Sit at my feet and learn." He was so loyal a Jew that he had never lost the Hebrew speech; he was not only a religious Jew, he was a member of their strictest and the most self-disciplined sect; he had had in his heart a burning zeal for what he had thought was the cause of God; and he had a record in Judaism in which no man could mark a fault. The excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus.I think that we have to be the most blessed and privileged people in the world. (1.) Hence he speaks of the conflict which they once saw to be in him, and now heard to be in him. The tribe of Benjamin had the place of honour in Israel's battle-line, so that the battle-cry of Israel was: "After thee, O Benjamin!" Let this be the end of everything; before you get to the end of it, and when you do get to the end of it, rejoice in the Lord.. Philippians 3:14. , one thing) viz. I do. , the things that are behind) even the very part of the course that has been finished. ) that is literally, extending myself over. Hence that which judged and put aside religion after the flesh, righteousness after the law, all that was now left completely and for ever behind, and the saint is set on the road that nothing can satisfy him but being in the same glorious condition with Christ Himself. It is no rule, but an evasion. Are we living out that life which we have? When first he tasted it, he found it so sweet that he cared for none other. Verses 1-21. He pressed towards the mark. After a dead dog! Why, it was gain. They helped them, and in that sense "laboured" if you will. Hers is a more delicate place than that which becomes the man, and one which a man attempting it would awkwardly fill. It was not a decision made in a moment of impulse, but one by which I still stand fast.". I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound: every where and in all things I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. Oh, is it not awful to think, that the best proof of the love of Christ and of His glory is the very ground which the base heart of man turns into a reason for denying both His love and His glory? WebPhil 3:12-14 (NIV) These verses flashed through my mind last night as I watched the intense focus of an Olympic competitor in the downhill slalom race compete for the gold. And what is this but the unfolding of the truth in the heart and in the ways of the Christian? But life is more than simply being born into Gods family. He forgot himself in the gospel. The moment you look at what He is made, then it is to the glory of Him who thus exalted Him. It is perfectly possible for him to observe all the outward observances of religion and yet have hatred and bitterness and pride in his heart. And therefore, "whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." I am crucified with Christ, now I can experience the power of the resurrected life. Generally the NASB is more literal, translating a Greek word with the same English word wherever the Greek word occurs. Such is the thought that the apostle had before his soul of that which became the Christian. Click to enable/disable Google reCaptcha. When we are resurrected, we will have the same type of body that Jesus Himself had when he was resurrected. "This shall turn," says he, "to my salvation through your prayers, and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ." He no longer existed. It was not a reference to a kindly family pet, but it was a reference to those mean wild dogs that roamed Israel. I am sure he wasn't rejoicing in the circumstances themselves. (iii) He was of the tribe of Benjamin. We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. I just can't rise above it. So what do I do? They shared the conflict of the gospel; they partook of the reproach that covered those who preached it. He had proved long the power and the joy of Christ for every day, and for every circumstance of it. Or is it, on the settled judgment of the old as altogether and only self and sin, that we are habitually manifesting Christ? Or it alludes to a judicial appearance; so we are to be found of our Judge in peace, 2 Peter 3:14. When, under Rehoboam, the kingdom had been split up, ten of the tribes went off with Jeroboam and Benjamin was the only tribe which remained faithful with Judah ( 1 Kings 12:21). Roman dress was worn; Roman magistrates governed; the Latin tongue was spoken; Roman justice was administered; Roman morals were observed. If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. He desired not anything for himself, but only what should abound to their account in the day of Jesus Christ. Reason and sense are out of the question, though reason must reject a creature's becoming God. "Don't know what is going to happen tomorrow, so hey, I will jump this ship and get on this one and I will gladly throw overboard the old life, with the struggle and the effort in my flesh, in order to live this new life after the Spirit, believing and trusting in Jesus Christ, to do for me what I really can't do for myself. 87-88; and S. Lewis Johnson Jr., "The Out-Resurrection from the Dead," Bibliotheca Sacra 110 (1953):139-46; and Lightner, "Philippians," p. 7 But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. "Being confident," he therefore says, "of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ, even as it is meet for me to think this of you all." Long before them, Mill had given his judgment in favour of the more ancient reading; and Wetstein repeated it apparently with approval. 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. It is the apostle giving us what his heart was occupied with when he could not go forth in the activities of work, and when it seemed as if he had nothing to do. And Jesus said, "Get thee behind me, Satan, you offend me." On my account, God writes righteous.Now, the problem of being righteous by my efforts, by my works, I may be doing right, I may have lived all of my life up to this point by the rules, having never violated, sailing along in good shape, and there is written across my name, righteous. But his spirit was as bright as ever, his joy perfectly fresh, deep, and flowing. Oh, it is a blessed thing, that in the midst of the sorrows of this world, the Holy Spirit knows how thus to blend the name of Christ, as the sweetest balm, with the sorrow, however bitter, and to make the very memory of the grief pleasant because of Christ, who deigns to let Himself into it all. 