TRIUMPHANT LOVE
(1)	A LIBERATED LIFE (PHILIPPIANS 3:1-14)

Lily and I had the privilege a few weeks ago of standing in line in a school hall not unlike this one, to receive the GCSE results of a friend of ours’ while they were on holiday.

It had been a while since either of us had received our own GCSE results – it was scary to think that we were both twice the age of most of the people queuing up with us...!
	But the level of nervous energy flowing around that hall brought it all swimming back for us.

Getting exam results at school is a nerve-wracking experience!

Have I done enough to get the grades I need?

Will I be happy with my results?  Perhaps equally important, will my parents be happy with my results?  Will my friends be impressed with how I’ve done?

Have the examiners been kind to me – or have they rejected me?  
	Have I passed – or have I failed?

I tell you, standing in that queue was enough to bring me out in a cold sweat... and they weren’t even my results I was picking up!

(Just to put your mind at ease, the person we were collecting results for did really well – so a happy ending for you...!)

It got me to thinking about the role of the examiner on days like that.

On a day like GCSE results day, it can feel as if the whole future course of someone’s life lies in the hands of an invisible examiner sitting miles away from the students, deciding whether to pass or fail individual students.

I know some subjects at school are still concerned with whether you’ve arrived at the right answer or the wrong one –
	But a lot of the time, the success or failure of a student rests on the judgement of the person marking their paper.

Get them on a good day, and you’ll be ok –
	But what you don’t want is to be the final paper an examiner marks at the end of a long day, when they’re tired and fed up with essays on photosynthesis or whether or not Hamlet really fancies his mum...

Get the examiner on a bad day – and you’re sunk!

It’s a frightening feeling, being examined –
	Placing what feels like your life in the hands of someone you know nothing about – with no guarantee that they will be fair or sympathetic to what they find.

The examiner is a shadowy, frightening figure when you’re the one being examined...

And I want to suggest that for many people today, it’s this vision of the examiner – shadowy, unknown, possibly unfair or harsh –
	That puts them off the idea of the God Christians believe in.

Even people with very little knowledge of the Bible will often have some idea that Christians believe that God is the one who will judge us for the way we have lived our lives –
	It’s a conception of God that is shared by other major religions, such as Judaism and Islam –
	And an awful lot of people find that vision of God repellent!

Some are simply terrified by the idea of God judging them for the good and bad things they have done in their lives –
	Others object to the whole idea: how dare this God judge me!  What gives him the right to do that?  

And how do I know that he will be fair in his judgements?  How do I know that he is not a harsh marker, who just loves to condemn people for tiny slip-ups?
	How could I ever praise or worship a God who judges people?

The suspicion that the God Christians believe in will judge the world is either terrifying – or harsh and unfair, 
	And it discourages many people from wanting to know more about him.

‘If that’s the God Christians believe in – then I don’t want to know!’

I think we can go a little further with this vision of God as harsh, invisible examiner –
	Because I fear all too often, those of us who are Christians can begin to think of our God in those terms as well.

All too often, even Christians can begin to think of God as supremely someone who is watching how we live – and who we need to work hard to impress.

Scratch a little beneath the surface of many of us, and you will find that what actually drives us in our lives –
	In our church service – in our Bible reading – in our prayer – in our giving –

Is a vision of God as our examiner.

We obey him to earn his approval – just as, back at school, we knew we had to work hard and play by the rules to get on with our teachers.

Sometimes we feel as if we are doing well and that God must be impressed by our spiritual disciplines and service –
	Other times, we are painfully aware of just how far short we fall from God’s standards of holiness and goodness.

But at bottom, our vision of God is of someone who watches our lives, tells us how we should live – and then expects us to get on with it.

God is our examiner – and it’s up to us and our efforts to show him that we are worthy of passing the exam and earning his approval and blessing.

It is this vision of God that Paul sets out to explode in this section of his letter to the Philippians.

Paul knows all about our tendency as human beings to think of God as supremely a judge, whose approval we must earn through our hard work and spiritual discipline.

We’re going to see here that Paul could have written the book on living a life of discipline, self-control and hard work in the service of God.

