Monday, December 5, 2011

Shining Lights - Sacrifice of Faith

Final Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:14-18



Working out your salvation entails cultivating by faith in Christ a life of Christ-like humility and maturity.   Such Christ-like humility and maturity will enable you to consider others to be more important than yourself so you can put their interests before your own.   This is what it means to have in you the mind of Christ.  This is the mark of genuine servanthood.  It is this Christ-like maturity that fosters real unity in the church and in our relationships as believers.  Working out your salvation entails cultivating the mind of Christ, the mindset of one who in love seeks to serve others for the sake of the Gospel and to the glory of God.  Now this not only will promote the unity of the church it will also strengthen and advance the witness of the church.
 
Not only are you to obey the Lord by cultivating the mind of Christ, you also are to obey the Lord in living out what having the mind of Christ means.  You are to obey the Lord in all things from this mindset and frame of heart.  Such Christ-like humility leads you to obey the Lord in all things without grumbling and complaining. 

Why is Paul concerned that you obey in all things without grumbling and complaining?  This is a concern because the spirit of true obedience is killed when we grumble and complain as we obey.  Paul has in mind the experience of the first generation of Israelites who were delivered from Egyptian bondage.  Here they were following the Lord who delivered them from bondage and was bringing them to freedom while murmuring and complaining at the first sign of inconvenience or trouble.  Such a carping spirit killed their faith and obedience.  You do not possess the mind of Christ when you grumble and complain.  This is contrary to the nature of Christ-like humility and maturity. 

The second reason that Paul is concerned about the matter of rendering obedience to the Lord with grumbling and complaining is the effect this has on your witness.  Grumbling and complaining is the language of the world – of the crooked and twisted generation.  Christ-like humility and maturity are demonstrated in speech that is gracious and filled with thanksgiving and praise to God.  The reason that Paul admonishes you not to grumble and complain is so that you might present a real overt contrast to the crooked and twisted generation that demonstrates their rebellion to God in speech marked by grumbling and complaining.

If you do all things without grumbling and complaining then in the eyes of the world you will be blameless and innocent.  You will be known as children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation.  This is how Christ was seen by the generation to which he ministered.  Not all of them liked this about him.  Many hated him because of his humility and holiness.  Yet he offered a clear and overt contrast to his generation. 

To claim to be a follower of Christ at work, at your school, in your neighborhood or among your peers, yet complain and grumble about perceived hardships, setbacks, mistreatment by others or even inclement weather discredits your claim.  It is as you demonstrate Christ-like humility and maturity in your speech and conversation that people will take note of the contrast and will see you as children of God without blemish.  This is further described in terms of you shining as lights in the world.  This is the substance of your witness.  You in your own life, manner, conduct and especially your speech offer a stark yet bright contrast in the midst of the crooked and twisted generation.  By doing this you are doing what Jesus taught when he said, “You are the light of the world.  A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house”  (Matthew 5:14-15). 

It is only as you work out your salvation by cultivating the mind of Christ, which includes gracious and God-glorifying speech that you become blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish.  Of course in your person there is still much darkness and need for growth but here you are offering a clear contrast to the men and women of this world.  In this way your life, which includes your responses, attitudes, behavior and speech means that you shine like lights in the world.  Being blameless and innocent, children without blemish parallels shining as lights in the world. 

Now it is as you do this that you give support and credence to the message and promises of the word of life, which is the Gospel.  It is as you shine as lights in the world due to having the mind of Christ within you that exhibits speech that is gracious and God-honoring that your holding out the word of life becomes effective.   If you hold out the word of life without cultivating the mind of Christ including doing all things without grumbling and complaining then your life and speech discredit the Gospel. 

Working out your salvation therefore by cultivating genuine Christ-like humility and maturity enhances the unity and witness of the church.  Yet the service that you render as you seek to follow Jesus Christ in this way is also likened to a sacrifice of faith.  Paul saw the suffering and hardship he endured in order to present all believers as mature or complete in Christ to be a drink offering poured out on the sacrifice and service coming from their faith.  In this sense having the mind of Christ and imitating Christ in your behavior will mean that your life and work are to be seen as a sacrifice coming from your faith.  It is not meritorious because it comes from your faith in Christ. Nor is it dreary and morbid.  Rather Paul encourages you that as you pour out your life in ministering from the mind and heart of Jesus Christ then there is real and lasting joy to be found.  So Paul reminds you that working out your salvation by cultivating Christ-like humility and maturity is for the purpose of shining as lights and offering your life as a sacrifice of faith.  This is what it means to be a Christ-like servant of others for the glory of God. 

