This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

(upbeat music) - Welcome back for day three of week four of our look to the New
Testament, quick look to the New Testament, a book a day. We're looking at a
very short book today, the Book of Philemon, a one chapter book. It's a book
about how to resolve conflicts because it's a book where Paul writes to Philemon
with whom he was having a conflict.

The book begins, Philemon 1. 1, or just verse one is all I'd have to say 'cause
there's only one chapter. Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our
brother, to Philemon, our dear friend and fellow worker.

We're going to do, in just a few minutes today, an in-depth study of an entire book
of the Bible, which happens to be one of the shortest books of the Bible. The
Book of Philemon is written not to a place, but to a person, Philemon, a friend
of Paul's, probably one to the Lord by Paul, we get some indications. The Book
of Philemon is Paul's shortest letter.

It's only 335 words in the original Greek, and it's his most individual letter.
Even his other letters to people like Timothy or Titus, they were letters to
pastors of churches, about their churches. This is a letter to an individual
about a personal problem.

It's from Paul, the prisoner, while he's in prison in Rome, and it's a letter
about difficult relationships. It's a letter about how to unstick sticky
relationships. Someone has called it rewiring relationships.

It's a letter, you know, sometimes you're going down the freeway and there's a
freeway closure, and you gotta find your way around the barrier, and there's all
these signs on this detour that gets you back on the road and gets you up to
speed again. This is a letter that's filled with all those signs. Turn here and
turn here and do this and do that, and it'll get you back on the road of that
relationship again, up to speed again.

How to resolve conflicts is what this book is all about. Within your marriage,
your family, with people at work, people at church, how to walk through the
minefield of personal communication and not have things blow up in your face.
How do you respond when you're caught in the middle?

'Cause Paul was caught in the middle in this. This is a blueprint for how to
confront someone. You might need to use this today, what we're talking about.

What do you do, five specific things in this book, to get through a difficult
conversation, a difficult situation with someone? First thing you do is you
applaud the positive. That's where he begins.

He doesn't begin with the negative, he applauds the positive. In verse four, I
always thank my God as I remember you in my prayers, because I hear about your
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and your love for all the saints. I pray that you
may be active in sharing your faith so that you will have full understanding of
every good thing we have in Christ.

Your love has given me great joy and encouragement because you brother have
refreshed the hearts of the saints. So he starts very positive, even though he's
going to have some negative things to say. In nature, positives balance negatives.

In fact, it's what keeps things from flying apart that there's both positives
and negatives. So we walk into a situation and we hand a person all the
negatives and we wonder why they fly apart at the seams. It's the natural thing
to do if all you got is the negatives.

If you don't have anything good to say, stop. Until you can figure out something
good to say. Now Paul helps us here.

Two ways to prepare yourself for a confrontation. Some positives. First, you
thank God for them.

Paul spoke of specific reasons why he was thankful for Philemon. I hear of your
faith and love. You've given great joy and encouragement to the saints.

You've refreshed the heart to the saints. So you thank God for them. The second
thing you do is you pray for them.

You pray for them even before and you let them know that you're praying for
them. I pray for you because you're active in sharing your faith. Just think of
the difference in an atmosphere that a sincere practice of these two words of
advice would bring to any conversation.

Thanking God for people and praying for people. That's where you begin. You
applaud the positive.

Number two, you appeal with love. Verse eight. Therefore, although in Christ I
could be bold and order you to do what you ought to do, yet I appeal to you on
the basis of love.

I then, as Paul, an old man, and now a prisoner of Christ Jesus, appeal to you
for my son Onesimus, who became my son while I was in chains. Onesimus, as we
read into this later, is a runaway slave whom Paul had somehow met and led to
Christ in Rome. Maybe it was because Philemon had sent Onesimus there to
minister to Paul and then he'd stayed.

Maybe Paul had accidentally met him somehow. But he is this runaway slave and
he's writing back to Philemon about this slave who's now become a believer in
Christ about how he should treat him, what he should do for him. And just a very
brief word about slavery.

Although the Bible tells us what to do for people who are caught up in slavery,
Philemon is one example among many, many in the Bible that God is working to
give freedom to those who are enslaved. Here Paul is appealing with love for
Philemon to now accept his former slave as a brother in Christ. That is such a
radical departure from what was going on in that day.

And as he appeals with love, there's this sense of, well, let me give you the
ABCs of this, what he does here. First, you want to appeal with love? You ask,
you don't tell.

He says, I could order you, I'm not going to, I'm going to ask. B is be humble.
There's this humility of heart with Paul.

And C is clarify the situation. One of the ways to appeal with love is to say,
this is how I'm seeing it. Not just launch into things.

