How should I say it? He's beginning
to unwind the Pharisees' teachings that they've been teaching. We
know that there was 400 years from Malachi till John the Baptist
came. So there was 400 years. And I think even before that,
because whenever Israel came out of captivity
in Babylon that last time, Babylon and Egypt, that last time. They
brought with them all the idolatry of the people. That's where the
Pharisees came up with a lot of their traditions. Whenever
you hear Jesus talk about you say this but I tell you this
or whenever you hear Jesus say you know that you've done this
by the traditions of men well that's what he was referring
to is these Pharisees and these lawyers and scribes and religious
leaders have taken from that idolatrous worship of the cabal
and the veil worshipers and all those
and have brought that into the worship and unbrave, that's the
word I was looking for. The Lord's beginning to unbrave
the doctrine of the Pharisees and one of the things that he's
starting to do here is this issue of the law and the Sabbath and
particularly here the fact that the It says here, but the days
will come when the bridegroom shall be taken away. And no man
also seweth a piece of new cloth on an old garment, else the new
piece that filled it up taketh away from the old, and the rent
is made worse. This is an allusion to if you
have a rip in your clothes, and you take some new fabric and
you sew that in there, Well, what's going to happen whenever
that new fabric is washed? It's going to shrink, right?
Well, as it begins to shrink, it's going to pull loose from
the old fabric that's already been washed and has already shrunk,
and it's going to pull that loose, and it's just going to say it's
going to be worse than it was before. Well, Jesus here is basically
telling them, if you take these old traditions of the fathers,
if you're taking these traditions that these men are teaching you,
and you try to incorporate that into the new covenant teachings
that I'm teaching you and everything, it's going to be worth it. As
a matter of fact, Jesus at another time said, if the blind lead
the blind, they're both going to wind up in the ditch. And
that he said that, you know, you encompass all the world to
make a proselyte. Whenever you make that proselyte,
you make him a twofold child of hell. That's what Jesus is
talking about. He said, you're coming in here
teaching on these things. That's what the Judaizers was
doing in Galatia. That is preaching the law and
the traditions of men along with grace. And you can't have that.
We talked about that last week, I believe it was. It's black
or white. It's either grace or it's not.
It works. And so Jesus is saying, you can't
do that. And they give also the illusion of putting new wine
in the old bottles. And of course, back then, they
used goat skins or animal skins to make a bottle. You've probably
all seen it. If you watch the westerns and
old adventure shows, you know, the old wilderness men, they'll
have their little canteens made out of skin, you know, and those
skins will dry out and get hard. Well, if you put new wine in
there, as that wine begins to ferment and begins to age and
oxidize, It's going to expand, it's going to bust that thing.
It's basically saying you can't put new wine, you can't put,
you can't mix the new covenant with the old covenant. And so
they begin to now start talking about the Sabbath day. Jesus
is saying, listen, these things wasn't made, man wasn't made for the Sabbath,
the Sabbath was made for man. So Jesus began to upbraid the
old covenant teaching and the old covenant laws, especially
as they were sullied by the religious leaders
and their veiled worship that they brought into it. All right,
we'll pick up with chapter three then next week, and let's see. We may read just the whole chapter
next week, All right. You ready? Oh, okay. Turn with
me if you would this morning to Philemon. Philemon? Is he from Jamaica? Philemon? No. Philemon. I don't feel for sure. The Epistle of Philemon, if you
would, we're going to look this up. See what the Lord has for us
this morning in this. Sometimes as I come into the
stand, I come and the Lord's really laid a lot of things upon
my heart and mind and kind of had a direction to go. Some mornings
he doesn't do that. Like I mentioned a while ago,
this is one of those mornings But one thing that did stick
out in my mind a little bit about this passage of scripture is just the kindness that Paul treats
Onesimus here, the way that he speaks of Philemon, the way that
he entreats Philemon to receive Onesimus. If you remember, I
don't know if you guys remember or not, some of y'all may, younger
folks may not even know, but Philemon was a was a believer
that came to know the Lord through the ministry of the Apostle Paul.
A lot of times in scripture, they will use the illusion of
a father and a son that, you know, I've begotten you as a
son. Not that he brought him to life or that Paul imparted
life to these men by his preaching or anything like that. It's just
that he brought him forth. The word begat means to bring
forth or to bring about. So he brought about the conversion
of Philemon under his ministry. So the Lord had granted Philemon
faith, granted him to believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ. He
became a disciple of the Lord and a follower of Christ Jesus. and became one who was helping
in the ministry with the Apostle Paul. And Onesimus, who we'll
read about here, Onesimus was, from what we can perceive from
the scriptures, Onesimus was a servant of Philemon. And he
had run away or escaped from Philemon, but in doing so, had
also come and was converted under the ministry of the Apostle Paul
and became a servant of the Apostle Paul in the fact of the ministry. Now, when this man was a servant
as far as a slave, he was his, you know, he was his worker. But to Paul, he was his servant
in the Lord. He was there helping in the ministry.
