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Rev Graham Harrison           Sunday August 1st a.m. 1999

Philemon - Colossians 4

ëPaul, a prisoner of Jesus Christ, and Timothy our brother, unto Philemon our dearly beloved, and fellowlabourer, And to our beloved Apphia, and Archippus our fellowsoldier, and to the church in thy house: Grace to you, and peace, from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God, making mention of thee always in my prayers, Hearing of thy love and faith, which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus, and toward all saints; That the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus. For we have great joy and consolation in thy love, because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother. Wherefore, though I might be much bold in Christ to enjoin thee that which is convenient, Yet for love's sake I rather beseech thee, being such an one as Paul the aged, and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ. I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds: Which in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me: Whom I have sent again: thou therefore receive him, that is, mine own bowels: Whom I would have retained with me, that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospel: But without thy mind would I do nothing; that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity, but willingly. For perhaps he therefore departed for a season, that thou shouldest receive him for ever; Not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved, specially to me, but how much more unto thee, both in the flesh, and in the Lord? If thou count me therefore a partner, receive him as myself. If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account; I Paul have written it with mine own hand, I will repay it: albeit I do not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides. Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord: refresh my bowels in the Lord. Having confidence in thy obedience I wrote unto thee, knowing that thou wilt also do more than I say. But withal prepare me also a lodging: for I trust that through your prayers I shall be given unto you. There salute thee Epaphras, my fellowprisoner in Christ Jesus; Marcus, Aristarchus, Demas, Lucas, my fellowlabourers. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amení [Philemon 1:1-25].

The apostle Paul when he writes the letter is in prison, he is in Rome. You remember the account in the Acts of the Apostles, Acts chapter twenty eight ends up by telling us that the apostle Paul was there in Rome in prison. He was there for some considerable period of time and that is where the Acts of the Apostles ends and we have to fit in the subsequent history of the apostle Paul from little pieces of information and hints and suggestions that we gather from the letter that he has written. But obviously he was subsequently released before eventually he was re-arrested and suffered a martyrís death. But this letter was written while Paul was in that first imprisonment in Rome.

Something remarkable has happened. There is a runaway slave who has come to Rome, not that this was anything unusual, Rome of course, the great metropolis of the empire, was the sort of place that anybody would go to who would want to remain anonymous and hide themselves away. So there would be many slaves who had run away from their masters and they would end up in Rome because there they would be able to lose themselves in the crowd. And Onesimus was a man like that ó but he had come some considerable distance from the place where he had been living. He had actually been living in the town of Colosse, and Colosse is in the land that today we would call Turkey, the Roman province of Asia, as it was then. It was a few miles from Laodicea and Hierapolis, that you might have noticed were mentioned when I read that concluding chapter of the epistle to the Colossians. The apostle Paul is indicating that the letter that he has sent to the Laodiceans he wants that read at Colosse and he wants the Laodiceans to read the letter that has gone to the Colossians. Probably the letter to the Ephesians as well was taken at the same time and it was something of a general letter that would have gone round all those churches in that part of the Roman province of Asia.

The particular recipient of this letter, Philemon, was the man who had been the slave owner, the one in other words from whom Onesimus had run away. And not only had he run away from him, but he had obviously stolen something as he was going. You might argue that was a sensible thing to do ó if he was going to run away he would need money, he would need something to sustain himself, but that did not make it any sweeter as far as Philemon was concerned when he discovered that his slave had run away. But when he got to Rome and presumably thought that he had hidden himself away in anonymity, hundreds and hundreds of miles away from where anybody would know him, he discovered that it was not like that. There were some people there in Rome who were from this town, this city of Colosse. Epaphras was one of them, he was now in prison with the apostle Paul, and Tychicus was another one. Maybe they recognised him ó or maybe he recognised them. In one way or another, how it was we do not know, he was brought into contact with the apostle Paul. There he was in prison, but able even though he was in prison to receive visitors and speak to thm of the things of God. Obviously Onesimus was brought to the Apostle Paul and the apostle Paul told him of the Lord Jesus Christ and something wonderful happened to him. He was converted, he became a Christian.

