Inductive Study: Philemon

Okay, this is the word of our Lord, Book of Philemon.

Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, to Philemon, our beloved fellow worker, and Apathia and our sister Archippus, our fellow soldier, and the church in your house.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers, because I hear of your love and the faith that you have towards the Lord Jesus and for all the saints.

And I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ.

For I have derived much joy and comfort from your love, my brother, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you.

Accordingly, though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do what is required, yet for love's sake I prefer to appeal to you.

I, Paul, an old man and now a prisoner for Christ Jesus, I appeal to you for my child Anastas, whose father I became in my imprisonment.

Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful to you and me.

I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart.

I would have been glad to keep him with me in order that he might serve me on your behalf during my imprisonment for the gospel, but I preferred to do nothing without your consent, in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion, but by of your own accord.

For this, perhaps, is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever, no longer as a bondservant, but more than a bondservant, as a beloved brother, especially to me, but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord?

So if you consider me your partner, receive him as you would receive me.

If he has wronged you at all or owed you anything, charge that to my account.

I, Paul, write this to you with my own hand.

I will repay it, to say nothing of you owing me even your own self.

Yes, brother, I want some benefit from you in the Lord.

Refresh my heart in Christ.

Confident of your obedience I write to you, knowing that you will do even more than I say.

At the same time, prepare a guest room for me, for I am hoping that through your prayers I will be graciously given to you.

Epaphorus, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, sends greetings to you, and so do Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke, my fellow workers.

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you, it be with your spirit.

I am one of the lay elders here at Redemption Church, and it is my my great privilege again to be speaking to you about the book of Philemon.

Uh let's go ahead and say a quick prayer, and then we can we can get into it.

We got a lot today.

So I hope you brought your game face.

If you need coffee, it's out there because we're getting busy today.

So let me pray.

Uh, Father, thank you so much that we can gather here to look at your word.

Um, I am so excited to see what you have to tell us through the book of Philemon.

Uh, Lord, I pray for everybody here in this room this morning.

Uh, we know we need the help of your spirit to show us, to illuminate our minds what your scriptures mean and what they and we need your spirit's help to apply it to our lives.

So I ask that you do that this morning.

Uh, Father, I'm eager, I am expectant to see uh what you do today, because I I I know your word uh is powerful and it affects change in our lives.

We ask this in your name.

Amen.

All right, quick thing.

If if you haven't grabbed a piece of paper out through that door, I highly recommend it.

Uh that is the book of Philemon, and you will see that I have uh taken out all the headings.

Uh I left the verses in uh because that's convenient uh as we go through it.

But the idea is grab a pen, grab a paper, uh, grab a pen, pencil, and that paper, and we can mark it up because we're applying what we did last week uh when we were learning about how to understand the Bible.

If you don't have that paper, the verses are not going to be up on the uh the board here.

So you're gonna get a little lost without it.

So I definitely recommend it.

So, okay, let's get going.

Uh last week we did a study on how we as Christians can read and understand the Bible, God's Word, uh, so that it can illuminate our minds and set our hearts on fire with God's truth.

And we looked at three ways we could do this.

We could uh go to the slide.

Uh first one is context.

Uh, we looked at how each sentence should be understood uh within a paragraph, how each paragraph needs to be understood within its section, how each section needs to be understood within the context of that particular book, and how that book needs to be understood in the context of the Bible as a whole.

And the big thing with understanding the Bible or that book within the context of the Bible is namely the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

That is the lens through which we interpret the entire Bible.

So events that came before it, we read it through that lens, and the events that came after the death and resurrection of Jesus, we read those events and those books through that lens as well.

And only after context is properly understood could we begin to grasp the author's original intent.

This is the step where we jump where we jump from seeing what is written to asking, why is it being written?

So we're jumping from what to why.

Why does the author say certain things?

Why does the author omit certain things?

The author is writing to us for a very specific purpose, is why.

After we understand the author's original intent, then we can begin to figure out how it applies to us here in the 21st century at Redemption Church.

When figuring out how it applies to us, we always need to be aware, though, uh that there's always three people that we're figuring out when it applies to us.

