(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Now, before I get into the sermon this morning, I want to get into a little bit of the background of the book of Philemon. This is often called one of the pastoral epistles. This is the apostle Paul writing to Philemon. Now, it's not really explicit in the Bible that Philemon is a pastor because it talks about the church meeting in his house, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he is the pastor, of course. Paul is writing to Philemon and sort of the mainstream traditional interpretation of this book is that Onesimus is a servant or a slave who has run away and Paul is interceding with his former master Philemon that he would receive him back, that he would forgive him, and that basically because of his respect for the apostle, he would treat Onesimus well and receive him as a brother in Christ and as a free man. Now I do believe that that is the correct interpretation. I've seen other people try to make this say something else, but I think when we look at this, you're going to see that that is in fact what's going on here. Now I kind of hesitate to use the word slave in regard to Onesimus and I like the fact that the King James Bible does not translate servant as slave because of the fact that that word today in our vernacular has a really negative connotation because when we hear the word slave, we're thinking of black people in the 17th, 18th, 19th century in the south and all of the baggage that goes along with that. And so I don't like the fact that the modern versions will translate the Greek word as slave in a lot of these places in the New Testament. For example, some of the modern versions will have the apostle Paul saying in Romans chapter 1 verse 1, Paul the slave of Jesus because that makes it sound like he's basically being mistreated by Jesus or that he's just property of Jesus or something like that, but in reality we know that our status with the Lord Jesus Christ as his servant, yes, he owns us, yes, we belong to him, yes, he is our boss, but he's a benevolent master and we're not forced to do things against our will or anything like that. And so the word servant I believe is a much better word to describe the situation. So you can think of Onesimus as a servant who has run off. Now again, when we say servant though, this could be like an indentured servant where he has to stay there and work for Philemon, maybe he was in debt or whatever, but for some reason he was indentured to Philemon and he had run off and maybe when he ran off he even stole some stuff because typically when people run away from a situation like that or flee from a situation like that they need a little money for the road and they might even steal some household items or whatever. Now where am I getting all this or what's the evidence for this? Well let me just point out a little bit of the evidence. It says in verse number 10, I beseech thee from my son Onesimus whom I've begotten in my bonds. And what Paul's saying is that while he was in prison, because Paul started out by saying he's a prisoner of Jesus Christ, and while he was in his bonds he begat Onesimus. What that means is that he won Onesimus to the Lord. He got Onesimus saved. He begat him spiritually, not physically. So he's his son in the faith and he's interceding with Philemon for Onesimus, he says, whom I've begotten in my bonds, which in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me. So what's the evidence? First of all we see that in the past Onesimus has been someone who has been unprofitable to Philemon. And that word is often associated with servants. You know the Bible talks about the unprofitable servant or profitable servant. So he's been unprofitable to Philemon in the past. Then in verse 13, Paul says, whom I would have retained with me. Like I wanted to keep Onesimus with me to work for me. He says I would have retained him with me that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the Gospel. So he's saying, you know I would have liked to have Onesimus to stay with me and just serve me and work for me and work with me, but without thy mind would I do nothing. Now that statement right there, without thy mind would I do nothing, shows that Philemon has some kind of authority here. Because why would Paul need to ask Philemon's permission to have Onesimus stay with him and work with him? It seems like Onesimus has some kind of an obligation to Philemon that he needs to fulfill and Paul wants him to be released from that obligation. Because Paul is saying, look I would have kept him with me, but first I wanted to get your permission that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity but willingly. So if we read that we can see that basically Philemon has to give the green light to Paul to keep Onesimus and in doing so that's Philemon doing Paul a favor, his benefit. He's saying I didn't want it to be of necessity where I just keep him with me and don't even get your permission, you know I wanted it to be something that you did willingly that you would basically allow Onesimus to stay with me. So you can see that Philemon has some kind of an ownership over Onesimus and Paul is getting his permission for that reason. Then it says in verse 15, for perhaps he therefore departed for a season that thou shouldest receive him forever. Now the way that reads in verse 15 is like Paul is trying to find a silver lining in something bad that happened, right? He's saying look maybe he departed from you for a season so that you could now receive him forever meaning maybe he intended it for evil but God meant it for good, here's a silver lining in the situation. And then last of all it says in verse number 16, not now as a servant but above a servant a brother beloved, especially to me but how much more unto thee both in the flesh and in the Lord. And so we see there in verse 16 that he's not going to be received now as a servant implying that in the past he was a servant but now he's going to be received not as a servant but as a brother beloved. So again just looking at those