Epaphroditus gives us another example of what it means to live a life surrendered to Jesus Christ.

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Philippians #10. Philippians 2:19-30

¹⁹ I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I too may be cheered by news of you. ²⁰ For I have no one like him, who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare. ²¹ For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. ²² But you know Timothy’s proven worth, how as a son with a father he has served with me in the gospel. ²³ I hope therefore to send him just as soon as I see how it will go with me, ²⁴ and I trust in the Lord that shortly I myself will come also.
²⁵ I have thought it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus my brother and fellow worker and fellow soldier, and your messenger and minister to my need, ²⁶ for he has been longing for you all and has been distressed because you heard that he was ill. ²⁷ Indeed he was ill, near to death. But God had mercy on him, and not only on him but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. ²⁸ I am the more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again, and that I may be less anxious. ²⁹ So receive him in the Lord with all joy, and honor such men, ³⁰ for he nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete what was lacking in your service to me. (Philippians 2:19-30)

Paul pauses here to explain a little bit more about why he is sending this letter. He’s planning to send his ministry protégé, Timothy, to the Philippians, because he knows and trusts that sending Timothy is almost as good as going himself. He says something that reveals he’s very human, and also that human nature doesn’t change much: “For I have no one like him, who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare. For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ.”

It’s not hard to become discouraged in ministry, and to feel like no one else is really whole-heartedly following Jesus Christ. After all his labours and journeying, nights full of prayer, days full of teaching and encouraging, Paul feels that the only person that he can really count on at the moment is Timothy. The discouragement was real, and also, Timothy’s faithfulness was real.

Paul decided to hold back on sending Timothy, however, until his court case is totally resolved.

Next, Paul explains that he is sending a man named Epaphroditus to the Philippians. It appears that Epaphroditus was, himself, a member of the Philippian church. In fact, Epaphroditus was in Rome with Paul precisely because, originally, the Philippians sent him there with a gift for Paul.

I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent (Philippians 4:18, ESV)

So let’s lay out the timeline. The church in Philippi decided to send Paul a gift. Roman prisoners were not allowed to work, but they were not provided with food or other necessities, either. So, prisoners had to be supported by friends and family. The Philippians sent a gift to help support Paul. There was no postal service to speak of, so the gift had to be personally delivered by someone trusted. The church at Philippi chose Epaphroditus to be the messenger, and deliverer.

The journey from Philippi to Rome (or vice-versa) was a very big deal. Philippi is in modern Macedonia, to the northeast of Greece. If you were to go the most direct route in those days, you would go overland from Philippi on the Via Egnatia (the major Roman “highway” in the area at the time) across Macedonia, and go into, and then across, Albania to the location of the modern-day city of Durres. Most of that first four hundred miles or so involves rugged mountain country. I’ve been in that part of the world, and still today, to go between Philippi and the Albanian coast is not for the fainthearted, and is difficult, even with vehicles. Roads quickly fall apart in that part of the world, and there is snow in the mountains in the winter, floods in spring and fall, and so on. Most people would make this first part of the journey by walking, which would take about three weeks—but only if the weather stayed good and you stayed healthy enough to walk twenty miles a day (carrying all your stuff with you) with not a single day for rest, or unforeseen issues. It also requires that all the river fords be passable, which was not necessarily something to be counted on. You might wait for several days for a flooding river to get low enough to safely cross (there were few bridges). After finally arriving on the Albanian coast, you would take a few days to find a ship to cross to the eastern side of Italy. Next, you are walking once again, across Italy from east to west, navigating additional mountain ranges to get to the area of modern-day Salerno. From there, you would probably go up the western side of that country to Rome. I have been in that region of Italy, as well, and again the country, at times, gets very rugged. The entire journey would be more than thirteen hundred miles, all but a small portion of it on foot, more than half of it through mountain country. If you figure about twenty miles a day (which is an average in ideal conditions) it would take at least sixty-five days, with zero time off for rest. In reality, it could be significantly longer—say three months.

