Shine
Phil 2:14-18 Jan 23, 2011
Intro:
To begin this morning I want you to imagine, or remember, a world without electric light. For most of us the closest we might get to imagining that would be a camping trip – I remember one night as a teenager where several of us had been working at Gull Lake Camp, and we took our sleeping bags down to the beach, made a fire, nestled into the sand, and slept outside under the stars. Can you imagine or remember a world without electric light? We need that picture, that image, as we head into the world of Paul the Apostle and his letter to the church at Philippi, where the central idea for us this morning is the phrase “shining like bright lights”.
Context:
But before getting to the central idea, let’s set the stage. In our study of Philippians we have seen that the major idea Paul is talking about here comes from 1:27 – “27 Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good News about Christ.” He’s been talking about that all through, and it continues in the passage we find ourselves in today. What does that mean? Does it have any impact in our daily lives?? Absolutely, and he has been talking about that in the passages we’ve looked at throughout, including the passage we studied last week that said “continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” (NIV). That brings us to verses 14-18:
Phil 2:14-18 (NLT):
14 Do everything without complaining and arguing, 15 so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people. 16 Hold firmly to the word of life; then, on the day of Christ’s return, I will be proud that I did not run the race in vain and that my work was not useless. 17 But I will rejoice even if I lose my life, pouring it out like a liquid offering to God, just like your faithful service is an offering to God. And I want all of you to share that joy. 18 Yes, you should rejoice, and I will share your joy.
Hansen’s Introduction:
Commentator Walter Hansen writes, “Paul now gives instructions for working out salvation in the community in one long, complicated sentence that stretches out through three verses (14-16). Each part of the sentence needs to be interpreted in the light of the whole sentence. Paul begins with an imperative modified by a prohibition: Do everything without grumbling or arguing. The all-inclusive imperative, do everything, demonstrates that we should work out our salvation in every dimension of life.” (Hansen, Pillar New Testament Commentary on Philippians, p. 179).
“Do everything”
Are there some parts of life that are the “spiritual” parts, where it is important that we pay attention to God? If we really believe in the Lordship of Jesus in our lives, that answer is “no”. Yet most people don’t really function that way – we find it more convenient to segment our lives, in our minds at least, into different parts, and then we apply different standards to those different parts. For example, we might think that when we go to church or are around church people we have to watch our language, or be more polite; or we might think that it is important that we “believe” (in the popular understanding of the word “believe” as a set of intellectual propositions to which we ascribe) the right things in our minds, but then it is ok to continue to live our lives day by day as we see fit. Are you with me with this idea of segmenting our lives into the “spiritual” and the rest, the “sacred” and the “secular”? Paul’s beginning command in verse 14 eliminates those lines – in Hansen’s words this “demonstrates that we should work out our salvation in every dimension of life”.
I’ve noticed in some circles a fairly strong reaction against this notion of being different people in different places – a rejection of the perception of hypocrisy, and I think that is a really healthy thing. We, here at Laurier, value being “real”, value accepting others for who they are, value authenticity and transparency. And again, I affirm that.
But I also want to say this: sometimes those values work against the transformation God wants to accomplish in us. Because sometimes we stop at authenticity. The progression is good, from pretending (or hypocrisy) to authenticity, but the idea of our faith is that we have to be authentically transformed into Christlikeness. Put more tangibly, it is wrong to show up at church on Sunday dressed up nice with a plastic smile and pretend that life is all wonderful when really it isn’t: “Hi Brother, great to see you praise Jesus. How am I? Oh, just great, God is good…”. That is the pretending (or hypocrisy) spot. But if we only take one step from there, to authenticity, what can (and sometimes does) happen is that we come together and are authentic in our sinfulness and loved unconditionally by others in our community, and so we continue in our sinfulness without going to the next level: “Hi, how am I? Lousy, my relationships are in a mess, I’m mad at so and so or such and such, I hate my job because my boss is an idiot, etc…”. And when someone genuinely listens and accepts us, we’ve made great progress from that first step. But the Kingdom of God is not about stopping at authenticity. God wants to change us, and take us to a next level together. That level is where our sinfulness is transformed by God, so that we are authentic and holy – not just in our hearts but in our actions. That level is where we authentically bring the struggles and frustrations and then are TOGETHER transformed so that we are like Jesus – so we have his perspective and priorities, so our relationships and activities are under the Lordship of Jesus, and we are transformed in how we see and live our lives. Do you see how it is not enough to stop at authenticity if we are being authentic but authentically stuck in sin?
Right down to the Attitude:
Key to understanding what I am talking about here is that the inner transformation changes our attitudes and perspectives, and actions then flow out of them. Outward conformity to some set of rules and guidelines is slavery and hypocrisy. And Paul’s command to “do everything” next goes to that attitude level. And again, before going there, remember to keep this in the realm of the true inner transformation God desires to do in us through His Holy Spirit.
“Do everything without complaining and arguing”. The word “grumbling” is in most translations where the NLT has “complaining”, similar words but “grumbling” is a better translation because we relate it more to the inside of us rather than the words that come out of us. But let me back up – do you generally consider “grumbling” a sin? What do you think???
