Philemon 1

¹Paul, prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timotheus the brother, to Philemon the beloved and our fellow-workman,

²and to the sister Apphia and to Archippus our fellow-soldier, and to the assembly which [is] in thine house.

³Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and [the] Lord Jesus Christ.

⁴I thank my God, always making mention of thee at my prayers,

⁵hearing of thy love and the faith which thou hast towards the Lord Jesus, and towards all the saints,

⁶in such sort that thy participation in the faith should become operative in the acknowledgment of every good thing which is in us towards Christ [Jesus].

⁷For we have great thankfulness and encouragement through thy love, because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brother.

⁸Wherefore having much boldness in Christ to enjoin thee what is fitting,

⁹for love's sake I rather exhort, being such a one as Paul the aged, and now also prisoner of Jesus Christ.

¹⁰I exhort thee for my child, whom I have begotten in [my] bonds, Onesimus,

¹¹once unserviceable to thee, but now serviceable to thee and to me:

¹²whom I have sent back to thee: [but do thou receive] him, that is, my bowels:

¹³whom I was desirous of keeping with myself, that for thee he might minister to me in the bonds of the glad tidings;

¹⁴but I have wished to do nothing without thy mind, that thy good might not be as of necessity but of willingness: