This transcript was generated by whisper.ai.

[Music] Welcome to the end of our study of the book of Philemon. The first day
of this week I said, "Here's the beginning and now we're at the end. "
Congratulations!

You've studied an entire book of the Bible this week. You don't have to tell
people what book. Just say, "Wow, I've really been studying God's Word this
week.

I went through an entire book and really gleaned God's truth from it. " I hope
you have. We've been talking this week about how you confront something in a
relationship, how you confront something in somebody else's life, and walking
through how you do it.

I want to remind you of how to begin and how to end, because in any conversation
as you work this through in somebody's life or in your relationships, the
beginning and the ending is extremely important. In the middle we talked about
the need to make sure that you're working with wisdom in the conversation, that
you make restitution anytime you need to make restitution, that you have faith
as you talk, but at the beginning and the end the first thing you do is you
applaud the positive. You begin by thanking God for the person, by praying for
the person, and at the end what do you do?

What's the fifth thing that you do? The fifth thing that you do is you approve
the future. Paul says in verses 22 to 25 that he's looking forward to the
future.

Listen to what he says, "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,
Aristarchus, Demas, and Luke, my fellow workers. For the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ be with your spirit.

" I gotta love that, what he says in verse 22, "Prepare a guest room for me. I
hope to be restored to you. " That's looking forward to approving the future.

Instead of Paul saying, "Well, we've got a conflict here. I don't know if we can
ever make it right. We may never get back together again.

" No, he talks about the difficult stuff and then he says, "Make sure you got a
guest room for me, because I'm looking forward to being with you again. " Now
the amazing thing is Paul writes this as a prisoner in chains in Rome. So in
that he is saying with faith, "I'm going to get released.

" In fact, he's saying, "I'm going to be restored in answer to your prayers. "
That's approving the future. That's looking forward to the future.

Now to get practical about this in a conflict situation, in a confrontation
situation, this is reminding us that at the end of the conversation, you don't
leave any ifs. You don't speak in ultimatums, but you speak in expectation of
continued love. You leave the door open.

You don't burn your bridges. Those are both ways to say that it is our Christian
responsibility to live with a clear and open heart in all of our relationships.
So you don't end the conversation by saying, "And by the way, if you don't do
this, I don't know what it's going to mean for this relationship.

" And then you walk out the door, "Oh, we love to do that. We all love to get
the last word in and just leave the person fuming. " I don't know how many times
I've done this and you may have too.

You have this great conversation. You say all the right things, then right at
the end, you say the wrong thing and it erases everything you said earlier, just
because you have to get that one jab in, just because you have to get that one
angry word in. You end by approving the future.

How you end is all important. Paul does that in his own life, but he also does
that in a deeper way in the very last words of this book, this short book, when
he says, "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. " Now that's
looking forward to the future.

It's a very significant ending. You might think, "Oh, it's just the way Paul
ends every book. " To me, it's a very significant ending to this book on
resolving conflict, because it reminds me.

It reminds me to think about the fact that Jesus Christ has done all of these
things for me. All that Paul models in his relationship to Philemon, all that is
modeled for us to do for someone else, Jesus Christ does all of these things for
you. Applaud the positive.

Jesus Christ does that in your life. Now he's not dishonest about who you are.
He tells us very clearly that we have sinned and that we're in desperate need of
the grace of God, but we're also very clearly told in the scripture that you and
I are made, we are creations of God made in the image of God, and that the grace
of God wants us to begin to live out that image again.

If you closely read the scriptures, they tell us of the fall, but they also tell
us of the creation. God tells us the whole story. He doesn't just major on the
negative now that it's negative.

That's what we tend to do. No, he also reminds us of the positive, still being
honest about the negative, confronting the negative in our lives. He applauds
the positive.

Jesus does that in our lives. He restores God's image in our lives. He does the
second thing as well.

He appeals with wisdom. That's why we have the Bible. That's what the word of
God is all about.

It is the sword of the spirit. It is God's wisdom in our life. It is the word of
Christ to us, and it encourages us and it challenges us to live out God's best
for our lives.

If you want to hear how God appeals with wisdom, just pick up your Bible and
begin to read through the New Testament. You'll see it again and again and again
and again. God tells us how to live our lives.

He says don't be angry with each other. You look at the book of Ephesians.
Appeal with wisdom.

Don't be angry with each other. Don't go to bed angry. Don't let the sun set on
your anger, but instead resolve it.