You could make the entire journey by ship, which would have been easier, but also more expensive, and it would take almost the same amount of time. Ships were used primarily for carrying cargo (rather than passengers), and so ships would have journeyed from port to port over relatively short distances. Periodically, the travelers would have to leave their ship at a port, and find a new ship that was going in their direction, in order to keep moving toward Rome. Remember, these are vessels powered by wind and oars. Even the process of going into and out of a port would often take several hours. Then, to find the right ship and price going their way might take several days, each time they had to change vessels.

The first five-hundred miles of the ship journey would take the travelers south, away from Rome, to get around the bulk of Greece. The ship-journey would cover maybe 1,700 miles. It would include dangers from weather, from pirates, and from crooks and con men and thieves in each port. During the years 2014-2023 there were an average of 2,600 casualties/incidences of accident, injury, or loss of life at sea in and around Greece and Italy. That is with modern ships, using modern technology and safety precautions. You can imagine that things were far worse in the time of Paul and Epaphroditus. In ancient times, travel at sea, though physically easier for passengers than walking, was by no means safe and relaxing. Ships were often dangerously overcrowded and/or overloaded. It was risky.

The point is, no matter which way they did it, it was a really big deal that Epaphroditus (and probably a few companions) traveled all that distance, risking all those dangers, hardships and troubles. The fact that Epaphroditus was carrying a relatively large amount of money as a gift for the apostle Paul made it doubly-dangerous.

As I just mentioned, almost certainly, Epaphroditus took a few companions with him, in case something should happen to him, and also to help guard against robbers. In any case, it appears that either shortly before, or after, he arrived in Rome, Epaphroditus grew seriously ill. His companions returned home to Philippi after they knew that Epaphroditus was sick, but without knowing whether or not he had recovered.

Epaphroditus probably had loved ones in Philippi, because when he recovered, he agonized over the fact that his companions had carried news of his serious illness back home to Philippi. He hated to think of his loved ones wondering if he lived or died. So, some time after he had fully recovered, Paul decided it was best to send him home to bring comfort to the church back there, who didn’t know whether he was alive or dead.

Paul certainly had a great deal of admiration and gratitude toward Epaphroditus. He calls him: brother, co-worker, fellow-soldier, messenger and minister.

Brother, was commonly used by the first Christians to mean “fellow-Christian.” Paul is affirming that Epaphroditus was a brother in Christ. He also calls him a co-worker. The word here means laboring together (it’s actually the word from which we get the English: synergy). So, apparently either at some point in the past, or, more likely, in Rome, Epaphroditus had been engaged in Christian ministry with Paul. Paul then describes him as a fellow-soldier. I assume Paul had been observing the soldiers that guarded him, and realized that following Jesus together is like campaigning together as soldiers (the word could also be translated “co-campaigner”).

The fourth word here, which the ESV translates as “messenger,” is literally “apostle.” I think it might help if we have a clear idea of what that word meant in the First Century Greco-Roman world. An apostle is a designated messenger, someone who acts and speaks on behalf of the one who sent him. So, the apostles of Jesus were his special messengers, who were designated to act and speak on his behalf, to carry out his mission and purpose in the world. But we need to remember that the word existed before Jesus, and had a broader meaning in the culture than “the special representatives of Jesus.” So, Epaphroditus was the special messenger sent by the Philippians to Paul, to act and speak on their behalf to him. It does not mean that we should consider Epaphroditus an apostle of Jesus in the same way that Paul and Peter were. But he was sent by the Philippians to deliver their gift to Paul, and to do for Paul what they, themselves, would do, if they were present. In a way, he was the embodiment of the Philippian church to Paul.

Paul’s final description of Epaphroditus makes more sense, now that we understand the full depth meant by apostle/messenger. Paul calls him “minister to my need.” Paul didn’t use the normal Christian word for minister/servant here. Instead, he described Epaphroditus as if he where an appointed government or religious official.

This little section about Epaphroditus is, in some ways, one of the main purposes for which Paul wrote this letter. The Philippians sent Epaphroditus not only to deliver the financial gift, but also to be part of the gift himself. They sent him to be a co-worker, a co-soldier, a minister in whatever way he could serve Paul. The gift they sent was money, plus Epaphroditus himself. But now Paul was returning part of the gift—he was sending Epaphroditus back. So, here, he explicitly says that Epaphroditus was everything he should have been, and more, but that things have changed, and, for several reasons, it seemed best to have Epaphroditus return home.