verses I think it's crystal clear that the traditional interpretation is correct that Onesimus had been a servant. He departed under bad circumstances, Philemon still has some kind of a claim of ownership to him or right to his labors which is why Paul has to get permission in order to keep him with them and that Philemon would be doing him a favor and so forth. So I'm pretty, I mean I think it's obvious, I don't really see how anyone could get another interpretation of this. Now some people have tried to find another interpretation just because they don't like the idea of quote slavery being in the Bible or of a guy like Philemon who's a godly man, a good Christian brother, you know, owning an Onesimus or having an Onesimus as a servant. But guess what? Why don't you take your preconceived ideas and shove them because I'd rather just read what the Bible says and just go by it and not try to change the Bible to fit your sensibilities or what you think is appropriate or what you think is right or what, you know, 21st century America considers politically correct. I don't really care about any of that. I'd rather just go to the text of scripture, read it, interpret it, believe it and not try to impose my views or your views on the text. That's the wrong way to read the Bible, okay? Onesimus has a, is a servant of Philemon and that doesn't necessarily make Philemon a bad guy and there's nothing wrong with Philemon having Onesimus as a servant because if we went back to the Mosaic law, we'd find that there are situations where having a servant is appropriate, there are rules with how to deal with your servant, et cetera. People will try to say, oh, the Bible's condoning slavery and then when they do that, they're trying to take something from thousands of years later in the south, black people and try to basically, you know, say that that's what the Bible's condoning. No, the Bible did not condone that kind of slavery. The Bible condoned a different kind of servitude where people who are in debt or whatever might be forced to work off their debt. They might be sold into an indentured servitude and I use, I like the word servitude better because it doesn't have all the baggage of slavery and then, you know, they would have to work that off and maybe even be physically disciplined by their master if they refuse to work. Now, it doesn't matter whether you like that. That's what the Bible teaches in the Mosaic law. That's what's going on in Philemon, so just deal with it. So this is a beautiful book because it's not just a situation regarding one guy who is a runaway servant and Paul is interceding for him, but it's actually a picture or an allegory about salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ as well. That's what's so great about this book. So we could think of this as Paul representing Jesus and interceding on behalf of Onesimus who represents the sinner who gets saved. So let's start out the book and let's look at it that way. It says in verse 1, Paul, a prisoner of Jesus Christ and Timothy our brother, unto Philemon our dearly beloved and fellow laborer and to our beloved Appiah, that's probably his wife and Archippus, our fellow soldier, that's probably his son, and to the church in thy house. So he's basically greeting Philemon, probably his wife and son, and the church that's in their house. Now, about five times in the New Testament we have reference to the church meeting in someone's house. Now there's absolutely nothing in the world wrong with having a church meet in a house because the building that the church meets in is totally irrelevant. The church could meet outside because the church is the assembly of born again baptized believers. The church is actually that assembly of people, not a building. I do have a problem with the so-called house church movement because what the house church movement is is not a legitimate church with an actual pastor who meets the biblical qualifications actually functioning and growing and thriving as a New Testament church. It's rather just buddies getting together at a home and calling it church. So just because you get together with other Christians and have a Bible study around the coffee table, that doesn't make it church. But if you have a legitimate church and it meets in a house, great. Now the problem with the church meeting in a house is that most houses typically aren't big enough for the church to meet there. But if the house is big enough, great. Now, for example, in Acts chapter 1, we have the early church meeting in the upper room. So they're meeting in an upper room, okay, that doesn't sound very big. Yeah, except there's 120 people meeting there. So that sounds like a pretty big room. So again, I don't see these so-called house churches meeting with 120 people. So you know, that's the difference. Do you see the difference there? Yeah. It has the church in its house, but there's probably 100 people there or 50. It's really not even about the amount because you could have a legitimate church that maybe only has 10 people, 15 people, 20 people, especially in the early days. It shouldn't stay that size, but obviously in the early days, churches might start out pretty small and then they're going to reach people and grow, God willing. But these house churches, they're not about soul winning and growing. They don't have a legitimate pastor. They're basically like a substitute for the church and then they'll use verses like this to twist scripture and say, see, you know, the church is just, it's just going over to a Christian's house and you have coffee and cake and talk about the Bible and that's church. Wrong. Our church, Faith Forward Baptist Church, we met in my house for the first year and a half of our existence. We met in the living room and you say, did you finally outgrow the living room? Well, sad to say when we left the living room, we really hadn't outgrown it, but I was just sick of having church in my house and so that's why we left because we could still fit in the living room if we wanted to because the church still was only running in those days, you know, 20 people or something, but it just got a little old having church in my house because I have a small house and my family was growing. So the point is, Philemon has the church, a legitimate New Testament church meeting in his house. Maybe he's the pastor, maybe he's not. Paul is writing to him and really praising him, talking about how he's dearly beloved, he's a fellow laborer. He says in verse 4, I thank my God making mention of the always in my prayers, hearing of thy love and faith which thou hast toward the Lord Jesus and toward all saints. Does this sound like some horrible slave owner guy? No. So he's obviously a benevolent master of his servant Onesimus. 