Speaker 1: Welcome to the CommonsCast. We're glad to have you here. We hope you find something meaningful in our teaching this week. Head to commons.church for more information. Alright.
Welcome to church. My name is Jeremy. I'm one of the people who hang out in these online spaces. Thanks for joining us today. We don't take it for granted that you do.
Last week we started a new series called Everything is Awful and hopefully that didn't throw you off too much, particularly given that we absolutely did not expect to still be online only when we planned this series more than a year ago. But the series is actually all about hope because that's what Philippians is all about. It's about Paul writing to his friends in the midst of their moments even while he is in prison himself and trying to encourage them with a bigger story. The thing is you can only do that at least well when you name the reality of the moment that you're in. And for the Lippeans trying to find their footing as a beloved community in the shadow of the emperor.
For Paul missing his friends while sitting in a jail cell, hope existed even where everything was awful. Last week we started the series by not even getting to Philippians. That's because the first week of this series we spent looking at the backstory that we find in Acts chapter 16. And it's a pretty interesting story. Paul makes a series of trips to Philippi.
His first is in Acts 16, but then again he travels through Macedonia and very likely visits a second time. And then finally in chapter 20 he comes through the city again and he spends time with his friends there. So this is kind of Paul's thing. He travels and he starts churches all across the Roman Empire. And he writes letters to those churches and those letters begin to circulate and be passed around to even more churches.
Now there were churches that he writes directly to like the one in Rome that he knows about by reputation and he hopes to come and visit and meet them one day in person as well. But then there are churches like this one here in Philippi where Paul has a long standing, deeply connected relationship that is built not just on teaching but on all kinds of shared experience. Last week we looked at the first three members of this Philippian church: The purple dealer, the fortune teller, the anxious jailer. And those stories are quick, but each of these people have this fascinating introduction that really leads you to speculate and wonder about the friendships Paul developed with them over time. There's Lydia of Theatira who was a dealer of purple cloth.
And we don't have a lot to go on about her, but there are some fascinating clues. First, her name, literally the Lydian woman from Theatira, suggests that without a given name she may have been a slave who was wise enough, resourceful enough to buy her own freedom and then go on to build a business for herself, buying and dyeing cloth with this expensive upscale purple dye. Whatever the case, she is a worshipper of God. She is in modern parlance perhaps spiritual but not religious. And yet she sees her story reflected in the Jesus story and she gives herself over to that.
And she becomes the foundation of this church that will follow. Next we meet a fortune telling slave girl who's enamored with Jesus but maybe not quite for the right reasons. And in an encounter with Paul, she leaves behind this fortune telling spirit or perhaps act that she's been putting on which creates a series of all kinds of new problems. Now, a couple things we didn't have time to get into last week. First of all, your Bible will probably say something like she had a spirit of divination or a spirit by which she predicted the future.
Last week I talked about how you can read that straightforwardly. She could tell the future by way of some kind of spirit. Or we can read the spirit as an affectation or an act that she put on to play the part of a fortune teller. And where I'm getting that from is actually there in the Greek. The Greek reading here says that she had a or literally a spirit of python.
Now python was a giant snake that the Greek god Apollo defeated. It's also obviously where we get our English word python from. But in the mythology, Apollo was the son of Zeus which made him a very popular god. And the famous oracle at Delphi was set up to honor him. That oracle was led by women priestesses known as Pythias who would prophesy on behalf of Apollo to the world.
So when the writer of Acts says that this girl has a spirit of Python, there's a couple implications. First of all, you can't just go around calling yourself a Pythia if you don't work at the Oracle Of Delphi. And second, the writer is probably not endorsing the idea that the Pythias can actually tell the future at all, Which means the writer is likely saying that she mimics the mannerisms or the affectations associated with the Oracle at Delphi. In other words, he's saying this is a scam. He's saying that these men who are slavers who have treated this girl as a commodity to be bought and sold have likely forced her into an act that has even further diminished her humanity.
He's saying it's evil. This is part of what we have to keep in mind when we read our Bibles. This is a very different world than the one that we live in. And even a small phrase like, you can translate that as a spirit of fortune telling. That's true in the most basic sense.
That's what the Pythias were all about. But there is this whole backstory to these words that unveil what it is the writer is trying to communicate with these choices. Now also, we should acknowledge here that we don't actually know what happened to this girl. Now I'm choosing to believe that she continues to follow Paul and learns about Jesus and participates in the church at Philippi that would follow. But I know that just like today, women in the ancient world were not given the value that they should have been.
And I'm not naive about that. I simply want to hope for the best for this young woman and her encounter with Paul. However, this interaction leads to the next. The slavers that owned this girl are upset that she's not going along with their plans anymore and they plan to take Paul and Silas to court over it. First, they have them beaten and thrown into jail.