One of the reasons for Epaphroditus to go home is because he was extremely ill already before his companions returned to Philippi. It would have taken those companions 3 months or more to get back. It would be another three months or more before Epaphroditus himself could have gotten home. During all that time his loved ones would have been deeply worried about him. On the other side, Epaphroditus was feeling upset that his loved ones won’t be able to ease their minds until he returns.

Second, Paul’s trial had begun in earnest, and Paul expected a resolution, soon. This is one reason he kept saying that he hoped that he himself (or at the worst, Timothy) would see them in person before long. He wanted them to understand that he did not need Epaphroditus in the same way that he might have before. In all of this, he wanted to make sure that they understood that, even though he came close to dying from his sickness, Epaphroditus fulfilled his mission fully in every way, and the fact that Paul sent him home should not be seen in any way as negative for Epaphroditus.

Now, I want to back out a bit, and consider two lessons from Epaphroditus. You may not have thought about it, but there’s something surprising here. Epaphroditus was sick, so sick that they thought he might be about to die. Paul was extremely worried about him. So what? Well, elsewhere, Luke writes about this same Paul:

¹¹ And God was doing extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, ¹² so that even handkerchiefs or aprons that had touched his skin were carried away to the sick, and their diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them. (Acts 19:11-12, ESV)

And yet here was Paul, who, in the past was used by God for extraordinary miracles of healing, and here was a man whom Paul testifies was a model follower of Jesus, and he was extremely sick. Obviously, he was not healed miraculously, not even through Paul. If he had been, it would have happened when he was first sick in Rome, and his companions would have carried the news of the miracle back to Philippi. Paul himself makes no mention of a miracle of healing. It seems clear that Epaphroditus fell deeply ill, and in spite of the prayers of Paul and the Roman Christians, he got even sicker, coming close to death before he finally began to recover.

There are some people who claim that God always intends to heal a sick person, no matter what. If there is no miraculous healing, it is due to lack of faith. This is not only untrue, but it is a dangerous teaching to spread, because it spreads disappointment with God and bitterness along with it. But Paul says nothing like it. Like most of us at one point or another, he watched helplessly while his friend battled for his life. No doubt he was comforted by knowing that even if Epaphroditus died, he would be with the Lord, but Paul says that in the moment it would have given him “sorrow upon sorrow” (v. 27). We don’t always understand the workings of God, of why some are healed, and some are not. Even the great apostle Paul encountered this mystery. We need to come to terms with some amount of mystery in various areas of our lives.

The second point I want to consider is this: the suffering of Epaphroditus was considered by Paul to be suffering for the sake of Christ. This suffering was not persecution, but rather a sickness that occurred in the ordinary course of life. Paul doesn’t mention anything unusual about it, except that it was a very serious illness. Why does Paul then claim that Epaphroditus, in his illness, nearly died for the sake of Christ?

I think it is this: Clearly, Epaphroditus was someone who had surrendered his life to the purposes of Jesus Christ and his church. Did Jesus need someone to take the gift of the Philippians to Paul in Rome? Then Epaphroditus was up for it, because his whole life belonged to Jesus. He was willing to do whatever was necessary in the service of Christ. In his life, which was surrendered to Christ, all things were for Christ and his glory. So, as Paul already explained, concerning himself, if Epaphroditus lived, it was for Christ. If he died, it was for Christ. In a life that is surrendered to Jesus Christ, all things are for Christ. In a way, what Paul is saying is that Epaphroditus shared the same attitude that he, Paul, had: to live is Christ, to die is gain.

Where does this leave us? I hope we can look at Timothy, and Epaphroditus, and be inspired. I want to live in such a way that I’m not living for my own purposes, but for those of Jesus. I would like to earn the titles of brother, co worker, co-soldier, messenger, and minister. Do any of these strike you? Which ones? What is the Lord saying to you about that?

If I do surrender my life in the way that Epaphroditus did, then I can also trust that whatever transpires (other than my own sin), it will be considered as in the service of Christ. If I am serving the Lord on the mission field, it is for Christ. If I am working at a company in the United States, but if my life is surrendered to him, that too, is for Christ.

Let the Holy Spirit speak to you right now.