And so, just so you kind of know the characters that we're looking
at here, the Apostle Paul, who is in prison, and writing this
letter to Philemon in prison is encouraging Philemon to receive
Onesimus back to himself and, you know, not be harsh with him
or anything like that because he is now a brother in Christ. And this really just kind of
come to my mind earlier this morning as I was thinking when
he was overseeing Brother Ed last night at the hospital and
just thinking about all the years together and the things that
we've discussed and the things that we've gone through in our
lives, thinking about all of us here, all the things that
we've gone through and the things that we've had. And just in ministry
for myself, this is the first church I've ever actually pastored. I was associate pastor in a Southern
Baptist church, but I don't count that and everything for anything. As far as a pastor, this is the
first time I've ever pastored anywhere and the only place I've
ever pastored and Just all the things that take
place in the life of a Christian and The way the Lord works in
everybody's lives as he brings us through troubles and trials
and tribulations through hardships and through relationships. There
are relationships that are formed and bonds that are made, but
later somehow the Lord, in his providence and in his sovereign
wisdom, may break those bonds and may break those relationships. Friends that were once really
good friends may not be friends anymore, or not at least as well
acquainted as they used to be. There may be disagreements we
know there was disagreements uh... with some of the apostles
uh... was a demis uh... who was uh... an issue between uh... paul and
uh... silas or paul and barnabas and
everything there was some some rub there between them but looking
at this i just think to myself how gracious the lord is to give
us Brethren in the faith that encourages us and that that is
there for us and and the experiences of grace that we are able to
see from the Lord Jesus Christ that he does through his brother
and So let's read through let's read through here Fleeman is
only one chapter and I'm going to read through the whole chapter
here And then we'll kind of go back and touch on a few things
here that the Lord is pleased to tell us to do that. It says,
Paul, a prisoner of Jesus Christ, and Timothy, our brother, unto
Philemon, our dearly beloved and fellow laborer. So Paul is
the prisoner, and Timothy is the prisoner, and they are riding
from the prison back to Philemon. I think you'll find that Onesimus
is the one who is doing the riding, for Paul, but anyway, it's Paul
addressing this letter to Philemon, who is his, what would we, he
would say his son in Christ, or his begotten in Christ, the
one that he had ministered to as the Lord brought him to faith.
It says, and to our beloved Aphia and Archippus, our fellow soldier,
and to the church in thy So he's writing this not only to Philemon,
but also to those in the church and the house of Archippus. He
says, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. This is a common introduction for Paul greeting.
He always starts with grace to you and peace from God our Father. and the Lord Jesus Christ. And
a lot of times we just kind of skip over that. It's just an
introduction. But whenever Paul writes this,
remember he's writing by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
Paul is saying that the ones that he is writing to has been
given grace and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ. God, through Christ Jesus, has granted them grace and peace
so that they are fellow laborers, fellow brothers and sisters in
Christ Jesus in this gospel that he is writing about, that he
has been spreading, that he has been sharing, that he has handed
down to them. And now they, as a church, are
meeting together and fellowshipping around this gospel and proclaiming
this gospel, contending for the faith, experiencing all the trials
of life that come from standing in the Word of God Paul is saying,
you are our fellow believers and you have been given grace
and peace through the Lord Jesus Christ. But notice here in verse
four, Paul says this, he says, I thank my God, making mention
of thee always in my prayers, hearing of thy love and faith
which thou hast towards the Lord Jesus Christ, or excuse me, the
Lord Jesus, and toward all saints. So Paul here is expressing his
thankfulness that Philemon, who he's writing this letter to,
has exhibited a love and a devotion and a faith towards God and towards
the brethren. Now, that kind of reminds you
of some other verses in the Bible, right? You shall know them by
their love, right? The Bible says that all the law
and the prophet hangs on two things. Love the Lord your God
with all your heart, mind, and soul, and love the brethren.
Love your neighbor as yourself. That word neighbor there means
those of the sheepfold. So we are to love one another. We are to love the Lord. We are
to love our brethren. That is where our faith is shown. Our faith is shown in our love
for God and the doctrine of God, ultimately. Whenever we love
God, we're going to love his teachings. Whenever we love God,
we're gonna love the report about him. Whenever we love God, we're
gonna love the things that he says. And then if we love the
brethren, we're gonna love them because they are fellow brothers
and sisters in Christ Jesus, and he has shed his love abroad
in our heart so that we can love them. Now again, it's not a perfect
love because we're in this flesh. We don't perfectly love God.
