Imagine the searching and the prayer that lay behind the letter the rector wrote after almost a decade of service to this majestic church.

It is has been argued that Luke may be writing: a letter of apology ( traditionally a defense for one ’ s beliefs ), a letter of legitimation for Christian beliefs, a letter to equip the church to function amidst the Roman Empire, or a letter that is apolitical.

Acts differs with Paul's letter on important issues, such as the Law, Paul's own apostleship, and his relation to the Jerusalem church.

" Under the persistence of the brethren who told him, " Emperor Constantine loves the church ," he accepted to write him a letter blessing him, and praying for the peace and safety of the empire and the church.

It was composed as an encyclical letter — that is, one not directed to the members of one church in particular, but intended rather to be circulated and read in all churches.

The most prominent reference to the term evangelist in the denomination's literature is found in its Articles of Faith, derived from the Wentworth letter, a statement by Joseph Smith in 1842 to a Chicago newspaper editor that the church believes in " the same organization that existed in the primitive church ", including " evangelists ".

Hence, the letter identifies Paul as its author, and these manuscripts designate the Ephesian church as its recipient.

It could mean that he received word of the further development and growth of the church in Ephesus, and if Paul — co-founder of that church --- wrote the letter, this illuminates his follow-up: " I do not cease to give thanks for you ..."

The lack of any internal references to Ephesus in the early manuscripts led Marcion, a second-century heretical Gnostic who created the first New Testament canon, to believe that the letter was actually addressed to the church at Laodicea.

The view is not uncommon in later traditions either, considering that the content of the letter seems to suggest a similar socio-critical context to the Laodicean church mentioned in the Revelation of John.

The central dispute in the letter concerns the question of how Gentiles could convert to Christianity, which shows that this letter was written at a very early stage in church history, when the vast majority of Christians were Jewish or Jewish proselytes, which historians refer to as the Jewish Christians.

The letter was written to the church at Philippi, one of the earliest churches to be founded in Europe.

Most New Testament scholars believe Paul of Tarsus wrote this letter from Corinth, although information appended to this work in many early manuscripts ( e. g., Codices Alexandrinus, Mosquensis, and Angelicus ) state that Paul wrote it in Athens after Timothy had returned from Macedonia with news of the state of the church in Thessalonica (; ).

Tertullian ( c. a. d. 160 – 225 ) wrote that when it was discovered that a church elder had composed a pseudonymous work, The Acts of Paul ( which included a purported Pauline letter, 3 Corinthians ), the offending elder “ was removed from his office ” ( On Baptism 17 ).

Additionally Phoebe was a deacon of the church in Cenchreae, a port to the east of Corinth, and would have been able to convey the letter to Rome after passing through Corinth and taking a ship from Corinth ’ s west port.

In the flow of the letter, Paul shifts his arguments, sometimes addressing the Jewish members of the church, sometimes the Gentile membership and sometimes the church as a whole.

Kodyke had appeared at the mine one day bearing a letter from Kruger.

When he started school at the age of five-and-a-half, he could not understand why the alphabet begins with the letter A, instead of C, as in the scale.

His letter had suggested we meet at my hotel at noon on Sunday, and I came into the lobby as the clock struck twelve.

A letter awaited her at Princeton.

It purports to be a letter from Steele to a friend at court, who, in Miss Blanchard's opinion, could only be meant as Swift.

But things were worked out in the family and late in August he wrote Miss McCrady an explanatory letter in which he told her that matters at home had been in an unsettled condition after Papa's death and he had not known whether he would stay at home with Mama, accept the Northwestern job, or return to Harvard.

But Morgan did not leave before he had written a letter to a William Pickman in Salem, Massachusetts, apparently an acquaintance, praising Washington and saying that the slanders propagated about him were `` opposed by the general current of the people to exalt General Gates at the expense of General Washington was injurious to the latter.

When Quiney and William Parsons wrote to Greville in 1593 asking his consent in the election for bailiff, they sent the letter to Mr. William Sawnders, attendant on the worshipful Mr. Thomas Bushell at Marston.

In accordance with legislation passed at the last session of Congress, each Representative is authorized to deliver to the Post Office in bulk newsletters, speeches and other literature to be dropped in every letter box in his district.

The letter writer who suggested saving money by taking kids out of school at 14 should have signed his letter `` simpleton '' instead of `` simplicitude ''.

Kate tried to contain her curiosity and foreboding at what the letter portended, at what involvement existed for Juanita.

but the letter went on: she had cried, she had implored, she had been miserable at his refusal, and finally he had relented -- and now how happy she was, how expectant!!

In a similar vein, but writing from the opposite side, Thomas Taylor, a private in the 6th Alabama Volunteers, in a letter to his wife, stated: `` you know that my heart is with you but I never could have been satisfied to have staid at home when my country is invaded by a thievin foe, by a set of cowardly skunks whose motto is Booty.

