Yea, brother, let me have joy of thee in the Lord,.... Through the apostle was his spiritual father, having been the instrument of his conversion, yet he calls him his brother, as being a partaker of the same grace, and a minister of the same Gospel; and intimates to him, that should he grant his request, and receive his servant again, it would...
Having confidence in thy obedience,.... In his obedience of faith to Christ, and his Gospel; he having been made willing in the day of his power to serve him, as well as to be saved by him; and being constrained by his love, and the Spirit of Christ having wrought in him both to will and to do of his good pleasure: l wrote unto thee, knowing that...
But withal prepare me also a lodging,.... Not that the apostle expected or desired any grand apartment to be fitted up for him; a room with such furniture as the Shunamite provided for the man of God was sufficient for him, and what he would have been entirely contented with; but his view in this was, to let Philemon know that he hoped to be...
There salute thee Epaphras,.... Who was a Colossian, and minister of the church at Colosse, and so might be well known to Philemon, who seems to have been of the same place and church; see Colossians 1:7 his name is omitted in the Ethiopic version: my fellow prisoner in Christ Jesus; this good man, and minister of Christ, might have been sent by...
Marcus, Aristarchus, Demas, Lucas,.... Marcus was Barnabas's sister's son, the son of that Mary, in whose house the church met, and prayed for Peter when in prison; whose name was John Mark, whom Saul and Barnabas took along with them to Antioch, and from thence, in their travels, to other parts; but he leaving them at Pamphylia, was the occasion...
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. Not with his spirit only, but with the spirit of Apphia and Archippus, to whom also the epistle was sent; and therefore the word is in the plural number; and the Syriac version adds pertinently enough, "my brethren": the salutation is the same as in all the epistles; the form of it...