The epistle to Philemon is the shortest of all the canonical letters of Paul. Conjoining Timothy with him in the salutation, as he had done to that addressed to all the Colossian saints, he here addresses, in company with Philemon and Apphia his wife, Archippus, a labourer in the Word, and the Church in Philemon’s house, sending the letter, not by Tychicus, but most likely by the one who was most deeply and personally interested in its contents.
Onesimus, who was Philemon’s fugitive slave, had been brought in the providence of God across the path of the apostle of the Gentiles during the latter’s imprisonment at Rome. (Philemon 1 v. 10) Converted through his instrumentality he would learn that his earthly master at Colosse was known to Paul, and owed his salvation under God to the same gospel, and to the same human agency. Paul was the father in the faith of both Philemon and Onesimus (v. 19), though how and when the apostle had met with Philemon we know not; for Colosse, in which the latter lived, was a town in which the former had never worked.
Onesimus, once a child of wrath, and walking according to the course of this world,...was such no longer. He was a child of God, set free from the slavery of sin..., enjoying redemption by blood; but he was Philemon’s slave still. Conversion does not necessarily change the social condition. Of this fact some at Colosse must have been continually, and perhaps painfully, reminded. (Col. 3:22-25.) Manumission because of his conversion no slave could demand, even of a Christian master. On this point the apostle is most clear, both in writing to Timothy and in this short letter to Philemon.
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Author: Christian’s Friend & Instructor
Keywords: Epistle of Philemon, Letter to Philemon, Onesimus, Philemon, Archippus, Apphia, Slavery, Runaway slave, Runaway servant, Bond slave, Bond servant
Bible reference(s): Philemon 1
Source: C. E. Stuart, The Christian’s Friend and Instructor magazine, 1882.
Page indexed by: inWORD Bible Software.