the Bible a book you've probably heard about is made up of dozens of different accounts taken over the course of several thousand years these accounts range from stories of Humanity's creation to struggles and turmoil during the time of the Roman government as well as prophecies into the future and of course the life of Jesus Christ the focal point of the entire Bible the Protestant version of the Christian Bible is made up of 66 different accounts or books of the Bible now while some variations of the Christian Bible can contain well over 80 books the two
most common are again the Protestant Bible which has 66 books or the Catholic Bible which has 73 out of the again dozens of accounts that make up the Christian Bible there's a lot of popular ones of course the most popular would have to be the story of Jesus's birth life and death which are recorded through the four Christian gospels of Matthew Mark Luke and John there's of course the stories of ancient Israel along with the judges prophets anding of the Old Testament figures like Samson David Samuel that are all recorded in the Major Prophets or
the history books of the Old Testament the beginning and ends of the Bible are well known the books of Genesis and Revelations and Paul's letters to the churches like Thessalonians Galatians Ephesians are again very well known that being said there are some lesser known books of the Bible as well now some of these lesser known books have explanations attached to them like for example some of the books of of the Old Testament written by what are considered the Minor Prophets like Obadiah or Micah these books serve as particular messages and pieces of Prophecy for the
people of the time now that's not to say they aren't important as a matter of fact a lot of the prophecy and context they give help further validate the legitimacy of scripture and of course as a part of the Bible it is sacred but not something you just throw out as an application for learning Christians and even in the New Testament some of the Lesser known books have an explanation while there are of course great things to be gleamed from the books of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus a large portion of those books is
Paul describing to the reader how to properly set up the offices of the church again incredibly important but more Niche than say the teachings of Jesus's life however there is one book in the New Testament that I think is one of the most perfect examples of not only the Christian life but of Christ love and the grace we are to show others that never gets talked about like no joke I see people just step over this book and throw it in the same pile they would throw something like the book of Jude like I understand
Jude quotes from like the Book of Enoch and other crazy stuff and it's like a really big thing to push like new Christians into I get that but the book I'm going to talk about today I think is applicable for everyone and one of the reasons I find the book we're going to talk about today so fascinating is because instead of being rich written on behalf of a king or as historical records to be kept in a palace or even to be read out among any number of Christians gathered together it is instead a book
that was written by one friend to another on behalf of a servant hello everybody today we are going to be talking about the book of fiman fiman has always been to me one of the most perfect examples of love and grace in application and no one ever talks about it and I'm tired of it so I'm going to talk about it today I do want to mention that originally I wanted this video to release on Easter because you know Bible and whatnot uh but then it took longer to get the Uzumaki video out last month
and I originally intended for it to and I had to put that video out in that month because that was the deal I had with the sponsor on that video uh so instead for Easter you got crazy flesh eating women murdering people and now a week after Easter you get the the Jesus stuff so oops but I believe the story of fiman to be an interesting one and one that I feel is worth sharing and if you want to know why I think a prisoner writing to a rich man on behalf of a servant is
one of the most interesting and overlooked books of the entire Christian Bible and stick around as we talk about it before we get started I just want to say thank you for watching to understand the impact that the book of fiman has you need to know some background going into the letter and the best way to do that is to tell you about the Letter's author Paul so Jesus Christ came to Earth died on the cross and then 3 Days Later Rose from the grave we just had Easter you're familiar with this I'm sure but
in short Christ despite our rejection of him paved the way so that we could return back to him in the wake of Christ's death his followers known as Christians began to spread this message to the rest of the world the more famous example of this is the 12 disciples or after Christ's death 11 because Judas you know wasn't really around to do that so the 11 disciples go out preach Christ spread the gospel to the world one of the most famous early Christians didn't begin his life as such as a matter of fact he began
his life by hunting down and killing Christians and this man's name was Saul see the early Christians were framed as an enemy to everyone Christ was seen as a heretic by the Jewish religion because he claimed to be the foretold savior of the Jewish people and the Romans didn't like Christians because anyone who claims some kind of governance or loyalty to something other than Rome was seen as an enemy so Christians shortly after the death of Christ were being executed left and right and one of the people who carried out these executions was Saul Saul
