SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 6/29/2017
9:58 PM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “Introduction”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
Philemon 1:1-3
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.”
I am not sure if I mentioned it or not when we went over
the introduction to this letter, but Philemon was a wealthy member of the
Colossians church, as it meet in his house.
The Greek word for “beloved” is Agapetos
and it is a familiar word of Paul’s from his writings. Fellow worker is from sunegos, and this is a term used by Paul for those who had worked
alongside him for the cause of Christ.
So we see familiar words in Paul’s introduction to this letter. We mentioned when we were studying the book
of Colossians that Paul never was at the Colossian church so this means that he
and Philemon must have meet in Ephesus.
As we get into what this letter is about and we have looked at words
like slavery, and also forgiveness we will see that Paul is putting his friend
on the line for the sake of the spiritual principle of forgiveness and also
reconciling Philemon with his slave Onesimus.
As I have been studying for some time now the 17th chapter of
John which truly could be called the “love chapter,” as we see Christ
demonstrating exactly what love is throughout this chapter. Jesus went to the cross in order to forgive
us because He loved, and still loves us, and yet it is difficult at times for
us to forgive someone of something that is actually small. My friends this should not be!
We see that the letter is also addressed to Apphia, who
was probably Philemon’s wife, and to Archippus who may have been their
son. He then describes Archippus as a
fellow soldier, and in 2 Timothy Paul describes Timothy as a fellow
soldier.
Next we look at the fact that Paul also addressed the
church that was in Philemon’s house as in the first century it was common for
churches to meet in houses as it is still in some countries, especially those
where persecution is found. It was not
until the third century that churches began to meet in their own buildings.
Next we look at another standard part of Paul’s
introduction “Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ.” John MacArthur concludes by
writing “Grace is the means of salvation, peace its result. The linking of God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ as joint sources of grace and peace would be blasphemous if Jesus
were a mere man or angel. That phrase is
to be understood as an affirmation of the deity of Christ, His equality with
God.” It is too bad that many people in
this world do not see this truth as it is made clear in the Word of God in many
places. 6/29/2017 10:19 PM
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