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From the Pulpit

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3 Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. 

1. “…rejoice in the Lord!”

1. 1. Paul has given so many reasons to rejoice: his evangelism, the coming of Timothy, the recovery of Epaphroditus, etc.  But the chief reason to rejoice is the Lord.
      
      
   2. Most causes for joy in this world are dependent on our circumstances.
      
      
      1. Our God is immutable.  He never changes.
         
         
      2. Our God is good.  He never does evil.
         
         
      3. Our God is loving.  He loves us and wishes for us to turn to Him.
         
         
   3. Because of who He is, no matter our circumstances, he is worthy of rejoicing about.
      
      
   4. We should delight in the Lord as Augustine does in prayer in the introduction of his Confessions: “Most high, utterly good, utterly powerful, most omnipotent, most merciful and most just, deeply hidden yet most intimately present, perfection of both beauty and strength, stable and incomprehensible, immutable and yet changing all things.”
      
      
2. “To write the same things to you again…”

1. 1. Paul is about to address something that he has addressed repeatedly throughout his travels: the Judaizers.  Not only has he dealt with this before with the Philippians, but this can be found throughout his New Testament letters.
      
      
   2. Galatians, Romans, Titus, Philippians, and 2 Corinthians all have very direct references to this conflict, although the thread connects pretty consistently even more broadly than that.
      
      
   3. HIs central frustration is that these “Judaizers” want Gentiles to accept Jesus as their savior… as long as they become Jewish first.
      
      
      1. They need circumcision
         
         
      2. They need to keep the law
         
         
      3. They need to know Jewish festivals and culture.
         
         
      4. And THEN Jesus, the Jewish messiah, will save them.
         
         
   4. Jesus saves through grace, not works.  Anything that you have to do BEFORE you go to Jesus is wrongheaded and ignorant.  He IS the salvation.  He IS life.
      
      
   5. Today, we don’t see a lot of people demanding circumcision, but there are other ways people gatekeep salvation…
      
      
      1. You must be confirmed.
         
         
      2. You must wear certain clothes.
         
         
      3. You must learn our songs.
         
         
      4. You must participate in our church’s programs.
         
         
   6. Paul has immense respect for the Old Testament, but it’s all fulfilled in Jesus.
      
      
   7. The ONLY thing that people need is Jesus.  Expressions of faith after that are evidence of genuine faith, but faith is the singular need for salvation.

² Watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh. ³ For it is we who are the circumcision, we who serve God by his Spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh—

1. “…dogs…”

1. 1. In Matthew 15:21-28 Mark 7:24-30, Jesus uses the word “dogs” specifically to refer to Gentiles that are not seated at the table of the household of God as he tests the faith of those who come to him for miracles.
      
      
   2. Continuing Christ’s metaphor forward, these are people that might see others as below the household of God, but Paul uses the same term here to name them as the ones that aren’t a true part of the family.  Their pride in their works has prevented them from joining the table.
      
      
   3. Calvin, as do many other theologians, favor a more literal reading of “dogs.”
      
      
      1. “In the first place, however, he calls them dogs; the metaphor being grounded upon this — that, for the sake of filling their belly, they assailed true doctrine with their impure barking.” -John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentary, Philippians 3.
         
         

2. “…evildoers…”

   1. The Judaisers claim to be good Jesus-loving people, but Paul does not mince words: they do evil.

   2. “As the public crier on being asked by Gracchus in mockery, on the ground of his sitting idle, what he was doing? had his answer ready, “Nay, but what are you doing?” for he was the ringleader of a ruinous sedition.” -John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentary, Philippians 3

   3. John Wesley has three rules for the early Methodists: do no harm, do good, and attend upon the ordinances of God.  Notice that he included both “do no harm” and “do good.”  It is not enough to just start doing what God loves.  We also need to stop doing that which is unworthy of a child of God.

3. “…mutilators of the flesh.”

   1. Paul isn’t using this terminology to disrespect the historic ritual of circumcision.  It’s not that what was past was bad; it’s that all things are now fulfilled with the coming of Christ (Coloss. 2:16–17, Heb. 8:5, Heb. 10:1, 1 Cor. 5:7, etc.).  

   2. The past all pointed to Jesus, but now he’s here.

4. “For it is we who are the circumcision…”

   1. A relationship with God is not governed by a ritual; it’s governed by a person.  Once we find ourselves in Christ, there is no need for anything else.  We have everything in him, and nothing without him.

   2. Romans 2:28-29 further clarifies that a true person of God, or a “true Jew,” is not a person who has external qualities, but someone whose heart is filled with the Spirit.

      1. Galatians 3:7, Luke 19:40, and Romans 11:17-20 are other verses that help establish that the fulfillment of the Old Testament and its promises exist through Christ, not through ethnic bloodlines or branches of Judaism that rejected Christ.

   3. “As many, therefore, as are led by their own spirit, trusting in their own virtue, with the addition merely of the law’s assistance, without the help of grace, are not the sons of God… He said this of the Jews, who in their self-assumption rejected grace, and therefore did not believe in Christ.” -Augustine, On Grace and Free Will, Ch. 24.

⁴ though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: ⁵ circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; ⁶ as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.

1. “I have reason for such confidence.

   1. Paul’s list of feats shows that if strict adherence to the law by earthly standards was the goal, nobody could have surpassed his efforts.

      1. Genesis 17:11-12 establishes circumcision on the eighth day as the ritual that allows a child to be born into the promises of Israel.

      2. “For two races descended from Abraham: one through Isaac, and the other through Ishmael. From Isaac also two races descended: one through Esau and one through Jacob. But the one from Esau and the one from Ishmael were not included in the inheritance, but only Jacob who is also called Israel,” -Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Philippians, Ch. 3, Lt.1, 110.