Talk to each other. Appeal with wisdom. He tells us not to judge each other, not
to live in judgment of each other's eternal destiny, but instead to recognize
humbly, first I got to get the speck out of my eye, the log out of my eye,
because it's a log size.

It's in my own eye before I can get the speck out of your eye. He's appealing
with wisdom. Just read Jesus' Sermon on the Mount.

It's appealing with wisdom. God does that in our lives. You applaud the
positive.

You appeal with wisdom. You appease those who are wronged. Jesus paid the price.

He paid the price on the cross. He made restitution. He made restitution for my
sin.

He made restitution for your sin. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with
your spirit, because he's the one who made restitution for the greatest debt in
all of this universe, the debt of my sin and your sin, and he paid it all. Now I
can choose to trust him for that or not trust him.

He does not force his forgiveness on me, but he offers it to every one of us,
and he paid the price for every one of us. The fourth thing you do is you apply
your faith. Jesus Christ is trusting the Father to draw us in.

All those you have given me, he says, you're going to draw them to me. He is
trusting the Father to speak to our hearts. He's trusting the Spirit.

Jesus said the Spirit sent to convict the world concerning sin and righteousness
and judgment. God's Spirit is speaking in each of our lives about who we really
are and what we really need and who God really is and how he deeply is willing
to meet our needs, the deepest need of our lives, the need for forgiveness, the
need for a restored relationship with him. Jesus has faith concerning you.

When he died on the cross, he has faith that all those who are called to him are
going to be brought to him. That was an act of faith. And then you approve the
future.

Jesus certainly does that. I love what he said to his disciples the night before
he died on a cross. He looked at him and he said, "In my Father's house there
are a lot of mansions.

I'm going to be gone from you soon, but I'm going to prepare a place for you.
And if I prepare a place for you, I'm going to return. I'm going to come back to
take you to be with me where I am.

And if I take you to be with me where I am, it's because," he's almost saying in
a sense there, "it's because of the depth of my love for you. I want you to be
with me where I am. " Later that same night he said, "You didn't choose me.

I chose you. And I appointed you to go bear fruit, fruit that will remain. You
approve the future.

" Jesus Christ tells us that we are fellow heirs with him, looking forward to
eternity. It's a reminder this last verse, verse 25, that the ultimate conflict
is between us and God. The ultimate thing that needs to be confronted in this
life is not something that's happened in my relationship with someone else, but
something that has happened in my relationship with God.

And I'm the one who has wronged God. My sin has wronged him and he confronts it.
He is honest about it.

Jesus is then the ultimate mediator. If we're to get out of that conflict and
confusion in our lives, it has to begin there in that relationship. If I want to
get out of the conflict and confusion in my relationship with others, with my
wife, with my husband, with my kids, with my friends, I have to get out of the
conflict and confusion in my relationship with God.

It has to start there. And the cross of Jesus Christ declared says without a
shadow of a doubt, it is taken care of. It is done.

It is finished. That's where you start. That's where you trust.

And then based on that, based on that, you ask him for the strength to live this
new way in relationships with other people. Let's pray together. Jesus, thank
you.

Thank you for this short book that reminds us of the length and the breadth and
the depth and the height of your love for us. Lord, help us to be honest, honest
about the fact that there are things that need to be confronted in our lives.
And as they're confronted, if someone confronts us, help us to be humble and to
listen.

It's so easy to be defensive. Help me to listen. Help us to listen.

Also help us, I pray, to be faithful and courageous. If there's something that
needs to be confronted in someone else's life, help us to have the strength to
do it and help us to learn from your word how to do it so that instead of it
blowing up in our faces, there is at least the opportunity for them to hear. And
then Lord, help us also to be grateful, to be grateful that you confronted the
sin in our own lives with the cross, but you also, in the greatest act of faith,
you also invited us into a new life through the cross.

Thank you for being honest with us about our sin, but thank you also for dealing
with our sin, for giving us a way to be forgiven and to live with you for all
eternity. Thank you for the cross of Christ and thank you for the promise of
heaven. In Jesus' name, we thank you.

Amen. That's drivetimedevotions. com and you can pick from one of the other
books that we've already studied and go through that.

Whatever my prayer is that God's word will continue to impact your life in a way
that changes your life every day. His word is written so that you and I can live
in a new way every day of our lives. Thank you God for your word and thank you
for your love.