Work Out Your Own Salvation


"Work" by Photomath
Even More Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:12-13

The main emphasis in this section of Philippians 2:1-18 is found in verses 3 and 4.  Here is a call to humility.  It is a call to be obedient by becoming humble before God in your dealings with one another.  It is a call to self-denial.  It is a call to consider others to be more important than you are and therefore to put their interests before your own.  Now this is not something that we naturally want to do.  We also do not have the capacity to do this.  We resist and come up with all kinds of objections.   Paul knew this and therefore he gives us three powerful incentives that help us to obey in this matter.  Here are our resources to take up and put on the servant’s garments.  The first is the impact the gospel should be having on our hearts (verse 1).  The second is the great two-fold example of Christ’s humble self-denial and his subsequent exaltation.  The third incentive comes from the fact that God is working in you.  This should promote within your heart a sense of godly fear and awe so that you will soberly and with determination be sure that you are in faith obeying this call.

The first question that may come to mind is what does Paul mean when he says that you are to work out your salvation?  There are two points that must be stressed.  First this salvation is something that you already possess.  You cannot work out what you do not already have.  Second, you are to work out your salvation not work for your salvation.  Paul is not teaching that justification, reconciliation or adoption, which are necessary gifts of salvation that come from Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection, are to be worked for or earned.    Nor can you work or earn the gift of the new birth that produces by the presence of the Holy Spirit saving faith in your heart so that you trust in Jesus Christ for your forgiveness and justification.   What he is saying is that when it comes to your maturity, growth, endurance in faith and sanctification you have a part to play. 

You work out your salvation as you in faith press toward obeying God.  You work out your salvation by putting on a heart of humility and seeking to serve others for their good.  You work out your salvation by being sure you cultivate your faith in Christ and obey him.  You are justified by faith in Christ alone but true faith never remains alone but expresses itself through love.  You are justified by faith alone but you mature in personal holiness (you are sanctified) by faith in Christ, which leads to obedience.   You are sanctified as you in faith work out your salvation.  

There is a connection then between humility and obedience here.  In fact Paul is calling you to be obedient by cultivating humility.  There can be no humility (and hence obedience) apart from maturing in Christ.  You have a relationship with Christ but are you maturing in that relationship?  

The manner or frame of heart by which you are to do this includes the following responses and motives.

1.      You are not to do this with a concern to please or impress other people.  This is especially the case with your leaders.  God gives you elders and teachers to help you grow and to whom you are to be accountable but you are not to obey only or simply when you are with them.  

2.      You are to seek to cultivate humility and obedience in working out your salvation with fear and trembling because God is working in you.   Fear and trembling are not due to craven fear of condemnation but a holy love for the august majesty and glory of God.  If you have such fear due to you knowing that God is actually working in your life then this is a strong incentive to a life of humble self-denial and obedience as a servant for Jesus’ sake.

3.      You are to work out your salvation knowing that God is working in you to give you two gifts.  He works in you so that you have the desire and inclination to obey him and he works in you so that you have the ability to obey him.  Both are necessary if you are to work out your salvation.  You would not be able to work out your salvation if he were not working in you to will and to do!

4.      Finally, you are to work out your salvation with the heart’s desire to honor and promote the pleasure of God.  God works in you for his good pleasure.  He takes pleasure in the process of this work and it its final completion.  You are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works and as such you are called to work under him and for his pleasure.

Your personal maturity in Christ is cultivated as you work out your own salvation.  This produces in your heart a growing humility toward others and before God.  This leads to greater unity in your relationships and in the church and with this a more significant impact on the world in which we find ourselves as a colony of heaven’s citizens.  Pray that the Lord will speak to your heart and encourage you to pour everything that you can into doing your part in working out your own salvation, which is seen in the lifestyle of a humble and loving servant of the Gospel.

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Sharing in the Exalted Glory of Christ

The Cross Exalted by Lawrence OP
Still More Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:9-11

As we continue our journey into what it really means to be a servant to one another for Christ’s sake we have seen that there are tremendous incentives and glorious reasons to obey the call to consider others to be more important than you are.  There is not a command or call of God that you are able to do without the Gospel of God’s grace working within your heart.  There are no easy commands!   Each one requires God’s grace to do.  In fact all of Christ’s commands center on the issue of genuine love.  We are to love God and to love our brothers and sisters in Christ and even to love our enemies.  If you love then you are serving.  You are serving with the right motivation of heart. 

