Let us begin our verbal study of the Letter which Epaphroditus carried to Philippi. We attempt first a translation of its first main section, interspersed with an explanatory paraphrase. This will be followed by a brief meditation upon one of the main "Lessons in Faith and Love" suggested by the section.
Ver. 1. +Paul and Timotheus, bondservants of Christ Jesus, to all the holy ones+ in union with +Christ Jesus who are living at Philippi, Overseers, Workers, and all+.[1]
Ver. 2. +Grace to you, and peace+—all the free favour of acceptance and of divine presence, and all the repose which it brings, within you and around you—from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,
Vers. 3, 4. +I give thanks to my God+ (He is mine, as I am His) +over my whole memory of you; always in each request of mine on behalf of you all forming and expressing+ (poioumenos[2]) +that+ (tên) +request with joy+;
Ver. 5. +on account of your participation with me in regard of the Gospel+, your active co-operation with me, by prayer, by work, by gifts, in the Gospel work,
Ver. 6. +from the first day up to this present. For+ (the thought of your long consistency suggests the assertion) +I am quite sure of just this, that He who inaugurated+ (enarkamenos: the word has solemn, ceremonial connexions) +in you the[3] good work will perfect it+, will evermore put His finishing touches to it (epitelesei), up to +Christ Jesus' Day+, the Day of His promised Return, and of our glorification with Him. But this is by the way; I return to my joy and my
Ver. 7. thanksgivings over you: +Even as it is just that I+, I above all men (emoi, emphatic, not moi), +should feel+ (phronein) +like this over you all, on behalf of you all,[4] because of my having you in my heart, as those who, alike in my imprisonment+ (desmois) +and in the vindication and establishment of the Gospel+, the defence of it against its enemies, the developement of its truths and its power in the believing, +are copartners, all of you, of my grace+; my grace, the grace granted me, the glorious privilege of suffering and of doing as a Missionary of Christ. Your loving, working sympathy has inextricably united you and me, alike in my prison and in my apostolate.
Ver. 8. Yes, I feel this in my inmost being. +For God is my witness, how I yearn+, as with a homesick affection (epipothia), +for you all, in the heart+ (splagchna) +of Christ Jesus+; for to His members His heart is as it were theirs; our emotions are, by the Spirit, in contact with His.
Ver. 9. +And+ what are those "requests" which I make for you with joy? +This is my prayer, that your love+, in the fullest Christian sense, but above all in the sense of your love to one another, +may abound yet more and more+ in the attendant and protective blessing of +spiritual knowledge+ (epignôsis) and all needed
Ver. 10. +discernment; so that+, amidst life's many temptations to compromises of conviction or inconsistency of spirit, +you may test the things that differ+ (ta diapherona), sifting truth and holiness from their counterfeits; +in order to be singlehearted+ (eilikrineis[5]) +and without a stumbling-block+, such as error and inconsistency so easily lay in our further path, +against+, in view of, +Christ's Day+; so that when that Day dawns you may be found to be not servants whose time has been half lost for their Lord's work and will, but