But instead, Paul’s letters in the New Testament helped write the book that describes God as supremely a God of grace –
	A God who sets us free from desperately trying to earn his approval and the approval of others –
	A God who delights to show foolish, weak people like us mercy – and who calls us into a personal relationship of love with himself, not because of anything we have done, but thanks to what he has done in sending his Son Jesus into the world!

Paul wrote these words to a community of Christians in Philippi because he was absolutely convinced that the only way a church can have a healthy and joyful life together –
	Is if we get our vision of God right!

It is absolutely essential that we see God for who he really is – for who he has revealed himself to be through his Son Jesus Christ –
	Because only then will we be equipped and empowered to live for him – 
	To love one another –
	And to make him known.

Paul sets two alternatives before us in this passage –

Do you want to relate to God on the basis of religion? 

Or do you want to relate to God on the basis of his grace?

Paul nails his colours firmly to the mast here as to which of these he believes truly honours God and empowers God’s people.

He calls on us to recognise God’s great grace towards us in sending Jesus Christ into the world –
	And to go on recognising his grace and rejecting religion, as we live for him and seek to grow in our knowledge of him.

For Paul, grace is not just a lovely word to help discouraged Christians feel better about themselves –
	We all desperately need to know God’s grace in our lives day by day – hour by hour – minute by minute –
	And if we ever lose sight of his grace, then we are in terrible danger of losing sight of God himself and shipwrecking our lives on the rocks of religion.

I want to ask us the question this morning:
	How do I know God accepts me as his child this morning?

If you’re not a Christian here this morning, that is a huge question for you – 
	And I hope Paul’s message for the Philippians will help you see how Paul himself would answer it.

If you are a Christian this morning, that doesn’t let you off the hook!

Think about your life as we look at Paul’s words here –
	Think about the motivation behind your life – the things you do, the things you don’t do, the way you think about God when you are on your own...

Do you know that God accepts you and loves you as his child this morning?

Paul wants you to be able to reply ‘Yes’ to that question –
	And he wants that ‘Yes’ to be grounded in what God has done for you through his Son Jesus Christ – and never in what you might find yourself doing for God!

Let’s look at this passage together now.

This section comes mid-way in Paul’s letter to the church in Philippi.

Paul is beginning to sum up his letter – and in v.1 he has some important advice for the Philippian Christians.
	Read v.1.

Apparently, this command – ‘Rejoice in the Lord’ – is something the Philippian Christians had heard from Paul before –
	It was a refrain they’d heard from him before in his time with them.

But for Paul, it was such an important command that he made no apology for repeating himself.
	‘Rejoice in the Lord!’

What Paul is calling them to here is a proactive commitment to ‘rejoice in the Lord’.

Paul isn’t concerned here with whether or not the Philippian Christians feel like rejoicing in the Lord –
	He tells them to do it!  

Rejoice in the Lord every single day, he urges them –
	Rejoice in who your Lord is – Jesus Christ, the gracious Son of God –
	And rejoice in who you are – men and women who live in relationship with him!

Rejoicing in the Lord isn’t optional – it isn’t just something for a sunny day –
	No – Paul is urging this group of Christians to actively remember to thank Jesus for who he is and what he has done for them in dying and rising again, every single day of their lives!

Joy in the Lord is something a Christian must fight for!

•	Rejoice in the Lord... (v.1)

I have a question for you:
	How seriously do you take rejoicing?

Seems a slightly bizarre way of putting it... but I think it’s the way Paul puts it here.

How seriously do you take rejoicing?  How serious are you about rejoicing ‘in the Lord’?

Because Paul tells us here –
	Rejoicing in the Lord is important – in fact, it’s vital!

Too often, we imagine that the truly mature Christians are the most sombre and serious.
	But Paul tells us something different – the sign of a healthy Christian is that they are joyful in the Lord!

And why is rejoicing in the Lord so important?  
	Why is a commitment to praise Jesus Christ and remember what he has done for us so vital to a Christian’s health?

Paul tells us in the following verses –
	If we are rejoicing in the Lord, then we are protecting ourselves from the drift to religion!

•	... it will protect you from the drift to religion (vv.2-6)

Look at the end of v.1 again.
	‘Rejoice in the Lord ... it is a safeguard for you.’

If you are a Christian here this morning, you need a safeguard – you need protecting.

And the threat you need protecting from is the threat of religion.

