PHILIPPIANS 2:23-24

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.

Verse 23 Why was Paul sending Timothy? It’s a bit of an odd scheme. He says in chapter 1 that he is sure he will be free soon, and intends to visit as soon as possible. Then here we read that Timothy is to come first. Then we read a few verses later that Epaphroditus is coming even sooner.

It does look as if Paul was more concerned about the situation in Philippi than he allows himself to express in this letter. With the Corinthians and the Galatians, he pulled no punches; it was time for plain speaking, and the urgency of their problems meant that tactfulness was out of place; but perhaps because of his long-standing warm relationship with Philippi – and the delicacy of the situation – he was reluctant to signal too clearly here just how worried he truly was.

But Timothy wasn’t to start out until “I see how things go with me”. Again, this doesn’t mean that he is uncertain about whether he will be released; it’s simply that he wants to send Timothy with hopeful news. And Timothy probably wouldn’t want to go unless his mind was at ease about Paul’s future. Paul isn’t thinking of himself (how could Timothy’s presence help him anyway, if things became worse?) but of the others affected by his circumstances.

Verse 24 He hoped “in the Lord Jesus” in verse 19; now he’s “confident in the Lord”, the same expression used in Gal 5:10. It seems to refer to a confidence that doesn’t derive from circumstances or hopeful signs, but from an inner conviction that God is about to act in a certain way (1:24-25).

“In the Lord” (or sometimes “in Christ”) is Paul’s favourite expression for the Christian life (Rom 14:14, 16:11, 1 Cor 11:11, Eph 6:21, Phil 1:14, Col 3:18, Col 4:7, 1 Th 5:12, Philemon 1:16!). We’re chosen in the Lord, a temple in the Lord, light in the Lord, commissioned for service in the Lord. We can work hard, boast, be faithful, insist, obey our parents, be strong, rejoice, stand firm, agree and urge in the Lord. Our relationships alter: we can receive others, love others, greet others, welcome others and benefit from each other in the Lord. Paul’s habitual use of the term may explain why the anchor, rather than the cross, was a key symbol of hope for the earliest Christians.

Curiously, it isn’t anybody else’s favourite term. Apart from the dead “in the Lord” in Revelation 14:13, and a couple of “in Christ” references in 1 Peter, the phrase occurs nowhere in any other New Testament writer.

Perhaps it’s because of the circumstances of Paul’s conversion. Unlike John or Peter, who had followed Jesus from the beginning in Galilee, Paul was always haunted by the fact that he had been “a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man” (1 Tim 1:13). It was when he asked the question “Who are you, Lord?” on the Damascus Road that his life changed irreversibly.

Christianity to Paul meant a change of authority at the centre of his life: coming into a sphere in which Christ was supremely sovereign. “Even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live; and there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we live” (1 Corinthians 8:5,6).

And so Paul’s confidence, like every other area of his thinking, planning and dreaming, is subject to the authority of Christ. Confidence “in the Lord” has a different flavour from confidence based on optimism or personal judgment. When Jesus is Lord, everything is different.

PHILIPPIANS 2:21-22

21 For everyone looks out for his 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.

Verse 21 Who is “everyone”? Is Paul berating his fellow workers for not really caring about the Lord’s work? Was there a rift in the team, like the “paroxysm” between Paul and Barnabas in Acts 15:39 (the word used is actually paroxusmos)? That seems unlikely in view of the friendly, casual way in which he includes them in his closing greetings (4:21). So there are two other possibilities:

(a) Perhaps Paul is speaking about some other people whom he doesn’t specify. That’s the argument of the IVP New Testament Commentary, of John Wesley , and also of Matthew Henry:

Did Paul say this in haste, as David said, All men are liars? Ps. cvxi.11 Was there so general a corruption among ministers so early that there was not one among them who cared for the state of their people? We must not understand it so: he means the generality; all, that is, either the most, or all in comparison of Timothy.

And certainly Paul seems to have enjoyed the loyalty and liking of his co-workers. He even mended his fences with Mark.

(b) Perhaps the criticism isn’t as severe as it seems at first sight. To be concerned with your own “things” (same vague phrase as in v. 4) isn’t necessarily to be totally self-centred and dead to all Christian concern. In 1 Corinthians 7:33-34 Paul had already commented that married people were concerned about “the things of the world” in a way that unmarried people were free from. That didn’t make them necessarily less spiritual – just less available.

If so, this is a warning to us that our lives can become so clogged with things we “have to do” that we lose our flexibility for God’s purposes. Our lives can start to run in grooves and we may imperceptibly miss out on the best alternatives God has for us. Because often, when he opens up a new direction for us, it’s the least convenient – and least sensible – idea in the world. (How many missionary stories have we heard which began: “The last place I thought God would ever send me was India, but…”)

The Bible is full of people who accepted “God’s second best”. Indeed the whole nation of Israel went that way, by demanding a king of their own. It didn’t mean God abandoned them – and Samuel said, “God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you” (1 Samuel 12:23) – but it did mean that their history was very different and much more complicated.

Verse 22 Paul commends Timothy by appealing to his track record. He’s saying much the same about Timothy as he does about the Philippians in 1:5 and 4:3; previous faithful service for the gospel has got to be respected – it provides evidence that we’re serious about our commitment, and prepared to submit our interests to those of the Lord. In Timothy’s case, he has acted as a son to Paul; and this clearly fulfilled an important emotional need for the often lonely older man (1 Tim 1:1, 18; 2 Tim 1:2). It’s often the case that serving God brings more than one positive result.

Track record counts. It’s easy to assess other Christians by the brilliance of their thinking, or the warmth of their friendship, or the novelty of their ideas, or the closeness of their doctrinal views to ours. We have to be careful that we don’t warm to the wrong things. It’s not difficult to get excited about the latest Christian superhero whose name is flavour-of-the-month in all the magazines, and on all the big event platforms. It can be less instinctive to remember and honour the commitment of people who have worked away quietly in the cause of the gospel for decades in unfashionable places. But if they are the people whom God will honour when we reach heaven, we ought to be trying to share his perspective here.

PHILIPPIANS 2:19, 20

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 takes a genuine interest in your welfare.

Verse 19 “Hope in the Lord Jesus” is a peculiar phrase, and one which Paul never uses anywhere else (although he “urges… in the Lord Jesus” a couple of times). It’s clear what he means by it, though: five distinct things:

(a) “After seeking the Lord Jesus’ will, I am intending to send Timothy – my hope is formed by the Lord’s prompting”

(b) “The reason I want to send him is connected to my ambitions to serve the Lord Jesus – my hope is shaped by the Lord’s agenda”

(c) “The reason I am hopeful that it will be possible is because the Lord Jesus is able to make it possible – my hope is fuelled by the Lord’s power”

(d) “But Jesus is Lord, so he has the final say, and he may decide otherwise – my hope is limited by the Lord’s supremacy”

(e) “yet my connection with the Lord Jesus gives me confidence that he will arrange for this desirable things to happen – my hope is emboldened by the Lord’s goodness and providence”

Not a bad range of meaning to cram into just five words. Paul is stressing that he doesn’t make his decisions lightly, a charge he was always sensitive about (2 Corinthians 1:17). Everything he intends for the Philippians (and this was a rather peculiar plan, as we’ll see!) is designed and directed by his overruling concern to do what God wants first and foremost.

Maybe this is a good way to test out our own hopes and schemes for the future. Can we honestly say about them: “I hope in the Lord Jesus that…”? If the phrase can’t be employed in any one case, then maybe we shouldn’t be cherishing that particular hope.

Verse 20 Paul’s relationship with his co-workers clearly wasn’t an autocratic one. He didn’t order them around like servants; they were free agents who could decide how far they were going to help him, and when they were going to follow their own judgment.

Towards the end of his life, he write to Timothy, “Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is helpful to me in my ministry. I sent Tychicus to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas…” (2 Tim 4:10-13). Reading this, we catch the atmosphere of the group that surrounds him: partly under his control (“I sent Tychicus…”) and partly judging for themselves (Crescens and Titus weren’t “sent”, and whatever Paul thought of his motives, Demas may well still have been operating within Christian ministry.)

And so here he’s complaining (says Gerald Hawthorne) that despite the fact that he has many Christians around him, who could potentially execute a fact-finding mission to Philippi, nobody is sufficiently concerned to do so. They all have other priorities.

It’s a reminder of how easy it is to allow the good to become the enemy of the best; to take refuge from a challenging assignment by busying ourselves with something easier and less stretching; to justify our activities in religious language when actually they’re no more spiritual; than Jonah taking ship at Tarshish. “Displacement activities” are sadly possible in the Christian life – which is why there is so much misdirected energy and duplication of other people’s work. (Just look at a few elaborate evangelical websites…)

How do we avoid fooling ourselves that we’re doing the right thing, when we’re actually opting out? There are several answers to that, and Paul hints at one here: a genuine concern for other people will sort out our motives and propel us into actions we’d otherwise never take.

I’m always challenged – who wouldn’t be – by the sacrifice of Maximilian Kolbe in Auschwitz. But before the war he was the head of a publishing company which published anti-semitic material (although it’s ridiculous to accuse him of personal anti-Jewish sentiments) and he wasn’t always wise in his judgments. Yet when the testing time came, the real commitment he had to serving other human beings was what shone through and decided the outcome of his life.

PREACH IT

Three ways of teaching Philippians 2:12-18

How to grow as a Christian

The vital activity: work out our salvation (12-13)

The essential style: shining like stars (14-16)

The indispensable attitude: rejoicing together (17-18)

Not only but also...

Fear and trembling

Willing and acting

No complaining and no arguing

Blameless and pure

Running and labouring

Gladness and rejoicing

Paul and his friends

The challenge of Paul’s absence (12-13)

The source of Paul’s pride (14-16)

The sharing of Paul‘s joy (17-18)

PHILIPPIANS 2:17-18

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.

Verse 17 What kind of “drink offering” is Paul speaking about? Probably the Old Testament kind; even if the Philippian Christians weren’t Jewish in background, they would probably have learned a fair bit about Jewish beliefs and practices as they started to explore their new faith. And some of them had been interested in Judaism even before they had heard the gospel from Paul, going each Sabbath to the “place of prayer” south of the city on the bank of the River Gangitis.

There were drink offerings involved in Greek customs too: ritual libations to the gods; ceremonial outpourings of wine on new graves; splashing wine on the floor to inaugurate a party. But the key thing about the Old Testament drink offering was that it was a supplement to something else. It was poured out to accompany another kind of sacrifice. Every day, for example, the Jewish priests sacrificed a lamb in the morning and another at sunset; and each time a litre of wine (approximately) was poured out around the altar as well.

And the drink offering was for God alone. The worshippers didn’t share any of it (as they did with other sacrifices).

All of this makes sense of the picture Paul is drawing here: the “sacrifice and service” of the Philippians was one kind of offering to God; his own contribution (is he talking about the possibility of his death here, or of all the sacrifices of his life?) is an additional, supplementary drink offering, poured out to God alone.

In days gone by there were old Bible teachers who used to write extensively about the “typical” meaning of the Old Testament offerings, and it’s interesting that they always associated the drink offering with joy. Wine is what makes the heart glad (Psalm 104:15). Perhaps that was Paul associated with the drink offering too; and it would explain why he includes this picture in his great epistle of joy – then goes on from it to say, “I am glad… So you too should be glad.”

