We come this morning to our nineteenth and last sermon on Paul’s Letter to the Philippians. Though prompted by circumstances peculiar to Paul’s life and to the situation then prevailing in the Philippian Church, and so very definitely a piece of firs…
We have finished the short section of ethical exhortations so characteristic of the latter part of Paul’s letters. The formally didactic part of the letter is now concluded and, as also characteristic of Paul’s letter writing, he concludes with some …
Text Comment
v.8
Verse 7 ended with the peace of God guarding our hearts and minds. But what God does in us and for us often requires our active participation. We have some responsibility for what goes on in our hearts and…
Last Lord’s Day morning we considered Paul’s exhortation to joy in this string of loosely related instructions for Christian living. Now we move on to the next: his command that Christians live at peace, at peace with one another – let your gentlenes…
We said last time that what we have in these verses is a concluding string of loosely related exhortation such as we find in other of Paul’s letters. It is by no means the case that the reader of these exhortations cannot find some connection between…
The long section of warning and specific exhortation was completed in what is our verse one of chapter four. Now follows a concluding series of general exhortations quite typical of the letters of the Apostle Paul, “a long string of loosely related c…
I have entitled this sermon “Looking East.” A word of explanation is in order. In Christian history the return of Christ is associated with the East, though it is not entirely certain why. And not the Second Coming only, of course. Christian churches…
We are reading this morning the text we read last Lord’s Day morning, 3:1-11, together with the next five verses.
Text Comment
v.12
Interestingly, Paul does not supply the object of the verb in the first clause. The N…
Text Comment
v.1
“In conclusion…” Paul is like those preachers you have heard who say “Finally…” – raising your hopes – only to go on and on. You know Paul and the onrush of his thoughts. One thought suggests another and b…
The previous section of the letter – the exhortation to holiness so characteristic of Paul’s letters to churches – concluded at 2:18. Paul now returns to an account of his circumstances and plans – his missionary report, as it were – picking up the i…