Philemon sermon

Philemon 1-21

Introduction
• Paul a thoughtful and prayerful leader & a good example
• Philemon = shortest of his letters in Biblel’
• A warm, personal letter which reveals his leadership style & priorities
• Full of faith, love and wisdom
• Paul tactfully deals with a sensitive situation
• He provides appropriate leadership which is both bold and humble

Background
• Addressed to Philemon, a ‘dear friend and co-worker’ with Paul, also to Apphia (Phil’s wife), Archippus (their son), & the church which met at their house.
• Written same time as Colossians, Paul in prison at Rome or Ephesus
• Situation: a slave called Onesimus has run away from his master Philemon, probably robbing him (18), or just failing to return from an errand, so ‘robbing’ P in sense of depriving him of his services
• Law: Anyone finding a stray slave was obliged to return him to his master or sell him and send the money instead.
• A returning slave would be severely punished, perhaps killed
• BUT while on the run O met Paul, became a Christian and a valued friend.
• Paul is obliged to return O to Phil but he sends WITH him this tactful and tender letter, appealing to Phil to receive him as he would P himself and to treat him AS A BROTHER.
• Paul also promises to pay anything O owes Phil and asks for continued prayer for his own release, so he can visit them.

Giving a dog a bad name…
• Onesimus means ‘profitable’ or ‘useful’ however he had proved to be anything but! Paul plays on this meaning in (11):-
Formerly he was USELESS to you, but now he has become USEFUL both to you and to me.
• Names are important in the Bible and for us today – we take great care naming our children and even pets, boats, churches. We give them A GOOD NAME TO LIVE UP TO.
• A baby girl born in Switzerland to ambitious parents was given the same name as a champion tennis player … and sure enough Martina Hingis followed in the footsteps of Martina Navratilova.
• Of course it doesn’t always work out! Not ALL of the current crop of babies called Leo will become great professional footballers!!
• I was born the year after Prince Andrew and look how I turned out!
• On the other hand you wouldn’t name your ship ‘Titanic2’.
• Giving someone a bad name can be dispiriting and self-fulfilling.
• How many people have been written off as Stupid, as a Failure, an Underachiever, a Liability, Useless… and how many of us have unthinkingly attached these labels to others?
• PAUL gives the people he sends AND the people he writes to a good name to live up to.
• Not flattery or manipulation – he just longs to see people fulfil the potential God has put in them.
• Nobody is Useless, everyone is created for a purpose and every life submitted to Jesus will be transformed by His Spirit and made useful and profitable.

Responding to grace
• Why is such a short, personal letter in the Bible? See verses 6 & 7:-
I pray that you may be active in sharing your faith, so that you will have a full understanding of every good thing we have in Christ. Your love has given me great joy and encouragement, because you, brother, have refreshed the hearts of the saints.
• Paul gives the highest priority to sharing the faith with others, and he knows this is best achieved NOT by telling people what to believe but by DEMONSTRATING Christian love.
• His appeal to Phil & his Church echoes words of Jesus in Jn 17
• Paul prays that the love at work amongst Christians will make their social status, slave or free, irrelevant, and will attract others to commit their lives to become followers of Jesus.
• Phil and co must have accepted Paul’s challenge, or the letter wouldn’t be in the Bible! We should also accept it:-
• By loving , serving and taking responsibility for each other in a way that demonstrates the life of Jesus
• By praying for the church and the world with thankfulness and hope
• By taking special care of the vulnerable and underprivileged
• By actively seeking reconciliation of any break in fellowship
• By helping each other to grow in godliness and Christian maturity.

I pray that this will be our story and that God will bless, transform and unite us as we journey together.