I invite you to turn tonight in the Bible to Exodus chapter 21, as we continue our study in the book of Exodus, Exodus chapter 21. We enter a section of Exodus now of civil laws and things that we might find somewhat challenging, but we should be reminded that we also live in a day where governments and our government is constantly giving laws and setting new laws and changing laws. And notice that when a government oversteps its bounds, that confusion is brought. To give you a brief illustration, I have a pastor friend who was flying out, flew out east this last week, and he was coming back for an ordination service. he was coming back and he had taken a late flight into the night and it had a layover there, I think it was in Chicago or somewhere, and he had to use the restroom. So he went into the restroom and he looked around and there were women in the restroom and he thought to himself, look at what this has already become in our country. I mean, even in the airports it's going this way. So he walked out and he turned around and realized he had been in the women's restroom. And the irony was, I pointed out to him, you realize that then everyone there thought you were the transgender person, but it was just a pastor in the URC, so it must have been okay. Tonight, I want you to see how wonderful the law of the Lord is. We're in the theocracy here, we're studying the theocracy, but I want you to see how God's law never did this kind of stuff. God's law brought clarity. God's law made things clear for people. God's law was the supreme demonstration of justice and what is just in the value of human life and the dignity of life which we don't see today in any way. In the institution of slavery, in what's happened to children in the womb. Look what happens in society and now as we come together value what God has given to teach us about His ways and what we can learn from studying these laws in the old covenant there's a lot we can. Exodus chapter 21 we'll look tonight at the first 11 verses. Now these are the rules that you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave he shall serve six years and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he comes in single he shall go out single. He comes in married then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I will not go out free, then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an owl and he shall be a slave forever. When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she shall not go out as the male slaves do. If she does not please her master who has designated her for himself, then he shall let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people since he has broken faith with her. If he designates her for his son, he shall deal with her as with a daughter he takes another wife to himself he shall not diminish her food her clothing or her marital rights and if he does not do these three things for her she shall go out for nothing without payment of money may the lord bless tonight the hearing of his word i was uh sitting with somebody last week and they um they asked me so what are you what are preaching sunday and i said well i'm going to preach old testament laws on slavery and the person kind of paused and looked up and says you know that's what keeps people away from christianity this is why in the world would you guys be gathering together to study old testament case laws and things on slavery i mean do you believe in that what in the world is the benefit tonight is this going to have for us as a people of god why are we going through these kind of things i have to give this kind of qualification tonight and justification for what we're doing because this is the kind of stuff that people open up the old testament and when anybody wants to attack christianity i can assure you there are a few places they're going to go and tonight would be one of them. I mean, you heard me read, if a man sells his daughter and all of you recoil a little bit, what in the world? This stuff can be hard to get through and we kind of leave it for the lawyer types, right, who like to read this stuff. I would actually suggest that we could learn way more from this tonight than we ever realize about the gospel, about what the Lord has done for us, about what he's teaching us. And you say, you're kidding, right? What could I learn about the gospel from a whole series of verses here on slavery? Well, I hope by the end of the sermon to have convinced you and shown you that there's a lot here that is showing us the gospel, the Christian gospel as we understand it. And even more basic too, to what we see here, we see and we learn a lot about the character of God. We learn a lot about his attributes. We learn a lot about his goodness. We learn a lot about his justice. We learn a lot about his desire that equity and people made in his image be treated with respect and honor. He cares a lot about these things. What we're studying tonight really is what is known as the book of the covenant. In fact, in chapter 24, we read that Moses took the book of the covenant and he read it in the hearing of the people. They would have got these laws handed to them and read to them of course uh all of them and had to put into practice what was being commanded here in the civil codes that we now are about to study they were civil codes and laws for israel functioning as a nation a theocratic nation under the government and the rule of god and you'll notice that there's a break there that's why i took last time that that section there dealing with ceremonial certain ceremonial aspects of the law and the moral law was the kind of test and then in verse 1 of chapter 21 it begins with uh you'll notice there the statement these are the rules that you shall set before them we have a break here and something now that he is emphasizing to govern the nation of israel to bring them under rule they were unruly people and last time we studied this test with the ceremony on moral but now before us are these civil laws that governed Israel as a people as a nation and I have to say these are not what we are directly under today but certainly there are moral principles and things that reflect the righteous character of God and we learn a lot from them we take that from them and we apply it in that way the