In Debt

Those words are some that scare me to death. Debt is one thing that causes great stress in many people’s lives today. It is proving more difficult each year to come out of college without having a mound of debt from student loans. I do not know many people who can buy a car or house without going into debt, but these are some needed things by many to function in this life.

The Bible speaks a great deal about debt. Many times there is the idea or thought of how to reduce or even eliminate debt in our lives. Proverbs 22:7 reminds us that the borrower is slave to the lender. As followers of Jesus, we are to be slave to no one except our Savior.

Today, I read something about another viewpoint of debt. It came from Reading Romans with John Stott. In this particular devotion, Stott was looking at Romans 1:14-15. He writes this…

Paul’s words “I am obligated” should properly be translated “I am a debtor.” There are two possible ways of getting into debt. The first is to borrow money from someone; the second is to be given money for someone by a third party. If a friend of yours had given me money to give to you, I would be in your debt until I handed it over. Your friend had put me in your debt.

It is in this second sense that Paul is in debt. He has not borrowed anything from the Romans which he must repay. Rather, Jesus Christ has entrusted him with the gospel for them. It is Jesus Christ who has made Paul a debtor by committing the gospel to his trust.

Paul was in debt to the Romans. As apostle to the Gentiles he was particularly in debt to the Gentile world. It was because of his sense of debt to them that he could write: “That is why I am so eager to preach the gospel also to you who are at Rome.”

I had always been told that debt is bad and something that we should work to get out of at all costs. Debt is something that we should work to be free from. Not all debt is a bad thing though. Not all debt comes to us because we have made bad choices. It might be because we’ve made the best choice.

I love this example of debt as being one that holds and delivers for a third party. Just as Paul had been indebted to share the gospel with Gentiles, so we have been indebted to share the gospel with those around us. The only way to get out of this debt is to share the gospel with those around us. It is in these moments that both those we share with and we ourselves can find freedom from debt.

Let’s be faithful to remove debt in our lives!