34. The epistles to the churches of Philippi and Thessalonica, both
lying within the bounds of ancient Macedonia, have a remarkable
agreement in their general tone and manner. In both cases we have the
same affectionate outpouring of the apostle's heart towards the brethren
to whom he writes, and the same abundant personal notices respecting
himself and his ministry. Yet they differ precisely as we might suppose
they would in view of the fact that the two to the Thessalonians are the
earliest of Paul's writings, and are separated from that to the
Philippians by an interval of ten eventful years. In writing to the
Thessalonians he gives peculiar prominence to the doctrine of our Lord's
second coming, perhaps because, in the persecutions which they were
undergoing, they especially needed its strengthening and consolatory
influence; perhaps also because in the continual maltreatment which he
had encountered ever since he entered Macedonia--at Philippi (Acts
16:19-40; 1 Thess. 2:2), at Thessalonica (Acts 17:5-10), at Berea (Acts
17:13, 14), at Corinth (Acts 18:6-17)--he was staying his own soul on
the same glorious hope. On the contrary, we find in these earlier
epistles no mention of Judaizing Christians, nor any contrast between
the two opposite systems of justification by faith and by the works of
the Mosaic law, such as appears in his later epistles, that to the
Philippians included. Phil. 3:4-9. His opponents at Thessalonica are not
Judaizing Christians, but unconverted Jews, whose malignant opposition
he describes in strong terms. 1 Thess. 2:15, 16. To the Thessalonians
the apostle speaks of himself; but it is of his ministry, and the manner
in which he has discharged its duties among them. To the Philippians he
also speaks of himself; but then it is from a prison, with a trial for
life or death before him, and the retrospect of a long ministry behind
him. He unfolds, therefore, as is natural, his deep experiences as a
Christian and an apostle of Christ. See above, No. 29. In this contrast
between the earlier and the later epistles we have an evidence of their
genuineness which is all the stronger because of its indirectness. It is
such a mark of truth as no falsifier has power to imitate.

VII. THE PASTORAL EPISTLES.

35. The attempt to find for the pastoral epistles a place in Paul's
ministry as far as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles is beset with
difficulties which amount to impossibilities.

Among