I'm glad for a place called heaven, aren't you? My heart is stirred this morning. Trust you'll turn in your Bible, if you would please, to the little book of Philemon. This will be the last time that we visit this little postcard epistle in this series of messages, and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time. in this book of 25 short verses. But yet the Lord's allowed us to learn so many wonderful truths. A little note from a friend to a friend. But yet we realize that while it is a short book, only one chapter in our New Testament, it packs a powerful punch, doesn't it? And has so much to say to us. Bursting with truth. Philemon, verse number 10. If you don't have a Bible, the text of verses will be on the screen. Notice he says in verse number 10, I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds, which in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me, whom I have sent again. Thou therefore receive him, that is, mine own bowels, whom I would have retained with me, that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospel. But without thy mind would I do nothing, that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity, but willingly. For perhaps he therefore departed for a season, that thou shouldest receive him forever, not now as a servant, but above a servant, a brother beloved, specially to me, but how much more unto thee, both in the flesh and in the Lord. If thou count me therefore a pardoner, receive Him as myself. If he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee aught, put that on mine account. I, Paul, have written it with mine own hand. I will repay it. Albeit I do not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides. Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord. Refresh my bowels, my heart in the Lord, having confidence in thy obedience. I wrote unto thee, knowing that thou wilt also do more than I say." What a wonderful passage of Scripture. If I were to write a theme for the entire book of Philemon, it would be our series theme, A Story of Grace. You're going to find that grace is prevalent throughout this wonderful book. And we've learned that the grace that saves us is the grace that changes us. Aren't you glad that God does not leave us where He finds us? I'm glad that God did not leave me in my sin. God didn't leave me in my past misery. God didn't leave me in my past iniquity. I'm glad, as the psalmist says, He lifted me out of the miry clay. set my feet upon a rock, established my goings, put a new song in my mouth, even praise to our God. And so the grace that saves is the grace that changes. When we come to this book of Philemon, we realize that it's written by a man by the name of the Apostle Paul. He's now an aged man. He has served the Lord now for probably 30 years. He's in prison there in Rome. He calls himself the prisoner of Jesus Christ. He's writing to his friend Philemon. Philemon's probably a very well-to-do Christian in Colossae. The church meets in his house. He's not a pastor. He's not a missionary. He's not an evangelist. He's a servant of the Lord in a local church. Can I just stop and say something? You don't have to be a pastor, a missionary, or evangelist to do something for God. God wants to use each of us and all of us for His glory. We just all want to be all in for Him. Amen? And we find that the church met in His house. There's a third person in our story, in our book, and he's a man by the name of Onesimus. We met him last week. Onesimus is a man that God has worked mightily in his life. He was an outcast. He was a man that was branded, so to speak. He didn't have much of a future. But God came on the scene in his life and he experienced the grace of God. And that grace changed him. Paul is sending him back to Philemon and he's a changed man. I believe when he gets there and he knocks on the door and Philemon looks at Onesimus and he says, Onesimus, what are you doing here? And I believe he said this, By the grace of God, I've been changed. Can I ask you this question? Have you been changed? Have you been changed? Because the grace that saves is the grace that changes. Let's pray together. Lord, we love you today. We thank you for the goodness and the greatness of God. Father, I thank you for grace. Lord, I'm so unworthy. But yet, Lord, in your love, you've bestowed grace upon us, and it's grace on top of grace. Lord, thank you for the grace that saves, but also thank you for the grace that changes. And Lord, I pray that this morning as we finish up this little book of Philemon, we look at this man Onesimus, that we'll see the grace of God that's been at work in his life. And Lord, that you would work in our lives this morning. There's someone maybe here today that they've never been saved. never put their faith in Jesus Christ for salvation. They don't know if they died they'd go to heaven. I pray they'll come to know you today. I pray there's Christians, Lord, that maybe there may be wrongs in their life that need to either be made right or forgiven. And I pray that, Lord, Your grace, that they would avail themselves of Your grace to deal with these areas of their lives, Lord, that they might be fully right with You as their children, as Your children. And, Lord, that we'd all be changed today. And we'll thank You for it. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Well, Onesimus is a picture of ourselves. I believe it was Martin Luther that said we are all Onesimuses. That there's a sense in which we were outcasts, we were slaves to sin and to self and to Satan. But thank God for grace. Amen. The grace that changes us. And we looked at his life, and the first thing that we noticed as we looked at this matter of being changed is the grace that redeemed him. We saw grace redeeming. Remember, Onesimus is a prodigal. He's a runaway slave. He has stolen from his master. He fled to Rome to try to, in the midst of all of that, hide himself in the masses and get lost in that great metropolis where nobody could find him. And we've already learned this, you can run away from life, you can run away from people, you can run away from places, but you'll never run away from God. And you're going to find that he runs away from Philemon, his master, but he didn't run away from God. God's been at work in his life all along, and God's going to bring him providentially into the presence of the apostle Paul. We don't know if he comes there as a prisoner, we don't know if he goes there because of the guilt of his own heart and conscience, but he sees Paul, he comes before him, and they're in a prison cell. There in Paul's prison, he begins to share with Onesimus the grace of God in Christ. He begins to share with him his need of a Savior. He tells him of his sin and the truth of salvation. And there Onesimus, in that jail cell, bows his head and receives Jesus Christ as his Savior. Onesimus, by the grace of God, becomes a redeemed man. Look, if you would, verse number 10. Notice Paul's writing now to Philemon, I beseech thee for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten in my bonds. What he's saying is that God has given me the privilege, Philemon, of leading Onesimus to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. Can I help us to understand today the best decision, the greatest decision, anybody will ever make in their life is to receive Jesus Christ and Him alone as their Savior, to come into a saving relationship with God, to be redeemed by the grace of God. Oh, the great doctrine of redemption that God has bought us. He bought us off the slave block of sin. He set us free. Jesus said, if the Son shall make you free, you're free indeed. Frank, can I tell you, there's nothing like the freedom that we have in Jesus Christ. And so we find that the grace of God has redeemed him. Preacher, why would God do something like that? Well, we saw it in verse 9, it was for love's sake. Because He loves you. And God loves me. And you say, preacher, does God really love me that much? Absolutely. Friend, can I tell you, if you just wonder about the love of God, look away to Calvary and there you'll see the great love of God. And so we saw grace redeeming. Redeemed how I love to proclaim it. Redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. Redeemed by His infinite mercy, His child, and forever I am. And so in that moment, Onesimus became a part of the family of God. But then, it didn't stop there. Not only grace redeeming we saw last week, but grace is restoring him. You see, whatever relationship Onesimus had with his master Philemon, before he ran away, before he stole from him, it's now broken. It's fractured. I mean, there is a wrong that has been done. And now, Onesimus is a saved man, and Paul says, Onesimus, I'd love for you to stay with me. I'm rejoicing how you're growing in the grace of God. I'm just watching the change in your life, and it's blessing my heart. You're such a help to me as you're ministering to me here in my bonds and caring for me and meeting needs, but Onesimus, it can't stay this way. There's a wrong been done, and Onesimus, it needs to be made right. And so he begins to send Onesimus back to Philemon, I believe with this letter in his hand. He has this letter here, and Paul is now Onesimus' mediator. He is his go-between. He's pleading the case of Onesimus, asking Philemon to receive him, to forgive him, and to restore this relationship. Look, if you would, please, in verse number 9. He said, Yet for love's sake I rather beseech thee. He's pleading. Verse 10, I beseech thee, I plead with thee for my son Onesimus. Look down, if you would, verse 15. Perhaps he departed for a season that thou shouldest