THE leading thoughts developed in the three epistles to Ephesus, Philippi, and Colosse seem distinctive and marked.
That to the Ephesians gives the moral picture of the shooting of the corn of wheat which fell into the ground and died that it might not abide alone—the Church seen in Christ in heaven.
That to the Philippians is a specimen of what fellowship with the Father and the Son is, as found displayed in the apostle while in the wilderness—Christ’s spirit in the believer.
The third, to Colosse, gives us God the Father’s estimate of Christ. These three letters contain a sort of divine paraphrase on the promise (John 14:2020At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. (John 14:20)) — “At that day (that is now) ye shall know that I am in my Father” (see for the opening of this, Colossians), “and ye in me” (see Ephesians), “and I in you” (see Philippians).