The sacrifice of his life will be worth it if the Philippians hold firmly to the word of life. In fact, it will be more than worth it; it will be a source of exultation. He will “rejoice and co-rejoice with you” (chairo kai sugchairo) , and they should “rejoice and co-rejoice with me” (same words, repeated).

We’re back again to the themes of joy in sacrifice and joy in other people. Our lives need to be so interlinked that the joy of others transfers naturally into our emotions too. And we need to be so committed to the service of God that anything that advances it brings us joy too, however painful it may be for us personally.

What’s the connection of this verse with what goes before? The IVP New Testament Commentary is helpful here. It claims that the “even if” at the start of verse 17 is “not to be taken as concessive (‘even though’) but as intensive, ‘if indeed this is happening’ (as the case really is)”. Paul isn’t saying he may be “poured out”; he’s saying he already is being. Then the Commentary continues:

If this is how we are to understand the if part of the clause, then what of the connection with verse 16? The logic seems to be that rather than Paul's having run in vain, which in fact is unthinkable, his present suffering, which is also on their behalf in the midst of their own suffering, presents the real picture of their relationship. What is missing is an implied middle step. Thus the whole would go something like "I expect you to be my grounds for boasting at the day of Christ, evidence that I have not laboured in vain. (And presently my labour includes imprisonment, as yours does suffering in Philippi.) But if indeed my present struggle represents a kind of drink offering to go along with your own suffering on behalf of the gospel, then I rejoice."

Verse 18 Rejoicing because Paul is being “poured out” for them? It almost sounds cruel. But it isn’t. When we see how much other Christians may sacrifice for us, simply because we’re brothers and sisters, it humbles us, fills us with gratitude and amazement, and helps us catch a glimpse of the staggering depths of the love of God, which is being modelled by those who are suffering on our behalf. And that brings joy.

But it’s sugchairo as well as chairo – we’re rejoicing with those who suffer too. It isn’t that we do the rejoicing while they do the tough bit. Those who pay the price, and those who reap the benefit, can share the gladness together.

It always humbled me, when I went to Poland in the Communist years, to see how impoverished and oppressed Christians were encouraged by the presence of Westerners. Surely they should have been resentful of our comfort, or at least proud of their superior, costly track record of service? Shouldn’t they have demanded our gratitude for keeping the flame alive in a part of the world where atheist materialism was trying hard to snuff it out? But they never were.

Was their friendliness motivated by a desire to exploit the relationship, to gain Western contacts and financial advantages for themselves? Very, very rarely. It was just pure joy at meeting other Christians, wherever they came from, and having an opportunity to share the life of Christ with people from a different culture. Who was doing better, and who was enduring suffering, didn’t enter into it. We could rejoice in what God was doing to all of us, different though our situations were.

PHILIPPIANS 2:16

16 as you hold out the word of life - in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labour for nothing.

Verse 16 “Holding out” is vague language. The Greek word epechontes could mean “holding on to” (and therefore “applying your mind to, attending to, paying attention to”) – and that would fit perfectly in a passage which is about working out what we already possess, staying close to God’s Word, aiming to be found without fault or twist in our nature. Or it could mean what most translations have taken it to be saying: “holding out”, i.e. offering to others.

But again: does it matter? And could Paul even have intended both?

You frequently find bits of Paul’s writing where he seems to be deliberately blurring two senses of a word, so that he can get two meanings for the price of one. (There’s a thesis to be written somewhere about whether or not Paul had Scottish ancestral roots.) My favourite example is Galatians 2:20, where he says that he lives by the pistis of the Son of God. Does this mean “by faith in the Son of God” or “by the faithfulness of the Son of God”? Answer: both meanings are possible, both are good Greek, both are excellent theology. Perhaps he meant both simultaneously.

(A less likely example occurs earlier in this chapter, where he talks about “the death of the cross”. Some commentators have speculated whether this slightly peculiar phrase is expressed like this because Paul is not just implying that Jesus died on the cross – but also that his unlikely triumph was the death of the cross itself. Personally I think this is a bit fanciful, but with Paul you never know, and it’s typical of the games he plays with language. If he wasn’t a poet, at least he appreciated poetry (Acts 17:28, Titus 1:12), and he knew how to make words perform unexpected tricks.)

So what would he be saying here? Simply that as we hold on attentively to the Word of life, and allow it to do its life-generating work in every part of our being, we shine like stars (or “lights” – the word doesn’t necessarily mean “stars”) against the canvas of a dark universe. And as a result we “hold out” the same Word to others. Our life validates our message.

Paul says that he wants the Philippians to do this so that he can rejoice (or “boast”) on the day of Christ that he didn’t run the race in vain, or work without result. Of course, this isn’t his primary reason for wishing their progress; he has given plenty of others; but he adds this one here because it allows him again to stress two themes he doesn’t want them to ignore: first, the potential for joy which Christian living brings; and second, how much that joy is tied up in our appreciation of one another.

He wants the Philippian church to see that although he has a track record of evangelistic success all over the Roman map, and churches everywhere who acknowledge him as their spiritual father, the little group of Christians in the small city of Philippi still matters to him enormously. So much so that if he arrived in heaven and found they had failed to “shine” as he wanted them to, he would feel that his whole life’s work had been a failure.

This is challenging in at least three different ways. First, we see again just how determined Paul was to see his converts through to maturity. Merely having an entrance ticket wasn’t enough. (What a contrast with some modern evangelists who try to secure an immediate response, count how many hands are in the air, and then move on to the next big crusade.) Second, it shows how much Paul cared about each individual and group who came to faith. The loss of any of them was a disaster. That was the outlook of Samuel Rutherford, and it’s why he had the enormous impact he did upon his parish of Anwoth:

O if one soul from Anwoth
Meet me at God’s right hand
‘Twill be two heavens for me
In Immanuel’s land.

He may not have been an impressive preacher, but he did get up at 3 a.m. to begin praying for each member of his flock.

And third, this verse underlines yet again how our personal “success” in Christian living is measured, not so much by our own personal spiritual achievements, but rather by the impact we have on others. Paul might have finished his course after a life of tremendous faithfulness, tenacious hard work, disciplined self-deprivation, incredible preaching and writing, and courageous risk-taking – and he did; but it wouldn’t have meant very much, at least in his own estimation, if he couldn’t also boast about the Philippians and their progress in Christ.

It prompts the question: how much of my own sense of achievement as a Christian is tied up with the effect I have on others? How prone am I to evaluate my progress in personal, private terms, such as my grasp of Scripture, the strength of my prayer life, the state of my struggle against indwelling sin? And how far do I derive my joy from the spiritual health of others? Would I experience more joy in my life if I did?

PHILIPPIANS 2:14-15

14 Do everything without complaining or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe

Verse 14 If we’re going to cooperate with God’s working in our life, as Paul has just suggested we should, it makes absolutely no sense to be negative about the way he’s doing it. And so part of the “working out” process is to make sure we don’t spend all our time feeling discontented.

Paul says that everything we do should be “at a space from” (Greek choris) complaining and arguing. Both of these are ways of expressing unhappiness; the first word describes muttering and grumbling in the background (the sound of the word, goggusmos, suggest the kind of noise it might be) while the second word (dialogismos) is talking about an upfront argument. Whether we make our protest quietly and secretly, or loudly and explosively, we’re doing the wrong thing.

There are goggusmos Christians who present a surface appearance of being keen, spiritual, dedicated to God’s work – and yet beneath the surface are eaten up with secret discontents: jealousy, envy, grudges, an overriding sense of the unfairness of everything. Their ongoing argument with God is crippling them just as it did Jonah and Elijah. And just like those two prophets, they may crucially limit the extent of their effectiveness for God by the way in which they burn out their limited energies in useless self-pity and indignation.

Then there are dialogismos Christians who flare up easily at the provocations of others. At least their indignation is out in the open, which is marginally healthier. But again it’s a pointless waste of creative energy. “Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit,” says Ecclesiastes 7:9, “for anger resides in the lap of fools.”

There’s another difference between goggusmos and dialogismos: the first can be just an instinctive, unthought-out, immediate reaction; but the second is the product of reasoning and sustained thinking. Sometimes our fleeting feelings propel us out of agreement with what God is doing, and sometimes we think and rationalize ourselves into a state of outrage. (That’s exactly what Elijah had done in 1 Kings 19; notice how he delivers exactly the same little self-pitying speech in verse 10 and verse 14. You can imagine him on his long journey, putting the ideas into place, honing the phrases with self-righteous indignation, trying to convince himself he had every reason to be annoyed.)

But however we do it – we shouldn’t. It does nothing to help us “work out” our salvation.

Verse 15 If we manage to keep “clear blue water” between discontent and ourselves, we stand a chance of becoming blameless and pure and without fault. You wouldn’t notice it in English, but all three Greek words begin with “a-“ (which means “not…”): amemptos, akeraios, amomos. Taken together they give us a clear picture of what God’s ideal for his children is.

Amemptos means “without blame” – irreproachable. There should be nothing in our conduct that could be questioned.

Akeraios means “without mixture”. It was a word used of milk or wine which hadn’t been adulterated with water; of metal which was 100% pure. According to James Denney, “The fundamental idea of akeraios is that of freedom from alien or disturbing elements.” William Barclay explains: “The Christian is a man whose utter sincerity must be beyond all doubt....When used of people, it implies motives which are unmixed. Christian purity must issue in a complete sincerity of thought and character." And so there should be nothing in our thinking that could be questioned either.

Finally, amomos means “without flaw”. It was a technical word in Greek religion, used to certify that an animal was pure enough to sacrifice; there was nothing wrong with it. Here’s Barclay again. “To say that the Christian must be amōmos is to banish contentment with second bests; it means that the Christian standard is nothing less than perfection." There should be nothing in our character that could be questioned.

Conduct, thinking, character – if our life is visibly, transparently different in these areas, we’ll “shine like stars”. For the universe, says Paul, is as dark as the night sky, and populated with people whose lives are twisted. In a “crooked” `and “perverse” world, the Christian difference will be the best demonstration possible of the gospel.

PHILIPPIANS 2:12-13

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 according to his good purpose.

Verse 12 It’s not difficult to do the right thing while others are watching. Which is why Bill Hybels once entitled one of his books Who You Are When No One Is Looking. “Character,” he says, “is what you are in the dark.”

Sometimes it’s only when the rest of the world goes away that we find out just how skin-deep our commitment really is. We can shock ourselves by how easily we can let things slip. We all rely much more than we imagine on invisible, unrecognized support systems: our partner, our youth leader, our small group, our minister. And when our support system is removed – or proves untrustworthy (for example, your minister goes off with someone else’s wife) – it causes a major crisis, and makes us think: how much of this stuff do I really value? How firmly do I believe?

And so Paul says: the time to prove your obedience is not while I’m on the scene. It’s while I’m away, and you have to make the best of it on your own. If you can keep going without my presence to keep you in line, you will prove to yourselves that you are not just baby Christians any longer. You are becoming self-motivated rather than authority-driven. And that’s one marker of adulthood.

So what must they do? Here Paul uses the phrase which (I think) lies right at the centre of the message of Philippians. “Work out your salvation.” It has often been pointed out that there are two things this doesn’t mean:

(a) that we have to earn our salvation by a life of good works. Before writing to Philippi, Paul has only just sent off another letter - containing Ephesians 2:8,9. (Or perhaps he still has to write it, but will soon.) He can’t have changed his mind so radically about the way people become right with God!

