What Paul Calls Himself, What He Calls Them, and the First Word Out of His Mouth

Main Idea of Philippians (The Central Thesis)

Philippians is a letter written from prison to a church Paul planted and loved. Its burden is maintaining our joy in the Lord while advancing the gospel, even in the midst of suffering. Paul thanks the Philippians for their partnership, reassures them that his chains have actually served the gospel, sets Christ before them as the pattern of humility, warns them against adding law-keeping to the finished work of Christ, and teaches them contentment in every circumstance.

The Big Idea of This Passage (The Main Point)

Before Paul thanks anyone, argues anything, or asks for a single thing, he settles the question of identity. Two slaves are writing to saints, and the very first thing Paul hands this church is grace. In a city where your name, your rank, and your citizenship decided your worth, Paul opens by telling these believers who they are in Christ—and that everything they have came to them as a gift.

The Logical Bridge (The Contextual Link)

These are the opening words of the letter, so the bridge runs from the situation into the text. Paul is a prisoner in Rome, writing to a church he planted about ten years earlier in a Roman colony that prized status and rank above almost everything.

Ancient letters followed a standard pattern: sender, recipient, greeting. Paul keeps the pattern—and reshapes every part of it. Where a writer would state his credentials, Paul calls himself a slave. Where a writer would name his social peers, Paul addresses every believer as holy. And where a writer would toss out the customary “greetings,” Paul writes “grace and peace” and names their source. Nothing here is filler. The whole gospel is folded into the envelope.

Questions for Reflection (Thought-Provoking Questions)

1. Paul introduces himself as a slave rather than as an apostle. If you had to introduce yourself in one word to a church that respected you, what word would you reach for—and why?
2. Paul calls every believer in Philippi a “saint.” Does that word feel like it describes you? Why or why not?
3. Paul says they are “in Christ Jesus” and “in Philippi” in the same breath. What does it mean to live in two places at once like that?
4. Paul always writes “grace” before “peace,” never the other way around. Why might that order matter for someone trying hard to feel at peace with God?

The Text

“Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus: To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

— Philippians 1:1–2 (CSB)

Observations (What the Text Says)

Verse 1a: The letter comes from Paul and Timothy, who describe themselves not by office but as “servants of Christ Jesus.”

Verse 1b: It is addressed to “all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi”—every believer, located both in Christ and in a specific city.

Verse 1c: The overseers and deacons are named as included among those saints.

Verse 2: Paul greets them with grace and peace, and names a single source: God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Interpretation: Identity Before Instruction (Understanding the Meaning)

1:1a – Two Slaves of Christ Jesus

“Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus.” The Greek word is douloi—slaves. Not hired workers who go home at night, but people who belong to someone else entirely, whose time and body and future are not their own.

Notice what Paul does not say. In Romans, Galatians, and both Corinthian letters he calls himself an apostle, usually because his authority is under attack. Here he does not, and the silence is warm rather than cold: these are friends, there is nothing to defend, and he has no need to pull rank on people who have loved him for a decade.

He also puts Timothy beside himself as an equal—two slaves, not a master and an assistant. That matters in a letter that will soon command this church to count others as more important than themselves (2:3). Paul is already doing it in the first four words.

And there is an Old Testament echo worth hearing. “Servant of the LORD” was the title given to Moses, to David, to the prophets. It was never an insult; it was the highest honor a man could carry. So Paul is saying two things at once: I am owned, and I am honored—because of whose I am.

1:1b – Saints in Christ Jesus, in Philippi

Paul writes to “all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi.” The word “saints” (hagioi) means those set apart for God, made holy by him. It is not a rank awarded to a few outstanding Christians after they die. It is the plain description of every believer in that city, given at the moment God claimed them.

Read the address slowly, because it has two halves. They are “in Christ Jesus” and “in Philippi.” Those are two real locations at once. In Christ is where their life, forgiveness, and identity come from. In Philippi is where they have to live it—in a specific city, among specific neighbors, under specific pressure. Paul does not let them float above their address, and he does not let their address define them. This is the first hint of what he will say outright in 3:20: their citizenship is in heaven, but their assignment is on this street.

And there is that small word again: all. Paul uses it constantly in this letter. Writing to a church where two women will need to be named and urged to agree (4:2), he refuses in his very first sentence to address a favored inner circle.

1:1c – Including the Overseers and Deacons

This is the only greeting in all of Paul’s letters that mentions church officers by title, which tells us the Philippian church had grown into ordered, recognizable leadership over its ten years.

But look carefully at where he puts them. He does not write “to the overseers and deacons, and also the saints.” He writes to all the saints, including the overseers and deacons. The leaders are inside the church, not above it. In a Roman colony organized entirely around who outranked whom, that word order is quietly revolutionary. G. Walter Hansen observes that Paul’s framing places leaders within the community of believers rather than over against it, so that their service is exercised as part of the body and not from above it.

