Book of Philemon - Vv. 23-25

Let's finish Philemon here. All right, let's start at verse 23. I'll wait for Ash to walk in. Hello. Oh, you're not late. We were just fixing the mics three seconds ago. Huh? I didn't hear you. Okay. Okay.

All right. All right. That's definitely goofy. All right, let's turn to verse 23 and finish up this study today. It says, well, I'll just say really quick, we didn't finish this kind of subtopic or subcategory that we're on, which is accountability.

We're talking about the motivations of one that forgives and specifically accountability from the brethren being one of those motivations. We were right in the middle of that when we stopped last week.

Accountability Through Christian Fellowship

So that's where we are. In verse 23 says, Now, earlier in this study, we talked a bit about the blessing and importance of Christian fellowship in general. Back when we were talking about Philemon being refreshing to the saints and his love toward them and all of those types of things, we talked about how important fellowship is in being that, in edifying others, in refreshing others and things like that.

But certainly in the context of the local church as well, it's very, very important. Fellowship is very important. Assembling together weekly is very important for so many reasons, but one of those being we can be refreshed by one another.

So we talked about that way earlier in this study many, many weeks ago. Now, there are very important reasons why the Lord tells us to not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, which he tells us in Hebrews 10.

One of these reasons is that being together, and this is really important, being together increases the desire to be obedient because of the accountability that we have. Being together increases our desire to be obedient to God because of the accountability that we have.

How many times have we referenced what Dad has said all throughout the years, where every time he'd get together with Otis, he would just want to be a better person, want to be a better, more godly person after being with Otis.

And it was because of the fellowship, and it was because of the accountability that Otis brought to the table, and vice versa for him as well. And one of the biggest reasons why I believe we are given that clear instruction in Hebrews to not forsake the assembling of ourselves together is because when you are not together, if you are just kind of out there by yourself, it can be a problem.

Paul, in telling Philemon that these brothers send their greetings, because look at all the names that are listed just right there at the very end. You've got Epaphras, Aristarchus, Demas, Lucas. He names all these guys.

Why is he doing that? Well, in naming all of the guys, reminding Philemon that these brothers, in addition to Paul, are sending their greetings, what this is doing, as Philemon is reading this, is it's just tearing apart any idea of Philemon wanting to be self-centered, self-focused on his part.

In other words, he's not going to let all of Paul's words become in vain. He's not going to let himself and his own selfish desires to not forgive, in this context, overtake everything Paul is telling him.

Why? Because he's going to be held accountable by Paul and by all of these brothers. There's no type of individualism here, in the negative sense, on Philemon's part, because Paul is saying that not only is he accountable to God, not only is Philemon accountable to Paul, but these brothers in Christ, he is accountable to them as well to do the right thing and to forgive Onesimus.

Now, this is, again, very important. How can we apply this to ourselves today? Well, as a Christian, you never want to live your life on any kind of foundation of self-concern or isolation, because without fellowship, without going out there, without spending time with your brothers and sisters, having coffee with them midweek, like Dad has done with Otis and with his men all throughout the years, whether it's having Bible study throughout the week, in-person fellowship, it could be phone calls as well, making sure that y 'all are kind of keeping tabs on one another, and then ultimately kind of reaching a peak each Sunday when we're all together.

All of those things, without that, without that kind of fellowship, any individual is a breeding ground for sin at that point, including bitterness, obviously, which Paul was protecting Philemon from here, that specific sin.

But any sin, any pet sin that any person has, anything they struggle with, and maybe things they don't even know that they struggle with, perhaps bitterness is one of them, if you are isolating yourself and putting whatever your schedule is and your comforts, and maybe you just don't feel so great, so you don't want to go spend time with anybody or that sort of thing, obviously, there is a time and a place where you got to rest if you're really sick or something like that, but just in general, if you isolate yourself from the brothers and sisters, from fellowship, from the assembly, you are a breeding ground for sin because you're no longer held accountable by your brothers and sisters.

You think, well, all I need is God. All I need is God to hold me accountable. Well, He will hold you accountable, but keep in mind that one of His methods in doing that is through His people, through your brothers and sisters, and specifically your local church family.

Thankfully, we can have family and friends that aren't necessarily church family that can encourage and can bring edification and hold us accountable as well, but it's magnified to a great degree when it comes to your church family doing these things for you, and so I think that what is happening here is Philemon is being told by Paul, you know, you are being held accountable by me as well as these great brothers in the Lord as well, and so you need to do the right thing.

