The Gnostics were heretics who tried to intellectualize Christianity and make a kind of philosophy out of it. But then this monumental statement. This is proper to give us measures in all our service, and to quicken us every step we take; and it is of God, from whom we are to expect it. ", Only he desires that their conversation should be as it became the gospel of Christ. It is no trouble to me to write the same things to you, and for you it is safe. The story of the beginning of that sign is in Genesis 17:9-10. Such is the sense of it here. Alter and Matthaei followed according to their plan the manuscripts before them; but the latter was too good a scholar not to feel the difference, though he appears to impute it to a corrector for the sake of elegance in his second edition. There were those who distorted the principle of Christian liberty. Remembering that, we try to paraphrase this passage and to set down, not so much what Paul says, as what was in his mind. That was a thing which he never forgot. "Our conversation is in heaven; from whence we wait for the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour" for this is the true meaning of it. Whatever he needed, love is never itself but in unselfish action and suffering. and the fellowship of his sufferings ( Philippians 3:10 ). They shared the conflict of the gospel; they partook of the reproach that covered those who preached it. The past has been glorious, it has been exciting to see what God has done, but you know, I am more excited about what God is going to do.So. Accordingly he prays for them, that as they had shown this true and unabated love for himself as Christ's servant, so their love might abound yet more and more, and this too in knowledge and in all judgment. Furthermore the resurrection he said he hoped to attain was still future whereas he had already experienced spiritual resurrection with Christ to newness of life (Romans 6:1-11; Galatians 2:20). (i) He sets down what we might call the indestructibility of Christian joy. This is one of the main features of our chapter. There is His own personal glory; and this first. WebPhilippians - (NIV Application Commentary) by Frank S Thielman (Hardcover) $26.99When purchased online Out of Stock About this item Specifications Suggested Age: 22 Years and Up Number of Pages: 256 Genre: Religion + Beliefs Sub-Genre: Biblical Commentary Series Title: NIV Application Commentary Format: Hardcover Publisher: Zondervan Academic So Paul states his attainments. I can be honest with myself. According to the true meaning it is not others, but those very sisters that he commends to Epaphroditus in desire for their blessing, "which labour with me in the gospel [or seeing that they shared the conflict of the gospel with me]." It is the personal experience of another person. But such things as I could humanly reckon as profits, I came to the conclusion were all loss for the sake of Jesus Christ. For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit ( Philippians 3:3 ), Paul was constantly emphasizing that the physical rites had no value except there be a corresponding spiritual experience, that the circumcision of the flesh accounted for nothing. For our conversation [citizenship] is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall change our vile body [or our body of humiliation], that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself ( Philippians 3:20-21 ). "Let's not get too," Paul said, "involved in the world. They were those who denied that there was any law at all in the Christian life. (iii) As far as zeal went, he had been a persecutor of the Church. He had been born in the Gentile city of Tarsus, but he had come to Jerusalem to be educated at the feet of Gamaliel ( Acts 22:3) and was able, for instance, when the time came, to speak to the mob in Jerusalem in their own tongue ( Acts 21:40). Our citizenship isn't here. There is, however, a sure and only divine standard: as far as we have attained, our call is to walk in the same path. Faith is the ordained means of actual interest and saving benefit in all the purchase of his blood. Click to enable/disable _gat_* - Google Analytics Cookie. "The prize" is "the crown of It was the teaching of these Jews that, if a man wished to be saved, he must earn credit in the sight of God by countless deeds of the law; and, further that salvation belonged to the Jews and to no one else, and that, before God could have any use for him, a man must be circumcised and, as it were, become a Jew. And with a lot of people, there is just a lot of bad experiences in the past. So Paul proves to these Jews that he has the right to speak. He had proved long the power and the joy of Christ for every day, and for every circumstance of it. Then he turns to what had drawn out the epistle. That is to say, he will never glory in any of his achievements or use them as an excuse for relaxation. They were bonds in Christ; how then could he be impatient under them? Perhaps he meant he wanted to experience suffering for Christs sake and was even willing to die for Him to arrive at his resurrection in a manner that would enable him to face His master unashamed. "Jesus" is His own name, His personal name. the love of Christ everywhere! Thus the true bearing of the passage is, that from the first the eye of faith is fixed steadily on the end of the journey. Long before them, Mill had given his judgment in favour of the more ancient reading; and Wetstein repeated it apparently with approval. The question is at once settled as a matter of faith. He says that the Lord will circumcise their hearts to make them love him ( Deuteronomy 30:6). Observe, [2.] He lives a focused life. in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Every teacher must be more anxious to listen to God than to propagate his own opinions or he, too, will run the risk of being a worker of evil, even when he thinks that he is a worker of righteousness. Who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself. He was Jehovah, equal with God the Father. The fellowship of His sufferings.Our flesh always rebels against suffering. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more [If anyone might have something to boast in the flesh. There is something which ought to be made known unto men, namely, the not fighting for your rights. Oh, what a shame. If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. Why? But it frequently happened that they forgot their own language. The Jew in essence trusted himself ; the Christian in essence trusts God. It was in the body that Christ rose and it is this body which he sanctifies ( 1 Corinthians 6:13 ff.). Far from him was the vanity of being the man first to preach Christ in the great metropolis. WebPhilippians 3:611 The New International Version (NIV) 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless. "My desire is to know Him, and to be found in Him." He was for a considerable time a prisoner. Heaven is the prize of the high calling; to brabeion--the prize we fight for, and run for, and wrestle for, what we aim at in all we do, and what will reward all our pains. It is not simply intellectual knowledge, the knowledge of certain facts or even principles. If he desired for them that they should be without one stumble till the day of Christ, it was the purpose to which grace had girded up his own loins. 13 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, 14 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. The cross was essential and necessary for Him to experience the power of the resurrection. Would God in this case let His servant be so long kept away from the gospel or the church? 165-77, for refutation of the partial rapture view.] It is not Paul's aim to know about Christ, but personally to know him. They were going to have the senior prom. Let me press this, because alas! How can they say . Christ was "without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation." And what is this but the unfolding of the truth in the heart and in the ways of the Christian? Strange way of God! In by far the most of them it does not signify what we might call abstract perfection but a kind of functional perfection, adequacy for some given purpose. John Piper @JohnPiper. Had he not been God, he could not have been our righteousness; the transcendent excellence of the divine nature put such a value upon, and such a virtue into, his sufferings, that they became sufficient to satisfy for the sins of the world, and to bring in a righteousness which will be effectual to all that believe. It was the natural cry of man, "Spare yourself from suffering." 1. Robert Wilkin, the writer quoted above, later changed his view and adopted the "spiritual resurrection view. but for you it is safe. Skubala has two meanings. We have only begun to see the work of God; we have only begun to see the glory of God poured out. 3. It is not a question of acceptance in Christ. There is the present joy of Christ; but this does not content the soul. WebScholars who interpret Phil 2:6-11 as an early Christian hymn point out that it contains a rich vocabulary, a number of poetic elements (e.g., parallelism, paradox, climax), and that, with only one or two small changes, it can stand alone as an independent composition. It would be mere independence of Christ if he could have stood without a single flaw, as blameless, in fact, as in a certain sense outwardly he was under the law, until the Spirit of God gave him to see what he was in God's mind. You see, Jesus could not experience the power of the resurrection until the cross. "You see, the angel doesn't have to erase the righteousness and then rewrite it, or whatever. And I may pull over to the side of the freeway and decide not to pass him so that I won't be a bad witness, and bow my head and say, "God, I am sorry. "Let your moderation be known unto all men," strengthened by this consolatory truth, "the Lord is at hand. He will reach it only on the day when Christ returns and raises the righteous from death. They declared that they were within the grace of God and that, therefore, it did not matter what they did; God would forgive. There is always danger of these, and the more so where there is activity among souls. doctrine as this to the Philippians. Long, long before this, the great teachers and the great prophets had seen that circumcision of the flesh is by itself not nearly enough and that there was needed a spiritual circumcision. And He said, "I am Jesus. This is where at least some of the Jews made the mistake. That which men call by this name is really the trial of what flesh is under law much more than experience of Christ. The one preach Christ of contention, not sincerely," nor was this all, but "supposing to add affliction to my bonds.". This joyful resurrection the apostle pressed towards. As he who runs a race never takes up short of the end, but is still making forwards as fast as he can, so those who have heaven in their eye must still be pressing forward to it in holy desires and hopes, and constant endeavours and preparations. How rich and full he was of the goodness of the God he had proved so long and could recommend so well! To me," may each say truly, "to live is Christ.". I. The Lord Jesus not only comes down into the place of servant in love among men, but goes down into the last fortress of the enemy's power. See 1 Thessalonians 4:6-18.". He had put all, as it were, into the hands of Christ, who had Himself given him His own comfort about it. The expression intimates that we have need to strive for him and after him, and that all is little enough to win him. This epistle treats of daily sorrows and difficulties, yet does it manifestly overflow with joy, which all the dangers, sufferings, and trials only made the more triumphant and conspicuous. The very language Paul uses to describe the Law--excrement--shows the utter disgust for the Law which his own frustrated efforts to live by it had brought him; and the joy that shines through the passage shows how triumphantly adequate he found the grace of God in Jesus Christ. In front of people they can act very holy and sanctified and excited and exhilarated in the things of the Lord, but when they get away from the stage, they can have filthy mouths; they can tell dirty jokes, they are living a two-faced life. The hope and prospect of it carried him with so much courage and constancy through all the difficulties he met with in his work. a. For the prize of the high calling. There is really no value to say I counted those things loss for Christ thirty years ago, if in the meantime I have picked them back up and I am encumbered with them again. WebJamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary 14. high callingliterally, "the calling that is above" (Ga 4:26; Col 3:1): "the heavenly calling" (Heb 3:1). Here we see One who is in glory, and on whom the eye of the believer is set; and accordingly the judgment of evil is from the side of heaven. Yet the truth as to this abides, not only at the starting-point, but all the way through. The history of the Jews had dispersed them all over the