"Do You Have Works Or Relationship"
11:00 3/14/93 Text Philip3:1-11 OT Prov. 2:1-8 Luke 12:13-21
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In our New Testament reading, we met a man who was greatly
blessed in terms of the material things. His work produced so
much wealth, he did not know where to store and invest all of it.
He had plans for great works that He was going to do with his
money. He was going to tear down some buildings and construct
larger ones. There is nothing in the passage to suggest that the
man was particularly evil, or greedy or immoral. The man could
probably point to a number of good works to demonstrate that he
was just as good as the next fellow. Yet God called him a fool
the day of the night that he was to die.
If someone said to you today, "Tell me, what proof is there
in your life that you are a Christian?", would you start telling
them about the good things that you do for others, or would you
start talking about a relationship you have with one called Jesus
Christ. Where is our hope for our salvation grounded today? We
will examine this as we continue our study in Philippians chapter
3.
We find in verse 1 Philippians 3:1 "Finally, my brothers,
rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same
things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you." We know
from our earlier study that Paul was having a difficult time in
prison, and the Philippians themselves were having trials and
struggles in their lives. Having trials and struggles should
not be reasons to start feeling sorry for one’s self, being ready
to throw in the towel on the church, on God, and on life itself.
In the midst of suffering Paul says, "rejoice in the Lord." When
our hope is centered in Christ, we can always rejoice in God’s
love for us, God’s grace that He gives us, and the knowledge that
God is still in control of the circumstances of our lives. A
divine joy in the Lord in possible for believers in spite of
adversities, struggles of difficulties, because we know that this
too will past. It may shake us, but we don’t have to let it
defeat us. If we can thank God for whatever that happens to us,
we will discover that God can turn every blow and disappointment
that comes into our lives into a blessing for us. The ability
to do this comes from a relationship with Jesus Christ, not from
doing a lot of good things.
Paul tells them to rejoice again and again throughout this
book. God does not mind repeating himself again and again,
because it is a safety mechanism for our own behalf. He tells us
things to practice, and God also warns us again and again of
things that will destroy us.
Every congregation carries within it, the seeds for its own
destruction. The same is true for every family, and for every
individual. There are feelings and emotions in each of us that
can severely cripple our lives if they are not submitted to the
will of God. In the Philippian church there were false teachers
that sought only their own good, and wanted people to pay them
special attention. They were dangerous to the church, because
they wanted to take the focus off a relationship with Christ, and
put it on doing things their way.
Look at verse 2 Philippians 3:2 "Watch out for those dogs,
those men who do evil, those mutilators of the flesh." The word
watch out here, is a very strong one. Some translations use the
words "beware of " or "take heed" One of the things you need
to understand here is that our view of dog and their view of a
dog were two different things. The Jews considered the dog to be
the most despised, shameless and miserable of creatures." The
Jews considered all Gentiles to be dogs. There were a group of
Jews called the Judaizers who came into the church and accepted
Christ, but insisted one had to be circumcised in order to be
saved.
These people who considered others to be dogs, are being
called dogs themselves because of the viciousness they were doing
to the body of Christ. Paul saw this group like the herds of
dogs which prowled the Eastern cities without a home and without
an owner, and attacking those who passed by. Today circumcision
is not an issue for the Church but it was in the first century.
This group was saying, the proof that one was saved was not that
he or she had a relationship with Jesus Christ, but that he or
she had been circumcised and had a number of other good works
that the law had set up. This relationship thing was of second
ary importance.
When anyone makes knowing Jesus Christ a secondary issue in
being saved, that person is an evildoer. The Judaizers made the
issue circumcision. Today we here a whole range of what once
must do in order to be saved. There is one must speak in tongues,
one must be baptized, one must tithe, one must just try to live a
good life, one must just believe in God somewhere, one must join
this particular church or one must do such and such and so on.
It is so easy and so tempting to want to be able to point to a
number of things we do and don’t do in order to show that we are saved. But that’s not where its at. We can do all the right
things, go to all the right places, and volunteer at all the
right functions and be lost and spend eternity in hell. Our hope
cannot be in doing, but rather in knowing who Jesus is.
