When the apostle of Paul first rolled into this town, city, like a city, called

Philippi, the city was famous for its connection to two of the greatest emperors that the world had ever seen at that point.

Paul first came to Philippi in the winter,

it connects with us, is the winter of the year 4950.

There was a population there of about 10,000 in Philippi,

which that's sizable in the first century not as big as other cities like

Duslan Aikka and Nephysis and Corinth but it's sizable and when he wrote this

letter to the Philippians ten years later I don't think it was lost on Paul

how significant it was to be writing to Saints in Philippi.

It is not a small thing. I bet Paul enjoyed getting those words down on the page.

There are Christians alive and well in no obscure city in Philippi in the first century.

The planting and the growth and the endurance of the church in this city represented gospel advance deep into the Roman

empire.

Now, Philippi had been founded about 350 years before Jesus.

It's about 8 miles northwest of a port city on the Aegean Sea called Neopolis.

It's in the region called Macedonia. G and see called Neopolus.

It's in the region called Macedonia.

The city was named for Philip of Macedon.

If you've heard of him, if you know of his name, he's famous because of his son named Alexander the Great.

So Philippi's name for Alexander's father.

And Alexander conquered Greece in 338 BC,

and he spread the language of the Greeks

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