receive him forever. Look down at verse 17. If thou count me therefore a partner, receive him as myself. You know what he's saying? Listen, there's been a wrong done Philemon. I understand that. But Onesimus is coming to make it right. And I want you to receive him. He is a mediator pleading the case of another. Frank, can I tell you, I've just got good news for you. The grace that saved me and the grace that redeemed me is the grace that restored me. You see, I was wrong with God, but through Christ we've been made right with God. There was a relationship that was broken that is now restored. We have a mediator. The Bible said there is one mediator between God and man, the man Jesus Christ. Listen, folks, can I tell you, we have one in heaven pleading our case. We have one in heaven that makes the wrongs in our lives right. Isn't that a blessing? There's one in heaven that says, Father, this is Kevin. I want you to receive him as you receive me. Receive him as myself. Friend, can I tell you, in Jesus, God welcomes us into the family. Isn't that a blessing? We've been not only redeemed, but by grace we've been restored. And I'm glad for the mediatorial work of Jesus because He continues to represent me before the Father and present us. We're accepted in the blood. Friend, grace redeems us. Grace restores us. But now, number three, we're going to see grace repaying. Grace repaying. Look again at verse number 18, would you please? If he, this is Onesimus, Paul writing to Philemon, if he hath wronged thee, or oweth thee aught, put that on mine account. Here's what he's saying, Philemon. I know that Onesimus has done you wrong. I know that he has run away. I know that he's stolen something very precious from you that may not even be able to be replaced. But I want you to know this, that if He owes you anything, I want you, after all of this takes place and He comes back to you and you receive Him, if He owes you anything, I want you to put that on my account, I will Repent. I'm going to make the wrong right. Grace... Paul didn't have to do it. Paul wanted to do it. Can I just stop and say something? God didn't have to save us. He wanted to save us. God didn't have to redeem us. He didn't have to restore us. But thank God He wants to. Amen? Isn't that a blessing? It's called grace. But here, not only do we see the great doctrine of redemption, but we see the great doctrine of imputation. Okay? You say, what in the world, preacher, this great big word doctrine of imputation? Well, let's just break it down here, put the cookies on the bottom shelf where me and you both can get to them, okay? And that's what we want to do. Because the doctrine of imputation is found throughout Scripture. It goes all the way back in the Old Testament to the book of Genesis to a man by the name of Abraham. Abraham was promised a son. He's now been in the land that God promised him for decades. And he's talking to the Lord, and Abraham says, Lord, you know, you promised me a land, and you promised me a seed, and you promised me an heir, but I don't have a son. I don't have an heir to receive it. The heir in my house is my steward, my servant, Eliezer. God talks back to Abraham when he's in that tent, and he said, Abraham, Eliezer is not going to be your heir, but one that comes out of your own bowels. You're going to have a son, you and Sarah, in your old age. Okay? And he says, Abraham, come out here. I want you to come out here and walk with me a bit. And so they come outside, and God says to Abraham, look up to the heavens, look at the stars. I believe it's one of them Middle Eastern nights, where I mean the stars were twinkling, they were shining. I believe it's some of those nights where you just feel like you could reach out and touch them. And Abraham begins to count. He said, I want you to number the stars. And Abraham starts saying, Lord, Lord, there's too many of them. I can't number them. I can't count all those stars. And God says, Abraham, that's how many children. That's your generation. So shall thy seed be. They're innumerable. And the Bible says, Genesis 15, 6, that Abraham believed in the Lord and he counted it. He imputed it to him for righteousness. You see, God credited righteousness in that moment. to Abraham's account. It's the doctrine of imputation. You're going to fast forward about a thousand years. You're going to come to a man by the name of David. He's going to write a penitential psalm in Psalm 32 about forgiveness. And here's what he says, Blessed, happy is he whose transgression is forgiven. If you don't have anything else to be excited about, You don't have anything else to be happy about. You don't have anything else to shout about. Friend, you can shout if your transgression has been forgiven. Amen? And he says, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. So that word