I need to take a moment to define what I mean by ‘religion’ here –
	As different people understand that word in different ways.

When I say Paul wants to protect Christians from ‘religion’, what I mean is:
	He wants to protect us from the mindset we see all around us in the world, and that we will always struggle with in our own hearts –

That God will only accept us – and others will only accept us – on the basis of what we do.

Religion says: 
	‘If you want to be accepted by God, then you need to obey him.’

And every single one of our hearts will begin to believe that, if we don’t actively remind ourselves of the gospel of grace and what our Lord Jesus Christ has done for us at the cross.

Religion is the default setting of the human heart.

In everything in our lives –
	In our work, in our relationships, in our pastimes...

We instinctively believe that we will only get out of it what we put in.

And of course, that is partly true!

We do need to work at our careers and our friendships –
	We do need to take responsibility for these things in our lives.

But Paul knows here that the real problem arises when we begin to believe that we need to earn God’s acceptance by the things we do.
	When we believe that the only reason God accepts us is because we work hard to be good people and to obey him.

In Paul’s own context, the big problem was the issue of circumcision.

In v.2, Paul’s tone changes abruptly from one of warmth and affection
	To one of violence and aggression!

Read v.2 aloud.

Three times he urges the Philippian Christians to ‘watch out’ – and the three terms he uses to describes the people they need to be on their guard against are deliberately offensive –
	‘those dogs ... those men who do evil ... those mutilators of the flesh’.

The people Paul had in mind here were those Jewish teachers who argued that, to be truly accepted by God, every Gentile man had to be circumcised.

It was not enough for them to simply have faith in Jesus Christ –
	They had to demonstrate to God just how serious they were about him by becoming Jews and by obeying the Jewish law.

We can see from v.2 – Paul will have none of it!

He uses such harsh language because Paul knows the damage these Jewish teachers can cause!

They are teaching the Philippians religion –
	When Paul knew that God was only truly glorified – and God’s people were only truly equipped to live for him – through God’s grace towards us in Jesus Christ!

And in vv.4-6, Paul makes it clear that he knows what he’s talking about!

Paul goes into great detail here into his life before he met Jesus Christ –
	And it seems as if he took religion and turned it into an art form!

Read vv.4-6.

Paul’s credentials and accomplishments as a devout Jewish worshipper of God were impeccable!

It’s not that Paul is looking down on the Jewish teachers he opposes here – or that he’s berating the Philippian Christians for being so stupid as to listen to them.

No, Paul is brutally honest here –
	For a large part of his life, he was not only attracted to religion – he excelled at it!

His religious and ethnic credentials were faultless –
	‘of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews’ (v.5)

His achievements in religion were remarkable –
	‘in regard to the law, a Pharisee ... as for legalistic righteousness, faultless’.

If you want to know how to succeed in religion – in the value of hard work and commitment in reaching your goal – then Paul is the man to talk to!

Paul was ‘faultless’ in his observance of the Jewish law –
	That was an amazing achievement for anyone!

Paul knew all about the appeal and attraction of religion to the human heart –
	He knew that inside everyone lives the belief that we can be good enough in and of ourselves to gain the approval and respect of God.

Paul had been down that road of religion – and he had excelled at it!

But now Paul totally rejects religion as a way of relating to God!

You might expect Paul to look back at his former ‘religious’ days with some fondness –
	At least to feel some pride at what he had achieved through hard work and study.

But no – Paul pulls no punches in telling the Philippians that the years he spent trying to earn God’s approval and impress God were completely wasted!

Read vv.7-8.

•	Knowing Christ sets us free from religion (vv.7-9)

So now we come to Paul’s reasons for warning the Philippian Christians – and us! – about the damage religion does to people.

Why is religion so dangerous?

•	Because it robs Jesus Christ of his glory!
•	Because it leads people either to pride or despair!

Let’s take the first of those first.

Look again at vv.7-8.

What is it that freed Paul from his former way of life?  What was it that led him to reject religion so completely?

The answer is – meeting Jesus Christ!

When Paul met Jesus on the road to Damascus, his whole life changed!

On that day, he discovered that God was far holier than he had ever imagined!

Up to that point, Paul had believed God to be his judge – but he had also believed that by his own attempts at goodness and spiritual discipline, he could somehow impress God.