      3. “The tribe of Benjamin adhered to Judah, not departing from the temple when the division occurred under Solomon’s servant [Jeroboam].” -Glossa Ordinaria, Philippians 3.

      4. The word Pharisee comes from the Aramaic word Pərīšā (פְּרִישָׁא) which means “one who is set apart.”  They prided themselves on keeping the law better than any others.

      5. He was so zealous to prove his righteousness by the standards of his culture, he hated the message of grace that the church had and sought to destroy it that his own righteousness would be established even further.

⁷ But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. ⁸ What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ ⁹ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.

1. “Whatever were gains to me, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.”

1. 1. It’s almost as if Paul was living out his days like a balance sheet.  The good things he did were gains, and the sins were losses.  In his case, almost all was gain, and very little was loss.  He thought he was in the clear!  It was only when he knew Christ that he realized that all the good things he did that he thought made him good actually belonged in the “loss” column because they kept him from Jesus’s grace.

   2. Many people assume that going to Heaven is about doing more good than bad.  They also imagine that they’re a good person because they deem their deeds more good than bad.

   3. A missionary once said that the biggest challenge in Western countries in evangelism is explaining sin, because nobody thinks they’ve done anything bad enough to need redeeming.

   4. “The gifts of God far exceed those worthless good deeds, which are due to our own diligence.” -Chrysostom, Homily 11 on Philippians

   5. [Through the law],your evil desire is not taken away by love, but suppressed by fear…. The wolf comes to the sheepfold; by the barking of dogs and the shout of shepherds, the wolf is driven away from the sheepfold; yet he is always a wolf. Let him be turned into a sheep. For indeed, the Lord makes this happen; but that is His justice, not yours. For as long as you have your own, you can fear punishment, not love righteousness. The delight of justice is a gift of God. -Augustine, Sermon 169.

2. “I consider them garbage…”

   1. This is the most famously intense iteration of this idea.  The word here, σκύβαλα or skubala, has been popularly translated as dung, garbage, trash, and excrement.

   2. Some have claimed that the Greek word used here, was equivalent to modern profanity.  This isn’t rooted in history.  The term may not have been used often by eloquent speakers, but it was used in both agriculture and to describe bits of food thrown out to dogs.  A modern equivalent that captures both the meaning and social connotations might be something like “crap.”

   3. “Paul shudders at his own righteousness, so that he might have righteousness from God.”  -Augustine, Sermon 169.

¹⁰ I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, ¹¹ and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

1. “I want to know Christ…”

1. 1. Notice that Paul is already converted.  He has planted churches.  He is an apostle.  He writes Scripture!  And what does he want?  Just to know Jesus better.

   2. He sounds much like the psalmist that wrote, “AS the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.” (Ps 42:1)

2. “Are you astonished that a saved man should have such a desire as this? A moment’s reflection will remove your astonishment. Imagine for a moment that you are living in the age of the Roman emperors. You have been captured by Roman soldiers and dragged from your native country; you have been sold for a slave, stripped, whipped, branded, imprisoned, and treated with shameful cruelty. At last yon are appointed to die in the amphitheatre, to make holiday for a tyrant. The populace assemble with delight. There they are, tens of thousands of them, gazing down from the living sides of the capacious Colosseum. You stand alone, and naked, armed only with a single dagger a poor defense against gigantic beasts… But what is this? O wonder of mercy! a deliverer appears. A great unknown leaps from among the gazing multitude, and confronts the savage monster. …The hero lifts you up, smiles into your bloodless face, whispers comfort in your ear, and bids you be of good courage, for you are free. Do you not think that there would arise at once in your heart a desire to know your deliverer?’” -Charles Spurgeon, Sermon 552.

3. “[P]ersecutions, and afflictions, and difficulties, ought not to disturb you, but ought even to make you glad, because through them we are conformed to His death….We are molded to His likeness,”-Chrysostom, Homily 11 on Philippians.

Full Transcript

Here is the cleaned-up transcript, removing verbal clutter, false starts, filler words, repetitive stutters, and transcription markers while preserving the original wording, structure, and intent as closely as possible:

So we’re about halfway through the book now. Previously, we just wrapped up chapter two. By the way, halfway through—how crazy is that? It’s a short book, but man, is it powerful. So last week we talked through the end of chapter two, and there were so many reasons that Paul gave for the people at Philippi to be joyful. They could rejoice at all these different things. Paul says, “Hey, I’m in prison, but I’m doing okay, and I’m sharing the gospel.” Paul told them, “I’m going to send Timothy to you, and Timothy—he is someone that will take care of you. He is someone that loves Jesus. He will help your community, and that’s a reason to rejoice.” And he tells them that Epaphroditus, a member of their congregation, that they sent to him to help him while he was in prison and to give him the financial offering that they had gathered so that they could help him cover his debts while he was in prison.

He got sick while he was over there in Rome, incredibly sick. He almost died, but he miraculously recovered and now is headed back to join them in Philippi. There are a lot of good things happening here. But Paul begins here with the greatest thing of all. He says, “Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord.”

There is nothing you can rejoice in that is greater than God, and I hope that’s what you’re doing this morning. I don’t know whether you had a good week or a bad week. This life, you know, as time goes by, things change. Even the most precious of moments slips away. So if we’re rejoicing in our circumstances, it’s not going to be something you can consistently get excited about. But God is the one thing that doesn’t change. He is not subject to the ravages of time. To the contrary, before the first day ever passed, God was. He is immutable. He doesn’t change. That’s why His promises are so important to us. Because when God says something, you can trust it forever. God is good.

If you had a miserable week this past week, if you got bad news, you’ve been trying to kick a bad habit and it crept back into your life, if you just felt lonely, or if you had a great week, if everything was going your way, either way, take this opportunity this morning to rejoice in the Lord, because the God above all things knows you and loves you. That’s never going to change. Rejoice in the Lord, and he continues saying, “It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you.” So Paul’s about to remind them of something he has told them about before, and this is something we find throughout the epistles. Paul consistently talks about this. You can find it especially in the book of Galatians.