You don't need to harbor any bitterness toward Onesimus. You need to forgive him for all the reasons I've laid out, but in addition to all those reasons, we're coming. We're going to hold you accountable ourselves, but as far as practical application goes, it could not be overstated, or I'm sorry, it could not be overstated, how important it is to have constant fellowship with your brothers and sisters to keep yourself from falling into habitual sin especially, but really any kind of sin.

It's really amazing the way that the Lord worked it out that way, where we can actually be sanctified through our brothers and sisters. Theoretically, yes, you and the Holy Spirit are in that together, and you are being sanctified through him, but the Lord ordained it to where you can also be sanctified by just being together, and because you're not going to be tempted to sin.

Like right now in this room together, as we have the word open, we're talking about the Lord, we're talking about heavenly things, and all of these great wonderful things. We're not going to be tempted.

Now, the devil will try to throw things in your mind and kind of get you off course a little bit, but it's still not the same as when you are by yourself tempted by anything and everything, and I think you'll know what I'm getting at there.

Just being by yourself is not good. You weren't intended to be isolated. I say by yourself. It could be you at home with your family as well, maybe you and your spouse, but you and your spouse need to go out and have that fellowship and partake in the assembly and things like that, because the principle still applies.

Anyway, I could talk about that a lot longer, but we'll move on. So who are these guys exactly, though? Who are these four or five guys that Paul tells Philemon? They send their greetings. They know about this whole situation.

They send their greetings too, so remember that. You're being held accountable by all of us. Who are these fellows? So Colossians, you don't have to go to all these places, but I'm going to just shed some light on who these guys are.

Let's start with Epaphras. If you go to Colossians 4 and look at chapter 12, it says, Epaphras, same guy, who is one of you, a servant of Christ. Remember that word servant? Doulos, a little bit more literal translation would be a slave to Christ.

It's a little more powerful. A slave of Christ saluteth you, always laboring fervently for you in prayers. So this is a guy that had a wonderful prayer life. He was constantly thinking about his brothers and sisters.

In this case, the members of Colossae. He's always laboring fervently for you in prayers. That is the kind of guy you want in your corner. That is who Epaphras was. That ye might stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.

That is really powerful. It's a great lesson, not only in prayer, because Paul is pointing out that through Epaphras' fervent prayers, you might become complete in the will of God. So we think about our own prayer life to God and having the Holy Spirit intercess on our behalf so that he can actually enlighten us into how we should pray and how we can pray so that we're in line with the will of God.

But here, Paul is saying through Epaphras' fervent prayers that you might be complete in the will of God. So this was a very powerful Christian man whose prayers were a big part of his life, a big part of his ministry.

That's who he was. In verse 13, he says, for I bear him record. So Paul says, I know this to be fact. I give testimony. I bear record myself that he hath a great zeal for you in them that are also in Laodicea and them in Herpuleis.

So he's talking about multiple churches now, not only Colossae, but those in Laodicea, those in Herpuleis. So Epaphras here has multiple churches in mind, essentially all of the first century churches.

I mean, if you think about it, there weren't all that many of them. He lists three of them here. Epaphras had a strong fervent prayer life for all of these. This is the same guy that is sending greetings to Philemon.

What about Marcus? Well, we're familiar with Marcus, or Mark, we're more familiar with. He wrote one of the Gospels, arguably the oldest of the four Gospels. This is the same Mark. And in Colossians 4 .10, it says, Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner, saluteth you and Marcus, sister's son to Barnabas, touching whom ye received commandments, if he come unto you, receive him.

Now, just a quick note, we know in Acts, there was kind of this weird thing between Paul and Barnabas, and Mark went with Barnabas. Well, probably a good reason is because they were brothers-in-law, or let's see here, or maybe uncle and nephew, sister's son.

Yeah. Okay. He was Barnabas' nephew. And then in 2 Timothy 4 .11, it mentions Mark again. It says, only Luke is with me. Take Mark and bring him with thee, for he is profitable to me for the ministry.

So you had to be a pretty standout Christian and have a lot of Christian character to be profitable to the apostle Paul's ministry. So Mark, another guy that sends his greetings to Philemon, very strong Christian guy.

Then we have Aristarchus in Acts. Well, first of all, it mentioned Aristarchus as well, just a second ago, when it mentioned Mark in Colossians. Aristarchus, my fellow prisoner. He was a fellow prisoner with Paul.

He saluted you and Marcus, and he goes on from there. That was to the Colossians. In Acts 19 .28 -30, it says, and when they heard these things, they were full of wrath and cried out saying, great is Diana of Ephesians.