Who wrote it?

Who was it written to?

Then we can figure out how does it apply to me.

You get in trouble if you put yourself in the place of the author, and you'll get in trouble if you put yourself in the place of the original audience.

So we have some work to do.

We have to understand the author, who it was written to, then we can apply it to ourselves.

So today's sermon, we're gonna do that.

I don't I don't know how it's gonna go.

I've never done this before on a Sunday, but we're gonna figure it out as a church.

It's gonna be great.

We're gonna race through Philemon, and we're gonna be looking and understanding the context of Philemon.

Then we're gonna jump to understanding the author's original intent, Paul and Philemon.

Then we're gonna figure out how it applies to us.

Um you'll you'll notice this sermon is gonna be a little more technical because essentially I'm actually walking you through how I prepare sermons.

And you're gonna see all my homework, right?

Remember in math class when your teacher said uh they wanted you to show work?

I I hated that in math because if I get the answer, I get the answer.

Um, it doesn't matter how I got there.

But they always wanted you to show work because, you know, they wanted to make sure you weren't cheating.

But really, today you're gonna see all my homework.

I I don't like to normally show my homework because it it can, you know, it can be a lot.

I want to give you the answers on Sundays, but today you're gonna see the homework because we're we're learning how do I understand and read God's word.

Okay.

You ready?

All right.

So today we're in Philemon.

For the sake of time, I'm going to help us put it in its context of the Bible.

So we're gonna start big here, rather than starting.

Remember, last week we started at the sentence, then we went to the paragraph, then the section, then the book, then the Bible.

We're starting the opposite way.

We're gonna say, okay, we're reading Philemon.

Where does Philemon fit in the book of the Bible?

Most scholars put the writing of Philemon at around 62 AD, or about 30 years after the death of Jesus.

How do we know this?

Well, Paul mentions in Philemon that he's a prisoner from the book of Acts and Timothy.

We know Paul was a prisoner three times in his ministry, once in Caesarea and in Rome twice.

Uh, his description in Philemon sounds as though he's hopeful that he will be released from prison.

So we can pin this probably during his first imprisonment in Rome.

If you read 2 Timothy, he says he's imprisoned again.

And the way he describes that imprisonment is he is not hopeful he will be released.

So we can put these in probably during his first imprisonment.

Paul wrote to Philemon, who was a member of the Church of Colossae.

How did I figure that out?

Because it doesn't mention it in the book of Philemon.

Well, we can we can gather that this was this letter was delivered to the Church of Colossae along with the book of Colossians.

We know this because in Colossians, Paul writes that Titicus and Onisimus, he's only mentioned two books of the Bible, Colossians and Philemon, will be delivering the letter of Colossians to the Colossians.

And one of the members that is mentioned in the church of Colossae was Archipis.

Well, Archipis is mentioned as a member here of the same church in Philemon.

So it sounds like Onisimus is going to personally deliver this letter to Philemon in the church at Colossae.

What's important to note, and you're gonna, you're gonna, this is, we're gonna have questions about it, but Paul never went to Colossae.

He he did not establish that church.

We gather that in Colossians when Paul mentions that Epaphras, who is his partner in the gospel, started the church in Colossae.

But Paul knows the members of Colossae very well.

Obviously, he knows Epaphras the founder, but you're gonna find out that he he knew and he met Philemon as well.

Because he even says to the point, Philemon, you were saved through my ministry.

A lot of scholars say during Paul's stay in Ephesus in the book of Acts, most likely Epaphras and Philemon went there and became saved through Paul's preaching.

Important to note, you'll you'll it'll make sense.

I'm doing all this context for you so it helps you.

Now, there's another piece of context that is not biblical that we do need to address, and it is very under it is very important to understand it, and that is slavery in the Roman Empire.

This book is written to Philemon, who is a Christian slave owner, and Onisimus, who was his slave, or bondservant, as the ESV tells us.

This is a very delicate subject, and it's not going to be the point of the sermon, but it needs to be at least brought to the forefront so you're not distracted the whole time as we try to understand the author's original intent.

We need to be careful in understanding slavery in the Roman Empire, because it is different than slavery in the US, which was frankly downright evil and wrong.

