Anybody watching?

Ephesians 6:5-8 NLT

Slaves, obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ. Try to please them all the time, not just when they are watching you. As slaves of Christ, do the will of God with all your heart. Work with enthusiasm, as though you were working for the Lord rather than for people. Remember that the Lord will reward each one of us for the good we do, whether we are slaves or free.

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Are you willing to think of yourself as a slave of Christ?
We like to think of God as our Father or Jesus as our brother. It is comforting to think of Jesus rescuing us or sending us power through the Holy Spirit.
But here Paul says compare your your slave master to Jesus. Think of yourself as a slave of Christ. And that in context here means thinking of your slave master's wishes as if they were Jesus' good pleasure. Further this isn't just a head game. We are to feel it. It is to be our attitude with sincerity. And still yet we are to try and please our slave masters with enthusiasm while they are not watching as if they were watching. We are to try and please them. And we are to do this as if the slave master was in fact Christ incarnate.

I'm not going to tell you there is a straight line between this slave master and your employer. I am going to tell you to consider for a moment that your attitude about work whether for a slave master or and employer should be so redeemed so that it is nothing like the attitudes of this world. It is not clever to slide by. It is not right to despise the people over you. Our hearts have to change to the point that we see Jesus when we see the person over us.

Being under someone, or under the burden of responsibility should point is to Jesus.

So much, is written about the husband and wife,  or the child and father submission portions of this passage. But in the end we are to act like Jesus. We are to see those over us and under us as Jesus.

Do you find yourself in authority over someone? Then sacrifice yourself to take care of them. (read the whole chapter to better understand.)

But far more of us will find we are under others.
Look at the people over you cheerfully and with enthusiasm, think of what they'd want you to do and then do that, as if it were Jesus asking you to do it.

There isn't some kind of escape clause. There is no way to soft soap this. The bottom line is submit. Submit to others. Submit cheerfully, with enthusiasm, and as if you were submitting directly to Jesus.
Leaders serve the needs of those under you sacrificially. Just as Jesus did.

Can Jesus save your attitude about service and submission? Can you let Jesus redeem your heart to the point that you willingly, cheerfully serve?