Paul’s problem before becoming a Christian wasn’t that he thought of God as too holy, too demanding a God... –
	Paul’s problem was that he hadn’t grasped just how much more holy and more demanding God really was!

Paul had believed that he could impress God with his life –
	But after meeting Jesus, Paul discovered that that was impossible!

No sinful human being can ever do enough to earn God’s approval –
	No amount of ethnic credentials or religious achievements on Paul’s part were enough to impress God.

God was just too holy!

Paul’s vision of God had been too small!
	He was totally lost if he had to rely on his feeble efforts to impress God!

But that is where Paul discovered the glory of Jesus Christ!

Jesus knew all about Paul’s feeble efforts to win God’s approval – as God’s Son, he knew that they would never be enough to earn God’s forgiveness –
	So Jesus died for Paul!

Jesus knew that religion – human effort – could never be enough to make anyone righteous –
	So he died for sinful men and women and gave his righteousness to everyone who places their faith in him!

I asked a few minutes ago:
	How do you know this morning you are accepted by God as his child?

The only adequate answer for any of us is:
	Because Jesus came into the world – died on a cross – and rose again, to make me his child!

Paul cannot get over what Jesus has done for him!

His previous commitment to religion had sought to gain glory for himself –
	‘Look, God, at how good I am!  At how seriously I take you!’

But in saying that to God, Paul was robbing Jesus of his glory!

Only Jesus can make anyone righteous!
	Only Jesus can forgive us and cleanse us and bring us into God’s family!

Only Jesus was loving enough to suffer and die for sinful people like Paul –
	For sinful people like us!

Paul now realised that without Jesus, he was totally lost –
	All his human efforts amounted to nothing!

But Jesus had rescued him!
	Jesus had shown himself to be the God of grace that we all desperately needed!

Jesus went to the cross and gave us his righteousness!
	So to go back to religion...?  To believe that we can still impress God by our own efforts...?

That is to try to rob Jesus of his glory!
	That is to try to gain some of the credit for ourselves!

And Paul is clear here –
	He will have nothing to do with that attitude!

Read v.8-9.

The only reason anyone can be made righteous, is if Jesus Christ makes them righteous!

The only reason you can know you are accepted by God this morning – is if you have placed your faith in Jesus and his death on the cross for you!

Jesus’ glory and ‘surpassing greatness’ is in the love he showed for sinners like us in going to the cross and dying for us.

He didn’t have to –
	He chose to!

That’s why Paul calls us to ‘rejoice in the Lord’ every day of our lives –
	Because without Jesus, we would all be lost!

Jesus died to set us free from sin and death –
	And he died to set us free from the lie of religion, that we can somehow earn God’s approval on our own.

Paul urges us here –
	We cannot know Jesus and then go back to living our lives as if we need still to impress God and earn his approval!

Our salvation doesn’t rest on our efforts at church or at home or in our spiritual life –
	Our acceptance as God’s children rests with Christ – and Christ alone!

We need to recognise the damage religion does this morning – and recommit ourselves as a church to living out the gospel of grace in our life together.

Religion leads to two extremes that can prove fatal –
	To pride –
	And to despair. 

When I am doing well – when I feel as if I’m living up to God’s standards and (equally importantly) the standards of the Christians around me, then I become proud –
	And I look down on the people around me who are struggling –
	I lack compassion for those who have made a mess of their lives –
	I’m not keen to welcome broken people into the life of my church.

And then there are the times when I’m not doing so well –
	When God’s standards feel impossibly high and I’m painfully aware of the sin in my life –
	Then, the tendency of the religious person is towards despair.

I realise that I will never be good enough for God – or even for the people around me – 
	And because all I have is my efforts, then I feel completely powerless to ever change or improve my performance.

The consequences of religion in someone’s life are disastrous –
	Paul knows that here!

But Jesus set Paul free from that cycle of pride and despair – and Jesus can set us free from that cycle too!

We’re coming to the end of the summer – a new term is about to begin, with new challenges and new opportunities.

For myself, I’m aware that this is the time of year for rotas to start up again –
	For set-up teams, junior church, music groups, preachers, youth groups...

