(Phil. 3:9-219And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: 10That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; 11If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. 12Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. 13Brethren, 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, 14I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. 15Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. 16Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing. 17Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so as ye have us for an ensample. 18(For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: 19Whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things.) 20For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: 21Who shall change our vile body, 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 3:9‑21)).
We still remind our readers that unless they have the Scripture itself before them and constantly refer to it, they are not likely to derive help from this article.
WE may gain very considerable insight into the character of a man if we are made acquainted with his real desires and aspirations. The passage before us gives us just that insight into the character of the Apostle Paul. His desires seem to range themselves under three heads, all found in the great sentence which runs through four verses. There is no full stop from the end of verse 7 to the end of verse 11.
First, he desired to win Christ. Second, to be found in Christ, in a righteousness which is wholly divine. Third, to know Christ, and flowing out of that to know an identification with Christ, in resurrection, in sufferings, in death. We are conscious at once that this third aspiration has great depths in it. We might truly have Christ for our gain, and for our righteousness, and yet be very poor and shallow in our knowledge of Christ. “That I may know HIM,” seems to have been the very crown of Paul’s desires.
But then, did not Paul know Him? Certainly he did, as indeed every believer knows Him. He knew Him in fact in very much larger measure than most believers know Him. Yet there is such an infinitude in Christ, such depths to be known, that here we have the Apostle still panting to know more and more. Have we not caught at least a little of the Apostle’s spirit? Do we not long to know our Saviour better—not merely to know about Him, but to know Himself in the intimacy of His love?
Our knowledge of Christ is by the Holy Spirit, and primarily through the Scriptures. Had we been on earth in the days of His flesh, we might have been acquainted with Him for a brief season “according to flesh.” But even so we should have to say, “yet now we know [Him thus] no longer” (2 Cor. 5:16,16Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. (2 Corinthians 5:16) N. Tr.). When His disciples spent those brief years in His company they had indeed a most wonderful experience, yet at that time they had not received the Holy Spirit and hence they understood but very little for the moment. It was only when they had lost His presence among them, but had gained the presence of the Holy Spirit, that they really knew the significance of all they had seen and heard. All that we know of Christ objectively is presented to us in the Scriptures, but we have the indwelling Spirit to make it all live in our hearts in a subjective way.
If the knowledge of the true living Christ, thus objectively presented to us, is brought subjectively into our hearts by the Spirit, it leads to a third thing; an acquaintance with Him in an experimental and practical way. To this Paul alludes in the latter part of verse 10. The order of the words is significant. The historical order in the case of our Lord was, sufferings, death, resurrection. Here resurrection comes first. Neither Paul nor any of us can contemplate sufferings or death save as we are fortified by the knowledge of the power of His resurrection. His resurrection is the pattern and pledge of ours. Indeed our resurrection altogether depends upon His.
As the Apostle realized in his spirit the power of Christ’s resurrection, he looked upon “the fellowship of His sufferings” as something actually to be desired. He even desired to be conformed to His death! Until the Lord comes we can only know the power of His resurrection in an inward and spiritual way, yet the fellowship of His sufferings and conformity to His death are of a very practical nature. Paul would taste of suffering in the cause of Christ and after the pattern of Christ—suffering which should be of the same order as those sufferings which Christ Himself endured at the hands of men. He would even die as a witness to the truth, seeing Christ thus died. He actually desired these things.
Let us each take a few quiet moments to interrogate our own hearts. Do we dire these things? We fear that to ask the question is to answer it. A few of us might be able to say, “I believe that through the Lord’s grace I could face these things if called upon to do so. But desire them? Well, no.” The fact that Paul did desire them is an eloquent witness to the wholly exceptional degree in which Christ personally had captured his heart, and the power of His resurrection had filled him with a holy enthusiasm. The fact is, he was like a well-trained athlete running in an obstacle race with a mighty enthusiasm for reaching the goal. The earlier verses have told us how he had flung away seeming advantages as being hindrances to his course. These verses tell us that he would be detained by no obstacle, he would tear his way through the barbed wire of suffering and plunge into the watercourse of death, if in such fashion he might reach his goal.
Now this is just the force of verse 11. The Authorized version would almost make it appear that resurrection is an attainment for us, with a measure of doubt as to whether we ever get there. A better rendering is, “If any way I arrive at the resurrection from among the dead” (N. Tr.). He would get there any way, through no matter what obstacles, even through sufferings and martyrdom. And not merely is it resurrection, but resurrection out from among the dead; that is, the first resurrection, of which Christ is the first-fruits. It is while waiting for that resurrection that we are to know the power of His resurrection from among the dead, and so be walking here as those who are risen with Christ.
Verse 12 to 14 show us that the thought of a race was present to the Apostle’s mind in writing. The word, “attained” in verse 12 is really “obtained” or “received” as a prize. He wished no one to think that he had already received the prize, or that he was perfected. The position rather was that he was still pursuing it. Christ Jesus had laid hold of him, but he had not yet laid hold of it. Still he was ardently in pursuit of it, stretching out like an eager athlete towards the prize of God’s calling on high in Christ Jesus.
The word “high” simply means “above.” The same word is used in Col. 3:1,1If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. (Colossians 3:1) where we are bidden to “seek those things which are above.” The prize, of the calling to the things above, is surely that full and perfect knowledge of Christ Himself, which will be possible for us when our bodies are changed and fashioned like unto His body of glory at His coming.
