Philemon 1:8-11
8 Therefore, though I might be very bold in Christ to command you what is fitting, 9 yet for love's sake I rather appeal to you—being such a one as Paul, the aged, and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ— 10 I appeal to you for my son Onesimus, whom I have begotten while in my chains, 11 who once was unprofitable to you, but now is profitable to you and to me.
Paul could have begged boldly with his friend and brother in Christ for the slave Onesimus, asking Philemon to consider doing the right thing. Instead he pleaded in love as an old man and prisoner for Christ’s sake that Philemon would consider what Paul was asking. He saw Onesimus as a son, converted under his ministry of the gospel while Paul was in jail. He saw this man who was a slave as free in Christ, as one of value to the gospel work and to Paul. And so he implied that this slave was valuable to his master because he had great worth to their Master. Thus begins the appeal for the one set free in Christ to find freedom in this life also. We are all slaves to Christ, and must use that freedom as slaves to the gospel while not binding others to us, but to Christ alone.
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