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What Goes Around

What Goes Around

Words of Faith 11-22-19

Dr. Jeffrey D. Hoy © 2019

Jeff.Hoy@faithfellowshipweb.com

Faith Fellowship Church - Melbourne, FL

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Colossians 3-4:1

     [25] Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.  [4:1] Masters, provide your slaves with what is right and fair, because you know that you also have a Master in heaven.

 

     We are familiar with the saying— “What goes around comes around."  The way that one treats people is eventually the way that person will be treated.  Paul was very clear in his exhortation concerning slave-master relationships that what goes around comes around. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.

      Treating people badly in a relationship of power is especially reprehensible.  All relationships are entrusted to us for a purpose—especially one in which there is authority, power, or responsibility of direction over another human being.  Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.  There is no special excuse afforded by wealth or social status. 

      Paul wrote a similar truth to the Galatians— Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life (6:7-8).  When people are entrusted to us, we have a special responsibility to sow only the things that please the Spirit, and that will reap eternal life.    

      Don’t misunderstand. We are saved by grace.  Yet God is very clear that we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad (2 Cor. 5:10). There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil (Romans 2:9).

     This is why Paul especially urged “masters” to treat slaves as those under their care.  Provide your slaves with what is right and fair— “give deliberate care”—because you know that you also have a Master in heaven (4:1). Do not threaten them, since you know that he who is both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him (Ephesians 6:9)

      Of course, such instruction was revolutionary in a society where slavery provided almost all labor.  But the same is true today of employers and other persons in authority. We are all responsible to the Lord, our Master in heaven, who treats us fairly.

       If employers today manifested this kind of compassionate and impartial care for their employees, motivation to work would radically improve. But far more critical are the matters of eternal significance—sowing the Spirit into people entrusted to us unto eternal life.  It causes us to ask: How do you treat the people “under you”? 

       Of course, this is a powerful question for those who manage and employ others.  But what about those who do not?  Perhaps you don’t directly manage anyone.  But there are many times when a brief relationship is entrusted to us.  When you sit in a restaurant, and a table server comes to wait on you. How do you treat that person?  How do you treat the person who rings your groceries or handles your transaction at a bank?  What about the convenience store clerk who rings your coffee? 

       How do you treat the relationships entrusted to you no matter how brief?  Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.  Provide for those who serve you what is right and fair, because you know that you have a Master in heaven. 

 

      Lord God, open my eyes to those around me.  Especially open my eyes to those I direct or manage.  Help me to see the ways that I might sow life and light into those people and relationships.  Open my eyes to the power of blessing, even in encounters that are very brief.  Make me a faithful steward of those moments.  In Jesus' Name. 

 

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The Words of Faith devotion is published five days a week by E-mail, and our website, and our church app, excluding Federal holidays. Please feel free to forward this devotion to a friend who might be blessed by this devotion. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture is quoted from the New International Version (R) of The Holy Bible. Copyright (c) 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Words of Faith (c) 1997, 2010 Jeffrey D. Hoy. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to forward this copyrighted material or use portions of it with appropriate notation of the source for non-profit purposes.  

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