impute or imputeth that's implied here in Philemon verse 18, put that on my account. It's an accounting term. It's a banking word. Alright? So if you work in the financial banking world, you understand imputation or this matter of imputing or crediting to an account. It means to reckon. It means to credit. It means to put to one's account. So, you go to the bank. That's not something I do a whole lot of. My wife goes to the bank, okay? If I was to go and cash a check with my name on it, they would think it was forged. I let her do all of that. So you make a deposit. It was crazy the other night. She's sitting there, standing there at the bar, and she's taking pictures of a check. I said, what in the world are you doing? Why are you taking pictures of a check? I'm depositing it in the bank. You see, I didn't realize you didn't have to go to the bank anymore. You can just take a picture of it and send it to them. How many of you knew that? Wow. See, I tell you, I don't go to the bank. When we're in the car, listen, when we pull up to the bank, I'm not gonna tell you which bank we go to, but I pull up to the bank, and I put something in that little thing that goes to the lady or whoever's there at the teller window, and they're looking at it, and they're looking at me, and then they look around me and see Lori, and they say, oh, hi, Miss Broyhill. I'm like, who am I, a chopped liver? But whenever you make that deposit, they impute that money or they credit it to your account. Alright? And so an account has a debit column, has a credit column. So imputation means they've imputed, they have credited it to your account. Put that on my account. I will repay it. Impute it to me, Paul says. Take it off of Onesimus' account and put it on my account. That's the doctrine of imputation because, I want you to get this, we're bankrupt spiritually. We have a debt we cannot pay. It's called the debt of our sin and our rebellion against the God of heaven, and the list of our sins, so to speak, in heaven, on our account in heaven, our crimes, so to speak, against God, what we owe God. We're bankrupt. We can't pay it. But thank God 2,000 years ago, Jesus walked up Calvary's mountain and there God laid on Him your sin and my sin. There was a great transaction. God took my sin off of my account and He imputed it, He placed it, He transferred it to His Son, listen, Jesus wasn't guilty. I was guilty. But He voluntarily took my place and God imputed my unrighteousness to His account. Are you with me? And the Bible said He took it away, nailing it to His cross. Christian, listen to me. Friend, listen to me. Jesus didn't just pay for some of your sins. He didn't pray for most of your sins. He paid for all of your sins. Put that on my account. And He paid it in full. For if you're saved today, your sins are forgiven. Oh, Jesus said, it's finished. Paid in full. It's done. It's done. The great transaction is done. The work of redemption is complete. When a person is saved and they trust Jesus Christ, let's imagine it in banking terms. Can we do that so that we understand what takes place in this doctrine of imputation? I'm not saying at all that you have some kind of written record in heaven, although I believe there are written records in heaven. Wouldn't we agree with that? Alright? But I believe that if there was a physical record in heaven, let's just say that, that listed all of the number and the nastiness of my sin and your sin. Well, the day I trusted Jesus Christ, do you know what happened? God the Father, so to speak, took a stamp and He stamped on my debit column in big red letters, PAID IN FULL. Jesus paid my debt for me. Paid in full. I love it when I pay something off and I get that little letter in the mail, the record back and stamped on it is paid in full. And I can say, see there, I don't owe you anything. Friend, when it comes to my sin, I don't owe anything. But on the other side of the column, See, on this side, there's a whole big list. It's called the unrighteousness side. That's the debit column. But it's been paid in full. But it didn't stop there. Oh no, on the credit side, where there was nothing, because I don't have any righteousness, in bold letters, it's stamped, The Righteousness of Jesus Christ. Christ, because Jesus took our sin and He gave us His righteousness. That is the doctrine of imputation, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them. For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Friend, God took my sin and He laid it on Jesus and He paid it in full. And then the day I said yes to Jesus Christ, that Sunday night in 1984, God transferred the righteousness of Jesus Christ onto my account and I stand before God righteous in His Son. Friend, thank God that we're clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That is the doctrine of imputation. Isn't