‘But I rejoice in the Lord greatly, that now at length you caused your thought for me to blossom, in which you did indeed take thought, but you lacked opportunity.'
Paul commences his expression of gratitude by pointing out what joy it had brought him in the Lord because it had demonstrated that they were thinking of him, and had not forgotten him, although he assures them that he had never doubted that they had been thinking of him, and knew that they had simply lacked the opportunity to show it. There may have been a number of reasons for this;
· It may partly have been because of the hard persecution that the Philippian church were enduring from the citizens of Philippi, whose dislike against ‘foreign religions' had been made clear in their comments about the Jewishness of Paul and Silas (Acts 16:20-21). This would have resulted in them having to support each other, and having little to spare.
· It may partly have been due to the problem of getting money to him when he was on his travels (his whereabouts may have been a mystery to them), especially if at the time he did not appear to be in great need.
· It may partly have been that they had been undergoing hard times wealthwise.
· It may partly have been because Paul had previously sought to dissuade churches from sending him gifts because of the false accusations that it resulted in (1 Thessalonians 2:9; 2Th 3:7-10; 1 Corinthians 9:3-18; 2 Corinthians 12:13-18) and because he was concentrating on the ‘collection' for the relief of famine in Judaea.
Whatever was the case Paul assured them that he accepted that they had had a good reason for their failure. There is no suggestion in the Greek of any dissatisfaction with their lack of response.
‘You caused your thought for me to blossom.' The picture is of a plant blossoming after a period of dryness. There had necessarily been an arid time, but as soon as the opportunity came, they burst into flower in their attitude towards him
‘I rejoice in the Lord greatly.' ‘Greatly' is in an emphatic position demonstrating how great his joy had been, something which brings out how much the Philippians meant to him. ‘In the Lord' brings out that he sees everything in the light of his association with the Lord. All that he did was ‘in the Lord'. The use of ‘rejoice' instead of giving the expression of gratitude that we might have expected, emphasises that Paul's major concern was for what it demonstrated about their spiritual status. He was genuinely grateful, but it meant far, far more to him that what they had done had demonstrated their spiritual nature and their outflowing love.