We don't perfectly love the brethren. but yet God does enable us to
do these in the times of his visitation upon us. It says,
I thank my God, making mention of thee always in my prayers,
hearing of thy love and faith which thou hast towards the Lord
Jesus and towards all the saints. Notice if you would there, he
says, I thank my God about the hearing of thy love
and faith. Why is Paul thanking God for
the actions of Philemon? Well, that's because Paul knows
the Word of God. He's been taught the doctrine
of Christ, that there's nothing that we can do, that all of our
righteousness is a filthy rag. All of our works are dead works. But yet, love towards God and
love towards the brethren that is a divine work that only comes
by God himself. Whenever there are signs or shows
of love towards God or love towards the brethren, that is because
the Lord is working that love in us and through us and outwardly
towards those that we are around. And so Paul goes back to the
source of where this love and faith that is exhibited by Philemon
is rooted in. It's rooted in God. It's wrought
by God. God has wrought this love, has
wrought this work in Philemon to the point where it is noticeable
and seen and because of that, that has brought comfort and
joy to the Apostle Paul. Now, that's kind of one of the
things I was thinking about whenever I was thinking about all of our
relationships together and our life that the Lord has allowed
us to live together with each other and the worship that we
have together and the hardships that the Lord has brought us
all through together and the things like that is whenever
we see the work of God in another brother and sister, how that
speaks peace and grace and it speaks joy and comfort and rest
to our souls. That is a way that the Lord feeds
his sheep and how he comforts his child is by the interaction
that they have with the brethren and the grace that the Lord Jesus
exhibits in them. So it isn't just as I'm secluded
and it's all by myself. I see myself and what the Lord
does in my life and how the Lord, you know, I hear it all, you
know, all the time, you know, everybody talking about, I have
a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's
not a religion, it's a relationship, which, you know, I'm not in total
disagreement with any of that stuff, and we do have a personal
relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, because we are his child,
we are his seed, I'm his offspring, spiritually. So I do have a personal
relationship, we call it the eternal vital union with Jesus
Christ. But brethren, it's not just about
me and my little life with Jesus, because Jesus has given us the
fellowship of the brethren. See, we can seclude ourselves
and truly we can read the Bible and we don't need any man to
teach us. We have the Holy Spirit to teach us. But yet He has given
us the gift and the blessing and the wonderful opportunity
to come and be a part of a local fellowship and to be able to
speak with and to fellowship and to interact with other children
of God whose experiences of grace may differ with ours. And because
of that experience, we too can fellowship and worship and rejoice
in the things that God has done. You know, Larry's experience
of Christ and my experience of Christ We may have similar things. We may go through the same thing.
Matter of fact, a lot of times whenever I'm talking with believers
in the sovereign grace, a lot of us has come the same way.
We began in some other church or some other organization that
preaches a false gospel, and the Lord, at some point, began
to give us faith and to see the true gospel and moved us out,
and then he began to teach us and grow us in the grace and
knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. And we've all kind of come similar
to that same way. Now, some has come always under
this gospel. You know, some of them has come
from not being under anything. And then all of a sudden, the
Lord just snapped them out of nowhere, like he did Abraham
out of the earth, the Cowleys, you know, just out of nowhere.
They've not had any religious experience, no church experience,
no Bible knowledge, no nothing. And all of a sudden, they felt
a desire that I need to know the Lord. I need to come find
out what he's about. You know, I've told you the story
of, you know, one of our brothers that used to be here. how he
said, you know, I never had any interest in God or anything.
And then all of a sudden I felt that I needed to get to know
God. And if I did, then the only place I know to see him is in
the Bible. He said, so he went and bought a Bible and began
to read it. He said, I didn't know nothing about it. I just
started reading the Bible. And he said, as I began to read
it and study it, I began to see there was a great emphasis that
the Lord put on the gathering of the saints together. And he
said, if, you know, if this God is real, and he's put his word
and his message, his ministry there, then I probably ought
to find some people that believe that and join up with them and
experience this stuff with them. And he did. And so where did
that come from? Out of nowhere. Well, the Lord
does that. He changes our hearts. And so
here we see our experiences of grace sometimes may differ But
sometimes it may be the same. And whether it's different or
whether it's the same, we find comfort with each other in that.
When I hear of what the Lord has done in your life, it encourages
me to see the work of God in your life and your enjoyment
of it, your receiving of it, your acknowledging of it. Man,
sometimes when we go through life and the Lord has done all
this work, is doing all this work in our life, And sometimes
we don't even realize it. We don't even recognize it. We're
just kind of going about the day, getting from hour to hour,
day to day, month to month, year to year, just going through life.
And a lot of times we're missing everything that the Lord's bringing
us from. But sometimes the Lord puts it in our mind to slow down
a little bit, to think about a little bit of stuff, to meditate
upon a little of that. I'm not talking about New Age
meditation. I'm talking about stopping and
just thinking over and considering the things of life and the things
that God has done for us, whenever we do that we begin to notice
the things that God has done for us. What we've overlooked
and maybe even neglected in giving Him thanks and glory for. Now
that too is the work of God in us. He's exercising faith and
the lack thereof for His purposes and for our learning and for
our growing. Here we see Paul was deeply moved
by the life of Philemon. So that tells me, brethren, that
our lives directly affect the lives of others. I know Larry
can attest to this. I surely don't mean it to brag
on him or me or anybody else that had these situations, but
a lot of times whenever you preach on social media or you put up
You get people that write in and send you messages and, you
know, pat you on the back about how good a job you've done or
how much they've been blessed or whatever and everything. And
really, you don't realize that. You know, whenever I'm standing
here today doing this, I'm not even thinking about, you know,
Germany or, you know, Lithuania or wherever in the world. Until
I sit down sometimes and I'm putting our sermons up on sermon.org
and I happen to see, oh, wow, man, there was like five people
listening over here and 10 people listening over here and all like
that. Or somebody sends a message and says, hey, I was listening
to this and it really spoke to my heart and blah, blah, blah.