The Judaizers wanted to say, that the cutting of the skin
was a key factor. Paul says no, the only cutting that truly
matters is a cutting of our hearts. That’s what keeps us from
building a relationship with Jesus Christ. The cutting of the
heart is a lifelong process. We know that we are growing in our
relationship to Christ, when we discover there is a lot more sin
in our lives than we ever imagined before. Anyone growing in
Christ, is constantly coming to the conclusion, God, I’m worse
than I ever thought I was and I really need you to help me out.
Look at verse 3. Philippians 3:3 "For it is we who are the
circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in
Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh--". The
word is saying here, there are three marks of a Christian who is
growing spiritually.
The first mark is, the person worships by the Spirit of God,
which means the person is empowered by the Spirit and lives and
serves through the Spirit of God. The person is recognizing,
that if the Spirit of God is not present in my life, I’m not
worshiping, I’m simply going through some motions. You see
worship is not something we come and do on Sunday morning.
Worship is what we do between 1:00 Sunday afternoon and 11:00 the
following Sunday week. During that other two hour period, we are
equipping ourselves with knowledge to make our worship
effective, and we are being renewed and empowered to take our
worship beyond the problems and difficulties that we face.
The second mark of a Christian growing spiritually is that
the person glories in Christ Jesus. Jesus’s death on the cross
alone is the person’s only ground for salvation, and he or she
does not boasts of personal goodness or works. Christ receives
the glory for any good that is done, and whatever is done, is
always done to lift up the name of Jesus Christ. One’s own
preference is secondary, to what will have the greatest impact
for Jesus Christ. Are our works done to glorify Christ or to
please ourselves? It’s amazing how many people will quit doing
something for Jesus, simply because they do not receive the kind
of recognition that they feel is due t o them.
The third mark of Christian growing spiritually in Christ is
that he or she puts no confidence in the flesh. The flesh, means
our own abilities and achievements. It covers who we are, what we
have and where we come from. Sometimes we think we’re somebody
because we have the things that the world considers important.
Money, power, education, profession, good looks or even royal
blood. We need to realize that even our intellect has been cor
rupted by this world and needs to be brought under the authority
of God. "How can you believe those simple things in the Bible."
Truth has a way of being simple, so that all of us can know what
to do in order to have a relationship with God.
Paul says in verse 4, "If anybody had a reason to think they
were somebody big in the eyes of God and of others, I had the
best reasons of all." Paul had more going for him, than most
people ever would have, especially some of the Judaizers who
thought they were somebody. He starts in verse 5, First of all I
was circumcised on the eighth day. In other words I was a child
of the covenant promise that God had made, and I was circumcised
on the exact day that the word of God said to do it. Next, I was
of the people of Isreal. In other words, I was born of the right
people. I wasn’t an alien or foreigner who came and converted to
Judaism. I have been what I am all my life. Not only that, I came
from the tribe of Benjamin. In other words, I’m from the tribe
that God chose the first king of Isreal from. Benjamin was one of
the most powerful tribes and at one time it took on all the 11
other tribes at once and won two major battles before losing. It
was also the only tribe that remained faithful with Judah, from
which the Messiah came.
He says he was a Hebrew of Hebrews. Both of his parents were
Jews, he spoke the Jewish language, practiced the Jewish cus
toms, and carried out the Jewish manner of life. He says in
regard to the law a Pharisee. Pharisees were the most educated of
the educated. Paul had his academic daggers. Not only that, the
Pharisees had the strictest and most difficult rules to follow.
There were held in high esteem by the people. When you said your
Son was a Pharisee, you had said something to be super proud of.
He says "as for zeal, persecuting the church." Paul hunted
down and voted to have Christians executed, not because he hated
people, but because he loved the word of God. He thought these
Christians were perverting the word of God in claiming Jesus to
be the Messiah. He went out of his way to make sure the Jews
remained steadfast to the word of God.
He says as for "legalistic righteousness, faultless." Paul
paid his tithes and all the special offerings without complaining
, he helped the orphans and the widows, he was present at the
temple, he was faithful in his tasks, he kept the law and nobody
could go and say, aha, you’re not doing this. The man had more
good works by himself than we probably have as a church.
If he wanted to have put confidence in his ability to make
it into heaven on his own he had what it took to try it. He had
religion, race, descent, education, high moral values, and blame
less outward righteousness. But my friends when Paul discovered
the reality of a relationship with Jesus was possible, his as
sessment of the value of these things in his life underwent a
radical change.
