Sunday 11-23-08

Philippians 2:12 - 18

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise you also should be glad and rejoice with me.

The response to last week's sermon was quite impressive. Many people have expressed the impact it had upon their lives and wanted Ruffin to continue this theme. Therefore Ruffin will be going to this passage rather than returning to Matthew.

There is much in this passage that is encouraging to us as believers and I just want to make a couple of observations on my part. (Ruffin will certainly do a fine job of exegeting this passage for us Sunday!)

1) We are called to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. This is not a call to obtain salvation through our works but rather a continual call to obedience that is the outworking of our sanctification.

2) The reason we can do this (#1) is because it is God who is working in us and through us to achieve his goals. We know that he will not leave this work unfinished. He will bring it to completion (1:6.)

3) Because of this we should not be about complaining or grumbling because God is in control. What a joy that should be to us! Because of what God has done is doing in us we should therefore shine like the stars. How can we do otherwise? ("Shall we go on sinning so that grace may abound? Certainly Not!" - Rom. 6:1 - 2.)

These are the thoughts that have guided my preparation for worship this week. You will notice that as we enter our corporate worship Sunday that many of our songs and readings pick up these very ideas. Our meditation also carries this idea. It is quite lengthy but I think appropriate for our worship this Lord's day. Here it is below so that you may read it before hand and meditate on it prior to coming to worship:

God makes the unfruitful fruitful by the power of His Spirit, he puts down the mighty from their thrones and raises the lowly, fills the hungry with good things and sends the rich away empty; and in all these acts within history he fulfills his promises…what is new is that this God takes human form. He himself experiences the pitiless depths of poverty, humiliation, and dying abandoned by God. But what we see when the horror comes to its ultimate end is that it was Light and Life and Love itself that allowed itself to become poor and humiliated and to die in forsakenness, in order to plumb all the depths of the human lot, including the fate of the sinner, and to rescue it and keep it safe in the divine life.

– Hans Urs von Balthasar