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. So just verse after verse is just talking about what a great guy Philemon is. Wherefore, for this reason, 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 a one as Paul the aged and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ. So Paul here basically says, you know, I could kind of just tell you to do this if I wanted to. I could just tell you what to do. But he said, you know, for love's sake I'd rather just ask you to do this for me as a favor instead, right? And then he gets into the meat of the matter, he says, I beseech thee from my son Onesimus whom I've begotten in my bonds which in time past was the unprofitable, the now profitable the enemy whom I've sent again. So basically Onesimus is carrying this letter. So Onesimus shows up at Philemon's doorstep. What are you doing here? Well, here, read this, it'll explain everything. And then basically the letter is sent with Onesimus, thou therefore receive him. So Paul is saying, please receive Onesimus, accept him back. 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 benefits should not be as it were of necessity but willingly. And he says he's my own bowels, bowels would be like we would say heart. You know, we don't really use our guts to talk about how we feel these days. We would talk about our heart more than our intestines. But that's what that means, bowels is referring to the heart as we would know it. But without thy mind, verse 14, would I do nothing that thy benefits should not be as it were of necessity but willingly? For perhaps he therefore departed for a season that thou shouldest receive him forever. 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 oweeth thee ought, so, you know, if he stole anything or whatever he owed you, why he was working off this debt, the additional time that he was supposed to work for you before he ran off. Put that on my account. So again there's the implication that he owes Philemon something or has done something wrong. Now remember he begat him in bonds. You think Onesimus was visiting Paul in prison? No they were obviously both in prison together. They're probably cellmates or whatever. And so that's how he even met Onesimus. So Onesimus probably arrested, maybe he'd lived a life of crime besides running away from Philemon. You know who knows or maybe it's because he was caught running away from Philemon that he was in prison. Who knows? But either way this guy had done wrong things and Paul is saying whatever wrong this guy did, put that on my account. I Paul have written it with mine own hand. I will repay it. Albeit I do not say unto thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides. Now this is where the connection to Jesus becomes really obvious, doesn't it? Because Paul is saying, look, whatever sins Onesimus has done, put that on my account. Don't hold him responsible, hold me responsible. This is exactly what Jesus Christ did for us when he died on the cross for our sins. The Bible says he himself bear our sins in his own body on the tree. And so Jesus Christ's substitutionary atonement is that he took upon him the sins of the whole world. And so whatever wrong, whatever sin that we have done, we're Onesimus and whatever sin we've done, that goes on Jesus' account. We're not held responsible for it, but rather Jesus took the punishment for our sins on the cross. And Paul says, I've written it with my own hand. I will repay it. He's saying, look, you can trust this guarantee. I've written this with my own hand. You can take it to the bank that I will repay whatever Onesimus owes you. This is the way it is with the Lord Jesus, that he has written it with his own hand in the word of God, that if we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall be saved. That all of our sins are forgiven and forgotten of God the Father. As far as the east is from the west, so far has God separated us from our sins, and God has written that with his own hand. Jesus has paid for our sins. And so therefore, just as Onesimus is scot-free because Paul's going to pay the debt, Jesus paid our debt. And so that's the symbolism here that makes it so obvious that Paul represents Jesus in this equation and that Onesimus represents the sinner who's getting saved. He says, I, Paul, have written it with my own hand. I will repay it, albeit I do not say to thee how thou o'est done to me, even thine own self besides. Well, Paul, you kind of did just say that, but he's saying like, you know, I'm not even going to, I'm not even going to bring up the fact that you owe me your own self besides, which is kind of ironic because he is bringing it up. But the funny thing about that, or the interesting thing about that is, you know, we would ask ourselves at this point, well, who does Philemon represent? So if Onesimus represents the sinner who's getting saved and Paul represents Jesus, then who does Philemon represent? Well, in this part, he would represent basically another Christian who's already saved. Okay. So Philemon represents the guy who's, he's a Christian, he's already saved, and he's being told to receive this new guy who's getting saved, Onesimus, in spite of the fact that Onesimus has wronged Philemon, Philemon is supposed to receive Onesimus as he would receive Paul and whatever sins Onesimus has done to put that on Paul's account. So this is where the