Scripture Introduction
One of my seminary professors illustrated the challenge of believing and living Biblical truth by saying that we work out our theology and practice on a razor’s edge. The faithful Christian does not walk the fine edge so much as she is always moves back toward Biblical truth and godly behavior. Fallen creatures living in a fallen world have neither the wisdom nor sight in these shadowlands to perfectly know or do God’s will; our goal must be to always move back toward the line.
Today’s text challenges us in such a way. The command is deceptively simple: “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel.” Only that! But the gospel is undeserved, so how do we live worthy of a gracious gift we are unworthy of? Such is the edge which God’s Spirit moves us toward this morning.
[Read Philippians 1.27-30. Pray.]
Introduction
Pastor John Piper describes a confrontation with a man committing adultery: “I tried to understand his situation and I pled with him to return to his wife. Then I said, ‘You know, Jesus says that if you don’t fight this sin with kind of seriousness that is willing to gouge out your own eye, you will go to hell and suffer there forever.’ As a professing Christian, he looked at me in utter disbelief, as though he had never heard anything like this in his life, and said, ‘You mean you think a person can lose his salvation?’” (Future Grace).
That little interaction reveals more than the hardness of one man’s heart. It shows how easily sinful minds warp into falsehood a received truth like, “Once saved always saved.” Yes, salvation is by grace, but the Savior also changes those he saves. It is as if we sometimes disconnect knowing Jesus from real life.
Dr. Bryan Chapell (President of Covenant Seminary) emphasizes the necessity of preaching grace Biblically by saying, “In the gospel the rules do not change—the means and motivation for obedience change.” In the gospel, lust is still a soul-damning sin—the rules does not change. But both the motivation and means of victory are different than we naturally expect.
So how do we change? How do we live worthy of the gospel? How do we please God as sinners living in a sin-soaked world? How do we fight lust in a way that honors the grace of Jesus and not the strength of our wills? Let’s consider two truths this morning. First…
1. We Must Begin with the Gospel To Please God
Our special Sunday morning breakfast is scrambled eggs. Now suppose Helen cracks a dozen eggs into a bowl and eleven are perfect. Eleven of twelve is a great batting average, a fantastic three-point shooting percentage, and well on your way to a quarterback rating over 100. But is 92% acceptable for a bowl of beaten eggs? No way! One rotten egg corrupts the whole.
In the old days, large windows consisted of several individual panes of glass. If you smack a baseball through one, the others can remain intact. But modern windows are made from large pieces of glass. Yours may appear to be divided by a muntin (the small piece of material which separates individual pieces of glass in the larger frame), but that merely decorates the window. A baseball breaks the whole window.
The Bible teaches that God’s rules are like modern windows, or scrambled eggs if you prefer. “Whoever keeps the whole law (the apostle James reminds us) but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it” (James 2.10). “Accountable” is a great translation of the Greek word [e;nocoj=enochos]; it is more subtle than simply guilty, though guilt is included in the meaning. The implication is that we are liable even if we did not commit the exact crime. The law is one piece—disobeying a part violates the law as a whole.
This is why none pleases God by the good we do or the bad we avoid. None obeys perfectly! Even when we manage some external conformity (“I never robbed a bank”), we dishonor God’s name and nature with corrupt hearts, selfish motives, and prideful desires (“I coveted my neighbor’s house”).
Augustus Toplady put our problem to song in the hymn, “Rock of Ages”: “Not the labors of my hands, can fulfill your law’s demands. Could my zeal no respite know, could my tears forever flow, all for sin could not atone; you must save, and you alone.”
To summarize the discomfort we feel about free grace, sometimes gospel preachers say, “There is only one thing you need to come to God through Jesus. The only thing you need is ‘need,’ but few will own that!”
A woman appeared at the church Thursday and told me of the miseries of her life, the death of her brother, the poverty of her parents, and how she spent everything on food and fuel to drive here for the funeral. She begged for some money to get a meal and gasoline to make it home to Kentucky. Then she said, “I will pay you back when I get home.” I said, “No, that’s OK, there is no paying it back.” She said, “No, give me the address of the church and I will mail the money to you when I get home.” Even when reduced to begging, free gifts make us uncomfortable. But I need the free grace.
Pastor Mike Ross: “One thing I must consistently remind myself, every morning in prayer, is that I am not ‘basically a good guy.’ Quite the contrary; I am radically a wicked fellow. I am, indeed, far worse than I ever imagined; but I know that God’s grace is more wonderful than I ever dreamed! The same must be true of you. To acknowledge and live in the light of this truth is what keeps you and me from becoming Pharisees. The root problem of those self-righteous men, who spurned gospel and grace, was their belief that they were ‘basically good people’ unlike the ‘tax-gatherers and sinners’ Jesus hung around with, and seemed to like. Because these men could not face the truth about themselves they could not embrace the truth about Christ.”
Pastor Steve Brown likes to say, “The only people who ever get better are those who know that if they never get better, God will still love them.”
A life worthy of the gospel begins with full acceptance of our acceptance in the Gospel. Has the Spirit shown you that Christ paid your debt which he did not owe, because you owe a debt you cannot pay?
Last week at Whiz Kids, I turned a corner in the hallway just as one of the kids stopped in the doorway of a classroom. The boy behind her did not want to stop, so he gave her a pretty good push. Of course she turned around and snapped: “Don’t you push me, boy!” Without a moment’s hesitation he said, “I didn’t push you.” Of course, I watched the whole thing, so I said, “You did push her, and you can apologize.” He adamantly responded: “I didn’t push her!”
That interaction reminded me that a life worthy of the Gospel is not measured by our perfection, but by our confession. That boy could not confess, because the payment for honesty is punishment. The law can only reward confession with consequences; the gospel, however, offers a different reward.