In Rome, you could become a slave four different ways.

Bad debt, you take a loan out, you say you're gonna pay it off, well, you don't have the money, payments are due.

Uh, you could sell yourself into slavery at that point.

They don't have bankruptcy in the Roman Empire.

You could also willingly sell yourself into slavery in the Roman Empire.

Uh, if you had, let's say, a sick family member, you needed assistance, or your business was failing, uh, you could go to a wealthy person and say, I would like to sell myself into slavery, I will work for you, and there would be a contract between you and the owner.

We can already see that's very different than the U.S.'s experience of slavery.

There was also bad ways to get into slavery.

The Romans would often have prisoners of war, and they would enslave them, whole cities at a time.

And the fourth way was infant abandonment.

So oftentimes, if there was an unwanted child in the Roman Empire, uh, they would leave them out, and those children would then be taken as slaves.

Now, the Bible actually gives us an understanding that all slavery is not the same.

And I think we can see that from here in the how the Romans practiced it.

There's some times where people did it willingly.

There's sometimes when people took out a loan, they should have paid it off, they didn't.

Now they have to sell their services.

And then there's instances which we would say are unjust in terms of prisoners of war and infants being taken from abandonment.

And we can actually see in 1 Timothy that Paul writes that slave traders, those who practice the trade of selling and buying people, is a sinful practice.

So even then, the Bible is telling us there's there's different types of slavery, and there's instances where it is sinful.

That's important to know.

Please keep that in mind as we go through Philemon, that we don't quite understand the full story with Onisimus and Philemon.

If I was a gambling man, which I can be, I would say that Philemon was probably enslaved for one of the first two reasons, bad debt or willingly.

I come to that conclusion a couple different ways.

In verses 18 and 19, Paul states that Onisimus owes him anything to charge it to his account.

I believe Onisimus got himself into this predicament with Philemon because of some poor financial choices.

And also historically, this was written in 62 AD.

This was the area of what they call Pax Romana or Roman peace.

There was not a lot of war going on at this time, so therefore there was not a lot of slaves being captured from the people that the Romans conquered.

Because of this, I believe that one of those first two reasons is probably a pretty good assumption that Philemon, or excuse me, Onesimus got himself into some trouble, and that's why he's in slavery.

I'm not 100%, but that seems to make the most sense to me.

Also, the last reason.

In verse 11, Paul says that Onesimus was a really useless slave.

He wasn't, you know, I don't want to say this lightheartedly, but like he wasn't ever good at working, is kind of what I'm getting at.

And Onesimus doesn't seem to be the person that works hard or makes right choices.

So it just seems to blend in with his character that Onesimus got himself into this situation.

All right.

Is that enough context?

Yeah, we're good.

Okay.

You got your papers in front of you?

We're gonna we're gonna do this.

We're gonna go section by section.

You'll notice each section is divided by five backslashes, forward slashes, whatever you call it.

So we're gonna do that.

And we're gonna go through each sentence of each section in each paragraph of each section, and we're gonna mash them all together.

So let's go to the first section, verses one through three.

If you want to like highlight or color, draw underline, like do whatever you have to do to begin pulling this passage apart.

I'd show you mine.

I have I have color highlights, I have arrows, I have everything going on here.

So sections one through three, uh, sorry, verses one through three.

We'll start in verse one.

Paul, a prisoner for Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, two Philemon, our beloved fellow worker, and Aphia, our sister, and Archipis, our fellow soldier, and the church in your house.

Grace to you and peace from God, our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Just look at it.

What do we see?

We see a lot of titles, don't we?

That's a lot.

I mentioned this last week.

We see Paul mentions that he's a prisoner.

We see Timothy is a brother, Philemon is a beloved fellow worker, Aphia is our sister, Archipis is our fellow soldier, and the church that's in your house.

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

I think it's interesting in verse 1.

We're just observing the what here.

Paul mentions that he is a prisoner for Jesus.

I found that very interesting in my studying.

Paul does not state he is a prisoner because of unjust Roman laws, but rather he is a prisoner because of his beliefs and work for Jesus Christ.

