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It's Time to "Join In" - Philippians 3:17-21

Sermon Series: Partners in Christ

I don’t know what it is about DJs and wedding receptions, but I’m convinced that the DJ will play at least one ‘line dance’ song at every wedding reception that I attend. You can almost be certain that when you go to a wedding reception the DJ is going to rock either “The Electric Slide,” “The Macarena,” or “The Cha Cha Slide.” And perhaps what’s even more amazing is that whenever these songs are played you are guaranteed to draw a crowd to the dance floor. You can be at the most boring wedding reception on the face of the earth, with the most boring and apathetic group of people who haven’t left their tables to dance to one song all night, and the DJ can start one of these songs and almost instantly fill the dance floor. Something about these particular songs has the weird ability to reach inside of certain people and flip a switch that transforms them from party poopers to the life of the party. It’s a bizarre and unique power that these songs have and which impacts lots of people. Think about the last time you saw one individual on the dance floor of a wedding reception doing “The Electric Slide” alone. It’s never happened! When these songs start playing all kinds of people start making their way to the dance floor. It’s as if they all have this unquenchable desire to join in. Then in unison with one another they move across the dance floor together until the song ends, when they all return to their seats. You all know what I’m talking about because you’ve seen it happen before.  And while some would never consider stepping onto the dance floor during a wedding reception to participate in a ‘line dance,’ we have to admit that it’s the participation of the group collectively that gives it some of its appeal. If only one guy is out on the dance floor doing “The Cha Cha Slide” we look at him and think to ourselves, “What’s wrong with that guy? How embarrassing is that – to be the only guy on the dance floor dancing right now? Doesn’t he know that everyone is watching him?” But that same dance possesses a unique appeal when everyone is on the dance floor doing it together. Then we look at the same dance and think to ourselves, “That looks like fun! And everyone is participating! There must be something to that dance. Maybe I should join in.”

As we continue to make our way through chapter three of Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi we see Paul making a unique plea to the church at Philippi, his partners in Christ. Paul is pleading with the church at Philippi to join in with him in his continued pursuit of Christ and his continued service to Him. You see, as partners in Christ, the pursuit of Christ and the service of Christ was intended to be participated in as a group – it wasn’t just Paul’s job description. Paul imagined that the pursuit of Christ and serving Him would be something that they did in unison with one another, not something he did while everyone else sat back and watched. So after sharing with the church at Philippi that knowing Christ was the greatest prize and reward one could have, and that he was pressing on toward that goal, Paul continues to call the church at Philippi to continue to join in with him in this pursuit. “Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (vs. 17). This is an important exhortation to the church at Philippi and to the church today. We can’t be effective partners in Christ if we are constantly looking back on our spiritual trophies and admiring what we’ve already accomplished or if we are standing around with the rest of the crowd just watching a handful of others who are pursuing Christ and serving Him. The church at Philippi, as well as the church today, did need to take the time to carefully identify those individuals who were striving to know Christ more and striving to serve Him well. But it wasn’t just enough for them to identify them – Paul instructed them to join in in imitating them. Paul had already identified Timothy and Epaphroditus as the kind of men they should look to and imitate. They were to fix their eyes on those who loved Christ, who were pressing on towards the goal of knowing Him more, and who were humble and self-giving (just as Paul had described Jesus in 2:6-8).

Paul gives more than just an admonition to the church at Philippi to join in in imitating himself – he also gives the church at Philippi a warning. “For many, of whom I have often warned you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things” (vs. 18-19). Paul tells the church at Philippi that there are many surrounding them who are living the wrong way. And Paul warns the church about these individuals because the way they live (while harmful) has a certain appeal to it. So we need to take some time to really dive into the text here to see what we can discern about this group. From what we can gather from the text it appears that these “enemies of the cross” positioned themselves around and amongst the church at Philippi. Note that Paul says he gives his warning “with tears.” If these individuals that Paul was warning the church at Philippi against had been a group of pagans, the Judaizers, or out-right persecutors of the church it isn’t at all likely that Paul’s warning would have moved him to tears. Instead, it appears that the individuals Paul is warning against are positioned around and amongst the church – possibly even considering themselves a part of the church. They appear to be individuals who are regularly exposed to the teaching of the gospel, who are hearing about the cross and the Savior, but who continue to live as if those things have no significance. This is what caused such an emotional response from Paul. This is what moved him to tears. Paul was heart-broken that there were those who were continuously exposed to the message of Jesus and continuously exposed to the truth of the cross and yet had not been transformed by that message.