These are pagan worshipers here that just heard Paul, and they're all out of sorts. And they say, great is Diana of Ephesians. And the whole city was filled with confusion. And having caught Gaius and Aristarchus, this is one of the guys we're talking about, men of Macedonia, Paul's companions in travel.

So these are guys that were traveling with Paul throughout his ministry, throughout his mission work, throughout Acts. They rushed with one accord to the theater. And when Paul would have entered into the people, the disciples severed him not.

So Aristarchus literally saved Paul from a rabid crowd that was all totally out of sorts after Paul had just preached, and they were pagans, and there was confusion. It was going to be a riot. And Paul was about to walk into that, the Apostle Paul.

And that's an interesting lesson there. You think, well, there are some guys that are so spiritual, just at the top of the pyramid, that they have all discernment and everything. Now, I'm not saying Paul didn't have discernment, but in this moment, he was about to walk into a theater, and it could have cost him his life, but he had brothers with him.

He traveled with these guys. They held him accountable too, and they protected him, and they grabbed him, and they pulled him out of that. Isn't that interesting? So Aristarchus, one of the guys that is sending greetings to Philemon, was with Paul.

He was a constant travel companion. He protected Paul in this case. And then finally, Lucas, Luke, he wrote the Gospel of Luke. So two of these guys that send greetings to Philemon were two of the Gospel writers.

It says in Colossians 4 .14, Luke, the beloved physician, remember he, well, this is how we know that was one of his professions, but we also know in his very technical writing in the Gospel of Luke and in the Book of Acts, he used very technical terms, very complicated Greek.

And at times when he, for example, when he was describing the virgin birth, he was very intentional in using very technical terms to prove that it was a legitimate birth and not just a miraculous, boom, there's a baby there.

Because there were some, the Gnostics and others, that challenged whether or not Mary actually gave birth. And even the Catholics today talk about the perpetual virginity of Mary. Well, okay, that'd be impossible if she actually gave birth normally, like normal childbirth.

And so if you go to Luke, the Gospel of Luke, and he talks about the virgin birth, you have the physician that is using these very technical medical terms to describe the birth, and there you can actually get testimony that, no, Mary had legitimate physical birth, but in her virginity.

So that's kind of neat. So this is the Luke we're talking about. This Luke sent greetings to Philemon. Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas greets you. And in 2 Timothy 4 .11, it says, only Luke is with me.

So Luke was very special to Paul. Luke was loyal to Paul, and he was there with him when others weren't, when he didn't have other disciples to lean on at that particular time. And by the way, 2 Timothy, that's the last letter that Paul wrote.

That's the very end of his life. So you have the very end of Paul's life. He doesn't have anyone with him except for Luke. So Luke was very special to Paul. Luke sends his greetings to Philemon as well.

So these are all the guys. These men were very loyal to Paul, but they were also great friends of Philemon as well. Paul wanted Philemon to remember that these brothers were there for him. They were there for him just as much as Paul was there for him.

And by default, that implies that they will hold Philemon accountable to God because that's much they care about him. They're going to hold him accountable to his obedience to God, in this case, to forgive for all of Paul's exhortations to him.

They were going to hold him accountable. Paul was going to hold him accountable in doing the right thing. Now, there was one name that I left out of that list. It says in verse 24, Marcus Aristarchus Demas.

I didn't talk about that guy. We're going to save that for a future study, and we'll talk about Demas as an individual later. But all of those other guys we mentioned were very key, very strong Christian men that were there to hold Philemon accountable to do the right thing.

All of us need that. We all need that. We have it within our church family. We have it from our mentors. We have that every week when we meet and we assemble. We are held accountable for the way in which we are living our lives in obedience to God and so on and so forth.

Grace, Forgiveness, and the Example of Philemon

And then let's look at the last verse here. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, we're back in Philemon now, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. So finally, any divine attribute that believers are commanded to imitate, especially when it comes to forgiveness, will not be possible to do that alone.

How does Paul end all of this? It requires the work of grace from the Lord in order to do it. We've been talking a lot about forgiveness. It's not some light subject. It sounds light. You think, oh yeah, forgive.

That guy told me off one time. I forgive him. We're all right. We're cool. Let's go shoot some pool. That's what we think of when we think of forgiveness. It's just this kind of, I don't even know, just this casual thing.

But true divine forgiveness as it flows from God, as it is an attribute that we emulate from God, that is no light thing. In fact, to such a degree, it is not possible to do without the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.

