Welcome to the Philemon Advent calendar. For
the next 25 days, receive short holiday devotions in your inbox. Together we
will deepen our anticipation of God's coming kingdom and prepare for the
nativity of Christ.
Philemon may seem like a strange text to pair
with the holidays. The excuse is numerological. There are 25 days in a
traditional Advent calendar. There are 25 verses in Philemon. Each verse will
open space for a brief reflection and a prayer.
In addition, Philemon is perhaps unique in
the whole New Testament as showing us how personal, and interpersonal, letters
can be. This letter between Paul and Philemon is much like a good Christmas
letter. It helps sender and recipient know each other better. The letter
connects them, even across great distances, and unites them in the love of
Christ.
Because Paul identifies himself so closely
with Onesimus (the slave on behalf of whom he is writing the letter), he models
the shape of the incarnation in his own life. In the same way Christ took our
part in the incarnation in order to reconcile us to God, Paul takes the part of
Onesimus in order to reconcile himself to Philemon. It is a beautiful model for
how Christ's incarnation, his birth, truly matters for our own life of faith,
because all of our interpersonal relationships are transformed in Christ.
We are all in this holy story together,
players in God's drama. Our place in that story is determined by our place
"in Christ," and as Paul models it in his letter to Philemon, we are
improvisers, free in Christ to perform the gospel in creative and generative
ways, ways that matter for the life of the world.
--
1: Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To
Philemon our dear friend and co-worker.
This is the week many of us sit down to draft
Christmas letters. Some are old school, hand-written notes to many and sundry.
Others are mid school, typed and crafted, with bible quotes and poems and
photos, then laid out in Publisher. Others are new school, typed quickly and
updated on Facebook or Instagram.
However you write your Christmas letter, or
even if you don't send one at all, you have some that are arriving. So you can
imagine by comparison this little letter from Paul. He sends it from jail (are
any of your Christmas letters addressed to those in prison?). He sends it
together with a co-author, Timothy (Is yours sent as a family? Do you include
your cat as co-signatory? Is your new baby the author?). He addresses it to a
dear friend and co-worker in the gospel.
It is enough, on this first day of our
journey, to simply be aware. Paul is writing a letter. He puts pen to
parchment, friend at his side, another friend in mind, and he opens that most
basic and intimate of moments: To say what needs to be said, and hope against
hope it is heard.
Lord Jesus, we are also your prisoners, free of all other
allegiances and tuned to your reign. Set us free in you. Make us mindful of our
brothers and sisters in Christ, our friends and family, our co-workers in the
gospel. Guide our hands as we write our words, and by your Spirit make them
your words also. Amen.
2: to Apphia
our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house:
Paul's letter
is addressed not simply to Philemon, but to his household. It is likely (but
not certain) that Apphia is Philemon's wife, and Archippus his son. In other
words, although the title of the letter may make us believe it is a personal
letter, it is actually a communal letter, addressed not only to Philemon's
whole family, but to the church that meets in their house.
This house
church receives a letter from Paul that is radical in its implications. The
letter is about Onesimus, Philemon's slave. Philemon sent Onesimus to Paul in
prison, probably delivering food and other necessities. Paul sends Onesimus
back to Philemon and his house church with this letter. The letter is
transformative. It invites Philemon and his church to reconsider how Christian
community is conceived. If Philemon receives the letter in the spirit in which
it is sent (and there is every reason to believe he and his community did), it
would "collapse the all-too-frequent oppressions that mar our world still
today" (The New Testament Fortress
Press Commentary on the Bible, Eric Barreto, 615).
Onesimus went
to Paul as a slave. He returns to Philemon not as a slave but as a sibling,
property no longer but rather brother. The gospel of Jesus Christ transforms
Onesimus's relationship to the church at Philemon, Apphia, and Archippus's
house.
