Philemon 1:15

This is how the apostle could interpret the otherwise shameful escape of Onesimus. Yet he adds a delicate "perhaps," hoping to carry Philemon along with him. Some of us know how brutal Roman or Greek masters could be in such cases. That cruelty has not been limited to those places and times. But the Christian may and ought to see things in the light and love and interests of Christ. So he does not even say that Onesimus departed. He says he "was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever" — that Philemon might have him in full. The Christian tie is not temporary but everlasting.

Paul's appeal goes on. He suggests that God used the events around the slave's running away for His own purposes. It appears God's providence led Onesimus to Rome. If we look only at the present situation, we may fail to see that God is ordering the very circumstance that seems to work against us. If Onesimus had never deserted his post, then Philemon's gain would have been only passing. An unconverted man has no lasting link with a Christian. But the voice of God had reached him and touched his conscience, and the pagan slave had turned to Christ. The reunion would be one that would never end; not even death could touch it.

No one knew better than the apostle that where sin had abounded, grace had super-abounded. But there seems a holy caution in the Spirit while speaking of these things, in case we should think or speak of sin lightly. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth, and while He delights to magnify the grace of God in Christ, He always upholds God's holy hatred of sin. Sadly, how often we find that familiarity with the doctrines of grace, where there is no deep work in the soul, leads to light thoughts of sin! What holy caution there is in the words of this verse! The letter hints that Onesimus had wronged Philemon. He had robbed or stolen from him, and then run away. Could God justify dishonesty and fraud? No, for no unrighteous person will inherit the kingdom of God. His dishonesty led him to Rome, led him to Paul, and led him to hear the gospel. But that did not change the character of the sin in the least.

The word aionios does not mean a limited period of time. It means eternal in the plain sense of the word. In Philemon 15, "that you might have him back forever" is aionion, eternally — again set against "for a while."

When a person says to his friend, "I give you this book, it is yours for ever," he simply means he does not intend to ask for the book back again as long as it exists. But would the friend be in any doubt about what "for ever" means? We believe not. Or when Paul, writing to Philemon about the runaway slave Onesimus, says, "For this perhaps is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever," will the meaning of "for ever," applied to a relationship that in any case ended with this earthly life, present any difficulty to the unprejudiced reader? Certainly not.

In the second place, the word was, "receive him for ever." Formerly the relations between Onesimus and his master were of a sort that could be broken, and in fact were broken by the misconduct of Onesimus. Now there were to be new relations of an order that could not be broken. It is just so in God's gracious dealings with us. As the fruit of Christ's work, we stand before Him in relations that are unfailing and eternal.