Trust and Obey
Philippians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
0 ratings
· 3 viewsNotes
Transcript
text: Philippians 2:12-13
12 Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. 13 For it is God who works in you to will and to act on behalf of His good purpose.
PRAY
Introduction
There are very few, if any, verses in the Bible more important than these regarding how we live the Christian life. The Christian life is a constant struggle to depend completely on God while taking seriously our responsibility to pursue holiness and become like Christ.
This seems like a contradiction, doesn’t it? It sounds like Paul’s saying, you need to do the work because God is doing the work. That doesn’t seem to fit with the way we usually think. To us it probably seems like only one of those things can be true, but not both. It seems like either we have to do the work, or God does the work. How could both of those things possibly be true?
Let me try to put together these two truths in a more helpful way:
God is the one doing the work through us.
God is the one who accomplishes our sanctification through our effort and hard work.
The work that you are called to do is actually God working in and through you.
Hopefully that makes it a little clearer, and yet there’s still some mystery to it, isn’t there? What the Bible shows us clearly is that we must hold onto both of these truths and seek to hold them in balance.
I am responsible to put forth great effort. I must work hard at killing sin, pursuing Christlikeness, and doing all the things God has for me.
God is the One actually accomplishing all the good work in my life. He gets all the glory.
Before we dig into these verses, let’s look at some examples from Scripture of what this looks like in action:
David (1 Chronicles 14:8-17)
8 When the Philistines heard that David had been anointed king over all Israel, they all went in search of him; but David learned of this and went out to face them.
9 Now the Philistines had come and raided the Valley of Rephaim.
10 So David inquired of God, “Should I go up against the Philistines? Will You deliver them into my hand?” “Go,” replied the LORD, “for I will deliver them into your hand.”
11 So David and his men went up to Baal-perazim, where he defeated the Philistines and said, “Like a bursting flood, God has burst out against my enemies by my hand.” So they called that place Baal-perazim.
12 There the Philistines abandoned their gods, and David ordered that they be burned in the fire.
13 Once again the Philistines raided the valley.
14 So David again inquired of God, who answered him, “Do not march up after them, but circle around them and attack them in front of the balsam trees.
15 As soon as you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the balsam trees, move out to battle, because this will mean that God has marched out before you to strike the camp of the Philistines.”
16 So David did as God had commanded him, and they struck down the army of the Philistines all the way from Gibeon to Gezer.
17 And David’s fame went out into every land, and the LORD caused all nations to fear him.
10 So David inquired of God, “Should I go up against the Philistines? Will You deliver them into my hand?” “Go,” replied the LORD, “for I will deliver them into your hand.” 11 So David and his men went up to Baal-perazim, where he defeated the Philistines and said, “Like a bursting flood, God has burst out against my enemies by my hand.” So they called that place Baal-perazim.
David went out to battle. David defeated the Philistines.
And yet David gives the glory to God and says that God did it.
Notice both in the Lord’s own words and in David’s expression how both of these elements are combined:
The LORD said, I will deliver them into your hand. (v. 10) In other words, God says, I will cause you to be victorious as you fight hard.
David said, God has burst out against my enemies by my hand. (v. 11) In other words, God is the one who defeated my enemies, but He won the battle through my effort.
Do you see that? In both God’s words and David’s, God is the One accomplishing the work, but He is doing the work through David.
Nehemiah (Nehemiah 4:9, 19-23)
In the book of Nehemiah, Nehemiah is leading the people in the reconstruction of the wall of Jerusalem. The wall had been broken down, and Nehemiah is leading the people to rebuild it, both for their own personal protection, and more importantly for the protection of the temple.
There is a lot of opposition to this work, which makes the job much harder. Notice what Nehemiah says and does:
9 So we prayed to our God and posted a guard against them day and night.
19 Then I said to the nobles, the officials, and the rest of the people: “The work is great and extensive, and we are spread out far from one another along the wall.
20 Wherever you hear the sound of the horn, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us!”
21 So we continued the work, while half of the men held spears from the break of dawn until the stars came out.
22 At that time I also said to the people, “Let every man and his servant spend the night inside Jerusalem, so that they can stand guard by night and work by day.”
23 So neither I nor my brothers nor my servants nor the guards with me changed out of our clothes; each carried his weapon, even to go for water.
The whole book of Nehemiah seems to present this same balanced approach. Consider again v. 9:
9 So we prayed to our God and posted a guard against them day and night.
Complete trust and dependence on God: we prayed to our God; later in v. 20 he says, “Our God will fight for us.”