traveled from City to City locating underground churches killing the men and selling the women and children into slavery as a matter of fact the first time we're ever introduced to Saul is at the execution of one of the earliest church leaders a man by the name of Steven who was stoned to death and as Steven was murdered it says that Saul watched on and held the coats of the men in attendance so Saul one of the most evil low down people to ever live even if you're not a Christian I think you can agree that
murdering people and selling children is a bad move but in in spite of this God looked at Saul and said that Saul was going to be one of the greatest Christians to ever live while Saul was traveling on the road to Damascus a city in which he was going to hunt down and kill more Christian leaders the Bible says that God appeared to Saul in a beam of light and asked Saul why he had forsaken him Saul realizing that he had murdered the followers of the one true God dedicated the rest of his life thereafter
to preaching in God's name Saul was renamed to Paul and Paul went on to become arguably the greatest Christian to ever live he went from City to City preaching and rebuilding the churches he had once sought out to destroy as a matter of fact several of the Christians Paul came into contact with even the disciples left after Christ were afraid of Paul because the guy who used to hunt them down to kill him now says that he's one of them through Paul's Spirit determination and Faith to God he became trusted by many of the early
church leaders as a matter of fact the Bible says that he was even joined to to the 11 disciples Paul not only began and fed several of the prominent new Christian churches like the church at Corinth or the church at Galia or the church in Ephesus but even after he left he would continue to write letters back both encouraging them and instructing them on how to follow Christ in the faith it's for this reason that several of those letters are crucial to us in the Modern Age of how to live the Christian Life several of
these letters became books of the Bible like the letter to Ephesus became Ephesians the letter to gal became Galatians and the letter to the people at colasse was called Colossians something that will be relevant for today Paul would be persecuted at multiple points throughout his life at one point he was even killed and then resurrected from the dead stating that his job was not yet done several times Paul would find himself in a Roman prison writing to the Christians that he hoped one day see again and it's one of these letters written from a Roman
prison cell that I want to talk about today the book of fiman opens with as most of Paul's letters do an address to the reader Paul Begins by saying Paul a prisoner of Jesus Christ and Timothy are brother unto fiman our dearly beloved and fellow laborer this already establishes a few things for one Paul is in prison as he writes this and he is with Timothy either also in prison or Timothy is sitting right outside of the cell as Paul writes this Timothy was Paul's apprentice and accompanied Paul on most of his journeys therefore they
would often be locked up together together it was pretty common for Paul and Timothy to travel to an area either establish or strengthen a church Preach the word of God and then get arrested by the Roman government for a while before they're kicked out and told not to come back to which they would inevitably come back and get arrested again at the end of the book of fiman Paul specifically says that this was written from Rome so we know that at this time he is in a prison in Rome now from Context that I'm going
to give here in a little bit as well as historical writings around the Bible we know that fiman is a Christian within the city of colasse the church at colasse being where the book of Colossians is addressed to because he was writing to the Colossians of the city and if you're wondering how vital fiman is to the church at colasse in the second verse Paul says and to our beloved apia and arpus our fellow Soldier and to the church in thy house apia is likely Fan's wife and arpus is either a friend of Fan's or
maybe even Fan's son and then he said says to the church in thy house as mentioned members of the church were being executed and imprisoned regularly so fiman has been holding the meetings of the church at colasse in his own home this not only shows the bond and commitment that Paul and fan must have to each other but also Fan's bond to Christ continuing to speak to them Paul says I thank my god making Mention Of Thee always in my prayers hearing of thy love and faith which thou Hast towards the Lord Jesus and toward
All Saints that the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus these are not only very kind words but again they show the bond that Paul and fiman must have for each other he not only prays for fiman daily but he's also heard word of him and make sure to keep track of what fiman is doing for God but in verse 8 we see the reason that Paul is writing this letter as he says wherefore though I might be bold in Christ to
