Charles Ellicott Commentary Philippians 1:7

"even as it is right for me to be thus minded on behalf of you all, because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as, both in my bonds and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel, ye all are partakers with me of grace." — Philippians 1:7 (ASV)

It is fitting.—Rather, it is but right, or just; it is but your due.

To think this of you all.—Rather, to be in this mind; to have this feeling on behalf of you all. The word rendered here “to think” is used with special frequency in this Epistle (Philippians 2:5; Philippians 3:15; Philippians 3:19; Philippians 4:2; Philippians 4:10), as also in the Epistle to the Romans (Romans 8:5; Romans 11:20; Romans 12:3; Romans 12:16; Romans 14:16; Romans 15:5). It is variously rendered; but it always refers, not to a single definite opinion, but to an habitual conviction or feeling.

I have you in my heart.—This (and not the marginal reading) is to be taken. The original is, grammatically speaking, ambiguous, but both the order and the context are decisive. Compare, for the sense, 2 Corinthians 3:2, Ye are our epistle, written in our hearts.

Both in my bonds, and in the defence and confirmation of the gospel.—These words are certainly to be connected, as in our version. St. Paul unites his bonds with “the defence and confirmation of the gospel”—that is, with his pleading for it against objections, and establishment of it by positive teaching—on the ground stated in Philippians 1:12-13, that these, his bonds, had tended to the furtherance of the gospel.

He accepts the help sent to him by the Philippians, in which they had “communicated” (in the original the word used is the same as here) with his affliction, as a means of fellowship with him in the whole of this work of evangelization. It is true that in Philippians 1:30 he speaks of the Philippians as having themselves to undergo the same conflict as his own; but the expression “in my bonds, etc.,” can hardly be satisfied simply by this kind of fellowship.

Ye all are partakers of my grace.—Here, on the contrary, the marginal reading is preferable: Ye are all partakers with me of the grace. This grace refers to the privilege described in Ephesians 3:8:

Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.

See below, Philippians 1:29: To you it is given—that is (in the original), “given as a grace”—not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake.