PAULINE EPISTLES

Bound for Joy : Philippians (ALABAMA)

Plot

"When Paul wrote his letter to the Philippians, he was a prisoner of Rome's mad Emperor Nero. He may have been confined in Ephesus or Caesarea, or locked in the recesses of Rome's infamous Mamertine prison. Yet his letter--thoughts of a man behind bars--speaks repeatedly of "joy" and "rejoicing." In Paul's day, the Roman prison was a joyless place of damp stone where "neglect, darkness and stench made it hideous and fearsome to behold." Yet Paul's letter proclaims that in Christ every Christian has victory over every circumstance of life. And in the joy of the Lord, Paul found the secret of such victory--the way of "escape" from his prison. As writer Briscoe points out, "We all have our prisons of one kind or another." But whatever your own prison may be, like Paul you too can find the way of joy in Christ."