enjoy thee that which is convenient in other words Paul is saying uh anyway now that I've said all of that it's going to be bold of me to ask this I know it might be inconvenient he says yet for Love's sake I rather beseech thee being such a one as Paul the Aged and now also a prisoner of Jesus Christ Paul stepping down here he's not addressing fleeman as yeah remember why that church in colasse started and remember why you're a Christian in the first place yeah that's me so I'm telling you what to do
instead he is humbling himself he says I come to you as the Aged as someone who's just a prisoner and he says that he is doing this for Love's sake because what Paul is about to ask is truly an act of love Paul says I beseech thee for my son onesimus whom I have begotten in my bonds now onesimus is not literally Paul's son onesimus is mentioned in the book of Colossians which we'll talk talk about in a minute but what Paul is saying here in that onesimus is his son is that Paul has led
onesimus to Christ onesimus approached Paul Paul witnessed to him and onesimus became a Christian we know that this happened while Paul was imprisoned because he says whom I have begotten in my bonds begotten means to have a child so he's saying he joined our spiritual family as I was here bonded in Rome what we will find out shortly is that pessimus was a servant of fiman now servanthood had a lot of different variations within this time in history sometimes it was as simple as the rich who had a large estate would pay people to live
with them and take care of things around the house think of it as a very sort of Butler scenario and in other times it was outright slavery sometimes people were bought and forced to work within house as servants now I believe that onesimus was the former rather than the latter and I have a couple reasons for that for one as we're about to see onesimus feels that he has wronged fiman in some way most historians believe that he probably stole money from a fiman that he was employed by fiman then he stole from him because
the journey from colasse to Rome ain't cheap and two onesimus wants to return to fiman which is why he came to Paul in the first place neither of which seems like a characteristic of an escape slave so after Paul says that he is besieging or basically asking him a favor on behalf of onesimus Paul says this which in time past was to thee unprofitable but now profitable to thee and to me whom I have sent again thou therefore receive him that is my own bowels now bowels is used a lot throughout the Bible to kind
of describe the way we would say heart now like oh I mean it from my heart or it makes me feel good in my heart we don't literally mean the organ we mean like Soulful spiritually basically insert that here that's what Paul means by bows not literally his intestines so we know that at one point onesimus was unprofitable or a problem to have around for fiman but now is Paul is asking him to receive onesimus not just as a servant returning home but as if it were me returning home Paul says whom I would have
retained with me that in thy stad he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the Gospel but without thy mind would I do nothing that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity but willingly Paul's saying as a matter of fact I would prefer onesimus stay with me so that we can commune together but I wouldn't do anything without your say so and this man has done you a wrong so I would have you go about this willingly Paul says for perhaps he therefore departed for a season that thou shouldest receive
him forever not now as a servant but above a servant a brother beloved especially to me but how much more unto thee both in the flesh and in the Lord Paul is saying that he would rather have onesimus stay with him that he enjoys their time together so much but he knows that it would mean even more if onesimus returned to fiman two people who knew each other before they had Christ so imagine how they could know each other now not as a servant returned home but as a brother Paul says if thou count me
therefore a partner receive him as myself and then Paul says what I think is one of the most underrated verses in all of scripture when Paul says in verse 18 if he hath wronged thee or oweth the ought put that on mine account so why does that matter why do I feel like this verse makes up the book which makes up one of the most underrated portions of the entire Christian Bible basically why am I yapping about this the reason I feel this is so important is because I think it's one of the most excellent
examples of Grace and action Christians will often throw around the word or as Christians will often throw around words like Christlike you know to to be like Christ what would Jesus do right and we like the examples of it that are fun that we can easily apply to everyday life but we often forget the gravity of what those words mean see there's examples that suit us often throughout the Bible like we all like to quote the part when Jesus went into the temple and found the uh the tax collectors and the Pharisees making the House
of Prayer into a house of sales so he picked up a whip and ran the salesman out of the temple we all love that right because we get to say oh if someone does us wrong we can use violence we can rise up against them that's not to say there's never an application for it but out of the hundreds of teachings and lessons Jesus gave he used violence once and the one time he did use violence was against a group of people who absolutely knew better not someone who had simply done him wrong it is
