WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:10.560 Okay, so we're going to look this evening at a few verses in this short letter, very 00:00:10.560 --> 00:00:17.199 short letters. Thomas said last week, probably the most important theological letter that 00:00:17.199 --> 00:00:25.640 Paul wrote because of the way his understanding of the Bible and of Jesus Christ and of theology 00:00:25.640 --> 00:00:34.480 is outworked practically. So I'm going to read verses 17 to 19 in Philharmon. And Paul, 00:00:34.480 --> 00:00:39.000 and I'm going to focus on that. So if you consider me your partner, receive him, that 00:00:39.000 --> 00:00:46.359 is Anesimus, the runaway slave. Receive him as you would receive me. If he has wronged 00:00:46.359 --> 00:00:51.560 you at all or owes you anything, charge it to my account. I, Paul, write this with my 00:00:51.560 --> 00:00:59.280 own hand, I will repay it to say nothing of your owning me, even your very self. And 00:00:59.280 --> 00:01:04.400 that's what we're going to look at these verses tonight as part of this short letter that 00:01:04.400 --> 00:01:10.300 Paul wrote to the church in Colossae and to Philharmon, one of the leaders of that church 00:01:10.300 --> 00:01:18.320 in particular. Now I think it's true for most of us that if you like fruit at all, you really 00:01:18.319 --> 00:01:26.159 like ripe, sweet fruit, mature fruit, fruit that's just, sometimes I think we talk about 00:01:26.159 --> 00:01:31.319 ripe fruit being, or mature fruit being overripe and we don't like that because it gets a bit 00:01:31.319 --> 00:01:37.959 soft and squidgy and it's not so good. But a fruit that's perfect is just beautiful to 00:01:37.959 --> 00:01:44.159 eat. It's good to look at a peach or an apple or any kind of fruit that's really ripe, but 00:01:44.159 --> 00:01:51.399 it's good to look at and it's even better to eat. It's matured and it's ready for us 00:01:51.399 --> 00:01:56.479 to enjoy. I remember growing up, I think I've probably said this before here, in Forbes 00:01:56.479 --> 00:02:01.039 Road in Edinburgh in the months that they had then, and there was big trees in the garden 00:02:01.039 --> 00:02:08.159 and there was a couple of huge, big pear trees which were brilliant for climbing, but desperately 00:02:08.159 --> 00:02:12.879 bad for eating, not the trees, the pears, because the pears never seemed to ripen. They 00:02:12.879 --> 00:02:17.639 were always small and they were always hard as rock. They were great for throwing at the 00:02:17.639 --> 00:02:23.319 neighbours, but they were just useless for eating. And that was a shame because a really, 00:02:23.319 --> 00:02:30.479 a nice pear is good, a mature and sweet pear is good, but these pears were really crunchy 00:02:30.479 --> 00:02:40.759 and hard and a bit bitter. And spiritually, the same is true of us as Christians. When 00:02:40.759 --> 00:02:46.599 we're matured, when we're bearing the fruit of the Spirit, then we are sweet and we're 00:02:46.599 --> 00:02:54.759 not bitter and hard. And what we recognise and we see that, that Paul is not only in 00:02:54.759 --> 00:03:01.639 his own life, but as he's trying to speak into the life of this church of which Philoman 00:03:01.639 --> 00:03:07.000 is a leader, he's wanting to bring them to maturity, to fruitfulness as Christians, and 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:10.960 that's the same aim that he has for us in our lives. So in Colossians 1, which is the 00:03:10.960 --> 00:03:17.080 kind of sister letter as it were to this one, Colossians 1 verse 26, we have these words, 00:03:17.080 --> 00:03:21.280 to them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory 00:03:21.280 --> 00:03:25.199 of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. So he's speaking about Christ 00:03:25.199 --> 00:03:31.840 in our lives. It's in him we proclaim wanting everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom 00:03:31.840 --> 00:03:38.319 that we may present everyone mature in Christ. So that's his aim. That's the aim of the 00:03:38.319 --> 00:03:44.159 Apostles, the aim of the teaching of the New Testament, and it's the aim of Jesus and the 00:03:44.159 --> 00:03:50.800 Holy Spirit in us to bring us to maturity, and that is to completeness so that we understand 00:03:50.800 --> 00:03:59.560 really what it means to have Jesus in our lives as we mature. And