ES/PHIL/04 Philippians 1:7-11
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7 Indeed, it is right for me to think this way about all of you, because I have you in my heart, and you are all partners with me in grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. 8 For God is my witness, how deeply I miss all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. 9 And I pray this: that your love will keep on growing in knowledge and every kind of discernment, 10 so that you may approve the things that are superior and may be pure and blameless in the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God.
Last week’s Paul talked of the great hope that the Philippians will indeed finish what has been started:
being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;
It is this same hope that we have. That what God started in us He will finish that also helps us to go on with the help of the Holy Spirit.
7-10
Paul here says it is right for me to ‘think’ this. In the NIV it says ‘feel’ this. Both are kind of right but it is not a particular thought or a feeling that is given here but rather a mindset. His thoughts and feelings are one. It is natural for him to have this mind about them for he has long practised thinking in this way about the Philippians.
Mindsets are very important. We all have them. And they very much dictate the way we live out our lives. Right mindsets, though, take discipline to achieve. We all know when it comes to learn things for the first time we have to work hard on how to put it into practice.
For example when we learn to drive we have got to put the clutch down, put into gear, gently lift the clutch, hand on the handbrake, gently apply fuel, look in mirror, signal, apply more fuel, lift clutch and we move off and after doing all that judder to a stop because we lifted the clutch too quick!
And then we have to do the whole thing again with the added pressure of other drivers behind honking their horns. It took practice for these things to come right and even by the time we had taken the test and passed or failed for the 3rd time it was not until sometime later that all these things became second nature, it became our mindset.
This is how it is with the disciplines of the Christian life.
To start each day with thankfulness instead of moaning, to give the day into God’s hands, to ask Him for things, to pray for others, to pray for the Church, for Manselton, for government, for the nation, for other nations, for Israel. To read Scripture, to meditate on a verse, to pray through Scripture. To wait upon God, to listen, to obey.
These things are not natural to us but are we disciplined enough for these things to become second nature, to be our mindset?
Paul’s mindset was a step further, his included joy. This was a man who suffered incredibly yet was a man full of joy. This letter, as we know, was written whilst he was in prison. Prison is not an easy place to be – it isn’t easy to be imprisoned today and to cope with freedom being taken, dealing with other prisoners but it was harder in earlier days – note here that he says ‘my chains’. Perhaps we haven’t considered this but Paul was literally chained to his guards and to the wall – not something that would happen today in UK jails.
It is plain from reading this that the Philippians are already those kinds of Christians who fellowship with Paul in his sufferings are also suffering the same kinds of things such as being in prison and they were keen in defending and preaching the Gospel and as such are partakers in this grace. Grace here means the Gospel: the Gospel being Good News. Good News being that God has come down to set us free from the bondage of sin reconciling us again to Himself. God came down. He has come to meet us. Paid for our sin on the cross. Have we asked Jesus into our lives to be the one who is in charge, to be our Saviour? These Philippians though were partakers in the same grace as Paul.
And as Ambrosiaster said:
People who share the same faith have good reason to rejoice together in the hope of future immortality and glory.
And this despite what our present circumstance is.
Yet whilst all this is going on to him his mindset included thinking about and being concerned for and praying for those who fellowshipped with him. God is my witness, he says, how much he longs for them. He has invested his everything into them for He wants to bring them to Christ so that they are a pure bride presented to Him. Not only that; but filled with fruit. He wants them to become like Christ and who will go on to bear fruit which will glorify Jesus.
What kind of mindset do we have? What are our disciplines? What are our habits? Surely when we remember all that God has done for us in Jesus Christ then it is little for us to change the way we live; the way we think. Right? Perhaps we need some sort of tick list to start the day until we have made these things our very lifestyle. I’ll include one on the next week’s bulletin so that we can think about this.
Paul shows his affection for the people with abandon. He truly loves these people. Of course it is the knowledge of doctrines, his knowledge of Jesus that is the outflow of his spirituality and his love for others. He knows how much Jesus loves His people. The knowledge of this is borne out when we understand how much Jesus loves us as individuals.
Like I said last week let us not forget all His benefits and this will lead to thankfulness and this needs to lead onto thankfulness for others. We know, don’t we, that people can bring grief as well as pleasure but it is for us to be thankful that they belong to God and He is working His purposes out in their lives for we can also be a pain in the neck to others and we trust God is working His purpose out in us too!
9-11
In his thanksgiving for these people we find a prayer, a request to God for them in verses 9 to 11 that in summary is:
Paul prays for their love to abound yet more and more;
that this be accompanied by full knowledge and moral insight,
so that they might approve those things that really matter,
so that they might be unsullied and blameless when Christ returns,
as they are now full of the fruit of righteousness,
fruit that is effected by Christ Jesus
and for the glory and praise of God.
