Understanding God's Heart For Us in Song
1 Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, to Philemon, our beloved fellow worker,
2 to the beloved Apphia, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the assembly in your house:
3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
4 I thank my God always, making mention of you in my prayers,
5 hearing of your love and of the faith which you have toward the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints,
6 that the fellowship of your faith may become effective in the knowledge of every good thing which is in us in Christ Jesus.
7 For we have much joy and comfort in your love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you, brother.
8 Therefore though I have all boldness in Christ to command you that which is appropriate,
9 yet for love’s sake I rather appeal to you, being such a one as Paul, the aged, but also a prisoner of Jesus Christ.
10 I appeal to you for my child Onesimus, whom I have become the father of in my chains,
11 who once was useless to you, but now is useful to you and to me.
12 I am sending him back. Therefore receive him, that is, my own heart,
13 whom I desired to keep with me, that on your behalf he might serve me in my chains for the Good News.