that comes from, I'm 00:03:59.560 --> 00:04:04.400 going to say this twice because it's an important sentence, it comes from recognizing who you 00:04:04.400 --> 00:04:13.400 experience and what you experience. So maturity comes from when we recognize who we experience, 00:04:13.400 --> 00:04:19.399 that is Jesus, in what we experience, good or bad. Whatever the circumstance is in, we're 00:04:19.399 --> 00:04:25.079 looking to see what Jesus is teaching us, how he can change us and mature us so that 00:04:25.079 --> 00:04:30.680 we grow up in our faith in Jesus Christ. You see, you can be a Christian for many, many 00:04:30.680 --> 00:04:35.359 years, be an old Christian and be as sour as these pairs that I was speaking about at 00:04:35.359 --> 00:04:43.399 the beginning, shallow and bitter and sour and legalistic, not really allowing the experiences 00:04:43.399 --> 00:04:51.519 of life to transform your heart towards Jesus Christ. Or you can be young in the faith and 00:04:51.519 --> 00:04:59.719 sweet because from the beginning maybe you've let Christ deal with your heart and you've 00:04:59.719 --> 00:05:06.680 let His light shine in the dark corners of your heart to transform it. The jackpot is 00:05:06.680 --> 00:05:13.240 when we get people who are old and sweet, who have been in the faith a long time and 00:05:13.240 --> 00:05:19.159 who also allow the gospel to continually transform their heart. There's nothing to be an old 00:05:19.160 --> 00:05:24.600 and sweet Christian and I don't necessarily mean age but it can be at age as well. Someone 00:05:24.600 --> 00:05:28.960 who's been a Christian, there's a degree of age in it obviously, someone who's been 00:05:28.960 --> 00:05:36.400 a Christian a long time, who's allowed the gospel to always work on in their hearts and 00:05:36.400 --> 00:05:43.280 for us all we're aiming for complete maturity ourselves and a students of faith. So in many 00:05:43.280 --> 00:05:49.040 ways this letter is dealing with that need for being mature as Christians and as a church. 00:05:49.040 --> 00:05:55.160 And I think nearly always a mature church is a church and a mature Christian is one 00:05:55.160 --> 00:06:03.320 who recognizes that that is outworked relationally as we love God and as we love one another. 00:06:03.320 --> 00:06:08.960 The sign of a mature gospel community, the church, isn't just good theology or good 00:06:08.960 --> 00:06:13.960 preaching or the level of giving that you have or the numbers attending or whether 00:06:13.960 --> 00:06:18.920 you plant churches or the number of young people in the church or even prayer meeting 00:06:18.920 --> 00:06:24.400 attendants, now all of these things are maybe significant. But the mark of a mature gospel 00:06:24.400 --> 00:06:33.920 community is how well they forgive each other and how honestly they apply grace to their 00:06:33.920 --> 00:06:41.600 own hearts and to their own relationships. Their families, their church family, their 00:06:41.600 --> 00:06:49.920 work relationships and how they take these experiences and allow Jesus Christ to transform 00:06:49.920 --> 00:07:00.760 them, good or bad. A people who are reborn, a people who are becoming more mature, changing. 00:07:00.760 --> 00:07:03.520 So one of the things that I want to leave with you tonight is the importance of do you 00:07:03.519 --> 00:07:16.039 have anything in your life that allows you to note, to be aware of whether there's maturing 00:07:16.039 --> 00:07:22.199 happening in your life? Do you look at your relationships and say, well, I've reacted and 00:07:22.199 --> 00:07:29.359 I've forgiven differently this year than I would have a year ago or 18 months ago. There's 00:07:29.360 --> 00:07:35.160 a growth in grace. I'm less impatient. I'm less unforgiving. I'm bearing more fruit 00:07:35.160 --> 00:07:40.319 rather than thorns in that relationship. And it's important that we are able to look at 00:07:40.319 --> 00:07:48.439 our lives in that way, in our marriages, with our children, with our colleagues at work. 00:07:48.439 --> 00:07:55.680 It's that maturing into the mess which is life, because that's what we have, isn't it? 00:07:55.680 --> 00:08:03.040 We somesce. It's not all neat and tidy and ordered. We get let down. Circumstances for 00:08:03.040 --> 00:08:10.160 us can be grim. People can annoy us. We don't get on with people. We are sinned against. 