Philemon 1:12-16
12 I am sending him back. You therefore receive him, that is, my own heart, 13 whom I wished to keep with me, that on your behalf he might minister to me in my chains for the gospel. 14 But without your consent I wanted to do nothing, that your good deed might not be by compulsion, as it were, but voluntary. 15 For perhaps he departed for a while for this purpose, that you might receive him forever, 16 no longer as a slave but more than a slave—a beloved brother, especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.
Paul was returning the slave to his master, but as a freeman in the Lord now after hearing the gospel and being reborn. Paul sent him back as affection from his heart because Onesimus was now a brother in Christ, even as he wanted him to stay and help in the gospel and with Paul’s needs while locked up. But to be fair to the laws of the land and to Philemon, he asked permission before doing these things. He wanted Philemon to respond with his heart by faith to answer this request for the service of God over that of man. He reminded Philemon that God allowed Onesimus to leave and be with Paul that he would be saved, and so would return as more than a slave to man and to sin; he pointed out that as a brother in Christ, Onesimus is a beloved member of God’s family and that was the greatest value - not as property.
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