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THE GOSPEL AND ITS GOAL II
Philippians 3:10-11
Bob Bonner
July 27, 2008
The end goal of all religions is for people and God to enjoy a relationship together. However, all but one begin with humans attempting to find or reach God. Christianity is the only religion in which God makes the initial move to reach down to restore His relationship with mankind. All other religions and Christian cults, such as Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and others are based on doctrines that man has to do something to reach God. Only true Christianity teaches how we can have a vital and personal relationship with the living God.
Biblical Christianity teaches us that God the Son, Jesus Christ, took the initiative to leave heaven and come to earth for the express purpose of dying as our substitute on the cross for the sin of the human race. If we put our trust in Him, we can be forgiven for all of our sin and rebellion against God and can begin an exciting relationship with Him. By Jesus’ dying on the cross, two things were made possible for the believer. First, the believer was redeemed, purchased from the slavery of sin and the kingdom of darkness, and placed into the kingdom of light where there is the power to live free from the slavery of sin. Secondly, because of Jesus’ actions on our behalf, God imputed or placed upon us a new righteousness and acceptability that was not our own. God has permanently dressed the believer in Christ’s righteousness, making us fully acceptable to God. All of what I have just spoken of is wrapped up in the work of God’s justification of the believer. That was the subject we introduced in our study of Philippians 3:7-9 last week.
This morning we return to Philippians 3, this passage of Scripture that is jam-packed with the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This chapter explains the purpose and goal behind the Gospel and why it is such Good News. Last time as we entered into this passage, I mentioned that the chief desire of every human being is to know that no matter what their past, they are deeply loved and approved of, never to be rejected. In addition, I reminded you that it is typical in all the relationships that we humans have with one another that we fail to love perfectly, and as a result we often reject or hurt one another, leaving us with the feeling of worthlessness. But when you realize that the most important Being, this One who carries the greatest authority and worth in all creation, has reached down from heaven and said, “I love you, forgive you, fully approve of and accept you,” and you believe Him, then that gives you the unshakeable ground of knowing your worth and value, regardless of past successes or failures. This enables you to move beyond your past with hope and excitement that your life counts and has a purpose.
How the Gospel actually works out in our lives continues to be the subject of our passage of study for this morning. In these verses, the Apostle Paul is not only teaching us the basic cornerstone truths of the Gospel, he is illustrating their importance and how they have worked in his life. As a man zealous and committed to knowing God and to living a religious and morally upright life, Paul told us that he discovered logically that even though he was sincere in trying to present himself worthy to be accepted by a Holy and perfect God, he could not do so. Even though he morally may have been better than other human beings, he fell so short of God’s perfect and holy standard required for God to relate to or to be connected to a man, that he failed to earn God’s approval. It was at that point that Paul recognized his need for help, that he needed a savior, and that’s when he placed his complete confidence in Christ.
If you have your Bibles with you, look with me at Philippians 3. Allow me to give you just a brief outline of our passage, with the hope that you will see where we have been and where we will be going this morning. Three of the verses we looked at last week were verses 7-9. Those verses reveal to us how it is that Paul or anybody can be made righteous (or the theological term “justified”) before God, so that one can be once and for all forgiven for one’s sin, made completely acceptable to God, and fully approved of by Him. This is because God deeply loves the individual. Based on God’s justification of the believer, every Christian is guaranteed an eternal relationship with the living God, beginning with that moment when the individual puts his or her complete confidence in the finished work of Christ on their behalf and, to the best of their ability, submits their life to Christ’s Lordship. But then, in our verses for today, Paul touches upon two other important aspects of the gospel. In verse 10 Paul will speak to the theological subject called “sanctification.” All that means is how God enables us to walk with Him during our years on this earth and how He does the work of transforming us more into the likeness of Jesus Christ as it concerns our thoughts, attitudes, perspectives, actions, and lifestyle. And in verse 11, Paul will introduce the subject of “glorification”. That is what happens to us and our relationship with God after we die. Please notice that respectively, each of these represent the past, present, and future experiences of the believer who submits his life to Christ.
Now because it is so important and because we do not want to have any misunderstanding before we move forward in the text looking at these two subjects of “sanctification” and “glorification”, I want to go back and make sure that we all understand what “justification” really means and its correct implications as it concerns our lives today.
As we said last time, to be able to stand before God as forgiven, accepted, fully approved of, and completely loved, one must be made righteous or “justified” by God. To be justified presumes that the individual understands four things.
The first thing that needs to be understood is the truth that due to our own sin, our own rebellion against God, or because of our ignoring of God, all human beings are alienated from God in the sense of having no connective relationship with Him. Our fellowship with God was broken by our sin.