00:08:10.160 --> 00:08:15.639 We can't be bothered. We can't be bothered with the church, with Christians, with the 00:08:15.639 --> 00:08:25.600 family, with others. And when the heat of that comes, are we bearing thorns or are we bearing 00:08:25.600 --> 00:08:35.680 fruit? Do we find ourselves in these times what's in our heart coming out? Maybe we're 00:08:35.680 --> 00:08:43.360 defensive or we badmouth others or we walk away or we grumble or we hate or we judge. 00:08:43.360 --> 00:08:52.480 Or do we let grace and the light of grace teach us and mold us and transform us so that 00:08:52.480 --> 00:08:58.759 we understand the cost of our being forgiven and what that involves in our relationship 00:08:58.759 --> 00:09:04.159 with others? That helps us to measure the growth in our Christian lives, and that's 00:09:04.159 --> 00:09:10.159 important. How we forgive others, how we deal with difficulties and difficult people and 00:09:10.159 --> 00:09:18.600 difficult ways that we have been sinned against helps us to understand a little bit more about 00:09:18.600 --> 00:09:20.000 Christ at work in us. 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:24.600 Now, there's a wealth of maturity in this letter. It's brilliant. Paul is not preaching 00:09:24.600 --> 00:09:30.720 cheap grace to a filament in this letter at all. It's been wrought in the fires of loving 00:09:30.720 --> 00:09:39.360 commitment to each other and a deep understanding of what forgiveness means for them. In the 00:09:39.360 --> 00:09:46.320 toughest of circumstances, Paul is writing this letter, and his own experiences come 00:09:46.320 --> 00:09:51.040 out in it, I think, both in his relationships and sometimes the mistakes he's made himself 00:09:51.040 --> 00:09:53.480 in the past. 00:09:53.480 --> 00:09:58.520 Because what we see, and we see it particularly, I want to focus on these few verses, we see 00:09:58.520 --> 00:10:08.640 that there are relationships in this letter that have been challenged by God's grace. 00:10:08.640 --> 00:10:15.000 And that's important. We see it with Paul and filament together in the kind of relationship 00:10:15.000 --> 00:10:23.679 they had. So they had a deeply wrought friendship, okay? Paul was great at friendships, and 00:10:23.679 --> 00:10:28.200 you'll find that we'll probably be repeating ourselves a little bit over this four weeks, 00:10:28.200 --> 00:10:35.240 but it's really worth repeating. He calls filament his fellow worker in verse 1, and 00:10:35.240 --> 00:10:40.039 that just a term, just, you know, they were sharers, they were companions, they were joint 00:10:40.039 --> 00:10:46.039 participants together, they had a committed partnership in the Lord. So he doesn't come 00:10:46.039 --> 00:10:50.559 and it's one of the few letters he doesn't come saying, I'm Paul, the apostle, and I'm 00:10:50.559 --> 00:10:58.240 coming with this important message. He doesn't call himself a shepherd or the preacher, he 00:10:58.240 --> 00:11:04.199 just calls himself a fellow worker with this filament who's a leader in the church in Colossia. 00:11:04.200 --> 00:11:12.360 There's no hierarchy, there's no lording it over this friend that he has. There's clearly, 00:11:12.360 --> 00:11:16.480 there's clearly, you can see it right through the letter, there's clearly great love, great 00:11:16.480 --> 00:11:24.160 friendship, great sacrifice. It's been costly for Paul to give of himself into this church 00:11:24.160 --> 00:11:32.160 and into this man's life. And as he writes this letter to him, he's risking that, he's 00:11:32.159 --> 00:11:36.759 risking that friendship, he's risking that commitment they've had together because he's 00:11:36.759 --> 00:11:42.959 asking him to do something really outrageous in accepting back and forgiving this runaway 00:11:42.959 --> 00:11:48.879 slave who's become a Christian as we'll see more of. Now that's the kind of leaders we 00:11:48.879 --> 00:11:56.079 want in the church. The minister doesn't lard it over people, doesn't, you know, make himself 00:11:56.079 --> 00:12:01.199 more important and more significant. We're fellow workers, we're fellow laborers, we're 00:12:01.200 --> 00:12:05.360 sharing together, we're giving of our hearts and of our lives to one another. That's the 00:12:05.360 --> 00:12:13.440 kind of mature church that we want to be. And for filament as well with Paul, we see 00:12:13.440 --> 