Great effort from Nehemiah and the people: we posted a guard against them day and night. And later he talks about remaining prepared for battle even as they are rebuilding the wall.
They fully depended on the Lord, and they worked hard to accomplish the project and defend themselves.
Paul (1 Corinthians 15:10)
Paul is a prime example of a hard worker. Few if any throughout the last 2000 years surpass Paul in his zeal and hard work in advancing the Gospel.
He traveled thousands of miles by foot, sailed hundreds or thousands of miles in boats, preached and taught in dozens of cities, won countless people to Christ, started dozens of churches, trained many church leaders, experienced persecution, beatings, and imprisonment like few others in church history, and finally died for the sake of the Gospel.
If anyone ever worked hard for the cause of Christ, it was Paul. And this is what Paul says about himself:
10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not in vain. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.
I worked harder than all of them. I have accomplished more than any of the other Apostles, he says. I have put forth greater effort and done more than all of the other Apostles. I don’t think this is Paul’s pride talking. I think this is a true, legitimate statement. Paul worked harder and accomplished more than any other Apostle. And yet, the credit and the glory does not belong to him.
by the grace of God I am what I am… His grace to me was not in vain … yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. Three times, Paul makes very clear that all the glory goes to God. It is all by God’s grace.
God gave all the grace, so He gets all the glory.
God gave all the grace, so He gets all the glory.
God is the One who really accomplished all the amazing work that Paul did.
Do you see that?
Paul worked harder than anyone, yet 3 times he says, the work I did was actually God’s work through me. I did the work, but God is the One really accomplishing the work.
There are other examples in Scripture that show us the same thing, but hopefully these three are helpful and make it clear: we are responsible to put forth great effort, yet God is the One truly accomplishing everything good in our lives. God accomplishes His good purposes through our effort.
Let’s dig into these verses, Philippians 2:12-13.
Our Responsibility to Obey
Our Responsibility to Obey
The focus of v. 12 is on the responsibility of believers to obey.
12 Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
Notice once again Paul’s tenderness and affection for these believers, as he refers to them as my beloved.
Then consider the word obey.
There is an attitude in our own day that easily rejects authority of any kind. People today are automatically suspicious of any authority and seem to think that every authority is evil and abusive. Certainly there are some authorities who are that way, and yet unless an authority is telling you to disobey God, you are called to submit to the authorities in your life - this includes government and other civil authorities, parents for those who still live with their parents, and spiritual leaders such as pastors and teachers. Those are the earthly authorities to which we are to submit, but most importantly, we owe our obedience to Jesus Christ.
11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Notice that Paul’s mention of obedience comes right after v. 11, where he says that every tongue [will] confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. To confess Jesus Christ as Lord is to confess that He is God and to say that He is my Master. Both because He is my Creator and my Redeemer, I owe my life and my complete allegiance and obedience to Him.
It is the responsibility of every person to submit to Him and obey Him, but even more so for those whom He has redeemed. He is your Creator and your Redeemer, and you must obey Him.
12 Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
And notice Paul says to the Philippians, you’re doing a good job!
He says, you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence. Paul says to them, this is the pattern of your life. You have submitted yourselves to Christ, you have obeyed the demands of the Gospel, you have been growing in your likeness to Christ, you have been persevering in faith, love, and obedience despite the trials and persecution you’ve faced.
And, this they have done not only in Paul’s presence - not only while he was with them - but also, he says, even more in my absence. Even though Paul could not be with them at this time, they were continuing strong in their faith, continuing to follow Christ and become more like Him. They were persevering.
Now Paul is encouraging them to keep up the good work.
Just as you have always obeyed… and we might expect him to say here, just as you have always obeyed, keep obeying in the same way. But Paul says it a different way:
Just as you have always obeyed… continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. I think it ultimately comes to the same thing though - Paul is encouraging them to persevere in their obedience to Christ. Keep fighting your sin, keep striving to be more like Christ.
Notice what Paul does not say. He does not say,
Work for your salvation (he’s not saying you earn your salvation)
Rather,
Work out your salvation.
The word translated work out could also be translated effect or accomplish or bring about.
To understand better what Paul means, let’s consider that word salvation.
Many of us have been taught in such a way that we think that the word salvation means what happened to us at the beginning of our Christian life - I got saved or we talk about how someone made a salvation decision.