Paul is kind of indicating that this is for Jesus, and it seems to be hinting that it's all part of the plan.

Paul includes Timothy as a brother.

We find out as well that Philemon is a beloved fellow worker, Affia, Archipis.

Apia is our sister, Archipis, our fellow soldier, and it looks like a church meets in their house.

From the context, we can say the church at Colossae meets in Philemon's and Aphia's and Archipis's house.

They all seem to live in the same house, right?

Because he mentions all three of their names and he says, your house.

Philemon's the father, Aphia is his wife, and Archipis is probably his son.

Why do you think and the church in your house is really important in this letter?

Because if if they didn't include that, this could be said it was a private letter.

But because and the church in your house is included in the introduction, we can assume this book was or this letter was meant to be read to the church.

Which also explains why it's in our Bible now, right?

If this was a private letter, it would have gone into the trash afterwards.

Verse 3, I find it really interesting how Paul describes God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

God our Father, that's familial language.

Let's look at the title that he's giving God.

God is our Father.

And he calls our relationship to Jesus as Lord Jesus Christ.

That's very intentional.

Paul doesn't just throw these things out there.

Lord refers to Jesus' authority and kingship, Jesus in his name, which means Lord of our salvation, and Christ refers to his special anointing from God to fulfill his specific duties of prophet, priest, and king.

Okay, let's go to the next slide.

Why?

We just did our first section.

We we observed all these titles, we observed these relationships amongst the church.

Now, why does Paul do this?

Paul's choice of titles in this beginning is beginning to build his purpose in writing this very personal letter to Philemon.

You can see from the slide that the relationship we have as a church has God as our Father, and the relationship that we have with Jesus is the Lord Jesus Christ.

Our relationship with these two members of the Trinity actually determines the status and station that we have amongst ourselves in the church.

Our relationship with God makes us all brothers and sisters with equal worth, excuse me, and writes there are no favorites when it comes to God's children.

We are all equal sharers and partakers in God's grace and blessing.

Paul, Philemon, Aphia are all equal when it comes to being the children of God.

For Paul and his service to Christ, we see that he was a prisoner for his name.

For Philemon, his service to Christ was as a gospel worker by letting the church meet in his home.

For Archipist, his service to Jesus is one that looks like that of a soldier.

Paul's choice of time.

Titles here show us that no matter our earthly stations or earthly circumstances, we all serve Christ and we are all God's children in the church.

If the emperor of Rome attended the church at Colossae, who was the most powerful man in the world at that time, Paul would not hesitate to call him a worker and servant of Jesus Christ.

Remember this as we progress through Philemon, that our earthly instations in life does not define our status within the church.

It is our relationship with God and Jesus that defines our station and status within the church.

Because as we go through the book, the question will arise: how should Philemon, who is a Christian slave owner, treat his runaway slave?

Philemon, under Roman law, owns Onesimus, and he is well within Roman law to execute him.

Philemon has, actually, you know what they did to runaway slaves?

When they caught them, they'd put a tattoo on their forehead, and it would be FUG, which was short for fugitivus.

That's where we get the name fugitive from.

Philemon under Roman law and earthly status has all of these rights to do to Onisimus.

Philemon has all the power, and Onisimus has none according to Roman law.

Is this, is it his status under Roman law that defines how Philemon should be treating Onisimus?

That's a question.

Or, and this is what Paul is alluding to, is it his God given status as a brother and fellow worker with Onisimus that should define his actions?

I think we would say the latter.

We're going to find that out as we go.

So even these titles begin as we go through the book, you'll see, are so rich in meaning and will develop Paul's argument.

Now, if you're thinking, I didn't get that, right?

I just looked at it for 30 seconds.

I did not get everything.

He said, I've been looking at this book for like at least 10 hours.

So I got a head start on you.

All right, next section.

So let's look at what our next section is as we progress through Philemon, verses 4 through 7.

So we looked at the what and the why of the first section.

Let's go to the next section, verses 4 through 7.

I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers, because I hear of your love and of the faith that you have toward the Lord Jesus and for all the saints.

Verses six through seven.

And I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ.

