Peter Barnes | Philemon 8-14
SERMON NOTES
DOING GOOD FROM THE HEART
(Philemon 8-14)
1. Loving Obedience is greater than duty.
– vv.8-10, 14; Paul could command (see 1 Cor.14:37; Gal.1:8); but preferred not to (see 1 Cor.7:35; 10:15; 2 Cor.1:24; 8:8, 19; 9:7); does not simply appeal to Deut.23:15-16 which probably refers to foreign slaves
– duty is still vital; C. S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters where the devils say: ‘Our cause is never more in danger than when a human being, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do [God’s] will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.
2. Christ transforms believers.
– vv.10-11; see Gal.4:19
– Onesimus is now useful
3. Do what is right over what is expedient.
– vv.9-10; Paul cleverly tugs at Philemon’s heart strings; but see vv.12-14; it could have cost Paul to say this (Ps.15:2-4)
– Martin Niemöller used to cite: One man will ask, “What comes of it?”/Another, “What is right?”/And this is what distinguishes/ The vassal from the knight.