In April 2018, Operation Libertad rescued nearly 350 victims of human trafficking in the Caribbean and Latin America. Some victims worked in spaces no bigger than coffins. Some were forced to work as prostitutes near remote gold mines. Others were stripped of their passports and savings and forced into total dependence. Essentially, they were slaves. But tragically, some of those victims wouldn’t acknowledge it. Slavery was a price they were willing to pay for the faint hope of a better life. 

At one time, we were slaves too. Our taskmaster was Satan. Our work was to roll in sin like pigs in mud. Our severance package was death. Sounds horrible, doesn’t it? And yet, left to ourselves, we would never admit or realize we were being exploited. We would choose to stay in Satan’s employ, prostituting ourselves to sin with hell as our final destination.

But God wouldn’t allow it. He planned a coordinated raid on our hearts. He sent a specialist, Christ, to disarm the devil and break sin’s shackles . . . and to give us a new master. “But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:22,23).

When we were slaves of Satan, death was our due. As servants of God, we are made holy and given the gift of eternal life. 

Who’s your master?