Paul prays that this commitment to the communion and fellowship of faith will give him insight then about what he ought to do: that the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ. (Philemon 1:6). He says that when you embrace this lifestyle of love and generosity and mercy in the fellowship of believers, God's grace becomes effective in you, and you start to understand what is good. His grace gives the definition of what is the right decision. The Roman law would give its definition, but Paul says, What about the grace of Christ? The idea of what is right and good becomes redefined. You see the question in Christ no longer is about what is my legal right ? Or what is my relational right? Or what do I have a right to demand or expect of this person, or do to them? Instead, the question Paul says is this: How does God's grace, for me and my fellowship with this person, call for me to think and act? F.F. Bruce notes, " Paul has one particular good work he wants Philemon to do, and the resources necessary for that good work, are resources not of material affluence, but of Christian grace.” Paul wants Philemon, and you and me too, to think and act as if what we profess to believe really is true. That is all it asks . Would it not be nice if it could be inferred from our actions that the things that we profess actually are true? That we ourselves are sinners, saved by mercy, by the loving, gracious God who sent his own Son and he ha s given us new life. He is Sovereign and he is taking care of us. We do not have to sin or hurt other people to get along. And there is eternal glory. Whatever our future holds, there is eternal glory in Christ. What if we acted as if we actually thought those things were true? That is all that Paul is asking: that we profess Jesus as Savior and demonstrate God's sovereign grace as actually true.
For most of us, our first reaction to that kind of difficult situation that Philemon is in, with a difficult person almost always is not to think in terms of God's grace. No, we react in the flesh, according to the law. What do we have the right to do? We want to do it, we want to enforce it. That is how we first think.
That is why we have prayer, so we pray about decisions. I personally, for instance, find it very difficult to pray for God to judge another person, in a prayer in which I have asked for mercy for myself. I begin by praying,
Richard D. PhillipsLord, have mercy on me; I'm a sinner; don't give me what I deserve.I appeal to the blood of Jesus Christ. But if I say, That guy, let him have it. Give him everything you got.” And if there is something within me, namely the Holy Spirit, then he says ,You know, Rick, I am having some cognitive dissonance about your prayer.That is why if you hate somebody, and you do pray for them, saying,How do I deal with this enmity? I have a fellow Christian, and I can't stand them. I would love to hear they were run over by a truck and you know, their remains eaten by wild dogs.Start praying for that person. You cannot keep up your hatred. The best way to stop hating someone is to pray for them. But here's the thing. Paul knows that the logic of love and grace and faith is not usually our first response, which is why he wrote this letter. That is why the Holy Spirit preserved this letter. You see, when faced with a relationship problem, and the failures of others and their disappointments, what we are to do is to think again, Paul knows what we are thinking. He says to Philemon,Think again, because of the grace of God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Think of who you are. Think of the fact that no one has ever sinned against you or me to the extent that we have sinned against God.God has forgiven us by His own blood, because of his graciousness, his redemption. Oh, can we not think again? Because that is true: God's grace for us in Christ. You see, here is Paul's formula: As we more and more practice the life of communion and faith with fellow believers in the love of Christ, God's grace becomes effective, kicking in to give us the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ (Philemon 1:6). The practice of loving communion, through God's grace, teaches us how to live for Christ glory, for His pleasure— to live in line with the precepts of his kingdom.1
6 Je lui demande que ta participation à la foi soit efficace pour la cause de Christ, en faisant reconnaître en nous toute espèce de bien.