But it’s also in Romans. It’s also right here in Philippians. It’s in Second Corinthians. It’s in Titus, and you can find references to it in other places. This is the Judaizers. The Judaizers were a group of people that said, “We love Jesus. Jesus is the Messiah. All that good stuff.” But when Gentiles wanted to join the church, they said, “That’s great. Here’s the thing, though. Jesus is the Jewish Messiah. The Jews are God’s people. If you want Jesus to be your Messiah, you’re going to have to become Jewish first. So let’s begin: we’re going to get you circumcised, and through this ritual, all of the promises of the Old Testament will finally be yours. And then you can learn the Jewish festivals, and you can learn the Jewish law, and you’re going to do all that stuff, and then Jesus will be your Messiah too.”

And hopefully, you can see why that frustrates Paul so much, because in this model, Jesus is not actually your salvation. There’s a million other things that you have to do first. Jesus is just the end of that process. And it’s not that Paul has any disrespect for the Old Testament. To the contrary, He respects it to the highest degree, but he recognizes that all of the good in the Old Testament is fulfilled in Jesus. All of that was pointing to Him the whole time. So, the Jewish festivals—you don’t need to celebrate them because they pointed to Jesus and His coming and the goodness that He brought. You don’t need to get circumcised because in Jesus the promises that God has made to everyone are yes. You don’t need to keep the law because Jesus already did it. All of this stuff points to Him. So getting caught up and trying to do it before you’re good enough for Him, no, it just causes trouble.

And I know that we today don’t see a lot of people going around saying, “Okay, you want to be Christian? Let’s get you circumcised and let’s go.” That’s not quite the same anymore, but there are definitely people that have this idea of the things you have to do before you’re really Christian. Well, let’s get you confirmed, and then you’ll really be a Christian. Let’s get you in a membership class. Let’s make sure you dress the right way and know the right songs, and then you’ll finally be a Christian. There is nothing you have to do to be a Christian except for go right to Jesus.

He is every bit the salvation we need. There is nothing we can do that makes us good enough for Him. He is so good that He condescends to us and takes care of us, even though we are so unworthy of it, and nothing we could do would be enough. So Paul has some very choice warnings about these people. He says, “Watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh.” That first one: “Watch out for those dogs.” “Dogs” was a term that was used by first-century Jews to refer to people that were not Jewish. The Gentiles were dogs, and for the most part, the average dog in the Middle East was not a cute little house pet.

They were mangy scavengers that lived out on the streets, and so calling them a dog—this is not something that belongs in the household of God. This is something outside. This is a scavenger. That’s what the Gentiles were. You can even see that terminology used by Jesus when the Syrophoenician woman goes to him and says, “Jesus, I need your help.” And to test her, he says, “Why would I give the food meant for the household of Israel to the dogs?” She continued to ask him for help: “Look, can’t the dogs just have the scraps left over?” And Jesus said, “Of course, I’m going to help you.” This test was to show that it doesn’t matter what your background is, what your ethnicity is. If you want to go to Jesus, all you have to do is humble yourself, not come from a certain background.

So this term, very likely, is the same kind of terminology that these Judaizers are using. They still think they’re the ones that are special enough for God’s household, and everybody else is on the outs. And what Paul is saying is they’re the ones on the outs. Just by thinking the way they’re thinking, they’re entirely wrong. And he continues on his second one: they’re evildoers. Well, now these are people that love Jesus. These are people that show up for worship. But Paul does not mince words. They’re evildoers. You can do a lot worse things than nothing, right? You can do things that are actively wrong, and we’d do well to avoid that.

I love—there’s a theologian named John Calvin. He’s one of the architects of the Reformation. In reading this passage, he was reminded of a story from ancient Rome. There was a senator named Gracchus, and this was in the last days of the Roman Republic. Things have not been going well in the Republic for a while, so Gracchus says he’s going to fix the Roman Republic. And how’s he going to do that? Well, it turns out mostly by breaking the rules of the Roman Republic. So when people disagree with him, they get removed, and when people don’t pass his laws, he just goes around them and does it anyway, because it’s okay: he’s saving the republic. He needs to break a few rules here and there, but it’s to save the republic. And then once things are better, he’s going to pass it off, right?

Well, this guy’s causing all kinds of grief and turmoil within the Roman Republic. And as Gracchus is walking through Rome one day, there is a town crier that sees him. Gracchus sees this guy just kind of sitting around. A town crier would give you news before, you know, newspapers, the internet, all that kind of stuff. He just shouts what you need to know. He sees him laying around. He says, “What are you doing?” The town crier responded, “Oh, I’m not doing anything. Nobody needs to worry about me. But you, on the other hand, what are you doing? You can do a lot worse than nothing.”

It’s one of the reasons why John Wesley gave the first Methodists three rules. Do you guys know the three rules? Three rules: do no harm, do good, attend upon the ordinances of God. And that third one is kind of, you know, go to church, read your Bible, that kind of stuff. And when I first heard them, I thought, “Man, those first two are pretty redundant, right? Do no harm, do good.” But you can do a lot worse than nothing. You can do things that are actively bad. And doing all the good things in the world and just adding those on on the side is not enough. As Christians, we have to be introspective. We have to take the time to look at our lives and ask, “What are things I’m doing that are wrong? What are things I’m doing that don’t reflect the heart of Jesus?” These people have not done that work.

They are doing things in the church that are actively evil. And the last one: “those mutilators of the flesh.” So they’re asking for circumcision, and Paul doesn’t even acknowledge it as legitimate. He doesn’t see it as something that accomplishes anything that they want it to. It’s just the mutilation of flesh.

