A Heavenward Perspective
A HEAVENWARD PERSPECTIVE
PHILIPPIANS 3:17-21
As Christian pilgrims in this world, we can confidently say, ”The best is yet to be!”
Having set out Jesus Christ as the supreme object of Christian longing, Paul now makes himself a secondary example to the church (3:17; see also 4:9). He calls the church to follow him in considering as loss all that the flesh finds as a reason for boasting (3:4-7), in refusing a righteousness of their own (3:9), in forgetting what is behind and racing on toward the goal (3:13f.). In pointing to what the believers may see in him, Paul is in fact pointing toward Christ, toward the evidence of the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings (3:9f.). There is no presumptuousness in commending such an example to the church.
The urgency which attaches itself to Paul’s plea arises from the threat to faith posed by those who pretend to march under the banner of faith (3:13,19). Paul is referring once again to the Judaizers who prompted his heated outburst in 3:2. The cross of Christ stands radically opposed to all religious and ethical presumption which seeks to achieve by works what can only be given through faith. The enemies of the cross of Christ are all those who resist the grace of God and refuse to walk the way of “loss” described in 3:4-14. In their insistence on circumcision, Paul sees a frontal attack on the sufficiency of the cross of Christ and an affront to the wisdom of God. Despising the cross, despising faith and its righteousness, they will experience destruction (3:19). The phrases which follow in 3:19 allude to circumcision and a reliance on the flesh (see also 3:2f.).
In contrast to the “enemies of the cross” who set their minds on “earthly things” Christians have been constituted a citizenship in heaven (3:20f.). The metaphor came readily to Paul’s mind since he had seen Jewish communities in many of the larger cities of Asia. His point is that Christians are not citizens of this world, but resident foreigners in the world, and their confidence rests, not in the world’s wisdom, but in the wisdom of God. With patience they await the triumphant return of their Sovereign, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will radically transform the body, not by the marks of circumcision but by “the power of his resurrection” (see also 3:10f.).
Thought There is power available in Christ to live a lift worthy of imitation.