PHILIPPIANS 1:1-2

1 Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus,

To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons:

2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 1 When we begin a letter, we tend to write down “Dear Sir”, then begin thinking what we really want to say. Paul wasn’t like that. Remember how he composed letters: dictating them patiently to an amanuensis, who wrote slowly and painfully on primitive equipment, giving Paul plenty of time to hone his phrases and search in his mind for the exact phrase he wanted. And so very little in Paul’s letters is purely functional. It all contributed to his meaning – even the greetings.

This verse is no exception. If Paul wrote Philippians when he was under house arrest in Rome – and that seems likely – it’s one of a group of major letters he fired off at roughly the same time. Most of the others start: “Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ…” But here he simply announces himself as “Paul, a servant”. Why?

Well, one major theme of Philippians, written to a church where people were disputing and jockeying for position, was the fact that we’re all just servants in one team. To seek prominence for ourselves is pointless. The enterprise we’re engaged in belongs to God, not ourselves. And once we lose the instincts and reflexes of servanthood, we lose the point of everything.

What’s more, Paul associates Timothy with his writing: “Paul and Timothy, servants”. And Timothy appears almost as a co-author, not a gracious afterthought, as he is for example in Colossians 1:1. Paul is straining every nerve to communicate his message of equality subliminally from the start!

Then come the addressees: “all the saints”. He doesn’t want any of the warring factions in Philippi to gain the impression that he is taking their side, or speaking against them. If they belong to Jesus, they matter to him – even if he doesn’t agree with their opinions and behaviour.

Nor does he want them to think that he is bypassing the leadership, who aren’t doing very well in holding the church together – so he names them. “Overseers and deacons” includes everyone involved in the management of a first century church. They count too. But equally, he isn’t simply writing to the leaders; every member of the church counts, because every member contributes to the success or failure of the church’s mission. No one is just “cannon fodder”. Christians are intimately connected as branches of a vine (John 15:1ff) and the same life flows through all of us.

Verse 2 “Grace” was the standard Greek greeting when you met someone in the street. A Jew would say, “Peace” (shalom – see Luke 24:36). Paul cobbles both together to form a distinctively Christian greeting. For God’s grace has come to us in Jesus, bringing peace to our lives; and the best thing he can wish for his readers is that God will bring more of his grace to them, creating more of his peace and wholeness in them.

This comes from Father and Son. It isn’t that Paul doesn’t believe in the Holy Spirit (see e.g. 2:1, 3:3); but here again he’s stressing co-working, perfect harmony in operation, and there’s no greater example of that than the work of Jesus, which he intends to describe unforgettably in 2:6-11.