Not only that, I think he’d go a step further. I don’t think I’m out of line here to say that it’s not only mutilating people’s flesh; it’s mutilating their souls. Because when you think, when someone tells you you could go to Jesus, but first you have to do these other things, that is a wrong mindset right from the beginning. There is nothing we can do to be worthy of Jesus. Any ritual that presupposes that it’s going to somehow make us good enough is wrong-headed from the start.

Verse three: “It is we who are the circumcision, we who serve God by His Spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh.” I think here’s a reading from the book of Romans. This is Romans chapter two, verses twenty-eight through twenty-nine. I think this really helps illuminate that: “He is not a Jew who is one only outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly, and circumcision is the circumcision of the heart by the Spirit, not by the written code.” Being one of God’s people is not about an outward ritual. It is about going to God sincerely, asking for forgiveness, and receiving the Holy Spirit—that is the real circumcision, so to speak. Not anything outward, but something inward, something deeper than that.

Although Paul does point out, if anybody could get in by being good enough, he thinks he’s got a pretty good case. He’s going to give us his resume right here, and sure enough, it is impressive: “If someone—though I myself have reasons for such confidence—if someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.” He says, “Look, if it were about all this other stuff, look, I was born to the right people. I did the right rituals. I was a Pharisee. I was literally a member of a sect within Judaism that prided itself on its ability to keep the law to the best of our understanding.” And he says, “That’s what I did. I kept the law as far as we understood the law.” Not only that, but these ideas from the church, I hated them.

I didn’t want to hear about Jesus and grace because I firmly believed you could do it if you worked hard enough. And if anybody had worked hard enough, it was me. And yet, all of that was worth nothing. Verse seven: “But whatever were gains to me, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.” It’s like he imagined his whole life like a balance sheet, and on this side you’ve got the gains, this side the losses. He was looking at his life and seeing all these things coming up as gains and saying, “Man, I’m doing really good.” It wasn’t until he knew the grace of God that he understood all those things that seemed so impressive before—they were actually things that belonged in the loss column because they stopped him from seeing God’s grace and God’s goodness. They were things that got in the way of seeing God’s love for him. You can’t understand the fullness of God’s grace until you understand how far we are away from it. Once you see how sinful we are, how much we ruined ourselves, then you can appreciate all the more God’s love and how He reached out to us.

Nonetheless, that mindset—that mindset that you can be good enough—it’s a pretty common mindset. I’ve talked to some missionaries who work on college campuses that say one of the biggest challenges in telling people about Jesus is talking about sin, because the average person doesn’t think they’re very sinful. They think they’re pretty darn good.

And as someone that taught confirmation classes more than a few times, one of my favorite questions was always, “In the eyes of God, how good do you think you are?” I’d give them a scale of one to ten, and I never got an answer below a seven. Most kids going through that thought they were pretty darn good. Now, mind you, the kids that went to church more were the ones that would rate themselves like a seven or so. It was the ones that had never been in a church that would be totally comfortable rating themselves a 10, like, “Yeah, I’m a great person. Let’s do it.” I think that tells us something about the culture around us. This is common, this idea that you can be good enough if the good stuff you do balances out the bad stuff that you’ve done. On the whole, it’s going to work out for you. But we’re a little biased in deciding how much good and how much evil we’ve done, aren’t we? That presupposes that any amount of evil is an acceptable amount. You can’t do enough to balance out the wrongs. You can’t.

And Paul continues; he makes the case even more aggressively. Verse eight: “What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.” Paul says, “I look back at all that I did, and now I realize it was just garbage.” And depending on the translation you use, you could have rubbish, you could have garbage, you could have dung.

The word here in Greek is skubola, and some have even suggested that that is such a vile word, it’s practically like Paul is swearing. This is not the case. He was not swearing for Jesus. The word is, however, not a fancy word, and it’s a word that falls somewhere between the meanings of any of those, really: junk, garbage, dung—somewhere around that. So really, what Paul is trying to say here is: everything I built my life on, when I look at it, it’s just a bunch of crap. It’s garbage. It’s nothing. I have wasted my life on all this stuff. What did I do?

And if you’ve never had a moment like that where you realize everything you built your life on is just junk, I hope you have one. I’ve certainly had a few. Sometimes they’re bigger, sometimes they’re smaller. But sometimes you look at what you did—all the things you have built your identity on, all the things you thought were so important—and you realize they didn’t really matter. They weren’t really important. To the contrary, they were taking you away from the things that did matter, from a life built on knowing Jesus and sharing His love.

Verse ten: “I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of His resurrection and participation in His sufferings, becoming like Him in death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.” Now, Paul’s already converted. Paul has seen Jesus on the road to Damascus. Paul is literally writing scripture right here through the power of the Holy Spirit, and yet, what does he say? “I want to know Jesus.” Kind of like in the Psalms, “As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after you.”

I really like the way one preacher, very famous, known as Charles Spurgeon—or his nickname people gave him, the Prince of Preaching, because he was a good preacher… When he preached, even if you didn’t believe in Jesus, you might just show up just to hear what he had to say. He was really, really good. I love the way he thought about this. He said, “Imagine that you are just a random peasant somewhere in history, and one day you are captured, you are enslaved, you are beaten, and you are thrown in a cell. And while you are in that cell, you realize that you are going to be thrown in the arena. You will have to fight for your life. You’re given rags to wear and a small, rusty dagger. And as you stand on the sands of the arena, you see a door, and you can hear behind it roaring. It trembles, and you know you do not stand a chance. You are about to die.

