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Introduction
Humans are wired for relationships with other people.
Some people seem to be friends with everyone and have at least some type of connection with an enormous amount of people, while others may only have one friend or spouse with whom they forge a deep, rich relationship.
But, nonetheless, we’re all built for relationships.
If you think about it, it’s even something that God himself tells us when in the Garden of Eden who looked to Adam, having been made in his image, and said, “It is not good for man to be alone.”
And so, this desire for relationships is hardwired into us, and over the course of our lives we spend an enormous amount of energy and thought and worry and time and money pursuing meaningful relationships.
Here’s the thing about relationships though: Our relationships with others bring to us a joy that we can’t find anywhere else, and at the same time, our relationships bring to us pain and sorrow that rock us to our very core.
And, such is the case with our relationships with one another in the church.
Nothing brings unity and passion and joy in a church like friendships and authentic relationships.
And, nothing can bring sorrow and division and ineffectiveness into a church like unhealthy and unforgiving relationships with each other.
So, this morning, I want us to turn to a small book that many of you may have forgotten was even in your Bibles — Philemon — so that we can see how the Gospel is intended to shape our relationships with each other.
God’s Word
Read Philemon
Fellowship Isn’t Fried Chicken
Eugene Peterson says that the “Love of God affects daily relationships.”
And, there is perhaps no place in the whole Bible where this is better demonstrated than in Paul's letter to Philemon.
Paul is writing this somewhat unprecedented letter to a close friend, and he’s writing on behalf of another close friend.
The purpose of addressing Philemon about an issue that was both socially complex and personally painful for him.
Philemon was an apparently wealthy man.
In a day in which is was common for a family to live in a single room, he had a house that was large enough to house his church.
He had what must’ve been a large estate and had slaves and servants that worked for him in the management of his estate.
And, one of those slaves, Onesimus, had caused him a great deal of frustration and had ultimately robbed him and rebelled against him.
And so, Paul writes to him for the purpose of calling Philemon to handle this painful and socially complex situation in a way that demonstrated Christ and the gospel and the transformation that had taken place as a result.
“the sharing of your faith” The central theme of this letter is the nature of Christian fellowship.
I say that because the greek word (koinonia) for fellowship is found twice in our passage, once in verse 6 translated in the ESV as ‘sharing’ and once in verse 17 as ‘partner.’
So, verse 6 could be translated rightly as saying “I pray that the fellowshipping of your faith may become effective,” and verse 17 could be translated as “Consider our fellowship, and receive him with the same fellowship.”
We baptists have diluted the word fellowship that we’ve lost its real meaning.
We have fellowship halls and fellowship meals and fellowship ice cream and always with a serving of fellowship fried chicken, and so probably, when I say the word fellowship some of y’all have Pavlovian response and begin having sudden urges for a bucket of KFC.
But, NT fellowship isn’t fried chicken!
It isn’t a hall in the church where you have an occasional meal.
It isn’t the ten minutes before Sunday school where you cut up the breakfast casserole.
All of those things are fine, but they aren’t true, Christian fellowship.
True, NT, Christian fellowship is sharing your faith with each.
It’s partnering in faith to live for Christ, day in an day out, with one another.
It’s a sharing of all that life has to offer: your home, your belongings, your time, your love, your struggles, your car, your kids, your responsibilities and burdens.
Fellowship isn’t something that’s scheduled within the church; Fellowship is the essence of the church.
Fellowship is the mortar that God uses to hold us living stones together with each other as we seek to grow in Christ together.
If there is no fellowship, there is no church, for fellowship is the essential nature of our relationships with each other.
TRANSITION: There are three significant relationships in the letter to Philemon that serve to teach us about the nature of our fellowship with one another.
Paul’s relationship with Philemon.
“To Philemon our beloved fellow worker” The first relationship I want us to look at is the relationship between Paul and Philemon.
Paul is writing this letter from a Roman prison, and as he writes these words wearing chains for Christ, he addresses Philemon as his beloved co-laborer.
In other words as Paul thinks about Philemon, he begins to think: “I’m not in this alone!
I have fellow servants of Christ that love me!
I have a co-laborer that is in this with me.
I have Philemon!”
“For I have derived much joy and comfort from your love” And so, what you see as you listen in on Paul’s words to Philemon is that they had a joyful friendship.
They had a friendship that left them both encouraged and happy and closer to the Lord.
