Philippians 1:1-6 To the Beloved Church

The speaker is introducing a study on the book of Philippians, which is one of the prison epistles written by the Apostle Paul. Unlike his other books, Philippians does not deal with theological problems in the church. It is a loving and appreciative letter to the church in Philippi, which was one of the few churches that supported Paul's ministry. The speaker also mentions the other books written by Paul and their respective themes, such as the second coming, the influence of Judaizers, and instructions for preachers. The speaker shares personal anecdotes about a teacher who influenced their education and their experience studying the Greek language in college. Good morning. How are you all today? Good. Good to see you. Can you hear me okay? Good, good. We are getting ready to start in the book of Philippians. This is the second of the prison epistles that we'll be studying. After we finish Philippians, we'll go to Colossians. And after we finish Colossians, we'll go to Philemon. And Philemon's one chapter so maybe we can finish that one in a month. Perhaps. But we'll give it a shot. Oh, Jim. Interesting thing about Philemon. He was a wonderful deacon businessman in the church in Colossae. That's where he was in church. And they were having some serious problems in the church. And the little book that Paul wrote to him was a book that was going to help him correct, if possible, the little problems that were going on in the church. That'll kind of give you a taste to get ready to know what's going to happen when we get to Philemon. So it's a kind of interesting little book. On the other side of that, Philippians is an entirely different approach by the Apostle Paul to his four churches from prison. By different approach, I mean, in this book, the Apostle Paul has no theological problems to correct. And that's kind of interesting because in all of his other books, he had theological problems going on in the church that he had to correct. In the first two books that he wrote, Thessalonians, he was helping them to correct the problems on what's going to happen to the dead who have died in the Lord. And you all remember that he answered them with 4.13, and the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, and the archangel, and the trumpets of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. So they had a problem. The problem was what's happened to our friends who've died. And you go to the city of Corinth, and they had problems. And the problems were theological. And the theological problems were there were a lot of Judaizers coming into town telling the Christians who were being born again, these new Gentile Christians and some of the Jewish Christians who were being born, telling them, it's okay for you to be born into the kingdom of God, but you also have to be circumcised. And so they were trying to retain circumcision. And these books are kind of put in little clusters. First and second Thessalonians are called the books that are going to deal with the second coming, the apocalyptic books. First and second Corinthians, Romans, and Galatians are books that deal with the Judaizers and the problems of the Judaizers who are saying, it's okay to become a Christian, but you need to be circumcised. So they were trying to put Judaism into Christianity. And then you have the three books to his preachers, first and second Timothy and Titus. And these books were to help these young preachers to get ready to face the problems that were coming. So in all the books, there were problems. And in Philemon, you had a deacon who was having a problem with a preacher and he was needing some help. And so all of the books, with the exception of this one, and this book, Philippians, is the, as far as I'm concerned, and this is my own opinion, as far as I'm concerned, this is probably his most lovingly sympathetic outpouring of love and appreciation and gratitude of any of the 13 books he wrote. And you'll see what I'm talking about. It's full of appreciation. It's full of gratitude. It's full of love. It's full of thanking them for what they have done. This church in Philippi was one of the few churches that really supported the ministry of the Apostle Paul. Paul loved this church. And as we go through the book, you're going to see why he loved it. In fact, I even named this lesson, The Beloved Church, Paul's Beloved Church. He loved this church. And he loved it because of the tremendous, in fact, if you remember the story of Philippi, after the jailer was saved, and after the earthquake happened, and after many people in the city were saved, including Lydia and some of the others, you remember that the city fathers came together and very lovingly, actually, these Roman leaders of the city actually lovingly asked Paul and Silas if they would move on down to Thessalonica. They were wanting to help the mission. And they did move to Thessalonica, where they went to the synagogue. See, there was no synagogue in Philippi, and I'll tell you why in a few moments. There's no synagogue there. There was a big synagogue in Thessalonica, and that's where Paul was going. But they were on a road called the Via Ignatia. And it was a road that came from Philippi down to Thessalonica, all the way down to