Word Study of Slave in Scripture
Philippians 1:1-2 ESV
Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers[b] and deacons:[c]
2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Doulos – slave, bondman, devoted to another to the disregard of one’s own interest.
Deo – Root word meaning to bind or tie, to be bound, to throw in chains
Sermon by John MacArthur titled “Servant or Slave” 2010
In 16th century the first English Bibles were being put together. The Geneva Bible was being translated and it was decided the stigma of slave was too strong, 800 times in the Older Testament and 150 times in the New Testament the word for slave is used and almost always it is translated to English as something other than slave, usually Bondservant or Servant. The word slave may be used when referring to slaves of sin or slaves of righteousness but never as slave when referring to Christians. In all those instances its the same word as the others, Doulos
John 15:12-15
12 “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.
The slave/master relationship in the apostles lives.
Paul:
Philippians 1:1, Romans 1:1, Titus1:1
James 1:1
Jude 1 & 4
Example in Scripture of the Christian viewed as a slave
1 Corinthians 6:19-20
19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body
Matthew 6:24
“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
Galatians 1:10
For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ.
Deuteronomy 15:12-18
12 “If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman, is sold to you, he shall serve you six years, and in the seventh year you shall let him go free from you.13 And when you let him go free from you, you shall not let him go empty-handed. 14 You shall furnish him liberally out of your flock, out of your threshing floor, and out of your winepress. As the Lord your God has blessed you, you shall give to him. 15 You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you; therefore I command you this today. 16 But if he says to you, ‘I will not go out from you,’ because he loves you and your household, since he is well-off with you,17 then you shall take an awl, and put it through his ear into the door, and he shall be your slave forever. And to your female slave you shall do the same.
Philippians 2:6-10
6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.