Devotional Meditations :: Philemon 18

 

Philemon is a strange book isn’t it? All it is is a personal letter from Paul to his friend Philemon. In it Paul is requesting that Philemon will accept his former slave Onesimus. There doesn’t appear to be much application for us modern day Americans. None the less, I began reading this book a few days ago because it was on my reading plan. I found Philemon 18 to be an amazing challenge!


Onesimus was once Philemon’s slave. He apparently was not a very good slave because Philemon 11 says that Onesimus was once useless to Philemon. Then Onesimus ran away, met Paul (probably in Rome), became a Christian, and is now going back to Philemon. According to the law Philemon was actually able to kill Onesimus for running away. Even with all that background, Paul still told Philemon to charge all of it to his own account! Paul’s life was all about the gospel. It was so much a part of him that he played it out in his actions. He wanted Philemon to charge Onesimus’ wrongs to his own account so that Onesimus could be viewed as blameless. It is a perfect illustration of what Jesus did for all of us!

That is the kind of life that each one of us needs to be living. It is the kind of life that I strive for. Our thoughts and our lives should be so centered on the gospel that it comes out in the things that we do. When that happens people will be able to simply look at our lives and see a direct reflection of Jesus and the gospel.

Testifying to the gospel of the grace of God,
Robbie
Acts 20:24