(b) that we can live in any way we like, as long as we somehow hang on to the basics of faith. It isn’t that we will all “work out our salvation” in different ways depending on how committed we are. No – Paul has very definite ideas about how we should live.

Edward Fudge, a remarkably careful and thorough Bible teacher, has analyzed the nine other places where Paul uses the verb katergazomai (“work out”). His conclusion: “To "work out" in these passages is to do the specified action which produces what by nature is inherent in something.”

So what this verse does mean, clearly, is that God has implanted his “salvation” within us, and now we need to allow his saving grace to affect every area of our lives – our minds, our relationships, our choices, our ambitions. The reality of our experience will be determined by how much of that we allow to happen:

It is not what we eat
but what we digest
that makes us strong;
not what we gain
but what we save
that make us rich;
not what we read
but what we remember
that makes us learned;
and not what we profess
but what we practice
that makes us Christians.
(I’ve borrowed this from a sermon by the practical, warm and funny Bruce Goettsche, whom I find one of the most helpful preachers on the Internet.)

And we’re to do it “with fear and trembling”. If this sounds a bit extreme, we need to realize that Paul uses exactly the same phrase when he’s describing how servants should relate to their masters (Ephesians 6:5) and how Titus was respectfully received by the church in Corinth (2 Corinthians 7:15). In other words, it’s not advocating stark gibbering terror, but an attitude of reverence, with an edge of anxiety lest we get it wrong.

Barnes’ Notes comment that we should be worried about several things; first, the undeniable fact that many people become shipwrecked Christians, and we could easily end up there too; second, the deceptive temptations and snares which make living in this world problematic for anybody who wants to serve God; third, the brevity of life, and the pressing necessity of making the right decisions now; fourth, the immensity of the stakes involved.

None of which means we need to become paranoid, driven Christians, neurotically terrified of making any bold move in case we crash and burn! But nor should we be careless and casual about our commitment. Possessing salvation is one of the greatest responsibilities in the universe, says Paul, and we need to be extremely careful about how we work it out.

It’s a bit like being presented with a cheque for a million pounds – then having to walk half a mile down the High Street to bank it. I don’t know about you, but in that situation, I think “fear and trembling” would describe my feelings nicely…

Verse 13 Here’s the other side of the equation. We have the responsibility for “working out” our salvation. But we don’t do it alone. In fact, we’d never get started unless it were for the new force within us which drives us forward, implanting new desires, wild ambitions, strange thirstings after righteousness, unexpected urges to serve others and deny ourselves. We do it – but God does it.

What does he do? Two things. First, he produces the willingness inside us by changing our attitudes. Second, he provides the power to make the whole thing work. Neither of these actions would be enough on their own. If God gave us the will without the power, we’d just be frustrated, longing to reach a moral and spiritual standard that would be forever beyond us. And if he gave us the power without the will, we’d never use it.

However, both things are available to us, and we need to remember this, because the devil will try to convince us otherwise. He may attempt to tell us that we just haven't got the will power, that serving God might be a praiseworthy thing to do, but honestly we just can't be bothered... yet. Or he may acknowledge that we'd really, really like to do it, but will try to give us the impression that we just don't have it in us to live up to our wishes. We need to remember that God's energizing is available in both departments - will and action - to help us do what we should.

But God works with the whole person: the will that drives us on invisibly inside, and the actions we perform visibly outside. We still need to “work it out”; but all the initiative, and all the resources, are always his.

PREACH IT

Three ways of teaching Philippians 2:1-11


"It's all about you, Jesus"

What Jesus wants: the deepest unity we can demonstrate (vv 1-4)
How Jesus came: the lowest place life could offer (5-8)
Where Jesus is: the highest position he could occupy (9-11)


Paul's little lists

Three gifts God provides (encouragement from Christ, fellowship with the Spirit, tenderness and compassion)
Three things we should do (abandon conceit, consider others better, look to others' interests)
Three steps Jesus took (made himself nothing, humbled himself, obeyed as far as death)
Three reasons he's the Lord (exalted by God, name above every name, worship of all creation)


Three great reasons for Christian unity

The life of Christ in humans (vv 1-4)
The love of Christ in history (5-8)
The Lordship of Christ in heaven (9-11)

PHILIPPIANS 2:9-11

9 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

Verse 9 How could God the Father exalt God the Son any further? Clearly he couldn’t; within the Godhead Father, Son and Spirit exist in equality. But in taking on human form, the Son had “made himself nothing”, and so the question is: on what basis does he now return to heaven? For as we’ve seen, his assumption of human form wasn’t a temporary expedient for thirty-three years. It was a permanent change in his nature:

And didst Thou love the race that loved not Thee?
And didst Thou take to Heaven a human brow?
Dost plead with man’s voice by the marvellous sea?
Art Thou his Kinsman now?

But in fact what did happen, says Paul, is that the One with the nature of a servant was taken right to the top. (“Exalted him to the highest place” is all one word in Greek, meaning roughly “placed him above”.) And the ordinary human name “Jesus” – one of the most common boys’ names in first century Palestine – is now the one to which not only heaven and earth, but even hell itself, must bow in submission.

Why does Paul make this point? Is he trying to say, “And if you live as the servant of other Christians, one day God will exalt you”? Well, possibly; that’s true enough – the last will be first, and he who gives away his life will find it again. The Bible reminds us often enough that we will reign with Him.

But Paul doesn’t make the comparison here, and I suspect it isn’t in his mind. Rather, he’s concerned to say: if Jesus is now the greatest person in the universe, there is no greater example to follow anywhere. And if he commands us to be servants of one another, as he did in John 13, then the authority with which he speaks has got to be absolutely determinative for our lives.

Verse 10 There’s the submission of the knee ­– physically demonstrating Jesus’ authority – and the submission of the tongue – acknowledging it in explicit words. Our submission to Jesus needs to be a matter of both life and language, heart and mouth. After all, that’s how we become Christians: confessing with the mouth and believing in the heart (Romans 10:9).

It isn’t enough just to speak the words; we need to prove we mean them by the decisions of our heart and the practice of our lives. And it isn’t enough just to have a heart commitment; we need to admit it openly so that everybody knows where we belong.

But of course what’s in the back of Paul’s mind is an Old Testament passage he knew well (and had already quoted in Romans, just a couple of years before): that part of Isaiah where God is explaining his greatness to Cyrus, arguably the most powerful human being in the world:

22 "Turn to me and be saved,
all you ends of the earth;
for I am God, and there is no other.

23 “By myself I have sworn,
my mouth has uttered in all integrity
a word that will not be revoked:
Before me every knee will bow;
by me every tongue will swear.”

Not everybody in Philippi would have known this reference (few of them would have been Jewish, which is why Philippians is the only letter of Paul’s to contain not a single direct Old Testament quotation). But what Paul is clearly implying by this citation – as if he hadn’t made his opinion abundantly clear before – is that the Jesus who died on the cross is actually just as much God as the Father who exalted him. The cosmic ruler of Isaiah and the exalted Christ of Philippians are actually one and the same.

Verse 11 “Jesus Christ is Lord”. Tom Wright has written powerfully about the revolutionary implications of these words – especially in a letter to Philippi, so proud of being Roman, so dependent on its links to a succession of Emperors. What did it mean to say Jesus was “Lord”? Wright says this:

The main challenge of the term, I suggest, was not to the world of private cults or mystery-religions, where one might be initiated into membership of a group giving allegiance to some religious "lord". The main challenge was to the lordship of Caesar, which, though certainly "political" was also profoundly "religious". Caesar demanded worship as well as "secular" obedience; not just taxes, but sacrifices. He was well on the way to becoming the supreme divinity in the Greco-Roman world, maintaining his vast empire not simply by force, though there was of course plenty of that, but by the development of a flourishing religion that seemed to be trumping most others either by absorption or by greater attraction. Caesar, by being a servant of the state, had provided justice and peace to the whole world. He was therefore to be hailed as Lord, and trusted as Saviour. This is the world in which Paul announced that Jesus, the Jewish Messiah, was Saviour and Lord.

If we truly believe that Jesus Christ is Lord, this conviction will radically alter the way we relate to the world around us. We can’t share the same priorities as most people, and we can’t live complacently in the presence of systems and arrangements that brush aside Jesus and his kingdom distinctives:

When we say "Alleluia! Christ is risen!" we are saying that Jesus is Lord of the world, and that the present would-be lords of the world are not. When we sing, in the old hymn, that "Judah's Lion burst his chains and crushed the serpent's head," are we ready to put that victory into practice? Are we ready to speak up for, and to take action on behalf of, those even in our own local community, let alone farther afield, who are quietly being crushed by uncaring and unjust systems? Are we ready to speak up for the truth of the gospel over the dinner table and in the coffee bar and in the council chamber?

For more excellent thinking about the Lordship of Christ, see Marianne Meye Thompson’s brilliant, thoughtful analysis of what the term means, and how it applies to the tensions of living in a pluralistic age.

Finally, notice how Paul ends: “to the glory of God the Father”. Jesus’ concern was always to bring glory to his Father: in the past he did it by completing the work he was given to do (John 17:4), and in the present he answers our prayers in order to bring glory to the Father (John 14:13). In the future, he will return “in his Father’s glory” (Matthew 16:27).

Jesus doesn’t seek glory for himself, he explains, but the Father seeks it for the Son (John 8:50). So both Father and Son work to bring glory to each other. And if God the Father, exalts Jesus to the highest place, and gives him the name above every name, Jesus’ use of that position will be calculated to achieve just one end: he wants to enhance the glory of the Father.

So there’s a final reminder, right at the end of the hymn, of the importance of our living in mutual submission to one another. If even Father and Son defer to one another, and make it their aim to bring glory to each other, rather than themselves – how can any Christian pursue a career plan of self-promotion?

PHILIPPIANS 2:8

8 And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!

Verse 8 “Heuristics” are problem-solving devices. In law, they help us make fast decisions without having to try every case individually. In psychology, they explain why people arrive at certain conclusions. In philosophy, “heuristic devices” are used to explore ideas that otherwise we couldn’t tackle. In computers, “heuristics” solve one problem by bypassing others. There are all sorts of applications – but the word always means the same: something which helps us make discoveries.

The term comes from “Eureka!”, which in turn comes from the Greek word heurisko which is used in this verse. Jesus was “discovered” to be in human form. The word suggests the staggering, surprising, yet definite and certain nature of the discovery. This is something which really happened – and we saw it with our own eyes. “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

Having assumed this position, Jesus “humbled himself” and became “obedient to death”. If God became a man, we’d probably expect him to take on a prominent position within his creation; but, Paul says, the amazing thing is that when he had already humbled himself by becoming human, Jesus continued to humble himself further. He even became “obedient to death” – something that wasn’t necessarily or inevitably part of the human package for the sinless Son of God – and not just that: death on a cross too.

It’s often been pointed out that the cross bore a tremendous stigma in Roman society. Cicero made a speech about it: “The very word "cross" should be far removed not only from the person of a Roman citizen but his thoughts, his eyes and his ears. For it is not only the actual occurrence of these things but the very mention of them, that is unworthy of a Roman citizen and a free man."

And so there’s a progression of amazement in the way the hymn describes Jesus’ humility: not only did he become a man, but a lowly one – and not only that, but he accepted the curse of death – and not only that, but also crucifixion!

“Obedient to death” is an interesting phrase. It doesn’t mean Jesus submitted to death’s power; that power was broken once and for all in the triumph of the cross. The word “obedient” really means “attentively listening”. Jesus took on all that death meant and shirked none of it. All that it does to human beings, it did to him.

