The Servant's Wage

Bondservants, obey your earthly masters with fear and trembling, with a sincere heart, as you would Christ, not by the way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ.
EPHESIANS 6:5-6
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The Servant's Wage
A servant, for example, who works and neither sees nor thinks any farther than this: My master gives me my wages and that's why I serve him; otherwise I have no regard for him. He does not have a pure heart or intention, for he works only to obtain a bit of bread. When this ceases his service also ceases. But if he were good and a Christian, this is what he would say: I'm not going to work because my master pays me or does not pay me, or because he is good or bad; but rather because the Word of God is there and it tells me: Servants, be obedient to your masters, as to Christ [Ephesians 6:5]. Then it issues of itself from the heart, which has laid hold on the Word and esteems it, and he says: All right, I will serve my master and take my wages, but the chief reason why I do so will be that in this way I shall be serving my dear God and Lord Christ, who has commanded me to do this and I know that this is well pleasing to Him. There you see a true work performed out of a pure heart.

From Sermon on the Sum of the Christian Life (Luther's Works 51:270-71)
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