[Sermon preached on 16 September 2018, 17th Sunday after Pentecost / 3rd year, ELCF Lectionary]
Today, the topic for our sermon gets really serious. No more and no less than a matter of life and death: “To live is Christ, to die is gain.” The apostle Paul is dead serious—forgive me the expression—as he thinks aloud about the implications of going on to live or having to die soon. It sounds as if he is given the choice between the two—as if he is allowed to decide about his life. But in reality, somebody else will be making that decision really soon. But what is most striking about the letter to the Philippians, is that despite the long shadow that an imminent death sentence throws upon his life, Paul is full of joy. If we should summarize this letter in three words, they would be: Joy, joy, and joy!
I remember about ten years ago an elderly man telling about the death of his wife. She had had some serious symptoms, and after several examinations he and his wife were to see the doctor for a verdict. The doctor looked very serious, took on an appropriate posture, and delivered the verdict to this couple. It was cancer, incurable, terminal. She would have somewhere between two and twelve months left, the doctor informed them. As the implications dawned on the woman, her face started to brighten up, and a smile of joyful anticipation came over her as she turned to her husband and said, “Oh Elias, how wonderful! It means that soon I will be with Jesus and I will see him face to face.” Her husband answered her in a mixture of joy and grief. But the doctor was flabbergasted. He just could not understand how the death sentence, combined with the imminence of physical torture by the growing cancer in her body, could bring joy and anticipation instead of fear and panic.
I think of another woman. She was also a Christian, be it almost thirty years younger than Elias’ wife. When she heard that she had incurable cancer, she went into a mode of panic that got worse as time went by. First, there was denial: “No! It cannot be true! It must be a mistake!” Then came the bargaining phase: “God, you cannot do this to me. Get somebody else! If you heal me, I will (so and so)!” The fear and panic and rebellion against God during those months before her death made her suffer so much more than the actual cancer with its pains and the side effects of her medication. Only when she had not more than a day or two to live and she was fully exhausted by her cancer and her fight against God, she gave in and commended her life and spirit to God.
When the apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Philippians, he was in prison in Rome, waiting for a trial before the Roman Emperor Nero. It was his first trial before Nero, and as far as we can tell, he was judged not-guilty and set free. We don’t know exactly what the charges were against him. The book of Acts tells us, that the real issue was a religious dispute between Paul and the Jewish Council in Jerusalem, not a crime against the Roman authorities. Objectively speaking, Nero had no reason to waste his time on this case, much less to convict Paul.
But Nero was not just any judge. He was a madman with a distaste for the Jews and an even greater—and ever growing—distaste for the Christians. When a huge fire destroyed much of the city of Rome—two or three years after Paul wrote this letter to the Philippians—Nero blamed the Christians and initiated a fierce persecution. Christians were thrown before the lions, burnt alive, or crucified. We know that in the persecutions following the great fire, both Paul and Peter were executed by the Romans. So with a judge like that, you just couldn’t know how your trial would end.
What would you do, if you were in prison waiting for a trial under such circumstances? I know that I would be completely upset and mixed up: both physically and mentally. If I could, I would try to lobby with people who could get the Emperor on my side. I would work out my arguments, write my defense speech, and rehearse it, morning and evening. But the odds are that I would suffer from severe depression and hardly be able to eat or sleep or do anything coherent.
But look at Paul! When a messenger from the church of Philippi comes to visit him and bring him a gift from his church, Paul bursts out in joy and thanksgiving. And he wants to share that joy and gratitude with the church in Philippi and encourage them. That is why he just has to write this letter to them. Regardless of whether he will survive the court case or be sentenced to death, he wants them to know that all is well. — It couldn’t be better! Either way, Christ will be glorified, the gospel will be made known, and the kingdom of God will advance.
As I said earlier, when we read what Paul writes to the Philippians in chapter 1, it looks like he is actually given the choice between life and death—like he can decide. He writes, “What I should choose, I cannot tell.”
But he is not like a depressed and suicidal man who feels life is too hard to go on living, but death is too frightening to take his own life. Paul is more like the boy in the candy store with a one-euro coin in his hand, having to make that greater-than-life decision about which candy bar to buy. Paul is excited about life, and he is excited about death. Both alternatives attract him. That is why he writes: “What I should choose, I cannot tell.” He feels like he is in a win-win situation. How is that possible?
I think we can find a key to the answer in the Bible lessons that we have been studying over the past two weeks.
Two weeks ago, our topic was “Give thanks with a grateful heart!” You may remember that I read you a short passage from Corrie ten Boom’s book, “The Hiding Place”. In that passage, we saw two women, two sisters, in a most hopeless situation in one of the notorious concentration camps that the Germans operated in World War II to exterminate Jews and war criminals. And they were giving thanks for things that nobody in their sound mind would ever give thanks for. How could they do so? It is because they prayed constantly. And in and through that prayerful relationship with God, God taught them to look at their circumstances from his perspective, and to see his guiding and protecting hand in everything that happened. They learned to trust in God even in the face of torture and death, because they had seen his providence and protection so many times in such wonderous ways. Last week, we expanded on that, when we looked at the people of Israel in the wilderness, and at how God provided for them there.
It was the apostle Paul who wrote those words in 1 Thessalonians 5:
“Rejoice always! Pray constantly! Give thanks in all circumstances!”