practical application of the book of Philemon comes in, because we can obviously just sit here and look at this and say, oh, it's such a beautiful picture of our guilt and we deserve punishment and Jesus takes the punishment for us and so we're saved. Isn't that great? Yes, it is. But there's also a practical application of the book of Philemon for us as Christians that we need to practice in our lives is that just as Philemon is being told, look, you need to receive Onesimus. Now I could just command you to receive Onesimus, but for love's sake, I'm beseeching you, I'm asking you as a favor, accept Onesimus. And he said this, receive him as myself. So he's saying receive Onesimus the same way you would receive me. Now keep your figure there in Philemon and go back to Romans chapter number 15. And really Onesimus doesn't even have to represent a new believer, it could really just represent any believer or fellow Christian. And the Bible says in Romans chapter 15 verse 7, wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received us to the glory of God. So as Christ received us, the Bible says we need to receive one another. Now the Apostle Paul received Onesimus, didn't he? The Apostle Paul accepted Onesimus into the beloved. He believes that Onesimus is a bona fide brother in Christ and so he's sending him to Philemon and he's telling Philemon to receive him as well. So we as Christians are commanded in Romans 15 verse 7 to receive one another even as Christ also received us. So how did Christ receive us? Did Christ accept us to be perfect, expect us to be perfect before he received us? Did we have to turn from all our sins and clean up our lives and follow the commandments in order to be received by Jesus Christ? Did we have to do that first? No. Christ received us in our sinful condition just the way that we are. Just by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, we got saved. We didn't have to clean up our lives first because otherwise we'd all still be working on it. None of us would be saved because all of us have areas of our life that we need to work on and sins that we need to get rid of and areas where we need to improve. Nobody is perfect. Nobody is repented of all their sins because we're all still imperfect Christians. We're saved but we're not perfect. We're not sinless. We're still growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so we see here that just as Christ received us, we need to receive other people, meaning that we ought not expect our fellow Christian to be perfect or sinless in order for us to accept them or, well, they have to be sorry and repent of everything and they have to clean up their life. Then I'll receive them as a brother in Christ. No, we need to receive the Onesimises or the Onesimi of this world. You know, we need to receive the Onesimises of this world as Christ received us. So the same forgiveness that Jesus has extended us, we need to extend that same forgiveness to other Christians and not get bitter at our brother in Christ or sister in Christ and hang things over their head from a month ago or a year ago or from 10 years ago. There is just downright unchristian to be bringing up people's past sins to them as Christians and yet Christians do it all the time. Christians are constantly drudging up past grievances and being bitter from one day to the next. Hey, the Bible says, Let not the sun go down on your wrath. Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven you. So if Christ has forgiven us, can't we forgive one another? Lest we be like that bad example in Matthew 18 where the servant is forgiven some huge debt by his master, then he goes out and finds one of his fellow servants, grabs him by the throat and says, Pay me what you owe me. I mean, is that what we're going to be like? Because if you remember, the Lord of that servant was very angry and actually delivered him to the prison, into the worst kind of prison, to the tormentors, and he went to a horrible place. Hey, I don't want God punishing me in my life, punishing me on this earth because I don't forgive people. I don't want to get bitter toward my brother in Christ or sister in Christ and hang on to some grudge or bitterness and then have God looking down and being upset about that and saying, Well, you know what? Then I'm going to hold a grudge about the stuff you're doing. I mean, the Bible says that if we forgive men their trespasses, our Heavenly Father will also forgive us. But if we forgive not men their trespasses, neither will our Father forgive our trespasses. You know, I want God to let things go. When I make a mistake, when I sin, when I do something wrong, I want God to be gracious, to let it go. And especially, you know, years later, I don't want him still mad about stuff I did years ago. Well, guess what? Then I better treat other people the same way that I want to be treated and treat other people the same way that I want Christ to treat me and the way that Christ does promise to treat me. God is forgiving. His mercies are new every morning. We need to be the same way. Just as Philemon is being told, accept Onesimus, receive him as myself. We need to receive one another as Christ received us, number one. But number two, we need to receive one another as we would receive Jesus. So if Jesus were physically here on this earth and he needed something, we would help him out, wouldn't we? If Jesus were physically here on this earth and he, you know, wanted to be received in some way, we would receive him in whatever way because he's Jesus. But here's the thing. Jesus said, inasmuch as you've done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you've done it unto me. So we should treat our fellow Christian as we would treat Jesus. And we should treat our fellow Christian as Jesus has treated us or as we would want Jesus to treat us. And so that's really the homework in the book of Philemon, you know, because it's one thing to just admire the book of Philemon and see all of the correlations with salvation and look at all the great symbolism. But then it's another