<p>1:1 <i>&nbsp;Paul, a prisoner of Christ</i>- Paul clearly resented his imprisonment, but he sees his captors as representing Christ; just as he asks slaves to consider their masters as Christ and live 'as unto Him' through secular experience. And Paul was no hypocrite; he saw his imprisonment as being served as unto Christ.</p><p><i>And Timothy our brother</i>- So Timothy was with Paul in Rome, possibly in prison with him. At the end of 2 Timothy, Paul begs Timothy to come to him, apparently before he dies. It could be argued that Paul was in fact released; for perhaps Timothy came to him, and now he writes to Philemon as if he expects to shortly be released and would come and visit him and settle any financial loss incurred by Onesimus (:19,22). Yet Paul does write in 2 Tim. 4 as if is at the end of his life, and the situation in prison has radically changed from the period at the end of Acts when he lived in his own rented accommodation within the prison. So perhaps during that period, Timothy came to him; and then on the second imprisonment, he asked for Timothy to come again to Rome and be with him. Seeing Paul had left Timothy with the difficult charge of running the rather wild church at Ephesus, this is itself a picture of how Paul took much encouragement from Timothy, a brother far weaker than himself. And this sets us an important principle.</p><p><i>To Philemon our beloved and fellow-worker</i><i> - </i>Paul shows an increasing fondness for the <i>syn</i> prefix in his letters, if we arrange them chronologically. He came to perceive, in his spiritual maturity, the need for our brethren, even if we disagree with them and have to rebuke their weaknesses.</p>