00:12:19.280 that Paul recognizes there's a great debt in the relationship together, you know, you 00:12:19.280 --> 00:12:23.960 know, he says that, you know, you owe me your very self. Now, filament knew that it was 00:12:23.960 --> 00:12:30.520 God who redeemed him. He knew that it was Christ who was his Savior and that he was 00:12:30.519 --> 00:12:37.039 all to Christ. But yet, Christ saves filament through the message and the work of Paul and 00:12:37.039 --> 00:12:41.120 the preaching of Paul so much so that he can say he owes his life from a human point of 00:12:41.120 --> 00:12:49.079 view to Paul. Paul gave time and energy and love and the gospel message was shared with 00:12:49.079 --> 00:12:58.159 filament and there's this great debt of love that he owes to Paul as he receives this letter. 00:12:58.159 --> 00:13:03.719 And again, that's a great lesson for us when we think about what if we want to be mature 00:13:03.719 --> 00:13:09.159 believers in a mature church that we don't just say, oh, well, it was Jesus that converted 00:13:09.159 --> 00:13:15.799 me and I was saved by grace by God alone. He uses people and we humanly speaking, you 00:13:15.799 --> 00:13:21.959 know, I owe my life to the church and to the preachers who spoke the gospel of grace to 00:13:21.960 --> 00:13:29.600 me. And we're all the same. We owe so much to the community of believers, to the worshiping 00:13:29.600 --> 00:13:34.720 people, to the preachers who brought us the gospel. Is it easy for us then to go and rubbish 00:13:34.720 --> 00:13:41.000 that? To rubbish the gospel community when it hurts me and where it lets me down? We 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:47.840 think about the debt that we owe, the debt that we owe and the appeals that Paul makes 00:13:47.840 --> 00:13:52.840 here on the basis of love to filament. So there's a cost involved in the background 00:13:52.840 --> 00:14:02.320 in all of this going on here. But we see there's also a cost in this act of forgiveness and 00:14:02.320 --> 00:14:09.800 what happens from it for Paul himself with onesimus, the runaway slave who's left filament 00:14:09.800 --> 00:14:17.000 and who has found his way to Paul's prison and has become a Christian. Verses 12 and 00:14:17.000 --> 00:14:23.240 13 speak about that joy and that loss that he has. You know, he was useless but now he's 00:14:23.240 --> 00:14:30.000 useful and I'm sending him back. So, you know, there's a cost to what's happening to this 00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:35.799 reconciliation that has to happen. Paul's in prison. He's lonely. He's in chains. He's 00:14:35.799 --> 00:14:42.559 isolated. Now, I don't know how Thomas might know this looking back in it. I'm not sure 00:14:42.559 --> 00:14:48.519 if any of us know how exactly onesimus ended up in Rome and how he ended up in the prison. 00:14:48.519 --> 00:14:52.719 I mean, was he imprisoned? We don't know. Or was he just visiting or did he become a 00:14:52.719 --> 00:14:59.079 Christian before that? We don't know. But somehow by God's amazing providence, onesimus 00:14:59.079 --> 00:15:05.000 ends up as a friend of Paul in prison a thousand miles away from Colossae. And he tells this 00:15:05.000 --> 00:15:09.599 story and he becomes a believer maybe through Paul's speaking to him or maybe through the 00:15:09.600 --> 00:15:19.120 church in Rome. And Paul says, who are you with? Phil, Philoman in Colossae. I know Philoman. 00:15:19.120 --> 00:15:25.440 He's a great friend. It was through my preaching that Philoman became a believer. And so there's 00:15:25.440 --> 00:15:31.200 this amazing, as we often experience in life, amazing providence of God bringing people together. 00:15:31.200 --> 00:15:39.440 And he would love to keep him onesimus because he's a friend and a companion and like almost 00:15:39.440 --> 00:15:44.520 a substitute friend from Philoman in prison. But he wants to give him, but he knows he 00:15:44.520 --> 00:15:50.680 has to go back. There's a cost to him becoming a Christian. He needs to be reconciled to 00:15:50.680 --> 00:16:02.560 his old boss, to his old one to whom he was a slave. And you see that, and that's what 00:16:02.560 --> 00:16:07.280 it's like sometimes, isn't it? It's like that for Paul. It's like that for us. There's great 00:16:07.279 --> 00:16:14.079 joy in birthing someone to faith. And then they have