So when we talk about forgiveness, you have to remember something. It's not going to be easy. It's not meant to be easy because we are fallen creatures. I say it's not meant to be easy. What I mean by that is because we are fallen creatures, it's not.

I guess you could argue it should be easy because we were created perfect, but we fell into sin. Y 'all know the story. So it's not going to be easy for us. To forgive is not going to be easy ever because we are fallen creatures.

And because it won't be easy, it's only possible to do in conjunction with the grace of Jesus Christ and him giving us that grace and it being with our spirit. Literally, that's what Paul is saying. That's how he ends the whole letter.

We have to remember that. We can't do it alone. That requires prayer. It requires us fervently praying like Epaphras to the Lord, asking him to help us and to give us the strength to forgive even when we don't want to.

That's what Paul is ending with is you need that grace. You need the grace of Jesus in order to do this. The fact that this story filled with all of the godly Christian character of Philemon. Remember, this was a man whom we ourselves could strive to imitate.

Yes, Christ is our ultimate example, but Paul says, do what I do. Other apostles said that too. We can look to men like the ones in the New Testament testimony as examples of how to be godly Christians ourselves, and Philemon was one of those guys.

We could look at all of the commendations that Paul gave him throughout the letter, at the beginning especially, and we can say, yeah, we could imitate this. He's a good example to follow if we want to be strong Christians.

So remember that. He had really strong character, and even with that, or because of that rather, because of who he was, the fact that this little letter, only 25 verses long, found its way into inspired scripture indicates that he did follow through with forgiving Onesimus because the story ends here.

This is where the letter ends. This was the initial letter sent to Onesimus. I would, we don't, we don't have scripture that that fleshes out the whole rest of the story. However, the fact that this letter is in the Bible, the fact that it is an inspired letter is testimony that Philemon did follow through with all of Paul's exhortations, with being held accountable, with having those motivations, with putting his character into practice.

He wasn't character, it wasn't just good character, but it was good character that turned into actions on his behalf. So the fact that this is an inspired letter indicates that he did follow through, and he did forgive Onesimus.

The Spirit solidified his character into this inspired letter, which certainly would have been a testament to Philemon's actions after he received it. The Holy Spirit, as he moved the Apostle Paul to write this inspired letter, had Paul put in all of these awesome things about Philemon.

And so it makes sense that he would follow through with all this, and that he would put all of that character to action. According to some of the earliest church fathers, and this is really interesting, this is not scripture, this is a little bit of church history, and so take it for that, take it for what it's worth there.

But this is cool, and it's likely, according to some of the earliest church fathers, Onesimus, the slave, the one that ran away, that was in Rome, that Paul converted, that he sent back with this letter to Philemon, Onesimus became the bishop of Ephesians later in his life.

Timothy was the first bishop of Ephesians, of the Ephesian church, the church at Ephesus, and Ignatius and Jerome later said that Onesimus succeeded Timothy. Timothy was the young kid, or at least young man, that Paul was writing to, obviously, in his two letters to Timothy.

They were the final letters of Paul's life. That was the end of Paul's ministry. He's handing the baton to Timothy. Timothy becomes the bishop of the church at Ephesus, and then according to some of these early church fathers, Ignatius and Jerome, Onesimus succeeded Timothy.

And we do know a lot about Timothy, which is pretty crazy that he would have been, or could have been, his successor. And they also said, according to the testimony of Ignatius and Jerome, that Onesimus, as the bishop of Ephesus, fervently preached the gospel until he was eventually martyred.

Now, of course, we are, again, that's not scripture. That is just some church history, testimony from church history. Onesimus was a very common name. However, knowing the way the Lord works, and knowing how much Onesimus, this particular man, meant to Paul as he is telling Philemon all these things to take him back, and so on and so forth.

It doesn't seem like it would be all that out of question, out of the question, too much of a stretch to say that the same man succeeded Timothy, who was also close to Paul. So, you know, there you go.

There's Ignatius and Jerome's testimony of what happened to Onesimus after this letter took place. He later became a bishop and was eventually martyred. So, in conclusion, with this little book, the underlying theme of not only Philemon, but also of scripture in general, is that we are never closer to emulating God, to imitating God, than when we forgive.

And such forgiveness should come easy because we ourselves have been forgiven. That was one of the ideas that we started with in the very first lesson in this series. We've learned that a needed requisite to being a forgiver in the imitation of God is to first be a Christian.

How can you imitate God's attributes if you are not one of His own? How can you ever truly forgive from the heart in the truest sense, where you no longer take account the wrongdoings of the person that did you wrong?