PHILIPPIANS 2:5-7

5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
6 Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
7 but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.

Verse 5 “This section is the most important section in the letter,” says Gerald Hawthorne, “and surely the most difficult to interpret. The number of genuine exegetical problems and the sheer mass of books and articles it has called forth leaves one wondering where to begin, despairing about adding anything new, and well-nigh stricken with mental paralysis.” (Philippians, Word Biblical Commentary vol 43, Waco, Tx (1983), 76.)

That's not encouraging! He’s talking about the whole section from 5-11. Hawthorne himself does manage to say a remarkably number of helpful things about it, though, so perhaps there are a few worthwhile points we can notice…

Once again Paul uses the word phroneo, “think”. He’s said already that Christians should share the same mind; now he wants to spell out in detail what that mental attitude is.

To be technical for a moment, he uses the third person passive imperative, phroneistho. According to Bill Klein, “The passive voice used here indicates that the believer cannot produce the mindset that Jesus had; rather the Lord must develop it in us as we continuously go through the trials and experiences of life.” Our part is to “let this mind be in you”, as the AV puts it. He’s got to develop it; but we have to give him permission.

Verse 6 It’s commonly agreed that verses 6-11 are a quotation from an early Christian hymn. Their rhythmical nature and poetic language make that clear, although scholars who have attempted to reconstruct the whole hymn have usually disagreed with each other. (And not surprisingly; how do we know that Paul wasn’t quoting just those lines which suited his purpose, cheerfully leaving bits out?)

Some scholars have seen quite a few parallels between the details given here and the story of the Last Supper in John 13:3-17. In John, Jesus lays aside his outer garments; here he lays aside his divine nature. In John, he humbles himself to wash feet; here, he takes on the form of a servant. In John, he sits down again at the head of the table; here, God exalts him to the highest place. In John, he says, “You call me master and Lord…” and here, at the end of the hymn, every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord.

Let’s examine the verse. There are two problems to solve here. First, what does the word “form” actually mean? And second, what is “something to be grasped”?

Hawthorne has three very detailed pages on “form” (morphe) which I won’t even summarize here. But this is his conclusion. “To say, therefore, that Christ existed en morphe theou is to say that outside his human nature Christ had no other manner of existing apart from existing `in the form of God’, that is, apart from being in possession of all the characteristics and qualities belonging to God.”

Paul is making a strong statement about Jesus’ divinity. Hawthorne wonders whether Paul’s Jewish monotheistic upbringing made it difficult or uncomfortable for him to say, as cheerfully and bluntly as we would, “Yes, Jesus is God.” Yet the impact of Christ’s statements, and Christ’s resurrection life, upon his experience made it impossible for him to deny the implications. So he says it in this way – but the meaning is clear!

“Something to be grasped”? Back in church history, the odd word harpagmon was read differently by the Latin Fathers and the Greek Fathers. The Greeks thought of harpagmon as “a treasure”, and translated the verse: “… thought of equality with God as a treasure which he did not greedily cling to”. The Latins translated it as “robbery” or “usurpation”, which produced: “… thought of equality with God as his by right, not as something stolen or usurped”.

Who is right? Probably the Latins. The Expositor’s Greek New Testament says, “"We cannot find any passage where [har.pa'zo] or any of its derivatives [including har.pag.mon'] has the sense of 'holding in possession,' 'retaining'. It seems invariably to mean 'seize,' 'snatch violently'.”

But does it matter? Not really. The claim is the same in either case: Jesus enjoyed equality with God. As far as he was concerned, it wasn’t robbery to make that claim. On the other hand, he didn’t attempt to cling to the treasure of his status, but willingly accepted the limitations of human form for us.

Verse 7 Now we hit the biggest one of all, the phrase which has given rise to “kenoticism”. What’s that? Well, kenosis is the Greek word for “emptying”, and back in the mid-nineteenth century Lutheran theologian Gottfried Thomasius began to query just what it meant that Jesus “emptied himself” (the literal translation of the NIV’s “made himself nothing”.) In what sense was Jesus still God, asked Thomasius, if he limited himself to human form? Does it really make sense to talk about “fully God” and “fully human”, or are the two things a contradiction in terms?

The “kenotic theory” (a complete misnomer, since by now there are dozens of versions of it) was very attractive to liberals who wanted to whittle away the traditional view of Christ’s divine authority. And so the battle lines were set for a century and a half of argument. Conservatives came up with many different versions of what Christ “relinquished” in becoming human: his glory; his independent use of his powers; nothing, since he still had the abilities but chose not to use them – and so on. I’ve put a summary, and more links, here.

I find Hawthorne’s answer most attractive. He points out that the verb kenoun doesn’t just mean “to empty”, but can also mean “to pour out”. So the verse would simply read: “he poured himself out”. It’s not really a learned attempt to define philosophically the difference between Jesus’ pre-incarnate and human states; it’s a hymn! And the purpose of quoting it here is to stress how self-sacrificial Jesus’ incarnation was!

So I don’t think this verse gives us a launching pad for metaphysical speculations about the precise role of omniscience in the career of Jesus, or the ontological limits of his incarnate employment of omnipotence. It’s just saying: look, Jesus poured himself out for us. Let’s do the same for one another.

Paul goes on to say that Jesus took “the very nature of a servant”; there’s the word morphe again. Its use tells us that Jesus wasn’t just pretending to be a “slave” for a while, like Zeus pretending to be a swan in order to rape Leda, or Krishna using the body of Sri Chaitanya as a vehicle temporarily. Jesus really was God; Jesus really was a servant. He entered the world with no rights and privileges of his own, and put himself at the service of us all.

“Human likeness” might at first sight suggest something different: as if he looked like a human, but wasn’t. But homoioma, the word used, doesn’t suggest this; it can mean “identity” as well as “likeness”. (Strong gives as one meaning: “likeness, i.e. resemblance, such as amounts almost to equality or identity”.) And you see that that’s the true meaning if you read on into verse 8: Jesus was also “found in appearance as a man”, which means he was “discovered to be, and recognized as, a man”.

So Paul is saying three important things about Jesus’ humanity: first, he truly took the nature of a human servant of everyone; second, he looked the part in every way; third, he turned out to be just what he claimed. By personal intention, outward appearance and intimate examination, Jesus proves conclusively to be God in human form.

PHILIPPIANS 2:3-4

3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Verse 3 This verse names two things which both drive Christians apart, but in different ways. “Selfish ambition”, or “strife”, is concerned with the future, and how large a part we should play in it; “vain conceit” (literally “empty glory”) looks back at the past, and exaggerates the part we played there. In the one case, we’re looking ahead and giving ourselves more prominence than we should; in the other case, we’re looking back – but doing precisely the same thing. Others will have a different scale of priorities for the future, and a different range of memories from the past; and so we’ll run into arguments and resentment pretty quickly.

Considering others better than ourselves doesn’t mean trying to convince ourselves that others are more talented or worthwhile than we are. It means putting them first, whether or not their abilities and experience match ours. The word literally means “to hold above”.

We need to recognize when other people know less than we do, or are less capable than we are; we can’t step in and use our gifts appropriately unless we have a clear picture of where we can fit in. And we need to be clear about other people’s failings, “as wise as serpents” (Matthew 10:16) when it comes to confronting human fallibility. Christians aren’t called to deceive themselves about their true worth, or to express gullible naivety towards other people.

But this verse is reminding us that we have to be “as gentle as doves” too. We’re servants of one another, and so regardless of other Christians’ status, talents or contribution, I have to put their good before my own and “hold them above” myself.

And we need to remember when we do observe the faults of others that it’s perilously easy to judge them more harshly than we would ourselves. That’s an insidious way of making ourselves feel better! Instead, as Matthew Henry comments on this verse, “We must be severe upon our own faults, and quick in observing our own defects, but ready to make favourable allowances for others.”

Verse 4 Putting others first isn’t straightforward. We can easily push them aside without even realizing it, if we aren’t aware of what matters most to them. Only when our attention is focused on their real interests will we make appropriate decisions. (It’s a bit like the difference between receiving a Christmas present which someone has carefully chosen to suit us perfectly, and receiving yet another pair of socks! Sometimes the socks will be just what we need – but it’s hit-or-miss, and we’re painfully aware that the gift is a casual, perfunctory fulfilling of a social obligation, rather than a real desire to bring us pleasure!)

So Paul tells us to look on “the things” of others. The Greek is intentionally vague. It covers possessions, desires, dilemmas, preferences, qualifications, dreams, ambitions, fears, insecurities… the lot. It means living inside someone else’s skin as well as we can, taking an imaginative leap and seeing the world from their perspective, rather than our own.

We may not always make the leap successfully – some people are more difficult to fathom than others – but most of the time we will, and in any case there will usually be gratitude that we have made the effort. I’ve often been counselled by well-meaning people who have no idea what’s really going on inside me; nonetheless, their human concern to identify with me has sometimes been healing in itself.

Looking at it from the other side, most arguments and quarrels between Christians start because we don’t understand “where people are coming from”. Often the websites you see blasting intemperately away at other theological positions have fallen into this trap: they completely misrepresent the other side, not because they’re intentionally trying to be devious, but just because they don’t have the imaginative sympathy to see how other Christians, with a different background and outlook, might justifiably arrive at such a position.

So we accuse one another of dishonesty and duplicity, of deceitfully handling the Word of God, and the temperature rises because we introduce a moral dimension into an intellectual argument. If only we’d “look on the things of others” first, we might save a lot of grief. When I read a book I instinctively disagree with, do I try to get into the mind of the author, and see sympathetically where his views arise from? Or do I simply scan it through looking for erroneous statements on which I can pounce and then pontificate?

PHILIPPIANS 2:1,2

1 If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.

Verse 1 Four “ifs…” which remind Paul’s readers of the things that have happened to them that should propel them towards unity with other Christians. First, union with Christ and the encouragement it brings. “Encouragement” is the word paraklesis, the same word that’s associated with the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete. The root idea is “coming alongside” someone else, or calling them to your side. It can also mean “exhortation”, “admonition” , or “appeal”. So it’s not the kind of encouragement which simply soothes us and reassures us; it’s the kind of encouragement which prompts us into action, stimulates us to serve God better.

Our union with Christ will not simply make us feel good, but stimulate us to do things we wouldn’t otherwise do. One of them, says Paul, should be drawing closer to other Christians. If that isn’t happening, perhaps we aren’t listening attentively enough to the “encouragement” Christ gives us.

Second “if”: comfort from the love of Christ. Now this is the word paramuthion, which is a bit more soothing. Its basic meaning – speaking closely to someone – suggests tenderness, intimacy, emotional support. Christ both prompts us into action, and develops a close, personal, unique relationship with us, based upon his self-giving love. If he cares for us in this breathtakingly individual way, it should give us confidence to reach out to the other people who matter to him just as much.

Then there’s fellowship with the Spirit. The AV translation, “fellowship of the Spirit”, is literally accurate, but may suggest our Spirit-inspired, shared fellowship with one another. And that’s not really what Paul has in mind.

He’s talking about the relationship with the Spirit which every Christian enjoys, and saying: doesn’t the Holy Spirit himself “drag you along” (Romans 8:14) towards greater unity with other Christians? His promptings inside us should make us feel uncomfortable is we are living at war with others in whom he is also at work.