Athens, all the way down to Corinth, all the way down to the end of the Peloponnese, and ended at the little tip of the Peloponnese on the Mediterranean Ocean. It was one of the roads of the Roman Empire. It was called Via Rode Ignatia, the Via Rode Ignatia. And it was named that sometime around the 42nd BCE, before the Common Era. It was named the Via Ignatia about that time, and it was named by Augustus, who was the Caesar. So, to kind of help you understand. Now, when I was in junior high, the trajectory of my life, that which I was planning to do, was I had planned to become an electrician like my father. My father was a master electrician, and I determined that I was going to be an electrician. So, I was working as an apprentice, electrician, with my dad, and I was just looking down the way saying, okay, this is going to be the rest of my life. I'll be an electrician like my dad, because I enjoyed doing it. I enjoyed doing the electrical work, hard work, but I enjoyed doing it. I thought the trajectory of my life was going to be electrician, and so I was moving toward becoming a journeyman, and eventually becoming a master electrician like my dad. But, I ran into an eighth grade school teacher. Now, you know, it's wonderful how school teachers can impact your life, and this school teacher was named Mrs. Rogers. She was my eighth grade English teacher, and she called me in one day after the first six. Now, we had moved back from California in the last part of my seventh grade, and this was the early part of the eighth grade. We'd only been back in Texas about eight months. Ms. Rogers called me into her classroom one day, and she said, I want to challenge you to do something. I said, okay. She said, I've been noticing that on my tests, you barely, barely ever make a C, and yet I've looked at your, I've looked at the papers that we have on you. I've looked at all of your evaluations, and you ought to be making an A, but you just barely make a C. I said, Mrs. Rogers, your class is so easy, I could make an A without even thinking about it. So, she said, I challenge you this next six weeks to make an A. I said, okay, piece of cake. So, at the end of the next six weeks, I had an A plus. I had five C minuses and one A plus because, Jimmy, I had not intended to go to college. I was going to be an electrician, and so every week she started challenging me. Then she said to me something one day that bothers Barbara a lot, and she talks to me about it a lot. She said, Jack, I want you to understand that a person who is truly educated is a person who has all kinds of questions about what they're reading and how they're reading it. So, I want you to start reading everything that we have in this English class. I want you to start reading it by developing questions that you're going to ask about all of the reading that you're reading. Now, that little lady sitting back there on that pew with me that lives with me, she is probably the best government student I have ever met. She loved government. In fact, she made straight A's in government and history in high school, and she hated Spanish because she could not obey any A class. She does not like Spanish, but she loved government and she loved history, and she is now my hearing aid of what's going on. I don't have to listen to the news she tells me about it, and all I have to do is ask her, okay, who's running, who's doing this, and she's read everything. She loves government, and she watches that government. She watches them talking, and I find out from her what all is going on in the world because I don't have time to read it, so I just ask her. She's my government background. She's a wonderful, but you have to have questions about what you're reading. So, I started doing that, and Mrs. Rogers helped me. Finally, she said to me one day, I want to challenge you to start making an A in your algebra class. I said, I'm not very good at algebras, Rogers, but that's a piece of cake. Long story short, at the end of that particular year, I had six A pluses in junior high school in the eighth grade. I had never made an A plus in my life. When I made an A plus, my dad threw a party. I generally had C minuses and Ds, but she turned my life around, and she started making me think about you really need to read what you're talking about, but you really need, as you're reading it, to start asking questions about it. Now, I'm telling you all this to get into Philippians. It just so happened that when I was in college, John, I took a Greek course. I took all of my Greek in college, and I had a Greek course in the book of Philippi. In fact, we did a complete interpretation and exegetical study in that Greek class of the book of Philippi, and it's interesting, when you study the book of Philippi in the original language, you begin to find some things that you can't see in English, and the thing that you begin to find is that in this book of Philippians, there are numbers of expressions and information related to the Roman military. And, you know, I'm reading this thing, and I'm seeing Paul talking about the praetorium, and I'm seeing him talking about the household of Caesar, and I'm seeing him talk about the Palatine, and I'm seeing him talking about the defense of the gospel, which is a very