that powerful? Put it on my account. Friend, all of your sins have been placed on Jesus. He paid in full the debt of your sin. All He wants you to do is receive it so that He can place His righteousness on your account. You're right with God. Isn't that amazing? But there's times even since I've been saved that I've disobeyed my Heavenly Father. that I've been less than what I should be, life, what I've said, or maybe what I've thought, or what I've done. The old accuser would say, look there, there it is, there's sin. Put it on his account. He deserves that. God, you said the wages of sin is death. He deserves to die. But I'm glad I have an advocate. His name is Jesus Christ, the righteous one. Send me the right hand of the Father." And he says, Father, I know that Kevin sinned, but you put that on my account. I paid for it. And that's why 1 John 1, 9, we can confess our sins. And He's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sin. Oh, what a Savior. Thank God for the wonderful doctrine of imputation. Put that on my account. Aren't you glad, friend, that Jesus took your debt that He might give you His righteousness? Oh, that's grace repaying. But then there's one more thing I want you to see and I'm done. Grace rearranging. You see, the onesimus that's coming back to Philemon is not the same onesimus that ran away from Philemon. It's different now. His testimony, I can see him standing before Philemon. He knocks on the door, his head's down in shame. And he said, Philemon looks at him and says, Nesmus, is that you? Yes, sir. What are you doing here? Well, sir, I just want to tell you, by the grace of God, I've been changed. I'm not who I used to be anymore. Can you imagine that? I believe that's what takes place. You see, the grace that saves is the grace that changes. Listen to Titus 2, verse 11. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men. It appeared in Jesus Christ. Teaching us, watch this, grace teaches us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts or desires, we should live soberly. That's not just avoiding being drunk, it's more than that. It's meaning to be serious minded about life. Life's not a game and it's not a joke. Life's serious business. Doesn't mean we can't have fun, doesn't mean we can't cut up, doesn't mean we can't laugh, doesn't mean we can't enjoy life, but life's serious business. We're going to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. You see, the grace that saves is the grace that changes. And it's an ongoing change in our lives as we grow in His grace. Oh, I think it went like this. Oh, what a wonderful... My voice is not going to let me sing this morning. Oh, what a wonderful change in my life has been wrought since Jesus came into my life. I believe Onesimus is saying, Philemon, it's different now. I'm not who I used to be. Friend, I'm glad. Sunday night, 1984. It's different. I'm not who I used to be. Thank God for that. You see, the moment Onesimus robbed his master and fled for Rome, he was a condemned man. Now, months later, he's returning home a changed man. Returning for Onesimus' church was serious business. It was dangerous matter. Under Roman law, and we were just talking about the culture of that day, there was harsh penalty for a runaway slave, and they were completely at the mercy of their master. They could be crucified. They could have had experienced a lesser punishment, if you want to call it that, being beaten with the cat of nine tails. They could have been forever branded with the letter F in their forehead for fugitive. So everywhere they went, it was a deterrent to try to keep them from running away again because wherever they went throughout the Roman Empire, that letter would remind everybody who they were. They were a runaway slave. They were a fugitive. And that would be on the forehead. It could be a combination of things. They could be in prison. It could be any number of things that could happen. But Onesimus was willing. He was willing. to face whatever would come his way to make the wrong right in his life. It was an evidence of the change that had taken place. He was a different man. I'm reminded of Zacchaeus, the tax collector that got saved. He was a robber. He was robbing the people. And then after he got saved, met the Lord, he started going from house to house, and he started writing checks back, reimbursing those he had stolen from. You say, preacher, what? He was making wrongs right. Let me just say something, and I'm trying to be kind as I can say it, but saved people make wrongs right. That's what Christians do. We make wrongs right. And we forgive wrongs. I'm going to quickly tell a story because I've got a few things to say and I don't want to keep us all morning. We're going to go back probably 1990. I'm getting ready to take Temple Baptist Church as my first