Trusting in Christ and Pressing on to Maturity
I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another I will experience the resurrection from the dead! I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us. Let all who are spiritually mature agree on these things. If you disagree on some point, I believe God will make it plain to you. But we must hold on to the progress we have already made. [NLT]Phil 3:10-16
These seven verses are filled with advice for our progress. One could even say for our metamorphosis, but maybe I am thinking that term because I am focused on rocks. I have rocks in my head at the moment, creating a new portion of Deeper Bible. Each time we move to a new portion of God’s Word, we need to set it in the wider context. Most of us are used to reading our Bibles in byte-sized chunks. The chunks given to us by the Bible publishers. I am talking about the pericope, the small titled portions of the Bible, the sections with the headings on them. But I have told you already they were not in the original writer’s mind. We are in the midst of an epistle, an old word for a letter. But stop and think what the word “epistle” means to you. I think for most of us it means a long letter. In the case of Paul’s letter to the Philippians we are dealing a short epistle. It’s not as long as Romans or the Corinthian letters. But it is still structured the same. It all flows from Paul’s mind or we could say from his pen (feather). We must stop at times and look back at the big picture to see how the pieces combine. Here is a slide from the first level of Deeper Bible to explain what I mean.
The large circle (dot) in the middle of my diagram represents whatever portion of the Bible is in focus for us. It could be a word, a sentence, a paragraph or a percope. So with each step we take forward, we need to set the word or the passage in its context. Let’s take a look back to what I did for you in Bible Gem 1960 and 1961.
In Gem 1960 I divided the remaining section as I believe Paul meant it.
- Don’t Trust the Righteousness that Comes From the Law; Trust The Kind Christ Gives (Phil 3:1-16)
- Follow My Example; Be a Citizen of Heaven (Phil 3:17-21)
- Stand Firm, Don’t Worry, Pray About Everything (Phil 4:1-7)
- The Secret of Contentment & My Thanks For Your Support (Phil 4:8-23)
But in Gem 1961 I took the first section, verses 3:1-16 and divided it into smaller units, when I talked about splitters and joiners. Sometime we have to recognise that our flow of thoughts are divided in smaller portions which are still joined together. Thinking like that, I divided Philippians 3:1-16 into smaller potions of related thought in order to get a better understanding of how Paul’s thoughts flowed. The sections I came up with are what we are working on. Namely:
- A warning against false teachers (3:1-3)
- Saul putting his confidence in his own righteousness (Phil 3:4-6)
- Counting his past achievements as dung (Phil 3:7-9)
- Trusting in Christ and pressing on to maturity (Phil 3:10-16)
I did that while making reference to the connectedness of the whole. How some commentators look at the first segment – A Warning against false teachers – and the words in it “I never get tired or telling you these things”. They don’t see a connectedness to this letter we are reading and come up with the idea that Paul must have mentioned this in an earlier letter to the Philippians. That is just wild speculation because they hadn’t seen that Paul is just simply using the Judaisers as an example of the false teachers he mentioned earlier. Do you see the difference it makes to see Paul’s letter as something which has flowed from thoughts as they have spilled out as opposed to over-analysing it. Expect to find thoughts which tumble over one another but are connected together. I trust you can now see how a title which may have been given to a part of the Bible in the 19th Century is more descriptive, like “Don’t trust the Righteousness that Comes from the Law; Trust The Kind Christ Gives” than dividing the passage into smaller unconnected portions just because we haven’t seen how the whole fits together.
As an ex-Pharisee, Paul is looking at what he once passionately believed, even to the point of killing those who opposed his worldview, namely Christians. Paul, who was once a Judaiser, has undergone a remarkable transformation. He is now looking back on what once was dear to him and seeing it in another light. Now the things he held as precious in the past are considered garbage. (I won’t use that unsanitized word again in this cleansed Gem.) He has learned to trust Christ and rely on His righteousness to save him. Now he turns from the teaching of traditional Judaism to rely on the Promised Messiah and His righteousness – God’s way of making us right with Himself apart for the Law. You need to look at Philippians in a larger block much like we ought to look at Romans in larger chunks. Look at Romans 1:18 and Romans 3:21 together and contrast them.
- For God’s wrath is being revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold down the truth in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18)
- But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets: (Romans 3:21)
Note how these two verses are contrasted and in fact set apart two different sections of Romans.
The wrath of God is being revealed cf the righteousness of God has been revealed (in Christ).
These large sections in Romans are set against one another. We need to learn to read with macro-lense glasses in order to take in the grandeur of Paul’s letter to the Romans. In Philippians, we need to do something similar but on a smaller scale.
Now we are ready to look at this last portion of Philippians with the right glasses on. Before I start to break it apart for you, read the portion we have above, Philippians 3:10-16 in the light of what we have looked at in detail before. Consider it in the light of both titles I used to cover it on the macro scale and on the micro scale.
- Don’t Trust the Righteousness that Comes From the Law; Trust The Kind Christ Gives (Phil 3:1-16)
- Trusting in Christ and Pressing on to Maturity (Phil 3:10-16)
While you read this smaller section, pay attention to the details. The words used and how Paul has put them together. I am sure you have got the idea by now and I don’t have to say anything more. We will begin our more in-depth look at this passage in the following Bible Gem.
We can’t watch TV for 3 hrs then read the Bible for 3 min & expect to grow spiritually.
Rick Warren
Education is what you get when you read the fine print. Experience is what you get if you don’t.
Ian Vail
“The more you read, the more things you’ll know. The more you learn, the more places you’ll go!”
Dr. Seuss
What are you reading this morning? News, Bible or Blogs?
Robb Thompson
When I read about the evils of drinking, I gave up reading.
Anonymous