Secondly, no human being can possibly reconcile their relationship with God by their own efforts. God is holy and perfect, and we are imperfect and unholy, and therefore, on our own, we are powerless to make ourselves perfect and holy, acceptable to God.
Thirdly, God is the only one who can take the initiative to reconcile this relationship between Himself and the individual. He did this through His own Son Jesus Christ’s going to the Cross to pay the penalty for our sin, so that our being reconciled to God could take place.
Fourthly, God’s initiative must be met with a human response. One must put his complete trust only in Christ’s work on the cross to justify him before God. This trust will be evidenced by one’s surrendering of his life to Christ.
When an individual puts this kind of trust in Christ, he or she is made righteous before God. That person is born again. He is made a new creation; the old life has passed away and a new one has begun. While we live the rest of our days here on earth, we grow into spiritual adulthood. In the meantime, there is nothing you can do to change your standing before God. There is nothing you can to do make yourself more righteous, loved, or approved of by God. There is nothing you can do to make yourself less righteous, loved, or approved of by God.
Now having said that, I’m well aware of a question that may be in many of your minds and needs to be answered. Here’s the question: “So, Bob, are you saying that once I put my trust in Christ, I am forever forgiven, never to be rejected by God, forever accepted and approved of by God, no matter what I do?” Yes! “But, what happens if I sin or rebel against God? Will I lose his acceptance, approval, and forgiveness?” No. God hates your sin, but He has already forgiven you because of Christ’s work on your behalf. “Then, what’s to keep me from just going out and sinning all I want, being selfish and rebelling against God, because there will be no apparent repercussions?”
My answer is, “Several things.” First, understanding what God has done for us, by His grace, compels us to follow the right course of action. Love for and a desire to honor the one who has so loved us motivates us to bring honor to Him. Our obedience to Christ is the expression of our true love for Him. Check out what God’s word says. In John 14:15 and 21, Jesus tells us:
“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments . . . He who has
My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me;
and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love
him and will disclose Myself to him.”
Then Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:14-15 these words:
For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that
one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that
they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him
who died and rose again on their behalf.
Hence, our appreciation for God’s love and for what He has done for us compels us to obey Him.
A second reason for us to obey God and not to deliberately continue to sin, even though for the moment it may be pleasurable, is that sin is destructive. Satan lied to Eve and wanted her to believe that there was nothing wrong with her wanting to enjoy pleasure through to deliberately doing wrong. He deceived her into believing there would be no consequences for her sin. But the end result of her and Adam’s sin was death and destruction to the human race. In 1 Samuel we read of the promising career of Israel’s first king, Saul. Because he ignored God and deliberately sinned, God took away his kingdom and Saul died a premature death. Sin has never had any lasting value and is always destructive.
A third reason for obeying God is seen in Hebrews 12:5-6. There we read, “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved by Him; for those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges every son whom He receives.” That rendering of these verses comes from the NASB. But look at how Eugene Peterson captures the emotion of these words in his paraphrase of these same verses.
So don’t feel sorry for yourselves. Or have you forgotten how
good parents treat children, and that God regards you as his children?
My dear child, don’t shrug off God’s discipline, but don’t be crushed
by it either. It’s the child he loves that he disciplines; the child
he embraces, he also corrects.
Obviously, a third motivator to obey God is to avoid unnecessary discipline, even though it may come from someone who loves you.
A fourth compelling reason why a true follower of Christ will not choose to sin all he or she wants is that of knowing that one day we will all receive eternal rewards based on how we have faithfully served Him. In Revelation 22:12, Jesus says, “Behold, I am coming quickly, and My reward is with Me, to render to every man according to what he has done.” Again, in Matthew 16:27, Jesus promised, “For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and will then repay every man according to his deeds.” Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 5:10, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good (worthwhile) or bad (worthless).”
I am convinced after having done a thorough study of eternal rewards, that before we ever enjoy serving the Lord here on earth during His coming 1000 year reign on this earth, before we ever enjoy one dance at the marriage supper of the Lamb, we will experience Christ’s very first action toward His faithful followers. He will pass out their eternal rewards. Hence, why would one want to invest time and energy in that which will not last and in that which we know is worthless and evil? It seems much wiser to walk obediently before the Lord so that we may receive the ultimate in eternal rewards.