church and become their pastor. But God reminded me right before my ordination and assuming that, that there was a wrong in my life. See, in Bible college, back as a freshman, I was a vacuum cleaner salesman. Imagine that. Didn't go very well. And the day... It came, I left my job, and I was to turn everything back in, and when I did, there was some damaged equipment, and I sort of just turned it in, in a sneaky fashion, and left. Because I didn't have the money to pay it. You say, Preacher, that's wrong. You're right. Time went by. Probably a couple years. I'd forgotten about it. But God didn't forget. I was getting ready for my ordination, preparing for all this, and God said, He didn't say it out of heaven, but God reminded me of that wrong and what I owed. These people, listen, probably the same people weren't there anymore. The manager probably wasn't there. They probably didn't even know who I was. But none of that mattered. I remember sitting down, I looked up the address, and I remember sitting down at my table, and I explained the story to my wife. And I said, honey, I need to make this right. God's dealt with my heart. I can't go forward and have His blessing on my life because there's a wrong here. I've got to make right. I've basically stolen. I didn't think about it that way as an 18-year-old kid, but now as a 20-some-year-old man, With a wife and a child on the way, I realized things were different. And I remember having my wife and we wrote out a check for the amount of money that it was. And I remember writing a letter explaining the situation to them and saying, you probably don't remember who I am. This is what I did. This is what I owe. And I put in there, God has reminded me that I need to make this right because, see, they knew I was a Christian. And I didn't know who was going to get that letter, but I wanted it right. And I wrote in there, shamefully, I wrote this letter and I mailed that check. You say, well, what happened? I don't know. They got their money and I got a receipt back. They didn't write me a letter back, but I did get a receipt that they had deposited that check. But let me tell you what happened. There was a burden lifted off of me. And there was a peace that came to my life because there was an area of my life that wasn't right. And God wasn't going to let it go on any longer. And he said, before you take another step forward, this wrong's got to be made right. And Christian, there may be wrongs in your marriage that are deep seated. But if you want God's blessing on your relationship, you're going to have to get some wrongs right. There may be some wrongs in your family. The grace that saves is the grace that changes. And this is a change that God wants to bring in our lives. It needs to be gotten right. Maybe relationships. I don't know. But I'm just saying that as Christians, we need to make wrongs right. And we need to forgive the wrongs that are done to us. And that's what Philemon is all about. And so let's say a husband and wife have a wrong in their relationship and one comes and says, honey, I've wronged you. And the other one said, well, you might have wronged me, but I'm not giving in. And then you refuse to forgive. You're just as wrong as the person that did the wrong. You're both guilty. Grace rearranges and changes how we live. And if we want to be holy people that have the blessing of God on our lives, then we seek forgiveness and we grant forgiveness. That's powerful. That's called revival. He's going to go from a slave to a son. You see, God rearranged his life. He was a slave, but Paul calls him his son. But more importantly, he's God's son. Isn't that a blessing? Can I just stop and say, it doesn't matter who we are or what we are, the ground's leveled at the foot of the cross. Isn't that a blessing? He's going to go from unprofitable to profitable. Look at verse 11 of Philemon. You see this? He said, which in time past was to thee unprofitable, but now profitable to thee and to me. And so you know what Onesimus' name meant? It meant useful or profitable. And there's sort of a play here on Onesimus' name, and he probably was a useless worker in the household of Philemon, probably got very little out of him, and he probably would say, you know, Onesimus, your name's useful, but you're just useless. But he's coming back, and Paul said, I just want you to know where he was useless, now he's useful. He's a different man. And you know what? There was a day that I was unprofitable so far as heaven's concerned, but I'm glad that by the grace of God that we've been made profitable or useful for heaven. Isn't that a blessing? And then let's get the last one. We'll go from fugitive to forgiven. He was a fugitive on the run who gets right with God. Aren't you glad God forgives us? And then he's going back to get right with his