Paul thirsted to know Him yet more deeply, as we have seen, while still he ran the race with the prize of a full knowledge of Him at the end. His desire was so intense that it made him a man of one thing. He was marked by concentration and intensity of purpose, suffering nothing to divert him from his aim. This feature, of course, goes far to explain the amazing power and fruitfulness that characterized his life and ministry. The weakness and lack of fruit that so often marks our lives and ministry may be very largely traced to exactly opposite features in ourselves—lack of purpose and concentration. Time and energy is frittered away on a hundred and one things of no particular value or moment, instead of the one thing commanding us is it not so? Then let us seek mercy from the Lord that in an increasing measure we may be able to say, “One thing I do.”
This really is very much what verse 15 says. Paul rejoiced in the knowledge that others beside himself could be spoken of as perfect or full-grown in Christ: they would be like-minded with him in this matter. Others again had hardly made the same spiritual progress, and consequently might view things somewhat differently. These are exhorted to walk in the same way according to their present attainment, with the assurance that God would lead them on until they saw things in just that way in which they had been revealed to the Apostle himself. We need to take these two verses very much to heart, for they exemplify the way in which the more spiritual and advanced believer should deal with those of lesser attainments than himself. Our natural tendency is to look down on these who may be less advanced than ourselves, to despise them or even to attack them because of their lack of conformity to that which we see to be right. This tendency is specially pronounced when the advance, upon which we rather pride ourselves, is more a matter of intelligence than of real spirituality.
Verse 15 and 16, then, reveal the spirit of a true pastor in Paul; and in verse 17 we find that he is able to refer them to his own life and character as an example. One is reminded of the words in which one of the poets has described the pastor. He
“.... allured to brighter worlds,
And led the way.”
In verse 15 and 16 we see Paul alluring his weaker brethren to brighter worlds. In verse 17 we see him leading the way. Example is, as we know, an immense tiling. Paul could say to the Philippians as he did to the Ephesians at the close of his ministry, “I have spewed you and have taught you” (Acts 20:2020And how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have showed you, and have taught you publickly, and from house to house, (Acts 20:20)). With him there was practice as well as doctrine.
For this reason he could call upon his converts to be “followers” or “imitators” of himself He was to be an “ensample,” that is a type or model for them, and this was the more necessary since even in those early days there were many walking in such fashion as to deny what is proper to Christianity, though evidently they still claimed to be within the sphere of Christian pression. Here we have brought before us not immature believers, as in verse 15, nor believers in a very perverse frame of mind, as in verse 15 of chapter 1, but adversaries whose end is destruction. These are exposed with great vigor of language.
We must not fail to notice the spirit that characterized the Apostle in denouncing them. There was nothing petty or vindictive about him, but rather a spirit of compassionate grief. He wept even as he wrote the denunciation. Moreover, his care for the Philippians was so zealous that he had often warned them before as to these men.
His exposure falls under five heads.
1. They are enemies of the cross of Christ. Not perhaps of His death, but of His cross—of that cross which has before God put the sentence of death on marl, his wisdom and his glory.
2. Their end is destruction. This alone would make Paul weep as he thought of them.
3. Their God is their belly; that is, their own lusts and desires governed them: desires often of a gross nature, though, we suppose, not always such. Always however, in some shape or form, self was their god.
4. They gloried in that which was their shame. They had no spiritual sensibilities at all. Everything in their minds was inverted. To them light was darkness and darkness light: glory was shame and shame was glory.
5. Their minds were set on earthly things. Earth was the sphere of their thoughts and their religion. They carried on the tradition of those of whom the Psalmist spoke, saying, “They have set their eyes bowing down to the earth” (17:11).
And that tradition is still being carried on vigorously. The generation of earth-minders still flourishes. It has indeed multiplied amazingly within Christendom. The unbelievers who fill so many pulpits that are supposed to be Christian, and control the destinies of so many denominations, have an incontestable claim to this un-apostolic succession. The cross of Christ as pouring contempt on man’s pride and abilities they will have none of. Man —that is to say, self—is their god. They glory in things, such as their descent from the brute creation, which if true would only be to their shame. Earth fills their vision. Believers of the old-fashioned, New Testament type they ridicule as being “other worldly.” They are altogether for this world.
Now, “our conversation is in heaven.” It is really our commonwealth, our citizenship. Our vital associations are there, not here, as the enemies of the cross would teach. Heaven is our fatherland, and to heaven, as a matter of fact, we are going. But before we get there a great change as to our bodies is needed, and that change will reach us at the coming of the Lord. Our bodies of humiliation are going to be transformed into the likeness of His body of glory, and the working of His mighty power is needed for its accomplishment.
So our attitude is that of looking for the Saviour, who is coming forth from the heavens, to which we belong. He is coming as One who wields a power which will enable Him to ultimately subdue all things unto Himself. Is it not a touching thought that the very first exercise of that power of His is going to be in the direction of subduing the poor bodies of His saints, whether living or in the graves, into conformity to Himself? Then in His likeness we shall enter upon all that our heavenly citizenship involves.
So, we look for the Saviour. Let us keep the eyes of our hearts directed to the heavens, for the next move of decisive importance is coming from thence.
F. B. Hole.
Never count a temptation so triumphed over, so beaten off, that it will never assault you any more, Satan has been called Beelzebub, or the god of flies, some tell us, because he will not take a repulse, because he comes back again and again, because it is impossible so to drive him away that he will not return.