benefit of studying these laws is that we see what god is like to his people and we have a good understanding too of justice and can anticipate one day when we enter the land that there will be no more anything that offends in the land we're going to learn a lot doing this god cares about people made in his image he certainly does and how people interact with one another and how people treat one another and god is then deeply caring about how we live as his people what we do as his people god loves justice he's a just god equity among neighbors well tonight as we open up this first section it's not by coincidence or not by chance that we're dealing with as we begin this set of rules we deal with the issue of slavery if you were to ask me well pastor what is your main point tonight and working to come up with that tonight i want to do something very simple and it is to show you how god regulated the practice of slavery and i'm going to qualify all this regulated the practice of slavery in the old testament in such a way old covenant that it would be used and always would be a purpose to teach israel about deliverance that the institution and what we're going to study about slavery would be regulated and used to teach these people about deliverance an opportunity then further to love their neighbor that's what we're going to see so this was to be that kind of opportunity as we open up exodus chapter 21 tonight and we come across all these laws on slavery it begins with this this great subject of slavery and i want you to remember how the decalogue the 10 words the 10 commandments began began i am the lord your god who brought you out of the land of egypt out of the house of slavery everyone in israel had a good understanding of what forced servitude was that didn't need to be explained they got it they understood it involuntary slavery it was awful if you need to know what it looked like just go back to exodus chapter one and you remember that that cruel pharaoh who no longer knew joseph what he did to the people of israel he beat them he put them under heavy burdens and heavy toil under the sun it was oppressive and you have this in exodus 2 then the children of israel groaned because of the bondage and they cried out and their cry came up to god because of the bondage and the lord said i have surely seen the oppression of my people who are in egypt and i have heard their cry because of their taskmasters for i know their sorrows so i have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the egyptians that cruel oppressive hand of slavery so cruel so hard they had loathed the egyptians and that wicked tyrant pharaoh would even cast their babies remember in exodus 1 and 2 into the nile river this is the kind of stuff we think of when we hear the word slavery don't we we immediately think of things in history like the european slave trade movement or what took place here uh in our country in the time of country where um you remember africans were brought here on ships and there was involuntary forced uh slavery away from families mothers and children ripped apart from each other separated from families put in the homes of of cruel masters there was forced submission that's what we think of when we think of slavery that's what comes to my mind when i think of slavery not so different than than the kind of forced servitude in many respects that we saw in exodus 1 the forced slavery much of that was common in the things that we know about slavery well here we come tonight to the book of the covenant and what is the first thing that god addresses it's this issue but it's different than what you think when you think of slavery many christians especially of a post-millennial and sort of reconstructive theonomic bent and emphasis has have advanced sort of openly statements like the bible doesn't condemn slavery and i hear that said and i i somewhat recoil i i get a little nervous when i hear that because it's easy to read the bible anachronistically it's evil easy to do certain things to the bible meaning that we set alongside of each other practices our practices our things that we're familiar with alongside of uh and in order with the cultural practices of other times and in other cultures and we end up what we do is read things back into the bible as we understand them which does have a particular culture and a place understood in the times in which they live some of the things that went on in biblical times we are very uncomfortable with it's a different time and place but i want everyone to answer this question tonight so that we understand what god is doing here i want everyone to look over at verse 16 of chapter 21 which i'm not really engaging tonight too much but so that you have this in front of you i'm going to put it out the whole idea that anyone would ever say that forced servitude or man stealing or putting someone in bondage against his will the bible expressly spoke against You'll notice that in verse 16. Whoever steals a man and sells him, and anyone found in possession of him shall surely be put to death. So God never put up with that. God never accepted that. It unequivocally, without doubt, condemns man stealing, involuntary slavery. It's been mentioned from the pulpit, and Dr. Godfrey mentioned it a few weeks ago, the problem of human trafficking. And I have felt that same way of how nonchalant and careless that issue is just presented in our day. And the shocking, staggering statistic that 12,000 people were trafficked and sold last year in San Diego. I mean, that's just unreal to think about. This kind of stuff, selling of human beings with wicked masters, as we would think about it, forcing people into servitude, had they lived in Israel, in the theocracy, they would have been put to death. God didn't approve of that. God did not approve of that. And so here he raises the issue of what they understood to be slavery. And notice what he does. It would be unthinkable for Israel who knew the practice and what they had experienced in Egypt to now do that to their own people. It would be unthinkable for them to act that way to their own people now. Since God had come down and freed them, since God had heard their cries from that kind of brutal institution such a wicked and cruel tyrant who drowned their babies in the nile for