A Letter to the Church of Philippi-Pt. 1

I wanted to simply walk through the Book of Philippians on the ole’ blog.  So each post will have the text and some of my thoughts and insights. I would love if in the comments everyone would write what was impressed on them or what stuck out to them.  As Robby Bell says, “God has spoken and the rest is commentary.”

Here we go

¹Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus,
To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons:

²Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

(((Joel Thoughts))) Although we usually refer to Paul as the writer of this letter, it could be confusing to see that it is titled from Paul and Timothy. Paul actually has Timothy on prescript on many of his letters in the New Testament.  All of  the nouns and verbs throughout the letter are singular and it is most likely that Timothy simply served as amanuensis or the person who actually wrote the letter down as Paul dictated it to him. Most Biblical scholars think that Paul was a Mr. Magoo type who had horrible eye sight.

(((Joel Thoughts))) I love how Paul writes this letter to the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi.  Paul does this all throughout the New Testament.  He is calling the churches that had messed up people with screwed up views and lives saints.  Not because of their personal lives and integrity, but because of the righteousness God had given them through their faith in Jesus.  Maybe we should start owning that word again.  Maybe we shouldn’t just reserve it for self-righteous people or our Roman Catholic friends, but maybe if we remembered that through Jesus—we are all saints, we would not be as likely to fall into sin.

³I thank my God every time I remember you. ⁴In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy ⁵because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, ⁶being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

(((Joel Thoughts))) The purpose of this letter was to thank the Church of Philippi for being so generous in giving to Paul’s mission and in giving to the collection for the poor believers in Jerusalem.  This is Paul’s most joyful letter in all of the New Testament and he continues to have a spirit of thanksgiving and gratefulness in all of his teaching in this letter.

(((Joel Thoughts)))Verse 6 is one of those great “memory verses” from my childhood.  Although Paul was so pleased with the Philippians’ spiritual growth and their generosity, he had much more confidence in the faithfulness of God to complete what only He could start and finish; salvation.  The good work is referring to the salvation that God has freely given.  Is it a different thought to think that Christ initiated salvation and we didn’t? People say all the time, “I found God.” I wonder if its more like, “I finally responded to God’s grace that has been calling me my whole life.  The day of Jesus Christ refers to Christ’s return to take His Church and judgment for everyone else.

⁷It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me. ⁸God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.

(((Joel Thoughts))) I love the language of the Philippians being in Paul’s heart.  The heart today in our culture basically only leads us to think of emotions and feelings, but to the ancient Greek or Hebrew, the heart was was the center of consciousness, personality, mind, and will.  This was a BIG compliment from Paul to this church that had identified themselves with Paul even when it was dangerous to do so because of his legal standing.  If you haven’t got it yet; Paul loves these guys!

⁹And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, ¹⁰so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, ¹¹filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.

(((Joel Thoughts))) Paul loved the Philippians and that love caused him to pray not only for the Philippians salvation, but also for their spiritual maturity.  Not wanting simply converts, but disciples.  He prayed that they might have a spiritual wisdom that flows only from Jesus.

Well, I hope we can do this consistently.  Please feel free to comment and give your insights as well. I hope this is helpful for you to study the Bible everyday.