NOTES for Php 1:23-24

²³For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:

²⁴Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.

Paul says of himself that it is all the same to him whether to remain in this world a while longer or to leave it. He is ready, following Christ's will, to choose what is better for the ministry entrusted to him. The apostle himself would like to be released and be with Christ, but if it is more useful for his brothers that he continue his earthly path, he agrees to this as well.

Paul considers this attitude toward life and death normal and natural for a Christian, and he calls his Philippian brothers to look at life and death the same way he himself does. And that is no surprise: with the coming of Christ, much here really did change. And above all, the relation between our untransformed world and the Kingdom, which, in the Savior's words, "has drawn near," changed.

Previously, before the coming of Christ, death one way or another meant departure into the world of shadows, which in the Bible is called sheol (in Greek and Greek-language books the Greek analogue of sheol is mentioned, hades, from which, incidentally, comes the Russian word ad, "hell"). There were also, for example in Egypt or Greece, ideas about another kind of afterlife, but it is difficult to say exactly what stands behind them, what kind of spiritual experience. The idea of the world of shadows can be considered universal, common to humanity; in one form or another it exists among all peoples. There, in the world of shadows, there is no life, but only its pale likeness, which can be called life only with a great stretch.

Rather, it is a kind of existence between being and nonbeing, in which no memory of earthly life remains and self-awareness barely smolders. With the coming of Christ, however, everything changes. The process of the general resurrection begins already at the moment of the Savior's death on the cross; the first risen ones come out of the tombs precisely at this moment. And afterward it continues: sheol, the world of shadows, no longer exists in its former form, and if before death meant the final loss (until the coming of the Messiah) of the fullness of life, now it is only a boundary dividing the stages of the Christian's path.

The completion of earthly life means for a Christian only the beginning of a new one, and what it will be depends on how he has walked his earthly path. That is why the apostle says that for him there is no difference between life and death: he does not live according to his own will; his earthly path is determined by Christ's will, and therefore Christ Himself will also determine the moment when this path is completed. Such is the path of a Christian, and this is the very path Paul calls his Philippian brothers to walk.

Other notes

For Php 1:12-30

¹²But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel;

¹³So that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace, and in all other places;

¹⁴And many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.

¹⁵Some indeed preach Christ even of envy and strife; and some also of good will:

¹⁶The one preach Christ of contention, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my bonds:

¹⁷But the other of love, knowing that I am set for the defence of the gospel.

¹⁸What then? notwithstanding, every way, whether in pretence, or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice.

¹⁹For I know that this shall turn to my salvation through your prayer, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ,

²⁰According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life, or by death.

²¹For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

²²But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labour: yet what I shall choose I wot not.

²³For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:

²⁴Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.

²⁵And having this confidence, I know that I shall abide and continue with you all for your furtherance and joy of faith;

²⁶That your rejoicing may be more abundant in Jesus Christ for me by my coming to you again.

²⁷Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel;

²⁸And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation, and that of God.

²⁹For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake;

³⁰Having the same conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me.

We always think of death with a certain fear, because it is terrible and hideous... Read more

We always think of death with a certain fear, because it is terrible and hideous, because it so plainly disfigures God's creation. In every age, the frightening image of death has drawn human thought, and we try to rethink life so that it will not be so frightening. But only a Christian can say with the apostle, “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Death becomes a place of encounter with Jesus, because the Lord took our death upon Himself on the Cross. It is important, however, that these words of the apostle show how one may regard one's own death, not another person's. It is also remarkable how the meaning of life changes for him: he lives not because life is better than death (on the contrary, he desires to depart and be with Christ), but so that we may gain joy in faith.