them to do the same thing to their own brethren would demonstrate no understanding of grace and gospel would it it would fit the whole parable of the unforgiving servant who was forgiven a great debt and then went out and found someone who had a lesser debt and grabbed him by the throat demanding payment so the lord takes what was evil and wrong and he does something that is really remarkable in the theocracy what is it well he did something that would constantly display their separateness in the earth i love this the wisdom of god is so beautifully shown here i hope you see it tonight and appreciate how good your lord is how did he want slavery handled well he begins in verse one with man servants you'll notice there that he says right at the beginning when you buy a hebrew slave he shall serve six years and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing keep in mind there's not forced slavery it's not what this is he shall serve six years go out free and then pay nothing what you have described are those who willingly put themselves up for hiring and became the property of the master in a way it's similar to the job interview today that only once you agreed that you would become a slave you would then become the property and you would work for six years you'll notice that there but what was the system designed to fix that's the question leviticus 25 says this if one of your brethren becomes poor and falls into poverty among you then you shall help him like a stranger or sojourner that he may live with you there were generally two reasons this happened in the society of israel if people were caught stealing or the poor among them it helped to solve the problem of the poor who could not feed themselves or families who got in great debt or people who just had problems or people who were irresponsible and people who stole there were no government bailouts you couldn't walk down and get unemployment god i'm driving down the other day and i see a guy on the side of the road and he has a big sign see if you can hit me with a quarter that one really bothers me you know i always feel incredibly guilty when i see that i would feel bad if i hit him in the head with a quarter but i mean i would feel incredibly guilty and my first response is probably like some of your first response is go get a job now easy for me to say i guess when we look at what god's doing here he had a system of rehabilitation for the poor he had a way to get them back on their feet the best thing they could do is put themselves up in this way the lord gave a way for people like this to have fresh starts there's something so powerful in that isn't there six years they would work the goal was to help the down and the out of their communities to become productive and responsible citizens in the kingdom i remember um speaking with a farmer in my home area of the central valley and i asked him how things were a long time ago and he said well we have the hardest time getting workers the only honest ones we're finding are those who come from over the border and this is what do you mean we can't really hire the youth of america they don't work hard everything's been given to them and all those who have been here a generation if they've been americanized they've learned to live off the government so so it's better for them so ironically they they pull up in in nice cars and with iphones and they just don't work the attitude's terrible they've developed a terrible attitude they're lazy and so what's happened in our society is that we've had parents and government create uh what we are living in is the entitlement age i mean that's just what we have that's our young person today. They don't really want to have to work for anything or at least work hard. And people coming over from Mexico who have never had handouts and have never had it like we have it, their work ethics are just unbelievable. I mean, you watch people pick a field. Many are so thankful just to have a job and just to have money. And here's the remarkable thing the farmer told me. Do you know what they do with their money? They ship it all back to Mexico to help their families. We've created this great nanny state and our government has promoted something that is just awful. And you see how things go awry. You see how things fall apart. I want you to notice God's law here in the theocracy. God cared about the down and outs. My attitude to the down and outs has not been good. But how did He care about the down and outs? six years of work. Now you say, well, what was the goal? Here's what I love about this. In the law itself, remember what it said in the fourth commandment. Honor the Sabbath day and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your male servants or your female servants that what they may rest as well as you he was concerned about slaves why look at his concern in the fourth why did he root it in the fourth why would he root that concern of servants in the fourth commandment well the sabbath principle was at work they would come under a master for six years they would be a slave but it was never designed to be permanent now think of the message in this i'll get there upon the seventh year he would be freed and pay nothing so the masters had to rest on the seventh day every seventh day remembering what that they were slaves in the land of egypt and the slaves had to rest anticipating their rest to come the whole system was designed to teach israel the gospel the rest anticipated we know was a rest that anticipated entering christ they were in bondage they were poor they were afflicted they were the lowly of the earth they were the scum on the side of the road they were the ones in egypt treated this way and god opened a door to them god came down pulled them out put him in his house gave them rest fed them cared for them loved them and built a house for them and so this taught them to look a little differently at the down and outs didn't it that they had a real goal to help the down and outs to the rest that they enjoy I love that I love that that is Christianity when we have been redeemed and we understand the call to love our neighbor here you go the goal was not servitude the goal was sabbath the whole practice was to tell the story of the bible over and over and over again in their homes i