strong political process, and I see him talking about many, many political and military things in this book, and I'm asking myself the question, why? Why, in this book, does Paul take time to talk to these people in Philippi about the praetorium that's associated with Caesar's house? May I ask you a question? Have you found that particular question in any of his other twelve epistles? The answer to that is no. It's got to be interesting. And yet, in this book, there's a number of military concepts, and there's a reason why, and I'm going to give you a brief history, and then we're going to get into chapter one. Before I get down, I'm giving myself about 25 minutes for history, then we'll get into chapter one going into next week. I have next week, don't worry about it. I've got two weeks to handle this one, Jim, and so we're going to be doing it. Okay. Interestingly about Philippi, there was a battle fought at Philippi. Now, I've got to give you a little bit of history, so hang on. Two men by the name of Brutus and Cassius, one day at the forum, assassinated Julius Caesar. You all know about that. You know about the assassination of Julius Caesar. Julius Caesar had already put in his will that his progenitor by the name of Octavian, who was his nephew, would become the next Caesar. That his son, Julius Junior, was not worthy to be the next Caesar, but Octavian was a marvelous military man. He was a great general, and he led a lot of campaigns for Julius Caesar and was a wonderful soldier. And so Octavian was named in Julius Caesar's will to become the next Caesar. Well, when Brutus and Cassius assassinated Julius Caesar, immediately they left, and when they left, they took half of the Roman army with them, and it left half of the Roman army with Octavian. And Octavian asked the assistance of Mark Antony, and he and Mark Antony took this half of the Roman Empire, and they had army, and they had this other half under Brutus and Cassius, and they were fighting in a Roman civil war that went on for about three years. And many, many Roman soldiers were dying in the battles between Cassius and Brutus and Mark Antony and Octavian. Finally, they met on the Plains of Philippi. Now, this area of Greece, Macedonia, it is a beautiful area. It is a summer wonder place. It has gorgeous scenery, and it has a big plain out there called the Plains of Philippi, and it was on these plains that Brutus and Cassius' army met the army of Mark Antony and Octavian, and they fought there, and Octavian and Mark Antony defeated the armies of Brutus and Cassius, both of whom committed suicide on the battlefield, and the war was over. And Octavian and Mark Antony took over, and Brutus and Cassius were gone. And so, in response to that, about four years later, Octavian, who then had become Caesar, and whose name was changed to Augustus, you remember in Luke chapter 2, in the year that Caesar Augustus, you remember that? That's the same guy. His name was Octavian. They changed his name to Augustus, and he's the one that said, in this particular year, all of the world is going to be registered, and everyone went to his own city. You remember? And Joseph, taking Mary, who was pregnant, down to Bethlehem to be registered with his wife-to-be. Okay, you get the picture. Octavian was so appreciative of what his army did on the Plains of Philippi, and this area was such a gorgeous, beautiful resort, retirement area, that Octavian, now Augustus, gave the entire city of Philippi, which had been established by King Philip of Macedonia, who was the father of Alexander the Great, gave this city to any of his leading military officers who would like to retire there. Got it? And many, many of his generals, and majors, and colonels, and captains, and all of his military officers who were ready to retire and wanted to retire, could get a piece of land in Philippi, and he gave it all to them, and he made Philippi a colony of Rome, not of Macedonia. And when Paul, and Silas, and Timothy, and eventually Dr. Luke, showed up in Philippi, it was in the province of Thessalonica Prima, but it was not a Macedonian city. It was a Roman colony, and it was a Roman colony that was the exact image of Rome. In fact, they had everything in Philippi that Rome had in Rome. They had a senate, they had their government, they only voted in Roman activity, they were not controlled by the Macedonian people, it was controlled, it was a microcosm of the macrocosm of Rome. And most everybody that lived there were retired military wonderful officers who fought in the Battle of Philippi. Now then, why would Paul talk to them about the Praetorium? Why would he talk to them about the barracks of the Roman soldiers? Hey, probably every one of them at one time had been in those barracks in Rome. Now, as you read through the book of Philippi, you look at various and sundry things, and you look at the many times that the Apostle Paul talks about the defense of the gospel, you look about the many times that he talks about a military procedure, you look about how many times he talks to these people their own language because they were military retirees. Isn't that interesting? Now, if you don't understand the Battle of the Plains of Philippi, you don't understand why he wrote this, you say, why in the