But probably our noblest reason for serving Jesus Christ rather than choosing to continue to live in sin is simply that He is worthy of our obedience. For the Apostle Paul and others, choosing to sin was irrelevant. He was so enamored with his own forgiveness and his standing in Christ’s righteousness, being fully accepted, completely approved of, and loved by God, that he was intensely motivated to know Jesus better and to live for Him in such a way that he would bring nothing but honor to Jesus. In fact, to live otherwise, Paul hints in 2 Corinthians 13:5, should cause one to question whether or not he was ever saved in the first place. Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:9, “Therefore also we have as our ambition, whether at home [meaning having died and gone home to heaven] or absent [meaning still alive here on earth], to be pleasing to Him.” Fully understanding the redemptive work of Christ, the price He paid with His body and blood for us to be made righteous, Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 6:20, “For you have been bought with a price: Therefore glorify God in your body.” One who has truly understood his lostness and the great lengths to which God has moved to save him will say in his heart, along with the psalmist, “Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth . . . But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all Your works.” Psalms 73:25, 28
So you see, our actions and attitudes are never irrelevant. They speak volumes as to what we really believe and what is really important to us.
Now let’s continue with our study of Philippians by looking further at why Paul so deeply desires to know Jesus Christ experientially, to walk with Him on a moment by moment basis. What we are about to study is what theologians call living the “sanctified life.” That simply means to live a life as though it had a purpose, that you were set apart by God to live in a godly fashion so as to fulfill His purposes through your life. To experience the sanctifying work of Christ in one’s life, Paul tells us over and over in these verses that we must experientially know Christ. But what does that mean? I’ll show you.
Since verse 10, is one long sentence that begins back in verse 8, let’s begin reading at verse 8 as we seek to understand why it was so important for Paul to know and experience Christ living in him, moment by moment. We read:
8More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the
surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I
have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish
so that I may gain Christ, 9and may be found in Him, not
having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but
that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which
comes from God on the basis of faith, 10that I may know Him and
the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His
sufferings, being conformed to His death.
One can’t read those verses without realizing how impassioned Paul was to know Jesus in the truest biblical sense—personally and experientially. Do you have that desire to know Jesus intimately? To awake with him in the morning and to live each day with him and in His presence? To experience His leading you and empowering you to do what you ought? To go to bed in the evening, knowing that Jesus never left you and was with you all through the day? Other people are fun to be around sometimes, but they will disappoint us, and Jesus never will. It is entirely satisfying to know Him. Do you know Him in this way, or is He still a distant historical figure to you? He doesn’t have to be, nor does Jesus want to be. He wants to be involved in every facet of your life, every day of your life.
I believe looking at another of Paul’s statements will help us to better understand this passage and why Paul has found it so rewarding to daily walk with Christ. Furthermore, in these next verses we will see what Paul is driving at here when he states that he wants to know the power of Christ’s resurrection and His sufferings so that he could be conformed to His death. Paul states in Galatians 2:20:
I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live,
but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I
live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself
up for me.”
For Paul to know Christ was to know or experience on a daily basis the same resurrection power of Christ at work in Paul’s life, transforming Paul from the inside out so that he would one day be like Christ, no longer enslaved to certain sin. The Apostle Paul knew himself well. He knew that by nature he was a very selfish, egocentric person. He also knew that he could not change his own personal bad behavior simply by trying hard to do so. He had tried that, according to Romans 7, and failed. Therefore, in order to become a faithful servant of Jesus Christ and to experience true transformation inside, he needed the very resurrection power, the very life of Jesus to be lived out in him. Hence by faith, he was learning moment by moment to trust in the Lord and to ask Him to so live His powerful life through Paul that when temptations came or suffering came, he would be strong through it. This very same resurrection power of Christ is what the Hymnist was writing about when he penned:
He breaks the power of cancelled sin,
He sets the prisoner free;
His blood can make the foulest clean—
His blood availed for me.
Sometimes, that being carried along by Christ living in Paul would not only result in Christ’s transforming Paul’s life, but it would also put Paul in difficult circumstances of unjust suffering so that others might live eternally. Suffering unjustly for the betterment of others is not easy. But Paul had learned that when He was faced with such situations, if he turned to Christ, surrendered himself to Him, and by faith trusted Him who was indeed in him and would live powerfully through him, Paul too could be merciful and gracious as Christ was when wronged. Paul too could minister to others when the very last thing his tired soul wanted to do was to spend time with others. Hence, being conformed to Christ’s death meant to be so empowered and led by Christ that Paul would die to his own selfish wishes so that Christ would be honored and that His purposes would be fulfilled through Paul’s life by the resurrection power of Christ.
In the 1700's David Brainerd was a single man who was a missionary to the American Indians. He would ride off into the forest for weeks, risking life and limb to find Indians and then to share Christ with them. He journaled about his everyday life with the Lord and his ministry. In his journal writings, he unreservedly poured out his heart to the Lord about matters of life and ministry that he struggled with. On one particular day, he was faced with an assignment at a time when he had nothing left to give, emotionally or physically, but had to ride some far away distance to carry on ministry to the Indians. Listen to what he so transparently wrote about his life at that time:
Lord’s Day, December 16, 1744. Was so overwhelmed with
dejection that I knew not how to live. I longed for death exceedingly;
my soul was sunk into deep waters and the floods were ready to drown
me. I was so much oppressed that my soul was in a kind of horror.