Finally, the door opens, and these ferocious lions tear through the arena, eager to gouge your flesh with their claws. And suddenly, someone steps between you and the lions. With one motion of their hand, the lions are gone. Before you can really even talk to them, you are ushered away to a mansion where you are given fine clothing. You are bathed, your wounds are tended to, and your hungry stomach is met with a feast every day. And you ask some of the servants, ‘Who was that that saved me?’ That’s the master of the house. You’ll meet him. Every morning you wake up, you find new gifts left for you.

And you find out that this person, before you even knew who they were, was at work trying to do things for you, trying to help you, trying, at great cost to themselves, to make your life better. How curious would you be to meet this person? How much would you want to know this friend that was a better friend than any you’ve ever had, someone who loved you better than you loved yourself? How much more should we love Jesus? This is someone who has saved us, who has redeemed us, who has nurtured us, who has helped us grow. This is someone who has given us everything we could possibly ask for. How much should we long, just like Paul, to see Him and to know Him—this friend better than any friend we’ve ever had, this person who loves us better than we love ourselves?”

We’ll continue on just a little bit: “Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Jesus Christ took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

Paul does not allow himself to get distracted, to focus on other things that don’t really matter. He keeps his eyes on the prize. He knows that he has been called by God for important work. He knows that he has been called by God to an eternal destination, and so no matter what is going on, he is going to focus on Jesus and keep going, no matter what, in full hope and trust that he is headed toward the One that he wants to see more than anything else.

And for all of us today, if you want to see Jesus, don’t get caught up on all this other stuff. Don’t think about what you should have done or what you need to do before you can start to properly focus on Jesus. Focus on Him now, knowing that He has called you to important work. He has an eternal destination ready for you. Don’t get distracted. Focus on Him and run forward, eager to see the One that loves you more than you love yourself. Amen.

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From the Pulpit

Commentary

¹² Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, ¹³ for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

1. Salvation
   
   
   1. “It has sometimes been said that preachers frequently select very unpractical themes. No such objection can be raised to-day, for nothing can be more practical than this; nothing more needful than to urge you to see to “your own salvation.” -Spurgeon, Sermon 1003, “Your Own Salvation”
      
      
   2. Salvation is the most important thing for every human on Earth, regardless of age, race, title, continent, or any other division.
      
      
   3. “If individuals live only seventy years, then a state, or a nation, or a civilization, which may last for a thousand years, is more important than an individual. But if Christianity is true, then the individual is not only more important but incomparably more important, for he is everlasting and the life of a state or a civilization, compared with his, is only a moment. -C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, Bk. 3, Ch. 1
      
      
   4. There are many today that consider talk about salvation a selfish abstraction about one’s own feelings, rather than anything that could be a real benefit to the world.
      
      
      1. On the charge of selfishness
         
         
         1. Would a person be selfish for brushing their teeth?  Or eating healthy?  Of course not.  Caring for what you’ve been given is healthy.
            
            
         2. We are more than just bodies; we’re souls.  There’s a spark of self that we know that’s boundless in its ability to ponder and grow.  Once we recognize that, we’re obligated to care for it.
            
            
         3. The only source to cleanse and strengthen our soul is the God that made it.  That’s what salvation is all about: caring for our souls.
            
            
      2. On the charge of pointlessness
         
         
         1. You don’t stop a problem with more problems.
              
            1. If a building is on fire, you don’t add more fire.  You add water.
               
               
            2. If a classroom is crazy, you don’t send in a hyper kid.  You send in a teacher.
               
               
            3. If there’s a problem, you don’t add more problems.  You add the solution.
               
               
         2. Sin is the problem in this world, but we’re a part of that problem.
            
            
            1. We’re selfish.
               
               
            2. We do wrong things.
               
               
            3. We are sinful and can’t change that on our own.
               
               
         3. God is the solution.  He can purify us, and then we can allow him to work in us so that we can help be a part of the solution, rather than a part of the problem.
            
            
2. “…work out your salvation…”
   
   
   1. Christians often think about salvation purely as the moment of justification, or the moment when we first put our faith in Christ and ask to be forgiven of our sins, but God’s salvation goes beyond that.
      
      
   2. Salvation isn’t just a one-and-done affair.  It’s not fire insurance you buy just in case.
      
      
   3. After justification, God draws us towards him through sanctification.  Through the Holy Spirit, God makes us holier and recovers his image and likeness (Gen 1:26) in us.  That is what Paul is referring to here.
      
      
      1. We don’t work FOR our salvation.  We work OUT our salvation.
         
         
      2. Working FOR our salvation implies we’re capable of forming ourselves through our own actions in ways that redeem us, which Paul will explicitly deny in Phil. 3:9.
         
         
      3. Working OUT your salvation is exercising the Holy Spirit’s power in your life, living what you believe.
         
         
      4. Our heart is like a field.  God wants to plant a garden there to grow the fruits of the Spirit in our lives, but if we don’t allow the soil to be plowed and weeded for God’s work, nothing will grow.  Stay receptive.
         
         
   4. “[H]is influences are not to supersede, but to encourage, our own efforts. Work out your own salvation – Here is our duty. For it is God that worketh in you – Here is our encouragement. And O, what a glorious encouragement, to have the arm of Omnipotence stretched out for our support and our succour!” -John Wesley, Wesley’s Notes on the New Testament
      
      
3. “…fear and trembling…”

1. 1. Paul is writing this having found joy in prison.  He doesn’t want severe anxiety and terror in us.
      
      
   2. Paul wants us to take God seriously.  It isn’t light work.  We won’t stumble into holiness.
      
      
   3. Consider the magnitude of the claim.  God is at work in us during every mundane day.  The Alpha and the Omega is actively shaping us.  Are we allowing Him to do so?  Do we even remember that in the average day?

¹⁴ Do everything without grumbling or arguing, ¹⁵ so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky ¹⁶ as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain.

1. “.Do everything without grumbling or arguing…”
   
   
   1. After talking about something as large as salvation, Paul follows up by talking about one of the smallest pieces of our lives: words.
      