world would Paul write to a group of people way up yonder in Macedonia about the Praetorium in Rome next to Caesar's house? Who cares? I mean, first time I read it, that's what I said. And then Mrs. Rogers came to mind, she said again in my head, Jack, start really looking for the reason why he said the Praetorium. Now, what you're going to come to understand as we go through this is that the Apostle Paul is trying to get these people to understand something that's very important as one day on the Plains of Philippi, they fought to the death in order to be sure that the Empire of Rome continued to live. And Paul is getting ready to tell them in here, for me to live is Christ, for you to live was Rome, got it? See what he's saying? For you to live was Rome, for you to live was the Empire, for you to live was what you're doing here, for me to live is Christ. And as many of you and your friends did, to die is gain. Because you see, ladies and gentlemen, every Roman soldier who died on the Plains of Philippi made that gain for the Roman Empire. You got it? You're going to like this book. You're going to really like this book. This is a wonderful little book. Now, looking at it, this little city sits right about 11 kilometers from the northern shore of the Aegean Sea. Now, if you can picture, over here is Asia Minor, and here's the Aegean Sea, here is Greece and Macedonia, and over here is the Ionian Sea. So you have these two seas on both sides of Greece and Macedonia. One attaches to Asia Minor, the other attaches to Italy. Now, up at the very northern part of this sea over here that attaches itself to Asia Minor, and also attaches itself to Europe, Philippi was in Europe, Galatia was at Asia Minor. Philippi was in Europe, Ephesus was in Asia Minor. Philippi was in Europe, Colossae was in Asia Minor. This little place is in Europe, and it's sitting right here on this plain, and it's right on the neck of this beautiful Aegean Sea, and it is magnificently wonderful in the summertime, and the mountains behind it are absolutely gorgeous, and those mountains turn to pure snow every year. In the summer, it is a gorgeous place to live. In the winter, it is a gorgeous place to live. The view, the sight, the sea, the mountains, it's perfect. In fact, there are two cities in the United States that I compare it to. I compare it to Hot Springs, Arkansas, and Little Rock. That's about how far they were apart. Philippi was about 32 kilometers from Thessalonica. So, Philippi was under Thessalonica like Hot Springs is to Little Rock. Got it? Who lives in Hot Springs? Not the people that live in Little Rock. Or, let me give you another comparison. It's like Denver to Colorado Springs. You got it? Now, what I'm helping you to understand is how luxuriously wonderful this particular area of Europe happened to be. It was a gorgeous piece of property, and Octavian Augustus gave it to any military officer who fought on the plains of Philippi who would like to retire there, not in Macedonia, but in a Roman colony that was governed by Rome, that was run by the people in the city. They had their own senate. They had their own magistrate. They had their own laws. They voted with the Romans. They had nothing to do with Macedonia. That's why when Paul got there, there was no synagogue there. Why would you have a synagogue in a Roman city? Now, there was a big synagogue down in Thessalonica, but nothing in Philippi. Okay, so here comes the party. They come across the Aegean Sea, and at first it's just Silas and Paul. Later on, Timothy will show up, and a little bit later, Dr. Luke will show up. And they get into the city of Philippi, and they start ministering in the city, and all of a sudden they realize that it is the Sabbath day. Now, for every Jew on the Sabbath day... Now, if you want the history of this, go to the 16th chapter of the book of Acts. It's in here. I put it in my paper. Go to the 16th chapter of the book of Acts. It'll tell you the whole story of Philippi. It tells about Paul and Silas coming into the city, and it tells about the fact that it was the Sabbath, and every Jew knows that on the Sabbath, if you don't have a synagogue, where do you have to go to worship? To running water. And there was a river. The river was called Agnesias. There's a river that ran through the city of Philippi. So, on the Sabbath day, according to the scripture in 16 of Acts, Paul and Silas went down to the river. And when they got down to the river, they met a lady who was a Jewish lady, but she was a God-fearer as well. That is, she really did not believe all of Judaism. She believed that there was a single God. There was a God, and she believed that that God had a son, and she believed in that God. She believed she was a God-fearer, and she was a seller of purple. She's a very wealthy woman. Her home was Thyatira. Thyatira has a root, madon root, a madon root, a little growing madon root that grows there, that you dig up and you mash, and it makes purple. In fact, there's a story, I love the story, about Cicero's dog. They say one day that Cicero's dog ate a piece of madon root and turned pink. Now, whether or not that's true, I don't know, but the madon root made purple, and you added to it a little snail, a little mucinex sea snail, and that little