A, ask, don't tell. B, be humble. And C, clarify the situation.

That's how you appeal with love. Third thing you do to walk through a difficult
situation is you appease those who are wronged. This is verses 18 and 19.

Paul writes, if he, Onesimus, has done you any wrong or he owes you anything,
charge it to me. I, Paul, am writing this with my own hand, I will pay it back.
Not to mention that you owe me your very self.

So Paul encloses his like Visa card number. I'm writing this with my own hand,
I'll pay it back. Now he does, by the way, say, oh, I want you to Christ, you
owe me everything, but just in case you want to charge me anything, you can.

So there's a little back and forth here personally. But he does say I'm willing
to pay it. And it's a reminder that sometimes it's not enough to say I'm sorry.

Often restitution must be done. Restitution is required when your sin has cost
another's possessions or your sin has cost another's reputation. Some kind of
restitution needs to happen.

You need to appease those who have been wrong. Because just saying I'm sorry and
not telling anybody else and saying I'm sorry and not paying it back is not
dealing with the situation. Now if you want to walk through a difficult
circumstance, the fourth thing of these five is absolutely vital.

The fourth thing you have to do is apply your faith. You have to apply your
faith. Recognize that this is done in our relationship with Jesus Christ, not
just as a relationship between you and I.

So he writes in verse 20, I do wish, brother, that I may have some benefit from
you and the Lord. Refresh my heart in Christ, confident of your obedience I
write to you, knowing that you will do even more than I ask. So he says, faith
does a couple things here.

Faith raises your expectations. I'm confident of your obedience. You're going to do
even more than I ask.

Faith causes you not to go into a circumstance thinking this isn't going to work,
this isn't going to work, this could never work, but to believe that God's going to
speak to the other person's life, the other person's heart, and that change is
possible because of Jesus Christ. Faith raises your expectations. Now does that
mean they're always going to do the right thing?

Does that mean every time you ask someone in a difficult situation to bring the
relationship back together that they're going to hear you? No, no. Faith is not
some magic pill that forces them to do the right thing.

If faith could do that, then every person in the world would be saved, 'cause I
just expect that every person in the world would be saved. Faith doesn't create
a magical situation. It just raises your expectations that something can happen,
that change can happen.

Faith doesn't cause me to be able to pray that everyone's saved and they're
saved, but it does cause me to expect that somebody can be saved who no one else
can expect could be saved. Faith can do that, and faith can cause you to see
that that relationship can be healed when no one thinks that it can be healed.
Faith can do that.

Faith also refreshes your heart. Refresh my heart in Christ, he says. When
you're in a difficult relationship, it can often cause your heart to feel
depressed, your heart to feel sad, 'cause you want the relationship to work, and
faith, your relationship with God and Jesus Christ, that refreshes your heart
enough to be able to walk into the circumstance and have the hard conversation.

Now there's a fifth, a final thing that you need to do in this conversation
that's going to cause some healing in the relationship. The fifth thing that you do
is you appreciate the relationship. So you applaud the positive, you appeal with
love, you appease those wronged, you apply your faith, and then number five, you
appreciate the relationship.

Verse 22, and one thing more. Prepare a guest room for me because I hope to be
restored to you in answer to your prayers. Epaphras, my fellow prisoner in
Christ Jesus, sends you greetings, and so do Mark, our starkest demons, and
Luke, my fellow workers.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. He ends this difficult
conversation by saying, by the way, make sure the guest room's ready 'cause I
want to come see you. He's saying at the end, he's making clear that the
relationship is greater than the issue that they're discussing and that he
expects the relationship to continue.

He's very clear about that. That's important in a difficult relationship. Well,
okay, we've just had a hard talk.

I want to let you know, I still love you. I want you to know no matter what, we're
in this together. Prepare a guest room for me.

I hope to be restored to you. That's how God changes lives. By appreciating the
relationship over the struggle, over the issue, sometimes you can be so right
that a relationship is destroyed.

Would you rather be right, or would you rather be loved and express love? So you
end by appreciating the relationship. Now I know as I talk about this, you might
be in a difficult relationship right now.

You may need to have a conversation even today. Let me pray for you. Lord, as we
pray together, I pray for those who need to have a conversation with someone
today.

Let the truth of your word cause that conversation to go differently. As we do
these things, as we applaud the positive, appeal with love, appease those wrong,
as we apply our faith, as we appreciate the relationship. Lord, work in ways
that only you can work.

Bring healing to that relationship. We ask this in Jesus' name, amen. Tomorrow
we're going to talk about Hebrews and the dare to live the Christian life.