That night an earthquake kicks and the jail is shaken open and the jailer is about to take his own life thinking that the prisoners have escaped, but Paul stops him. This man as well, along with his household, they hear about about Jesus, they are baptized that day, and they are added to our fledgling community in Philippi. This is where we start. An ex slave turned successful businesswoman, a former fortune teller, and an anxious jailer who was very likely an out of work Roman soldier. And to think Paul comes to town looking for a synagogue where he can debate the merits of Jesus as Jewish Messiah with his fellow Jewish men.
But these are the kinds of unique unexpected relationships Paul forms and then invests himself in that lay the groundwork for the letter that we now dive into today. First though, let's pray. God of all grace who shows up in the strangest of places, in the most unexpected of relationships, who allows us to encounter your divine presence in the face of everyone we meet. We become aware of you all around us all the time. The ways that your wisdom and your grace and your gift to us is popping up in every conversation we enter.
May we have eyes to see and ears to hear. May we recognize you in each other always. And in that, as we begin to invest and pour in and build those relationships, may they then become the source of strength that we need when we find ourselves on the other side of the equation. May community be strength. May it be grace.
May it be encouragement. May it just what we need this week as we face the days to come. In the strong name, the Risen Christ, we pray. Amen. Okay.
Today we have Paul and Timothy, Apostles and authority, Philippi in Rome, and grace and peace. Now, let's start by actually reading from Philippians. This is chapter one verse one. Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, to all God's holy people in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and the deacons. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, last week we saw Paul and Silas travel to Philippi. This week we see Paul and Timothy write a letter to Philippi. And a couple interesting things here. First, Timothy is a student of Paul. He's mentioned in a number of Paul's letters and very possibly is the one who's actually writing down the letter that's to be taken to Philippi.
Paul does this pretty frequently and there's even this neat moment in II Thessalonians where he rends the letter by saying, I, Paul, write this greeting in my own hand. This is how I write. So he's dictating the letter, but then at the end he writes his signature on the paper just to say hi. And I I just really like that moment. But what's interesting is that in second Corinthians, for example, Paul will say, Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God and Timothy, our brother to the church of God in Corinth.
He kind of makes a distinction there between himself and Philippi, sort of big brother, little brother kind of thing maybe. Here they are just coauthors. Now as we read the letter, we're going to see that it really is just Paul writing, but this introduction puts Timothy on the same level with Paul, and that's kind of interesting. Now part of this is going to make sense later in chapter two when Paul writes that he's planning to send Timothy to spend time with the Philippians and he wants them to welcome Tim as he would himself. So it makes sense he introduced him this way in the beginning.
By the way, vouching for each other, this is a wholly sacred thing. The number of people who have done this for me and given me opportunities and chances to try new things beyond my experience level, this has been some of the most profound gifts anywhere in my life. If there's anything I hope to do in my career, it's introduce new voices into new conversations. All of us are better when we do this for each other. Also notice that Paul puts the Philippians on the same level as he and Timothy as well here.
Paul will often start his letters by claiming his apostleship in a way that sets him apart from any co author and asserts his authority in that letter and that community. Here, though, if you notice, he he doesn't do that. And I don't think that's an oversight. I think it's actually because of everything we talked about last week, the depth of relationship that exists between Paul and Philippi. And here's what I take from that.
Titles have a place but it's not in relationship. Yeah. I'm a pastor and I'm not ashamed of that. I love being a pastor. It's the best gig I've ever had.
But I don't generally go around introducing myself as pastor Jeremy. Most of you in community don't call me that. Some of you, it would be weird if you did. But there are times, however, I do use my title. If I'm speaking to a reporter like I did a couple weeks ago when asked about churches that have adapted to public health restrictions, I introduce myself as a pastor.
I I don't mention my theology degrees in normal conversation. I do, however, add them when I submit a paper or a manuscript for review. And that's because titles and qualifications, they serve a function. They help us establish a starting point quickly. They help us skip past some of the time needed to build credibility, and we leverage the experience and the endorsements of others behind those titles.
And here's the thing, titles can't actually substitute the time or replace the investment that relationships need to develop properly. They simply stand in as a temporary shortcut. And what that means is if I have to tell you I'm a pastor, that likely means I haven't earned the right to be your pastor. And if I have to quote my credentials to you, that probably means I haven't earned the right to be any kind of authority for you. When someone needs to be named, it probably means they know a title is all they have in that moment.
And so when Paul writes to a church that he doesn't know, maybe one he wants to come and meet one day, maybe a church like the one in Rome perhaps, he opens his letter by saying Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God just as he does in Romans one one. He's not demanding anything. He's simply trying to cut to the chase. But here in Philippi where Paul is known, where Paul has been held in jail, where Paul has spent time and earned the right to speak into these lives through developed relationships, he simply opens Paul and Timothy, slaves of Christ Jesus, to all of my friends in Philippi. And understand this.