snail turned purple, and you put that madon root and those sea snails, and it took about 150,000 sea snails to make one little ounce of purple. That's why purple was so expensive. But may I ask you a question? Who, during this particular time, was even wealthy enough to wear purple? You got it? Only the aristocracy. Only the kings and the rulers and the muckly mucks could wear purple. And she had a real great business going. She was a seller of purple. She was from the city of purple, Thyatira, and that's where they had the madon root, and they got all of these little sea snails and they crushed them up, made their purple, and she was there by the riverbed worshiping God. She was a God-fearer. And Paul sat down and engaged her in conversation, and Lydia was the first woman convert in the country of Europe. Across the way was Asia Minor. There was no churches in Europe. Not at this time. The only churches up to this time were the three churches of the first missionary journey. Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. They were over in Galatia. You didn't have any other churches. This was the second missionary journey, folks. There are no other churches. They're all Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe over in Galatia. And now this city sits here, and it sits on the continent of Europe. The others sit on the continent of Asia. And now this woman, Lydia, is the first convert on the continent of Europe. That means that the gospel has now moved from Jerusalem to Judea and to the uttermost parts of the world. And it's moving. It's now going to be set in Europe. And so this woman is saved. And she is so wonderfully saved that she brings Paul and Silas to her house in Philippi. Look at chapter 16, Book of Acts. She brings them to her house and her entire house is saved. The whole household becomes Christian. And she says, wouldn't you want to use my house for your church? And the first house church on the continent of Europe was Lydia's house in Philippi. Kind of an interesting city, isn't it? And so that happened. Well, you know what happened. A little girl of divination, they were put in jail. They had an earthquake. And all of a sudden, Paul said, do thyself no harm to the jailer. He's about to kill himself because he thought he'd lost his prisoners. And he comes running in with a light and he says, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And you remember what happened. The Philippian jailer and all his house was saved and a lot of people were being saved. And now what we're seeing is from the time that Paul is writing this in the 28th chapter of the Book of Acts, going back to the 16th chapter of the Book of Acts, from that period of time to this one, almost four to five years have passed. And the church in Philippi is really growing. In fact, when Paul and Silas, Timothy and Dr. Luke started down the Ignatia via Ignatia going down to Thessalonica, the first thing they received when they got to the church in Thessalonica that they had organized outside the synagogue. And you remember a person in the synagogue was saved and in his house, the first church in Thessalonica was organized. The first people to send Paul money was Philippi. They sent him a big offering from Philippi, 32 kilometers down to Thessalonica. Paul gets down to Athens and guess who sends him money? Paul gets down to Corinth and guess who sends him money? Paul goes over to Ephesus, guess who sends him money? Paul comes back to this church after having been in Ephesus and he thanks them and he's now on his way to Rome for house arrest. And he gets in Rome and house arrest, this is sometime around 61 or 62 and Paul writes them a letter and he says in the letter, how can I thank you for all that you have done for the kingdom of God? And this letter does not correct anything theological. They are not having any theological problems. Now Paul does give them a heads up and we'll see about that in a few moments. And the heads up that Paul gives them is beware of the Judaizers. Beware of these Jews who come in and say it's okay to be a Christian but you need to be circumcised. Beware of the Judaizers. And that's all he's saying to them, just beware. He said don't let Philippi undergo the same problem that the church of Galatia, Iconium Lister and Derby have gone under. They have been attacked by the Judaizers and they're trying to convince them that it's okay to be both Jew and Christian but in order to do so you've got to be circumcised. And so that's what Paul is warning them about but as far as correcting any theology, there's no theology corrected in this book. This book, ladies and gentlemen, is a love letter to the church at Philippi and to what they have done and to who they are and to what God is planning to do with them. And so with that in mind let's look at chapter 1 verses 1 and 2 and we'll start working down through the passages and see exactly what the Apostle Paul now. Now you remember he's in Rome. He has not seen these people since about 60, somewhere around 62 or 63. It was early on that. He hadn't seen these people for about five years because he left from here on the third missionary journey, went to Jerusalem and then was sent to Rome. He's been in Rome now two years and he was in house arrest two years