1:2 – Grace to You and Peace

A normal Greek letter opened with one word, chairein—“greetings.” Paul takes that word, changes it to charis, “grace,” and joins it to the Hebrew blessing shalom, “peace.” What was a formality becomes the gospel in miniature.

The order is fixed and it is never reversed anywhere in Paul’s letters: grace first, then peace. That sequence is the whole logic of salvation. Grace is God’s undeserved favor reaching down to people who have nothing to offer him. Peace is what follows—not merely a calm feeling, but an actual end to hostility, a real reconciliation with God. You cannot get the peace by working for it, because it only ever arrives behind the grace. Anyone trying to feel settled with God by improving first has the order backwards.

Then notice the source: “from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” One preposition governs both names. Paul does not say grace comes from God and, separately, good wishes come from Jesus. Father and Son stand together as the single fountain of grace and peace. That is a quiet, enormous claim about who Jesus is—made not in the middle of a theological argument, but in the address line of a thank-you letter, where a man reveals what he actually believes.

Application (How We Respond)

Let “belonging to Christ” be your first answer to who you are. In a culture that trains you to lead with your job title, your platform, or your achievements, notice that Paul—who had more credentials than anyone—introduced himself as someone owned by Jesus, and ask what you reach for first when you describe yourself.

Accept the name God gives you before you feel you have earned it. If you have trusted Christ, you are a saint right now, not after you clean up; refusing that name may feel like humility, but it is really an argument with God about what his grace accomplished.

Stop trying to earn the peace that only follows grace. If your sense of standing with God rises and falls with your performance this week, you have reversed Paul’s order—receive the grace first, and let the peace come where it always comes from.

Be Intentional (Putting Truth into Action)

1. Intentional Identity: This week, when someone asks what you do or who you are, answer once out loud in a way that names Christ before your role—and notice how it feels to lead with that.
2. Intentional Belonging: This week, write down the two addresses of your own life—“in Christ” and in your actual city or neighborhood—and name one specific way the first should shape how you live at the second.
3. Intentional Order: This week, each morning, say grace before peace: thank God for one specific undeserved kindness before you ask him for calm about anything, and see whether the calm follows.

Link to the Main Idea

Philippians is about joy in the Lord and the advance of the gospel in the middle of suffering. Joy like that has to rest on something a prison cannot reach—and these two verses lay that foundation before a single circumstance is mentioned. Paul’s identity is that he belongs to Christ, which chains cannot change. The Philippians’ identity is that they are saints in Christ, which pressure in a proud Roman colony cannot revoke. And what flows to them from God is grace and peace, which no emperor grants and none can take away. Everything joyful in the rest of this letter grows out of what Paul establishes here.

How Does This Text Point to Christ?

Christ is named twice in two verses, and both times he is the ground of everything.

Start with that word doulos, slave. Paul uses it of himself in verse 1—and in chapter 2 he will use the very same word of Jesus, who “emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant” and “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death—even to death on a cross” (2:7–8). Paul’s servanthood is not an achievement he is proud of. It is a copy of his Lord, who took the lowest place first.

Then consider how anyone becomes a saint. The Philippians are not holy because they tried hard; they are holy because they are “in Christ Jesus.” Their holiness is a location before it is a behavior. They are set apart because Christ set them apart at the cost of his own blood, and the life they now live is lived inside him.

And the grace and peace of verse 2 have an address in history. They are not vague blessings floating down from heaven. Peace with God was made, as Paul writes elsewhere, “through the blood of his cross” (Colossians 1:20), and Christ himself “is our peace” (Ephesians 2:14). When Paul names the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ together as the source, he is telling us that the gift and the Giver cannot be separated—what comes to us comes to us in the Son.

Summary (Recapitulation)

Paul opens his letter by settling identity before anything else. He and Timothy are slaves of Christ Jesus—owned, and honored precisely because of whose they are. The Philippians are saints, all of them, holy not by achievement but by being in Christ, and living that out at a real street address in a proud Roman colony. Their leaders are named inside the church, not above it. And the first thing Paul gives them is grace, followed by peace, flowing from the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ together. Before a word of thanks or instruction, the gospel is already in the greeting.

Ask Yourself (A Deep Heart Examination)

1. If someone listened to how I describe myself for a week, would they guess that I belong to Christ before anything else?
2. Do I actually believe God calls me holy right now, or am I still waiting to feel worthy of the word?
3. Am I trying to work my way into peace with God, when Scripture says peace only ever comes after grace?

Bibliography (For Further Study)

Fee, Gordon D. Paul’s Letter to the Philippians. New International Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

Silva, Moisés. Philippians. 2nd ed. Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.

Hansen, G. Walter. The Letter to the Philippians. Pillar New Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.

Merida, Tony, and Francis Chan. Exalting Jesus in Philippians. Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary. Nashville: B&H.

Carson, D. A. Basics for Believers: An Exposition of Philippians. Grand Rapids: Baker.

Soli Deo Gloria