The pastor writes a personal letter to each individual, expressing his joy over the decision, assuring him of a pastoral call at the earliest convenient time, and outlining the plan for membership preparation classes and Membership Sunday.

She had held to the letter of her contract and didn't come onto the stage until well after 4 p.m., the appointed hour, although the Music at Newport people had tried to get the program underway at 3.

But while she is able to tell her retarded family about the new world she has seen open before her, Ronnie has not been able to observe her progress, and instead of appearing at a family party to be looked over like a new bull, he sends Beatie a letter of dismissal.

In a letter to Andrew Johnson, the military governor of Tennessee, encouraging him to lead the way in raising black troops, Lincoln wrote, " The bare sight of 50, 000 armed and drilled black soldiers on the banks of the Mississippi would end the rebellion at once ".

Some alphabets today, such as the Hanuno ' o script, are learned one letter at a time, in no particular order, and are not used for collation where a definite order is required.

* 1527 – The first known letter from North America is sent by John Rut while at St. John's, Newfoundland.

A few months before Augustus ’ death in 14, the emperor wrote and sent a letter to Agrippina mentioning how Caligula must be future emperor because at that time, no other child had this name.

The letter doesn't indicate where he is writing from, but it is usually dated after Paul left Ephesus for Macedonia ( Acts 20 ), from either Philippi or Thessalonica in Macedonia.

In a letter of about 446 to a successor bishop of Thessalonica, Anastasius, Leo reproached him for the way he had treated one of the metropolitan bishops subject to him ; after giving various instructions about the functions entrusted to Anastasius and stressing that certain powers were reserved to the pope himself, Leo wrote: " The care of the universal Church should converge towards Peter's one seat, and nothing anywhere should be separated from its Head.

When Paulus arrived, he showed him the emperor's letter, and ordered him to be quietly taken through the palace to the waterside, placed on board ship, and carried off to Thessalonica, his native town.

Since Bulgarian troops began hostilities in the countryside against our Army, I have the honour to request you to leave the city of Thessalonica one hour after the delivery of this letter.

Apollos and Paul were both in Ephesus at the time Paul wrote the letter ( 55 AD ); 16: 12 states Apollos was unwilling to go to Corinth yet at Paul's urging, but that he would later when he had an opportunity.

A similar link between ” prophecy ” and ” encouragement ” is found in Paul ’ s letter to the Corinthians ( 1 Corinthians 14: 3 )

" The attempt by some twentieth-century Catholic theologians to present the Eucharistic change as an alteration of significance ( transignification rather than transubstantiation ) was rejected by Pope Paul VI in his 1965 encyclical letter Mysterium fidei In his 1968 Credo of the People of God, he reiterated that any theological explanation of the doctrine must hold to the twofold claim that, after the consecration, 1 ) Christ's body and blood are really present ; and 2 ) bread and wine are really absent ; and this presence and absence is real and not merely something in the mind of the believer.

According to tradition, Saul / Paul of Tarsus wrote this letter while he was in prison in Rome ( around AD 62 ).

The first verse in the letter, according to the late manuscripts used in most English translations, reads, " Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints in Ephesus, the faithful in Christ Jesus.

* The letter lacks any references to people in Ephesus, or any events Paul experienced there.

If Paul was the author of the letter, then it was probably written from Rome during Paul's first imprisonment (; ; ), and probably soon after his arrival there in the year 62, four years after he had parted with the Ephesian elders at Miletus.

" Paul addresses hostility, division, and self-interest more than any other topic in the letter, leading many scholars to believe that his primary concern was not doctrinal, but behavioral.

In the 4th century, Jerome and Augustine of Hippo supported Paul's authorship: the Church largely agreed to include Hebrews as the fourteenth letter of Paul, and affirmed this authorship until the Reformation.

It is a letter from Paul of Tarsus to a number of Early Christian communities in the Roman province of Galatia in central Anatolia.

In addition, the exclusion of any mention of the letter of Acts 15 is seen to indicate that such a letter did not yet exist, since Paul would have been likely to use it against the legalism confronted in Galatians.

In the conclusion of the epistle ( 6: 11 ), Paul writes, " Ye see how large a letter I have written with mine own hand.

The letter may have been written by Paul at Rome during his first imprisonment.

Those who are advocates of Pauline authorship defend the differences that there are between elements in this letter and those commonly considered the genuine work of Paul ( e. g. 1 Thessalonians ).

Paul devotes part of the letter to correcting these errors, and exhorts the Thessalonians to purity of life, reminding them that their sanctification is God's will for their lives.

Many scholars see this as an indication that this letter was written before the Epistle to the Galatians, where Paul formed and identified his positions on these matters.

The letter was most probably written while Paul was in Roman Corinth, and probably while he was staying in the house of Gaius and transcribed by Tertius his amanuensis.