to go and they have to move away 00:16:14.079 --> 00:16:18.839 or they have to go somewhere else. And you've given your heart and Paul had given his heart 00:16:18.839 --> 00:16:24.279 and he would love his company, but he has to move on. And more than that, he's willing 00:16:24.279 --> 00:16:30.799 even to pay as he writes in the letter of, if anesimus has stolen money from Philoman 00:16:30.799 --> 00:16:35.879 as he ran away, then Paul's willing to pay that. So there's even a physical cost as it 00:16:35.879 --> 00:16:43.120 were. But he knows, he knows that anesimus needs to go back. He knows that it's going 00:16:43.120 --> 00:16:48.200 to be awkward for him. He knows there's going to be tension. He himself is going to lose 00:16:48.200 --> 00:16:56.039 out on it. But he puts Christ and he puts other people before his own comfort and before 00:16:56.039 --> 00:17:01.519 his own friendships that he's developed here. And then also we see that there's a cost to 00:17:01.519 --> 00:17:09.879 this act of reconciliation and forgiveness for anesimus and philemon together, Philoman. 00:17:09.879 --> 00:17:17.440 Onesimus has become a Christian by the amazing grace of God. He'd run away. He was in Rome. 00:17:17.440 --> 00:17:22.559 And now Paul's saying, you go back, take this letter with you, hand it. Who? Who's going 00:17:22.559 --> 00:17:28.720 to hand it to? To the leader of the church in Colossae, Philoman, who's the slave owner 00:17:28.720 --> 00:17:35.880 that he's run away from. That would be the last thing, I guess, that he wanted to do. 00:17:35.880 --> 00:17:40.079 Because there's not just reconciliation, there's not just forgiveness here. There's 00:17:40.079 --> 00:17:49.680 also reconciliation. I guess he just didn't want to face up to that. You know, if you'd 00:17:49.680 --> 00:17:53.400 been in that situation, I'm forgiven by God, I'll just make a fresh start somewhere else. 00:17:53.400 --> 00:18:00.440 I'll avoid it. And isn't that what we often do? We avoid difficult consequences of our 00:18:00.440 --> 00:18:05.640 forgiveness. We avoid reconciliation. We just maybe make a fresh start. And we avoid the 00:18:05.640 --> 00:18:13.080 people that have hurt us in the past or that we've let down. We don't think of making amends. 00:18:13.080 --> 00:18:20.280 And for philemon, he is not just to forgive onesimus, but to accept him as he would accept 00:18:20.279 --> 00:18:29.200 Paul, who he regards as a brother. Now remember, philemon was probably wealthy. The church 00:18:29.200 --> 00:18:33.960 probably met in his home. He was a leader of that church. There would be all kinds of 00:18:33.960 --> 00:18:42.680 personal, professional, cultural, and probably church pressure to deal with philemon, to 00:18:42.680 --> 00:18:48.519 deal with onesimus who came back, this runaway slave. Oh yeah, he's become a Christian. Oh, 00:18:48.519 --> 00:18:54.440 that's convenient. That's what they all say when they're in prison. And there would have 00:18:54.440 --> 00:18:59.079 been doubt and there would have been professional questions to say, no, don't accept him back 00:18:59.079 --> 00:19:05.559 or make him pay or make him give restitution. But Paul's saying, oh, look, I don't even 00:19:05.559 --> 00:19:10.920 want you to take him back as an employee or a slave, as it were. I don't want it just 00:19:10.920 --> 00:19:15.359 to be bald for giving us or tolerating him or when he comes to church, say hello to him 00:19:15.359 --> 00:19:20.719 at the door. I want you to treat him like you owe him your very life like you did to 00:19:20.719 --> 00:19:27.039 me. There's a great cost. I want you to make him a friend, one who you accept as a brother, 00:19:27.039 --> 00:19:35.159 not as a slave. That's utterly and completely costly forgiveness. But it's a great picture 00:19:35.159 --> 00:19:40.959 of a mature believer, which if we want to take it into our own lives, mature believers 00:19:40.960 --> 00:19:49.240 and a mature church, there's a fantastic challenge there for us to understand the gospel community, 00:19:49.240 --> 00:19:54.279 that forgiveness is something we trip off our tongues. We believe theologically, oh, 00:19:54.279 --> 00:20:03.200 but boy, until we're hurt, until someone bad mouths us, until we don't like something, 00:20:03.200 --> 00:20:09.360 then we find forgiveness very difficult. And we find it far too costly. Oh, we love