See, we don't really realize that. A lot of times we don't
realize how the Lord is using our life to effect and comfort
and encourage the lives of others. I also think, and I say I think,
this is my opinion, I think that we ought to encourage one another.
Now, not to bolster their pride or not to tell them, a lot of
times, we as sovereign grace believers, and especially as
predestinarians, we get so rigid in, well, the Lord is predestined,
it's gonna happen exactly the way the Lord does it, everything's
lined out, nothing's gonna fall out of place, everything's in
order as it does, and debase man, glorify God. And so we do
that in such a harsh way that a lot of times we come across
as so cold and uncaring and unloving. And again, that too is the work
of God in our lives. And so I'm not saying that this
is something to try to work up on your own. I'm just telling
you the facts, just like the Bible does. I'm telling them
what we are, what we are by nature and what we are by the children
of grace. and how God functions and how God works in these circumstances
so that you can maybe see that and maybe it encourages you a
little bit. But a lot of times we need encouragement. There are brethren that are going
through things that we don't know about. See, not everybody
wears all their stuff on the sleeve. You know, there's some
of us that we're open like a book. We tell everything that's going
on. We tell everything that's bothered us. You know, we may
be sensitive, and everything little things sets us off. But
there are some that don't. They're very reserved. They don't
speak what's going on. But there may be a lot of turmoil
that's going on in them. And we don't know that. We don't
know where they're at. And so a lot of times we come
across as crass, and we think it's funny. You know, I'm a sarcastic
person. I've passed that down to my kids. You know, we're sarcastic people.
You know, we deal a lot of times We deal with embarrassing times,
awkward times. We deal with that with humor,
sarcasm, a lot of times. Not only to cover our weakness,
but we do that because that's how we show our love to everybody
else. Sometimes I'm sarcastic to somebody.
because I feel comfortable with them, and it's to let them know,
hey, I'm with you, I love you, blah, blah, blah, this ain't
no big thing, you know, I'm with you. You know, but sometimes
it's not perceived that way, okay? It's not perceived that
way. You gotta know and have, well,
Paul here, he's saying, listen, I'm looking at the life of Philemon,
and the life of Philemon is having an impact on those that are around
him, and that impact is showing love for God, love for the brethren,
and he's doing that through the faith that God has given him.
He's not doing that by pulling himself up. So the whole entire
glory is going to the Lord Jesus Christ, but he's not neglecting
the acknowledgement of the work of God in Fleming. So a lot of
times we have these that are so puffed up in righteousness,
that they can't have any room to tell the brother I love you
and you've ministered to me or you've helped me or express our
need for comfort from them. Well, I would never let anybody
know that because I'm a pastor of a church. I'm supposed to
be the spiritual leader. How can I express my need for
somebody else? See, that's the kind of mindset
that we can get into. But here is the Apostle Paul. bearing his heart that Philemon
is exhibiting something that God is working in him, that is
reaching into Paul and giving Paul some consolation, giving
Paul some comfort, some joy and enrichment, that it brings Paul
to glorify God. See, whenever we do these things,
and right off the top of my head there's another church that Paul
wrote to, that whenever he's seen their deal, it was to the
glory of God and cause other people to glorify God. I think
it was maybe the Macedonians or something like that, but I
can't remember. And that whenever he's seen that, it caused them
to glorify God. Their actions, not being glorified,
not glorifying them, but glorifying God because of what God was doing
in them. So God receives glory a lot of times from his work
in others that he allows us to see. He says, I thank my God, making
mention of you always in my prayer. Hearing of thy love and faith,
which thou hast towards the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints,
that the communication of thy faith may become effectual by
the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ
Jesus. So here again, he's saying, all
this good that's coming out of you, Philemon, is coming out
of you because you're in Christ Jesus. It's Jesus that's at work
in you. It's Jesus that's doing this
in you, so don't get the big head. But I do want you to know
that the work that Christ is doing in you has brought joy
to me and joy to others. It is being seen. And that the
work that is being done in you, don't be discouraged. Listen,
you can easily be discouraged in the ministry of the gospel.
You know, the years of labor, of preaching, and teaching, and
ministering to people, praying over people, praying with people,
going to see them when they're sick, all that sort of stuff.