One of the very unfortunate realities for the first century church is still a very unfortunate reality for the church today. The unfortunate reality in this particular instance is that exposure to the gospel and exposure to the message of the cross doesn’t make an individual a genuine Christian who is reconciled to God and whose life honors and glorifies God. There were those who positioned themselves amongst the church at Philippi in the first century and those who position themselves amongst churches today who believe that being around the church and listening to the message the church proclaims is all that is necessary to be a Christian who is in right standing with God. Pay careful attention to what Paul says in these verses! He implies that while those individuals may be regularly exposed to the good news of the gospel that the way they live actually makes them out to be enemies of the cross, reveals what their true eternal outcome will be, and speaks volumes about who they are really living for. “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things” (vs. 19). Although these individuals may have been exposed to the message of the gospel, and even though some of these individuals may have actually professed to be believers in Christ, the way they lived declared that their greatest goal was the fulfillment of their self-centered ambitions and desires. G. Walter Hansen says this about these individuals, “The self-indulgence of these people expresses itself in their appetites, their pride, and their mind.” So let’s give some consideration to these phrases Paul uses to describe these individuals. “Their god is their belly . . .” Paul says that while these individuals may claim to be followers of Christ they are in practice serving a different god. The god they are serving is their stomach, or their belly. While the word ‘belly’ refers literally to the organ in our body that food travels to, Paul uses the word metaphorically to describe the innermost part of a man from which thoughts, feelings, and desires come. Paul says that these “enemies of the cross” look to serve only their own thoughts, feelings, and desires. Whatever seems good and appealing to them and whatever promises to satisfy the desires of their flesh, these are the things they chase after. They live to serve their own wants and desires. Again G. Walter Hansen says, “For those who have no higher authority for the way they live than the dictates of their bodily appetites, their god is their stomach. They worship their appetites.” Paul also says, “. . . they glory in their shame . . .” Here is a reference to the pride of these individuals. While these individuals may have been around the church regularly, Jesus was not the source of their pride. The thing in which they took pride and the thing that they considered their source of glory was their shameful indulgence. So while these individuals may have been a regular part of church gatherings, when they were away from the church their source of pride which they broadcasted to others was the shameful behavior they had participated in.

I find this to be an amazingly accurate description of many individuals today and how they use social media like Facebook and Twitter. I’m ‘friends’ with individuals on Facebook and ‘follow’ people on Twitter who claim to be regularly involved in church and who profess to be followers of Christ, but who are constantly broadcasting things which aren’t consistent with genuine followers of Christ. They use vulgar language when posting comments and post pictures of themselves when they were intoxicated and participating in acts that neither glorified nor honored God. But these are the acts that they believe help them achieve status and standing amongst their peers. These are the kind of posts that they believe will get them a lot of ‘likes’ or produce a lot of ‘comments.’ So they continue not only to pursue the appetites of their flesh, but then to make their shameful acts that which they take pride in and boast about.

. . . with minds set on earthly things . . .” The third and final characteristic Paul uses to describe these “enemies of the cross” is that they were individuals who have their “minds set on earthly things.” Though exposed to the message of the gospel and the news of the cross, these individuals didn’t give any real thought or consideration to it. Their desire wasn’t to know Christ more. And in all honesty they probably had no desire for their lives to be changed and to be made more like Christ. Their minds were fixed on popular culture and the context of the community in which they lived and resided. So the things that they valued, the things that they sought after, and the things to which they wanted to conform their lives weren’t consistent with the heart and desires of God, but things consistent with the world.