So if we only see our choices as either “slap a happy smile and pretend things are rosy” or be authentic and complain/grumble, we have a problem with this verse. Both pretending and complaining are sin. The reason it can work, make sense in our lives, and even change our lives is that there is a third option: allow and facilitate the work of God to transform our inner core into Christlikeness. I’m not making this up, it is the key idea in the verse right before: “13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” This is the inner transformation, this is the “new life” in Christ, this is the pathway God wants to take us on that leads us to “life to the full”. You see, from elsewhere in Philippians and in the life of Paul we clearly see that the “life to the full” is not without struggle and difficulty, but is about facing those and overcoming all of them with a transformed inner core that can’t be hindered, overwhelmed, or beaten by any of the struggles or difficulties of life.
So, that sounds good, you might be thinking, but how do I make that happen in my life? You don’t. God does, it is a work of grace, and yet we must “continue to work out our salvation with fear and trembling”. You and I have to do the simple things, the everyday things, “all things”, out of a decision and action that allow God to transform us. Most simply, all we need to do to begin is carve significant space and time in our lives for God. Then cooperate with God as He works within us.
Jumping Ahead (vs. 16-18):
I’m going to jump past vs. 15 for just a moment, to simply glance at vs. 16-18. Among many other things, these 3 verses are an example of a transformed life. A transformed life “holds on firmly” to truth, to words of life God has already spoken (vs 16). A transformed life is poured out for others (vs 17). And a transformed life is a life of joy (vs. 18).
Shine (vs 15):
Now let’s go back. Vs. 14 commands us together to not complain or argue but instead be transformed by God at work in us to “will and to work”, verse 15 tells us why. It is not so we’ll have great lives (that is a by-product). It is not so we’ll avoid pain and hardship (in fact it might cause some conflict). And it is not so we will earn some additional measure of love from God.
“Do everything without complaining and arguing, 15 so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people.”
The reason is because we have to shine. Paul says “live clean, innocent lives” – authentic ones, not “pretending” that life is good – being transformed by God so that no matter what happens in life it IS good, because it is good within us, we are genuinely fighting all that is wrong including (and beginning with) whatever things within us are wrong (and that often lead to complaining). And by the way, where do complaints and grumblings come from – usually from an attitude that “we don’t deserve this”, an attitude that Paul directly confronted earlier in chapter 2 when he reminded us that even though Jesus was God he humbled Himself and was obedient to the point of death on a cross. And we think we don’t deserve whatever bad things happen to us?? One look at Jesus transforms us from that selfishness to the place where we really are living clean, innocent lives.
“As children of God”. Note how Paul brings it back to identity. Who are we? Children of God, adopted, accepted, forgiven, given new life, and continually transformed. And it is absolutely vital that we realize who we are, and then act out of that truth. Same idea as way back in 1:27 where Paul says “as citizens of heaven, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the Good news about Christ.
And now here is the “why”: so we might “shine”. So there would be a really clear contrast between our lives and the lives of the world around us that doesn’t know Jesus. That is Paul’s point, can you see it? The whole passage is not about stuffing the difficulties down and refusing to complain or argue, that line of thinking takes us right back to hypocrisy which always eventually cracks and the reality of who we are spills out. It is about being genuinely, honestly, truly different. And that difference is the light.
You’ve heard me talk about this and pray about this lots. We live in the middle of a world that really needs Jesus. I hope we believe that – even though many people look “fine” and seem to be doing really well, without Jesus there is something really, deeply, painfully wrong. There is no hope for eternity. No freeing worship, where we know love unconditional and love so powerful that it refuses to let us live some meager, barely awake life. No grand purpose worth giving our lives for (“like a liquid offering to God”). No transformed inner core that faces every situation of life, from disappointment with friends to cancer diagnosis to poverty to injustice at work.
Now our job is not to bring any of those things, only God can, but our job is to shine so the world around us can see what it looks like to be transformed by God. And this is something we must do together, as a community. I haven’t got time to get deep into the passage so take my word for it – it is addressed to the community and not first to individuals. In other words, the “shining” is not the idea of a single flashlight beam, or one little star in a huge black sky. Rather, it is the idea of a whole bunch of different twigs, sticks, logs, together in a fire pit. Jesus said, “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden.” (Matt 5:14) – it is the light from the town, the people together, that needs to shine.
Conclusion:
At the beginning I asked you to imagine a world without electric light and told you about a night on the beach at Gull Lake. Two of my strongest memories from that night are these: first, the sunset. Wow… across the lake, light and color dancing across clouds and mirrored on the surface of a completely calm, glassy lake. Second was the fire – how it was alive, warm, and it enabled us who were there to talk and laugh and live, and it kept us warm through the night.
That is what we need to be as children of God in our world. Together like the lake reflecting the glory of the sunset, together like the logs in the fire casting a warm glow, so that all around us, wherever people are living in spiritual darkness, they see something else. They see a different way to live – an authentic, real, powerful way to live – not devoid of struggle but rather transformed within so that there is no complaining or arguing, just the glory of God shining through us, which then offers something vastly different to them. Something, indeed, compelling to them.
So let us go. Let us let God transform us, so that the authentic life we live out together is clean and innocent and brings life in others. Let’s shine.