the 00:20:09.359 --> 00:20:14.479 words. We love the prayers. But very often the light that shines into the grubby and 00:20:14.479 --> 00:20:23.079 the unforgiving nature of our hearts is too great to bear sometimes. And much more so 00:20:23.079 --> 00:20:27.479 for us as leaders, Philoman was a leader in the church, and as leaders, the remaining 00:20:27.479 --> 00:20:32.199 sinful nature in us, whether it's leaders in a business context or a church context, 00:20:32.200 --> 00:20:39.799 we have a tendency to control, a tendency to be defensive, to abuse our power, to be 00:20:39.799 --> 00:20:47.279 distant, to think we're important. And yet that was not so with this church, this mature 00:20:47.279 --> 00:20:53.840 church where Paul didn't play the apostle card. He recognized that Philoman was a brother 00:20:53.839 --> 00:21:02.079 who needed to involve himself in expensive, costly forgiveness. It wasn't just a kind 00:21:02.079 --> 00:21:10.959 of paper exercise. He was going to need to take Onesimus into his home as a family member, 00:21:10.959 --> 00:21:18.000 this runaway slave who'd probably stolen from him, as we've seen in previous weeks. 00:21:18.000 --> 00:21:25.240 So that's a picture of a mature Christian and of a mature church. And just briefly in 00:21:25.240 --> 00:21:31.839 conclusion, we see that mature church throughout this letter. We see it in the way Paul, at 00:21:31.839 --> 00:21:38.319 the very beginning, reminds us that the letters from him and from Timothy. So I presume in 00:21:38.319 --> 00:21:42.119 that they discussed things, they discussed this matter together. They talked and probably 00:21:42.119 --> 00:21:47.920 prayed about it. I don't think Paul was acting on his own here. He was seeking God's wisdom 00:21:47.920 --> 00:21:53.200 from another leader, Timothy. And that's wise leadership and we should always learn from 00:21:53.200 --> 00:22:01.759 that. We should learn to, in difficult situations when we're maybe asked to forgive and to gracefully 00:22:01.759 --> 00:22:08.360 that we seek counsel about it and we seek wisdom and the wisdom of others. We also see, 00:22:08.360 --> 00:22:16.720 and this was mentioned before by, in the last couple of weeks, I think, it was mentioned 00:22:16.720 --> 00:22:23.200 by Thomas that there was transparent honesty in this church. This is a very personal letter, 00:22:23.200 --> 00:22:28.960 isn't it? Being asked to do something very, very challenging, but it's written to the 00:22:28.960 --> 00:22:33.039 whole, it's written to him, but also to the whole church. The whole church read it. So 00:22:33.039 --> 00:22:37.200 it wasn't to be something that Philharmonists kind of did quietly. Okay, I'll do that quietly 00:22:37.200 --> 00:22:43.360 on my own. No one needs to see. The whole church was kind of, were on the sidelines watching 00:22:43.359 --> 00:22:49.199 how he would respond as a leader in this situation. Isn't that so refreshing? See, the leader 00:22:49.199 --> 00:22:53.119 was put on this spotlight and say, well, let's see what, you know, you preach forgiveness 00:22:53.119 --> 00:22:59.559 all the time. Let's see what it's really like with Onesimus. It wasn't secretive, it wasn't 00:22:59.559 --> 00:23:08.079 private or individualistic. He was being challenged in front of that gospel community. Beautiful, 00:23:08.079 --> 00:23:14.759 really. And that's the sign of a mature church, mature leadership and the mature people. They 00:23:14.759 --> 00:23:19.720 wouldn't have been looking to catch him out, but they would be looking for him to set an 00:23:19.720 --> 00:23:20.720 example. 00:23:20.720 --> 00:23:29.839 But I think the greatest thing we see here in terms of maturity is what Paul says in 00:23:29.839 --> 00:23:35.720 verse 18, where he says, if he has wronged you at all or owes you anything, charge that 00:23:35.720 --> 00:23:42.600 to my account. Charge it to me. Now that really summarizes everything about the gospel because 00:23:42.600 --> 00:23:50.079 it comes from the very heart of God. Because God says that, doesn't He? When He looks at 00:23:50.079 --> 00:23:57.839 you and when He looks at me, the Father looks at you and me and Jesus says, charge it to 00:23:57.839 --> 00:24:05.680 me. Charge their grubby, sinful, selfish hearts to me. But before the foundation of the world 00:24:05.680 --> 00:24:11.960 that has been the mind and the heart of God. It's the nature of His love. It's so other-centered. 