And we must presume that he practiced what he preached. In prayer, God showed him what his life and his ministry looked like from God’s perspective. Through prayer, he discovered the purpose for the many bad experiences that he had: opposition, exile, imprisonment, physical violence, assassination attempts, and shipwreck. And with the purpose, he discovered the good side of those experiences. Each of them served to build character and persistence. Each of them allowed Paul to share in the sufferings of Christ. Each of them contributed to the spreading of the Gospel. Each of them brought him a step closer to the summit of his mission: to preach the Gospel of Christ in Rome—the capital of the civilized world—to the Emperor and his court. I am sure that Paul did not always see the connection, but he saw enough of it to trust God for those things where he did not see for himself.
And with the same prayerful mind, with which Paul looked at his life’s journey so far, he looked into the future. And he realized that, whatever his fate would be, it would serve the Gospel of Jesus Christ, whom he loved with all his heart, mind, soul and strength.
Paul could see a purpose for what was to come, regardless of whether he would survive or whether he would be sacrificed for the Gospel. Either way, he would be able to testify of the kingdom of Christ Jesus.
When he looked at the options before him, he saw two positive, two fantastic opportunities. If he were to survive and be set free, he would be able to continue his ministry as an apostle of Jesus. He could serve the churches that he had helped establish, build them up in their faith, and encourage them in their daily walk with Christ. He could go and reach out to new regions where the Gospel had not been heard yet. We know that Paul harbored the hope of traveling at least to Spain to preach the Gospel there. If he were to survive, those Christians that lived under the threat of persecution would find great encouragement. It would be a message to them that “he who is in us is greater than he who is in the world,” to quote 1 John 4:4.
On the other hand, if he were to be convicted and sacrificed, his perseverance in the face of trial would be a sign to his adversaries that they can kill the body, but not the soul. It would prove that Christ is strong enough to help his followers through the fears and tortures of persecution. And to the Christians throughout the world, his perseverance would be an encouragement to hold fast to the faith no matter what the cost.
“What I should choose, I cannot tell.” Paul’s choice was not between the pain of life and the fear of death. It was between a life in, with and for Christ, and a death that would unite him with Christ in an infinitely more intimate and full way. For him, life in Christ was good, despite all that he had to suffer. Because, in the balance of his life, the joy of having Christ and serving Christ weighed so much more than the costs he had to pay and the sacrifices he had to bring. And in death, the prospect of being reunited with Christ forever was so bright, that he couldn’t even give much thought to the shame and pain and fear that he might have to go through before breathing his final breath.
“For me, to live is…” How would you complete that sentence? “For me, to live is to…” If you are really honest—I mean, 100% honest—what would you say?
I tested this out with some people. One said, “For me, to live is an endless series of attempts to meet deadlines, to stretch myself a bit more, and to try to make ends meet.” Another said, “For me, to live is to chase my dreams and to share them with my loved ones.” A third person said, “For me, to live is to make a difference so that, when I die, I will be remembered.” They all have two things in common. The first is that to live is to do something. There is a verb there: to meet deadlines, to stretch, to chase, to make a difference, and so on. To live is to do things, to be busy. The second is that there is a statement of purpose—something they want to achieve in life: make ends meet or be remembered after death.
The same is true for the other part of Paul’s statement: “For me, to die is…”. Some of the answers I got were: “For me, to die is to dissolve in the ocean of peace forever.” “For me, to die is to live on in the memories of my children.” “For me, to die is to leave behind everything I built during my life.”
For Paul, “to live is Christ, to die is gain”. There is no verb there, no action. Just a state of being. It means I live in Christ and Christ in me. It means I live with Christ and Christ with me. It means I live for Christ and Christ for me.
Ever since his conversion to the Christian faith on the road to Damascus, where he encountered the risen Christ, everything in Paul’s life was submitted to Christ, conditioned by Christ, given direction by Christ, given a purpose by Christ… And you can go on. Christ filled Paul’s calendar 24/7, and he filled his heart 100%. That was what gave him joy and purpose in life. That was what lifted him up above the frustrations and fears of day-to-day life.
What about you and me? How does Christ affect the way we perceive life and death? Are our mindset and our focus governed by the problems and challenges that we face day-to-day? Are our mood and our view of life set by the successes and setbacks that overcome us on our journey? Do we lose sight of Christ, because so many other, more urgent things demand our attention?
For many of us, the honest answer to those questions would be “Yes.”
But it is possible to live a life free of fear for the future, a life in which each and every moment and event have purpose and meaning. A closer walk with Jesus, more quality time with him, an attitude of submission to his will and anticipation of his blessings—those things can change the way we look at life and death, at everything that goes wrong all the time, at all those unanswered prayers, at how unfair God is towards us, at why it is always me.
As I prepared this sermon, I found tremendous strength, encouragement and joy in the reading of Psalm 23, the Shepherd’s Psalm. I realize that many times I can enjoy the green pastures and fresh waters, and I really have no reason to complain. But I also understand that there are times that I need to go through physical and spiritual wilderness to get from one pasture to another. I know that some of life’s stages go through a deep, dark and frightening valley. Even then I can rest assured, for the Good Shepherd is with me. And even when it is time to say my farewells and cross the final frontier to the other side, I need not be afraid. What is awaiting me there is far more glorious than anything I will experience in this life. If, for me, to live is Christ—being with the Shepherd, hearing his voice, and following his footsteps—then to die is gain indeed. Because on the other shore is awaiting us a great feast:
You prepare a table before me
in the presence of my enemies.
You anoint my head with oil;
my cup overflows.
Surely your goodness and love will follow me
all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord
forever.
Amen.