And you do all that, and then maybe one day, all of a sudden,
you know, you accidentally say something, a little cross to
them, and they throw all that away. You know? We're still in this flesh, and
this flesh still His back biters, this flesh is still haters, quick
to shed blood, always divisive. And so those things are always
going to happen while we're still in this flesh. But whenever the
Lord works in us to see that He can bring out of this flesh,
or I say not out of this flesh, but in this flesh, He can bring
joy and comfort and peace and glory to God by what he works
in the heart of people by subduing their flesh so that the divine
work of love towards the brethren and towards God and the faith
in Christ Jesus and the preaching and the ministry of the gospel
can be seen, that is something that, as Paul says here, is the
communication of that faith, it becomes effectual. It becomes
something that works. It becomes something that actually
takes place. Whenever we see this, it becomes
effectual in our lives. He says, for we have great joy
and consolation in thy love. Seeing your love for Christ,
it brings us joy and consolation. I think of it all the time. I
always remember Brother Jack Duplechain. an old preacher friend
of mine who's gone to be with the Lord. He, whenever we'd go to different
conferences all over the place, wherever he might be and everything,
they would give him a topic to preach on. And it didn't matter
what topic you give him to preach on. He might start out in that
thing, but by the time it was all said and done, he was preaching
on Christ crucified. He was preaching Christ and the
work of Christ, the finished work of Christ, And no matter
what you give him, if he was preaching on eschatology, somehow
it came back and it was preaching that. I mean, he always preached
Christ. And I appreciated that about
him. That his central mind, and he, and a lot of times, they
would try to get him, you know, we'd be sitting around the table
and guys would get entangled in all these conversations about
different things and everything. And he would just tell them,
you know, I don't know about all that stuff. That's way over my head.
All I know is Jesus. You know, all I know is Jesus.
And I appreciate that. That was a consolation to me
to see, here's this man, and he did have great knowledge.
But yet when you've seen him preach, he wasn't an orator like
many. He was a Cajun with a Cajun accent,
and he spoke a lot of times from the cuff. And sometimes he was
pretty crude in his speaking, as far as he talked like a Cajun
man, like you would think. But yet, whenever he got up there
in the pulpit and he began to preach, it was all about Jesus.
And that was something that the Lord impressed upon me about
it doesn't matter about all these academic discussions that are
out there. The main thing that we need to
hear and know is the love of Christ, the love of God in Christ
for his people and the work that was done on our behalf that secured
our salvation. And that right there is the main
issue. And that became a consolation to me. And so here we see, just
like how Brother Duplechain was for me, the great joy and consolation
in his love for Christ and his love for the people. Listen,
he loved those members of his church. And to see that exemplified
brought joy to my heart. Whenever I see other brothers
and their love for their brethren in the church and how they One
of the things about the brethren down in Coahuila, those brethren
love each other. They're looking out for each
other, thinking about each other, making sure each other's okay.
And man, it's just a blessing whenever we see that. I'm thankful
here that we call and check up on each other. We are all the
time praying for each other and encouraging one another. And
it truly is a blessing to be in one of the Lord's churches
and to be a part of what he's doing in the lives of his brethren.
He says, for we have great joy and consolation in thy love,
because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother.
Now that sounds a little strange to us in nowadays language, because
to us, you know, the bowels are not something that we just really
talk about much. But in Bible days, where we would
say my soul or my heart was overjoyed, The bowels was the seat of their
emotion. The heart is the seat of our
emotion. To us, that's just kind of common whenever someone says,
oh, my heart just broke over that. You know, well, your heart
pumping vessel muscle didn't actually break. What are you
talking about? The seat of my emotions was third,
was affected by that. Well, that's what he's talking
about here. He says that the great joy, consolation, and I
love because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by them.
Paul and the brethren there with him was overjoyed and received
consolation to see how the brethren were being, was being refreshed
by the love of Philemon for them. So, brethren, it does really
affect others whenever they see our love for each other. Whenever
people see a church, I remember I told you about that little
church that I preached at there for a little while in between
before I came here. And I was preaching there and
I came, they asked me to preach and they was without a pastor
because they'd had a church split, had a church fight. And they'd
run, some people had run the previous pastor off. And they
were trying to find another pastor, and so I had stepped down from
pastoring that Southern Baptist Church, that associate pastor.