00:24:11.960 --> 00:24:19.759 It cost Him the infinite depth of forsakeness of the cross that we can never fathom so that 00:24:19.759 --> 00:24:25.960 when I stand before God and you stand before God and I feel and I sense my sin and my guilt, 00:24:25.960 --> 00:24:34.400 I hear Jesus saying, charge it to me. Or it's been charged to me. I've paid the price. I've 00:24:34.400 --> 00:24:43.320 covered the cost. They're forgiven. And that, you see, is what makes Paul a mature believer 00:24:43.320 --> 00:24:50.680 because he can say exactly the same, charge it to me. He can say that about money that 00:24:50.680 --> 00:24:57.280 Onesimus might owe, but he knows that there's far more to that, isn't it? That there's 00:24:57.279 --> 00:25:04.399 a debt that Christ has paid, that Philoman needs to recognize, and that Paul recognizes 00:25:04.399 --> 00:25:13.440 too. It's the essence of grace, not my will, but yours be done. The essence of grace is 00:25:13.440 --> 00:25:23.279 other-centered, not self-centered. It is worshiping and loving God and loving others. It's sharing 00:25:23.279 --> 00:25:33.799 our hearts and our lives with those who let us down, who frustrate us, who annoy us, who 00:25:33.799 --> 00:25:42.519 sin against us because we have done all that to Jesus and He said, charge it to me. That's 00:25:42.519 --> 00:25:48.119 how we become mature when we see that and let that light shine into the grubby corners 00:25:48.119 --> 00:25:54.399 of our hearts. So the gospel community, the church community, which we battle so hard 00:25:54.399 --> 00:26:03.159 to develop and maintain and live out here, is not just a Sunday morning experience, a 00:26:03.159 --> 00:26:10.879 Sunday morning sing-along, or a Wednesday evening theology lesson or prayer time. It's 00:26:10.880 --> 00:26:18.800 an investment in people's lives. It's becoming a kingdom of heaven community. However difficult 00:26:18.800 --> 00:26:24.040 that is to work out when we're split apart and we're all over the city, apart from anything 00:26:24.040 --> 00:26:32.080 else, where we play our part on a week-to-week basis in reconciling and forgiving and having 00:26:32.080 --> 00:26:37.720 long, short memories about the sins of others and long memories of the grace of God in our 00:26:37.720 --> 00:26:44.519 own hearts, where we are repaying, healing, restoring, encouraging, challenging what it 00:26:44.519 --> 00:26:51.880 means to understand grace at work in our lives. That's when we are a fruit bearing community. 00:26:51.880 --> 00:27:00.360 That's why I say that that's real fruit. That's where the rubber really hits the road. It's 00:27:00.360 --> 00:27:06.360 relational. It's how important you regard the people you will spend eternity with here 00:27:06.359 --> 00:27:12.439 and now. It's whether you rubbish them or whether they're insignificant or all that matters 00:27:12.439 --> 00:27:19.679 is me and God, whereas all of the commands point towards our loving Him and loving one 00:27:19.679 --> 00:27:26.919 another. But that's the sign of a mature and a healthy community, a healthy growing one. 00:27:26.919 --> 00:27:34.079 It's so costly. It involves so much generosity. It involves not quickly jumping to the wrong 00:27:34.079 --> 00:27:42.879 conclusions or attributing the worst of motives. It's three-dimensional forgiveness. So you 00:27:42.879 --> 00:27:48.240 can recall your life and I can look at my life and we can measure whether there's been 00:27:48.240 --> 00:27:51.919 any growth in our life. Since maybe it's right, let's take it from the beginning of 00:27:51.920 --> 00:28:05.000 the lockdown. Has there been any growth? The measure of maturity is how willing we are to 00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:15.320 say like Paul, charge it to me. Let me be wronged. Let me be the one who forgives. Let 00:28:15.319 --> 00:28:22.079 me be patient. Let me bear fruit. When the trials come, may it not be thorns but may 00:28:22.079 --> 00:28:28.639 it be fruit that we bear. I think that's hugely significant because that will enable 00:28:28.639 --> 00:28:36.480 us to be a sweet people, not a sour people. I think the history of the church is so checkered, 00:28:36.480 --> 00:28:46.400 isn't it? I think that's what it will always be and we just battle with that. But we really 00:28:46.400 --> 00:28:52.920 