Parashat Mishpatim and Slavery

This parsha begins with the laws of slaves. How fitting, seeing as Bnei Yisrael were just let out of Mitzrayim after being slaves.

Slavery could be that one is a slave to a master, doing work for him.
But, it could also be another way:

In life, we are given the opportunity to gain wealth and accumulate possessions. But what we do with these possessions is the important part. You can either use them for good, or use them for bad - as is the case with everything in life.

Either you can be the 'master' over these things, or you can be their 'slave'.
As is the case with most of the world, unfortunately, people are slaves to their possessions. When you focus on your belongings more than your avodat HaShem(service to Hashem), there is a problem there!

HaShem gives us these things not so we can focus our entire lives on them, but so we can use them for a higher purpose, to further our avodat HaShem! We have money so we can give tzedakah. We have a house so we can put up a mezuzah, and so we can do the mitzvah of hachnasat orchim! We are given a parnassah(income) so we can use that money to provide for our families, so we can raise our children in the best way possible and so we can do our mitzvot in the best way possible.

We are not given all these things to compete with our neighbor over who has the best car or who has the most money. You want to have a great car so you can use it to go out and do mitzvot? You want to use it to drive people around because they don't have one or you want to use it to deliver tzedakah and food to the needy? Fine, that's wonderful; you're using your belongings in a positive way!

But it's when you lose sight of your avodat HaShem and replace it with a focus on your possessions that is when you become a slave to the world.

In reality, the world is not our master, HaShem is. So the only 'thing' we can be slaves to is HaShem - We must serve HaShem always, not the world and our possessions