to take away an application of what we need to do. We need to be Philemon and receive the Onesimus' of our life in the same way that he's being told to because Jesus Christ has paid for all of our sins. And so this is why Paul can say to Philemon, I, Paul, have written with mine own hand, I will repay it, albeit I do not say to thee how thou o'est done to me, even thine own self besides. We owe our own self to Jesus. So Jesus could say to us, you owe me your own self, so therefore I'm commanding you to receive Onesimus. I'm commanding you to forgive him. We're commanded by God to forgive others and he has every right to tell us that because we owe our own self to him besides, as Paul said here. Yea brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord, refresh my bowels in the Lord. That tells me that it brings joy to Jesus Christ to see Christians forgiving other Christians and receiving other Christians. How beautiful and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity. And when God looks down and sees us practicing that attitude of forgiveness and showing mercy, then he is pleased. It truly blows my mind how people today can commit a sin, do something wrong, whatever, and just repent of that, be punished for that maybe even, maybe they even do prison time for that or whatever, but whatever it is, it's over. Something from the past, they've done something, they've paid the punishment, they're sorry, they've admitted it, they've moved on, and then for Christians to throw that in their face later. It's mind blowing to me. You need to have the fear of God my friend and God has commanded against that attitude. And so don't you dare bring out past things that are not relevant anymore that have been totally dealt with and they're forgiven and forgotten and pull those things out and hang them over people's head and rub people's nose in that. You're wicked if you do that. But in other situations you say, well, here's my situation. This person wronged me and they're not even sorry. This person wronged me and they didn't repent. They didn't admit it and they're not even sorry. Well, look, in that situation, there's not the hard and fast requirement that says you must forgive that person. But you know what? In most situations, the godly thing to do would be to just forgive that person anyway. Just for your own sake and just to show Christ how forgiving you are to go above and beyond the letter of the law, which demands that we forgive everyone who is repentant. And if your brother sins against you seven times in one day and seven times in one day comes to you and says, I repent, you're supposed to forgive him. So even a repeated offender is supposed to get forgiven. But here's the thing. We, in most cases, should even go beyond and forgive people who didn't even apologize. What's wrong with just letting something go? Somebody does something wrong to us and they're not even sorry. What's wrong with just letting it go and just taking the high road, being a better Christian, going beyond the minimum, and just living our lives that way. That's usually the best situation. Now there are some situations where someone wrongs us in a certain way and it might mean that we don't necessarily want to have a relationship with that person anymore. That makes sense. But you can forgive someone and also not have a relationship with that person. Does everybody see how those two things are separate? Maybe you're dating someone and they do something horrible. You could still forgive them and say, you know what, I forgive you. And there's no hard feelings. There's no grudge. There's no rancor. But you might not necessarily want to date that person anymore once you've seen what they're capable of or what they're like. It's like, oh, well, you broke up with me. That means you didn't forgive me. Well, no, because you could forgive them and just decide maybe this isn't who I want to marry. But I still forgive you. Still love you. I'll still let it go. Or maybe you're close friends with someone and they do you wrong and it sort of sours the relationship. But then they come to you and they're sorry. Well, you know, you could still forgive them and let it go and not hold a grudge and have nothing but just love in your heart toward that person, even if you decide that maybe the friendship isn't going to continue. Maybe you're just going to be cordial, but you're not necessarily going to be friends. And here's the thing about Faithful Word Baptist Church. We have a church with hundreds of people in it and not everybody is going to get along necessarily, and not everybody is going to be compatible as friends. And so when you're in a church with hundreds of people, you're going to have certain people that you kind of click with, that you get along with, that are your friends, and then other people that you don't necessarily click with and you don't want to be their friend. There might even be some people that you have had serious problems with and you just want to avoid those people. And this has always been our policy is that you don't have to be friends with anyone that you don't want to be friends with. It's always bizarre when people are forced to be buddies with someone that they don't want to be buddies with. And it usually just creates more resentment and more problems when you force people to be friends who don't want to be friends. And so if we decide that someone is not guilty of something, let's say someone's in jeopardy of being thrown out of the church or something, but we decide no, this person's OK. You're like, well, I still think that person's bad. You don't have to be friends with that person. But here's what you do have to do at Faith Forward Baptist Church is you do have to treat everyone with civility. You do have to be kind unto everyone. You do have to endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace. And we need to have some kind of peace and unity in our church. And we need to have that kind of an atmosphere. And so, you know, somebody walks up to you that you don't like and extends their hand to shake your