Our Way of Forgiveness

a) We’re continuing in our series through Philemon, which was a short letter written by the Apostle Paul during his 1st Roman imprisonment. Paul began this letter in v1-3 by reminding Philemon of his Christian identity. Last week in v4-7 he encouraged Philemon about his Christian character. b) Paul said he’d heard of Philemon’s faith & love for the Lord. He’d heard of Philemon’s love for the saints & how he refreshed their hearts. And Paul prayed Philemon would continue in the fellowship of the saints & come to a full knowledge of every good thing in us for the sake of Christ c) But now we’ve finally reached the point in this short letter where Paul’s going to make his request to Philemon. Today we’re going to look at v8-16. I’ve titled today’s sermon: Our Way of Forgiveness. W/ that background let’s now hear God’s holy word in Philemon v8-16. Read-Pray

Here’s the 1st way we as Christians seek forgiveness & reconciliation w/ 1 another: for love’s sake

a) Look at how Paul begins in v8: “Accordingly, though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do what is required.” 1st, Paul begins w/ the word accordingly or therefore or for this reason. In other words, b/c of everything I just said in v1-7, therefore I’m now going to ask something of you.   b) Then 2nd Paul says: “though I am bold enough in Christ to command you.” Paul was an Apostle of the church. He, like the other Apostles, was commissioned directly by Jesus & had authority to speak on behalf of Jesus & to issue commands to believers. And that’s what we see in the NT. c) But here, Paul says although he has the boldness & authority to command Philemon, he’s not going to do so. Rather than demand, Paul’s going to appeal. Then 3rd, notice how v8 ends: “Accordingly, though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do what is required.” d) See, Paul’s appeal to Philemon wasn’t optional or a suggestion. Paul could’ve pointed Philemon to the Lord’s prayer in Matt. 6:12. The Lord instructed his disciples to pray: “forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” Paul could’ve pointed Philemon to his own words in Eph. 4:32 e) “Be kind to 1 another, tenderhearted, forgiving 1 another, as God in Christ forgave you.”  Paul’s appealing to Philemon to do what was required. Philemon, like all believers, must forgive others who’ve hurt us & wounded us. If Jesus is your Savior, then He is also your Lord. f) It’s now His will, not your own. As those loved & forgiven by God, we must forgive others. Think about the parable of the unforgiving servant. In Mt. 18:21-35 Jesus told a parable about a king who forgave a great debt 1 of his servants owed & could never pay back.

g) But then, that same forgiven servant went out to a fellow servant who owed a much smaller debt. The forgiven servant seized & choked their fellow servant & demanded they pay back their debt. When the fellow servant couldn’t, the forgiven servant put their fellow servant in prison.

h) But another servant saw this & reported it to the King who summoned the forgiven servant. The king said in Matt. 18: 32-33: “You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt b/c you pleaded w/ me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?” Then Jesus said the King took the wicked servant & delivered him over to the jailers until his debt was paid.

i) Jesus said in Mt. 18:35: “So also my heavenly Father will do to every 1 of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.” That’s why Paul began this letter w/ Philemon’s identity & character in v1-7. He’s reminding Philemon he was a forgiven servant who experienced God’s love j) Look at v9: “yet for love’s sake I prefer to appeal to you.” Paul wants Philemon to seek forgiveness & reconciliation for love’s sake. See, when it comes to our obedience in the Christian life our motivation matters. Let me give you an analogy. Suppose 3 people go running 5x a week.

k) The 1st person says: “I run b/c my father died of a heart attack at 54 & I want to live long enough to retire & see my grandchildren.” The 2nd person says: “I run b/c I can eat anything I want & don’t gain weight & I sleep better & feel better.”

l) But the 3rd person says: “When I run my legs soar & the wind brushes against my face & I feel alive. I run b/c I love it.” See, the 1st person ran out of fear: worried about the consequences of not running. The 2nd person ran for the benefits it gave them in this life: eating more & feeling better.

m) But the 3rd person ran simply b/c they loved running. They ran for love’s sake. Now duty is an essential part of Christian living. It’s not wrong in & of itself, but duty is ultimately an inadequate motivating factor. The goal of the gospel & our sanctification is not just to change our behavior.