That changed everything! He knew that he had done wrong, he knew that he had run away from his master, he knew that he had robbed his master and things needed to be put right. But you know it was a very, very dangerous thing to be a runaway slave in the Roman Empire. You were without the law, you could not go to any civil rights body and get them to speak up on your be half. You were regarded as a slave, as the goods and chattels of your master. Let me read to you something of the state of being a slave in the Roman Empire:

The statistics of slave owning in Italy are quite startling. We are told that wealthy Roman landowners sometimes possessed as many as ten or twenty thousand slaves or even more. These vast masses of human beings had no protection from Roman law. The slaves had no relationships, no conjugal rights; cohabitation was allowed to him at his owners pleasure, but not marriage. His companion was sometimes assigned to him by lot. The slave was absolutely at his masterís disposal, for the smallest offence he might be scourged, mutilated, crucified, thrown to the wild beasts. Only two or three years before the letter to Philemon was written, and probably during St. Paulís residence in Rome, a terrible tragedy had been enacted under the sanction of the law. A Roman Senator had been slain by one of his slaves in a fit of anger or jealousy and the law demanded that in such cases, all the slaves under the same roof at the time should be put to death and on the present occasion four hundred persons were condemned to suffer this inhuman enactment. There was a popular reaction against it and the matter went to the Senate but the Senate ruled that the law had to be upheld and the law was put into force. The roads were lined with a military guard as the prisoners were led to execution to prevent a popular outbreak. The incident illustrates not only the heartless cruelty of the law but also the social dangers arising out of slavery.

So that was slavery in Rome ó and here was a runaway slave. Probably if you have watched any Westerns on the television, you have come across the concept of a bounty hunter, somebody who would look out for somebody who was running away from the law and he would capture him, take him back and get the reward, get the bounty. Well there was the equivalent in the Roman empire, slave hunters, they were looking for slaves that had run away from their masters. Then they would take them back to their masters, they would get a reward from the master and the slave would have whatever punishment the master chose to inflict upon him.

Now that is the background. Put yourself in the place of Philemon, you have run away ó not just run away, you have robbed your master as you went. You know that it is no good going to a lawyer, he is not going to be able to help you. You have found this man the apostle Paul, you have been spoken to about the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, you have trusted in Christ, you have become a Christian, you want to put things right. What do you do? Do you take the risk? Do you go back to your master and say, ëWell, master I am sorry. I ran away and not only that I stole money from you. I should not have done it. Please forgive me!í Well, you can imagine the sort of reception that most slave owners would have given to such slaves.

Yet here is this man Onesimus and he is obviously now very close to the apostle Paul. The apostle Paul writes of him very affectionately in that epistle to the Colossians. He puts it like this, he speaks of: ëOnesimus, a faithful and beloved brotherí [Colossians 4:9]. Then as he writes in this little letter to Philemon, this is what he says about him: ëWhom I would have retained with me, that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospelí He obviously looks upon this man, Onesimus, as somebody who is very close to him, somebody that had ministered to him and somebody that humanly speaking he wanted to remain with him. But he was not willing to say that he should do that ó instead he sends him back to Philemon.

But what he does is to write this letter and presumably the letter is given to Tychicus who goes back with Philemon, and that no doubt was an act of protection. If the slave bounty hunters came and tried to fasten onto Onesimus, Tychicus would say: ëLook! No, it is alright, I am looking after him; I am taking him back to his master. I have a letter here that explains everything.í So back they go to the Roman province of Asia and then Onesimus turns up at the home of Philemon ó the letter is presented. We do not know what happened, but I think that we can in all reason presume that what happened was exactly what the apostle Paul suggested would happen and that instead of being received back as a slave, he was received as ó well to use the phrase that the apostle uses ó ëa brother belovedí. Maybe, I think the suggestion is implicit in the epistle, maybe he was given his freedom by Philemon.

Now I came across another quotation about this letter and the three people involved in it, the apostle Paul, Onesimus and Philemon. This was the comment:

An ex-Jewish rabbi to whom all Gentiles were once untouchable, a wealthy Gentile patrician (that is a member of the sort of aristocracy, the ruling class), to whom an itinerant Jewish preacher in a Roman prison would normally be an object of contempt and to whom a runaway thieving slave was a dangerous animal to be beaten or put to death, a rootless slave without hope of human sympathy, or even human justice ó in all conscience, humanly speaking, an impossible trio. Yet all three are caught up through their common allegiance to Christ into an entirely new relationship, where each acknowledges the other as one of Godís adopted sons, and a brother for whom Christ died.