Romans 2.4: “Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?”
Whether I am a Christian or not, I sin. True faith knows God as the graceful Father, the loving Savior, the merciful Master. So she quickly confesses faults, asks for forgiveness, accepts responsibility, compares herself to Jesus, sees her need for grace, turns to God for forgiveness and restoration. She begins with the Gospel. Is that where you begin each day? Second…
2. We Must Continue with the Gospel to Please God
Many people who accept God’s acceptance through faith in Jesus nevertheless expect to work hard to keep God’s favor. Like first round draft choices, we may aim to live worthy of the team we are on. But a life worthy of free grace and unmerited favor may look different. It seems to me that professing Christians can fall into three “sub-gospel” groups.
Some lower the standard so they feel accepted. They figure God wants them in church on most Sundays and avoiding really big sins. By aiming low, they are pleased with their performance, and they do not need the gospel on a daily basis. Religion is akin to a self-help philosophy.
On the other end, some like a high standard. These “committed Christians” read the Bible and pray regularly, and they are probably involved in a Bible study and some ministry. But in their heart of hearts, they may also feel they do not need the gospel. Their religion is all about performance, and they meet the challenge.
A third group dwells on their failures to meet their standards. For example, they might try to have a quiet time every day, but grow discouraged over their wandering minds and cold hearts. They know they should do better, and feel guilty for not measuring up. All three groups are performance driven, but this last group is driven by their failure to perform.
It really does not matter so much which of these errors you find controlling your heart and life, because all have two critical things in common: 1) we image growth in godliness results from our good works, but the truth is that it results in good works; and 2) we forget that we need the gospel.
Richard Lovelace writes about this well: (Dynamics of Spiritual Life: An Evangelical Theology of Renewal, 211): “We all automatically gravitate toward the assumption that we are justified by our level of sanctification, and when this posture is adopted it inevitably focuses our attention not on Christ but on the adequacy of our own obedience. We start each day with our personal security resting not on the accepting love of God and the sacrifice of Christ but on our present feelings or recent achievements in the Christian life. Since these arguments will not quiet the human conscience, we are inevitably moved either to discouragement and apathy or to a self-righteousness which falsifies the record to achieve a sense of peace.”
Jerry Bridges: “I learned that Christians need to hear the gospel all of their lives because it is the gospel that continues to remind us that our day-to-day acceptance with the Father is not based on what we do for God but upon what Christ did for us in his sinless life and sin-bearing death…. Therefore, I don’t have to perform to be accepted by God. Now I am free to obey him and serve him because I am already accepted in Christ. My driving motivation now is not guilt but gratitude” (“Gospel Driven Sanctification,” Modern Reformation, May/June 2003, 14,15).
3. Conclusion
Let’s work though the practical application in this text. After telling the Philippians to let their manner of life be worthy of the gospel, he notes this should produce a oneness of mind and spirit as they strive together to advance the faith. This paragraph also begins the transition to the exhortation to humility in the next chapter, which is the spiritual grace necessary for unity in the church. So, the work needed in our hearts is humility producing unity. How do we live that in a manner worthy of the gospel?
Since faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, we begin by recognizing humility as a godly and Biblical trait. In addition to the command in Philippians, Psalm 138.6 reminds us that “Though the LORD is high, he regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar.” Proverbs 29.23: “One’s pride will bring him low.” Jesus himself is gentle and lowly in heart, and it was Satan pride that caused him to seek God’s place as ruler of all.
But once we agree that we ought to be humble, we do not get there simply by trying harder, nor by regretting our failures. What process enables us to remain worthy of the Gospel?
First, we acknowledge that we lack both the desire and the ability to obey by ourselves. We admit to God that the standard is good and good for us, but we also confess that we fail to meet it apart from a work of grace, and that any forms of humility we achieve in the flesh result in spiritual pride. We admit that pride comes from our hearts, defiles us, and deserves judgment. Even better if we have the courage to confess specific sins of pride.
Second, we pray, asking for God’s help. The life of faith depends on God’s provision, so we ask God to do what we cannot. In fact, we probably can say more here than simply pray. If we really want humility, we will admit to others (as well as to God) our need for grace and help, and we ask pastor and friends to pray for us in this area. People that expect God to answer with his power and presence are eager to involve many in prayer.
Third, we must trust the promise of future grace. God never commands humility to make us into doormats; like all commands, this is the path to reward. “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you” (James 4.10). Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5.5). God saves a humble people (Psalm 18.27) and to the humble he gives favor (Proverbs 3.34). “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble” (James 4.6). “The last shall be first.”
Luke 18.9-14: Jesus also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
We trust these promises by writing and reciting them every day. We memorize and meditate on them when our hearts complain of humble treatment. We cherish the reward and use it to motivate behavior which places us in God’s debt—we expect him to reward humility. We can never make a sacrifice.
Fourth, we enjoy the Spirit produced humility. We do not begrudge opportunities for humility or become bitter, because the reward is so great. When those feelings arise, we confess them and ask forgiveness. But our focus is opening ourselves to the Spirit and the work of God, we believe God blesses this fruit.
Fifth, we are thankful to God for the beauty of the humility he has produced in us and the rewards he gives for it. We thank him for the promptings of the Spirit and the prayers and exhortations of her friends. We call those who prayed with us and thank them for their ministry; we tell them of the goodness of God and asks of their progress in the faith. We share our testimony with others, speaking much of God’s goodness.
The rules have not changed. The law requires humility from those who are not God and who deserve damnation for their sins. But the means of obedience is not our effort, and the motivation is not the law’s punishment. The means is now the work of God based on the promises of the Bible, and the motivation is the reward of God’s exaltation of the humble.
Let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel.
