Paul's letter to the church in Philippi is one of his most beloved epistles; some of the best-known and most widely memorized verses from Paul can be found here. From start to finish, you can hear the apostle's love and affection for the Philippians. He prays for them and thinks about them, even while imprisoned; he is confident in their faith and dedication to the gospel. Nevertheless, he's heard of some threats to their unity coming from both inside and outside the church. He therefore writes to them as a loving pastor to encourage them to continue to be the humble and caring people he already knows them to be.
First Episodes
Episode 1: A letter between friends
What we know as the “book” of Philippians is actually a letter, as most of the books of the New Testament are. But is letter-writing becoming a lost art in today’s wor...
Episode 2: In it together
How did Paul and his companions first meet the people of Philippi? How did they plant a church there? Let’s review the story from Acts 16 as a background sketch to int...
Episode 3: Grateful for the gift
One of the reasons for Paul’s letter is to say thank you for a generous gift of support. Strangely, however, he waits until the end of the letter to say it, and even t...
Episode 4: Purposefully unconventional
Personal letters in Paul’s day tended to follow certain conventions, and the letters of the New Testament are no exception. Paul himself adopts such customs and then a...
Episode 5: The holy ones
In his opening greeting, Paul call his friends in Philippi “saints” or “holy ones” (1:1). We know that God is holy, but may have experienced God’s people as anything b...