After the relative quiet of the summer, things will get busy again –
	And as I look over the list of church members, I can see that there will be a lot of busy people, balancing work and family commitments with a variety of church commitments.

I have to be honest –
	Sometimes, my heart sinks a bit at this time of year...!

I always enjoy the slower pace of summer – and the challenges of the coming term can leave me feeling quite daunted.

And I know that many of us can feel like that at the end of summer.

The question is:
	How will we face those challenges?

We all need to be on our guard against the drift to religion that Paul warns us of here.

All too easily, we can become so busy that we begin to believe God’s acceptance of us is on the basis of what we do!

Our service in the church – our Bible reading – how we raise our families – how we worship him at work.

We all struggle with this drift towards religion –
	We are all, at bottom, like Paul – proud people who believe that we can make it on our own.

And that pride will lead either to a lack of love and compassion for others among us who are struggling –
	Or despair for ourselves, when we recognise that we will never be good enough even for our own standards, let alone God’s.

How can we guard against this drift to religion as a church?
	How can we remain committed to the gospel of grace in our life together?

Paul tells us back in v.1 –
	Rejoice in the Lord!

Look to your God!  Look to Jesus!

Open your eyes to him and think again about his love for you and his glorious purposes for you!

Every day, spend some time and refresh your memory of the gospel of grace – 
	Remember what Christ has done for everyone who comes to him in dying on the cross and rising again.

And if we see others among us struggling to see God’s grace towards them –
	Then we need to remind one another of his grace!

Remember who your God is –
	And then you will begin to see that knowing him and being known by him is the most precious gift we can ever enjoy.

Then, whatever the coming year holds for you and whatever you will be doing at work – at home – in the life of the church –
	You will be able to grow in your knowledge of Jesus Christ and of how precious you are to him!

In v.8, Paul speaks of ‘the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord’ –
	And in this he is referring to more than the liberty Paul now enjoys from his former life of religion and foolish pride.

Knowing Christ Jesus not only sets a Christian free from the world’s addiction to religion and the desperate search for approval –
	Knowing Jesus also, more positively, gives our lives meaning, joy and a future!

•	Knowing Jesus gives us meaning, joy and a future (vv.10-14)

Up to now, Paul has portrayed the past and present effects for the Christian of knowing Jesus Christ –
	Freedom from the futility of religion in the past, and being declared righteous by God in the present.

But Paul ends this section by describing something of the future direction of the Christian –
	And that is to grow in our knowledge of Christ and his power at work in us!

Read vv.10-11.

Paul already knows Christ – he has made that clear in v.8 –
	But he is also confident that there are still riches for him to discover!

In one sense, Paul wants us to remain rooted in the basics of the gospel of grace –
	He urges us here to ‘rejoice in the Lord’ and in what he has done for us in dying on the cross and rising again.

There is no moving beyond the gospel of grace – we need to remind ourselves of it every day and rejoice in all that Christ has done for us!

But v.10 and following reminds us that there is still a forward momentum in the Christian life.

If you’re a Christian here this morning, you already know Christ – rejoice in that!

But rejoice also that there is so much more you have to learn of him, even in the coming year!

You already know that Jesus is gracious –
	But you can pray today that you will discover in new and unexpected ways just how gracious he really is!

You already know that God has declared you righteous in Christ –
	But you can pray today that the preciousness of that gift might make you even more thankful to him over the coming year.

Paul’s expressed desire to ‘know Christ’ in vv.10-11 should encourage us to pray for a deeper knowledge of him over the coming months.

We are all proud and forgetful people –
	We all need God’s grace even to remind us of his grace!

But Paul’s desire to know Christ can become our prayer this morning for the coming term!

I don’t know how you’re feeling about the coming months –
	Whether you are relishing the challenges of work and home and church life –

But let’s remember who we are in Christ –
	Sinners who have been declared righteous by him!

We all have a long way to go in grasping more fully the gospel of grace –
	In fact, it will take the rest of our lives and all of eternity for us to grasp it!

But let’s pray that this term, whatever happens – whether we face struggles or joys, encouragements or frustrations –
	We will reject the lie of religion –
	We will see our new identity as children of God through Christ’s death for us –
	And we will echo Paul’s words in vv.12-14 as we look to the future:

Read vv.12-14.