That’s not entirely incorrect, but the Bible often uses the word salvation in a much broader sense. Your salvation does not only include the moment when you first trusted Christ and you were justified or declared righteous before God.
Biblically speaking, your salvation includes everything from God’s choice to save you in eternity past to your eternal life with Christ forever - the term is that broad. But often, salvation refers specifically to the ongoing perseverance in faith, love, and obedience that characterizes everyone who is truly a believer. If you are truly a child of God, it is not only true that you have been saved, but also the Bible repeatedly tells us that we are being saved.
18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
So this word salvation sometimes refers to the process of becoming more like Christ, becoming more holy, persevering in our faith, love, and obedience.
Another word for this is sanctification or being sanctified.
I believe that is what Paul is talking about here, and that’s consistent with many other Scriptures.
When Paul says work out your salvation, he is not saying earn your way to heaven. Rather he is saying persevere. Keep trusting Christ, keep growing in love, keep following Him and obeying His commands, not to earn your salvation, but to prove the reality of your salvation. Because those who do not persevere are not genuine believers. So persevere to show that you do in fact belong to Christ.
And specifically in context, Work out your salvation means grow in humility & love. That’s what Paul has just been describing in the first part of this chapter, and he gives other examples of that later in this chapter.
Work at thinking more like Jesus
Work at having the same humble attitude He had
Work at considering others more important than yourself
Work at looking out for the interests of others
Work at loving others like Jesus does
Work at serving others the Jesus serves
Work at being more like Jesus
That’s what Paul is getting at. The commands he gave us in the first part of chapter 2 take serious effort on our part. We don’t just become humble overnight. We don’t just wake up every day naturally thinking about others and living in perfect humility and love.
We have to work at it.
We have to fight for it.
We have to battle against the pride and selfishness that are all too natural for us.
We have to fight to keep our eyes on Jesus and think and act like He does.
The Christian life is like war, not vacation.
The Christian life is like a marathon, not a walk on the beach.
If you are hoping that you’ll become like Christ without any serious effort on your part, your attitude is seriously wrong. You need to repent right now, ask God’s forgiveness for your spiritual laziness, and get up and fight.
Fight against your sin.
Fight for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord (Heb 12:14).
This verse is calling us to radical effort in our Christian lives.
12 Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
And Paul says that we do this with fear and trembling. What does that mean?
Certainly this includes the attitude of worship and reverential awe of God, similar to the phrase “the fear of the LORD” in the OT. But I think there’s more.
Fear and trembling means that we take very seriously the need for us to persevere in our faith, love, and obedience to Christ. There is fear and trembling in this because we realize that if we do not persevere, it means we are not saved. It means that we are extremely serious in our pursuit of Christ and following Him faithfully. We do not have a casual attitude toward Him.
Fear and trembling also means that we take this seriously for others who are part of our church. We work hard to encourage each other to be faithful to Christ, not to fall away but to continue persevering in faith, love and obedience to Christ.
I think this is the attitude the author of Hebrews expresses in Hebrews 3 and 4 as well:
12 See to it, brothers, that none of you has a wicked heart of unbelief that turns away from the living God.
13 But exhort one another daily, as long as it is called today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
14 We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly to the end the assurance we had at first.
English Standard Version Chapter 4
Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.
Both for ourselves, as well as for others in our Christian community, this is something we must take seriously. Perseverance is an issue of life and death. If you do not persevere, you are not a genuine Christian.
Therefore, we must fight to persevere, and we must help each other to persevere in our faith, love, and obedience to Christ.
Now, if this sounds like an impossible task, that’s because it is.
If you were left up to your own ability, you would not persevere.
Apart from God’s grace, none of us would persevere. You don’t only need God’s grace to become a Christian, but also to stay a Christian. And the good news for us is that if God has begun a good work in us, He will not abandon it. If God is at work in you, He will keep on working in you. And that’s the hope that v. 13 provides.
We are called to an impossible task. But it will happen because God is the one making it happen. And nothing is impossible with God.
God’s Work to Produce Obedience in Us
God’s Work to Produce Obedience in Us
13 For it is God who works in you to will and to act on behalf of His good purpose.
It is God - specifically God the Holy Spirit who is at work in believers, leading us to know, trust, love, and obey Christ better. He is called the Holy Spirit because He is the Spirit who makes us holy. He is the one producing the fruit of the Spirit in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal 5:22).
