Principles to Live By

Introduction

You know I like sports. I like the competition; the battle between teams or individuals that results in a victor. I like the twists and turns that alter the outcome or add variety of imperfection to the event. I like the sheer athletic grace of the participant who has worked, trained, and practiced to engage in the event making it look so easy when I know it is so difficult. I like the feeling of following a team and vicariously joining in with the excitement of win. For those who do not care for sports nor find much pleasure in the event, I suppose it would be analogous to a good HGTV show in which a dump of a house is transformed into a beautiful cottage that delights the homeowner with years of service. Somehow those two things do not seem to be the same.

While I like sports, I do not understand the legalities of professional sports. The athletes rightfully have options that they didn’t have only a few decades ago. Follow sports very long and you begin to hear the words of a player being traded, or the athlete’s contract being bought out, or free agency. You will even hear about the owner of the franchise who buys the services of an athlete. No one believes for a moment that the franchise owner enslaves the athlete. The athlete is being paid for their work. We can discuss things such as collective bargaining, pay limits for athletes, reverse clauses, arbitration, free agency, and antitrust law and it will be a short discussion. For all the legal terms are lost on me because I like the game without necessarily understanding the “behind-the-scenes” laws that support and allow the game to be played.

I am suggesting to you that Exodus 21–23 is a time when God allows us to pull back the curtain and see some of the elements that will allow his people to live in relative security. These laws may seem to be unfair. We may even fail to understand the reasoning behind some of these laws. But as we study God’s word today, remember that He was setting up laws that would allow a people who to reveal his glory while being able to learn how they were to treat each other. God reveals his love and compassion in these laws.

Laws about Servants

Through 21st century eyes, we read these first 11 verses of Exodus 21 and think that God is endorsing slavery. He isn’t. Remember this new nation had come out of slavery. This new nation had never existed without slavery. So as free people, they would not have wanted to enslave. But God in his foreknowledge knew something would happen. There would come a time when a person was so destitute that he/she needed to find a way to survive. Look at verse 1. Who is the servant? An adult, Hebrew. Who does the owner pay for the servant? Let me suggest to you that we do not have slavery here. Notice in verse 2, that the slave is free to go after six years of work. There is a time limit to this person’s service. Notice in verse 8, the owner is not allowed to sell the person to a foreigner at all. There is no permission to engage in human trafficking. In fact in Deuteronomy 24:7, anyone who does engage in human trafficking is to be put to death.

God’s laws in these verses surround a particular situation. In the event that a fellow Hebrew was so destitute, he would not steal but instead he would sell himself and his services for six years. During those six years, he would be fed, clothed, cared for, treated with dignity, and paid. If he were not, then the one who bought his services would have to compensate him. We see this arrangement in Genesis 29 when Jacob works 14 years for Rachel. His “payment” came at the end of 7 years but he worked another 7 years to fulfill the contract. God is setting boundaries so that a person who needs financial help can with dignity offer his services and then be compensated for his work so that he can resume life without going back into poverty.

If during his service, the owner provided a wife for him from his own household, then the wife and subsequent children still belonged to the owner. This hardly seems fair. Again our 21st century view gets in the way. In those days, all marriages were arranged marriages. A man and woman did not meet, fall in love, and find someone to conduct a ceremony. Instead, a marriage was arranged and a “bride price” was given for the woman. Again, this makes it sound as if the woman is a piece of property but far from it. The groom’s family understood that through this marriage the woman’s family would lose the benefit of the woman’s work and productivity. She was invaluable to the family she was leaving. Thus, the groom’s family would compensate the bride’s family for lost production. The same thing is happening here.

The owner who gives a woman to be married to servant needs to be compensated. Leviticus 25 has additional laws that it is possible for the man to redeem the woman and the children; that is, to pay the bride price or the man can become a permanent resident with the owner thus he exchanges his freedom for working for the owner for life as compensation. But you might say this still cheapens a woman. She is being treated like property. No. She is being protected. Do you think a woman could just go find a job somewhere in those days?

Verse 7, the woman has been sold to the owner by her father. In this case, the suggestion is that there is an implied promise of marriage. She will marry the owner or the owner’s son. If things do not work out, the owner cannot sell her to foreigners to rid himself of one who does not please him, instead (vs. 8) he must allow the family to redeem her. If she has been selected for his son (vs. 9), then the owner is to treat her like a daughter and not a servant. If the son (vs. 10), decides to marry a second wife, then his first wife must still be cared for fully including sexual rights. If that doesn’t happen, then she is free to leave without compensation for the owner.

The rest of this chapter deals with various situations that may arise. These laws deal with personal injuries. What is to be done in the event that someone is killed, maimed, or if an animal is hurt in someway. Different scenarios are imagined and then outcome is given. Two things to note: First in 21:22, these laws are to be carried out in a legal system. Courts are involved. In most of these disputes, the one who had been damaged would take the one who had inflicted the pain to court. The court would follow the law and determine a just compensation for the loss. In some cases the outcome was already determined and the courts would simply acknowledge the outcome. All of this was to limit the compensation (vs. 23).

Second, there is no prison system. A person who killed another with malicious intent forfeited his life. The person who cursed his parents forfeited his life. The person who stole had to repay the full amount of the cost of the stolen item and additional compensation was required. Steal an animal pay 4–5x its cost. And in human terms, mistreat your servant so that the servant loses the ability to function, the servant is free without owing anything further. Personal responsibility for actions received a sentence that reflected compensation for the offended party in full.

So What?

What does all of this mean to us? Two things. First, God’s compassion is seen. God is concerned that his people treat each other well. He is concerned that we think about the other person. These laws are to push us to see situations and people as he sees them. The driving force behind these laws is compassion. Living life has all kinds of scenarios. What if this or that happens? How am I supposed to act if this or that situation arises? We look for specific rules about our conduct. Laws are there to help us in particular situations but the driving force God’s law is his character of compassion. So God states how he wants people to treat those who are under our charge or how to deal with situations in which you borrow a tool and it breaks or you accidentally and unintentionally hurt someone. Your embarrassment and your anger get pushed aside by compassion. You see others the way God does and act accordingly. The eye for an eye section is about compassion. It is to limit the amount of restitution while recognizing that personal responsibility requires an appropriate response to compensate the one who has been harmed.

Second, verse 6 resulted in a song that we periodically sing “Pierce My Ear.” If we read the verse with a jaded sense then we come away thinking this man had no choice. He was married and had children, how else was he going to be able to be with them? That probably says more about our motivation than it does the man. We romanticize the situation. Our Hallmark ears want to see an expression of deep love and commitment. Frankly, the option of going to work hard to have enough money to redeem his wife and children seems far more romantic. But read the verse carefully. This servant loves his master and his wife. Word means a longing for or deep affection. It is used to describe the relationship between husband and wife and the relationship between friends. The servant has a choice. He can leave without penalty while his wife and children remain behind to fulfill their indebtedness. He can walk away and spend years working to compensate the owner for their services. Or he can stay because he loves his master. He can voluntarily express the depth of his freedom by choosing to remain in the employ of his master and working for his family. A permanent arrangement. He will get paid; he and his family will be clothed, sheltered, fed, and loved.

Now the song has its fuller meaning. Pierce my ear, O Lord, my God/Take me to Your door this day. I will serve no other gods, Lord, I’m here to stay. For You have paid the price for me With Your blood You ransomed me. I will serve You eternally, A free man I’ll never be. This is our response to our loving, compassionate God. We choose to stay. We choose to serve. We choose to be free to be in his household.

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