And so I was preaching over there and was traveling up here off
and on whenever I was just filling in the pulpit up here. And if
you remember, I was telling you whenever they asked if I would
consider being their pastor, and I said, yeah, I'd do that. And as we were having discussions,
questions that they asked me when the men met with me is,
you know, if we call you to be the pastor, what is the, you
know, what are you going to do about evangelism or outreach
to the community by bringing others into the church? Well,
a little back story, you know, this church, again, had went
through a split, had a fight. Some of the people didn't like
the pastor that was there before. had threatened his life. I mean,
someone had said, you know, we're going to take you out in the
woods, and all three of us are going to go in, and only two
of us are going to come out. A deacon's wife attacked the
preacher's wife at a school function. There was a fistfight out on
the front lawn between some of the members out there, and it
was reported in the regional paper. Well, anyway, there was this
schism within the church, and it was pretty, I mean, they were
at odds with each other pretty good. And so whenever this guy
asked me that question, what are you gonna do about evangelism
and getting people in the church whenever you become our pastor,
I said, well, the first thing whenever I come here is we're
gonna cease all outreach to the city. we're not going to invite nobody
to come to church here. I said, until the Lord grants
repentance and restoration and reconciliation and restores love
within the brethren here, I'm not going to make any effort
to invite people to this church. I said, we're going to preach,
get in and we're going to preach the gospel. We're going to pray
together that the Lord will restore fellowship here, that he would
make amends among the brethren and that he would restore a right,
a right, attitude towards each other, and until he does that,
why would we go out into the community and say, hey, we love
you, Christ loves you, can you come into the church and all
that kind of stuff, and then bring them into a church where
everybody's fistfighting out on the front lawn, and everybody
in your community knows about this because it was put in the
paper and plastered all over the county, you know? whenever people on the outside
see that kind of stuff, how does that reflect on the Lord Jesus?
But, on the other side, whenever God is working love within the
brethren, and they see the love and the joy that the brethren
have, not only for God, but for each other, that brings a consolation
to each other. It brings a consolation, he says,
Wherefore, though I might be much bold in Christ to enjoin
thee that which is convenient, yet for love's sake I rather
beseech thee, being such a one as Paul the aged, and now also
a prisoner of Christ Jesus." So Paul is saying, while yet
I have the authority as an apostle to say, do this or do this, he
said, I'm not coming that way. I'm coming as a friend, as a
brother in Christ. I'm not coming in the authority
of the apostle Paul. Now there's a little lesson there
for us preachers as well. While the Lord may have given
us the oversight of the congregation whenever it meets together, He
doesn't give us authority over them. He doesn't give us power
over them. He doesn't give me a title that I am to lord over
God's heritage. That's something for us to learn,
that no matter what position that we might hold or the office
that we might whole because that too is by the gift of God. I wasn't actually seeking to
be ever a pastor. Matter of fact, I had a conversation
with my grandpa one time. I told him, I said, I really
don't want to ever be a pastor. I love to preach. I just want
to go to churches, preach, and go walk away. I don't have to
deal with all the other stuff. But my grandpa told me, he said,
well, if the Lord calls you to pastor, he'll give you the heart
to do so. I hope that the Lord has given me that, but here I
am today. Though I might have an office
to do that, though the Apostle Paul had an office to do that
and had some right as the Apostle to lay some things out and how
things should be done among the churches because God had commissioned
him to do so, We as preachers, God has commissioned us with
certain things that the gift that he has given us, how to
carry that out and how to conduct ourselves and how to conduct
the order of the church, doesn't mean that we have the right to
just abuse that at every turn. And expect that, remember, because
we are fellow brethren with everybody else in the church. I'm no different,
I'm in no level above anybody else here. I've just been called
into an office other than other people have done, been. The Lord's
called you to giving you a gift or something, giving another
a gift or something. This is what he has called me
to do. And so for me to lord that over you is wrong because
Paul makes it very clear in Corinthians that we are not to lord those
over, not only to not lord that over the God's heritage, but
that every member has been given a gift and is profitable for
all. So even the very tiniest gift
that God has given you is profitable to the whole. You can't do without
it. We can't do without it. It's integral to our relationship
and to our fellowship that every person works that gift that God
has given them as the Holy Spirit enables it. And so it's important. And so Paul here, a beautiful
picture of Paul coming in humility, not in pride, not in official
capacity saying as the apostle walked out. No, he's coming to
say, while I could do that, I'm not coming as your brother in
Christ and beseeching you on Christ's behalf. And he's imploring
him, he's saying, yet for love's sake, I rather beseech thee,
being such a one as Paul the age, and now also a prisoner
of Christ, I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have
begotten in my bonds. So here again, he's saying, Listen,
I'm beseeching you, bring this Onesimus back. Receive him back
to yourselves as a brother in Christ. He is now a brother in
Christ. He's not just your servant, but he's now a brother in Christ.
If you don't bring him back as your servant, bring him back
at least as a brother in Christ and receive him in such a way.