All of these characteristics ultimately made clear that these individuals were not genuine believers in Christ. Paul says that these characteristics ultimately made clear that “their end is destruction.” Their participation in the church and their positioning of themselves around the church at Philippi didn’t give them right standing with God or guarantee them eternal security in heaven. The way they lived actually declared their rejection of Christ and their rejection of that which the cross proclaimed. Why does Paul say this? Note the differences of the two messages. The cross of Christ declared with extraordinary volume the reality of sin. When we look at the cross and see the Son of God hanging on it, we come face to face with the reality that something incredibly serious and incredibly bad brought the Son of God here. If God wasn’t angered by sin and if sin didn’t really separate us from God, then God is not a good and loving God, but a harsh and unloving God who sent His Son to earth to die for no apparent reason. That makes no sense at all. So when we look at the cross and see the Son of God dying there, we realize that something bad must have taken place. The desires in the deepest part of our being, the desires that we pursued and chased, neither pleased God nor caused us to draw near to Him – they angered God and separated us from Him. And the only means of reconciliation with God was through the cross, for the Bible teaches that this was our only hope for salvation. The cross also speaks to the severity of our sin from God’s perspective. Some choose to look lightly upon the sin that we commit and choose to believe that God can simply overlook our sin. But the cross declares something altogether different. When we look at the horrific death of Jesus on the cross the picture that gets painted is not a picture of God looking lightly upon sin. The horrific nature of Jesus’ death on the cross declares that sin is an abomination in God’s sight and that He deals incredibly harshly with sin. No one could ever look at the terror of Christ on the cross and come to the conclusion that sin is no big deal to God. So the cross of Christ declares the reality of sin, it declares the severity of sin, and it declares that it is only through Christ that our sin is dealt with. If there had been another way to deal with sin then Jesus’ death on the cross wasn’t a necessity. And if Jesus’ death on the cross wasn’t a necessity then we again see a picture of a God who isn’t loving and compassionate but a picture of a God who sent His Son to die a horrific death that wasn’t completely necessary. The cross of Christ declares that this was the only way for sin to be dealt with. On the cross, Jesus, the Son of God, became our substitute. Though He was perfectly righteous and undeserving of death in any form, Jesus took our sin upon Himself and paid the penalty for the sin that we deserved by dying on the cross and having the full and complete measure of God’s wrath poured out on Him. The cross, though horrific in nature, declared that God was rescuing humanity from sin by sacrificing His own Son so that we might be able to experience forgiveness and reconciliation with God the Father. It was as Paul declares in Romans 5:8, God’s demonstration of His love for us. When viewed rightly the cross of Christ declares that God chose to love us despite our sin, that He made a way for us to be rescued from our sin and its consequences (when we were unable to do it ourselves) by sending His Son Jesus to endure the penalty for our sin, and that God’s desire for us is a new way of living that conforms to the life and model of His own Son. When we see the cross this way it demands a response from us! It demands that we turn away from our former way of living (i.e. serving our own appetites, taking glory in our shame, and having our minds set on earthly things) which separated us from God, and model our lives after Christ. It means that we believe in the work of Jesus’ crucifixion, death, and resurrection as the only hope that we have for the forgiveness of our sins and the salvation that we need. And it means that we give our lives to knowing Jesus more and worshipping and serving Him. When we hear the message of the cross but choose not to respond in this way – when we continue to pursue those things which separated us from God, continue to glory in our own sin rather than Jesus, and continue to fix our minds on earthly things we set ourselves apart from the cross and apart from Jesus. We are “enemies of the cross” and as a result we are still in line to experience God’s wrath and eternal separation from Him in hell.

