Living In Slavery

Living in Slavery

Hebrew Women In Egypt

Read: Exodus 1:11-14

When the Egyptians grew alarmed over how numerous the Israelites had become, they forced the Israelites into slavery. The rulers appointed brutal slave drivers to wear them down by forcing them to make bricks, build cities, and work in the fields. How the hearts of the women ached as they were enslaved by ruthless masters that treated them and their loved ones cruelly. As they watched their children growing up, did they dare to hope in a future that held something better for them than this bitter life of slavery?

We tend to think of slavery as something from the distant past, but the abhorrent practice still thrives today. An article on the National Geographic Web site estimates that twenty-seven million men, women, and children around the world are enslaved today—“physically confined or restrained and forced to work, or controlled through violence, or in some way treated as property.” Modern slavery takes several different forms and affects all ages and races. Often people become trapped in bonded labor after being tricked into a debt that they can never repay. These circumstances can be handed down from one generation to the next.

In a spiritual sense, every person is born into slavery. The Bible teaches that anyone who sins is a slave of sin. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the Garden of Eden, sin enslaved the world until Jesus was crucified. Now we have a choice either to live in slavery to sin or to walk away free. When we identify with Jesus’ death and resurrection, we can be released from sin’s hold on us. Sin is a brutal slave driver, but thanks to God’s mercy, we can have a better life.

Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave of sin.”

John 8:34