Imagine what
this might look like in each of our own households. That each of our households
thought of itself as, and sometimes gathered, a church. That we sent food to
those in prison. That we received letters challenging us to make less
distinctions based on wealth, class, power, and race. That because Christ came
as a child, one of us, we can imagine ourselves becoming like those whom we
consider most different, or lower.
3: Grace to
you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the
classic Pauline greeting. It's so brief and beautiful and clear. No wonder many
Christians borrow it for their own letters, and churches use it in their
liturgies. When we borrow it, we align ourselves with the author, identify with
him, so anyone who hears us speak or reads a letter with these words thinks to
themselves, "That sounds like Paul. That is Paul. It's a New Testament
thing."
How we
associate, the posture we bring to an encounter, makes so much difference in
our communication. Paul has already opened his letter self-identifying himself
as "a prisoner of Christ Jesus" (v. 1). Because he is a prisoner of
Christ, he is associated with the lowest of the low. He is a prisoner, a slave,
poor and weak and vulnerable. So when he writes verse three, "Grace to you
and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ," he does so not
from any sense of superiority or power, but from vulnerability and weakness.
So he is
already inviting the recipient(s) of the letter into that same vulnerability.
It is a gentle, non-coercive invitation, but it is an invitation nonetheless.
He is saying, in effect, "May I greet you in solidarity and mutuality as
someone like me, a fellow prisoner in Jesus Christ? May I call you slave?"
Christ
approaches us through the Incarnation in a similar manner. He does not descend
in a ship from a position of power and say, "Take me to your leader!"
Instead, he arrives clothed in the humility of swaddling, resting in the
feeding trough of the animals, housed in temporary shelter, hungering for
mother's milk and gentle touch, and washed in the waters of new birth. In this way Christ is the very "grace
and peace" Paul mentions in his letter. This is grace and truth, to know
this one Jesus Christ, and his/our Father, God.
God our Father, you are grace and
peace for us in your Son Jesus Christ. We pray that his Lordship might make us
fellow prisoners, equally slaves, all servants of you and of each other, and so
recognizing the full humanity and vulnerability and mutuality of all. Amen.
4: When I
remember you in my prayers, I always thank my God
Paul was
remarkable for many reasons. One of those was his commitment to prayer, and his
commitment to giving thanks. In fact, although Paul is famous for his doctrine
of justification by faith apart from the works of the law (the classic insight
of faith Lutherans in particular emphasize) Paul actually spent as much or more
of the content of his letters on the topic of thanksgiving. In part, he did
this because it was an important standard form in Christian letters of the early
church. Gratitude for early Christians was a major virtue.
Opening the
letter with thanksgiving, and appealing to Philemon's faith (in verses 5-7 Paul
refers to Philemon as a model of faith), is also a winning rhetorical strategy.
It has sometimes been popularized (and vulgarized) as a "criticism
sandwich." If you have a criticism, sandwich it between two compliments.
This is not
precisely what Paul is doing in his opening thanksgiving. What he is doing is
offering a favor to Philemon, the favor of his thanksgiving and prayer, and
anticipates/hopes that Philemon will reciprocate. Not all gifts are free. Some
are given in the hopes that the free exchange of gifts will be reciprocal. A
classic Roman author, Seneca, wrote a whole book On Favors. The voluntary economy of favors was a rich and gracious
tradition, and Paul situates himself in the middle of it with these
thanksgiving verses at the beginning of the letter.
We can learn
from Paul this simple spiritual practice: If you wish to make an appeal to a
brother or sister in faith about a matter around which there may be
disagreement, first do the important spiritual work of giving thanks for them,
and say thank you to them. Then pray for them. Imagine them praying for you. In
this holiday season, as we shop for a prepare gifts for one another, let us
deepen our commitment to a free exchange of favors that honors God as the great
gift giver.
God of all favors, we give you thanks
for the many gifts we receive from your gracious hand. Strengthen us to see your
gifts even in those with whom we disagree. Through your most gracious gift,
Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.
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