How can you do any of that unless you are a Christian, unless you're one of God's own, unless you have the grace of Jesus Christ bearing with your spirit like Paul ended the book of Philemon with? So we learned that the first step is to be a Christian.

The first step in imitating God's attribute of forgiveness is to be saved, to have great Christian character, and to be willing and eager—not just willing, but eager—to forgive our transgressors. Of course, we got an example of that in the Prodigal Son parable as well.

We have learned that the actions of a godly forgiver, what they look like, we've learned what those actions look like—namely, that they will receive the wrongdoer back into fellowship after they have returned, asking for forgiveness, certainly, but also in the case of Onesimus, a changed, converted man.

He was now a brother in Christ. He was no longer a slave. He was no longer just a person. He was now a brother in Christ to Philemon. That is one of the ways in which our character, our desire to forgive, actually flows into actions is to receive that person back into fellowship, which is exactly what happened in the case of Philemon and Onesimus by all accounts here.

We have learned that the forgiver has great motivation in forgiving as God has forgiven them, such as being held accountable by God and by their brothers and sisters in the Lord. It's one thing to remember the fact that we were forgiven for the very sins that sent Christ to the cross in the first place.

If God can forgive that, surely we can forgive the things that people have done wrong to us, but just as a little bit of extra checks and balances, that is true. The Holy Spirit is our ultimate teacher.

We know that, but God also gave us other checks and balances as well, one of which being the accountability of our brothers and sisters, being together, fellowshipping, talking through things, and getting some counsel.

Everyone needs it, and the Lord ordained it for that for good reason. Given the scriptures that we've examined in this study, we've determined that it would be impossible to rejoice in the Lord while simultaneously having a heart of intentional, and that's a key word there, intentional unforgiveness, because that inevitably leads to harboring bitterness in our hearts, which is a grave sin, and it can be a cancer to our souls.

We've talked about the fact that bitterness can actually change a person's physicality after so many years. That's one of the things that makes it really sneaky. It's not like you are a little bit bitter towards someone, and then you look like the Wicked Witch of the West the next day.

It takes time, and it's sneaky, it's subtle, and it's sometimes decades later. I told you all a story last week about a particular evangelist, remember, that talked with that prisoner, gave him counsel.

Y 'all remember that story? Well, in the same book where that same counselor was just giving other examples of his ministry, he talked about the fact that there were, in some cases, people that he worked with and counseled that were harboring bitterness toward a particular person for 40 years.

So 40 years later, there's going to be some change in a person physically, and it'll be noticeable. He pointed that out. He talked about how it makes a person look different. What's interesting is those same people that he would counsel with, he would walk them through a lot of what we've talked about in this study, and give them counsel, tell them to confess the bitterness to God, and to get rid of their own sin.

It's one thing that the person did wrong, but don't join them. Don't match their sin with your own. Confess the sin to God, and he would send them home with some homework, like you need to go read these passages, you need to go consider these things, contemplate these things, meditate on the Word of God, think about what we've talked about, bring your troubles to the Lord, and let's talk tomorrow.

And then he gave multiple cases where he would do that with someone who had been bitter for decades, and you could just see it on their face. By the next day, he said, in some cases, I did not recognize the person when they came back to me the next day to talk about the fact that they had confessed their bitterness to the Lord.

And so, those are anecdotal, obviously, but I think it is a powerful testimony as to what bitterness can do. We don't want it. We want to get rid of that. It's not necessarily easy, but it is easy. It's not easy in the flesh, but it's super easy in the Spirit.

With the grace of the Lord, as Paul ends the letter with, it can be as quick as that. And by the next day, you have a total change in not only your spirit, but in your physical appearance as well. And so, again, just to rehash a little bit what we just said, what we've determined is that it is really hard, if not, I would say impossible, to have true joy in the Lord moment by moment, rejoicing in all ways.

And again, I say rejoice if you have bitterness. Now, if you know about it and it's intentional, that is kind of what I'm getting at. There could certainly be some cases where you may not have even realized, you know what?

This happened a while back. This person hurt me, and I didn't even realize it, but I guess I haven't really truly forgiven them. And in that particular case, perhaps it's not the extreme example where it's intentional, and you know you haven't forgiven them, and you don't want to forgive them, and then bitterness flows from that.

You can still fix it either way, and it'd be taken away in the Lord supernaturally, because that's what it is. This is a divine attribute we're talking about here. It's not some work you can work up in your brain.

