From Servant to Friend

John 15:15

¹⁵ I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me.

We all have jobs, and not all the time are we presented with the reasons we do what we do. We often sit and do our jobs without knowing the real reason behind them. Teenagers get cranky when they do math or science in school because they ask the question, “Why are we doing this? I will never use this in real life.” We’ve all been there. Toddlers get especially angry when they cannot do what they want, and we, as guardians, must redirect or correct their behavior.

Jesus is speaking here to His disciples, or in modern lingo, Christians who follow Him. I’ve heard people say that they are servants of Christ. This is all good, but if you read the verse above, it is not the proper term we should use. The translation is “slave” in the verse above. I’ve also seen it translated as “servant.” That might work better for modern ears.

Servants don’t always get to know the reason behind why they are doing things. Remember the introduction about teenagers and math, just do the work and stop asking questions. Jesus is defining the ones who follow Him. He calls them “friends,” not servants or slaves, but friends. Last time I checked, your friends are the ones you do life with. You tell each other what is going on in your life. You cry together, laugh together, love together, and even hurt together. You could never do this being a servant. When was the last time you spent quality time with your lawn guy? Not picking on lawn guys, but the point is that friends get to know the behind-the-curtain details of why you are doing what you’re doing.

Jesus is calling us friends, not servants who get the orders we must obey and stay quiet, but friends. Jesus says He will reveal His plans to His friends, the ones who follow Him. It gets better, Jesus says that He will make known to us “all” the things that He has heard from the Father. Can you see? Your friend, the one you spend a lot of time with and tell everything to, is Jesus. He is not a dictator or some god on Mount Olympus dictating what we are to do, but a friend.

Today, stop viewing the Lord as a dictator or someone who rules your life. Instead, view Him as a friend, the kind you tell everything to and want to spend time with. The Israelites spent over 400 years as slaves in Egypt before Moses led them out by the hand of God. We are all born in Egypt, slaves to sin with no end in sight. When you accept Jesus as your Savior, you walk out of your Egypt as a free person, free of the sting of sin and the never-ending slave mentality. You get a Savior who will be with you and who calls you “friend.”

Which Jesus do you know?

Prayer: Father, help us to know You as friend. You gave us Your Holy Spirit to be our Helper. I pray that I listen to and want to spend time with the Holy Spirit. I pray that my sinful, slave mentality gets rewritten to one that calls You a friend. Father, help us understand You as friend. In Jesus’ name, amen.