In our last lesson Paul moves from sharing his prayers for the Philippians to addressing their concerns for him. He dealt with their concerns about how his imprisonment would affect the gospel and the reality that there were people now preaching that may not be qualified or whose motives may not be pure. In tonight’s passage we see that Paul deals with their greatest concern, would Paul survive this imprisonment or would he ultimately be killed? In a deeply personal passage of Scripture Paul shares his heart with his friends. He deals with their concern, with the nature of life and death with both joy and sobriety. Paul is not flippant but he refuses to be fearful, he’s careful in his words but above all else he is joyful in his confidence that for him (he speaks for no one else and he is not offering instruction) “to live is Christ and to die is gain”.