n) The goal of the gospel & our sanctification is to change our hearts. Our affections. Our love. The HS works in us change our hearts & to shift our affections from loving the world & sin to loving God. There’s a famous sermon by a 19th C. Scottish preacher named Thomas Chalmers.

o) Chalmers says: “the only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection is by the expulsive power of a new one.” In other words, an old love can only be replaced by a new & greater love. Chalmers goes on to say that God hasn’t offered us something marginally better than sin & this world.

p) Chalmers says: “He presents to the soul the most supremely lovely object in the universe: Himself.” Paul appealed to Philemon that for love’s sake, b/c of God’s great love for him & his great love for God & the saints, that Philemon forgive & seek to be reconciled w/ Onesimus.

q) We too should forgive & be reconciled to 1 another for love’s sake. We should forgive as those who’ve been loved & forgiven by God – all in order to love Him & others united to Him. But that will only happen when we don’t just love the gospel & what it takes away or what blessings we get

r) Such forgiveness & reconciliation for love’s sake is only possible when we truly love & trust & find our joy & satisfaction in the God of the gospel. We obey b/c we love Him. We obey b/c we love what our Lord loves. We forgive & seek reconciliation for love’s sake.  

Here’s the 2nd way we as Christians seek forgiveness & reconciliation w/ 1 another: w/ humility.

a) Notice Paul’s tone. We see humility. Notice once again in v10 Paul appeals to Philemon rather than demanding he do something. Paul didn’t Paul out his Apostle & authority card. At the end of v9 Paul identifies himself as: “I, Paul, an old man & now a prisoner also for Christ Jesus.”

b) Paul has given up his rights, & even in his freedom, for the sake of the gospel. Then he says in v11 Onesimus had become very useful to him while he was in prison. Now we don’t know for sure, but apparently Onesimus was bringing Paul food, attending to his needs, or serving in some way.

c) So much so that in v12 Paul calls Onesimus “my very heart.” Now here’s what’s interesting & reveals Paul’s humility. The Greek verb Paul uses that’s translated as send means: “to send to a higher authority.” We see this same verb in Luke 23:7 when Pilate learned Jesus was a Galilean.

d) Luke 23:7 says: “And when he learned that he belonged to Herod’s jurisdiction, he sent him over to Herod.” Now obviously, Paul was of a higher authority & rank than Philemon. But Paul says I’m sending him back to you who has rightful authority over Onesimus as his owner.

e) Then look at the humility we see w/ Paul in v13: “I would have been glad to keep him w/ me, in order that he might serve me on your behalf during my imprisonment for the gospel.” Paul was giving up his own comfort & well-being. Paul sacrificed his own physical well-being.

f) Paul sacrificed a close relationship. And Paul did so in humility. Look at v14: “I preferred to do nothing w/o your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own accord.” Again, Paul had the authority as an Apostle of the church to keep Philemon.

g) But we see Paul’s humility in not thinking about his own needs & preferences & comfort. He’s considering what’s best for Philemon & Onesimus & the gospel & the church. Paul wants Philemon to forgive & be reconciled to Onesimus not just for love’s sake, but w/ humility.

h) As Paul wrote in Phil. 2:2-5: “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.” i) See, we won’t seek forgiveness & reconciliation if we are operating pride, selfishness & conceit. We won’t seek forgiveness & reconciliation if we’re looking only to our own interests. Forgiveness & reconciliation requires us to have the same mind & love as Christ. Phil. 2:6-8 says of our Lord: j) “who though He was in the form of God did not count equality w/ God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself by taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men, & being found in human form He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death even death on a cross k) The Lord Jesus is the supreme example of humility. A love for His Father in heaven led Him to seek our forgiveness & reconciliation when it wasn’t deserved or earned. Paul’s appealing to Philemon to humble himself & forgive & seek reconciliation w/ Onesimus.

l) The last 2 weeks in v1-7 we saw how glowingly Paul spoke about Philemon. He was a rockstar. But Philemon, like all believers, still had blind spots. As Christians, we can still fall victim to pride. We can believe we have arrived. We can start to think we see all & know all. m) We can begin to minimize our own sin & maximize the sin of others. It requires humility to acknowledge we haven’t arrived & we don’t see all or know all & we have sinned & hurt others.

n) It takes great humility to hear the council & correction of other believers. See, God’s basic remedy for our blind spots is community. We need others. W/o community, we won’t be all God wants us to be. Here, Paul appeals in humility for Philemon to humble himself & seek not his own interests.