in Rome according to the book of the 28th chapter. And so he's writing to them from Rome and he's telling them about a man whose name was Epaphroditus. Now brother Jimmy said last week, you know, here's a guy by the name of Tychicus. Paul had some really wonderful people that worked with him. Tychicus and Epaphroditus and you've got to have a little note in order to say it. You know, Epaphroditus, well Epaphroditus, are you ready for this, was from Philippi. That was his home. And Epaphroditus was Paul's delivery person. Paul trusted Epaphroditus. Epaphroditus was a wonderful minister with the Apostle Paul. And in this book you're going to see, I think brother Jimmy will be doing that chapter, you're going to see where Paul says to this church in Philippi, do you know that our good friend Epaphroditus nearly died? What kind of letter is that Paul? He's loving him. Do you know that our friend Epaphroditus nearly died? He was very sick. He's the one that brought the offering to me from you to Rome. These people sent an offering to Rome and he's saying I'm going to send him back now and let you know he's well. So it's kind of interesting. Okay, so let's look at this. Paul and Timothy, servants of Jesus Christ. Pause. Paul and Timothy, bond slaves. Do loss. Bond slaves of Jesus Christ. Paul always identified himself as a slave of Jesus Christ, which means servant. And Paul says I am the slave of Jesus Christ. He is my master. He is my king. I am his slave. I am the do loss. And then he says something else that's kind of interesting in this next verse. This next verse tells you that when this church organized itself in the home of Lydia and when this church, after a period of six or seven years, really began to grow in ministry and began to do ministry, this church picked up the ministerial ideas that the apostle Paul had been telling them that needed to be in place. And you're saying what are you talking about? What are you talking about that this church picked up the ministerial ideas that needed to be in place? Well, I simply need to take you to a book we just studied. The book of Ephesians. Written also from house arrest. Written about to say a year or two before this. And in that book, in the fourth chapter, the apostle Paul says, and there are some apostles and there are some prophets and there are some evangelists and there are some pastors and there are some teachers. And in that book, the apostle Paul rehearses what he and Timothy and Dr. Luke and Silas and all of the farmers of church all over the world now are putting into these places. They are getting ready to get these churches under the leadership of wonderful ministry leaders in their community because the apostle Paul knows that the apostles are disappearing. At this particular point, the only apostle still living is John. Paul knows that the apostles are disappearing. Paul knows that he, because of all kinds of problems and now this house arrest in Rome, cannot minister these people because he can't go as freely as he would like to go. Timothy can come and yet Timothy is hindered. Silas, we don't hear anything else about Silas. We don't know where Silas went. He stayed with Paul. But now all of a sudden, the apostleship of Paul cannot go to these churches. So who are these churches going to depend on? They're going to depend on the people that Paul told the church in Ephesus they needed to organize. They are going to depend on prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers. And Paul says there will be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers to equip the saints. Verse 12, Chapter 4, Book of Ephesians. To equip the saints in order that the saints might do the work of ministry, in order that the kingdom of God might grow. That was the formula, ladies and gentlemen, for every church. That was the formula Paul left in Philippi. And they followed it. I'm sitting back here saying, you know why they followed it? Great days. They were military. If their commander said, pull out your sword and go get them, what did they do? Run the other direction? If their commander said, it's time for us to get into battle, what did they do? Hide out? Or if their commander said, okay, we're going to do a forced march of 12, 14, 15 miles. Get your boots on. Let's go. What did they do? Go sit under a tree? These were military people. And when Paul said, this is the kind of organization you need to have in this church, guess what they did? They did it. I'm going to show you. Verse 2, to all the saints in Christ Jesus, who are in Philippi with the bishops and the deacons. Hello. Can you show me any other of Paul's 12 books where he talks to the church about their bishops and deacons? I'd love to see it. Now you can see where he tells them they need to have them. You can see where he tells them that they ought to be in place. But do you see any place where he is already saying, I am really grateful that you've got your pastors in place and your elders in place? Bishops, the bishop is the pastor. The presbyter is the elder, presbyteros. Episcopos, the pastor, presbyteros. The elders and the deaconia, the deacons. This church, because of its background, had all of this organization in place. And it was working like an oiled engine. That's why Paul loved this