world. Select a Passage. This chapter then looks for the working of the gracious feelings of Christ Himself in the Christian individually, showing us, first, the fulness of them all in Christ in contrast with the first Adam. But this Christian joy enables a man to accept even them with a smile. It is a description that might almost do for Christ himself, so high is the standard for those that belong to Christ. Moreover the term "out-resurrection" seems to stress separation from others at the time of resurrection rather than separation from others following resurrection. and have no confidence in the flesh ( Philippians 3:3 ). Seven times in the book of Hebrews, the author captures the heart of Christianity in a simple, wonderful command: draw near. We cannot know everything that Paul meant by this phrase; but the Resurrection of Christ is the great dynamic in at least three different directions. But Paul is willing to follow Jesus to the cross. The tribe of Benjamin had a special place in the aristocracy of Israel. Paul evidently expected that the Rapture could happen before he died (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17). It is ignorance and absurdity to answer such scriptures by the text, that in Christ there is neither male nor female. The Lord apprehended me, but when He did, He had a purpose in mind. 3:2-3 Be on your guard against the dogs; be on your guard against the evil workers; be on your guard against the party of mutilation; for we are the truly circumcised, we who worship in the Spirit of God; we whose proud boast is in Jesus Christ, we who place no confidence in merely human things. Thus "forgetting those things which are behind" refers to the progress that we may make. The lost must bow; the devils must bow; the lake of fire must own the glory of Him who has power to cast them there, as it is said, "unto the glory of God the Father." But Paul the apostle said, "Look, I don't consider that I have attained; I don't look at myself as being perfect, the work of the Lord is not yet complete in me.". Other people would have merely thought of or seen bonds under the Roman emperor, the bonds of that great city that ruled over the kings of the earth. 7 But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. Another, less likely, possibility is that Paul meant faithful Christians will experience a better resurrection than unfaithful believers. 2. All we want is, that the eye of faith be a little open; but it is only Christ before the eye that keeps it open. I have not yet accomplished that purpose. i. Jesus was not merely resuscitated from the dead in the same body. Christ is the sovereign balm for every wound; and it was the apostle's joy, whatever men's spirit might be, not only to enjoy Christ himself, but that His name was being proclaimed far and wide by many lips, that souls might hear and live. We do not tire of the foods which are the essentials of life. WebFor we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit ( Philippians 3:3 ), Paul was constantly emphasizing that the physical rites had no value except there be a He knew that the only way to peace was to abandon the way of human achievement and accept the way of grace. All error is founded on a misuse of a truth against the truth. Their sympathies, drawn out by the afflictions of the apostle in his work, were the workings of the Holy Spirit in their souls at least the instincts of a life that was of Christ, and that judged in view of Him, and not according to appearances. So, those things which we once gained, those things which were once so important to me, I counted loss, and I forget those things which are behind, because I am pressing forth for those things which are before. It just doesn't work. And if anyone is otherwise minded in any way, this too God will reveal to him. "Filled," says he, "with the fruit of righteousness, which is by Jesus Christ;" for it is all supposed to be fruit, not isolated fruits here and there, but as a whole, which adds greatly to the strength of it. It speaks of believers who were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. All believers will be resurrected, but there is a better one for those who endure. The word if can be translated as since: Since I will attain to the resurrection from the dead is the But the weakest of saints (how much more this greatest of the apostles!) Philippians 3:1. Not that all shall be delivered and centred in Him, but that all must bow. I. As he went on, the cheerfulness and composure of his countenance were amazing to all the spectators." What a God is ours, so to treat that which, connected with the world, Christ Himself calls "unrighteous mammon!" But she went down to the dime store and picked out the best that she could afford, bought a simplicity pattern. b. So, the exhortation in the scripture is always that of rejoicing in the Lord. should have been altered to . "My joy and crown," "my dearly beloved." For no personal end did he mention their grace; "but I desire fruit that may abound to your account." The effect upon the individual is usually pride and the developing of a judgmental attitude.As the Pharisee who went in before the Lord and said, "Father, I thank you that I am not as other men. Yet these shall bow, no less than those in heaven, or on earth. forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before ( Philippians 3:13 ), We haven't seen anything yet. The disciples found it difficult to handle when Jesus started talking about the suffering that he was to experience, and Peter cried out, "Lord, be that far from thee." Christian worship is not a thing of ritual or of the observation of details of the Law; it is a thing of the heart. There is nothing so high as that which we all have been made in our blessed Lord. The apostle loved to give God's place and value to everything; and here it is the mingling of Christ with the circumstances of every day. Other Scripture points to the judgment seat of Christ as the time when God will make this distinction, not the resurrection. So, she decided that she would make for herself a new dress for the senior prom. Treat that which, connected with the world, Christ himself, so to that... Drawn out the best that she could afford, bought a simplicity pattern writer quoted above later... When Christ returns and raises the righteous from death his sufferings ( Philippians 3:10 ) could afford, bought simplicity... Law at all in the flesh ( Philippians 3:3 ) something which ought to be made known unto men! 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