Onesimus...the runaway slave
In the short book of Philemon God has given us an insightful illustration of God's saving grace at work in the person of Onesimus, Philemon's runaway slave. He had a good name, it meant "profitable." But having robbed his master and runaway from the one who had legal right to him, he was as Paul wrote, "unprofitable." Isn't it the very picture of you and me before God saved us? Running from the very one who made us in his own image and likeness. Like the coin Jesus used in Luke's gospel, asking whose image and superscription does it bear? "Well," they replied, "it bears Caesar's image." The poignant reply of Jesus is hard to forget: "Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's and unto God that which is God's." In this we have all had our turn at being "unprofitable," whatever our names might mean!
It is interesting to note that Philemon had a church in his house. Onesimus being a servant in that house had perhaps attended the services there any number of times. No doubt he had heard the gospel of Jesus. It had done him no good. Being in church doesn't save you nor does the mere hearing of the word of the Lord. Solomon wrote in Ecclesiates of many who had done essentially the same thing when he said, "I saw the wicked buried, who had come and gone from the place of the holy." Salvation is not found in the mere going and coming from God's house...or the mere hearing of the gospel. Paul reminds us in Hebrews chapter 4 of some who had heard "the word preached (but it) did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it." So it had been with Onesimus and so has it been with many.
It's hard to run from God. But run Onesimus did from Colosse in Asia across the Agean Sea and beyond Greece across the Adriadic Sea to Rome, a trip of nearly a thousand miles. Running from his master...running from the church in his house...running from the gospel...running with his master's goods...a slave running to get free. How ironic in God's Providence that he runs into the Apostle Paul, himself a prisoner in a Roman jail. It was there Paul would write of "Onesimus whom I have begotten in my bonds," i.e. of Onesimus being "born again" by the work of the Spirit of God through the man Paul and the ministry of the gospel. Onesimus would never be the same, having been "born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God."
Paul speaks of some of those profound changes in the letter he wrote to Philemon. In verse 11 Paul admits that Onesimus was certainly an unprofitable servant..."but now profitable to thee and to me!" For the first time in his life Onesimus would live up to his name, "profitable," this is the grace of God at work. Admittedly, "departed for a season," Paul continues in verse 15, "that thous shouldest receive him forever." And so it is with every blood-bought child of God who ran for a time...often like the prodigal into a far country...only to be received by the God who made us "forever." But not as a servant any longer...as Paul writes in v16..."not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved!" So it is with each of us who God has called in Christ Jesus our Lord: (John 1:12 KJV) "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name." Onesimus' life would forever be changed for the better...and so it ever has been with those whom God saves in Jesus Christ.
Why would be happy to receive Onesimus on Paul's terms? For the same reason that God the Father is happy to receive you and me. Paul gives us yet another beautiful illustration of this important truth in verse 17 and 18. First he says, "receive him as myself." That is exactly how every sinner saved by grace is received by God, "in Christ." As Paul said in (Eph 1:5-6 KJV) "(God) having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, {6} To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved." He receives us as He receives His son.
But how can the sinner be received by God as the one who knew no sin? The words of Paul to Philemon in behalf of the sinner, Onesimus, tell the story in v18 & 19: "If he hath wronged thee or oweth thee ought, put that on mine account...I Paul have written it with my own hand, I will repay it." That is precisely what Jesus says to the Father in your behalf..."whatever he or she might owe thee, Father, put it on my account, I have paid it all." Paul writes of it eloquently in the letter to the church at Colosse when he says God has "forgiven you all trespasses; Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross..."....in effect, putting it all on His account when He bore the judgment of God for the sin of the world on Calvary's cross. Justice is served...so when God receives us as He receives His beloved son "he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus."
Finally, notice with me one more interesting point in this story of the miracle of salvation. This letter, the letter of Philemon, with its story of salvation so beautifully described was entrusted into the hands of the runaway to carry back to his master. The fact that we have it as part of the inspired book bears witness that Onesimus was faithful to carry the message of salvation home. Having saved us...God entrusts us to faithfully deliver the message too. Paul calls the Christians at Corinth "living epistles...known and read of all men." Our lives are letters too. Do they read the story of a runaway slave whose life was forever changed by God's saving grace? It's a question worth asking as we think about this beautiful story of Onesimus the runaway.