I could not keep my thoughts fixed in prayer for the space of one
minute, without fluttering and distraction. It made me exceedingly
ashamed that I did not live to God. I had no distressing doubt about
my own state, but I would have cheerfully ventured (as far as I could
possibly know) into eternity. While I was going to preach to the
Indians, my soul was in anguish. I was so overborne with discour-
agement that I despaired of doing any good, and was driven to my
wit’s end. I knew nothing what to say, nor what course to take.
Here, this poor missionary is burnt out, depressed, and realizes that he has nothing left to give, but he is expected to do something significant with the Indians. Rather than “bucking up”, he turns to the Lord, seeking for His resurrection power not only to enable him to get the job done, but also to reveal to him what he should teach or say to these Indians. Two months pass before his next entry. Listen to what David recorded in his journal after he had finally reached his destination and had spent time reaching out to the Indians with the Gospel.
Lord’s Day, February 17, 1745. I think I was scarce ever enabled to offer
the free grace of God to perishing sinners with more freedom and
plainness in my life. Afterwards, I was enabled earnestly to invite the
children of God to come renewedly and drink of this fountain of water of
life, from whence they have heretofore derived unspeakable satisfaction.
It was a very comfortable time to me. There were many tears in the
assembly and I doubt not but that the Spirit of God was there, convincing
poor sinners of their need of Christ. In the evening I felt composed and
comfortable, though much tired. I had some sweet sense of the excellency
and glory of God; and my soul rejoiced that He was “God over all, blessed
forever”; but was too much crowded with company and conversation and
longed to be more alone with God. Oh, that I could forever bless God for
the mercy of this day who “answered me in the joy of my heart.”
That’s the effective result of Christ’s resurrection power, enabling one exhausted man to do ministry when he alone could not. This same resurrection power is made available to the Christian spouse who finds himself/herself married to a non-Christian spouse and is called to love that person. This same resurrection power is made available to a young mother suffering from migraine headaches but needs the strength to care for her children. It is the same resurrection power that can enable a man struggling to get free from the grasp of internet pornography to find freedom in Christ.
It was because Paul knew the reality of this resurrection power of Christ that he wanted to stick close to Christ and to know Him more intimately. That same resurrection power is available to be at work in your life today. It’s Jesus’ power breaking us out of our own arrogant, selfish, sinful ways so that we, in His power, can touch others for Christ.
But then in verse 11, Paul adds another reason why he values knowing Christ. He says, “In order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” That word “resurrection” is an extremely important word, unique to scripture. It was coined by the Apostle Paul and used only once, right here. When I was in seminary, I discovered that someone had written his entire master’s thesis, which was required for graduation, on just this one word! The only difference between this word and the normal Greek word for resurrection is that Paul added the preposition “out” to the beginning of the word, signifying something different from the previous resurrection power and different from the normal use of the term to describe someone coming to life from the dead.
One day all persons will be resurrected from the dead, both the saved and unsaved, to continue to live an eternal life. The unsaved will be condemned to eternal separation from God. The saved will be “out resurrected” meaning separated out from that group of non-believers at their resurrection and placed in the presence of God to spend eternity with Him in their glorified resurrection bodies. Being older and experiencing all that accompanies age, Paul looked forward with great joy to this experience: to be away from physical suffering, be done with temptation and the evil constantly surrounding him, and to be with Christ face to face, free from all the negative things of this fallen world. And now, the more he got to know Christ to better serve and obey Him here, the greater the joy would be then in knowing Christ in heaven.
Hence, the Good News of the Gospel covers every period of Paul’s and our lives. Through justification by faith in the finished work of the Christ on the cross, our past is taken care of. Because of the ever-present Christ living in the believer, even in this fallen world, right now we have His power to be changed and to fulfill the purposes for which Christ has called each of us. And finally, because the Gospel secures our future, we will never be separated from Christ but are guaranteed to live with Him forever, freed from these mortal bodies and free from this fallen world.
Do you know Christ and of that which Paul writes in these verses?
Of the several reasons mentioned as motivators to not deliberately choose to live in sin, what two motivate you the most, and why?
Share one area in your life that you would like to experience God’s resurrection power. Is it an area in which you have tried in your own strength to change and would like to experience His power to change you? Or, is it an area in which you would like to experience His resurrection power to enable you to do something for Him?
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