Who was Philemon? Well, we do not know very much about him, just what is mentioned here in this letter and then the background circumstances that we can gather from the epistle to the Colossians ó but obviously he was a well to-do slave owner, with, shall we say, a considerable property; the church used to meet in his house. So he was wealthy, he was well to-do and yet he was a Christian. Now Paul at that point had never been to Colosse, so even though he does write to Philemon and ask him to prepare him also ëa lodging: for I trust that through your prayers I shall be given unto you.í But as yet he has never been to Colosse. The nearest that he has been is the city of Ephesus ó and that is probably about eighty to one hundred miles west of the town of Colosse. You remember that the apostle Paul was there in Ephesus for quite a period of time, in fact we read about it in the book of the Acts of the Apostles. It is one of the places where Paul stirred up animosity because of the power of God that was upon him as he preached the gospel. But Paul stayed there for about two years and we read: ëall they which dwelt in Asiaí and that is the Roman province of Asia that would have stretched right in land and would have included this city of Colosse ëall they which dwelt in Asia heard the word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks ë [Acts 19:10]. If you remember the account that is given to us in Acts 19, you know that it goes on to describe a riot that was stirred up against Paul and the Christians there in Ephesus, because people were being economically threatened by the success of the gospel. Ephesus worshipped the goddess Diana, or Artemis to give her Greek name, and they u sed to make little silver shrines. They would sell these and thousands and thousands of pilgrims would come to Ephesus, would buy these shrines and engage in the worship of this goddess ó but that was being limited by the success of the gospel.

So the silversmiths fearing economic disaster, they stir up a mob and they grab hold of one of the Christians, they put him there in the theatre at Ephesus and you remember how Acts chapter nineteen tells us that for two hours they chanted, ìGreat is Diana of the Ephesiansí. Then one of the ring leaders, a man ëMoreover ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost throughout all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, saying that they be no gods, which are made with handsí [Acts 19:26]. So you get the picture, this great city of Ephesus, the focal point you might say, the capital as it was of the province of Asia, a great economic centre, it would get visitors from all over the rest of the province ó and presumably Philemon was one of those. Perhaps he had gone up on a business trip to Ephesus and while he was there he must have heard of what this man Paul was doing. Each day Paul had hired a school of Tyrannus and he used to argue the case for Christianity, day after day during that period of almost two years that he was in Ephesus. Perhaps Philemon went along and was gripped by what he heard and was converted by it. So he actually was one of the converts of the apostle Paul.

Back home he goes inland to the city of Colosse and before very long there is church that is established at Colosse. It is not very far from Laodicea, not very far from Hierapolis ó about a dozen or twenty miles would cover all of those three places, and there is a church that is brought into existence, actually meeting in his own home. His wifeís name is Apphia and Archippus is mentioned and most of the commentators suggest that he was probably the son of Philemon and he seems to have functioned as the minister. In fact there is a little bit of a implied rebuke at the end of Colossians: ësay to Archippus, Take heed to the ministry which thou hast received in the Lord, that thou fulfil it ë [Colossians 4:17]. In other words the suggestion is, ëArchippus, you are not really giving one hundred percent to the Lordís work as you should do. Take heed to the ministry to which you have been called and fulfil it.í So here is this set up there in Colosse and from that particular place the man Onesimus makes his escape and up he ends there in the city of Rome.

Now what brought him into contact with the apostle Paul? Well, I think that there are a number of possibilities. One thing maybe he saw, or was seen by, some of these men who had actually come from Colosse and who now were companions of the apostle Paul, in Rome ó Tychicus or Epaphrus, who was in prison with Paul. Maybe they were concerned ó not to get him sent back and punished, they were concerned first of all to get him converted, so they would bring him to the apostle Paul. Or maybe it was like this, maybe ó and one can think of many modern examples that would fit into this category ó he had run away to the big city. But he discovered hard times when he got there and he was down on his beam ends and he did not know where to go but he had heard of this man Paul in prison and he had known by reputation what a generous character he was and perhaps he had gone along to him and even though he was in prison and had access to certain funds, he was perhaps hoping that Paul would give him some money. And Paul gave him more than money, he gave him the gospel ó maybe it was like that.