For I have derived much joy and comfort from your love, my brother, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you.

All right, let's just let's ask the what?

What did Paul write here?

Seems like this is a prayer, right?

He he mentions in verse 4 that he thanks God, his God, for Philemon when he remembers him in his prayers.

Why does Paul thank God for Philemon in his prayers?

Because he is heard in verse 5, because he has heard of all the love and the faith that he has towards the Lord and the saints.

The same love and faith that Philemon shows towards Jesus is the same love and faith that Philemon shows towards all the saints.

And Paul knows that.

What about verses six and seven?

Signifies a change, right?

And in verse six, and I pray.

So now he's he's moving into an active, hey, this is what I've been praying for, now I'm praying this.

Paul not only thanks God for Philemon's love, but what does he say?

I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective.

What do you think effective means?

Seems like Paul is saying, uh, I'm asking that your faith, I'm praying that it turns into a tool, it turns into an action, right?

It becomes effective to teach the church in Colossae how to behave and to teach the church in Colossae what we have in Christ.

Paul then tells Philemon how encouraged he is through Philemon's love to the church at Colossae.

And it's really great.

You can find out what is what does this love look like?

His love is a source of joy and comfort for Paul personally because he's heard how the entire church has had their hearts refreshed, underlying hearts refreshed.

It's the first time he's mentioned this.

He's gonna do it two more times through Christ.

This one's a little bit harder than the first section, right?

Welcome to Paul.

It's gonna get even worse in the next section, but we'll go through it together.

But it it, you know what I noticed when I was doing this?

I was like, I'm having a really tough time pulling apart faith and love in these verses.

Um you're not alone if that's what's happening to you.

Faith and love are deeply intertwined, it seems like in Paul's mind here, to the point where it's hard to determine where one starts and the other ends.

We learn the same faith and love that we have towards Jesus.

Paul mentions it's the same faith and love that Philemon shows towards other Christians.

And we learn that when faith is put into practice, it becomes a love that refreshes the hearts of the Christians around it.

You see the inner how intertwined they are with each other.

So let's ask, go ahead and go to slide four or next slide.

So why does Paul write this?

Well, if our relationship, remember, we just got into our status within the church, if our relationship with God determines the status, our status within the church, then surely our relationship with him determines how we behave towards one another.

How are God's children to behave?

How are prisoners and workers for the Lord Jesus Christ to behave towards one another?

Our behavior as God's children, Paul shows us, begins with prayer to God the Father that should be filled with thanks and gratitude about one another.

That's a complicated diagram.

That's the best I could do.

You see that in verse 4.

Paul's prayers about Philemon are ones of gratitude and thankfulness.

He's saying, God, thank you so much that Philemon is my brother.

Thank you that Philemon has given his life to follow you.

Thank you that his thank you for his service to all the saints in Colossae.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

It's really hard to be thankful for somebody and sin against them at the same time, isn't it?

I so appreciate you.

Now let me say some horrible things about you.

So so our relationship with each other is one that is shaped by prayer towards God the Father.

And it's prayers of thankfulness.

Thank you, Lord, for Redemption Church.

Thank you, Lord, for those in my congregation.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

That's how we behave towards one another.

The second way we are to behave towards each other is with the same faith and love that we have towards Christ.

From our faith springs forth good deeds that result in joy and comfort and refreshed hearts of our Christian workers around us.

In this context, the way that Paul uses faith and love, it would be very safe to say that in the Christian life, faith does not exist without love, and love does not exist without faith.

The fruits of our faith in Christ and towards other Christians is manifested in love, is what Paul would say.

Now, remember this.

Paul is bringing to Philemon, hey, look at look at all you've done in the past for the church.

Look at all you've done for me.

I'm so thankful you've you've done all these wonderful acts of service to the church that's refreshed the hearts of the saints.

Now, Paul's gonna switch gears in the next section and be like, can you can you do that again?

The way you've acted in the past with faith and love, can you again put it into practice?

Paul's very deliberate here in mentioning what Philemon has done.

Okay, next section.

So we've asked, we've observed two sections.

We've asked the what, we've observed two sections, and we've looked at the why.

