Philippians

Philippians is a thank you letter written from a prison cell, and once you know that, the tone of it becomes remarkable. Paul mentions his chains in the first chapter and refers to the imperial guard. He is not writing from a study. He is writing to a church that has just sent him money and a man to look after him, and he wants them to know it arrived.

Philippi was a Roman colony in Macedonia, settled with retired soldiers and proud of its Roman status. Acts 16 describes how the church there started, and it is one of the stranger founding stories in the New Testament: a businesswoman who dealt in purple cloth, a slave girl whose owners lost their income when Paul freed her from what was tormenting her, a beating, a jail, an earthquake and a jailer baptized before dawn. That is the congregation Paul is writing to, and he clearly loves them.

The word that keeps surfacing is joy. He uses it, and the verb that goes with it, again and again, which would be unexceptional in a comfortable letter and is not in this one. Alongside it runs a steady concern with unity. Two women in the congregation have fallen out badly enough that Paul names them and asks the church to help them sort it out.

At the center of the letter, in chapter 2, is a passage many scholars think Paul is quoting rather than composing: a short, rhythmic piece about Christ letting go of equality with God, taking the form of a servant, and obeying to the point of death on a cross. Paul does not introduce it as theology. He introduces it as the reason to stop competing with each other.

For a family, Philippians is four short chapters of unusually quotable material. Expect to meet several verses your children already half know, and expect the letter to put them back in a context that is harder and better than the poster version.