Paul sometimes get a rap for being a little domineering. And sure, mean, he can be. But he also knows the difference between titles and relationships. And he knows what one gets him, a hearing perhaps, but he also understands what the other gets him which is actual influence built in friendship. And at the end of the day in the community of Jesus authority doesn't come from a title or a degree or a badge or sword.
It comes when it is earned in love. And trust me, apart from that is entirely overrated. Actually, in fact, I'm not even convinced that authority is a concept that holds much weight in Christianity at all. Paul famously uses this phrase in first Timothy. He says, I do not permit a woman to exercise authority over a man.
Ouch. But but if we really want to take this seriously, then we need to look a little closer because what's really interesting there is that the word Paul uses often oh, is what we call hapax legomena. It means it's a word that's only used once in the entire bible and this is that only time. Now we know what that word means from how it's used outside the Bible. It means a domineering authority.
And so Paul speaking to a specific church in Ephesus that was dominated by the goddess cults of Artemis, firstborn sister of Apollo by the way, says domineering authority, not cool. But you know what Paul never does anywhere? Paul never permits a man to exercise authenteo over a woman. Paul never permits an apostle to authoritative over a church. Paul never permits a believer to ever exercise any domineering authority over anyone else ever.
Because authenteo is not Jesus centered category. It's not how the community of Christ is meant to operate regardless of who it is that is wielding it. So sure, if Paul was going to write us a letter here Commons, he probably would address us as Paul the Apostle called by God to share the Gospel. He might drop a title to let us know who he is. But I promise you, the moment that Paul met us, the moment Paul spent time with us, the moment he had the chance to move past titles and into relationship, he would trade it all away in an instant the exact same way that he does with Philippi.
Because influence and friendship and service will always be more important than power and authority can ever be. Which is exactly where Paul goes next. Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, this is Paul's standard greeting. He uses it in several letters.
And yet here in Philippi this might be where I think it carries the most significance. We talked last week about the founding of Philippi, named after the second king Philip of Macedonia in the third century BCE, taken over by Rome in January, conquered by Octavian and Mark Antony in a battle against Brutus and Cassius in forty two BCE, renamed Colonia Vitrix Filippensia in thirty BCE when Octavian turns on and defeats Antony, and renamed Colonia Augustus Ulia Filippensia after Octavian rises to the throne and takes the name Emperor Augustusian twenty seven BCE. But really, that is just the start because remember, Philippi was centuriated when it was taken over by Octavian. That meant it was divided up between soldiers of the eighteenth legion. It was remodeled after the style of Rome, including the roads and the walls and a giant altar to Mars, the Roman god of war built at the city's entrance.
And all of this tied directly to the military victories of the person Augustus, the man who took the title savior of the world for bringing the Pax Romana to the empire. The man who once said that he saw his father ascend to the right hand of God declaring that he believed Julius Caesar had become a deity in the Roman pantheon making him the son of a god here on earth. By the way, name Augustus means the Divine or the Majestic One in Latin. This was not a man lacking in ego. But Augustus had his own Gospel.
It was called the Evangelion of Rome and it was the recounting of Rome's military victories. The steady march of the Pax Romana or the Peace of Rome under the banner of Augustus. One famous inscription carved in fourteen CE just before Augustus' death read, Terra Mariace, Parta Victoris Pax or Peace Through Victory on Land and Sea. This was Rome's calling card, victorious peace, peace at the point of a sword, peace at the spear of a Roman legion, peace in the name of Mars through Augustus. And now here is Paul who does not believe in the way of authentic oh, who believes titles have little ultimate value, who trusts in the way of Jesus and says that authority or power or exusia comes only from the way we pour into each other with love.
Who travels to Philippi, conquered by Rome, re founded by centurions, and then gathers together a group of misfits in the shadow of the God of War. And he writes and he says, not victorious peace, but instead gracious peace. You see, Paul says grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ, there's a lot going on here. Paul has taken the typical Greek greeting karen and he's changed to cheris or grace. And then he's paired that with Greek eirene, the equivalent of the Latin Pax to say cheris eirene, a direct challenge to the Gospel of Philippi, a victorious pact that has been literally built into the roads and the walls and the temples of the city.
You see, to say Lord Jesus Christ, savior of the world, this is a direct affront to the Lord Augustus, savior of Philippi. And in the abstract, every time Paul writes this, every time Paul uses this play on words in a greeting to any city, he is challenging the rule of Rome. But here in Philippi, here these words are magnified by all of the history and all of the relationships, all of the story that should have stopped a non violent Gospel in its tracks well before Paul ever made his way into town. And yet, with grace and peace, with a willingness to work with unexpected persons in unexpected places, Paul opens the possibility of a new story here in the heart of a Roman colony. Except now.