Here’s the 3rd way we as Christians seek forgiveness & reconciliation: under God’s providence.

a) Look at v15-16: “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 & in the Lord.” b) Paul now appeals to Philemon to reconcile w/ Onesimus on account of God’s providence. We will see this in next week’s passage, but Onesimus had sinned against Philemon & ran away from him. But Paul encourages Philemon to see these events as being an outworking of God’s providence. c) Paul suggests the ultimate design in these events may have been to bring Onesimus to saving faith. Now notice, the Apostle Paul does this somewhat hesitantly. He doesn’t say “this is why” these things happened, but “perhaps this is why.” Seeing God’s providence can be difficult. d) As 1 of my professors said: we can only see God’s providence in the rear view mirror, not the windshield. It’s only as we look back that we can see God’s providential hand was at work. Move to TX. Paul trusted God was at work, but he also didn’t assume he understood all God was doing. e) Yes, Onesimus made a decision & sinned against Philemon. Yet Paul says, perhaps God used his sin & departure so Onesimus might come back to Philemon not just as a slave, but as a brother. As Joseph said in Gen. 50:20, “what you meant for evil, God meant for good.”

f) God is always triumphing over sin by His providence even if we can’t see it. Friends, our lives are not haphazard. In Christ, we’re not held in the grip of fate or some blind deterministic forces. We’re not bobbing around in a sea of chance. We live under God’s providence.

g) See, from a human perspective we might say: “If Onesimus was going to become a Christian, where would it most likely happen? Wouldn't it have been more likely in Philemon's house? The church met there. Philemon was a rockstar. But, Onesimus came to salvation when he departed.

h) God is God! God’s ways are not our ways. See, things might seem impossible to you for that lost family member right now: but watch & pray & see what God might do. W/ God, there are no impossible cases. Onesimus was a runaway slave who fled to Rome. Was he in prison w/ Paul?

i) Did he get a job at the prison where Paul was? We don't know. But in God's providence, Onesimus met Paul & came to Christ. We know this from v10: “I appeal to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I became in my imprisonment.” Now notice what Paul’s showing Philemon here.

j) He’s reminding Philemon that Onesimus’ sin & primary issue was not w/ Philemon, but w/ God. Onesimus wasn't just rebelling against & running away from Philemon, but from God. Paul says: “perhaps Onesimus parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever.”

k) The word in the Greek we translate as “forever” means “a period of unending duration or w/o end.” And look at what Paul adds in v16: “no longer as a bondservant but more than a bondservant, as a beloved brother.” Philemon lost a slave for a while, but he gained a brother in the Lord forever.

l) Onesimus may have caused irreparable damage to Philemon & his trust for a while. But Paul wants him to see the big picture & to have an eternal perspective. Philemon was a sinner who didn’t deserve forgiveness. He didn’t deserve to be reconciled w/ God.

m) “But God, being rich in mercy, b/c of the great love w/ which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together w/ Christ - by grace you have been saved.”

n) If the forgiveness we received at the cost of the blood of God’s Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, is so ineffective in our hearts that we are unwilling to forgive & be reconciled w/ others, we are hypocrites. It shows that we haven’t truly known & experienced God’s love & forgiveness.

o) How can we hold a grudge against someone if we know we have not been offended nearly to the level we have offended God. How can we be unwilling to lay down our hurt when Christ laid down His life for us & our sin & the hurt we caused our Creator?

p) As long as we are in the flesh, we will never be perfect, nor will we perfectly forgive & love 1 another. Jesus died for our imperfections. But if we won’t forgive or we refuse to forgive those who hurt us & sin against us, we show that God’s love has not truly been poured into our hearts.