We seem to be that our status within the church is determined by our relationship with God, not by earthly status, and our behaviors, the way we treat one another, is one of thankfulness towards God and faith and love towards each other and Christ.

Okay.

Next section.

That is gonna be verses 8 through 16.

It's a lot.

When I am encountered, or you know, when a big when a big section of the Bible hits me like this, I like to find like logical ways to break it down, right?

Because Paul packs a lot of punch in small paragraphs.

So what I want to do is I want to break this down according to Paul appeals to Philemon three times in this paragraph.

Underline them as we go, because that's going to be kind of the bones of this paragraph, and we can then flesh it out and understand exactly what Paul is trying to say.

So in the first verse, verse eight, we see his first appeal, where he says, Accordingly, though I'm bold enough in Christ to command you to do what is required, yet for love's sake I prefer to appeal to you.

I, Paul, an old man, and now a prisoner for Christ Jesus.

Do the next slide.

All right, here's the first appeal.

This is how it's broken down.

Paul mentions that he's bold enough in Christ to command Philemon to do the right thing.

But rather than commanding Philemon, he would prefer to appeal to him in love.

As an old man, he's using his titles again in prisoner for Christ.

Notice that the title, notice the title Paul uses for himself.

Old man is very self-depreciating.

It's not one you would typically say, as an old man I command you.

It doesn't have a lot of authority behind it.

And it's the same with prisoners.

Prisoners don't usually tell free men like Philemon what to do.

Paul's again invoking that worldly authority structures have no bearing when it comes to the church.

We can see here kind of the logical thing.

I could command you, yet, for love's sake, I prefer to appeal to you.

And then in verse 10, he points back, or excuse me, verse 9, and old man imprisoner for Christ, I'm appealing to you.

He's using that churchly authority.

Verses 10 and 11, verse 10, let's move on.

That is your second appeal.

I appeal to you for my child Onesimus, whose father I became in my imprisonment.

Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful to you and me.

Do the next slide.

In verse 10, what title does Paul use?

We're just going to keep hammering these titles as we go through.

Paul really likes them in this book.

Onesimus is a child, and I, Paul, became his father.

Again, this is familial language, which describes our relationship with God as our father.

It's also now starting to make sense what happened.

We can begin actually finally understanding Onesimus is a runaway slave from Colossae, and he made it all the way to Rome.

He most likely sought out Paul in Rome and visited him in prison, and he became a Christian.

I don't think Onesimus was a prisoner because Paul's going to send this letter with Onisimus to Colossae.

If he was a prisoner, he wouldn't be able to deliver the letter.

So most likely Onisimus was visiting Paul while he was in prison.

During that time, he became Christian.

And Omisimus probably told Paul, I'm guessing, that he was a runaway slave.

In verse 11, Paul tells us that Onisimus became a Christian and he went from being useless to useful.

Paul is making a word play on Onisimus's name because Onisimus in Greek means useful.

Seems to be way of Paul telling Philemon that Onesimus is completely new after encountering Jesus.

Oh sorry, next slide.

Verses 12 through 14.

We see his third appeal.

This one is a little confusing because it goes in reverse order.

He states the reasons for his third appeal, and then he states the appeal at the end.

The prior two appeals, he gave the appeal, then the reason.

Now we have, because Paul likes to do this, we have the reasons, then the appeal.

I'm sending them back to you my very heart.

I would have been glad to keep him with me in order that he might serve me on your behalf during my imprisonment for the gospel, the reasons.

Now we get to the appeal.

But I preferred to do nothing without your consent, in order that your goodness might not be of compulsion, but your own accord.

Paul says, I'm sending my very heart, Onisimus, back to you.

Where have we seen that before?

Paul mentioned Philemon's love in verse 7, has refreshed the hearts of the saints.

Now Paul is sending his very heart, the object of his love and affection back to Philemon.

In verse 13, Paul says he would have gladly kept Philemon in Rome.

Or sorry, Paul would have gladly kept Onisimus in Rome to serve him, basically on loan from Philemon.

Little audacious, isn't it?

But because of uh because of how much service Onisimus has been towards Paul.

