Emancipation in Christ

For I have great joy and encouragement from your love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you, brother.

For this reason, although I have great boldness in Christ to command you to do what is right, I appeal to you, instead, on the basis of love. I, Paul, as an elderly man and now also a prisoner of Christ Jesus, appeal to you for my son, Onesimus. I fathered him while I was in chains. Once he was useless to you, but now he is useful both to you and to me. I am sending him back as a part of myself. I wanted to keep him with me, so that in my imprisonment for the gospel he might serve me in your place. But I didn't want to do anything without your consent, so that your good deed might not be out of obligation, but of your own free will. For perhaps this is why he was separated from you for a brief time, so that you might get him back permanently, no longer as a slave, but more than a slave- as a dearly loved brother. He is especially so to me, but even more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.

Philemon 1:7-16

It is only fitting that on the day, 28 August, on the anniversary of Martin Luther King delivered his speech: 'I have a dream,' that we look at another story of slave emancipation at the hands of the apostle Paul.

Christianity had a way of breaking down the divide between slave and master and in fact the who,e idea of slavery. In a day when slavery was rife and as Aristotle put it: 'a slave was a living took, just as a tool is an inanimate slave.'

Today, Christianity has once again taken up the cause for the slaves through groups such as A21. I belong to a group called Trifreedom. Our group enters athletic competitions and raises funds to aid the cause of worldwide emancipation of slaves.

Daily I re dive posts about another slave set free and I rejoice, and yet the work is great that needs to be done.

As Christians we know the freedom Christ brings and that all men are equal before God, there is no master and no slave.

Onesimus had run away and taken what was not his. As an employer I understand how Philemon would be indignant with him. The fact that Paul is defending Onesimus gives Philemon not much room for expression of his disapproval. In fact Paul appears to cleverly silence Philemon. It looks like manipulation, am I allowed to say: 'Paul! You are being manipulative?' Because this is what it appears. However, as we do not know what caused Onesimus to run away, was he unfairly treated?

As an employer I do not own my staff, whist I would love their heart in the business, it is theirs to give or withhold. I cannot manipulate either. In all relationships there is tension, even employer and employees struggle with each other's expectations.