The church at Philippi – those who had genuinely surrendered their lives to Christ, who were following after Him, and who were seeking to know Him more – was markedly different from these “enemies of the cross.” Even though these “enemies of the cross” were many and all around the church at Philippi, their behavior declared that they did not belong to God and were not a part of His Kingdom. While their temporary residence was in the world, the eternal destination that awaited them was hell. This wasn’t the reality for those who had trusted in Christ as Savior and Lord though. Paul says in verse 20, “But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ . . .” Paul had earlier command the church at Phillip to “join in imitating me” and “keep your eyes on those who walk according the example you have in us” (vs. 17). Verse 20 gives the reason that Paul was commanding the church at Philippi to do these things – because their citizenship was in heaven. Paul wanted to remind the church at Philippi that their present location wasn’t their final destination – it was only a brief stop before they spent an eternity in either heaven or hell. Because those who made up the church at Philippi were believers in Jesus their eternity would be spent in heaven. It was important for them to remember that because Paul believed a right understanding of their true citizenship would impact the way they lived while they were temporarily residing on earth. As citizens of heaven their hope for persevering and making it through their time on earth resided in Jesus.

At the time which Paul was writing, the city of Philippi was a Roman colony. And throughout the Roman empire the Roman Emperor, Caesar Augustus, had been given the title “savior of the world” because he had restored peace and order to both Rome and the regions under Rome’s rule. All around the believers in Christ were citizens of Rome who were placing their hope in Caesar Augustus. As G. Walter Hansen writes the natural inclination of those residing in Roman cities was, “to look to the emperor in Rome to exert his sovereign power to solve their problems, satisfy their appetites, rescue them from trouble, and protect them from danger.” But the hope of the church didn’t reside in and wasn’t coming from Rome. The hope of the church resided in heaven and that is where Jesus would be coming from. Paul fully expected that when Jesus came again that He would do more than just remove believers from their circumstances of suffering and take them out of their hard circumstances. Paul was convinced that when Jesus returned that He would complete the work of transformation that had already been started in the lives of believers. Listen to the familiar text of Romans 12:1-2, “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you ay discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” In this particular text Paul teaches that when we come to faith in Christ as Savior and Lord that God begins a work in us of making us more like Christ. The transformation of making us more like Christ begins to take place in our hearts and minds. But one thing that remains unchanged when we come to faith in Christ is our physical bodies. Our bodies continue to be impacted by sin as our bodies move closer and closer to death and decay. So while we may be becoming more and more like Christ in our hearts and minds, our bodies never experience the transformation that our hearts and minds do. So in some ways it’s our bodies that prevent us from being truly transformed into the image of Christ. Paul foresaw a time when that would change though. He looked anxiously to the return of Christ because when Christ returned the believers in Christ would have their physical bodies transformed to be like Jesus’ and Jesus would, in His great power, subject all things (including Caesar) to Himself.

Let me try to wrap this passage up for us. Think back on the wedding reception analogy we used to start our study of this passage off with. While a DJ playing a ‘line dance’ song tends to get lots of people to join in, the reality is there are still a lot of people who only choose to stand around and watch. Some watch because their too shy to participate. Others watch because they find it all to be a little silly. But every single person at that wedding reception has something in common – they are all part of the wedding party. Imagine how differently things would look if the DJ started one of those songs and called all of those who were present to join in and everyone actually did. That would be pretty amazing! But this is exactly what Paul is calling the Church to. He doesn’t want a few individuals who claim Christ as Savior and Lord to join in in imitating him and others. Paul’s desire is that everyone who is a part of the church, everyone who has trusted in Christ as Savior and Lord, to join in in imitating him. Paul longs for each and every person making up the Church to forget the past and to press on towards knowing Christ more. He wants us to recall the cross and the message of the gospel and to live in light of that good news. We can’t continue to live as if our time on earth is a time for fulfilling our own desires and our loving that which doesn’t honor Jesus. Instead we need to remember that our time on earth is just temporary and that our citizenship is in heaven. And there is coming a time when Christ will return and finish transforming those who follow after Him by transforming their bodies (making them entirely like Him) and making everything subject to Him. So Paul makes the call to us who make up the church to “join in.” But it leaves those of us who are believers in Christ with one task – we have to make a defining choice in our lives in regards to the way we live. Are we going to live Christ-centered lives or self-centered lives? We can’t straddle the fence on this issue. We have to make a choice.

 

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