      
   2. We work out the grandeur of our salvation in the tiniest moments of taming of our tongue.
      
      
   3. “First, he points out two ways to act, namely, without murmurings and hesitations. For virtuous works are very difficult and offer a fertile field for grumbling:” -Aquinas, Commentary on Philippians, C2, L4 79.
      
      
2. God’s words are powerful:
   
   
   1. Genesis 1: God speaks creation into being.
      
      
   2. John 1: Jesus is the Word.
      
      
   3. Genesis 1:26 We are made in the image and likeness of God.  Our words are powerful too.
      
      
   4. We can speak things into being too.  Disunity.  Anger.  Fear.  Frustration.  We can create a world we ourselves don’t want to inhabit.
      
      
3. Speak life, not death; hold firmly to the word of life to shine like stars.
   
   
   1. “And the reason for this is given there, ‘among whom you shine as lights in the world,’, for however the world may change, their lights in the sky remain bright.” -Aquinas, Commentary on Philippians, C2, L4 79.

¹⁷ But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. ¹⁸ So you too should be glad and rejoice with me.

1. “But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering…”
   
   
   1. Paul models the taming of the tongue in hard circumstances. He is imprisoned, wondering if he will be executed, but he writes with joy and hope.
      
      
   2. If you were in prison, what would your communications look like?

¹⁹ I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you. ²⁰ I have no one else like him, who will show genuine concern for your welfare. ²¹ For everyone looks out for their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. ²² But you know that Timothy has proved himself, because as a son with his father he has served with me in the work of the gospel. ²³ I hope, therefore, to send him as soon as I see how things go with me. ²⁴ And I am confident in the Lord that I myself will come soon.

1. “I have no one else like him, who will show genuine concern for your welfare….”
   
   
   1. Paul shows Timothy’s leadership credentials by focusing on two things: 
      
      
      1. How he loves Jesus.
         
         
      2. How he loves others.
         
         
   2. Notice that it wasn’t his intelligence, his speaking ability, his leadership capacity, or any other thing that got presented as the reason to get excited.  Timothy loves Jesus and others.  A lot of people don’t do that very well.  He WILL be a blessing.
      
      
   3. The old Sunday School acrostic serves us all well if we remember it: Live a life of JOY
      
      
      1. J- Jesus comes first.
         
         
      2. O- Others come second.
         
         
      3. Y- Always put Yourself last.
         
         
   4. Timothy led a joyful life.
      
      
   5. “Oh, what longing had he toward Macedonia! …[H]ere he says, “I hope to send Timothy that I may know your state,” which is a proof of excessive care: for when he could not himself be with them, he sent his disciples, as he could not endure to remain, even for a little time, in ignorance of their state.” -Chrysostom, Homily 9 on Philippians.

¹⁹ I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you. ²⁰ I have no one else like him, who will show genuine concern for your welfare. ²¹ For everyone looks out for their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. ²² But you know that Timothy has proved himself, because as a son with his father he has served with me in the work of the gospel. ²³ I hope, therefore, to send him as soon as I see how things go with me. ²⁴ And I am confident in the Lord that I myself will come soon.

1. “…it is necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother, co-worker and fellow soldier…”
   
   
   1. Epaphroditus is a member of the church at Philippi.  He came to help Paul and offer the financial support gathered by the congregation.
      
      
   2. This was a long journey: from modern Greece to Rome!  And Rome was hostile to Christians under Nero.  This was a dangerous journey for Epaphroditus.  And to top it off, he nearly died from an illness that he contracted during this journey.
   3. Notice that Paul calls him “soldier.”  He is ready to respond to God, even to give his life if the Gospel cause should require it.
      
      
   4. “Here too he gives another reason for sending so late to them, not from any remissness, but he kept Timothy because he had no one else, (for, as he had written, he had no one likeminded,) and Epaphroditus because of his sickness. He then shows that this was a long sickness, and had consumed much time, by adding, for he was sick near unto death. You see how anxious Paul is to cut off from his disciples all occasion of slighting or contempt, and every suspicion that his not coming was because he despised them. For nothing will have such power to draw a disciple toward one, as the persuasion that his superior cares for him.” -Chrysostom, Homily 9 on Philippians

Full Transcript

So today we are talking about the most important thing we could possibly talk about. We are talking about something that is important regardless of your socioeconomic status, regardless of what you do for a living, regardless of your age. It’s just as important if you’re five or if you’re 55 or if you’re 105. Talking about salvation, your salvation.

Now I know there are those out there who would doubt whether that’s all that’s important to talk about. It’s about your salvation. You want to make a difference in the world. Stop being so selfish. Focus on someone else for a change. Don’t worry about your sense of spirituality. That doesn’t matter. That’s not going to fix anything. Go out and do some good for someone else. And I want to take that concern seriously. Because I think if you don’t have a Christian background, if you don’t understand what salvation is, it can be hard to understand the value in it. And while I imagine a lot of us in this room have a Christian background and understand the need for salvation, there are people in your life that don’t. Whether it be someone who doesn’t believe in God at all, or someone who, the last time they thought about their salvation, they were in eighth grade going through confirmation class, and they haven’t looked back since.

So let’s talk about it. Why is thinking about your salvation worth your time? Well, it’s certainly not selfish or pointless. To the contrary, it’s healthy, and it’s critical if you want to make a difference in the world. As to the first part, is it selfish? Let me just ask you: If you saw someone brushing their teeth in the morning, would you say, “Yikes! They could have been using that time to go help someone else, and instead they’re focusing on themselves. Shame on them!” Like, of course not, right? No, it’s good to brush your teeth. You should do that. You don’t want to get cavities, so you take care of your teeth. It’s a good thing. Or if you saw someone eating healthy, maybe they’re eating a nice salad. You look at them. Would you really think that is the most self-obsessed person I’ve ever seen in my life?