church. He was seeing in this church what he had hoped he could see in every church. He saw they had pastors, they had elders. The pastors and elders were doing their job, bringing men and women, boys and girls to Jesus Christ, baptizing them, helping them into the kingdom of God. They had deacons who were helping the pastor leaders, just like our deacons here helped Brother Jimmy when he was pastor, and they're helping Brother John. These deaconia, these were helpers to the pastors and the elders. And this church is working, ladies and gentlemen, exactly like a first century and a 21st century church ought to be working. And Paul said, because of that, I love you. I really love you. You are a great church. Now, this is a love letter. And then he says, his normal salutation, grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, Brother Jimmy, and all of us, as we have taught you, always tell you, in all 13 of Paul's epistles, it's somewhere in the very beginning, this salutation will appear, grace and peace. Now, actually, in my notes, I give you some other information. There were three salutations that could be used. One was the word joy, which basically is in the Greek, all it's sharing, which is almost in the Greek like grace, which is kind of ease. And so oftentimes the Greek would move back and forth joy and grace together. Joy primarily for the Grecian people, but grace primarily for the Christians. Because we understand that grace is unmerited favor. And that in order for us to have the peace of God, which passes all understanding, we have to be saved. We have to have received the unmerited favor of God. And so the Apostle Paul is always saying in his salutations, you've got to have grace before you can have peace. And so he says it here. But now the Romans also said joy. They also said health. In fact, have you ever heard a salutation where someone says to you, joy and health and peace? I've heard a lot of people who put that health in. That was a Roman activity. Joy, Greek, health, Roman, shalom, Hebrew. And so this salutation was of three natures. It was of Grecian, it was of Roman, and it was also of Hebraic. Joy, grace. What else? Health and peace. Now, Paul never used the word health in his salutations. He always said grace from God and grace from the Lord Jesus Christ and his unmerited favor to you and peace from God, his Father, who gave it to you. And so the salutation here is what the... Now, Paul is saying you folk really demonstrate this salutation. You folk really demonstrate the grace that's from Jesus Christ. And from what I'm seeing in the church, you have no problems, you're not fighting anybody except in the last chapter where he's got a couple of women that he needs to straighten out. You remember Udoria and Cynthia? And he loves them. By the way, the thing you got to remember is the first members of this church were women. Lydia and following. And many of these members of this church were women. And he mentions Udoria and Cynthia in chapter four. And he says, come on now, get your head straight on. Let's do this right. You know better than that. He's just loving the day. He loves the daylight side of these people. Okay. I'm going to quit in about five minutes. Okay. And we'll be a quarter to 11, Brother Jimmy, quarter to 11. And I may not, I may keep going. Okay. Now he's going to start saying some things. He's going to start his love appreciation to them. Look what he says. I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. I have a watch that was given to me, Brother Jim, at the First Baptist Church in Lake Jackson, Texas. I still have the watch. On the back of that watch is Philippians 1, 3. And the church said, Brother Jack, since you are going to go back to school and you're going to go teach somewhere, we want you to take this watch. And every time you put it on your arm, you remember we are praying for you. And you remember that we are praying for you and Barbara and for your family. And you remember that every time you put on this watch, we are remembering you. And every time I put it on, I remember that. And it is as Philippians 1, 3. I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. Now, ladies and gentlemen, listen carefully to what I'm getting ready to say because it's important at this point. Some people say to Barbara and me, do you pray for everybody every day? No, we can't. You can't pray for everybody you want to pray for every day. And that's what this particular scripture is talking about. You see, when I'm by myself and when Barbara's by herself and when Brother Jimmy and Carol Ann are by themselves, if something in their mind happens to pop up and your face pops up in their mind, guess what they do? Guess what we do? We pray for you. It's not on our knees saying, no. I mean, Linda, your face pops up and I say, God, thank you for Linda. Or Jan, your face pops up and I say, boy, that was great what Jan did. Or Glenn, your ugly bald head comes up and I say, I love that guy. I don't know. You see, that's how you remember people. God in his infinite ability puts images in your head. And ladies and gentlemen, when he puts those images there, pray for them. They may be having a problem you don't know about. They may be having a need that needs some concerted prayer