True Friendship
There had grown up between Paul and the Philippian church a bond of friendship closer than that which existed between him and any other church. It was his proud boast that he had never taken help from any individual or from any church, and that, with his own two hands, he had provided for his needs. It was from the Philippians alone that he had agreed to accept a gift. Soon after he left them and moved on to Thessalonica, they sent him a present (4:16). When he moved on and arrived in Corinth by way of Athens, once again they were the only ones who remembered him with their gifts (2 Corinthians 11:9). ‘My brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for,’ he calls them, ‘my joy and crown . . . in the Lord’ (4:1).
The Reasons for Writing the Letter
When Paul wrote this letter, he was in prison in Rome, and he wrote it with certain definite aims.
(1) It is a letter of thanks. The years have passed; it is now AD 63 or 64, and once again the Philippians have sent him a gift (4:10–11).
(2) It has to do with Epaphroditus. It seems that the Philippians had sent him not only as a bearer of their gift, but that he might stay with Paul and be his personal servant. But Epaphroditus had become ill. He was homesick, and he was worried because he knew that the people at home were worried about him. Paul sent him home; but he had the unhappy feeling that the people in Philippi might think of Epaphroditus as a quitter, so he goes out of his way to give him a testimonial: ‘Welcome him then in the Lord with all joy, and honour such people, because he came close to death for the work of Christ’ (2:29–30). There is something very moving in the sight of Paul, himself in prison and awaiting death, seeking to make things easier for Epaphroditus, when he was unexpectedly and unwillingly compelled to go home. Here is the height of Christian courtesy.
(3) It is a letter of encouragement to the Philippians in the trials which they are going through (1:28–30).
(4) It is an appeal for unity, from which rises the great passage which speaks of the selfless humility of Jesus Christ (2:1–11). In the church at Philippi, there were two women who had quarrelled and were endangering the peace (4:2); and there were false teachers who were seeking to lure the Philippians from the true path (3:2). This letter is an appeal to maintain the unity of the Church.
The Problem
It is at this point that the problem of Philippians arises. At 3:2, there is an extraordinary break in the letter. Up to 3:1, everything is serenity, and the letter seems to be drawing gently to its close; then without warning comes the outburst: ‘Beware of dogs; beware of the evil workers; beware of the mutilation of the flesh.’ There is no connection with what goes before. Further, 3:1 looks like the end. ‘Finally, my brothers and sisters,’ says Paul, ‘rejoice in the Lord’ – and, having said finally, he begins all over again! (That, of course, is not an unknown phenomenon in preaching.)
Because of this break, many scholars think that Philippians, as we possess it, is not one letter but two letters put together. They regard 3:2–4:3 as a letter of thanks and warning sent quite early after the arrival of Epaphroditus in Rome; and they regard 1:1–3:1 and 4:4–23 as a letter written a good deal later, and sent with Epaphroditus when he had to go home. That is perfectly possible. We know that Paul almost certainly did, in fact, write more than one letter to Philippi; for Polycarp, the second-century Bishop of Smyrna, in his letter to the Philippian church, says of him: ‘when he was absent he wrote letters to you’.
The Explanation
And yet it seems to us that there is no good reason for splitting this letter into two. The sudden break between 3:1 and 3:2 can be otherwise explained in one of two ways.
(1) As Paul was writing, fresh news may have come of trouble at Philippi; and there and then he may have interrupted his line of thought to deal with it.
(2) The simplest explanation is this. Philippians is a personal letter, and a personal letter is never logically ordered like the argument of a thesis. In such a letter, we put things down as they come into our heads; we chat on paper with our friends; and an association of ideas which may be clear enough to us may not be so obvious to anyone else. The sudden change of subject here is just the kind of thing which might occur in any such letter.
The Lovely Letter
For many of us, Philippians is the loveliest letter Paul ever wrote. It has been called by two titles. It has been called the Epistle of Excellent Things – and so indeed it is; and it has been called the Epistle of Joy. The words joy and rejoice are used again and again. ‘Rejoice,’ writes Paul, ‘again I will say rejoice’, even in prison directing the hearts of his friends – and ours – to the joy that no one can take from us.
PHILIPPIANS
A FRIEND TO HIS FRIENDS
Philippians 1:1–2
Paul and Timothy, slaves of Jesus Christ, write this letter to all those in Philippi who are consecrated to God because of their relationship to Jesus Christ, together with the overseers and the deacons.
Grace be to you and peace from God, our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
THE opening sentence sets the tone of the whole letter. It is clearly a letter written to friends. With the exception of the letters to the Thessalonians and the little personal note to Philemon, Paul begins every letter with a statement of his apostleship; for instance, he begins the letter to the Romans: ‘Paul a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle’ (cf. 1 Corinthians 1:1; 2 Corinthians 1:1; Galatians 1:1; Ephesians 1:1; Colossians 1:1). In the other letters, he begins with a statement of his official position, why he has the right to write, and why the recipients have the duty to listen; but not when he writes to the Philippians. There is no need; he knows that they will listen, and listen lovingly. Of all his churches, the church at Philippi was the one to which Paul was closest; and he writes, not as an apostle to members of his church, but as a friend to his friends.
Nonetheless, Paul does lay claim to one title. He claims to be the servant (doulos) of Christ, as the Authorized and Revised Standard Versions have it; but doulos means more than servant, it means slave. A servant is free to come and go; but slaves are the possessions of their masters forever. When Paul calls himself the slave of Jesus Christ, he does three things. (1) He lays it down that he is the absolute possession of Christ. Christ has loved him and bought him with a price (1 Corinthians 6:20), and he can never belong to anyone else. (2) He lays it down that he owes an absolute obedience to Christ. Slaves have no will of their own; their master’s will must be theirs. So Paul has no will but Christ’s, and no obedience but to his Saviour and Lord. (3) In the Old Testament, the usual title of the prophets is the servants of God (Amos 3:7; Jeremiah 7:25). That is the title which is given to Moses, to Joshua and to David (Joshua 1:2; Judges 2:8; Psalm 78:70; Psalm 89:3, 20). In fact, the highest of all titles of honour is servant of God; and, when Paul takes this title, he humbly places himself in the succession of the prophets and of the great ones of God. A Christian’s slavery to Jesus Christ is no cowering subjection. As the Latin saying has it, Illi servire est regnare – to be his slave is to be a king.
THE CHRISTIAN DISTINCTION
Philippians 1:1–2 (contd)
THE letter is addressed, as the Revised Standard Version has it, to all the saints in Christ Jesus. The word translated as saint is hagios, and saint is a misleading translation. To modern ears, it paints a picture of almost unworldly piety. Its connection is rather with stained-glass windows than with the market place. Although it is easy to see the meaning of hagios, it is hard to translate it.
Hagios and its Hebrew equivalent kadosh are usually translated as holy. In Hebrew thought, if a thing is described as holy, the basic idea is that it is different from other things; it is in some sense set apart. In order to understand this better, let us look at how holy