Look at verse 7 "But whatever was to my profit I now consid
er loss for the sake of Christ." Paul is saying, all these things
that I thought were so important in life, and these things that
I thought gave me an advantage with God not only do I consider
them a loss, I realize now that they were actually a danger.
Paul is not saying, that I’m giving up these things to follow
Jesus. He’s saying, these things would have sent me to hell, had
it not been for Jesus.
My friends, there is nothing in our lives that is a plus,
that we give up to follow Jesus. When people say, I gave up my
career to follow Jesus, or I gave up a good job to follow Jesus,
or I gave up my fiancee to follow Jesus, they do not understand
what Jesus offers When we hold on to something instead of letting
it go and following Jesus, the truth is, we are not holding on to
anything. That thing has seized control of us and has become our
god.
What would you think of a person in this condition. A rich
woman was on an ocean liner that had struck on iceberg. The
ocean liner was doomed and was rapidly sinking to the bottom of
the ocean. The rich woman on the liner had the option of going
back to the cabin to get her jewels and going down with the ocean
liner, or getting in the lifeboat and saving her life. She decid
ed to get into the lifeboat. From that moment on the woman spoke
of how she gave up her jewels just to get in the lifeboat. That
is how most Christians talk about their relationship to Christ.
I gave up this to follow Christ. When you discover what Christ
does for a person’s life and eternal salvation, you realize,
nothing you have given up, comes close to the value of what you
have gained.
Paul takes it a step further in verse 8. Philippians 3:8
"What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the
surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose
sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may
gain Christ." Notice it wasn’t just when Paul got saved that he
considered everything a loss. It became a lasting attitude or
way of life. Nothing was excluded. Anything that hindered him
in developing and maintaining a relationship with Jesus Christ
was considered a loss and a minus factor in his life.
Some of the things that we once considered a blessing, have
now become a loss in our lives, because they now keep us from de
veloping a relationship with Christ. I hate it when I see Chris
tians who are not real strong in their faith, start jobs that
work on Sunday. One by one, they drop out of the church and out
of their relationship to Jesus Christ. The devil tells them, you
can still be a Christian and not go to church and to bible study.
You take a coal out of a burning fire, and it will burn at first
by itself. Not too long, all the color and the heat fades away.
Keep in mind that losses are not bad things in themselves.
You can be spending time doing good things, even church things,
but if they rob us from spending time in developing our relation
ship with Jesus Christ, those things are losses. Even people in
our lives can become losses. Some of us are flirting with mem
bers of the opposite sex more than we should have. What started
out as a good friendship is about to explode into something
nobody wanted. Know that as nice as things seem now, that rela
tionship has become a loss and you need to deal with it, before
it becomes a disasters.
Jesus does not call us to do things. He calls us to come to
Him, that we might become more like Him. Good works do not save
us, nor do they change us. But building our relationship with
Jesus Christ causes both processes to take place.
Paul says nothing compares to knowing Jesus Christ as his
Lord. Jesus is someone personal to Paul and Jesus wants to be
someone personal to each of us. When Paul became a Christian, he
loss the esteem of his colleagues, he was no longer the ideal
role model, and he was no longer among the privileged few of
society. But he says, as far as all that stuff is concerned, I
consider them to be rubbish, worthless, and undesirable in order
that I might gain Christ.
Paul is saying, if I had to chose between having nothing and
having Christ or having everything without Christ, I would
gladly choose to have nothing with Christ. Paul’s goal for his
life begins in verse 9. "and be found in him, not having a right
eousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is
through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God
and is by faith."
Paul does not trust in a righteousness of his own from doing
good works, because he knows there are no good works apart from
Jesus Christ. The righteousness he thought he had, was not
righteousness at all. The only righteousness that exist any
where, is that which we receive by faith in Christ realizing that
it comes from God. This is why anyone who knows Jesus Christ,
can never look down upon anyone else, because we know that we
are what we are because of God’s grace and God’s mercy.
Jesus is not looking at how many good works, and good things
we are doing. The rich farmer had plenty of both. One thing he
lacked, was a relationship to the God, who made all his many
ideas and dreams possible. For this alone he was called a fool.
Are you determined to build on ongoing relationship with Jesus
Christ, or do you think just doing good works every now and then
will get you in? Don’t let your good works, be the loss that
cause you to lose out on knowing Jesus Christ.