We object to serve and hesitate to show concern for one another (and especially for those difficult people) because we know that it will cost us something.  We will risk being hurt, rejected, shunned or at least not appreciated and thanked.  It also requires humility to serve this way.  Paul says, “in humility consider others to be more important than yourself.”  This call to serve exposes how self-centered we naturally are.  We are not more inclined toward genuine humility than we are to genuine servant love. 

It is for this reason that Paul reminds us and points us to the incentives of grace.  In verse one he reminds us of the impact that the Gospel should have on our hearts – our outlook and yes even on our affections and emotions.  In verses 5-11 he points us to the example of our Lord Jesus Christ.  This example has two parts to it.  First we see the self-denial and willing humility and obedience of the Son of God given for our sakes.  In his coming, taking on human nature as a servant and his death on the cross he was putting our interests before his own.   How can we who have personally benefited from his sacrificial service refuse to serve one another?   He, who was and is infinitely superior to us in every way, nevertheless considered us to be more important than himself.   It is inconsistent for us who say we trust in Christ and his cross work to object and refuse to follow in our Master’s steps here. 

Now we look at the second part to Christ’s example for us.  It is the reality of his glorious exaltation. Here, as we see, is contained the truth that we find expressed in Romans 8:17 where Paul says that you are heirs of God and fellow heirs of Christ, provided that you suffer with him in order that you may also be glorified with him.   As Sinclair Ferguson says “only what goes down will go up.”  The path to glory is the same one traveled by our Lord Jesus.  The cross comes before the crown but here is the promise to you who take up the servant’s towel – the crown will come!    What goes down will go up because God the Father will see to it.  So we need to look to the reality of Christ’s exaltation as what we have to look forward to and find the hope to endure the hard, painful and lonely path of the servant.  Here we find reason to hope.  We need to believe that the path of humility if walked with faith in Christ and love for him is the safest of all paths to walk because it is the only one that leads to glory.  

 So we find two realities here.  First if we are to share in his glory we must be willing to share in his suffering.  This also means that being glorified together with him is where we are to set our gaze.  Second, that God’s way is that humility precedes glory. Yet for the humble of heart and mind glory is a certainty.  Only what goes down will go up!  So what about you?  Does the fact that Christ’s suffering led to his glory and ultimate relief and that it is presented to you in this text as a pattern of what you may expect from the Father encourage you to endure in serving others?  If this doesn’t what will!

Having the Mind of Christ

More Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:5-8

Before you can really follow the example of Jesus Christ as a model for your life and relationships you must first have a saving relationship with him.  I was once talking with a member of the Hari Krishna sect who told me that he was a Christian too because he sought to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ.  I tried to point out to him that he had the cart before the horse.  He first needed to truly bow in faith before the Lord Jesus Christ and personally trust in Him as savior by looking to what he did on the cross for sinners.  He responded that all he needed to do to be both a Hari Krishna and a Christian is to follow Jesus as his example and that is what he was doing.   You cannot follow Jesus’ example in anything that he taught or did if you do not know him as your savior and Lord.  

However, if you do know him as your Savior and Lord then you must look to his example.   In fact what Paul is calling you to do in Philippians 2:2-4 is to walk in Jesus’ footsteps.  Before he brings you there he first reminds you of the Gospel.  This is what was stressed in the previous post on Philippians 2:1-4.  It is the impact that the Gospel should have on your heart and life, which is the first incentive to put off the garments of pride, self-importance and self-interest and take up the servant’s robe and towel of humility and obedience.  It takes real humility of heart and mind to consider others to be more important than you are.  It takes grace to put their interests before your own.  It takes obedience to do this because it is after all what you as a follower of Jesus Christ are called by him to do.

The second incentive that motivates you to be a servant to others is the example of the Lord Jesus Christ.  His example entails two realities that can really help you to overcome your objections to serve others and your fear in doing so – in taking the risk that serving others brings.  The first is the example of Jesus’ great humility and obedience.  The second is the example of his great deliverance and exaltation.   We will look at the first in this post. 

Paul says to us that we are to have the same mind as Christ.  This means that we are to continue to have the mind or frame of heart that Jesus had.   What he is referring to his the willingness of the pre-incarnate Son of God to deny himself and for our good become a human being for the purpose of being a servant and offering his life on the cross as the ultimate and sufficient atoning sacrifice for our sins.   We are to value the way the Son of God placed the interests of his people before his own.   He in essence did for us what Paul is calling us to do for one another in verses 2-4.