But he says in verse 14, I appeal, I prefer not to keep him with here without your explicit consent.

Because I wanted to give you the choice, basically, to send him back to me of your own free will.

Verses 15 and 16.

So we see Paul's three appeals.

We've seen that he's appealed to him three times for three different reasons.

Paul really wants Philemon's heart to be engaged in this.

He's not commanding him, he's asking for his engagement.

Verse 15 and 16.

For this is perhaps why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever.

No longer as a bondservant, but more than a bondservant as a beloved brother, especially to me, but how much more to you in both the flesh and in the Lord?

All right, slide 14.

We can go to the next one.

Sorry.

Yep, there it is.

Paul concludes his three appeals by giving us a peek behind the curtain of God's will.

That perhaps Onisimus ran away from Philemon, became a Christian in Rome, and is now returning to you, Philemon, so that you would no longer have him as a slave, but rather than a brother in Christ.

That's the whole meat of this book.

That's what Paul wrote now.

Why did he write it?

This whole section is really summarized up in verses 15 and 16.

Philemon.

This is the meat of the book.

Put yourself in Philemon's shoes really quick.

I found this really useful when I was trying to understand this.

Who knows how long Onisimus has been gone, right?

Colossae is in modern-day Turkey.

Rome is in Italy.

They don't have cars, they don't have planes, they have boats, or you walk, or you ride a horse.

Either way, no matter which way you cut it, it was a long time for Onisimus to get from Colossae to Rome.

Has he been gone for weeks at least?

Months?

Maybe years?

I don't know.

And now he's showing up on your doorstep, okay, which also happens to be the door to the church.

And you have every right under Roman law to punish him as you see fit, and he hands you this letter from Paul.

And you begin to read it.

And Paul appeals to you three times to accept him back.

You could feel outraged or taken advantage of.

Just letting Onesimus off could seem like cheap grace.

You've been wronged, you should demand justice.

And now Paul has the audacity to appeal to you to forgive Onesimus and show him grace.

We could easily see how Philemon could fall into the victim mentality, but Paul leaves him no room with that kind of thinking.

Instead, Paul says, Philemon, this was actually part of God's plan.

Onesimus ran away.

And God used that so that he would become a Christian.

God took a horrible situation and completely redeemed it by making Onesimus none other than a son of our great God the Father.

And now God has brought Onesimus back to you.

And now it's your turn to let God finish his work.

His plan, Philemon, is that you would no longer see him or treat him as a slave, but as a brother.

God's hand has been writing this story from the moment Onesimus ran away.

And now he wants to finish it with how you react.

Paul says, I won't command you to do it.

I could, but I won't.

I want this to come from your heart of faith and love.

I want you to benefit from this, Philemon.

I want this situation to transform you.

Just as the gospel transformed Onesimus.

God is putting you in this really difficult situation, Philemon.

Because he wants you to change.

What are you gonna do, Philemon?

What are you gonna do?

Are you servant of Christ?

The Christ who asked his father to forgive the people that were killing him?

The Christ who tells us that we don't stop forgiving when it's asked for?

Are you are you that servant?

Are you going to be the older brother in the story of the prodigal son?

Philemon.

Is that how you want to do this?

Remember, the younger son squanders his inheritance, returns home, and when the father sees that he's returned, he runs to him and embraces him.

News gets to the older brother, who's always been faithful to the father, and says, Your brother has come and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received his younger son back safe and sound.

But the older brother was angry and refused to go in.

His father came out and entreated him, but he answered his father, Look, these many years I have served you, I have never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat that I might celebrate with my friends.

But when this son of yours comes, he has devoured your property with prostitutes, and you killed the fattened calf for him.

Don't be the older brother in the parable, Philemon.

God doesn't want you to receive him like that.

Do you know why I included the parable of the prodigal son?

Luke is actually mentioned as somebody in this book in the uh in the closing.

It says Luke is with us.

Do you know what book of the Bible the prodigal son is found in?

Book of Luke.

So this kind of blew my mind when I thought about it.

Onesimus is saved with Paul under his ministry in Rome.