No, they’re taking care of their body. That’s a good thing. You want to stay healthy. You want to be able to live long without getting any problems with your body because you didn’t eat right. When you recognize that humans are more than just skin and bones, that there’s something underneath all of that, this spark that is who we are, this sense of self, this ability to think and make decisions, a self that can think on the deep things of life—that’s our soul. And if we have a soul, taking care of it, well, that’s incredibly important. How do we take care of our soul? How do we make sure there’s no rot in our soul? How do we make sure it doesn’t atrophy?

Can’t do it on our own, but we can go to God. God can cleanse our soul. God can make our souls strong. Talking about salvation, thinking about our salvation—it is certainly not selfish. It is just taking care of what you’ve been given by going to the God who made us and loves us, and asking Him to help take care of the most critical part of our being.

Now, as for whether or not it’s going to help anybody, is salvation helpful to others, or is it pointless? It’s more than just a sense of spirituality. It’s more than just warm fuzzies. It’s like I was talking to the kids earlier. If you are someone that wants to make a difference in the world, you don’t solve a problem with more problems. You don’t try to put out a fire with more fire.

You don’t try to calm a rowdy classroom with another rowdy kid. If you want to make a difference in those situations, you get a teacher for the rowdy classroom, and you get water for the fire. When we see ugly things in this world, and I know that you do, because you can watch the news or you can just live in this world and know that there’s death and sin and cruelty and poverty. There’s so many things in this world that are problems. Unfortunately for us, on our own, we’re a part of those problems. If we want to make a difference, we go to the one who can solve the problem—God. We ask Him to start with us, and with His Holy Spirit inside of us, working on us, transforming us. We can slowly, not only cease being part of the problem, but go out and help others, and help reclaim this world and redeem it.

Now, a lot of times when we think about salvation, we tend to think of a very certain part of it. The fancy church word for it is justification. It’s that moment when you first ask Jesus for forgiveness and put your trust in Him. That’s a good moment. It’s important.

But there’s more to it than that, because going to God, it’s not like fire insurance—just something you get and you keep around just in case something goes wrong. God wants more than that. God wants to work in us to make us holy, to recover His image and likeness within us. That process is called—the fancy church term is sanctification. God slowly making us what we’re supposed to be, and that’s what Paul’s talking about when he says we need to work out our salvation. The way it’s phrased is a little strange. I mean, I don’t know about you, but when I hear “work out,” I think about someone lifting weights at the gym, right? And it’s not entirely different from that. What Paul’s getting at, he’s saying you need to exercise the Holy Spirit’s power in your life. You need to live out what you believe. You need to allow God’s power and God’s mercy to work within you, so that you can start to be what God’s calling you to be. You can start to become holy.

Working out your salvation is not at all the same thing as working for your salvation. We can never be good enough on our own. We are not capable of being so good that this disease of sin suddenly just vanishes from us. God has to come in and do His work, and that’s the great news. Salvation is not a work we do alone. God is at work in us, and that’s one of those things you hear in church constantly. You’ve probably heard it many times through your life, so sometimes it can sneak right by you. What a big deal that is! So I’m going to say it again: God is at work in you. Think about that. The Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, is at work in you. Think about what you were doing yesterday.

What were you up to? Did you recognize that God was at work in you? Were you allowing God to shape you and mold you? They were. Look at that. They were ready for it. You got to be conscious of it, though. You don’t stumble into holiness by accident. If you want to work with God, you have to be receptive to what God is doing.

Imagine your heart like a patch of soil. God wants to take that heart and plant the seeds in it that are going to grow into magnificent trees that produce the fruit of the Spirit in your life—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, all that good stuff, all the virtues. That’s what God wants. But we have to till the soil. We got to pull the weeds. We have to make sure that we are receptive to what God is trying to grow in us. That is why Paul says we do it with fear and trembling. And Paul does not mean that we should be terrified 24/7 and super anxious. I mean, you can see this is a letter written by a guy who was imprisoned by Romans. It is remarkably delighted. Most people would not be nearly this comfortable and happy.

Paul is not someone who’s this anxious, freaking-out kind of guy. Paul’s just trying to say, take it seriously. Don’t just assume you’re going to stumble into holiness because God’s at work in you and you can just forget about the whole thing. Be receptive to it. Be mindful of it. Allow yourself to continuously be aware of what God wants you to become, and work with God to become what He’s pulling you towards—to be holy.

Now that’s a big idea. When I think about big ideas like salvation, I tend to think of those big mountaintop moments, right? Think about salvation, and I imagine someone talking about, you know, at one time I was at church camp, and I felt led to go to the altar, and I went up there, and I could feel the presence of God, and I gave my whole life over to Him, and started weeping.

Which is kind of weird that I think that way, because I didn’t have any experience like that. But it feels proper. It feels like a big moment that a big idea like salvation is worthy of. But Paul follows up with the most mundane, tiny thing you can possibly imagine. Paul follows up by talking about words, the little words that we speak every day. How many of those do we say in an average day? How many of those do we really think about before we say them? Paul follows up, saying, “Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Yeah, things are bad in this world, but we’re meant to shine.

But we’re never going to shine like we’re supposed to. For grumbling, for picking fights, our words matter. They’re powerful. Just think about all the way back in Genesis, right? In the beginning, God does what to create everything? Someone can get it. He speaks. God speaks in the beginning. He spoke things into being. Jesus is even known as the Word. God’s words are powerful. We are made in God’s image and God’s likeness. Our words are powerful. We can speak things into being. If we speak and we argue and we use our words like that, we can create hostility, frustration, and ugliness.