First he really considered or counted us to be more important than himself.  This is astounding.  Here the infinitely worthy and glorious Son of God who is inherently pure, holy and good and who shares in all the attributes of God considered those for whom he died to be more important than himself.  Who can fathom this!  On one level we certainly are not more important than the Son.  This is also true in terms of those we are often called to serve.  We are called to humble ourselves like Christ and in fact to consider others more important than ourselves.  Where this should take us is in putting the interests of others before our own.

This is indeed what Jesus did by humbling himself he put your interests before his own.  This is what Paul means when he says, “He who is in very nature God did not consider equality with God something to be grasped but emptied himself taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men.”  This does not mean that by virtue of his incarnation he ceased to be fully God or that he emptied himself of some of his divine attributes or glory.  His incarnation was not a subtraction but an addition.  The glorious person of the Son of God who possesses all the nature of God took on a new nature – a human nature.  In doing so he denied himself.  The phrase “he emptied himself” is a metaphor describing his self-denial.  He denied himself his rights and divine prerogatives.   He considered you to be more important that himself and placed your interests before his own.  His human nature was the servant’s garment that he wore to accomplish our salvation.  He possessed a servant’s attributes of humility and obedience.  This frame of mind took him to the shameless death on the cross. 

Now the point should be obvious.   If this is what your Lord and Savior did for you then how can you in faith and with a clear conscience object to doing this for one another?  He is inherently superior to you as the glorious Son of God and yet he considered you to be more important than himself.  He did not hold onto his divine rights but put them aside and humbled himself placing your interests before his own.  This was the frame of mind that he possessed which led him to the cross for you.  So, how can you who have benefited from his great self-sacrifice refuse to serve those who are equal to you as fellow human beings and fellow believers?    

Here is further perspective from Charles Spurgeon.

Jesus is the great teacher of lowliness of heart. We need daily to learn of Him. See the Master taking a towel and washing His disciples' feet! Follower of Christ, wilt thou not humble thyself? See Him as the Servant of servants, and surely thou canst not be proud! Is not this sentence the compendium of His biography, "He humbled Himself"? Was He not on earth always stripping off first one robe of honour and then another, till, naked, He was fastened to the cross, and there did He not empty out His inmost self, pouring out His life-blood, giving up for all of us, till they laid Him penniless in a borrowed grave? How low was our dear Redeemer brought! How then can we be proud? Stand at the foot of the cross, and count the purple drops by which you have been cleansed; see the thorn-crown; mark His scourged shoulders, still gushing with encrimsoned rills; see hands and feet given up to the rough iron, and His whole self to mockery and scorn; see the bitterness, and the pangs, and the throes of inward grief, showing themselves in His outward frame; hear the thrilling shriek, "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" And if you do not lie prostrate on the ground before that cross, you have never seen it: if you are not humbled in the presence of Jesus, you do not know Him. You were so lost that nothing could save you but the sacrifice of God's only begotten. Think of that, and as Jesus stooped for you, bow yourself in lowliness at His feet. A sense of Christ's amazing love to us has a greater tendency to humble us than even a consciousness of our own guilt. May the Lord bring us in contemplation to Calvary, then our position will no longer be that of the pompous man of pride, but we shall take the humble place of one who loves much because much has been forgiven him. Pride cannot live beneath the cross. Let us sit there and learn our lesson, and then rise and carry it into practice. 

Having the mind of Christ simply means that we like him consider others more important than ourselves and thereby put there interests before our own.   The pressure we feel against doing this is simply, "who will take care of our interests?"  For the Lord Jesus the answer was his Father.  For us the answer is that God in Christ has already done this for us in the Gospel.  Christ shepherds his sheep and through him we have the Father's love and the Spirit's fellowship.  The second incentive to take the basin and the towel of the Gospel servant is found in the fact that Christ had this very frame of heart and mind toward us when he became incarnate.  His willing humility for the sake of sacrifice remains a huge motivation to Gospel servanthood for the Gospel saturated heart! 