There's Luke writing Luke's gospel at this time.

Onesimus probably heard this directory directly from Luke's mouth about the prodigal son.

That's pretty trippy when you think about that.

So what are you gonna do, Philemon?

What are you gonna do?

This book's only 25 verses, but it packs a punch.

Let's keep going.

Next section.

We're actually gonna wrap these two these these three sections up.

I know it's getting late.

You guys have done a lot of work.

I thank you for hanging with me.

So we're gonna we're gonna bring this thing to a close.

Verses 17 through 2025.

I'm cheating.

I'm mushing them all together.

So we're gonna look at the what.

So if you consider me your partner, receive him as you would receive me.

If he has wronged you at all or owes you anything, charge that to my account.

I, Paul, write this with my own hand.

I will repay it, to say nothing of you owing me your own self.

Yes, brother, I want some benefit from you and the Lord.

Refresh my heart in Christ.

Epaphras, the founder of the church in Colossae, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, sends his greetings to you, and so do Mark, Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke, my fellow co-workers, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you in spirit.

These closing sections, Paul uses a couple things here, but it basically says if if we're partners in this gospel, right, then you need to receive Onesimus as you would receive me.

Kind of what Paul is drawing on here is he's saying to Philemon, I I taught Onishimus this gospel, right?

That that we have a gracious God who sends his son to die for our sins.

We were enemies, he brings us into God's family.

And I told him that that now we as Christian brothers and sisters are to live into love or live in live in love with one another.

That's my gospel, Philemon.

God forgives our sins, reconciles us to one another.

Are we partners?

Do we believe the same gospel?

Do we see eye to eye on this one?

Because if we do, then you're gonna put that gospel into practice and receive Onisimus as your brother.

That's how I know we're partners.

Paul even goes so far as to say, I want you also to prepare a guest room for me.

So Paul is saying, I want to make sure that as soon as I'm out of prison, I'm gonna do my best to get to Colossae because I want to ensure that our gospel, that we are still partners in this gospel as well.

So Paul's saying, how you receive Onisimus is going to tell me whether we're partners, and when we get, when I get out of prison, I'm gonna come visit you.

And we're gonna solidify this gospel relationship that we have.

That is the what, and that is the why of Philemon.

Now we can ask ourselves, what's the author's original intent?

I took a stab at it.

You can do uh that one.

I tried to summarize in my own words, what do I think Paul is getting at here?

Paul wants Philemon to receive Onisimus back as a brother and not as a slave.

Not for Onisimus's benefit, but for Philemon's benefit.

And to once again, for Philemon to put his faith and love in action to refresh the heart of the church.

That was my best guess.

Yours might look a little different, that's fine.

You know, this this part we can we can differ a little bit, but that's that's kind of the heart of it.

Now that we have the context, now that we have the author's original intent, I think nailed down pretty well, we can now ask, how does this apply to me?

I'm not Paul, I'm not Philemon, I'm not Onesimus, but how does this apply to me?

What do you think?

How would this apply to us today?

Because we've done all the work.

Now it should be the easy part.

I'm not going to tell you.

If you have questions, though, you can ask me after the service.

Be happy to weigh in.

I think it's pretty clear here that uh being reconciled to one another is pretty important for this gospel and forgiving those who have done us wrong.

It's very, very important, not only for those who have wronged us, but for ourselves and for the church.

And onisimus.

Wow.

To become a Christian and then go, I did some horrible things in my previous life.

I've wronged somebody.

I need to walk like a thousand miles to go make it right.

And I need to show up and ask for his forgiveness.

Asking forgiveness is really important too.

Let's pray.

Um, no, let's do communion.

Then we'll pray.

Uh, for I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you.

That the Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread.

When he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me.

In the same way also he took the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death till he comes.

Thank you, Jesus, uh, for giving your life so that we could be reconciled to you and to each other.

I pray as we take this communion that you bring into our minds if we need to ask for forgiveness or if we need to have conversations with anybody about it.

Especially here within the church, Lord.

I pray that you convict us and let us remind ourselves that you have forgiven our sins, remove them as far as the east is from the west, so that we can always be in good standing with you.

Amen.