Fourth and finally: tenderness and compassion. Literally this means “intestines and bowels”, another reminder that this is where in the body the Greeks believed the emotions to be located. Paul is saying: don’t you feel any stirrings within you of inward affection, of pity and compassion for others? Quite apart from the moment-by-moment promptings of the Lord Jesus, and the constant leading of the Holy Spirit, there is inside you a capacity for love and an instinct for brotherhood which is part of your new nature. And it, too, should be drawing you towards others, demolishing barriers, creating community and the impulse to forgive.

Verse 2 If these things are at work in our lives, then, says Paul, certain results should follow; and if the Philippians will only show some signs of that, his joy in them will reach its climax. (Paul was always clear that the joy that results from bringing someone to Christ was only part of the deal; the joy of seeing Christian maturity arrive was the icing on the cake. He was never happy with a shallow commitment. He’d already written to the Galatians to say that bringing them to Christ had been like going through labour (Gal 4:19) – but that the job of bringing them to spiritual adulthood was costing him the same agony of childbirth all over again.)

What results did Paul want to see? First, he wanted them to have the same mind. This doesn’t mean identikit opinions; Christians can disagree about all sorts of things, and on some contested questions Paul was happy to allow differences of opinion (Romans 14:4-6). The word phroneo isn’t so much about the content of our opinions, as about the disposition of our minds. It’s more a case of having the same outlook as one another: the same priorities founded on a biblical world view.

Indeed, it can help us enormously to have different opinions from one another; it makes the unity all the more real. If we always see eye-to-eye about everything, there’s no effort involved in agreeing together. But if we sometimes struggle to see why the other person is thinking as he does – and yet we respect, honour and defer to him – it shows just how much Christ has really changed our natural instincts.

Mark Ashton, one of Britain’s best Bible teachers, used to say: “Loyalty begins at the point of disagreement.” If my superior wants me to do something which I’d have done anyway, it costs me nothing to be loyal! But if he disagrees with me, and asks me to do what I consider wrong-headed… loyalty dictates that I go his way, not my own.

Paul wanted them to have the same love. (This is agape, the self-giving, ask-for-nothing-back kind of love, which characterizes Christians.) John Newton once wrote searchingly about different kinds of love which may exist between the people of God: “natural love”, “party love”, “love of convenience”. If we’re not careful, we can mistake these kinds of affection for the true supernatural thing. But they aren’t; they always work very well between some of us, and exclude all the others. Only the love of God given to us by the Spirit will embrace all believers in an equal, undiscriminating way.

Finally, he wants them to have the same spirit and purpose. This sounds a bit like “the same mind”, and to some extent it is; Greg Herrick is right to comment that all of these phrases are “virtually synonymous, and their piling up on top of one another is Paul’s way of emphasizing to the Philippians’ their need for genuine unity”. But there’s a bit of a difference. If the same mind is about the way we think, the same spirit is about the way we put that thinking into action – the way we approach life and its challenges. So in every area of our inner lives – thinking, relationships and emotional temper – our functioning is supposed to be identical. That’s the sign that we really are branches, organically connected to the Vine.

PREACH IT

Three ways of teaching Philippians 1:12-30


Suffering isn't all bad

Suffering brings opportunities (12-18)
Suffering doesn't last forever (19-26)
Suffering is really a privilege (27-30)


Paul's three alternatives

The chains he was enduring: defeat or opportunity? (12-18)
The choice he was facing: living or dying? (19-26)
The challenge he was giving: stand or surrender? (27-30)


God at work in difficult times

At work in the circumstances (12-18)
At work in our attitudes (19-26)
At work in our suffering (vv 27-30)

PHILIPPIANS 1:28-30

28 without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God. 29 For it has been granted to you on behalf of Christ not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for him, 30 since you are going through the same struggle you saw I had, and now hear that I still have.

Verse 28 There’s one more sign that we are living in a manner worthy of the gospel: we’re not scared by opposition. When we are able to stand firm in the face of antipathy and hostility, and not simply hang on by our fingernails but stay calm and purposeful, it’s an indication that God truly is doing something powerful in our life. Paul says much the same thing in 2 Thessalonians 1:4-5. And Jesus, when he’s listing the signs of the end of the age, says that one of them will be the persecution, betrayal and execution of believers. Opposition is not a reason for despair, but for hope – our salvation is drawing closer. “When you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door” (Matthew 24:33).

This, I suppose, is why Western Christians sometimes envy the simple, clear faith of the persecuted church. When you’ve never been put to the test of unbearable pressure, how do you know you will last in the time of trial? But once you’ve been through the loss of all things for Christ, you know just how deep and durable is the work that God has done inside you, preparing you unmistakably for a future with him.

The unity and the lack of fear Christians can show in extreme situations can also act as a sign to their persecutors that they are opposing God himself. No one knew this better than Paul; even before he had heard the Aramaic voice on the Damascus road, he’d started to become dimly aware that he was “kicking against the pricks” (Acts 26:14). He knew just how often the bluster and seeming assurance of Christianity’s most hostile critics can be a desperate attempt to cover up a growing, nagging feeling that perhaps these people are actually right.

Verse 29 And so suffering for Christ is not a regrettable calamity that befalls some particularly unlucky believers. It is a gift which God grants, a privilege for which not all qualify.

This wasn’t a new idea Paul was introducing. Right from the beginning, in the Beatitudes, Jesus had said that those who were persecuted because they belonged to him were actually blessed (Matthew 5:11-12); and so the first Christians to face hostility in Jerusalem had rejoiced that they were “counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name” (Acts 5:41). A few years before Philippians, James had already written his letter (we think), exhorting his readers to “count it all joy” when trials came (1:2); and shortly afterwards, Peter – who had obviously read Ephesians and Colossians, and possibly Philippians too – wrote to say that persecuted Christians should rejoice, “for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you” (1 Peter 4:14).

So it’s the consistent teaching of the New Testament that suffering for Jesus’ sake is a sign of God’s favour – not the opposite. It isn’t that God has deserted us, and left us in trouble, but that he wants us to experience his reality more dramatically and more starkly than ever before. Like the three friends of Daniel who were thrown through the air into the fiery furnace, we will land on our feet, unsinged, and realize that we are there in the cauldron alongside the Son of God.

Just theory? Only in the Bible? Mehdi Dibaj was murdered because of his faith as recently as 1994. Before then, he had lost his wife and family, sacrificed his comfortable background, and endured prison sentences.

And yet, while in prison, he wrote, "What a privilege to live for our Lord and to die for Him as well."

We bear the torch that flaming
Fell from the hands of those
Who gave their lives proclaiming
That Jesus died and rose…

Verse 30 One of the things that can give us courage in our spiritual struggles is the fact that we’re not alone. God asks no more of us than he is asking of others; and if they can make it, so can we. Paul says, “You know what I’ve been through. You’ve heard what I’m going through now. Well, welcome to the club. Feel special!”

Peter tells his readers to resist the devil and stand firm “because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings” (1 Peter 5:9). Why does it help to know this? Because one of the devil’s most insidious lies is: you’re all on your own now. When we start feeling alone, and sorry for ourselves, we lose the will to continue. (That happened to all three of the men in the Bible who asked God to take away their lives: Elijah, Moses and Jonah.)

And so when temptation strikes it’s vital to know that “no temptation has seized you except what is common to man” (1 Corinthians 10:13). It’s easy to feel that no one on earth has ever had to go through quite what I’m going through, no one could possibly understand the depths of my struggle. That’s rubbish; and sometimes when we have the courage to confess our sins to one another, we find to our surprise that we’re healed.

PHILIPPIANS 1:27

27 Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel.

Verse 27 Paul doesn’t detail what he means by “a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ”. But he does specify what its result will be: a firmness of purpose, an eager desire to establish the credentials of the Good News, and – most importantly – a sense of unity with other Christians who are doing the same.

There are many ways of living out the gospel lifestyle, and we won’t all do it in the same way. But whatever the specifics of our particular “worthy manner”, it will have the same results in our lives if we’ve got it right. First, we will not be easily moved by opposition, scorn, threats or contrary ideas. The integrity of our living will give us a secure foundation which won’t easily be shifted. The times when we feel least certain of our ground, least enthusiastic about our Christian witness, are the times when we’ve slipped into living with a double agenda – partly living out the gospel, but partly indulging our own sinful nature. And a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways (James 1:8).

Second, we will be ready to battle for the truth of the gospel. The more it means to us personally, by its daily effect upon us as we live out its lifestyle, the more we will be upset when it is attacked, indignant when it is dismissed, eager to explain when it is misunderstood. We will find ourselves getting into conversations we never anticipated, and sometimes getting our of our depth in our enthusiasm to advocate the truth. We will become eager to learn more so that we can “contend” better.

Charles Wesley put it like this:

My heart is full of Christ, and longs
Its glorious matter to declare!
Of Him I make my loftier songs;
I cannot from His praise forbear;
My ready tongue makes haste to sing
The glories of my heavenly King.

Paul said, “If I proclaim the Message, it's not to get something out of it for myself. I'm compelled to do it, and doomed if I don't!” (1 Cor 9:16, The Message).

But third, and this is Paul’s major point, we will be drawn together. We aren’t living in a manner that adorns the doctrine (and isn’t that an interesting phrase) as long as we’re fighting with one another, writing articles pointing out one another’s doctrinal deficiencies, forming lobbies to oppose one another, scoring cheap points instead of concentrating on the essentials. Last night I found on the Internet a dissertation about the mistaken theological views of Dr Paul Tournier, whose prolific writing and personal counselling have helped millions (well, me for a start). I was quite depressed to see yet another great Christian servant receive yet another broadside. But then I noticed that the student concerned had very fairly written these words in his introduction:

This author has not been without personal reservations in completing this investigation. What began as a detached theological attack soon changed, upon reading his works and coming to know him through these, into a deep respect for his value of unity among men of every theological persuasion. That this research could contribute to divisions or perpetuate barriers did, indeed, instil personal feelings of guilt. In talking with many who have met him or who know him personally, the relative insignificance of his particular viewpoints became evident when set against the background of all the good he has contributed to the lives of those he has touched. It is similarly hoped that the study of these findings will be set against the same background.

Good sentiments well expressed. The concern for the gospel’s defence, in tension with the concern for “standing as one man” – that’s the manner worthy of the gospel which Paul is speaking about.

PHILIPPIANS 1:22-26

22 If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labour for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! 23 I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; 24 but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. 25 Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith, 26 so that through my being with you again your joy in Christ Jesus will overflow on account of me.

Verse 22: The AV translation of this verse doesn’t make a lot of sense, and virtually all modern translations concur that the NIV has got it right here. To carry on living means work for Paul; and work means fruitfulness. Those two assumptions are important! Life means work: God doesn’t intend people ever to sit around in idleness, doing nothing; even in the Garden of Eden, there were responsibilities for Adam and Eve, and even in heaven, “reigning” with Christ implies some sort of administrative input! Work is a necessity for the healthy functioning of the human system; we have to count for something, to feel that we’re making some kind of a contribution, or life rapidly becomes intolerable. That’s why Paul criticizes the people in Thessalonica who were living in idleness, supported (so we assume) by a wealthy patron who required them to do nothing but simply exist as living, sponsored examples of his generosity. It isn’t right, argues Paul, and if you don’t work, you don’t eat.

