Preached by Apostle Aje Pelser
Harvester Reformational Church, Cape Town
1Pe 2:11 Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul,
1Pe 2:12 having your conduct honourable among the Gentiles, that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by your good works which they observe, glorify God in the day of visitation.
1Pe 2:13 Therefore submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, whether to the king as supreme,
1Pe 2:14 or to governors, as to those who are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of those who do good.
1Pe 2:15 For this is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men—
1Pe 2:16 as free, yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice, but as bondservants of God.
1Pe 2:17 Honour all people. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honour the king.
Qualifications of God’s Bondmen
1. God’s Bondmen are loved by God
2. God’s Bondmen are pilgrims of faith. Holy aliens in the world settled down alongside a pagan, unsaved people – passing through like pilgrims.
Heb 11:13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off were assured of them, embraced them and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
Heb 11:14 For those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland.
3. God’s Bondmen practise abstinence. Abstinence from the cravings of the flesh. Fleshly lusts that carry on a military campaign against your soul. To break down your mind, will and emotions is the strategy of the enemy through the flesh. But build up a stronghold of faith.
4. God’s Bondmen display beautiful good works.
The world you do are so beautiful that people will constantly, carefully and attentively watch your life and glorify God. It speaks about the day of visitation – for the world they do not perceive that God’s presence is availed to them now and they wait for the visitation of the Lord. When God manifests from within you, they experience it like their first visitation or manifest presence of God and proof of His existence. Up till that point your life is the only Bible they read. God is setting us in this world like living scrolls.
2Co 3:2 You are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read by all men;
2Co 3:3 clearly you are an epistle of Christ, ministered by us, written not with ink but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh, that is, of the heart.
5. God’s Bondmen display an Attitude of Submission
Submission on every level of life is the for the sake of the Lord. We submit t to every ordinance of man, the king and governors so that can silence the ignorance of men who are unreflecting, unintelligent in truth.
6. God’s Bondmen are free but they have taken away their license to sin, not using their freedom as a cloak for vice.
7. God’s Bondmen are honourable.
They honour and love the brotherhood, fear God and honour the king. We are the holding force in society preventing the final judgment of this earth. When we leave this planet like aliens that have a set time to write out the principles of God through our lives like a organized collection of books, then they will have to answer for their stubborn rejection of His love and statutes, clearly evident through our characteristic lifestyles that reflect another realm of existence.
The Good news is that God is giving the world time to repent.
2Pe 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
2Pe 3:10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up.
2Pe 3:11 Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,
2Pe 3:12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat?
2Pe 3:13 Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
These 7 qualifications make us bondservants of God, or Bondmen that the world will never quite understand, but they are watching constantly so allow His Spirit to develop your life to the level that you can affect change in the hearts of people towards a God they might never meet. If it weren’t for your life as a bondservant of God, they might never know how beautiful life can be … as a Bondman!
Photo by Aneta Ivanova