Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit? Are your hearts tender and compassionate? Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose. Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Therefore, God elevated him to the place of highest honour and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Dear friends, you always followed my instructions when I was with you. And now that I am away, it is even more important. Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear. For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him. Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people. Hold firmly to the word of life; then, on the day of Christ’s return, I will be proud that I did not run the race in vain and that my work was not useless. But I will rejoice even if I lose my life, pouring it out like a liquid offering to God, just like your faithful service is an offering to God. And I want all of you to share that joy. Yes, you should rejoice, and I will share your joy. If the Lord Jesus is willing, I hope to send Timothy to you soon for a visit. Then he can cheer me up by telling me how you are getting along. I have no one else like Timothy, who genuinely cares about your welfare. All the others care only for themselves and not for what matters to Jesus Christ. But you know how Timothy has proved himself. Like a son with his father, he has served with me in preaching the Good News. I hope to send him to you just as soon as I find out what is going to happen to me here. And I have confidence from the Lord that I myself will come to see you soon. Meanwhile, I thought I should send Epaphroditus back to you. He is a true brother, co-worker, and fellow soldier. And he was your messenger to help me in my need. I am sending him because he has been longing to see you, and he was very distressed that you heard he was ill. And he certainly was ill; in fact, he almost died. But God had mercy on him—and also on me, so that I would not have one sorrow after another. So I am all the more anxious to send him back to you, for I know you will be glad to see him, and then I will not be so worried about you. Welcome him in the Lord’s love and with great joy, and give him the honour that people like him deserve. For he risked his life for the work of Christ, and he was at the point of death while doing for me what you couldn’t do from far away.
Phil 2:1-30
We stand on the border between Chapter One and Chapter Two of Paul’s letter to the Philippians. Now that is a strange comment if you think about it. Who divides their letters into chapters? Paragraphs yes, but chapters no. Let me assure you, it was most certainly not Paul who broke his letter to the Philippians up into chapters, nor any of his letters for that matter.
- So where did the chapter breaks come from?
- Who put the chapter breaks into his letter?
In fact all of the original text was concatenated into one long continuous flow of letters. In the early Uncial (CAPITAL LETTER) texts of the New Testament, there were no word breaks or spaces between the words. The letters were all run together. On occasions I have thought of giving you Gem readers a chance to test yourself on a more original looking text of Paul’s letter, but each time I refrain from doing so. Firstly, it would take me a long time to prepare it and it would probably put you off reading it. But if you wanted to prepare the text above to look like the original then simply take out all the word breaks and punctuation marks and turn all the letters into capitals. Believe me it makes a difference. Try to decipher the text I have placed at the end of this Gem before the quotes section and you will see what I mean.
Robert Estienne was the one who put the chapter breaks and verse numbers into the Biblical text in 1550. Before that time there was no John 3:16, nor any other divisions or verse references. Critics claim that Estienne put the chapter divisions and verse breaks into the biblical text while riding a horse, simply because of the random nature of some of them. So what I want you to do with the text of Philippians Chapter Two is to make your own divisions into paragraphs and even to the extent of giving those paragraphs a title. In other words turn them into pericope – the little titled segments of Scripture. Try it for yourself and see how useful that exercise is for you to do. It will demonstrate some principles for you and it will give you a better feeling for how the text of this chapter is put together. I know some of you love to accept the challenges that I give you in the Gems. I also know there are more of you who will pass up the opportunity, willing to wait for me to do it for you. That choice is up to you, but I dare you to give it a go with these 30 verses and see what it will do for your understanding of the text Paul wrote.
There is one more thing to do. Take time to look back at the last four verses of Philippians 1:27-30 and check to see if there is any connection between them and the verses which open Philippians 2. Perhaps Robert Estienne put the chapter break in the wrong place. The horse may have stumbled at that point and his stroke dividing Paul’s text ended up in the wrong place. Think about it. Here is the end of Philippians Chapter One for you.
Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ. Then, whether I come and see you again or only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the Good News. Don’t be intimidated in any way by your enemies. This will be a sign to them that they are going to be destroyed, but that you are going to be saved, even by God himself. For you have been given not only the privilege of trusting in Christ but also the privilege of suffering for him. We are in this struggle together. You have seen my struggle in the past, and you know that I am still in the midst of it.
Phil 1:27-30
And now for the trial text that I referred to above: Try dividing Gloria’s letter into its natural segments in order to make sense of it. It’s simple, just put the spaces between the words and insert the punctuation marks.
dearjohnIwantamanwhoknowswhatloveisallaboutyouaregenerouskindthoughtfulpeoplewhoarenotlikeyouadmittobeinguselessandinferioryouhaveruinedmeforothermenIyearnforyouIhavenofeelingswhatsoeverwhenwereapartIcanbeforeverhappywillyouletmebeyoursgloria
Study to show yourself approved, rightly dividing the word of truth.
1 Tim 2:15