Second assumption Paul makes: work means fruitfulness. This doesn’t imply that all Christian service will be attended by spectacular results; many great missionaries have laboured for years in unrewarding cultures, and seen very little “fruit” for their labours. But sometimes the “fruit” is late in appearing; only a few minuites ago I was reading Ravi Zacharias’ story of how an old Pentecostal missionary came to his home in India and prayed for Ravi’s brother, who was at the point of death. The boy recovered, and the deep impression made on Ravi was one of the major steps leading to his conversion. Ravi Zacharias is now one of the most influential Christian apologists in the world. Yet the missionary never knew:

I don’t recall ever seeing Mr Dennis again, though I have often thought of him. He was a missionary living on a meagre salary, a living saint. Somebody must have supported him. Why did he pick our family to visit? Was this not God in the shadows, keeping watch over his own?

Sometimes, too, the fruit will be other than we expect. Sometimes we go through tough times in which God appears to be doing nothing through us. And we’re slow to realize that he’s doing something in us instead. I remember going off on an Operation Mobilisation mission to France, as a student, convinced that God was probably calling me to go and work there.

I discovered rapidly that I wasn’t at all suited to the door-to-door work I was expected to do. And that was the staple of evangelistic work in France in those days. So I wasn’t called to go there after all; but I had signed up for a full month of mission, and there was no way back.

I don’t think God used my efforts in that month to do anything significant in the life of France! But I did see him do something significant in me, as I learned the discipline of doing something faithfully that I was completely ungifted for, and emotionally unwilling to tackle. The “fruit” wasn’t what I anticipated; but it was there.

Wherever the fruit comes from, Paul’s expectation is that “work means fruitfulness”. This is what Jesus called us to (John 15:16) – not just to work, but to be fruitful. We don’t control the production of fruit, any more than a lemon tree takes executive decisions about how many lemons it will output this year. But if the fruit never appears, there’s something wrong with the normativity of our Christianity.

Verse 23: The Darby translation is “I am pressed by both”. The word sunecho means “to hold together”, or “to press from either side”. It’s sometimes used of holding your ears so that you can’t hear (Acts 7:57). Strong says it can be used of a “cattle squeeze, that pushes in on each side, forcing the beast into a position where it cannot move so the farmer can administer medication”; or of a narrow channel that forces a ship to navigate with caution. What Paul means is that both possibilities are pressing in on him forcefully; both appeal to him so strongly that he finds it hard to decide which he’d prefer.

Verse 24: “It is more necessary for you”. Our life isn’t independent of others, as Paul Simon’s great song reminds us. There’s a touching memorial website for those who have committed suicide, called www.1000deaths.com . Its name is chosen because, it says, “The person who completes suicide dies once. Those left behind die a thousand deaths, trying to relive those terrible moments and understand... Why?” And it continues: “Remember ...We are all intertwingled, each desperately loved and needed by others.”

This is vitally important to remember at times when our life seems meaningless to us, when we’d rather give up the battle and simply leave the field. Our existence matters to others, and sometimes people who stay around for the sake of others will discover an unexpected new sense of purpose and drive which changes their outlook completely.

As Christians, our life needs to be other-directed anyway. It struck me yesterday, reading through the list of “new garments” which Paul says we should “put on” in Colossians 3:12-14, that every single thing in the list is directed towards our relationship with others. By contrast, the “old clothes” (3:8) are all things which divide us off from others and push them away. No wonder we lose the point of life when it ceases to be our motivation to serve others and put them first.

Verse 25: Paul is convinced he will remain alive because there’s still work to do. He was right (for another few years, anyway) but we need to be careful about applying this reasoning to ourselves. Sometimes – we’ve all seen it – God will remove one of his greatest servants from the planet when it appears he’s irreplaceable. Why take David Watson? Why allow Henry Martyn or Keith Green to burn out so soon?

And often when Christian leaders have been diagnosed with cancer, their first thought has been: “Not now! There’s still so much to do!” None of us are as indispensable as we suppose (1 Kings 18:10, 14, 18) and it’s good to remember that.

Paul had been wrong before (Acts 20:25) so maybe we shouldn’t take his statement here as divine revelation, so much as a sober assessment based on what he thinks God is doing. At any rate, he’s arrived at the conviction that death is not summoning him yet, but he is unclear about the rest: will he stay in chains, or be freed? Will he revisit Philippi, or only hear about it (v. 27)?

He has learned through experience that it is wise not to “second-guess” God. And we can all learn from that.

Paul thinks he will be staying in order to bring two things into the Philippians’ lives: “progress” and “joy”. This is what God wants for us: not just progress, but joy too – Christian living is supposed to be a happy experience, a discovering with delight of new dimensions in living, new sources of pleasure in God’s creation and his providential care over our lives, new riches in our relationships with others. If we’re not enjoying God, we’re getting it wrong. I very much like John Piper’s concept of “Christian hedonism”, the idea that our calling is to enjoy God as we live for him.

The other side of the picture is that it’s not just joy, but progress too. Christian living is not just a happy-happy experience of blissful moments and constant thrills. It’s supposed to be going somewhere. And the two go together: only as we’re making progress will our joy be full. You can’t live off yesterday’s manna (Exodus 16:19-30).

Verse 26: This is a complicated verse. Paul literally says: "... so that your boasting may abound in Christ Jesus in (or by) me on account of my presence with you again". It isn't the normal word for "joy", but kauchema, which really means "a reason for glorying". Does he mean: My presence with you will give you added reason to glory in Jesus, because he's brought me back? or does he mean: My presence with you will increase your reason for taking pride in me, because Jesus has done one more marvellous thing for me?

And does it matter? Because it's all true. The Philippians are wrapped up in joy - caused by Jesus, intensified by their love for Paul, making them even more excited about being Christians. Often when this happens to us it's hard to disentangle the causes of our joy. The important thing is just that it does happen!

Incidentally, I like Louis Segond's translation here: afin que, par mon retour auprès de vous, vous ayez en moi un abondant sujet de vous glorifier en Jésus-Christ. ("So that, by my returning to you, you'll have in me an abundant cause of glorifying yourselves in Jesus Christ.") Read with 2 Cor 10:17 (in Segond: Que celui qui se glorifie se glorifie dans le Seigneur), that makes a lot of sense.

PHILIPPIANS 1:21

21 For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

Verse 21: “To live is Christ” isn’t the same thing that Paul is saying in (for example) Galatians 2:20, or Colossians 3:3 – that Christians have died to the world, and the source of their power in living is now Christ, not themselves. It includes this idea. But it says more: that to Paul, Christ sums up everything he is living for. He has no other agenda, no other dreams, no other purpose, than to serve Christ and experience his love with every moment of his lifetime. This is what gets him out of bed in the morning. Other interests have been excluded by the overarching desire to give Jesus everything and know him to the full.

This doesn’t mean that Paul was a narrow fanatic. It’s obvious from his writings that he appreciated poetry and could quote it effectively. He must have been a sports fan, judging by the references to games and racing. He had close, appreciative friends of both sexes, and a variety of age groups; he wouldn’t have had the impact he did in city after city had he not been an interesting, warm, engaging personality.

But you can be a rich, rounded human being and still hopelessly devoted to one thing: the knowledge of Jesus Christ. If it’s true, as Paul believed, that “in him all things hold together”, then you meet Jesus at every turn when you’re looking for him – whether in the sports headlines or in classical poetry.

At any rate, that was Francis Thompson’s experience:

The angels keep their ancient places -
Turn but a stone and start a wing!
'Tis ye, 'tis your estrangèd faces,
That miss the many-splendoured thing.

But (when so sad thou canst not sadder)
Cry - and upon thy so sore loss
Shall shine the traffic of Jacob's ladder
Pitched betwixt Heaven and Charing Cross.

Yea, in the night, my Soul, my daughter,
Cry - clinging to Heaven by the hems;
And lo, Christ walking on the water,
Not of Genesareth, but Thames!

“To die is gain”: Paul was a Pharisee, and so had always believed notionally in a resurrection of the dead; but what exactly his fate would be in the next life, he thought, had depended on his efforts. And he had done a pretty good job (Phil 3:5-6).

But then Jesus Christ had brought life and immortality to light through the gospel (2 Tim 1:11). And that changed everything, because now Paul’s future destiny was secure. Christ became “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col 1:27) – a revealed “mystery” Paul could never have suspected previously.

And so death becomes “gain” – not that Paul was eager to die, in the manner of some of the more unbalanced, neurotic martyrs who were to follow in the next couple of centuries (look for example at Origen’s attitude, as a young man).

He recognizes in the next few verses that staying alive is more strategic than dying, and so he’s content to do so. Paul was no glory-hunting death-embracing suicide bomber.

But he knew that death would bring “gain”, not just a snuffing out of the candle. This commercial word always reminds me of the way Ecclesiastes constantly repeats the word yitron (“gain”, “profit”) and asks: where is the “gain” in living at all? His answer: if life “under the sun” is all there is – no profit. But if life goes on beyond the “box” we live in, if Jesus Christ has greater plans for us than any we have encountered yet (1 Corinthians 2:9), then not just life but death itself becomes “gain”.

PHILIPPIANS 1:19-20

Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, 19 for I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. 20 I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.

Verse 19: There’s another cause for rejoicing: Paul has come to the conviction that he will be set free, or at least not executed (the word he uses, soteria, can mean simply “safety”). How will this happen? Again he’s careful to stress that there are two agencies involved: God’s part and ours. Our part is prayer. God’s is to help through the Holy Spirit.

Prayer is important! Can’t God deliver Paul without it? Yes, of course he can; but prayer is the way he chooses to bring about solutions in the real world. He involves us in the process. It isn’t just a matter of our standing helplessly by while he does everything for us. We can be co-workers with God.

We need to realize that prayer is serious work! It’s taking part in a spiritual battle, as Scripture insists again and again. It isn’t just a matter of addressing a few polite requests to God and leaving him to get on with the job. The mystery of how God’s action and our prayers work together is ultimately insoluble; but we know that both things are vital parts of the process. When we forget this, we stop praying!

Note that Paul doesn’t ask for prayer here. He simply assumes that the Philippians are praying. Why wouldn’t they be?

How does the Holy Spirit help? Paul isn’t specific; he simply talks about “the supply of the Spirit” – epichoregia, which comes from the word choregos. A choregos was the citizen in a Greek community who was nominated by the state to pay the full costs of the training and performance of the chorus in a tragedy. The chorus consisted of a lot of people, and the costs could rise to 3000 drachmae (a drachma being equivalent to a normal day’s wages). The choregos took pride in never being niggardly, but providing lavishly everything that was needed. So epichoregia came to stand for the most lavish supply you could imagine. That, says Paul, is how God gives the Spirit; and so in this perilous situation God will supply everything that could possibly be required to ensure Paul’s safety.

It’s never safe to assume that we know precisely how God will work in any given situation. He is always capable of surprising us; he’s a God of infinite resources and unending creativity. All we need to know is that through his Spirit, he’ll meet every single need we have – and generously.

Why “the Spirit of Jesus Christ”? Perhaps because Jesus is seen as the source of so much in Philippians, it’s the natural way to refer to the Spirit too. The fruit of righteousness comes through him (1:11). Joy (1:26), grace (4:23), affection (1:8), God’s riches (4:19), and much more, all flow from our relationship with Jesus. So the natural title to choose for the Spirit brackets his work with the Lordship of Jesus.