And, of course, he said he's begotten in my bosom, and while
I've been in prison here, he has been one who has been converted
in this ministry while I've been in bonds here. He says, which
at times past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and
to me. So Paul says, listen, Onesimus
has become one that is profitable to both of us because he is now
a brother in Christ. What does that mean? Why is he
bringing that up? How is he profitable to Paul and to? I mean, how can
someone be profitable to Paul? He's the apostle. probably the
greatest apostle of all the apostles in our eyes. Well, he's integral
because Onesimus also exhibits the love for God and the love
for the brethren. He exhibits the gifts and the
work of God in him that again becomes this thing that encourages
and comforts and others put their rest in God and their worship
in God because of what is being seen. He says, whom I have sent
again, thou therefore receive him. That is my own vows, whom
I would have retained with me, that in thy stead he might have
ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospel. But without thy
mind would I do nothing. So he's saying, I would like
to have, I could have, kept him here, and he could have served
me while I'm in the bonds of the gospel. He could have helped
me in this ministry. Deliver letters, write letters,
Go out and help the people, the churches, you know, as I send
him out to do all this stuff. But he said, I'm not going to
do that without your permission. He's your servant. He belongs
to you. So here again, Paul is taking
a subservient place, even though he's the apostle, he takes a
humility role, a humble role, and he takes a subservient role
to Philemon, on behalf of fleeman and on this list that this relationship
might be restored and that even though fleeman has been a great
comforter of the people if fleeman doesn't bring back on this list
and give forgiveness and reconciliation to fleeman there very possibly
could be a hindrance to fleeman's testimony and witness to others
he's been such a great witness of christ and a source of joy
that others glorified God that now if he doesn't forgive and
he doesn't reconcile and he doesn't bring in Onesimus and treat him
as a brother in Christ that there could be some detriment there
to your witness and to your testimony of Christ Jesus and the love
of Christ Jesus. That's what I was talking about
a while ago with this little church. How in the world can
we preach and testify to the little children of god out there
the love of god the fellowship of the brethren the love for
the brethren whenever we're blackening each other's eyes out on the
front porch i mean how are we going to preach service and humility
with each other serve one another in love how are we going to preach
that whenever we're busting noses and knuckles out on the front
i mean we can't do that how can Philemon continued to be a source
of enjoyment, a source of, I say enjoyment, of joy. How can he
be a source of comfort and congratulations and praise to the Lord whenever
he loves all the brethren, but yet now this man who was his
servant who ran away and has beef with, he won't do. He says, but without thy mind
would I do nothing that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity,
but willingly. For perhaps he therefore departed
for a season that thou shouldest receive him for ever. See, Paul
said, hey, did you ever think about that maybe God had a purpose
in this? Well, we know he did. But he
said, just think about it, Philemon. God had a purpose. Maybe He had
him leave for a season so that you might experience having and
receiving back not only a servant, but a brother in Christ. Someone
that you now have a forever friendship with. See, I didn't just get
my worker back, but I got a worker back that is now a brother in
Christ. And if I retain him as a worker
and he comes back as my employee slave or whatever he was, and
he comes back, guess what? He comes back as a better employee,
a better slave, because now he is a child of God. He is filled
with the Spirit, and now he's going to be working as unto the
Lord. I'm only getting a lot better deal here. I don't mean
that deal as something to make light of anything. Paul's trying
to let him know, hey listen, you receive Him back, you're
going to be receiving back twofold. Not only a servant back to you,
but you're going to be receiving a child of grace that is now
your brother in Christ, who will be working as a child of grace. And so now you have even more
to rejoice about. He says, not now as a servant,
but above a servant, a brother beloved, especially to me, But
how much more unto thee, both in the flesh and in the Lord?
So he's saying, you're gonna receive twofold if you bring
this guy back. He says, if thou count me therefore
a partner, receive him as myself. So Paul is saying, listen, if
you count anything, you know, if you have any respect for me,
any love for me, if you know anything about me, he said, receive
this brother back and receive him just as if you would receive
me if I was coming to you. That's how much Paul has seen
in the life of this Onesimus. And this is how much that Paul
believed the work of God in Philemon to do such a thing. He says,
if he hath wronged thee or owed thee aught, put that to my account.
Paul was even willing to go so far as saying, listen, and if
he owes you anything, just count it to me. I'll make sure that
it's taken care of. He says, I, Paul, have written
it with my own hand. I will repay it, albeit I do
not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides. Yea, brother, let me have joy
of thee in the Lord, refresh my vows in the Lord, or refresh
my soul in the Lord. Having confidence in thy obedience,
I wrote unto thee, knowing that thou wilt also do more than I
say. So see why Paul is entreating
him, beseeching him to do this? Paul has every bit of confidence
in the man that Philemon is, and what the Lord has worked
in Philemon's heart, that Philemon is going to do the right thing.
He says, but withal, prepare me also a lodging, for I trust
that through your prayers I shall be given unto you. There salute
thee Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus, Marcus, Aristocrats,
Demas, Lucas, my fellow laborers, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with your spirit. Amen. So Paul here, again, writing
to Philemon, such a beautiful picture of the work of Christ
and how the effect of that work that Christ does in us affects
others to such a point that we have confidence. I wouldn't have
any problem, you know, sending somebody to Larry and say, listen,
I've seen how Larry does this or does that. Go to Larry. As
a matter of fact, here recently, I've done that. I said, hey,
Larry's got experience in this. The Lord's brought him through
some things. He's came through by grace, through a lot of experiences
in this life. And listen, you really ought
to go and get some advice from him and see what he has done
and let that encourage you. That's how the Lord does it.
And listen, brethren, again, I want to go back. Just because
we believe in predestination and we believe in God sovereignly
working all things and He's controlling all things, we believe that firmly.