a lot harder to say what would Jesus do when we are discussing forgiveness or we're discussing turning the other cheek this was something that was hard for even the disciples who lived with Jesus to understand in the Book of Matthew in chapter 18 Peter asked Jesus how many times are we supposed to forgive someone who does us wrong are we supposed to forgive them seven times because to Peter Seven's an absurd number of times to forgive a person and Jesus says I say not unto thee until seven times but until seven * 7 now of
course this doesn't literally mean forgive someone 490 times he is saying to forgive a brother in Christ as many times as is needed now this doesn't necessarily mean you let someone trample over you and use you time and time again but when it comes to the Forgiveness the hate within your heart what right do we have to hold on to it in that same conversation with Peter Jesus gives us a parable Parables were object lessons that Christ would use throughout his teachings they were fictional scenarios that were made to illustrate a real point of discussion
that he was trying to get across in the parable that Jesus gives to Peter he says the Kingdom of Heaven is like a king and one of the king's servants owed the king 10,000 talents which translates to a lot of money the King has every right by law to throw the servant in jail for not giving him 10,000 talents so the servant comes to the king falls on his face and asks for forgiveness and the King says not only will I not throw you in jail but you're forgiven of your debt you don't owe me
a thing so the servant is elated by this he gets up leaves the palace and then remembers that someone owes him 100 talents so the servant goes to the guy who owes him money and has him thrown in jail for not giving him the 100 talents the king hears of this and goes to the servant and says I forgave you for the much how could you not forgive him for the little if we are taking this whole Christianity thing seriously because the two options are either God is real and created the universe or he isn't
and who cares if he is real if that's really the story that we're going with then that means the creator of the universe found it fit to suffer and die so that we could be at his side for eternity if that is the case if our rejection of him if our mocking of him if our murder of him was forgiven then what what right do we have to hold someone to anything of course there's still consequences for committing evil Acts or harming another person but when it comes to the soul when it comes to truly
being a Christian there should only be two groups of people in the world those who are Brothers and Sisters in Christ and those who are potential Brothers and Sisters in Christ how can we that was forgiven of the 10,000 talents hold a 100 against someone else and that is hard right it's very easy to say oh Jesus wants you to be forgiving but forgiveness in action is difficult again it's easy to say be Christlike when it suits us it's another thing to actually do it and here in this Roman prison Paul embodies what Grace really
is in a way few Christians ever have if he hath wronged thee or oweth thee ought put that on M account the Bible says that when Christ died on the cross that the sins of humanity were placed upon him that he felt the weight and evil of the world and he died with it for us and in some small way Paul is saying whatever sins this boy has committed put it on me I can't help but imagine that Paul sitting in that prison saw a child really a young man at least compared to Paul in
his age and he saw him scared asking forgiveness at the lowest point in his life and I bet he saw Saul who was once on the road to Damascus not knowing that he had been running from God his whole life because Paul got the point that by the grace of God there go me to not only forgive someone of their wrongdoings but to say you'll take the blame for it is exactly what Christ did on the cross and is exactly what Paul's talking about here now immediately after this verse Paul does what Paul always does
and is kind of snarky about the whole thing is he says I Paul have written it with my own hand I will repay it albeit I do not say to thee how thou owest unto me even thine own self besides he's saying I've written it that I will pay whatever he has done back unto thee now of course I'm not writing the part that you know the fact that you're a Christian and this whole church thing is going was because of me I'm not writing that I'm not saying that I'm just saying hypothetically if I
were to that might factor in Paul ends the book of fiman by saying having confidence in thy obedience I wrote unto thee knowing that thou will also do more than I say because again Paul's writing to a friend here someone who as we know is allowing the church into his home someone who gets what being Christlike means Paul knows the answer before he even finishes it he says his goodbyes to the other people in the city and then Ends by saying the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit amen written from Rome
to fiman by onesimus a servant and it seems considering that this letter to fiman which compared to other books in the Bible is very short at only 25 verses was delivered to fiman by onesimus and from there fiman began to Syndicate it throughout the church and it made its way into the Bible as we know it today and given that we're reading this letter now I think we know Fan's answer Not only was this letter surely shared with the people at colasse but it was syndicated through the entire Christian church and in our Bible now