If we speak by grumbling, we can take a world where God is at work doing good things all around us, and make the people around us feel that it’s just hopeless, and there’s nothing good happening, and nothing’s good enough. And here’s one that Paul does not mention, but I think is very much in the same spirit about gossip. That’s an easy one. We can use our words to divide people from each other and to obscure the truth.

I know, just listening to. So the other day, the conference superintendent, one of the bigwigs in the denomination, was here. His name’s Dan Guildner. Felt like he was a really good guy. Excited to work with him. He was talking a little bit about his hopes for the church, and he said, “We started this denomination because we thought that people weren’t really taking the Bible seriously. We wanted to take the Bible seriously, and we’re really good at that, at some parts.”

Really bad at other parts. How many of our churches have grumbling or gossip, despite many passages in the Bible about that? If we want to see God’s power at work in our communities, we have to listen to the whole Bible. We have to speak life and not death. That’s what Paul wants. He wants to see people using words beautifully to create the goodness in the world that we want to see so much. He continues on saying, “Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky, as you hold firmly to the word of life. Then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain. But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you.”

So you too should be glad and rejoice with me. We immediately get to see Paul working out his salvation by paying attention to his words, because it would be very easy if you’re talking about don’t grumble, don’t argue, to make it sound like a scolding. But the way he puts it, it’s just beautiful. He just wants you to shine like stars in a dark world.

And he talks about his imprisonment, not in a way that’s fearful or distrusting, but in a way that has total faith in what God is doing. In a way that expects good things to come from even the darkest moments. Ask yourself this: If you were in prison, no phones, no emails, and you wrote a letter to people on the outside, how much of that letter would be griping? Let me just tell you, I assure you, a fair bit of mine would be. That’s something I could stand to work on. That’s precisely why Paul’s letter is so beautiful. Why it’s so impressive to see how he’s working out his salvation? Because even in these dark moments, you see someone filled with joy and excitement. He moves on and he talks about two other people here.

Timothy and Epaphroditus. These are two men that embody that very thing that he’s talking about. He begins by talking about Timothy. Now, this is the same Timothy that First and Second Timothy in the Bible are written to. So he says to this church, he says, “I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you. I have no one like him who will show genuine concern for your welfare. For everyone looks out for their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. But you know that Timothy has proved himself because, as a son with his father, he has served with me in the work of the gospel. I hope, therefore, to send him as soon as I see how things go with me, and I am confident in the Lord that I myself will come soon.”

Saying, “Look, I can’t be there right now, but I’m really hoping I can send Timothy, because here is a Christian leader that is smart as a whip. He is brilliant. He’s going to blow your minds with his teachings.” No, he didn’t say that, right? And he doesn’t say, “Oh, here’s Timothy. He speaks so well. He’s so eloquent. You’re just going to be hanging on every word he says.” He doesn’t say that. He says, “I’m going to send you guys Timothy, and I know he’s going to be good for your community because he’s going to care about you.” And he puts Jesus first. That is the qualification that he touts more than anything else for this strong Christian leader—for all of us.

Especially those in leadership. How often do we think about that? How often do we put Jesus and others first as the most important thing? Reminds me of a lesson that I had back when I was in school. When I was a kid, there was a church about five minutes down the road, a little Christian school, and I went there for school from grades one to seven, and I’m not gonna lie. I don’t remember a lot of what they taught me in religion class, partially because it was just a really long time ago, and also partially because I don’t know how receptive I was every day of the week. I definitely remember being the only kid that got caught cheating on their Bible memorization tests.

Which, thank God, Jesus washes our sins away. Because if I died as a pastor that cheated on his Bible memorization, I think there’s like a special hell for that, right? No, I don’t remember a lot, but I do remember one lesson. And maybe you had it in Sunday school. It’s not especially hard or especially deep, but in other ways, it is very hard and very deep. They just talked about living your life with joy, and they made a cross stick out of the word joy. J-O-Y. Jesus, others, yourself. That’s the order. Put Jesus first in everything. Put others second, and put yourself last. That’s the kind of guy Timothy is. He puts Jesus first even when nobody else does. He puts others second, so you can trust that he’s going to be great in any community he is in, because he wants to help people and love them. He doesn’t worry about himself.

Not only do we get to see Timothy, but we get to see Epaphroditus. Verse 25. “But I think it’s necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother, coworker, and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger, whom you sent to take care of my needs, for he longs for all of you in his distress, because you heard he was ill. Indeed, he was ill and almost died, but God had mercy on him, and not on him only, but also on me to spare me sorrow upon sorrow. Therefore, I am all the more eager to send him, so that when you see him again, you may be glad, and I may have less anxiety. So then, welcome him in the Lord with great joy, and honor people like him.”

“Because he almost died for the work of Christ, he risked his life to make up for the help you yourselves could not give me.” Epaphroditus is a member of the church at Philippi. They sent him with the money that they were giving Paul so that he could sustain himself while he was in prison. And that’s a long journey, right? Not only did he travel from modern Greece all the way to Italy. And they did not have planes or cars, right? Not only is that a long journey, but Paul is literally imprisoned because of his faith. Rome is not a safe place for Christians. But even so, Epaphroditus went. He went and even got sick on the journey, very sick.

His church back home heard about it. They were worrying. But notice how Paul calls him a soldier. This is someone who answered the call readily. This is someone who acted immediately. This is someone who is ready to fight against the evils of this world with the goodness and mercy of God. He is certainly not worried about himself.

Paul is happy to send him back, knowing that this is a good guy that will be wonderful for them to have again. And so, for us this week, as we think about working out our own salvation, think about people like Timothy, people who put Jesus first, others second, themselves last. Think about Epaphroditus, someone who is a soldier for Christ. And think about the Holy Spirit at work in you, because God wants to make you holy. If we’re receptive, we can see how He’s molding us and shaping us to recover the image of Jesus that we were made in. Amen.