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Updated: June 25, 2025
We learn from Philippians iv. 15, and 2 Corinthians xi. 9, that they brought gifts from the Church at Philippi; and from 1 Thessalonians iii. 6, that they brought something still more gladdening namely, good accounts of the steadfastness of the Thessalonian converts.
And this is so true, that even without reckoning the Epistle to the Hebrews amongst St. Paul's writings, nay, even if we choose to reject the three pastoral epistles yet taking only what neither has been nor can be doubted the epistles to the Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians, we have in these, together with St.
Rejoice in the Lord always. PHILIPPIANS iv. 4. This is the beginning of the Epistle for to-day, the Sunday before Christmas. We will try to find out why it was chosen for to-day, and what lesson we may learn from it. Now Christmas-time was always a time of rejoicing among many heathen nations, and long before the Lord Jesus Christ came.
Let it suffice to say that the principal theme of the two epistles to the Thessalonians is the expected return of Christ to earth; that those to the Corinthians are largely occupied with questions of Christian casuistry; that those to the Galatians and the Romans are the great doctrinal epistles unfolding the relation of Christianity to Judaism, and discussing the philosophy of the new creed; that the Epistle to the Philippians is a luminous exposition of Christianity as a personal experience; that those to the Colossians and the Ephesians are the defense of Christianity against the insidious errors of the Gnostics, and a wonderful revelation of the immanent Christ; that the Epistle to Philemon is a letter of personal friendship, embodying a great principle of practical religion; and that the letters to Timothy and Titus are the counsel of an aged apostle to younger men in the ministry.
One of the most beautiful elements in the Pauline Epistles is the intimate relation which evidently existed between the Apostle and his converts. This is especially the case in the Epistle to the Philippians, for in no other writing is there such a full revelation of the heart of St. Paul and of his love to those with whom he was united in Christ.
Till, when too hard pressed by the more ruthless of the two old men, the exasperated youth at last frankly burst out: "I will never believe that my heart is thus bad!" There is a warm touch of Bunyan's own experience here, mixed up with his so dramatic development of Paul's morsels of autobiography that he lets drop in his Epistles to the Philippians and to the Galatians.
They had been reading the Epistle to the Philippians, and when they came to the verse where the Apostle Paul says, that to him "to die is gain," and to that other verse which speaks of departing "to be with Christ, which is far better," though he could hardly speak for tears, he told her just what the doctors had said.
If Ignatius and the Philippians wished their letters to be carried to Antioch, why did they not say so? Syria was an extensive province, much larger than all Ireland, and many a traveller might have been going there who would have found it quite impracticable to deliver letters in its metropolis.
When Polycarp wrote, he speaks of them as still living; and he is anxious to know what may yet betide them. Let us now call attention to another passage in this letter of Polycarp to the Philippians. Towards its close the following sentence appears somewhat in the form of a postscript.
In Philippians our citizenship is in a country which is in heaven from whence we are to look for a Saviour, even the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change this body of our mortal humiliation that it may be fashioned like unto His immortal and glorious body, a change which He will effectuate by that mighty power according to which He is able to subdue all things unto Himself.
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