It appears that according to what Paul writes in verse 19 that he had been the one to lead Philemon to Jesus and that from that day forward a friendship had been forged between the two men.
As verse 17 says, they had become partners in the cause of Jesus.
They had shared their lives with one another and now they had a friendship that from which Paul says he could ‘derive much joy.’
Refreshing Joy
“because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you” It appears that Philemon likely had the spiritual gift of encouragement.
In verse 7, Paul says that what causes him to praise God most for Philemon was the way that he refreshed and encouraged the other Christians that he met.
In fact, in verse 20, Paul appeals to Philemon’s refreshing, encouraging, joyful reputation and says, “I know that you will do what I’m asking and so ‘refresh my heart.’
APPLICATION: Joy in the life of the church is found largely in our friendships with one another.
We are to befriend one another as co-laborers for Christ so that we might encourage one another until Christ returns.
Our friendships with each other are to be filled with refreshing joy.
The world may dampen my spirit, but my friends in the church will lift it again.
I struggle with sin and unfaithfulness in my walk with Christ, and then I get around my brothers and sisters at the church, and my heart is set on fire for Christ again.
We are to bring refreshing joy into each others’ lives.
Are you that kind of friend?
Are you the kind of friend the fuels the joy of others?
Are you the kind of friend that refreshes the hearts of those you love?
Do you stand out as an encourager in a world filled with discouragement?
An Atmosphere of Friendship
“Yet for love’s sake I prefer to appeal to you” Now, what’s extraordinary about Paul’s relationships with Philemon is the way that he broaches the difficult subject at hand.
Paul as an apostle of Jesus Christ.
When he spoke on issues within the church, he spoke with an apostolic authority that carried with it an irrevocable demand.
And, Paul has not been shy about using it when necessary on a number of occasions.
But, with Philemon, he lays that down.
He says, “I could come to you in my apostolic authority, but I’m going come to you as a friend instead because I know your heart and I know your desire is to please Christ and I know already how you will want to respond to my request.
So, he doesn’t demand by apostolic authority that Philemon accept back Onesimus; he appeals instead to his friend’s loving nature and generous character.
He even says to Philemon, “I’m confident in your obedience, and I know you will treat Onesimus with an even greater kindness than I am requesting.”
APPLICATION: Oh, if we would only learn to approach each other this way!
Man, if this gets turned loose within our church and our families and our friendships, we’re going to have something big around here.
You see, because Paul and Philemon friendship with one another created a healthy atmosphere for this conversation: 1) Philemon had shown himself to be someone who was kind, generous, and forgiving.
He refreshed those that were around him, and so he had a reputation for responding in a godly, Spirit-filled way.
So, to approach Philemon wasn’t confrontational and dramatic, fearing he might fly off the handle.
2) Paul believed the best about Philemon and gave him the benefit of the doubt.
You can tell a lot about a man by the way he wields authority, and we learn a lot about what kind of friend Paul is here.
His full expectation is that his friend will do the right and godly thing.
He believes the best about him and so he approaches him accordingly.
Brothers and sisters, this is the kind of atmosphere I want us to seek here.
There is no place for skepticism and suspicion in the church.
That’s the opposite of grace!
No, we must build an atmosphere of refreshing friendship so that others know that we are approachable and patient on one hand and that we will give them the benefit of the doubt on the other.
Paul’s relationship with Onesimus.
“I appeal to you for my child, Onesimus” The second relationship that I want us to look at is Paul’s relationships with Onesimus.
Now, the fact that Paul is writing this letter in the presence of Onesimus is remarkable in and of itself.
Philemon and Onesimus were from Colossae, and Paul was in Rome and in prison.
So, not only had Onesimus managed to make it 1300 miles from Colossae to Rome, but he had managed to come into contact with Paul in a city of 5 million people, who was in a prison there!
But, we know by reading this letter that it wasn’t a meeting of chance but a divine appointment, for Paul leads this wondering slave to freedom in Jesus.
And so, Paul calls Onesimus his son in the faith.
Paul was his spiritual parent.
In fact, Paul was the spiritual father to both Philemon and Onesimus, and so we see the responsibility that Paul feels toward both of them by his working as mediator between them.
Spiritual parents take ownership of their disciples.
“I’m sending him back to you, sending my very heart.”
When Paul talks about Onesimus, he says to Philemon, “I’m sending you my very heart when I send him to you!”
In other words, I am sending you one that I love with everything that I have, and my joy will directly proportional to how well he is treated.
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