I preached on Philemon last week. It is Paul's shortest letter - and his only letter that is addressed to a single person instead of a church. It is a valuable glimpse into how the early church navigated the challenge of applying the gospel to the mess of community. What happens when an escaped slave becomes a follower of Christ and then returns to his Christ-following slave master? It gets messy. Community was a mess for them and it is a mess for us. In Colossae, in the church that met at Philemon's house, you had men and women, laborers and wealthy land owners, slaves and slave-masters sitting side by side worshiping the same God. And, amazingly, they didn't kill each other. They didn't implode into infighting and bitterness or explode into a hundred different affinity groups. They united together around the person and work of Jesus. And if they could do it, so can we. Most of Paul's letters are a combination of lesson and lab. They teach and apply.
A man made of mud learning to live as an image bearer of God