“Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons: Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.” (Philippians 1:1–2, KJV)
When I was in school, we were taught how to address a letter. Most often it would look like this, “Dear” followed by the name of the person. The greeting would often be nothing more than a formality. As I have worked with other organizations around the world in my time in engineering management, I have seen other similar greetings. There too, the greetings seemed to be nothing more than a mere formality with little to no true heart. In fact, you might receive a scathing letter from someone prefaced with “Dear” and your name.
When Paul wrote a letter to the churches, he put his heart into it. We see that in his greetings at the beginning of these letters. The greeting were not just some standard platitudes. There was meaning in every greeting. The greeting to the Philippians was no different.
Here, Paul is writing from an imprisonment, likely in Rome or Caesarea, to a church that had partnered with him is his evangelistic and church planting mission. The Lord had used Paul in planting this church in Philippi. Thus, there was a significant heartfelt involvement with this church as there was with all the churches.
In his introduction, Paul made a special mention of the entire church to include the overseers, (the pastors), and the deacons. This establishes that the church in Philippi had a sound biblical structure, one that was capable to fulfill the Lord’s glorious purposes.
He concluded this greeting with a very cordial and meaningful salutation. He wrote, “Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.” It is, or at least it should be, the hope of every pastor that his parishioners would experience the awesome wonder of the peace of God in their hearts. The word, “peace,” eirene refers to peace, quietness, and rest. It is something difficult to find in the world in which we live. Our world is filled with busyness, difficulties, and hardships. Yet peace is possible only through God’s grace found in the Father and the Son. Paul’s heart desire was for the Philippians to experience the kind of peace that will come by trusting the Lord our God in all the circumstances of life.
We can learn from Paul’s salutation here that as we greet people, it should be more than a cliché. There should be sincerity in our hearts. This is only something that we can have through the work of Christ in us. Our heart should desire that all those who we meet might experience the Grace and resulting peace of God in their lives every day. “Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ.”
Renewing the Heart 