also spiritual implications. It’s about who you serve.
So let me ask you, who really controls you and your church? If you think it is you, you are in for a surprise.
Often people of faith point out that you cannot serve two masters. They also point out that we should give nobody control over our bodies, lives, or minds, for they belong to God; so much so that we are to renew our minds daily.
It is this idea of control that should send a shiver down your spine.
When Rome oversaw Judea, the Jewish king, Harod, was allowed to retain his authority within the Jewish land and law. We could easily make the case that Rome allowed this because it is easier to control people who believe they are free than it is to control people who are aware of their own captivity. Regardless of the reason, for a major portion of the Roman occupation, the Jewish people were largely “free”—free to engage in commerce, free to worship how they wished, free to have their own homes, free to pray to the One True God.
This of course changed to varying degrees after two events. The first event was the death of Harod, when his kingdom was divided among his three sons. The second event was the death, burial, resurrection, and ministry of Yeshua.
If we were to go back in time just before these two events and ask a rabbi who or what controlled the growth and effectiveness of his congregation, he would say, “God.”
Likewise, we in the Western world assume that our churches, temples, synagogues, and lives are under the control of God. Ultimately, that is true, as He is divine and sovereign. However, we need to have a more mature look at this. If your child were in a class and didn’t like math, she could say that because God is in control of her schooling and her life, if God wanted her to learn math He would give her that desire, make her homework easier, and so on. Does God control her class? Ultimately, yes. However, her teacher controls the class on a daily and directional basis, and we hope that God is in the teacher’s heart. You would tell your daughter to listen to her teacher, do the work her teacher tells her to do, and listen to her teacher when it comes to manners in the classroom, would you not? Of course you would.
When Adam ate of the forbidden fruit, the keys to the Kingdom were given over to HaSatan (Satan), who had since been called the “god of this earth” and the “prince of the air.” Even though God is sovereign, He allows consequences for our actions, be they natural consequences, such as driving drunk could lead to death, or spiritual consequences, like the Adversary influencing people, governments, and economies. If you hand over control of your mind to the media, for instance, you have to deal with those consequences, regardless of how long you have been a believer. You have allowed the media to be your god. I could go on and on—porn, sports, alcohol, and so forth—there are hundreds of idols and gods to which we hand control of our lives. So consider, who controls you, your family, and your church?
Are You Calling the Shots?
It would be easy (wrong, but easy) to assume that you have control over yourself. What if I were to tell you that your boss actually controls your life, and your family’s life, and that your boss—along with the bosses of your church’s congregational members—actually control the life of your church?
Don’t believe me?
The decisions you make in life are in relation to the wages your boss pays you. Your wages limit your options.
What determines the house you live in? Your boss. What determines which school your kids attend? Your boss. What determines where you go on vacation? Your boss. What determines which clothes you purchase? Your boss. What determines the number of missionaries you can support? Your boss. What determines how much you can give? Your boss. What determines the quality of food you can purchase? Your boss. What determines the number of days you can take off to go on your mission trip? Your boss.
The examples goes on and on. Your entire life and ability to make an impact is determined by your employer. The same holds true in the lives of those with whom you attend church. I understand the tendency to be prideful and stubborn at this point, as realizing this fact is hard for many to take. Sadly, we again say this is God’s doing—but, in 99 percent of the cases, it is not.
Since the issue is so sensitive, let me state again that money is not the most important thing. Our gross misunderstanding of how to use it places us in a position where others have more control over our lives than we do or than God does. Yes, we could make the argument that even entrepreneurs are affected by the economy. That’s partly true, but devoid of the complete picture.
When you are an entrepreneur, you have the freedom and ability to shift with a changing economy, realizing that the “bad” times can actually be the most advantageous times. For example, if you owned a business in 1903 making horse-drawn carriages, you could decide to start working with a manufacturer of those newfangled internal combustion engines to start making horseless carriages, later to be known as automobiles. However, if you are an employee at a carriage maker and your boss decides not to change with the times, then your paycheck is going to end. It will have nothing to do with your work ethic or abilities; you simply had no control over your employer’s decision to stay in carriage production. This same lack of control on your end holds true if your employer does decide to change with the times and starts making motorized carriages, but also decides to let you go and hire what they call a mechanic instead, who seems to be more suited to working on the new technology. Again, your income and everything affected by it was 100 percent in the control of your boss and 0 percent in your control.
Are you going to tell me God wants most of us to be voluntarily under the control of others? Sorry, but you need to sell blasphemous craziness somewhere else.
The Bible mentions four types of people: masters, laborers, servants, and slaves.
Masters and slaves are pretty easy to understand. A master is an entrepreneur, and with the blessing and guidance of Elohim, expands not only his business but also his ability to impact the areas of life that really matter to him and the One he serves.
Slaves, on the other hand, were considered property. In Biblical times slavery came about through war and people owing debt, and civil law commanded the owners to release their slaves after six years. They were never to be acquired from someone kidnapping and selling them—that was a crime punishable by death. It happened, though. Men, women, and children wrongly belonged to other men and were often treated as little more than livestock and had no option of freedom.
What about servants and laborers, though?
Laborers in the Bible are treated as independent contractors, a form of self-employment. If I am a laborer or independent contractor, and you are a farmer and you want your crops picked, you and I agree on a wage for the job. I complete the job, you pay me, and I move on. We negotiate the wage, hours, and terms. If you like the service I provide, you may want to hire me again, so it is in my benefit to do well. My future is in my hands, and if I want to learn new skills, I can make myself more desirable to those who may wish to secure my services. With a proper understanding of sound economic practices, I can even work my way up to master status. I have the ability to work hard, take time off, even relocate if I so desire.
Then there are the servants. They’re not quite slaves, as they get wages and certain amount of liberty, yet they are not laborers either, as they have a set and limited form of earning, set hours, limited living conditions, and futures largely in the hands of their masters. Typically a servant in Biblical times would wear an article of clothing representing the master that he or she served. Today we call that a uniform or name tag. There was no end to the work. Unlike a laborer, who was paid and then free to move on to other pursuits when a task (e.g., rolling up fishing nets) was complete, when a servant was done with one task, he or she would