mean awesome think about this here's your kids around the table and you've brought in a down and out and this person's going to work for you and then be free talk about a home life illustration right in front of you so the whole thing was designed to teach them the gospel all time over and over of their own deliverance and the master was required to be a kind master to treat them with equity to treat them with love once the six years was over the master didn't say out of here the master didn't do that what happened god gave a command here's what i want you to do masters to your servants i want you to load them up i want you to give him all kinds of food and blessing why well how about this deuteronomy 15 if your brother a hebrew man or a hebrew woman is sold to you and serves you six years then in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you and when you send him away from you you shall not let him go away empty-handed you shall supply him liberally from your flock from your threshing floor from your wine press from what the Lord your God has blessed you with you shall give to them you sure it is you shall remember you were a slave in the land of Egypt and the Lord your God redeemed you therefore I command you this thing today see it again I did this when you came out of Egypt I gave you everything I loaded you up your wagons were full I gave you all kinds of blessing guess what you get to go do now not build your barns bigger you'll notice in verse seven he gives laws concerning maidservants look at verse seven if uh if a man when a man sells his daughter as a slave he shall not go out as male slaves do if she does not please her master who has designated her for himself then he shall let her be redeemed he shall have no right to sell her to a foreign people since he has broken faith with her i could keep going imagine reading that in the public square today by the way just verse seven when a man sells his daughter as a slave everyone would stop and say that's your god that's your god i want you to listen to what the intention was think of a poor man in society he has no way for his daughters to make it what is what is a poor man's concern if he's a good man for his children his daughter well you don't know home life and family life but fathers bore a big burden on this and want the best for their daughters he it was um in this particular case a provision that god gave to better his children's life How so? A poor man knows a good man in Israel. Respectable, kind. He would send his daughter to him with the goal that she would become a permanent part of the household. A servant in the household. In other words, like an arranged marriage, fathers were involved in the marriage of their daughters. The daughter would enter the home, become a slave, become a servant with the hope that she would marry one of the master's sons. So the Lord, in summary, is providing a lot of care for women here. Notice the detail. See how he values his image bearer. What would be every father's nightmare in this system? And we know what every father's nightmare would be when it's involuntary slavery and a woman is sold. Well, he gave his daughter to a man who ultimately might not be a good man. Who might abuse her. who might sell her to a foreign people, trade her, treat her with cruelty, God shuts it down. Uh-uh. Verse 8, if she doesn't please the master, notice that there in verse 8, if she doesn't please who's designated her, he shall let her be redeemed. Ruth, Boaz, let her be redeemed. He shall have no right to sell her. And here's the thing. If he designates her for his sons, he shall deal with her adoption as a daughter. She is permanent. Every right as a daughter. And if he takes another wife, the son, he shall not diminish her food, clothing, marital rights. And if nothing, if he won't do this, she gets to go out. She's free. It's just remarkable when you understand what God is doing here. All I want you to see in this is God is training them from the beginning in what a gospel response should look like. Now the goodness of God jumps off the pages here. God brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. That's now to have a profound effect in how you treat one another in hoping and leading them to their freedom. You were once a slave. You were in bondage and Christ delivered you by a strong arm and now liberally lead my weak sheep in the community to this understanding. liberally lead my weak sheep my down and outs in the community to this understanding that you have is it a bad question to say well what in the world does that have to do with us today living in 2016 yeah everything won't this affect in the house how husbands love their wives as christ loved the church won't it mean a lot for parents training children not to provoke them to wrath to hate them but to show love to them remembering the purpose is to lead them to rest shouldn't it affect christian employers who treat their workers well not as commodities not as soulless bodies who are just making money for them but that they would care about the down and out to work for them to lead them to rest and pray for them i'll be honest some of the worst things that i've seen are in the christian world is how christians have treated their employees farmers i worked on a farm once i was appalled by how the mexicans were treated they're the mexicans i was absolutely appalled to support the mansions next door while four or five a night slept on a bunk on the property. That's not right. That is not right. Do the masters of the house know the Gospel? If the master of the house knows the Gospel, you're going to love your servants. Paul said, servants, be obedient to your masters, but masters, do the same things to them. Give up threatening, knowing that your own master also is in heaven and there's no partiality with him. Don't threaten. Nurture, love. There's a goal to all of this. There's something here that's even stronger tonight. I want you to look back at verse 5. He describes a slave who would work for six years, and then he was set free. And then notice in verse 2. you'll notice there that he shall go out free the seventh year. In verse 5, if the servant plainly says, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I'm not going to go out free then. What does the master