Shining Brighter Together.

Philippians 2:12-18

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish though you live in a crooked and perverse society, in which you shine as lights in the world. – Philippians 2:14-15 NET

According to Paul, our lives should reflect the reality of our salvation. Jesus didn't just reserve us a permanent place in the life to come. He provided a means by which we can experience abundant life in this life – right here, right now. He has placed His Spirit within us so that we have no excuse if our lives fail to reflect our new nature. But some of us are a bit surprised when we learn that living the Christian life is hard work. I'm not quite sure where we got the impression that becoming a Christ-follower was going to be easy. It certainly wasn't for the disciples, Paul, or any of the members of the early church. Paul was brutally honest about the high call to commitment required of all believers. He told the Philippians, "Work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear" (Philippians 2:12b NLT). A more familiar translation of that passage might be, "work out your salvation with fear and trembling." Either way you look at it, there is a clear responsibility given to the believer to do his or her part in the process of sanctification. While it is true that we can no more sanctify ourselves than we can save ourselves, there is still a vital part that we are to play in the process of our transformation into Christ-likeness.

One of the key words left out in the New Living Translation's reading of this passage is the word, "therefore" that appears at the very beginning of verse 12. It is the Greek word hoste, a word of transition that means, "now then." It ties the verses to come with the ones that just preceded it. Paul had just finished talking about the mind of Christ. His was an attitude of humility, service and sacrifice. And as a result of His life of obedience, even unto death, God elevated Him to the place of highest honor. He is worthy of honor and glory. His name is above all other names. He is the Lord of all – the one who all will eventually recognize and kneel before. As a result of that fact, Paul tells the Philippians, their behavior should be different. They should want to put every effort into seeing to it that their salvation, placing their trust in Jesus Christ as their Savior, will produce fruit. Paul tells them to work out their salvation, not work for it. There's a huge difference between those two phrases. Believers are to eagerly put effort into the cultivation of their new life in Christ. Paul told Titus, "all who trust in God will devote themselves to doing good" (Titus 3:8 NLT). As always when reading the letters of Paul, we must constantly remind ourselves to keep the content within its context. Paul is writing to the church – the corporate body of believers in Philippi. He has been telling them to not live selfishly, focusing on their own interests, but instead they were to focus on the needs of one another. They were to love one another and work together with one mind and purpose. Paul is still addressing the body of believers. He is calling the church to display the reality of their salvation through tangible acts of kindness, compassion and love.

When Paul tells them to "do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may be blameless and pure, children of God without blemish though you live in a crooked and perverse society, in which you shine as lights in the world," he is speaking to the entire body, not just to individuals. This passage is a call to Christ-like community. We shine the brightest as believers when we do so together, not alone. The Christian life is to be a corporate experience, not a solitary one. We are children of God together, not just individually. How sad it is when our earthly children can't get along. Think about how much it saddens you as a parent when your own children can't seem to get along. How much more so for God when His adopted children, who have been given so much, fail to love another and live in harmony with one another.

Paul tells his readers to work out their salvation with fear and trembling. There should be a real sense of awe, reverence and legitimate fear in the lives of all believers when they consider what Christ has done for them. Paul describes Christ as being in the place of highest honor. He has the name that is above all other names. One day all men will kneel before Him, acknowledging His Lordship. The day is coming when every tongue in heaven and on earth will confess that He is the Lord. As believers, because of what has happened in our lives as a result of Christ's work on the cross, we know exactly who He is right now. So we should pursue our own personal sanctification and that of the corporate body of Christ with a sense of awe, reverence and fear – for what He has done and what He is doing in our midst. Our lack of love and unity is a slap in the face of Christ Himself, reflecting our disdain for His sacrificial death on our behalf. Our failure to live as lights in the world discredit His redemptive work on the cross, giving the world the impression that His death was ineffectual. So because of who Christ is and what He has done, we should work out, pursue, and make as our highest priority, our ongoing transformation into His likeness. And nowhere does our Christ-like character show up best than in the community of fellow believers.

Father, Your Son has done so much for us, the least we can do for Him is to pursue our transformation into His likeness with a vengeance. Forgive us for making our transformation into His image a low priority, allowing too many other things to distract us. You have called us to be lights in this world, shining out and illuminating the darkness around us as we live out our lives in love and unity. We shine so much brighter when we shine together. Show us how to work out our salvation together. Show us how we can continue to grow in Christ-likeness together, not just alone. Amen.