Or perhaps there is another scenario that is possible. Back in the church in Colosse, the church that had met in the home of Philemon ó no doubt the slaves would have been there as well. Not just the family and the other Christians that were there in the town, but the slaves of the household, they would have been there. Maybe as Archippus, or one of the other Christians, had been opening the word of God there was the slave there, perhaps under sufferance, and yet something had gone in. Maybe years down the line, when he has run away and there he is in Rome, his conscience is getting at him. Something that he could not get out of his mind, a passing word, a quotation from Scripture, one of the promises of the gospel ó it would have brought it all back to him, and there in his wretchedness he would have realised the emptiness and the futility of life as it was and was drawn to the gospel. Well, however he was converted, he was converted and he became a most excellent Christian and Paul really wanted him to stay with him in Rome ó but he says, ëNo! You go back to Philemon! I will write a letter to accompany you.í

Now that tells me that the gospel changes men! Things like this do not happen in the world, do they? A person reading this would say, ëWell this is the height of stupidity! You are putting the manís life at risk! You send him back to his slave owner and if he is the average, typical slave owner, the very least that he can expect is a cruel beating. and he might not even survive; he might be put to death. He might be made some public spectacle of because after all if you have got slaves you want to keep the rest of them in order and so you want to warn them what is going to happen if they dare run away from you and are caught! So you treat this man very, very severely.í That is how the world would have reacted. ëOnesimus the last thing that you want to do is go back to Colosse. Do not think that Philemon because he is a Christian ó do not think that is going to make any difference! He is still a human being, he still knows where his profit is. No! You stay put in Rome. You can hide yourself away there. You can join up with the Christians there, you can worship God with this new-fangled religion that you have got, if you want to. But do not be a fool and go back to Colosse!í

Yet the gospel had taken hold of this man and the gospel had changed him ó and back to Colosse he had to go ó and the apostle Paul was party to that desire and writes this letter to Philemon explaining to him what has happened. And he is reminding Philemon of the grace of God, reminding him of how much he owes to God and to Godís grace ó and very gently reminding him what he owes to the apostle Paul. ëDo you not remember,í he says, ëYou were converted under my ministry! Do you not think that in one sense, from a human point of view, you owe me something? Well, here is how you can repay it. Here is Onesimus, I am sending him back to you. Do not beat him. Receive him, not as a runaway slave ó receive him now as a brother beloved ó that is how he describes him. There is a strange play on the word Onesimus, it means profitable and of course that is the last thing that Onesimus had been to Philemon. But you notice how Paul puts it: in verse ten and eleven: I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds: Which in time past was to thee unprofitable,í ó in other words he did not live up to his name ó ëbut now profitable to thee and to me: Whom I have sent again: thou therefore receive him, that is, mine own bowelsí. ëHe is almost part of me,í he says, ëThat is how close he is to meí. ëWhom I would have retained with me, that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospel: But without thy mind would I do nothing; that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity, but willingly. For perhaps he therefore departed for a season, that thou shouldest receive him for ever; Not now as a servant (literally as a slave), but above a slave, a brother beloved, specially to me, but how much more unto thee, both in the flesh, and in the Lord? If thou count me therefore a partner, receive him as myself. If he hath wronged thee, or owe th thee ought, put that on mine account; I Paul have written it with mine own hand, I will repay ití And there as Philemon held the letter, perhaps he would have recognised Paulís handwriting, the signature of Paul at that point. ëAlbeití he says, ëI do not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides.í

So here is the apostle writing this letter that is evidence of the fact that a wonderful change has been wrought in the life of Onesimus ó and he is writing to a Christian and he is expecting a change there in Philemon as well. Does it not give you a wonderful insight into the New Testament church and the nature of the New Testament church? This is almost incredible from a human point of view, is it not? Here you have this man, this rich prosperous leader of the community ó a slave owner. And here you have this other man a runaway slave, a thief ó but now he is converted, he comes back and there they are in the congregation in the home of Philemon, perhaps on the Lordís day, just as we are. There would have been Philemon, there would have been Onesimus and there would not have been any pecking order between them ó they were brothers in Christ. In the world, come Monday morning, there might have been a different status. It happens like that, does it not?

Perhaps I can give an illustration. Over the years, if you were to ask me what are the two professions that this church has abounded in, I would have to say nurses and teachers. Forget the nurses, just remember the teachers at the moment. Often it has been the case that some of the teachers here on a Sunday, have been teachers of some of the young people on a Monday ó and there is a different relationship on the Monday from what there is on the Sunday. At least I presume there is! On the Sunday if they are both Christians, they are all on a level. On a Monday, it might be Mr So-and-So, Mrs, or Miss So-and-So and there is the pupil having to be ordered about maybe and perhaps on some occasions even punished by them. But it is no good saying, ëAh, but you are a member of Emmanuel church, just as I am. I am not going to do that punishment for you! You would not be so cruel as to do that to me, would you?í That would be quite improper, would it not? But here in the church all on a level, brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus Christ. Or you can take it if you like and use it not in that way of teachers and pupils but what, for example, if there was somebody who had a business and somebody who worked for him and both were members of the church. Exactly the same principal, in the congregation, the membership of the church, there is no difference between them ó but maybe in the business world, the world of everyday work, the one gives the orders the other has to implement them.

