1. Kings Don't Shout

for love’s sake

Dec 22, 2024

Philemon 8-9 Though I am bold enough in Christ to command you to do what is required, yet for love’s sake I prefer to appeal to you

I, personally, would like to believe that the most powerful people are also the most restrained, but if history has been teaching me anything, it is that power pulls along with it a good deal of arrogance; we know it as a fact that some of the most powerful people in the world today are also the most arrogant. It would be tempting to call names, but surely we might have witnessed how entitled power can make any man feel, and suddenly turn him into a jerk, one arrogant bastard. Correcting my assertion then, it is desirable that a powerful man be capable of exacting great restraint in how he deals with his subjects. Powerful men are those who don’t need to use power.

It, also, all comes down to how we define power. How we define influence. Or authority. If we talk about rulers, and kings, who obviously are expected to be powerful people, we come to realize, that if they are loved, it never is because of their commands, nor is it because they can shout, rather, we love them more because of how indulgent they are willing and able to be, how restrained they are in exercising power. And though at times there’s much need for the rod, it would be much better to show love in a spirit of gentleness. Real kings know that it is not force that leads them to achieving their purposes, and they would certainly not assent to being rolling stones, not if they care for some bit of moss. They are calm, and reserved if they have to be. They excel in love. They deal in love. Because love for his subjects is what is most desirable in a king. It is what makes him a real king. A man of the people. So it is that Paul tells Philemon, even though I am very much able to command you, yet for love's sake, I plead with you.

Growing up, I think I was a little too hard on my siblings. Being the firstborn son meant I had to be in charge of quite a handful, and I think I would lose control of myself many times than it was appropriate. You know what happens when you are the older sibling who is always screaming, always shouting, always complaining, always ordering, always commanding, always punishing? Your siblings hate you. They won’t say it, but they will resent you. There’s nothing good about that. I have come to learn that what our younger siblings really need is love, and guidance. Sure, the rod has its place, and we should be firm as circumstances demand it, but we also need to lead with love, and that would mean that sometimes, instead of commanding, we plead. After all, we know that when someone is doing something out of choice, they are likely to do it well, not as they would have if they were under compulsion. Isn’t that how the Lord means to deal with us? To always allow us to make our own decisions. We call it free will. “Today I have set before you life and death,” He declares, “choose whatever you will.”

In Proverbs, we learn that it is good sense that makes a man slow to anger, and that his glory is to overlook offense. The glory of a man is his ability not to act upon an offense. In Jesus’ words: turn the other cheek. Go two miles. Don’t repay evil for evil. We may think that we prove our power by being vindictive, we have never been so wrong. We show power by being forgiving. By being indulgent. By loving. Forgiving requires love, and we know that love is the most courageous thing. David cries, Oh Lord if you should mark our iniquities, who will stand? And then he swiftly adds, but forgiveness is found in thee that thou might be feared. In essence, David seems to be saying, “God,we do not fear you because you rain down fire and sulfur, we fear because you forgive our sins.” Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, “Neither do I condemn you,” essentially forgiving her her sins. Then he added, “go, and sin no more.” Now that is fear. I don’t think the woman would have the audacity to go on sinning, least of all presumptuously. Not after she saw such a display of love. We are not forgiven so that we can fall back into sin, we are forgiven so that we fear. So that we love. And we who have been forgiven more, love more. We fear more.

When the king forgave his servant who owed him a thousand talents, he must have hoped that he also would go on to forgive others. He did not expect that this same servant would cast into prison another man who owed him way less a sum of money. Leonard Ravenhill in Revival Praying, quoting Helmut Thielicke says: “When we come from church,we give the impression that instead of coming from the Father’s banquet, we have just come from a sheriff who has auctioned off our sins, and now we are sorry that we can’t get them back again.” Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors, that’s what Jesus taught His Disciples. That as the Lord forgives us, so are we supposed to forgive others who wrong us, but we have proved not to be anything like our father in heaven, when in fact Jesus demanded that we be perfect as God is perfect.

Nietzsche probably was justified in sneering, “you will have to look more redeemed if I should believe in your redeemer.” We are redeemed men, who look nothing like it. In one moving essay, Beware the Romantic Spirit in Religion, A.W Tozer lashes at the man who though he goes to Church every Sunday, and calls himself a Christian, is really nothing like one through the week: Tomorrow he will drive just as hard a bargain in his business, tell the same shady stories, cheat on his income tax, shout at the driver ahead of him, bark at his wife, overeat and otherwise live like the son of this world that he in fact is. We may have much in common with this man than we would like to imagine.

If the Lord deals graciously with us, it is so that we also deal graciously with other men. If He forgives us, it is so that we forgive others. The Lord has had mercy on us, that we may have mercy on others. And in James we are warned, judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Paul says, we were severely afflicted, almost beyond despair, but the God of all comforts comforted us, so that with the same comfort which we received, we might be able to comfort those who likewise are afflicted. There’s something particularly sobering about this Scripture, I see it to mean that none of our afflictions is meant to be wasted, but it is so that we may learn to depend on God, and be comforted by him, so that should we meet another brother in affliction, we might be able to comfort him. Of Jesus the writer of Hebrew declares, “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are…” God is known to carry out his purposes with posterity in mind, so when he allows a man to be afflicted, it is not only about that man.

Now God has loved us, so that we can love as well. God is love, John says. If we can love, it’s because we have first been loved. Jesus said that the mark that we are His disciples is that we love one another. In Revelation John writes that Jesus loved us, and freed us from our sins by his blood, and He has made us kings and priests to His God and Father.

It rightly follows that one of the the marks of greatness of any king is love. The king must love his people more than he loves his throne. That’s the problem in many states today. Presidents love their seats of power more than they care for the people. Yet we know that Jesus loved us more than he loved being God, for though he was in the form of God, he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but he emptied himself, and took the form of a servant.

Paul’s lament was: “none of these men are genuinely concerned for your welfare, they only seek their own interests.” Why do most people get into politics if not to enrich themselves? These men care for power more than they do service. No nation is ever in short supply of good politicians, yet what we need is good leadership. Servant leadership. Jesus put it expressly, if anyone would be your leader, first he has to be your slave. Yes, you read right, a slave. If you cannot be slaves, you cannot rule. Most slaves think little about ruling, maybe that’s the point for Chesterton belaboring in his foundational book Orthodoxy that “he is most fit to rule who thinks himself unfit to.”

“The Gentiles lord over their servants,” Jesus told his disciples, “but have I not shown you how you ought to treat one another?” “Who is the greatest,” he asked them, “he who reclines at the table or he who serves?” Logically, it would be he who reclines at the table and is served, but then he asked them, “what have I done? Haven’t I served.” And then comes the punchline, “whoever wants to be the greatest, must accept to be a slave.” And slaves don’t shout. And if only slaves should be king, why would kings presume to shout? Jesus came to teach and show us what it meant to be a King, and he showed us by being a servant. “If I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.”

In conclusion, coming back to our text, Paul explains to Philemon that though he is very much able to command him, yet for the sake of love, he would rather plead. For the sake of love. Faith, hope, and love remain, these three, but the greatest of them is not faith. It is love. Love bears all things, love endures all things, love hopes all things. We have faith in God because we have learnt to love him. We hope in people because we love them. E. M Bounds in his passionate book Power through Prayer:

The pastor binds his people to him and rules his people by his heart. They may admire his gifts, they may be proud of his ability, they may be affected for the time by his sermons; but the stronghold of his power is his heart. His scepter is love. The throne of his power is his heart.

The mark of a true king is his love, for though he is able to command, yet for the sake of love, he will plead.