yes many of Paul's letters were written to Great groups of people or those who would go on to be leaders and founders of the church as we know it today but I think one of the most beautiful examples of Grace came from a letter he wrote to a friend now some historians dispute the exact timeline that fiman to Colossians happened fiman occurs after Colossians as you read through the Christian New Testament but that's not saying that's how it shows up chronologically the reason it's structured that way is because Paul's letters to the churches come first
and then his letters to individuals come second however given chapter 4 of Colossians it seems that Colossians was written after fiman or maybe even at the same time both delivered to fiman by onesimus being that Colossians Ends by saying the salutation by the hand of me Paul remember my bonds Grace be with you amen written from Rome to Colossians by thius th thius whatever thus and onimus meaning that onimus also delivered the book of Colossians to the people of colasse and in chapter 4 of Colossians Paul says while while saying goodbye to the people he
has written the letter to with onimus a faithful and beloved brother who is one of you I can't help but imagine how onimus must have felt hearing that a servant who at once was departed from them he probably took money from them he probably at one point was despised and rejected by the people of the room but then for it to say a faithful and beloved brother who is one of you I can't imagine what that felt like and just before chapter 3 I can't imagine that perhaps Paul was talking to fiman when he said
forbearing one another and forgiving one another If any man have a quarrel against any even as Christ forgave you so also do ye Paul was in a jail Cale and he saw a young man who was in the same position that at one point Paul was as well and this young man it seems did a disservice to a close friend of Paul's and I'm sure the human part of him wanted to hold that against him but Paul remembered that at one point he was onimus and that now because he is in the position that Christ
was at once before him with the potential to forgive if he truly claims to be a follower of Christ what else could he do but to say put that on M account as a Christian I believe the Bible to be the word of God and that these events really did happen but I also believe it to be perfect picture of how we are to live and because of that if I was once onesimus what right do I have to be anyone other than Paul because if the god of the universe is willing to look at
me and say that I am fit to be a part of his perfect family then what right do I have to turn that away from anyone else and this would have been a perfect video to release on Easter but I had to be lazy and slow so you got murder spirals instead but better late than ever I guess shortly after his writings to the people of Colossians uh many believe that Paul's last letter was the book of Romans that he wrote to the Christians within Rome shortly after writing that Paul would be executed but the
church his writings the messages he gave to fiman and onimus they would continue on his grace outlived himself the impact of Love is immeasurable when put to action I absolutely love fiman and I hate that it never gets talked about again like maybe a couple sermons I've sat in have brought it up but everyone treats it as like a footnote that kind of step over it to get to like the gospels and Paul's other letters and yes those are all really good but I think fiman deserves some love as well and if you've stuck around
this long hopefully you enjoyed and hopefully you agree that Fan's at least kind of important and I really appreciate that and I just want to say thank you for watching it feels good to do this uh the Bible is very important to me as I'm sure you figured out at this point uh and it's been a while since I've just done kind of a sit down video to talk about it I used to do the Sunday studies a lot but I got kind of convicted about those because I wasn't giving it a lot of effort
it was kind of just like you know I sat down and I read a few verses for 15 minutes and I end it but doing stuff like this or things like the paradise loss video where I incorporate it into fiction regarding the Bible or uh like the Lost Books of the Bible stuff that feels more researched stuff that I feel is more interesting to an audience who aren't Christians who are just interested in you know what what's this Bible thing all about what might be in there I feel a lot better about doing that than
I do just making it into the laziest content I can throw out right so I want to talk about this what I truly believe is the most underrated book of the Bible and if you stuck around this long thank you for hearing me out in all my yapping and whatnot I really appreciate it ideally this will be going up a week after the last upload which is like an insane rate for Windon who normally uploads like once a month if he's lucky or whatever hopefully you enjoyed this as low effort as it was um hopefully
so you remember some of it in some small way even if it's just the fact that there's there's a lot of books in there Bible whole lot of books for sure but hopefully you enjoyed thank you for sticking around uh new content on the way and I believe that should do it for now but I just want to say thank you for watching I hope that you enjoyed and I will see you in the next one bye
