Ephesians to Colossians and Philemon: A Bible Commentary for EverydayPaperback

The letters to the Philippians, Colossians, Ephesians and Philemon are known as the captivity epistles because in each of them Paul appears to refer to the fact that they were written while he was in prison. Apart from that, they are all very different. Philippians is written to a church with which Paul had close ties, and about which he had no serious worries. Colossians addresses a serious threat from false teaching, while Philemon is a personal letter about a runaway slave, and Ephesians is a letter of general encouragement and exhortation, addressed to several churches.