do? Master brings him to God. And he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an owl, and he shall be his slave forever. what a scene after six years it's been so good in the house oh it's been great in the house man this has just been why would i go anywhere i don't want to leave you he's brought to the elders and plainly says i want he's brought to god then he would be brought to the master's door post and they would take a large sharp object object and they would jam it through the ear into the doorpost. There would be blood on the doorpost and the servant, his ear would be opened in an oath ceremony. It's the one time earrings are okay for men, by the way. He wanted to live forever with his master. I love the master. I don't want to leave the master. He's a kind master. He's a master that cares for me. He's a master that loves. He's a master that provides for me. He cares for my whole house. Why would I ever leave this? I'm going to close, but I want you to turn with me one place tonight. It's John 8. John 8. Jesus is standing before the leaders of Israel, and I want you to notice in John 8 what he says in verse 32. Listen to this. actually just back up so 31 so jesus said to the jews who believed him if you abide in my word you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth and the truth will set you free they answered and said to him we are offspring of abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone how is it you say we'll become free jesus answered now now follow me here for a minute we've never been slaves yes yes you have oh yes you are you're slaves most assuredly i say to you whoever commits sin is a slave to sin you're slaves to sin you're in a house that should be for your rehabilitation i can set you free by the gospel but you won't come now look carefully verse 35 the slave does not remain in the house forever but a son does a slave does not remain in the house forever but a son does he's right in Exodus 21 a son abides forever in the house a slave went into the house with the goal of receiving what? rest in that house he finds it remember the one provision that if he loved his master, he would never want to leave that house because he found wrath? What was Jesus saying? I'm the master of the house. You hate me, he said to the Jews. And you show you're a slave to sin. You show you're not free. But here's the truth that sets someone free when they know me, when they know what kind of master I am, When they understand me, when they believe me, they enter the rest. That's promised a slave. And a true son never wants to leave that house. That's the Gospel. Isn't it so beautiful? Be careful you don't miss the slavery problem. The real slavery problem. You want to say to people today, be careful in all your fighting of the earthly slavery problem that you don't miss the real slavery problem everyone's a slave in this life either of sin leading to death or righteousness leading to life i'm the master of the house says jesus how you relate to me tells me whether you're free or not how do you relate to jesus that'll tell you whether you're free or not in other words are you the prodigal saying i went out of the house or are you the prodigal saying i gotta get back to the house he's so good why would i ever want to be out of that house he loves me he cares for me he's a good master when that happened they went and they dug open his ear so these people walk around israel with their ears open psalm 40 picks that up sacrifice and offering you did not desire but you dug open my ears you dug them open and that should have a little bit of meaning to you when Jesus said blessed are your ears for they hear you know who your master is and you know where you found life I close with this Phil Riken tells the story of Abraham Lincoln who was appalled to see the buying and selling of human beings I quote his heart was especially drawn to a young woman on the block whose story seemed to be told in her eyes she looked with hatred and contempt on everyone around her She had been used and abused all her life, and this time was but one more cruel humiliation. The bidding began, and Lincoln offered a bid. As other amounts were bid, he counterbid with larger amounts until he won. When he paid the auctioneer the money and took the title, the young woman, he stared at him with vicious content. She asked him what he was going to do next with her. He said, I'm going to set you free. Free, she asked. Free for what? Just free, Lincoln answered. Completely free. Free to do what I want to do? Yes, he said. Free to do whatever you want to do? Free to say whatever I want to say? Yes. Free to say whatever you want to say? Free to go wherever I want to go? She added with skepticism. Lincoln answered, you're free to go anywhere you want to go. Then I'm going with you. She said with a smile. All of us are intensely bitter until we're free. And that's what this section has taught us. God, all the way back in Exodus 21, was teaching Israel, there was a way to be free. If you don't think the gospel is in the Old Testament, you've missed it. Through the Son. And now, you want to live in the house as a son with joy and with peace, knowing everything's provided for you. That should affect everything you do now as a free son. Remembering that you were once slaves in the land of Egypt, that the Lord your God has set you free, you're going to know your freedom by your desire to be in the house. And you're going to know it by your desire now that all the down and outs of the society would come to know the same freedom, the same rest that you do. A son abides in the house forever. Amen. Let's pray. Gracious Heavenly Father, what a wonderful section of Scripture. We have to confess that we are so shallow. We've read these laws almost with contempt in the Old Testament. And throughout them, you have so much to say. We're just barely skimming the surface. We just need ears to hear. We need to understand freedom. We need to understand your gospel, your love for us. Thank you for revealing it tonight. May we be overjoyed to be a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ who became a servant for us so that we might live. Thank you for the gospel and thank you for instructing us in it tonight. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.