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. At any rate, such is the picture that the Holy Spirit gives of him there. But all in heaven and on earth shall be in reconciliation with God and headed up in Christ, with whom the Church shall share the unbounded inheritance. When Saul is seeking to take his life, David's demand is: "After whom do you pursue? I do not say that the fruits of the loving service of any one of them will be forgotten there; nor that even glory will not bear the impress of that which has been really of the Holy Ghost here. I might attain unto - I may come to, or may secure this object. God was pleased, even whilst the apostle was alive, to set him aside and to prove the power of faith where he was not. This he must wish for them, if he wished them well. Phinehas had saved the people from the wrath of God, and been given an everlasting priesthood, because he was zealous for his God ( Numbers 25:11-13). WebPhilippians 3:11-14 Meaning and Commentary INTRODUCTION TO PHILIPPIANS 3 In this chapter the apostle cautions the Philippians against false teachers, whom he describes Here the King James Version is dangerously misleading. [Note: W. E. Vine, Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, 1:86.] I was circumcised when I was eight days old: I am of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin: I am a Hebrew, born of Hebrew parents. God, I thank you that I am so good," that pride and self-righteousness. "So Paul, he had done his best to clothe himself in righteousness by works, but then he came in to that glorious knowledge of Jesus Christ, and, "No longer," he said, "to be found in my own righteousness, which is of the law, my own making, my own work, but I will gladly exchange that for the glorious righteousness which God has accounted to me through my faith in Jesus Christ." Click to enable/disable _ga - Google Analytics Cookie. But Paul didn't stop there did he? I. No; it is practical. It is something that I could have never made for myself, but it was given to me by Lady Bountiful. One possibility is that Paul was thinking of his spiritual co-resurrection with Christ. Looking to the Lord, as it is the life-breath of love, so it adds to the value of brotherly kindness in its season. "That I may know him." Habitually, indeed throughout this epistle, we find the word " me," and a very different "me" from the "me" of Romans 7:1-25. It was due to His humiliation and obedience; and so it is here treated. And this puts the doctrine, as far as there is doctrine in the epistle, in a very clear light. 11:24-28). We expect to eat bread and to drink water every day; and we must listen again and again to the truth which is the bread and the water of life. They stubbornly refused to be assimilated to the nations amongst whom they lived; they retained faithfully their own religion and their own customs and their own laws. WebThe allusion is to the white line, or mark, which the runners in the Olympic games made up to, and to which he that came first received the prize; and by which the apostle intends the Lord Jesus Christ, who is ( skopov) , "the scope", or "mark", of all the thoughts, purposes, and counsels of God, to which they all aim, and in which they all For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. But whatever might be their own proper joy, whatever might be their delight in that which God works in the church, they had full and simple-hearted fellowship with His good news. They are stagnating now. WebPhilippians 3:1-11 Bible Study Commentary And Questions. Let us not mistake in this; let us not be driven from it by a too common misuse. 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 ). No doubt the new creation is essentially neither male nor female; it is not a race perpetuated in a fleshly way; but all things are of God and in Christ. And now she was in her senior year. WebOther Commentaries. the love of Christ everywhere! WebPart of the perceived problem here is the assumption that Paul told only one version of Christs story. It can be a very dangerous thing.On the other hand, I can recognize that I have a problem with sin, with myself, with my flesh. Philippians 3:1114: Can I Really Have Assurance? You may be perfectly sure of an answer when you make known your requests: therefore let it be with thanksgiving. Thus we see here the power of a risen and a heavenly Christ, not now treated doctrinally as in 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 or 2 Corinthians 5:1-21 and elsewhere, but as that which bears on the Christian for the constant experience of every day. John Piper @JohnPiper. (b) It is the guarantee of the life to come ( Romans 8:11; 1 Corinthians 15:14 ff.). "I'll show you a mystery, we are not going to all sleep, but we are all going to be changed in a moment, in a twinkling of any eye. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.". What the happiness of heaven is: it is to apprehend that for which we are apprehended of Christ. Faith is the ordained means of actual interest and saving benefit in all the purchase of his blood. It is not love growing less but more, and this abounding in intelligence and knowledge, which could not be looked for in saints just beginning their career. He had put all, as it were, into the hands of Christ, who had Himself given him His own comfort about it. He looks upon himself to be in a state of imperfection and trial: Not as though I had already attained, or were already perfect,Philippians 3:12; Philippians 3:12. Oh, what a shame. THE WORTHLESSNESS OF THE LAW AND THE VALUE OF CHRIST ( Php_3:8-9 ). But Paul said. Get Your Bible Minute in Your Inbox Every Morning. Observe, The apostle was as ambitious of being sanctified as he was of being justified. Something that I could never purchase for myself, something that I could never do for myself. He provides his own life as an example to the Philippians to follow as opposed to the false teachers. And so, it is an established righteousness. Other Scripture points to the judgment seat of Christ as the time when God will make this distinction, not the resurrection. should not of itself have the same sense as that conveyed, with more propriety of expression (and for that reason likely to be adopted in the early Uncial MSS. Many times the worst thing you can do is share with your friends what the Lord has laid upon your heart to do. Indeed Paul did. So here at the beginning he simply takes the place of servant with Timothy, owning all the saints as well as the officials in their place: "To all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons." In this chapter the apostle cautions the Philippians against false teachers, whom he describes as evil men, and exhorts them to walk as they had him, and other faithful ministers for an example. body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able to subdue all things unto himself." But in it and beyond it all there was joy. The name of Christ Himself is the true centre of the saints; unto this the Spirit gathers. So, by the trial and error method, the redoing a lot of the seams and all, and the hem wasn't really straight, but it was a good effort. Their mind isn't after the Spirit and after the things of the Spirit, they are more concerned and interested in the types of cars they drive and the things of the flesh and the earthly things, than they are the things of the Spirit. Benjamin was the child of Rachel, the well-loved wife of Jacob, and of all the twelve patriarchs he alone had been born in the Promised Land ( Genesis 35:17-18). Bible Minute in your Inbox every Morning the Christian picture that the was. His spiritual co-resurrection with Christ I still stand fast. `` heart and in the circumstances themselves was due his! Found it so sweet that he cared for none other of him there worn ; Roman magistrates ;. 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