Note (return) — Rev. ANDREW LEE, A.M. (continued 5)

St. Paul was the apostle of the Gentiles. The care of the churches gathered among them devolved particularly on him. At the writing of this epistle he had no personal acquaintance with the church to which it is addressed. [102] Epaphras, a bishop of the Colossians, then his fellow prisoner at Rome, had made him acquainted with their state, and the danger they were in from false teachers, who, during the absence of their minister, labored to turn them from the duplicity of the gospel; and this letter was written, through divine influence, to guard them against those deceivers, and persuade them to abide in Christ.