clouded epiphanies
My morning Bilbe study yesterday included 1Peter, 2:18-23. You know, on submission to authority: "Servants, be submissive to your masters..." I thought @ it all day, & something kept bugging me. I finally realized that it's Matthew, 6:24: "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one & Love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one & despise the other..."
Assuming one works for other than a Godly "master", how shall these passages be reconciled? If, to act in good faith as a functionary of an employer, one must act willfully against his conscience, is he not caught between The Rock & a hard place? To be faithful to the teachings of Christ, he must follow his conscience. But what's that twinge of guilt he feels for not having acted in his employer's best interest? This same employer we are taught by Peter to serve "with goodwill doing service, as unto the Lord..." (Ephesians, 6:7).
I know it seems a pedantic objection; it is easily reconciled, in theory. But in practice, it is something altogether different. Well, okay. Not altogether, but different, nonetheless. The simplest &, I would think, the 1st answer would be that the man should not be working for said employer, if he can not in good conscience carry out his duties in that capacity. But what about 1Timothy, 5:8? "But if anyone does not provide for his own, & especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith & is worse than an unbeliever." But to that, one might say, "...do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?" (Matthew, 6:25&26).
Anyone got any input?
Assuming one works for other than a Godly "master", how shall these passages be reconciled? If, to act in good faith as a functionary of an employer, one must act willfully against his conscience, is he not caught between The Rock & a hard place? To be faithful to the teachings of Christ, he must follow his conscience. But what's that twinge of guilt he feels for not having acted in his employer's best interest? This same employer we are taught by Peter to serve "with goodwill doing service, as unto the Lord..." (Ephesians, 6:7).
I know it seems a pedantic objection; it is easily reconciled, in theory. But in practice, it is something altogether different. Well, okay. Not altogether, but different, nonetheless. The simplest &, I would think, the 1st answer would be that the man should not be working for said employer, if he can not in good conscience carry out his duties in that capacity. But what about 1Timothy, 5:8? "But if anyone does not provide for his own, & especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith & is worse than an unbeliever." But to that, one might say, "...do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, for they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?" (Matthew, 6:25&26).
Anyone got any input?
posted by starbuck at 01:40
8 Comments:
first, that last passage speaks solely for the one; not for his family. but when ishmael and his mother were banished from abraham's household and left to die in the wilderness, it was the child's cries that God heard and responded to.
second, "man is slave to whatever has mastered him" - sorry, i've lost the reference on that one.
context . . .
these are good passages and certainly seem to pose a quandry when taken collectively, but i think each needs to be considered in context. you have taken them out of the context in which they were given. i think Biblical parables and stories are intended to teach or offer a lesson in two manners. first, the lesson is given to help us know how to deal with the specific type of situation that is part of the story. second, it gives us general guidance on how to live our lives. so, while i think it is good to compare the seemingly contradictory guidance, i think it is also important to keep each in the context in which it was offered.
context . . . it's a funny thing. over the centuries, people have made ridiculous claims and used Bible passages to support their radical thoughts. however, in every case that comes to mind, the passages were taken out of context. when taken in context, they represented a completely different perspective.
as to serving more than one Master - i think the first verse you mentioned is referring to employers, but the second is referring to serving more than one God. too bad they both used the Master term. i would have to reread the verses (in context) to really say for sure, but that's what i believe was intended.
good blog topic :-)
you're right, scoupe, but that only reinforces the verse. peter tells a man not to worry for his own provision, & GOD shows us that he will take care of a man's children, if he is unable or (as abraham was) unwilling.
as for being a slave to what masters you, that's more @ addiction, i think.
the 1st verse is technically regarding how slaves ought to behave toward their "owners", but i think that can easily be extended to an employee/employer relationship.
the 2nd verse is @ the love of money. Christ tells us that we cannot serve mammon (money) & GOD equally. He's basically saying that seeking your own wealth is not compatible w/ a GODLY life. But, in reading His parables, teachings, & especially His answers to the pharisees & saducees, Jesus always seems to answer the situational question w/ a broader, more universally applicable truth. I don't think you can really ever take His teachings out of context. & actually, the verse practically stands on it's own, in both the books of matthew & luke.
but take, for example, the context of this verse:
"Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 'Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don't wash their hands before they eat!'...
to which He replied:
"What goes into a man's mouth does not make him 'unclean,' but what comes out of his mouth, that is what makes him 'unclean.'"
(matthew, 15:1,2,11)
Christ answers a very specific question w/ a much broader statement. it's His genius in framing answers that keeps the Bible so applicable to us today.
maybe i'm just restating what you've already said. what i mean to say is that i don't find the verses contradictory @ all. quite the opposite. a man is to serve GOD in whatever capacity he is able. if that means shining shoes as best you can, then those shiny shoes will be pleasing to GOD; if it means staying home to raise GODLY children, then your labor is "as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God."
the problem, in my hypothetical, comes when a man is put (or, more likely, has put himself) in a position where he's obligated to do something against his own conscience. he should obviously not do it, right? but then there's the part of his conscience which will tell him he's refusing to do the job he's paid for. he's now got an angel on each shoulder.
the 1st angel argues that he shouldn't have a job that pay's him to act against his conscience. angel #2 retorts that he has a duty to provide for his family, so he must keep the job, so he must do it (that is, act against his conscience) as unto the Lord.
this is obviously a ludicrous conclusion. what, then, have i missed? does it not come down to acting in good conscience vs. acting in good conscience? doing the right thing, by providing for one's family vs. doing the right thing by refusing to do the wrong thing?
well, ifyou lokk at the greek used in those verses, you will find that two different words are being translated as "master" and each comes from a different root word.
matt 6:24 - 'kuriôs' - (from 'kurôs', meaning "supremacy")
-'supreme in authority' as a 'controller' and can be used for God, Lord, master, sir.
I peter 2:18 - dêspôtes - (from the combination of 'dêô'[to bind] and 'pôsis' [husband])
-'absolute ruler; despot' and can be used for Lord, master.
they can be used for the some of the same terms but also contain inherent connotative differences by their derivations.
then again, when "there was no king in israel, every man did that which was right in his own eyes" (judges 17:5, 21:25).
we have a conscience for a reason. its purpose is to help us to discern the right thing to do when we have no clear direction.
I'd have to agree with your dad in the importance of context. Christ's teaching can AND have been taken out of context in order to twist them to the interpreter's preference. It's also true that commandments (these or any others) can clash at certain times in practice. The answer, I think, comes not from one particular Bible segment (althought the Word of God is fundamental and irreplaceable in any discernment process) but from the discernment one makes in the presence of God. I think the Gospel did not mean to lay it out neatly for us. It tells us stories of people like us that made choices, some wrong, some right. The difference was when they could see themselves in the light of love, or in the light of their misery or hatred (Peter and Judas are perhaps the best example: both traitors, one repented, one despaired). We have to keep meditating the Gospel so it progresively shed its light upon our hearts... the more we do that, the more our discernment will be faith-guided. It doesn't mean it will always be right, and it certainly doesn't mean it will always be easy. But it will be done as a sincere search for God's will. I'd say that's pretty good, at least for me.
i don't know this eduardo guy, but i'm really starting to like him :-)
but seriously, thanks eduardo. i've read many of your posts and enjoyed them immensely.
on this particular subject, your explanation is both elequent and insightful. thanks.
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