Verse 20: “I eagerly expect and hope” uses a very odd word, which occurs only once more in the New Testament (Romans 8:19). It literally means a way of looking forward which stretches the head outwards – almost standing on tiptoe to peer eagerly into the future. Paul is stressing that he isn’t avoiding thoughts of what might happen to him; he is so confident that the supply of Jesus’ Spirit will enable him to meet any eventuality with courage, that he isn’t worried about facing up to it.

It is important to him that he is able to use his body in God’s service – whether freely moving around the map preaching and church planting, or giving it up to be tortured and destroyed. As far as Paul is concerned, the body matters. Unlike the Greek philosophers he’d studied when a pupil of Gamaliel, he didn’t believe that only the invisible spirit mattered. The body was a vital part of our identity, and God was concerned with the whole person (1 Th 5:23). The future after death is not to float around as a disembodied spirit; we’ll be reunited with our bodies one of these days (1 Cor 15:42-44).

How careful are we with our bodies? When we allow them to grow fat, or go out of condition, or inspire inappropriate desire in others, or look unkempt and uncared for, we are making a comment about how much they matter to us. When we let them go to the wrong places, or do unchristian things, we misuse one of God’s eternal gifts to us. How much do we think about the issue of whether Christ is being exalted in our body?

oly Spirit; so in this situation of imprisonment, everything the Spirit Spirit

It’s always good to leave

PHILIPPIANS 1:12-18

12 Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel. 13 As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ. 14 Because of my chains, most of the brothers in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and fearlessly.

15 It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. 16 The latter do so in love, knowing that I am put here for the defence of the gospel. 17 The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. 18 But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice.

Verse 12 The message had clearly reached Philippi that Paul was in jail. And it could have made them feel anxious: how would the gospel survive? But they should have remembered they’d seen Paul in jail before – in their own city, when God caused an earthquake and converted the jailor’s family, all in one eventful night. And Paul is eager for them to understand: his imprisonment has actually helped the gospel go forward.

Sometimes the things that seem most catastrophic for us are the cause of most blessing. God does not guarantee that he will give us both his power and an easy time. But he’s able to work through the contrary events caused by human hostility to bring his blessing in the end (Genesis 50:20). Sometimes we have to be willing to carry the cross personally so that God’s power can break forth. New life comes through death: “Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.” (John 12:24)

Verse 13 Paul has two reasons for claiming that his imprisonment has helped the gospel forward. This verse gives the first: how else would people in the palace – the very heart of Rome’s worldwide administration – ever hear the Good News? With Paul permanently there in captivity, there was no problem.

And we know that Christianity spread very early to the Roman army, and to the higher echelons of Roman society. Only thirty years after Paul died, and fifty years after he wrote this letter, Titus Flavius Clemens was put to death for “sacrilege”. He was the Emperor’s own cousin, and the likelihood is that he and his wife Domitilla (who was exiled) were Christian converts. It couldn’t have happened without Paul’s time in jail.

Verse 14 A courageous example always stimulates other people to try harder themselves. And so Paul’s imprisonment had not daunted the Christians; it had led to an outburst of gospel proclamation from people who had stayed silent before.

Sometimes when people suffer for Christ, such as the five young missionaries who died in Ecuador in 1956, we wonder why God allows it. But sometimes through their death Christian martyrs have a long-lasting impact that would never have been achieved through their life. (Of the Ecuador five, Wikipedia records: “They are credited with sparking an interest in Christian missions among the youth of their time, and are still considered an encouragement to Christian missionaries working throughout the world.”)

But not everybody reacts in this way; Paul says that “most of the brothers” had. It all depends on how willing we are to hear God’s challenge coming to us through the sacrifice of others. We need to ask: am I really so in tune with what God is doing in my brother’s life, that I’m able to discern what he’s saying to me through it?

Verse 15 Down through the centuries the gospel has been preached for many strange reasons and with many impure motives. (It was always this way: one of the most spectacularly effective evangelists in the Old Testament was Jonah, at the precise moment when he was on the run from God.) So I can’t rely on the effectiveness of my ministry as an index of how much God is pleased with me; sometimes powerful results will come through people whose heart is in the wrong place.

I always remember speaking at a Bible School some years ago just the week after a well-known preacher who had made an enormous impact. I felt quite humbled to be following him, and didn’t feel I made quite the same impression! Only a couple of weeks later, the man concerned had left his wife and gone off with his same-sex lover, with whom he had been having an affair during some of the most fruitful years of his ministry. Had it all been worthless? No, God had used it. But had it brought any blessing to the preacher himself?

So while Paul is grieved – we can guess – by the “envy and rivalry”, he is still happy that the gospel is being preached. It’s amazing what twisted means God can use to lead people to himself. I’ve worked with religious cult members for many years, and I have met people who have been truly converted through their membership of the Jehovah’s Witnesses and even the Unification Church. How they stumbled upon the truth there, I can’t imagine; people are not rational beings most of the time. But it was impossible to deny the genuineness of their commitment to the Lord Jesus and the Word of God.

(There's another possibility to consider about this verse, raised by Tom Wright: "They are, I suggest, people in the local pagan (and quite possibly Jewish) communities who are telling people about this ridiculous fellow, Paul, and his wild claims: he is saying that Jesus of Nazareth, a Galilean preacher, is the Lord of the world! Paul's response is simple: as long as people hear the news that Jesis is Lord of the world, I am content to stay in jail." Wright stresses, quite rightly, that the word kataggelein doesn't just mean "to preach", but really "to proclaim", like a herald; and Paul's gospel was ultimately political in its implications ("this is fighting talk, the sort of thing that gets you in trouble with the authorities"). If this is the true interpretation, it wouldn't be the first time that attempts to pour scorn on the gospel have led people to Christ. I wonder how many conversions The Da Vinci Code will be indirectly responsible for?)

Verse 16 Some, though, are preaching out of “goodwill”: Paul can’t do it, so they will. Their very act of testimony is a statement of their love. And this can make Christian proclamation incredibly effective: when it’s simultaneously a demonstration of unity and cooperation in the Lord Jesus.

I used to work occasionally on school missions with Ishmael, a British evangelist whose theology was entirely different from mine. Yet we respected each other immensely. He used to make jokes to school classes at my expense, and I used to give as good as I got. And the kids saw that here were two Christians who disagreed profoundly, yet loved one another. The unity between us was as powerful a statement about the truth of the gospel as anything we said.

Verse 17 Paul mentions two wrong motives for preaching: first, “selfish ambition”. Some of those concerned wanted to take over Paul’s crown. Religion can be a very effective route to power over other people’s lives, and ever since Constantine made Christianity the state religion of Rome, power-seekers and glory-hunters have infested organised Christian structures.

It places a responsibility on every one of us who preaches to ask ourselves: how much of what I say is genuinely promoting Christ? How many stories do I tell that put me in a good light, or drop the names of important people I’ve met and impressive things I’ve done? How much of my message is tailored for the consumption of the audience, and how free do I feel simply to say what God wants me to, without adulteration?

Is my preaching going to promote myself – or Jesus? Because it can’t be both. This little bit of verse has stayed with me since I was a teenager. I have no idea where it comes from, but I’m told it’s to be found “on the study wall of a well-known London rectory”:

When telling Thy salvation free

Let all absorbing thoughts of Thee

My heart and soul engross:

And when all hearts are bowed and stirred

Beneath the influence of Thy word,

Hide me behind Thy cross.

The second reason for ignoble preaching is to “stir up trouble”. How many messages are delivered in a spirit of hatred or competition? How often do Christians take the opportunity to have a sideswipe at their brothers and sisters as they deliver the Good News? There are many evangelistic Internet sites which, regretfully, I won’t point people to, because although they contain a clear gospel message, they also contain broadsides against believers in evolution, or those who practice infant baptism, or Christians who don’t believe in eternal security, or haven’t had the experience of speaking in tongues.

May God give us the clarity of thought, and the insight into our own confused hearts, to be able to detect when we’re sullying the purity of the gospel with a poison that comes from our own selfish concerns. We can follow our agenda, or his. Not both.

Verse 18 Yet none of this matters, in Paul’s analysis, as long as the gospel is going forward. It isn’t the false motives that will prevail; it’s the life-giving truth at the heart of it all. And so we have to be glad whenever the real gospel is being preached. I may not like the activities of some prosperity-gospel preachers, or those who promote a joyless Calvinist rigidity of belief, but if they’re preaching Christ, I have no right to treat them as members of heretical fringe religions. They are still my brothers or sisters.

I’ve often found this a challenge, in evaluating new groups I haven’t met before. Is this a dangerous “cult”, or just a freaky bunch of believers? If they are the latter, then they are part of my family, whether I like it or not.

It’s important to remember how great Christians have sometimes got it wrong; G Campbell Morgan, for instance, dismissing the Pentecostal movement with distaste as “the last vomit of Satan”; or Lord Shaftesbury, in his old age, fearing that the Salvation Army was a trick of the devil, trying to make Christianity look ridiculous.

It’s tragic that a teacher who had written so powerfully about the Holy Spirit as Campbell Morgan had, couldn’t see what God was doing in Azusa Street. It’s sad that a Christian social reformer like Shaftesbury wasn’t overjoyed at Booth’s new, pioneering form of evangelism. Yet both were wise, experienced Christians. We need to pray that God will deliver us from writing off our brothers too easily.

PREACH IT

Three ways of teaching Philippians 1:1-11


Three key factors in Christian growth:

The persistence of God (v 6)
The pursuit of holiness (vv 9-11)
The prayers of friends (vv 3-5)


What holds Christians together?

Sharing in God's service (v 5)
Sharing in God's grace (v 7)
Sharing in God's love (v 9)


Paul and the Philippian church

The past: Paul's joy (vv 4-5)
The present: Paul's longing (v 8)
The future: Paul's prayer (vv 9-11)

PHILIPPIANS 1:7-11

7 It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. 8 God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.

9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.

Verse 7 Paul gives two reasons for the feelings he expresses towards his friends. First, he “has them in his heart”. We need to remember that the “heart” in the Bible isn’t just the mushy, Valentine’s Day sort of thing we leave in San Francisco. It isn’t just the centre of our fleeting feelings, but “the soul or mind, as it is the fountain and seat of the thoughts, passions, desires, appetites, affections, purposes, endeavours” (Strong).

Paul’s commitment to other Christians was an unconditional one, from the very centre of his being.

Second – or maybe it’s an explanation of the first point – he feels this way because “all of you share in God’s grace with me”. Whether in bad times or good, in Philippi or Rome, in prison or on a preaching trip, the distinctive experience of Christian living is the constant receiving of God’s grace. People who share that experience, of God’s grace streaming towards them in Christ, have a bond which nothing can break. One of the things that brings bitterness between us is when we start to miss the grace of God (Hebrews 12:15). If we ignore what God is constantly supplying, we soon fall out with our brothers.

Verse 8 Paul’s affection for the Philippians isn’t just a human attachment, based on natural liking. It comes from the supernatural love which God has shed abroad in Paul's heart (Romans 5:5) for his brothers and sisters.

Francis Schaeffer said that love was “the mark of the Christian”, the distinguishing mark of true Christianity (John 13:35). “The affection of Jesus Christ” is literally “in the bowels of Jesus Christ”. It seems odd to us, but that part of the body was where the Greeks thought the emotions were centred. And so Paul daringly identifies his emotions with the most intimate feelings and personal drives of Jesus himself.

The love we share isn’t generated by ourselves; it’s the very love of God, implanted in us by Jesus. (Which, of course, is why Paul can appeal to the Philippians at the start of chapter 2 to “have the same love”).

