Skip to main content
I am sending him back to you, and with him comes my own heart.
Philemon 1:12 NLT
Paul is in prison, an old man, and somehow he gets to spend time with Onesimus, maybe he's been in jail with him for some reason?
Across the ethnic divide, the age divide, the religious, the cultural divide Paul and Onesimus have connected. 
What a beautiful thing to say; "with him comes my own heart". 
Paul didn't let any of those barriers stop him from loving his neighbour.
Carlos Rodriguez is a pastor in Puerto Rico and has t-shirts printed with variations on this theme:
Love thy neighbor
Thy immigrant neighbor
Thy atheist neighbor
Thy LGBTQ+ neighbor
Thy depressed neighbor
Thy disabled neighbor
Thy Muslim neighbor
Thy homeless neighbor
Thy millennial neighbor...
Thy _______ neighbor

Paul is asking Philemon to love his slave neighbor.
Imagine choosing to love a person who you "own" and still want or be able to "own" them. It seems impossible to do both. Tough work ahead for Philemon, tough work to change Onesimus's label from slave to neighbor.
To be able to see Onesimus as worthy.
As Brene Brown says "worthy of love and belonging"
Remember today that nothing needs to shift in Jesus to see you and me as worthy of love and belonging...we're already there.
#philemon
#aroha
#alreadydearlyloved
#loveyourneighbour

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation,  for through him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can't see - such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities in the unseen world. Everything was created through him and for him. Colossians 1:15-16 NLT OK so this is an English translation of a letter Paul wrote to a church 2,000 years ago, but does it feel like Paul is wrestling with words and ideas to try and capture all of who Jesus is, of who God is, of how does it work that the walking around Jesus was also there before the beginning of the beginning of everything we can see and touch and know. Not only that but Jesus was somehow the agent of everything that has been made in the physical, social, and spiritual.  Jesus is at the centre of it all.  Walking around Jesus. Cooking fish for breakfast Jesus. Heart aching as he ...
Post a Comment
Read more
As Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside privately and told them what was going to happen to him.  "Listen," he said,  "we're going up to Jerusalem, where the Son of Man will be betrayed to the leading priests and the teachers of religious law.  They will sentence him to die. Then they will hand him over to the Romans to be mocked,  flogged with a whip,  and crucified.  But on the third day he will be raised from the dead." Matthew 20:17-20 NLT Jesus wanted his team, those closest to him, to know what was going to happen next.  It seems he wanted them to be prepared.  To be able to hold the hope of what's at the end as they go through the watching him be betrayed, sentenced, mocked, abused, and killed.  I wonder if Jesus needed to tell them, to let those he knew best what was ahead because he needed them with him. Jesus wanted community in the most difficult of times. It's no wonder that we do too.  We're in...
Post a Comment
Read more
Now rescue your beloved people. Answer and save us by your power. ... Who will bring me into the fortified city?  Who will bring me victory over Edom? Have you rejected us, O God?  Will you no longer march with our armies?Oh, please help us against our enemies,  for all human help is useless. With God's help we will do mighty things, for he will trample down our foes. Psalm 108 6, 10-13 NLT After the most beautiful and uplifting worshipful first half to this song, David takes us somewhere completely different in the second half.  It's all about victory, power, winning, it's all about him. The "mighty things" he wants God to do are all on the outside, all about power, and David's writing sounds like he's a bit lost in his quest to win. And I do the same thing. Praise God and ask him to fix my problems. Fix the classroom/online/workplace bully, fix my finances, fix my relationships, fix my problems. So as I sit with this psalm of 2 halves, its a bit of a mir...
Post a Comment
Read more