being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
The "you" is plural: Paul's confidence is first about a congregation that shared the work of the gospel with him.
Today's reflection
This verse gets written on cards for one person, often at a hard moment, and it can carry that. But Paul was writing to a church.
The letter is addressed to all the saints at Philippi, with their overseers and deacons. English cannot show it on the page, but every you in these verses is plural. He who began a good work in all of you.
Look at why Paul is so sure. The reason is in the verse just before: because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. The word is koinonia, a shared life and a shared work, and near the end of the letter Paul fills in what it meant. When he left Macedonia, no other church gave to him. While he was in Thessalonica, they sent help again and again. Now, with Paul in chains, they have sent gifts once more by Epaphroditus.
So Paul looks at something God began at a riverside place of prayer and in a jailer’s house, a church that has kept giving, praying and standing with him for years, and he draws the conclusion. God does not start something like that in order to drop it halfway. He will carry it on to completion, until the day of Christ Jesus.
Of course it reaches each person. Every believer in Philippi was part of that good work. Still, the confidence was first about a people, and it could be seen in what they did together.
Some of us need to hear the verse that way. When your own faith looks thin, remember where Paul found his evidence: in a congregation still showing up for the gospel. Look at the people God has set you among. He began something there too, and he does not leave his work unfinished.
Why this passage
Context checked: Paul writes in chains (1:7, 13) to "all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons" (1:1). The church began with Lydia's household and the jailer's family (Acts 16). Every "you" in 1:3-8 is plural in Greek. Verse 5 grounds Paul's confidence in their "partnership in the gospel from the first day until now," the word koinonia; its related verb returns in 4:15, where 4:15-18 recalls the support they sent him more than once, most recently through Epaphroditus. The "good work" is most naturally God's work of grace among them, visible in that partnership, and "the day of Christ Jesus" is his return. The same plural address comes back in 2:12-13: work out your salvation, for it is God who works in you.
Scripture in English is from the Berean Standard Bible, which its publisher placed in the public domain on 30 April 2023.