Verse 9 Love is a great start. But it needs to deepen and mature as we grow in experience. Paul wants the Philippian Christians to develop a love which isn’t just an emotional rush, but which is founded on increasing knowledge: knowledge of God’s heart, knowledge of the human situation, knowledge of our own inner propensities.

The first of these will deepen our love as we come to understand more and more just how much God cares for our brothers and sisters, and just how greatly it thrills him to see us living in the unity he designed us for before the universe existed. The second will help us be wise in our approach to others (Mt 10:16), not naively expecting a standard of behaviour which will leave us disillusioned when we find out we’ve been let down, but yet able to see (and rejoice in) the grace of God at work in sinful human hearts like ours. And the third will help us keep a sense of proportion, and realize how incredible it is that God loved us in the first place. “Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” (1 John 4:11)

But “knowledge” is a dry, theoretical thing without “depth of insight”, or “discernment”. If our love is to grow, the knowledge we gain mustn’t be merely theoretical, academic learning. It must have a direct impact on our lives and choices; and for that to happen, we need to have the gift of discerning just where this knowledge we’ve gained affects us. This is a skill that takes a lifetime to learn: “discernment selects, classifies, and applies what is furnished by knowledge” (M R Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament).

I haven’t finished preaching until I have given my audience some clue about what the truth I’ve been expounding will mean for them in daily life the following morning. I haven’t finished my morning reading until I’ve reflected on how the facts I’ve considered must alter my priorities and decisions immediately afterwards. And when I get excited about discovering some new idea in the Word of God, do I get equally excited about how I’m going to put it into practice in my life?

Whenever I fail to do those things, I reveal just how little I’ve still allowed my love to become flavoured and deepened by God’s gift of discernment.

Verse 10 There are two reasons that “depth of insight” is so important. First, it helps us see.

We need to be able to focus on “the best” – those things that really matter in life, that will truly inspire us, that will feed our spirits and imaginations. All too often we can read a passage of Scripture without really seeing what’s there. I’ve often re-read a passage I’ve skipped before, and been stunned to see how much there is in it that’s exciting, and obviously so… and yet I’d missed it all earlier.

Sometimes, too, we fail to see what God is doing in a situation. I’ve always remembered the advice an old American missionary gave to one of my colleagues when he was discouraged by mounting problems, and just wanted to resign and go home: “Yes, I know it’s tough, Richard. But don’t miss God in this situation. That would be worse than anything.”

Second, we need to live. Insight helps us steer clear of traps that would otherwise ensnare us. God wants us to be “pure and blameless” in the way we live. Sometimes we make so much of the (equally true) fact that God loves us despite our sin - that he’s committed to us no matter how much we let him down, that we will never reach perfection down here, that there is instant cleansing for failure whenever we simply come to him in confession – that perhaps we forget how often the New Testament insists that purity is at the centre of God’s plan for us, and he really cares about the moral standard of our lives.

Verse 11 But pure living isn’t just a matter of keeping our noses clean. It’s a constructive, fruitful, productive way of life. The “pure” Christian isn’t one who simply never does anything wrong – you can live a narrow, joyless, technically correct life easily enough – but one who brings a new dimension into other people’s experience because of his commitment to God’s standards of integrity. The “fruit of righteousness” includes everything we do that reflects God’s goodness and brings his righteousness to areas where it isn’t already.

We need to remember, as Harvie Conn once observed, that the Greek word for righteousness – dikaiosyne – is used in the Septuagint (the Greek Old Testament that Jesus used) to mean “social justice” . So the “fruit of righteousness” won’t just mean good deeds in my life on a personal level. It will mean a “hunger and thirst for righteousness” (Matthew 5) which makes me a peace-bringer and an agent of social change in situations of justice and oppression. “There is no holiness,” said John Wesley, “without social holiness.” To the great founder of Methodism, combatting slavery was as much “to the glory and praise of God” as preaching to thousands.

PHILIPPIANS 1:3-6

3 I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Verse 3 Just a short phrase – but pretty challenging! What do we think of when some Christian’s face comes to mind? The thought of some people might make us instinctively frustrated, depressed, angry, bitter or even lustful. Paul’s immediate instinct was to thank God. He could see beyond the blemishes to what God saw in them. To treat other people as a gift we can be grateful for – that’s a tremendous way of looking at life. It helps us psychologically by making us more positive. And it helps them, because it makes us more eager to pray for them.

Verse 4 Thinking about people thankfully helps us to pray about them with joy. Often when we pray for people, we rush into telling God all about the problems they have, and the things we wish he would change. Paul takes time first just to enjoy the thought of all that God has done already, and how much these people mean to him. Maybe that’s one reason we don’t pray more: because intercessory prayer tends to be a process of bringing up before our minds a series of difficulties, pressures and imperfections. If we make space for mental enjoyment of the good things about the people and situations we call to mind – won’t prayer be a lot more rewarding?

Also, notice how Paul keeps on stressing his theme of equality: all my prayers, all of you, always. No exceptions. There may be some of God’s people whom I warm to, more than others – but I need to thank God for them all!

Verse 5 Paul had done a lot for the Philippians. He was the one who had brought Lydia to faith, who had performed miracles and taught the gospel, who had gone to prison for them. Yet he claims that the church members were “partners in the gospel” right from the start. It takes more than one great man, however multi-talented, to bring a person to Christ.

This phrase raises two important issues. First, however insignificant we think we are, we’re part of God’s strategy, just as much as Billy Graham or Luis Palau.

If God has given some Christians greater evangelistic gifts than to us, it’s not because he likes them better or attaches more importance to them. We all count – and sometimes it’s the little people who do the really big jobs. Behind the ministry of George Verwer, world missions leader and founder of Operation Mobilization, stands a little old lady who prayed for pupils at his high school. Behind Paul stands the almost forgotten Ananias, who probably never did anything notable again.

Second, if we are leaders, it’s good to remember that others can do things we can’t. And we need the others. Often the voice of God in a perplexing situation is detected by a quiet, unassuming Christian when all the big shots are confused. God has made no mistakes in his distribution of spiritual gifts, and if we start acting as if we can do it all ourselves, we’re heading for disaster.

Verse 6 Despite all that was wrong with the church in Philippi, Paul was convinced that God wouldn’t give up on them. God is not the author of confusion, and his Word does not return to him void. What he starts, he finishes. And so if we know that God has begun to do something in us, we can be sure that he isn’t going to stop. Sometimes, when spiritual growth seems slow or nonexistent, we need to remember that. Just because God seems inactive, it doesn’t mean he’s doing nothing. Indeed, at the very time when he seems to be doing least, he may be bringing about the most significant changes of all.

I sometimes run Lavasoft AdAware on my computer to clear out unwanted malware, bugs, and spy programs which would otherwise clog it up. I have a lot of files on my computer, and so it can take the program a fair while to clean up my act. Sometimes it seems to have slowed down and stalled… but I’ve learned through experience that this isn’t the case. Often, when it sems to be doing nothing, it’s actually wrestling with a particularly knotty part of my Registry, buried so deep within the system’s inner workings that for a while I can’t detect anything going on. But after a few minutes it will finish the job triumphantly, and then my computer will be faster and fitter than before.

In the same way, sometimes God’s deepest work within us is his quietest and least spectacular. But the changes he brings make all the difference.

PHILIPPIANS 1:1-2

1 Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus,

To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons:

2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 1 When we begin a letter, we tend to write down “Dear Sir”, then begin thinking what we really want to say. Paul wasn’t like that. Remember how he composed letters: dictating them patiently to an amanuensis, who wrote slowly and painfully on primitive equipment, giving Paul plenty of time to hone his phrases and search in his mind for the exact phrase he wanted. And so very little in Paul’s letters is purely functional. It all contributed to his meaning – even the greetings.

This verse is no exception. If Paul wrote Philippians when he was under house arrest in Rome – and that seems likely – it’s one of a group of major letters he fired off at roughly the same time. Most of the others start: “Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ…” But here he simply announces himself as “Paul, a servant”. Why?

Well, one major theme of Philippians, written to a church where people were disputing and jockeying for position, was the fact that we’re all just servants in one team. To seek prominence for ourselves is pointless. The enterprise we’re engaged in belongs to God, not ourselves. And once we lose the instincts and reflexes of servanthood, we lose the point of everything.

What’s more, Paul associates Timothy with his writing: “Paul and Timothy, servants”. And Timothy appears almost as a co-author, not a gracious afterthought, as he is for example in Colossians 1:1. Paul is straining every nerve to communicate his message of equality subliminally from the start!

Then come the addressees: “all the saints”. He doesn’t want any of the warring factions in Philippi to gain the impression that he is taking their side, or speaking against them. If they belong to Jesus, they matter to him – even if he doesn’t agree with their opinions and behaviour.

Nor does he want them to think that he is bypassing the leadership, who aren’t doing very well in holding the church together – so he names them. “Overseers and deacons” includes everyone involved in the management of a first century church. They count too. But equally, he isn’t simply writing to the leaders; every member of the church counts, because every member contributes to the success or failure of the church’s mission. No one is just “cannon fodder”. Christians are intimately connected as branches of a vine (John 15:1ff) and the same life flows through all of us.

Verse 2 “Grace” was the standard Greek greeting when you met someone in the street. A Jew would say, “Peace” (shalom – see Luke 24:36). Paul cobbles both together to form a distinctively Christian greeting. For God’s grace has come to us in Jesus, bringing peace to our lives; and the best thing he can wish for his readers is that God will bring more of his grace to them, creating more of his peace and wholeness in them.

This comes from Father and Son. It isn’t that Paul doesn’t believe in the Holy Spirit (see e.g. 2:1, 3:3); but here again he’s stressing co-working, perfect harmony in operation, and there’s no greater example of that than the work of Jesus, which he intends to describe unforgettably in 2:6-11.

INTRODUCING PHILIPPIANS

PHILIPPIANS The first project we'll take on will be a verse-by-verse analysis of Paul's letter to the Philippians. That's because I'll be teaching a series on Philippians at Belmont Chapel next month. For some background material on the letter, look at the little website I've put together to support the series.

WHAT IS THIS BLOG ALL ABOUT?

This is a project which I've started for my own benefit, but if it helps anybody else, that would be great. I'm a Bible teacher and writer with a completely disorganized mind. I'm never happy with what I preach, and as a result I find it hard to keep notes of anything I've said... even the good bits. I could also do with some added discipline to keep me going in serious regular study. So I'm going to record here some of the discoveries I've made in reading the Bible for myself.

I'll be doing it in a fairly structured way, so I hope it will build into a commentary on some of my favourite books of Scripture. It won't be a technical, scholarly commentary; the emphasis will be on understanding the author's meaning, the significance of passages in the light of the whole biblical revelation, and its devotional impact on living today; but I will be trying to ensure that it takes account of the best scholarship available and builds itself on reliable fact.

So I'll be grateful to anyone who challenges claims I make, or statements I advance, which they believe to be inaccurate. The Bible is important enough for us all to be concerned to get it right. E-mail me at johnallan@unforgettable.com if you have any comments to make.

I will also follow the example of Charles Spurgeon's great book The Treasury of David and supply preaching outlines on all the passages I deal with. Not only is this a useful discipline (and another way of wrestling with the text's meaning), it also gives me a fund of ready-to-use outlines if I ever need one in a hurry!

I hope you can use what will follow. But even if you don't, I will!