Saturday, December 3, 2011

The Gospel's Impact on Your Heart for the Servant's Life


Musings on Gospel Servanthood
Philippians 2:1-4

The New Testament describes your status as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ in several ways.  Through faith in Jesus Christ you have received the grace of adoption as a firstborn son of God (Galatians 3:26-4:5).   You are also a citizen of God’s kingdom.  You are part of the kingdom of priests (1 Peter 2:9 and Philippians 3:20).  You are also under the rule of God.  You are no longer a slave to sin because you have been set free and are now a slave to God (Romans 6:1-10).  Closely connected with this reality you are also to see yourself as called to be a servant of other believers for the sake of Christ.  This is what Paul is teaching in Philippians 2:2-4.   He is telling you that you are to see yourself as a servant of other believers.   As we really seek to put this into practice in our relationships we will be working toward cultivating unity.  

Yet being a servant is hard.  To really consider others to be more important than you are is not natural.  To look not only to your own interests but also to the interest of others is contrary to our latent self-centeredness.  There is also a great deal of risk involved in doing this.  If you take this to heart and really view others as more important – as VIP’s – and you put their interests before your own who is going to look out for your interests?   Being a servant is a menial, hard and thankless vocation.  It is lowly work.  This is why you are told to put off selfish ambition and vain conceit and put on a humble mind – a humble view of yourself.  It requires humility to be a servant of others.  In fact the only way you are to view other people is in terms of how you might serve them.  This is God’s way for our relationships, especially in our families and in the church.   It is as each of us who know the Lord Jesus Christ serve in this way that we will see godly unity in our relationships. 

Now there are three incentives that Paul gives us that should motivate us and enable us to obey this call to serve one another.   We will look at the first in this post and the others in following posts. The first incentive toward being a servant is the reality of the Gospel’s impact on your heart and life.  Has the Gospel impacted your life?  Is your outlook toward life (your circumstances, possessions and people) shaped by the realities of the Gospel?  Is your heart encouraged, filled with hope and strengthened by the fact that you are savingly united to the Lord Jesus Christ?  Does this fact have weight in your thinking?  The Gospel sets us free to be radical in our thinking and in our relationships.  The Gospel gives us the power to take up the servant’s towel and really consider others to be more important than we are.  The Gospel changes our hearts and gives us the desire to really put the interests of others before our own. 

In Philippians 2:1 Paul points you to the impact that the Gospel should be having on your life.  He does this to show you how deep and abundant your resources really are.  You are indeed richly blessed in Christ and this fact should impact your view of your situation.  Paul describes this impact and effect the Gospel should be having on your life by calling your attention to the following realities.  He uses an “if” “then” argument.  It goes like this.

“If you have any encouragement from being united to Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any partnership with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion…then take up the servant’s towel and view one another as VIP’s, whom you are called to serve.”

The Christian life is a call to really love other people, yet you do this not from a hole in the ground but from a mountaintop of grace.  The sad truth is that for many who profess faith in Jesus Christ the thought of really doing what Paul describes here is just plain scary or at least inconvenient.   We hold our life more precious than the Gospel, our time more precious than the Gospel, our property more precious than the Gospel, our dignity more precious than the Gospel, our money more precious than the Gospel.  This leaves us with all kinds of excuses and objections against really serving others with selfless love.   Paul knew this about us.  He knew that we would naturally object to his appeal, so he calls our attention to the riches of the Gospel and the impact those riches should be having on our hearts.   

He first reminds us of our union with the risen Christ.  Our relationship with Jesus should give us tremendous encouragement to overcome the hardships and difficulties of being a servant.  He then reminds us of Christ’s love for us – a love that is shared by God the Father.  The love of Christ should bring great comfort into our hearts to heal the hurts and wounds that serving others can and do cause.  He further reminds us of the fact that we are in partnership with the Holy Spirit.  We have fellowship with the Spirit and this means that we are not alone in serving others.  Serving others can be a lonely and risky business.  Yet because of the Gospel we have a unique partnership with the Holy Spirit, who helps us serve.  Finally, he reminds us that there should be within our hearts true tenderness of feeling and genuine compassion for the cares and grief of others.  This tenderness and compassion is there due to the fact that it is the tenderness and compassion of God that moved him to love us in our sin and send his Son to serve us and hence save us.  It is in the Gospel that we meet the tenderness and compassion of God.  This fact transforms us and will not leave us unmoved by the burdens and troubles of others.  You cannot really believe the Gospel and remain hardened toward the problems of your brothers and sisters in Christ.

This is the first of three incentives that should motivate you to obey the call to serve others.  The Gospel’s impact on your heart and mind should be a reality to you even now.  Its implications are very practical.  It is meant not only to bring you to glory but move you toward others in selfless love and joyful service.  Well, is it?