master. You know what the good news is? The good news is that when God forgives us, it's gone. Isn't that a blessing? And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more. That means I'll never face my sin again. I've heard preachers talk about how that one day we stand before God and it's almost like there's this big picture movie screen up there and God's going to replay our life before everybody and everybody's going to see what we've done. I don't believe any of that. I don't believe any of that. You say, preacher, why? Because my sins are gone. There's no skeletons coming out of the closet when we get to heaven. No bones gonna rattle because my sins are gone. And God said, your sins and iniquities will I remember no more. That's not to say we wouldn't stand before the Lord and Him say, Kevin, you know, this area of your life you weren't faithful in. You could have been more faithful here. You know, why was your motive wrong here in my service to Him? I believe that we'll all have times before the Lord that we wished we'd have been different and done better. Wouldn't we agree with that? But so far as my sins, friend, I'll never face them again. They're gone. And God had forgiven Philemon. I mean, excuse me, Onesimus. And now Paul says, Philemon, I want you to forgive him. And Philemon is a story of grace and mercy, of friendship and forgiveness and reconciliation and renewal. And that's the very heart of the gospel, that God not only restores our relationship with him vertically, but he restores human relationships horizontally. That's what he does. And I'm just gonna ask you, is there a wrong in your life that needs to be made right? And number two, is there a wrong done to you that needs to be forgiven? And I'm gonna give you a couple reasons why you ought to forgive it. Number one, it's for love's sake, verse nine, yet for love's sake. Philemon, I want you to forgive him for love's sake. Because God's loved you, Philemon, and you love him, and out of love, you need to forgive him God's love. I want you to do it for his sake, for the Lord's sake, because you've been forgiven. He tells him that. You owe me. He tells Philemon this. He said, brother, you owe us me. What he was talking about, Philemon was saved and right with God because of Paul's ministry in his life. And he was saying that, look what God's done for you, Philemon. If God can forgive you, you can forgive Onesimus. And what I'm saying, dear child of God, is this, that if God can forgive us, we can forgive each other. Isn't that right? That's where the revival comes. Now here's what's interesting and I'm done. We're not really told in the book of Philemon how things turn out. You know how we're left? We're left in my mind with Onesimus standing on the doorstep of Philemon. with the confession coming out, but we don't know what happens after. Paul doesn't tell us. There's no book of the Bible. There's no sequel. There's no Philemon 2 that says, oh, here's what happened. But you know what's interesting? As I was studying the life of Onesimus, that there is a historical letter written to a church by a man by the name of Ignatius. And Ignatius is on his way to be martyred. And he writes to the church at Ephesus. And guess who their pastor is? You got it. Onesimus. And I believe Philemon forgave him and restored him. And God used him to become the pastor of one of the great churches in the New Testament. Can I read the quote out of the letter? Are you ready? This letter is thousands of years old, this quote. This is Ignatius writing to Ephesus, and he said, I received therefore your whole multitude in the name of God, probably multitude of encouragement, maybe a love offering, through Onesimus. a man of inexpressible love, and your bishop, pastor in the flesh, whom I pray you by Jesus Christ to love, and that you would all seek to be like him. And blessed be he who has granted you being worthy to obtain such an excellent pastor." The grace that saves is the grace that changes. Isn't that amazing? There's an old, worn gravestone in a churchyard in St. Peter and St. Paul's Church in Olney, Buckinshire, England. On that gravestone is an epitaph and here's what it says, John Newton, Once an infidel and libertine, that's just a good way of saying a wild man, a servant of slaves in Africa, was by the rich mercy of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ preserved, restored, pardoned, appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy. He's the man that wrote Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I'm found, was blind, but now I see. I believe you could sum up John Newton's testimony, Onesimus' testimony, and every other Christian's testimony in three simple words. You know what it is? I've been changed. Now I'm going to ask you a question. Have you been changed? Let's bow our heads in prayer.