It is God - the same God who began a good work in us and will finish what He started (Phil 1:6). He is faithful, and if He has started working in you, He will not stop. He will complete the work.
The word work in Greek is where we get our word energy, and it’s got the same root as the word translated work out in v. 12. We are to work out our salvation because God is the one working in us.
God’s work is not instead of us. His work is in us. And there are two things He is working into us: To will and to act (or to will and to work, or the willing and the working)
First, to will. This has to do with our desires. We do whatever we desire most to do at any given time. The desires may be so faint we can’t recognize them or they may be extremely strong desires that lead us to make decisions and act in certain ways. Our actions are governed by our will, and our will is led by our desires. If we are to obey, we must want to obey.
Because of the sin of Adam and Eve, we are all born with a will and desires contrary to God and His law. With the exception of Jesus, no other human since Adam and Eve has been born with a desire to do what is right. We all naturally desire to rule our own lives and ignore or even openly rebel against God and His law.
By the miracle of new birth, God has given us a new heart and put His Spirit within us, giving us a truly free will and the ability to choose what is right. Yet for now, He has chosen to allow our sinful nature to remain, so that our spiritual life in this world is a battle. Galatians 5 and Romans 7 are some chapters that describe this ongoing battle in the Christian life to fight against sin and fight for holiness, the fight of the flesh against the Spirit.
So when God works in us to will, it means that God is working at the deepest level of our desires, producing in us a greater desire for Him and His righteousness than for the sinful pleasures of this world.
God is not forcing people to act against their will; rather He is making the unwilling willing. He is acting in your will so that you want what He wants.
The Example of Titus - 2 Corinthians 8:16-17
16 But thanks be to God, who put into the heart of Titus the same devotion I have for you.
17 For not only did he welcome our appeal, but he is eagerly coming to you of his own volition.
Second, to act (or to work).
Not only is God working in your will, He is working in your actions. As you work out your salvation, God is the one working that in you. As you persevere in your faith, love, and obedience to Christ, God is the one producing the work. It is God’s work, and God is doing His work through you.
These things that God is working into us, are in fact, part of the promise of the new covenant:
Jeremiah 31:33 (BSB)
33 … I will put My law in their minds and inscribe it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they will be My people.
27 And I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes and to carefully observe My ordinances.
On behalf of His good purpose - this word translated on behalf of indicates purpose or goal or reason - why does God do these things the way He does? It is for His good purpose or pleasure. God has chosen to do things this way because He wants to, because it is what pleases Him, and it brings Him the greatest glory.
Put simply, the teaching of these verses is Trust and Obey.
Keep your focus on God, receive His grace, trust Him for the help you need in your Christian life.
And obey. Get to work killing sin, pursuing holiness, growing in likeness to Christ.
These verses are here to keep us from two opposite and sinful attitudes:
Self-sufficient pride - we must not think or acts as if our progress in holiness is our own doing; any progress we make in our Christian lives is ultimately God’s work, not ours, and so we have no reason to boast.
Humble laziness - depending on God without getting to work; since it’s God’s work, I don’t need to do anything...
These verses urge us to
Strive for growth in holiness, work hard to become more like Christ, actively pursue a closer relationship with God.
Give all the glory to God, trusting Him, depending constantly on His grace, and praising Him every step of the way.
Practically what does this look like in your life?
Let’s say that there’s a particular sin that you’re struggling with. What should you do?
Pray and ask for God’s help, and then fight the sin - avoid situations where you’re tempted, memorize and meditate on verses that apply to that particular temptation or sin, seek accountability.
If you struggle with sexual sin and a desire to use pornography - first go to God, confess your sin and struggle, and ask for His help; then ask someone else to hold you accountable, set boundaries that keep you away from that temptation, and learn some Bible verses on sexual purity.
If your struggle is managing your finances wisely or spending too much money, take it to God first, ask for His help, depend on Him, and ask someone else to help you budget your money and hold you accountable, and memorize some verses on how to use money wisely.
Or let’s say that there’s someone in your life who is not a believer that God has burdened you for. What should you do?
First, pray for that person. Take it to the Lord in prayer. But don’t stop there. Get out and share the gospel. Find a way to share Christ with them.
Simply put,
Trust God and Work Hard
Trust God and Work Hard
We probably all tend to overemphasize one or the other of these things. Figure out what your tendency is and get to work on keeping these balanced.
Give your best effort to the things God gives you to do.
Trust Him for the strength, and give Him all the glory.
PRAY