Well here you see in the New Testament church this staggering difference between a slave owner and a slave is overcome ó they are all one in Christ Jesus. And of course it was because of that that slavery ultimately was abolished. Some people come and say, ëWell, why was it that you do not get some tirade in the New Testament against the wicked institution of slavery?í There are a number of answers and one of the most common, I think probably one of the most sensible ones that are given is this ó had Christianity set itself up as a slave liberation society, it would have just been snuffed out. It would have been looked upon as something that was hostile to the whole fabric of society. The whole of the Roman empire depended on the institution of slavery and for the gospel to have made a frontal attack on that would have immediately brought against it the wrath of the authorities and the furious persecution of the authorities ó not on a gospel basis, but more on a sociological and economic basis. What the gospel does is something much more subtle and much more effective than that. It takes a slave owner, it takes a slave and it does the impossible it puts them together. They regard one another as brothers in the Lord Jesus Christ, for in Jesus Christ there is neither bond nor free ó so writes the apostle Paul. All these worldly distinctions they are irrelevant as far as the church is concerned. When you begin to work on that basis, you see bigger questions are raised. People say, ëWell now does not this say something about slavery itself?í Eventually of course that is what happened. In the long term the gospel wins the battle against slavery.

Take these characters again, Paul , Philemon, Onesimus ó think of all the prejudice that potentially was there. You think of the ethnic, the racial prejudice ó Philemon listening to a man like Paul, a Jew. You know what the Greeks thought of the Jews, they looked upon them as barbarians, queer religion and odd people and no man in his right senses would want to be a Jew! The feeling was probably mutual between them ó ethnic prejudice. And religious prejudice as well ó can you imagine Saul of Tarsus going to this slave owner who was a Gentile and looking upon him as a brother? Why if he had actually come into contact with him he probably would have wanted to wash his hands after he had touched him. He would have looked upon him as some outsider. Then the social prejudice ó a slave owner and a slave! You do not have cooperation and fellowship between those two! The one has got to remember his lowly status in society and the other one is going to see to it that he does remember it.

Ah, but this is the church! Here is the gospel and the gospel overcomes all that prejudice, ethnic prejudice, racial prejudice, religious prejudice, social prejudice ó the gospel overcomes that! You know the gospel does something else as well. Put yourself in the position of this man Onesimus; there he is he has got his freedom. He is in Rome, he is not likely to be caught now, he can lose himself in the crowd. can you imagine the burning resentment that there must have been in his life. ëTo think that I have been a slave!í Perhaps he was born a slave; perhaps he was captured in some military expedition and then sold off as a slave ó that was very often how people became slaves. It must have rankled with him that he had lost his freedom that this other man, who was only a human being like himself after all, had been able to order him about and treat him cruelly perhaps. Can you imagine the resentment that must have built up in his life? How he must have not just wanted his frredom, but if it wre possible, get his revenge. In a sense he did it, taking some money as he his escaped. Probably there in Rome before he was converted, well you might have argued that he wsa the sort of material that revolutionaries were going to be made of.

Then the gospel comes and it deals with him! He wants to go right back where he has come from. He wants to go to the master from whom he has run away, the master, who as far as the law is concerned can do whatever he likes with him. But Christ has taken hold of him and he wants to put things right with him. It is a searching thing, is it not? When a person repents it is more than using a word, it is something that effects your life. Do you remember the fore-runner of the Lord Jesus Christ, John the Baptist? People came to him wanting to be baptised and this is what he said to them: ëBring forth therefore fruits meet for repentanceí [Matthew 3:8]. Do not think that this rite is going to set you right with God. ëBring forth therefore fruits meet for repentanceí. If you really have repented ó show it! Let there be a difference in your life. Repentance is more than a word, it does something to your life. If ever there was a man in the New Testament that repented, surely it was Onesimus.

What an example he is to us all! And what an example is Philemon to us all in receiving back as a brother beloved this run-away slave!

Amen
 
 

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