"For now, am I trusting man, or God? Or am I seeking to be pleasing man? If still I was pleasing man, I was not ever Christ’s bondslave.’
-Paul just called down a curse of destruction from Heaven on the ones who are distorting the Good News, on those who are spreading false teaching about how to be saved. Obviously to do this is not a very conciliatory thing to say. He’s not playing nice, to put it mildly. It’s not politically correct. It’s not very tolerant, in fact not at all. Imagine how a modern audience might react to such a statement - they would boo Paul out of the building for being so deplorable, so mean and critical, so hateful and bigoted and intolerant. Which is exactly why Paul at this point points out precisely where his loyalties lie. An audience of One. He’s not playing to the crowd. He’s not trying to curry favor with the man (or woman) next to him. He’s striving to please the One Who owns him, Who bought him with blood, Who died for him and Who reigns on high, King of the universe. Paul seriously cares very little if anything for how his words may be off-putting to anyone else.
-Because the truth is, Paul is a slave, a doulos. Generally speaking, this person was owned by another, but not against their will. They wanted this. They freely chose this of their own accord. They deliberately volunteered to bind themselves to this one who is now their owner/master. Their life now is no longer theirs. Their time is not their own. They live for the master. They do what he wants, what he commands, and they have no greater aspiriation than to make their master happy, to hear him (or her) say, well done. They get up in the morning and get down on their knees and ask, what is thy bidding, my master? The one who has thus freely surrendered control of their life to Jesus Christ has a higher allegiance, a higher motivation, a higher obligation to do all things to please this Master in heaven (2Corinthians 5.9; Ephesians 5.10; Colossians 1.10; 1Thessalonians 2.4, 4.1; 2Timothy 2.4; 1John 3.22) - and this idea appears over and over again in Paul’s writings. So it matters not what others might think about what Paul does, or what he says. He wants what his Master wants. And thus Paul has strong words for anyone who may be deviating from devotion to Christ, much more so for those who are disrespecting and distorting the Master’s Message about His Son and are leading others astray. Only a few things are necessary - really only one... (Luke 10.39-42). #AO1 - Audience of One.
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