He prays that their love would abound, emphasizing still more and more. This assumes a love is already present and focuses on its development. This love is grounded in knowledge and all discernment, not some warm, fuzzy feeling. To what end? Verse 10 provides the answer: to be able to discern what is excellent in order to be sincere and blameless at Christ’s return
What is this love that should abound more and more? Well love is such a common word it is easy to misunderstand with all its various meanings. The love that Paul has in mind here is one that bears in mind the character of God; God’s actions are as a result of His character.
Galatians, Philippians, Philemon, I Thessalonians A Prayer for Abounding in Righteousness (1:9–11)
Paul does not pray that the Philippians be kept safe in their status quo but that they move forward and grow in their gospel partnership so that more and more they may extend God’s goodness to others.
God’s love is demonstrated in patience and forbearance and kindness.
Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?
It is a love that puts a high value on someone – it actively seeks the benefit of the one who is loved. Paul is expecting the behaviour of the Philippians to get better and better towards one another. This would come about more and more as we get to know God and His ways. This in turn should lead to walking worthy of the Gospel. With this knowledge and insight we gain discernment.
Working out the things that matter is very important for there are things that matter in the Christian life and there are things that don’t. For instance in
Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God is what matters.
Paul is saying you are not better off being circumcised or not being circumcised but only in doing what God says is what matters.
And this is emphasised in another place in
For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.
Paul wants the Philippians to be able to discern the things that matter and the things that don’t. The thing that matters is keeping the command of God as we read in 1 Cor 7.19 which is interpreted in Galatians 5.6 as being faith working through love. Faith working through love. How easy it is to have a faith that does not have love! This is a problem for so many Christians. We can know the truth but the truth can be extremely hard-hearted. We know the truth and it becomes the battering ram to break into other people’s lives.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.
And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
We can be absolutely right by being absolutely wrong. We can be right in our beliefs but wrong in our action.
But to be truly right in our beliefs is to put right beliefs with right action – faith working through love.
Have we made it? Is this true of us? Faith working through love?
Paul goes on in the Philippians passage about how we are to be pure, sincere, without offence until the day of Christ. I think it is fair to say that none of us quite match up to this yet but this is no excuse to not be so. Paul is saying that we need to be mature and complete for that day. This verse, though, is about our relationships with each other – it is again about faith working through love. We are to be pure, that is, unmixed, with sincerity, single hearted.
What is being blameless or to be without offence then? It is not causing others to stumble.
[For instance there may be things that you think are acceptable to do as a Christian such as drinking alcohol but there are plenty of Christians who do not think it is acceptable and it would be against their conscience. It is better not to drink alcohol around those whom we know would not agree or for that matter in front of alcoholics or recovering alcoholics. Not because it is sinful but for the sake of the conscience of the other person. Now exchange out alcohol for anything else you know you accept but other Christians might not – do not cause someone else to stumble just because you have the right to do things that you think are alright but only before God.](Spoken on before).
I am not talking about those things which are explicitly not allowed in Scripture – no one has a right to do those things – but I am talking about areas which may be grey in relation to what the Bible says. Not everything is beneficial especially to others. An example could be the eating of Halal meat. Halal meat is offered in the name of Allah; this is a similar problem in Paul’s day. For some there would be no problem eating this meat for it is known that there is no harm in this fact scripturally, for their god does not exist, however many, many Christians will not eat Halal because they know it has been offered to another god – if we know that is the opinion of a particular Christian then you should not eat Halal in front of them or offer it to them for conscience sake. By offending someone else’s conscience we are sinning by causing them to stumble. We are to be blameless in this regard – this is love.
Paul goes on to say in Philippians that they are to be full of the fruits of righteousness so that when Jesus does come back they – and. of course, I mean, we - need to be those now living in righteousness. It is clear that is ‘already but not yet’ that the life of Christ is fully demonstrated in us. We are righteous and we are being made righteous and one day we will be righteous. Righteous people in Christ will produce righteous fruits. And it is only the righteousness that Christ gives that can make us produce righteous fruit with the help of the Holy Spirit.
Conclusion
Love that reflects God’s love is the only righteousness that counts. We need love to overflow to one another. This means that we have to take into account other people and their foibles. We are not to ride roughshod over others but to be blameless, for faith is to be working through love. And with that we need the knowledge of God to overflow too so that we give ourselves only to those things that really matter and leaving off the things that do not.
The more we comprehend the things of God, and we are urged to gain knowledge and discernment, the more we will understand the love of God towards us and how we should behave towards others. But this will only puff us up with pride if we do not put these things into practice and carefully consider one another and have genuine care for one another as was evident of Paul for Philipi’s believers.
As we do these things it will become our mindset and as we do these things Jesus will ensure we will bring forth the fruits of righteousness this, in turn, will redound to the praise and glory of God.