want to be a sweet people. We want to be a mature people and that is costly. The theme 00:28:52.920 --> 00:28:59.559 of the title of this sermon was costly forgiveness. There's no doubt it's costly. It's easy to 00:28:59.559 --> 00:29:04.240 accept from God, isn't it? Of course it is. It's the best thing. It's free and it's the 00:29:04.240 --> 00:29:09.559 most wonderful thing to be forgiven. It's the hardest thing to hand out to others. That's 00:29:09.559 --> 00:29:16.240 where our great battle lies. And Paul and Philharmon here, and Paul is absolutely convinced Philharmon 00:29:16.240 --> 00:29:22.200 will do more than he even asks here because he knows him. He's committed to him. There's 00:29:22.200 --> 00:29:26.960 that costly friendship that says, well, I know how Philharmon was. If someone wrote 00:29:26.960 --> 00:29:32.880 this to you, how would you react? What a cheek. How before he's asking me to do that? It's 00:29:32.880 --> 00:29:38.800 how could I possibly forgive? And maybe we wouldn't know the person who's asking us very 00:29:38.800 --> 00:29:42.560 well. We might not know the leader of the church very well or if someone said it to 00:29:42.560 --> 00:29:50.440 me. But isn't it interesting that there was obviously so much investment in that relationship 00:29:50.440 --> 00:29:55.880 between Paul and Philharmon that he could say, look, do this. I know you will. I trust 00:29:55.880 --> 00:30:01.160 you will. He knew he would pay the price because he knew that he was mature and that he understood 00:30:01.160 --> 00:30:07.840 grace. It's not a wonderful coming and going in a church that we know each other enough 00:30:07.840 --> 00:30:12.759 that we are willing to challenge one another about being forgiving and paying the price 00:30:12.759 --> 00:30:21.160 of what it means to be a Christian. I wonder if we can do that. That's a great challenge. 00:30:21.160 --> 00:30:25.440 And it's a great comfort to know that God will help us to do that. And that makes us 00:30:25.440 --> 00:30:31.920 sweet. So when we're tempted to remember the two different responses, are we going to be 00:30:31.920 --> 00:30:38.840 sour or sweet? Amen. Let's pray. Father God, help us not to be sour Christians. So easy. 00:30:38.840 --> 00:30:43.039 It's so easy to talk a good game, especially for ministers and for preachers. So easy for 00:30:43.039 --> 00:30:52.160 us to just say as it should be, but either with each other or denominational or in the 00:30:52.160 --> 00:30:58.880 church to be sour, irrelationally, so easy. Forgive us when that is the case, Lord. And 00:30:58.880 --> 00:31:04.560 forgive us when as a church we find it easy to criticize and condemn and not pay the price 00:31:04.560 --> 00:31:13.519 of understanding what it is that we have received from Jesus. And therefore, our grace is free, 00:31:13.519 --> 00:31:19.720 but it isn't cheap. And help us to recognize the cost of that in our daily relationships, 00:31:19.720 --> 00:31:27.640 the way that we are asked to forgive and to not just bear forgiveness, but treating one 00:31:27.640 --> 00:31:32.720 another like brothers and sisters, reminding ourselves that we will spend eternity together. 00:31:32.720 --> 00:31:37.360 And therefore, we're to start being like heaven here. Lord, help us to know that. And help 00:31:37.360 --> 00:31:43.319 us to start being like a community of heaven here, because I know that will be attractive 00:31:43.319 --> 00:31:48.839 to a lost world. And I pray for our friends and for our neighbors who don't know you, 00:31:48.839 --> 00:31:53.399 that somehow they may see this community at work and be attracted when maybe all they 00:31:53.399 --> 00:32:00.039 are hearing on maybe in the workplace or on social media is division and nastiness and 00:32:00.039 --> 00:32:06.839 judgment and separation. May they find in the church community something very different 00:32:06.839 --> 00:32:14.519 that's not made up or is not false or is not put on, but comes from people whose hearts 00:32:14.519 --> 00:32:23.359 are being wrought, worked at with all the pain and the cost of rooting out sin so that 00:32:23.359 --> 00:32:28.559 we become more like Jesus. It's a painful healing. We know that, but help us to be willing 00:32:28.559 --> 00:32:37.639 to pay that price, to be mature, to be sweet, to be beautiful. We ask it in Jesus' name. 00:32:37.640 --> 00:32:44.640 Amen.