What Difference Does It Make?

Romans 12:1-16

And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. – Romans 12:1 NLT

Paul launches this next section of his letter with the words, "And so…." Some translations use the word, "Therefore…." Which reminds me of an old adage that says, when you see the word, therefore, in Scripture, always ask what it's there for. What is the writer trying to tell you? It is almost always used as a transition from one train of thought to another. It is used to tie when section to another, and so it is here as Paul makes his transition from the end of chapter 11 to the beginning of chapter 12. Up until this point in his letter Paul has been stressing the sin of man and the grace of God. He has stressed the universality of man's sinful state and his inability to save Himself. He has spoken of God's gracious gift of salvation made possible through His Son's death on the cross. He has contrasted faith and works. He has reminded his readers of the freedom found in Christ – freedom from having to try and keep the Law in order to have a right relationship with God. He has written of God's mercy, love and faithfulness – illustrated in His plan to fulfill every single promise He has made to the people of Israel – despite their constant unfaithfulness to Him.

And then Paul says, "And so…." With all of that in mind, here is what we are to do. This is where Paul moves from the theological to the practical. As a result of all that he has told us about God, man, sin, salvation, the Spirit, freedom, grace, mercy, eternity, and love, here is how we should respond. Paul pleads with us to give our bodies to God as living and holy sacrifices. Why? Because of all He has done for us. Paul is going to begin with what our reaction should be to God. That is the most important relationship any man can have. All of our other earthly relationships with human beings are insignificant and immaterial if we do not have a right relationship with God. So Paul begs us to respond to God's mercy, grace, goodness, sovereignty and love with an attitude of willing submission. We are to offer ourselves to Him for His use. In doing so we are acknowledging that we belong to Him and Him alone. Elsewhere Paul wrote, "You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body" (1 Corinthians 6:19-20 NLT). But it is interesting to notice that Paul's emphasis is on the group, not the individual in his letter to the Romans. He pleads with them to give "your bodies" as a living sacrifice. It is to be a group effort, not an individual one. Paul is going to stress what it looks like to live as a holy sacrifice to God and it is going to involve our interactions with one another as believers and our relationships with non-believing world in which we live.

Paul exhorts them to NOT copy the behaviors and customs of this world. As a group, they are to live lives that are set apart and distinct from the world around them. Part of living as a sacrifice to God is allowing Him to do with us as He wishes. And part of God's desire for us is to transform the way we think. He wants to renew our minds and transform us into the likeness of His Son. And there's no better way to see that transformation take place than in our relationships with one another. Paul makes it painfully practical. "Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us" (Romans 12:3b NLT). When God starts changing the way we think, we will see ourselves and others differently. Rather than living lives marked by pride and self-centeredness, we will begin to display humility toward others and develop a healthy assessment of who we are in Christ. We will understand that God has placed us in the body of Christ, given us gifts for the good of the body, and challenged us to live with and love one another. And we are not to live hypocritically or insincerely. Our love must be real, involving self-sacrifice and eager enthusiasm. As God transforms our way of thinking, we will begin to even bless those who persecute us. In other words, we'll develop the capacity to love the unloving and unlovely. We'll learn to love in ALL of our relationships and in all circumstances, developing a harmony and unity that is not of this world.

That kind of living is holy, sacrificial living. It is pleasing and honoring to God, because it reveals the very power of God in our lives. No one can live and love that way unless God makes it possible. It takes the saving work of Jesus Christ and the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit to bring about that kind of radical transformation. But we must choose to offer ourselves as sacrifices to God, for Him to do with as He wishes. It all begins there – with a willing submission to the will of God. We must constantly give in to Him so that He can impart into us. In the end, this kind of life is the greatest form of worship to God.

Father, continue to show me how to live out this passage. It is so easy to talk about being living sacrifices, but it is another thing to live it out in real life. I keep wanting to crawl down off the altar. But I really do want to see You continue to change the way I think and transform my behavior. And I realize that the greatest illustration of those things taking place will be in how I react to and relate with others. That includes not only my fellow believers, but the lost world around me. Amen.