The Lord can supernaturally change your heart and give you the ability to forgive. In Hebrews, in fact, why don't y 'all turn with me here? We're almost done, but in Hebrews 12, the writer of Hebrews, presumably Paul, gives us a little bit more insight into what bitterness can do if we don't take care of it with the Lord helping us out.

He says in verse 14 of Hebrews 12, and then look what he says next in verse 15. First of all, consider the analogy that Paul or the writer of Hebrews uses here. A root, a root of bitterness, what does a root do?

It hides under the ground for a long time, soaking in all the water, soaking in all the nutrients. What is bitterness? What are the nutrients in the water for bitterness? It's taking account. It's taking account and having those hypothetical debates in the shower and the hypothetical arguments with the person and thinking about things and having vain imaginings that at this point didn't even happen.

All of that is watering that root that can be within you, just like a root deep in the ground. Then someday though, what happens? That root springs up and people see the plant. People see the manifestation of the bitterness, and that is when our physical appearance starts to change.

When we let that root within us get watered and get so much nutrients that we start to change ourselves, and then all of a sudden it's not inside anymore. It's also outside as well. So what is he saying?

Let's read 15 one more time. So being diligent, there's a key word, looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God, lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you and thereby many be defiled.

But look at 16, lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. That's a really interesting parallel that the writer draws there in the context of talking about bitterness.

Let's look at one more really quick passage. In this one, go to Ephesians chapter 4, and we actually looked at this at the very beginning of our study here. But this one is a little bit, so Paul is kind of bringing the hammer down in that Hebrew passage, again presumably Paul, and we should take his words to heart there.

I mean, Hebrews has no shortage of warnings in it, and this is another warning. Be diligent lest any root of bitterness spring up trouble you and thereby defile many. So that can convict any one of us.

There's not a single person alive that hasn't at some point been a little bit bitter about something. So it's not like I'm up here being preachy, telling you guys that you need to fix it, or anyone online, or anyone listening to the recording 30 years from now.

This is something that can be very subtle, and it can sneak up on anybody at any given time. So we read this so that we have this ammunition, and we're ready for it. When it does begin to take root, we can quench it.

So there's that in Hebrews, but take a look at Ephesians chapter 4. Look at verse 29 and think about the positive, some of the positives that are in here mixed with the bitterness. It says, look at the context, let no corrupt communication, this is one of dad's recent big aha moments not that long ago that he had that he shared with all of us, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of that it may minister grace unto the hearers.

And then look at the very next verse in that context, and grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed into the day of redemption. So how do we grieve the Holy Spirit? By not doing what Paul just said in the previous verse, by letting corrupt communication proceed out of our mouth, by spewing words of division, by wanting to sow discord among the brethren, that will quench the Holy Spirit.

And then in verse 31, in the same context, listen to this, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice. And then listen to how it ends, and it's so beautiful, and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.

It's the opposite. It's the opposite. It's two ends of the spectrum. He gives you the first one in verse 31, the other side in verse 32. One end of the spectrum is evil, bitterness, anger, clamor, put all that away from you and replace it with what?

Kindness, tenderheartedness, forgiving one another, and then he finishes it just to really hammer it home, just as Christ, I'm sorry, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you. So we're reminded one more time, we need to do this because we ourselves have been forgiven, and we can do this, and that's the beautiful part.

It seems like a tall mountain to climb sometimes, but it actually isn't with the help of the Holy Spirit. Imagine it being a mountain, and you're like, there's no way I can climb this, and the answer is it's true, you can't climb it by yourself, but if your heart is in the right place, and you pray, and you bring these things to the Lord, he'll pick you up, and you'll just kind of float to the top of the mountain.

You don't even have to worry about climbing it. You just get to the top. You're at the bottom, and then boom, you're at the top, and you have a heart of forgiveness just like that. So in this brief letter, we're given an example of what true forgiveness can look like, but we're also given another great example of Christian relationship dynamics, and that is Paul is resorting to love over authority.

He's resorting to friendship over rebuke in this particular context. That's important to remember as well, because remember, he did not bring his apostolic authority necessarily onto Philemon. He came to him as a loving brother, friend, companion, brother in Christ.

So we can learn a lot from that. We can learn a lot from Paul's approach, understanding that Philemon was a brother, that he had a great testimony. Does that make sense? You got to remember both, though.

It's not just that Paul would go to anybody like that. He certainly didn't. Paul rebuked left and right when it was necessary, but he went to Philemon differently because of who Philemon was. So you got to remember who is it you're dealing with.