BIBLICAL MESSAGES & HYMNS: PAUL'S LETTER TO PHILEMON - (with Video, Photos, Map, Dictionaries & Notes on Philemon by Dr. Thomas L. Constable)

sábado, 19 de março de 2016

PAUL'S LETTER TO PHILEMON - (with Video, Photos, Map, Dictionaries & Notes on Philemon by Dr. Thomas L. Constable)

I. Philemon

1.1 Colossae

colossae photo: Colossae colossaeview.jpg

Photos of Colossae

http://www.bibleplaces.com/colossae.htm

1.2 Philemon

an inhabitant of Colosse, and apparently a person of some note among the citizens (Col. 4:9; Philemon 1:2)

He was brought to a knowledge of the gospel through the instrumentality of Paul (19), and held a prominent place in the Christian community for his piety and beneficence (4-7).

He is called in the epistle a “fellow-laborer,” and therefore probably held some office in the church at Colosse; at all events, the title denotes that he took part in the work of spreading a knowledge of the gospel.

II. Onesimus

2.1 Onesimus

Meaning: useful

a slave who, after robbing his master Philemon (q.v.) at Colosse, fled to Rome, where he was converted by the apostle Paul, who sent him back to his master with the epistle which bears his name

In it he beseeches Philemon to receive his slave as a “faithful and beloved brother.” Paul offers to pay to Philemon anything his slave had taken, and to bear the wrong he had done him. He was accompanied on his return by Tychicus, the bearer of the Epistle to the Colossians (Philemon 1:16, 18).

The story of this fugitive Colossian slave is a remarkable evidence of the freedom of access to the prisoner which was granted to all, and “a beautiful illustration both of the character of St. Paul and the transfiguring power and righteous principles of the gospel.”