Years later Paul finds himself back in jail, the same place he found himself on his first trip to Philippi. Except this time he's been arrested by the Empire for challenging the Empire. And no wonder the Philippians are getting nervous. I mean, they're worried about their livelihoods and jobs. They're worried about their children and families.
They're worried about their neighbors looking over their fences, wondering who's going to report them to a magistrate. If Paul is back in prison, what does that mean for them here in Philippi? And so when Paul writes these words, Jesus is Lord, not Caesar, and the Evangelion is about grace and peace, not war and victory, this coded challenge to Rome from a Roman prison to a Roman colony, all of it must have hit like a ton of bricks. Because Paul is not saying that this outlaw church in the corner of Macedonia can ever overcome Rome. He is saying Jesus already has.
The Russian philosopher and theologian Nikolay Berdiaev once wrote, Anyone who allows himself to come under the obsessive grip of the idea of a worldwide peril or a worldwide conspiracy ceases to believe in the power of God and the power of truth. And he learns only to trust in his own coercions, cruelties, and murdering. This is in some sense Paul's point. If you believe in the power of cruelty you will eventually have nothing but your own cruelty to rely on. And yes, everything is awful.
And yes, I am in prison. And yes, you are in peril. And no, I'm not ignoring any of that. But when I speak of grace, I am refusing to believe that power and might and strength and war and military and violence and coercion and cruelty can ever truly create peace. Because here's the thing, Paul isn't trying to overthrow Rome.
Paul is trying to overthrow the assumptions that underpin Rome's Gospel. And so this is exactly what Paul goes on to do. He says, I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the Gospel from the first day until now. Paul uses the phrase you are partnering in the Gospel here, but the specific word he uses is koinonia, and this is this is literally the word for community and fellowship.
For Paul, Gospel, good news is built as we work together not as we conquer each other. Next he says that the one who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion. And that's actually a call back to the Genesis story of God creating calling all of it good. Paul reminds the Philippians that no matter what story they have heard from Rome, you and I, we, all of us began as the good creation of a generous God and that same God is continuing even now to create and recreate in you and through you. Everything is in process, so don't believe anyone, even Rome, when they tell you the story is over.
And then he says this, it is right for me to feel this way about all of you since I have you all in my heart. And what's really neat here is that in the construction of the sentence, the the Greek works two ways. It can either be I have you in my heart or it could be you have me in your heart. That's actually what the NRSV translation goes with. I I just love this little maybe intentionally confusing moment that makes you pause and wait.
Say, does does he mean this or does he mean that? Or maybe actually just he means both. I mean, come on. That would just be fun to read for the first time, wouldn't it? And finally, he says this, whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the Gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me.
And as nice as this sounds, as a good place as it is to end a sermon, what it probably means is that this community in Philippi was paying for Paul's imprisonment in Rome. See, when you were arrested in Rome and you had the means, you could hire a jailer and rent a villa and have your groceries delivered while you awaited trial. You could even carry on your business by hiring a secretary and having them deliver your letters, and that's exactly what Paul is doing as he writes this letter. But this phrase Paul uses here, means co participant. Meaning you are with me in prison, meaning we are in this together, meaning Rome doesn't win if we don't abandon each other.
And come on. Paul in lockdown having groceries delivered by neighbors forced to write letters because he can't visit his friends while in prison, that feels a little on the nose, especially this far into a pandemic. But ultimately this is Paul's point, the one that we can't let go of right now, particularly on the verge of all of us hopefully returning to something more familiar soon. Rome doesn't win unless we give in to the idea that we are on our own. And when everything is awful, the good news is that we're not.
And so Paul writes, Grace and peace to you from the one who drew us together, the one who reshapes our imagination of community, the one who elevates the voices that have gone ignored. And in that opens us up to better stories of good news popping up around us all the time, even when it looks like everything is awful. Because this is Paul's point. When we give in to Rome's version of the story, they will always win. But when we hold on to the grace and peace that sits at the Good News of God, that draws us together and reshapes us from the inside out, then we can never lose.
Let's pray. God who has brought us together, even as we find ourselves separated and distanced by space and time, we watch online and wish that we could be back in the room together right now. Might we remember that even in this moment we are never alone. That your spirit is near to us even now in this moment, even if we are struggling this day, reminding us that we are loved, that we are not forgotten. That there are ways that we can reach out to each other for grocery deliveries, for kind words, for encouragement.
And that when we offer that to each other, we find that same strength in making its way back to us. Help us to remember that when we buy into your story of peace through grace, peace through acceptance, peace through welcome, we find ourselves welcomed back to our seat at your table. Welcomed in and loved, embraced and known, so that even when everything is awful, we will know that there is goodness that surrounds us. Help us to trust, even when we struggle to, that you are the God who makes all things new. In the strong name of the risen Christ, we pray.
Amen.