hand, you know, you don't just go like this. You know, you give them the handshake. You don't leave them like Biden just up there kind of like, you know, just shaking hands with thin air. You shake their hand. You smile. You don't necessarily need to go out to eat with that person, have a big, long conversation with that person, hang out with that person. How do you avoid that person? But you don't make a scene about it. You don't treat them bad or be rude or tell them off or refuse to just say hi. You know, anybody can just say hi and shake hands to anyone on this planet. And you say, well, that makes me a hypocrite. No, it does not make you a hypocrite to just say hi to somebody. What kind of a hypocrite is that? You know, a hypocrite is somebody who says one thing and does something else, OK? That doesn't make you a hypocrite. What are you saying that's not compatible with what you're doing? OK. In fact, the Bible says, you know, if you salute your brother and only what do you more than others do not in the public. And so, you know, we could pretty much salute whoever we pretty much just say hi to anyone. And it's really not going to hurt us. You know, I mean, let's say and I know this is a situation a lot of people find themselves in in 2022. Let's say I worked at a job where I'm working with just some horrible reprobate, sodomite weirdo or something, right? And I, you know, I mean, I hesitate to ask this question, but, you know, who has people like that at your workplace? You have to see. Yeah. OK. You don't have to raise your hand, but lots of hands are going up. So I mean, that's a situation that's out there, right? So, you know, I've never had to work with someone like that as a coworker, but I have been in situations at my job where I had to deal with customers like that, where I would show up at a Bed, Bath and Beyond or whatever. And you know, you're not going to believe this, but, you know, there are some guys who work at Bed, Bath and Beyond that aren't straight, you know. Now, I will say this. There are also some great people, some great guys that work at Bed, Bath and Beyond because a buddy of mine works there and so forth. So obviously there were times, though, where I showed up and, you know, there's some weirdo sodomite and I would try to avoid these guys. You know, if the manager was some pervert, I would try to get an assistant manager to sign my paperwork or something. One time I showed up at a fire alarm inspection at like Urban Outfitter or something and literally every single employee was a sodomite. So I just, I went for the lesbian to get a signature or whatever because it was just like, you know, it was just like, you know, I couldn't get away from it. I'm not saying that that's better, but it was just more palatable for me to get that signature, but it was just that bad. Okay, so I get that that's the world that we live in, but here's the thing. I didn't just walk in and be like, sign here, you filthy faggot. Okay, because obviously, you know, I'm representing my employer and I'm there on the job. I have to obviously follow some protocols of right business. I can't just sit there and just act like I'm in my own living room with my feet on my own cock. You know, if I'm in my own living room, you know, that's how I'm going to talk, but I'm not going to talk that way when I'm on the job. Does that make me a hypocrite? No, that's me fulfilling the will of my master, of my employer, doing my job to the best of my ability and endeavoring to be at peace with all men. The Bible says we should strive to be at peace with all men. So here's the thing. I'm not going to get together and hang out with these people. I'm not going to have lunch with these people. I'm not going to chat with them in the break room, but you know, I am going to be civil and get through my job, sign here, and then, you know, rub hand sanitizer all over my hands and then light it on fire and you know, whatever I can do and don't do that, okay? I'm kidding, but you know, whatever I could do to just, you know, exfoliate or whatever just to get rid of the germs. But the point is that, you know, I could still be civil and just get through that interaction and do my job. I'm not condoning anything. I'm not being friends with this person. I'm not hanging out with this person. I'm just getting through my job. Well, here's the thing. If I could do that, if Pastor Anderson, you know, the certified leader of a hate group or whatever according to this world, you know, if I can basically get through an interaction in a work context just to basically get from point A to point B in my life and do my job and do what my employer is telling me to do without sinning, but just getting through a situation, you know, I'm pretty sure that you could just get through your interaction with a fellow church member that you don't like or a fellow church member that you, you know, have red flags about or maybe you're wary of that person. Look, you can have red flags about somebody. You can think somebody's bad in your head, but you know where you cross the line is where you just start rudely treating that person publicly, treating that person in a way that is not civil, and here's where you cross the line when you go around telling other people your misgivings about that person. You know, I have a bad feeling about this guy. I have a bad feeling about her. Oh, you're new to the church? Well, let me just warn you about Sister So-and-so. Let me just warn you about Brother So-and-so. I don't want to say too much. I don't want to gossip or anything. I just want to tell you that that person is just, you know, malas kosas, right? Just stay away from that person and they're bad news and I'm not going to say anything else because I don't want to gossip. You just did gossip. You can't just say that. And by the way, when you're not specific, it's even worse because you're basically leaving people to imagine the worst. You know, these vague like, well, he's been into some bad stuff. I'm not going to say what. Let's just say that he's been church disciplined. People