PT-2 Intro to Philemon 1:1-7

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/27/2017 10:11 PM

My Worship Time                                                                  Focus:  PT-2 Intro to Philemon 1:1-7

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                   Reference:  Philemon 1:1-7

            Message of the verses:  “1 Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our beloved brother and fellow worker, 2  and to Apphia our sister, and to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house: 3  Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 4 I thank my God always, making mention of you in my prayers, 5 because I hear of your love and of the faith which you have toward the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints; 6 and I pray that the fellowship of your faith may become effective through the knowledge of every good thing which is in you for Christ’s sake. 7 For I have come to have much joy and comfort in your love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you, brother.”

            In our last SD we were talking about forgiveness and so we want to finish up that discussion in this SD, and then in our next SD from the letter to Philemon we will be looking at verses 1-3 which is actually the introduction to this letter.

            John MacArthur states that there are 75 different word pictures about forgiveness found in the Word of God and they help us grasp and understand how important the nature, and also the effects of forgiveness.  Now the following is a quote found in the commentary written by John MacArthur that he gets from John Nieder and Thomas Thompson Forgive and Love Again.

·       To forgive is to turn the key, open the cell door, and let the prisoner walk free.

·       To forgive is to write in large letters across a debt, ‘Nothing owed.’

·       To forgive is to pound the gavel in a courtroom and declare ‘Not guilty!’

·       To forgive is to shoot an arrow so high and so far that it can never be found again.

·       To forgive is to bundle up all the garbage and trash and dispose of it, leaving the house clean and fresh.

·       To forgive is to loose the moorings of a ship and release it to the open sea.

·       To forgive is to grant a full pardon to a condemned criminal.

·       To forgive is to relax a stranglehold on a wrestling opponent.

·       To forgive is to sandblast a wall of graffiti, leaving it looking new again.

·       To forgive is to smash a clay pot into a thousand pieces so it can never be pieced together again.

John MacArthur concludes this introduction by writing “Forgiveness is so important that the Holy Spirit devoted an entire book of the Bible to it.  In the brief book of Philemon, the spiritual duty to forgive emphasized, but not in principle, parable, or word picture.  Through a real life situation involving two people dear to him, Paul teaches the importance of forgiving others.  Following the introduction in verses 1-3, Paul describes the spiritual character of one who forgives in verses 4-7.  Such a person has a concern for the Lord, a concern for people , a concern for fellowship, a concern for knowledge, a concern for glory, and a concern to be a blessing.” 

6/27/2017 10:29 PM