But let this be for our understanding and our knowledges, and this
is the attitudes that we ought to set our minds to as the Lord
enables us to do that, to keep our mind on these things for
encouragement, to know how they are. It's the statements of fact,
if you would. of who we are in Christ Jesus
and what it is that the Lord does in the lives of his people
and how he interacts with his people and through his people
to the betterment and the joy of his people. I always go back
to that verse that Jerry Mouw used to always say, he said,
comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Well, you can't comfort each
other if you ain't meeting together and visiting with each other.
You can't comfort each other if you're at odds with each other.
or if there's some sort of strain of some kind between you. No,
you comfort each other because you're both of the same love,
you both have the same mind, and you have both of the same
intent. Our work is here is to glorify
the Lord Jesus Christ and to encourage the brethren. And so,
group picture here this morning. Anybody got anything you'd like
to add to that? I think it's a good picture of
that. And from what I understand, Fleeman
did receive an SMS back to himself, and what a joy to hear that. There's a lot of times that I've
heard of churches splitting or people leaving the church, and
a preacher or a member of the church telling somebody, don't
ever come back to this church ever again. or say, I'm not ever gonna, you
know, I'm not ever doing nothing for that person ever again. It
just breaks my heart to hear that kind of stuff, because our
intent, when somebody goes out from us, is reconciliation, and
that we should love them, and if they, if the Lord is working
their heart to reconcile and to make amends, hey, we're not
to hold that grudge, we're to forgive them and bring them back,
loving arms, and to fellowship with them. and everything, and
that's, I believe, what the Apostle Paul was trying to get across
to Fleeman, that, brother, you're a good brother, but if you would,
make reconciliation with your servant who's now a brother in
Christ, and the joy that brings to the brethren. All right, anybody,
anything? All right. Okay. Remember, Brother Ed Bart,
if you don't, if you get a notion to do so he's in Grove Hospital
in the ICU department. He's stable, but still critical. They said that they don't know
if he'll have another heart issue or not. There seems to be some
blockage in his coronary artery going into his heart, and that's
what kind of caused everything. But we pray for him. Next Saturday, the 30th, 31st. Next Saturday is a, we're
going to have a 5th Saturday Fellowship meeting down at Coahuila
Baptist Church and everybody's invited to come. The preacher
said it's going to start at 10 and it'll go to roughly around
3 o'clock in the afternoon. The church will provide lunch
there and everything. There'll be other churches that'll
be coming and he said he's going to try to that's as many preachers,
preachers that are there if time allows. So a good time of fellowship,
wonderful church. The brethren there are truly,
truly tremendous folks and everything. And I've met the pastor and of
course, you know, the previous pastor and some of the other
pastors that will be there and good brethren. And I'm sure we'll
hear some good messages from the Lord. So if you need to know
addresses or anything like that, whether you've already got them
for me, but anybody listening or watching that might be interested
in coming, just contact me and I'll get you the address and
all the information. We still will have services here
on Sunday as well. Unless we, after Saturday afternoon,
we'll see how everyone, after everyone feels. about an hour
and 45 minute drive over there. So we'll see how everyone feels. And if you don't feel we're gonna
be able to meet, that'd be all right too. All right, let's pray. Father, we thank you for this
day and we thank you for the grace that's in Christ Jesus.
Thank you for the love and the grace and the mercy that you've
shown to us and through us Lord as each and every one of us have
the work of God brought in our hearts. We know that in our flesh
we can do nothing That even the love and the love for the brethren,
the love for you and the love for the brethren, Father, is
not perfect. But whenever you brought that
love in our hearts and it's exemplified and shown, and the other brethren
see it, Lord, we know what a consolation that is, what a comfort and joy
that is. Whenever we see their love for
you and the love for the gospel, it just blesses our heart. And
we're thankful, Lord, for the work that you do in our lives
for that. We thank you for those examples that you have given
us, those ones who encourage us in the faith. Lord, may we
also be given to encourage one another in the faith. I'm thankful
for all these brethren that you've gathered together with us, Lord.
We're thankful for the love and the grace and the mercy that
you've shown to them and that we've experienced together and
the things in life that you've brought us through. Lord, we're
thankful for that. Even the hard times and the bad
times, Lord, we know that they were for your purpose and for
our good, and we rejoice in those things. We rejoice, Lord, not
only on the mountain, but in the valley. We weep with those
who weep, and we pray with those who pray, and we rejoice with
those who rejoice. And so, Father, Lord, we just
pray that you continue to grant us that true fellowship that
comes by the love of the gospel and the Lord Jesus Christ. Thankful
again, Lord, that you have blessed us with salvation, that you called
us as your own. And Lord, we just pray that you'll
keep us safe as we leave this place, be with all the people
through all the flooding that we're experiencing around here. Lord, be with those brethren
that are here today that have to travel back home. Just give
them safety in their drive home. And Father, we just appreciate
all that you've done for us through the Lord Jesus Christ. It's in
his name that we pray.