are just going to assume the worst possible thing. Their mind is going to be racing. Look, you keep your mouth shut about the person that you don't like, you know, unless you're actually dealing with a real problem. If there's a real problem, then bring that to the leadership so that we can deal with it if it's a real problem. But you know what? If the church decides, no, this person's okay, and you're like, well, I don't think they're okay. Well, then you know what? You go ahead and think that, but you keep that to yourself, and you smile and shake hands. You don't have to be friends with them. You don't have to hang out with them. And look, I've even had people come to me and say, hey, listen, at sowing time, can you please not pair me up with so-and-so, the person, because I have a problem with that person. And you know what I say? Sure. No problem. Because, you know, I'm not trying to just pair people up that don't want to be paired up. Or hey, you know, on the mission strip, don't bunk me with so-and-so in the lodging. Okay. No problem. But, you know, even though we'll help you avoid that person that you want to avoid, you know, we're not going to sit there and put up with you, you know, rebuking them for no reason, mouthing off, you know, treating them poorly, and so forth. But you know what? Here's the thing. You can forgive people and love people and treat people well without being their buddy also or without dating them or marrying them as well. Okay. So you need to separate these things in your mind. But we as Christians have a duty to Jesus Christ to respect his institution here, the local church. Just like I respected my boss enough not to just walk into Bed Bath & Beyond guns-a-blazing, just telling him everything I think about everything, I respected my employer and fulfilled his wishes. You know, you need to respect the owner of Faith Forward Baptist Church, which is Jesus. And you need to respect Jesus, the owner of the company here. He wants his institution to be a peaceful place where there's unity and where people get to get along with one another. And so you've got to be kind. You've got to forgive. So if someone did something horrible to you, but basically, you know, you didn't get your satisfaction, well, then just avoid that person. But you know what? Treat them well for Christ's sake. And let's say someone did you wrong and isn't sorry. If there's any way in your heart that you can just forgive that person and love that person and move on, do it. Just do it. Do it. Because sometimes the pettiest little things people can be upset about for years, for months and years, they just keep thinking about it and just, I'm never going to forgive them. I'm never going to let it go. And they think that that's some kind of a point of pride or something. I will take this bitterness to the grave with me. You know what? That's not Christianity. That's the mentality of this world, OK? Christ teaches us to forgive. Be like Philemon, receive Onesimus, oh, he's wronged you? OK, well, what about times that you wronged Christ? How about that? OK. If Christ forgave that person, why don't you forgive that person? If they're saved, that means they're forgiven by God, so you should be able to forgive that person. Christ forgave you, you should be able to forgive others in the same way. He received you just as you are. We need to receive others just as they are. By the way, I love the song Just As I Am, OK? I just wish that people today in independent fundamental Baptist church would actually listen to the words of that song because that's salvation for you. It's just as I am. It's not first I clean up my life and then I'll be saved. That's garbage. So he says in verse 21, he says, having confidence in thy obedience, this is Paul writing to Philemon, I wrote unto thee, knowing that thou wilt also do more than I say. You know what that tells me? We should do more than what Christ tells us to do. Instead of going to the Bible and trying to figure out the minimum requirement, why don't we do extra? How about that? How about instead of figuring out, well, what is the minimum requirement of forgiveness? Oh, OK, so I only have to forgive if they come to me and they're repented or whatever. OK, well, I'm just going to do the minimum. I don't know about you, I'm going to do more than that. I'm actually going to do some bonus forgiveness, forgiving some people that aren't even sorry, forgiving some people that didn't repent. I'm going to do some bonus forgiveness because I want to be the guy where Jesus looks down and says, well, I know Pastor Anderson's going to do even more than I say. He goes he goes further. Yeah, he does what I tell him to do, but he does a little more to that ought to be the way we look at the word of God. Instead of trying to do the minimum, let's try to be maximum. And then he says in verse 22, but with all prepare me also a lodging for I trust that through your prayers I shall be given unto you. You could even think of that as being symbolic of the second coming of Christ that he's going to return someday, of course. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, Amen. And so all throughout this epistle, there's all kinds of great symbolism about Jesus and our salvation, our relationship with other Christians. And think about this. Why is Paul going to bat for Onesimus in the first place? I mean, does Paul just have a ministry where he just writes letters to masters of servants just telling them forgive your servant and he's just he's just churning. It's like the it's like the faithful word vaccine exemption letter. He's just churning out 300 of them, 500 of them just saying like, hey, you know, you please forgive your servant and just put it on my account. Why is he writing this letter for Onesimus specifically? Is he writing it for everybody? I mean, I guarantee you there are thousands and thousands and thousands of servants running away from their masters. So why is he writing this for Onesimus? Because he knows Onesimus, right? Well here's the thing. The reason why we're saved, the