A Brief Introduction to Slave by John MacArthur

Slave by John MacArthur (2010) is one of those books that every Christian should own and read.  Personally, I find it a game changer, like Radical from David Platt.  Yes, Radical in my opinion is more important but Slave is right up there.  Outside of the Bible, I would say that all of Francis Chan’s books are extremely valuable followed closely by Radical and Slave. 

What is Slave about?

John MacArthur shows that the Greek word Doulos means slave and that almost all of our English translations have mistranslated the word into servant (HCSB gets it right), because there are at least a half dozen Greek words that mean servant and could have been used by the authors of the New Testament.[1]  Therefore, Slave contains thirteen chapters and one appendix that covers what is means to be a slave to Christ.  He does so by showing the differences of first century Greco-Roman slavery to the evil Western society’s slavery of the colonial era.[2]  MacArthur also includes the Old Testament views of slavery.  Furthermore, Slave does not read like some scholarly theology text book, instead it is reads at a personable level that all can enjoy and appreciate.

Why is Slave so good?

MacArthur does not just go through his own biblical exegesis on the issue by demonstrating what other Church Fathers and famous leaders believed about it.[3]  But more importantly the book goes through a large portion of the passages where Doulos is found and displays how the term slave gives much more theological importance to the meaning and context of the passage over servant.  Additionally, MacArthur gives a fair and solid analysis of the Free Grace Movement and demonstrates his biblical views on the Lordship of Jesus Christ.[4]

An Area for Improvement

The only area for improvement that I would have liked to see in Slave is a scripture index.  Almost every page has a footnote and a large majority of those footnotes are of passages in the Bible.  As someone who likes to reference and look up passages a scripture index would have been beneficial.

Concluding Thoughts

Instead of going on and on about how great this book is, I will close by exhorting all to go and read it for themselves.  I guarantee all that if we take the Bible passages that talk about being a slave to Christ serious and understand the original context of the Greco-Roman slavery our walk with the Lord will improve and we will all have fuller deeper lives!

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[1] MacArthur, Slave, 16.

[2] See pages 17-38.

[3] See the appendix for snippets of famous Church Fathers and Leaders like Spurgeon and Jim Elliot.

[4] 73-75 and 134-136.