from you. They need to be mentioned to God and they need to be remembered by us. And that's the most wonderful thing God does for us. I'll be driving down the highway. One of your faces will pop up. God, I love her. Thank you for having her in the class. She's such a sweetheart. She's an adorable woman. I thank you for her, Lord. And you know what I'm talking about, right? And that's what Paul's talking about. He's saying to this church in Philippi, every time your little faces pop up, guess what I do? I thank my God for you. I thank the Lord and Jesus Christ for you. I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. Remember that passage. It's very important when a face pops up. Then he says, and I do this remembering always in every prayer of mine, making requests for you all with joy. That's how I know Paul was from Southern Asia Minor. You know, he was from, he wasn't from Israel, he wasn't from Jerusalem. He was from Southern Asia Minor. Do you remember where he grew up? What was his hometown? Tarsus. Remember? Am I right? And was Paul born in Tarsus too? He was born in Asia Minor. He wasn't a Jew. He wasn't a Jewish guy. He didn't grow up. He wasn't born. I mean, and that's how I know he was from Southern Asia Minor because he says you all a lot in his books. He talks about y'all a lot. He just doesn't say y'all. He says you all. He says it right here. He says always in every prayer of mine, making requests for you all. Every time I remember you, I make requests to God for you all. I make requests for y'all. Brother Jimmy makes requests for y'all. Each of you makes requests for y'all. This church, ladies and gentlemen, was demonstrating they had a marvelous prayer ministry. I'm remembering you, you're remembering me, and I'm remembering you with joy for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day. Oh, what first day is he talking about? The first day he hit Philippi. It was Sabbath. And the first day he hit Philippi as a Jew, he headed for the river. And the first day that he was in Philippi, he met a very wealthy woman who was a seller of purple. And she became a believer in Jesus Christ and a magnificent supporter of the church, even having the first church in the city of Philippi in her home. That was the first day. Wow. I wonder what happened the second day. Well, he met a little girl who had a spirit of divination and then problems arose. But the first day he's talking about here, he's talking about that first day on the river where he met Lydia and where eternal God in his more magnificent salvation, redemptive process, took an Asian woman who feared God but didn't know why and brought her into the kingdom of God so that she could become one of the major supporters of the Apostle Paul's ministry. Isn't God good? Now, Brother Jimmy, you and I and Brother John, having been pastoral types, understand how much we thank God upon every remembrance of you and from the very first day we met you and from the very first day that you have demonstrated to us you have been supporters of the ministry of the kingdom of God. We love you. You get the picture? That's why this little epistle is so different from the others. This thing just brims with appreciation, with gratitude, spirituality, love. It just brims. You'll see when they get next week. In next week, he just brims over with it all. And so he says in verse six, being confident of this one thing that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day Jesus comes back, until the return. And this is the last verse. He's saying, if God starts something in you, and on one of those days, by his marvelous redemptive grace, he started faith and redemption in you. And from that very first day that he started that in you, Paul says he will complete it. If God starts something good, he's not going to let it sink. Amen? And it just simply says, he didn't bring me this far to leave me. He didn't teach me to swim to let me drown. He didn't put his salvation in me to move away. He hasn't lifted me up to let me down. See, that's what he's saying to them. He's saying, Jesus didn't bring you this far to leave you. He didn't teach you to swim to let you drown. He didn't put his love in you to move away. He did not lift you up to let you down. He that has begun a good work in you will complete it. Not might, not maybe, not should, but he will complete it. He will not let you down. Amen? Eternal sovereign, how gracious your love and will is and how wonderful this little passage through this little book of Paul's great love and appreciation for this church that has demonstrated that they are doing everything Paul taught them to do right and doing it with great grace and love and their support of ministry with the apostle Paul and the gifts that they send him, always loving him, cherishing him, praying for him, wanting him to be with them, and thanking God for his ministry. And so God, we thank you for all the people that Brother Jimmy and John and I have known in all these churches who've done the same thing. And we remember them every day as their faces come about, and we thank them upon every remembrance of you. Thank you for redemption. Thank you for Christ. Thank you for the word. In Jesus' name, amen. See you next Sunday. We'll finish chapter one, I think.