who raises his child this way may be accused of treating their child as a “slave.” Respectively, in our culture when we think of a slave we think of cruel slave owners and this is hard to reconcile with our idea of a loving God. I didn’t get a chance to take your survey and honestly I would have had a hard time between picking child or slave. In the end, I believe I would have chosen “child” having already reconciled myself in the role of slave (a response to a deeper understanding of His sovereignty,) “child” is the identity I am trying to learn to walk in at the present moment.
“Be Afraid”…..good stuff!
Nice response, thank you. I like your perspective on this subject…
I had the poll up for over a year and you didn’t get around…?! Yeesh. Oh well, I tried to put another up, but PollDaddy was being difficult.
Take care and thanks for your fresh perspectives.
An extension of the Godhead? More like an extension of the godless.
But we are slaves. Bought, purchased, with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Yet, as the word of God says, we are children of God. We are all God’s creation, but not all are His children.
So polldaddty rejected the poll on prayer? Must be run by muslims.
Take care.