reason why we have an advocate with the Father, the reason why we have Jesus in our corner, the reason why we have Jesus forgiving us and telling others to forgive us and taking our sins upon himself on his account and putting his righteousness on our account and our sins go to his account is because he knows us. He knows us. Now what's interesting about this book of Philemon is that you don't really see a lot in this book about how sorry Onesimus is and how he's been rehabilitated in the prison and how he was such a model prisoner, he's such a great guy. Where do you see Paul in this epistle praising Onesimus as a great guy? You don't really see that, do you? There's not a lot about Onesimus here. It's not like do this because Onesimus is a good guy. Do this because he's so sorry. If you knew how much it hurt him what he did to you, Philemon, you'd do this. No, no, no. Paul's saying do it for my sake. Do it because of me. Do it because I'll pay for it. Do it because you owe to me your own self besides. Do it because I'm Paul the agent. I'm a prisoner of Jesus Christ. I can just tell you to do this. Do it because of me. Folks, we are not saved because of us. We're saved because of Jesus. We're not forgiven because we're so great. We're forgiven because of Jesus. You know it's interesting that if you look at other letters, there are some other letters that have survived from the first century AD. Latin letters written by people like I found one that was written by this guy named Pliny the Younger and he wrote a letter where he's interceding for a runaway slave. So it's kind of interesting the parallel, right? Because Philemon is about a servant who had left his master. So there's a secular example of just a famous Roman who wrote a letter something like this basically writing and saying, hey, receive this guy back and forgive him and let it go. But the colossal difference that I saw from reading that letter and reading this is that it was kind of just going on and on about how he's sorry and he has changed and he's a good guy. Isn't it interesting that we don't see that here? Why do we not see that here? Because God is using this as a picture of salvation. So salvation is not about Onesimus, salvation is about Jesus. So that's why it's all about do this because of Paul, not do this because of Onesimus. Why is Onesimus getting off the hook? Because Paul knows him, not because he's so super sorry and he's such a great guy and he's been rehabilitated. No, it's because Paul knows him. And it's the same thing with us. We're saved because Jesus knows us. We're in the family. Why do we forgive other people? Why do we forgive our fellow Christian? Because they're such an awesome Christian, because they're such a great person, because they're so super incredibly sorry? No, we do it for Christ's sake. We forgive for Jesus' sake and that's what this letter is trying to get across, which is why it doesn't go into great detail about Onesimus. The one thing it says about Onesimus is, well, in time past he was unprofitable to you, but now he's profitable. That's really the only thing you could construe as being something positive about Onesimus. But what that's basically teaching us in the allegory here is that before we're saved, we're unprofitable to the Lord. And we're unprofitable to our fellow man. Without faith, it's impossible to please God, whereas when we get saved, we become profitable. Now we actually have the ability to do something of eternal value for Christ and for our fellow man. So you may be one who feels like a loser this morning, but let me tell you something. If you're saved, you're not a loser. You know, if you're saved, you matter. You're a child of God, God has work for you to do, and you have the ability to be profitable to Christ and to your fellow Christians and to our church, you can be profitable because you're saved. You say, well, I don't know about me, but as long as you're saved, maybe you were unprofitable in the past, but now that you're saved, you can be profitable going forward. You can actually be somebody that God uses in a great way. And so don't be down on yourself, but don't be down on other people either. Oh man, this guy, he's such a wicked past or whatever, but here's the thing, maybe he's unprofitable in the past, but now that he's saved, now he is profitable to the kingdom of God. Now he is profitable to our church, to Christ, to his fellow man. And so Philemon is a beautiful book about our own salvation and it's a great picture of Jesus' substitutionary atonement, but there's also an application for us to apply where we need to turn around and extend forgiveness to our fellow Christian, love our fellow Christian, and not necessarily make it contingent upon what a great person they are, but rather do it in the name of Jesus and do it for Jesus' sake. Why should I forgive so and so? Well, not for their sake, but because you love God. Because you love Jesus, that's why you'll forgive that person. That's why you'll go above and beyond and do more than he says because you love him. You know, if you love the Lord and he tells you to do something, if he tells you to go one mile, you want to go two because you love the Lord. That's why you're going to go that extra mile. God's saying, forgive your fellow Christian. And not only that, when you do so, go the extra mile of forgiveness. Go beyond the basic minimum forgiveness and do more than I say. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this book of Philemon, Lord. I pray that every single person who's here would let these things sink in and become a forgiving person and decide that they want to be exemplified by this Christian virtue of forgiveness. And Lord, help the unforgiving Christians out there, the Christians who love to dredge up the past and bring up ancient history, Lord, about their brother and sister in Christ. Lord, I pray that they would be convicted by this sermon, that they would realize the error of their ways and become a more forgiving, kinder person, Lord. And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.