The Solution to Sin.

Romans 7:14-25

Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. – Romans 7:24-25 NLT

I have always taken comfort from this passage. Here is Paul, the great apostle and a veritable icon of spiritual virtue and Christian integrity, wrestling with the very same issues that plague me as a believer. Even as a great man of God and powerful spokesperson for the cause of Christ, Paul still struggled with the effects of sin in his life. Like me, Paul still had a sin nature. There was that part of him that was still susceptible to falling back into slavery to sin – even though he had been set free by Christ. Remember what he wrote in chapter six? "Don't you realize that you become the slave of whatever you choose to obey? You can be a slave to sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God, which leads to righteous living" (Romans 6:16 NLT). It's a simple matter of choice. You can choose to obey God or you can choose to obey sin. And it results in a daily struggle for most of us. Paul said, "I don't really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don't do it. Instead, I do what I hate" (Romans 7:15 NLT). In other words, in his heart he desires to do the right thing, but his sin nature leads him to do just the opposite. The problem with Paul is the same one that we face. He had an active sin nature. "And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature" (Romans 7:18 NLT).

Paul describes in simple, yet stark, terms, the all-too-common theme of my life. "I want to do what is right, but I can't. I want to do what is good, but I don't" (Romans 7:18-19 NLT) The important thing to remember in reading these verses is that Paul is pointing out our inability to conquer the presence of indwelling sin through self effort. We may desire to do what is right with all our heart, but our flesh is inherently sinful and incapable of living up to the righteous standards of God. Which Paul describes as a principle of life that manifests in the following way in each of our lives. "…that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong" (Romans 7:21 NLT). It is as if there are two persons living in the same body. One wants to do the will of God, while the other seeks to resist that will and pursue a life of sin. It reminds me of the image of the demon and the angel, sitting on opposite shoulders of an individual – alternately whispering into the poor person's ears, providing contradictory counsel about what to do in a given situation. Paul describes it as "another power within me that is at war with my mind" (Romans 7:23 NLT). The result for Paul was misery, which caused him to call out for deliverance from this daily, ongoing battle with sin in his life.

Paul knew that he had been set free from slavery to sin by the death of Jesus on the cross. He knew he was a new creature and a new creation. But he also knew, from experience, that he still had a formidable sin nature that waged ongoing war with his new nature. As long as we live on this earth and in these bodies, we will do battle with sin. Jesus' death did not eradicate sin. He simply ended its strangle hold on our lives. We no longer have to live as unwilling slaves to its influence, obeying its every command and fulfilling its every wish. We have been set free. But sin still remains. And if we try to conquer sin on our own, we will always fail. If we attempt to rely on our own strength, we will always come up short and unsuccessful. Which is why Paul exclaims, "Thank God! The answer is Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 7:25 NLT). Jesus is the answer for not only our salvation, but our ongoing sanctification. It is He who gave us victory over sin and death, providing us with a way to made right with God. And He continues to do it throughout our lifetimes. He gives me the strength to say no to sin. He has provided me with the Holy Spirit, as a powerful ally in my daily struggle with sin. I need to recognize that it is Jesus who saved me, but who continues to save me from the effects of sin on my life. He alone can deliver me from a life dominated by sin and death. The presence of sin in and around me, should drive me to a greater and greater dependence on Christ and His Spirit within me. I should know from experience that my flesh is weak and incapable of winning the battle alone. But I have Christ on my side and the Holy Spirit within me. I have a resource that provides me with the capacity to do what my heart desires. Paul goes on to describe this capacity as "the power of the life-giving Spirit" who has "freed you from the power of sin that leads to death" (Romans 8:2 NLT). Jesus has provided us with eternal life. The Spirit provides us with the ability to live righteously in our daily lives – here and now. Thank God!

Father, there is a daily battle going on in my life that I far too often fail, because I am attempting to do it all on my own. Continue to show me my daily need for Your Son's saving power. He didn't just save me and then leave me on my own, but He gave me His Spirit. I just need to learn to rely more and more on the Spirit's power and less and less on my own. As I grow increasingly aware of my sin nature, drive me to Your Son and Your Spirit's indwelling presence in my life. I have the power to live the life You've called me to live, and it comes from You, not me. Amen.