Search
Scripture Reading: Phil. 1:19; 2:12-16; 3:9-10; 4:8, 12-13
In this chapter we will look specifically at the power of resurrection and the conformation to the cross. We all know that Philippians is a book that speaks specifically about the experience of Christ. As such, it is a book of experience. The truths contained in it are very deep, but these truths are expressed to us in experience. This book has four chapters, and we have quoted some verses from every chapter. These verses are the very essence of this book. It is only after we get into these verses that we can say that we know the book of Philippians.
Philippians 1:19 says, “This will turn out to salvation through...the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” Salvation here does not refer to the deliverance from God’s punishment or from future perdition. Salvation here refers to that which was spoken of in verses 20 and 21. We are to be saved to the extent that “Christ will be magnified in my body, whether through life or through death.” Hence, the salvation in Philippians is not just a matter of living out Christ but a matter of magnifying Christ in our bodies.
In His humanity Christ passed through the experiences of incarnation and human living, eventually being crucified on the cross. All these processes are very insignificant in man’s eyes. Even today, while the gospel is preached throughout the whole earth, man still feels the same way. When Paul wrote the book of Philippians, he was imprisoned in Rome (v. 13) during the reign of the Roman Caesar. The people then, especially those in the house of Caesar, thought very little of Jesus. Although Paul as a prisoner suffered much and experienced great difficulties, even to the point that he could have been executed the very next day, he was bold to experience Christ and to magnify Christ through life or through death before Caesar and all those around him. As a result Paul’s magnifying of Christ brought even some in the household of Caesar to salvation through believing into Christ.
Had Paul not magnified Christ while he was being interrogated and persecuted in prison, it would have meant that he was not saved in that circumstance. It is not an easy matter to be saved in your environment when you are in prison. This can never be achieved by yourself. How can you be saved? It is by the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ that you can magnify Christ whether through life or through death.
We can see from history and from biographies that when martyrs die, they receive a special power from on high. I can never forget a story that I heard fifty years ago. One day in northern China where my hometown was, I met a brother. He was formerly a merchant. Later, he gave up his career to become a traveling evangelist. I asked him on that day how he was saved. He told me the following story.
At the end of the Ching Dynasty there was the Boxer Rebellion in China. Eight nations joined forces to wage war on Beijing. Many Christians were persecuted and even died for the Lord during the riots. At that time this man was an apprentice in a shop in Beijing. One day the Boxers were parading on the streets, sending Christians to the execution ground. They shouted and cried with their swords in their hands. The scene was frightening. All the households, including the shops, were closed. Out of curiosity he peeped through a crack between the closed door. He saw that among the parading line, there was a very young Christian girl about twenty years old. She was on her way to be executed. Although the Boxers around her were very fierce, this sister was able to sing and praise with overflowing joy on the cart bound for the execution ground. This not only shocked him but touched him to the uttermost. He was determined to investigate thoroughly the Christian religion as soon as the Boxer Rebellion was over, to find out from where the girl derived her strength. Not long after his search, he believed in the Lord and decided to no longer be in business. He became instead an evangelist. This was the result of the girl’s magnifying Christ in the face of execution.
In the province of Kiangsi at the time of the Communist turmoil, many Christians also were martyred. One Western missionary was caught and spoke one famous sentence as he was about to die: “The face of every martyr shines like the face of an angel.” This shows us that the Christ experienced in Philippians brings us to the point that we can become a martyr. We know that there is no suffering more severe than to be martyred. This is the most difficult thing for anyone to experience. This is why Paul says that it was through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ that he could magnify Christ whether through life or through death.
In Philippians 2 Paul mentions submission many times. To be submissive is to agree with whatever God says. In the chorus of Hymns, #481 Brother A. B. Simpson writes, “All the way to Calvary.” This is the Lord’s ordination and commandment for us. Since the Lord died on the cross, we also should take the narrow way of the cross. The Christian life is, on the one hand, to live daily. On the other hand, it is to die daily. The life between a husband and a wife is a “martyr’s” life. Daily the wife slaughters the husband, and the husband, the wife. If you have been living wholly and proudly without having others slaughter you, you are a defeated Christian. You must be a “martyred” Christian, not just before the Roman Caesar but before your husband or your wife. In other words, let your husband or wife slaughter you and terminate you.
Today you are living in the training center. Every dormitory room is a slaughterhouse. We know that in the Old Testament the first step in the offering of a burnt offering is the killing of the sacrifice. Then there has to be the skinning, the cutting to pieces, and finally, the laying of the sacrifice on the altar to be burnt to ashes. Only then will the sacrifice be accepted, and only then will the sacrifice be considered complete. The result of the burnt offering is a pile of ashes. Today when I come to your dormitory, and I do not see ashes, it means that you are not yet “martyred,” that you have not been “slaughtered,” and that you have not been burnt to ashes. You have not yet taken the narrow way of the cross.
In Philippians 2:17 Paul says, “Even if I am being poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice, and I rejoice together with you all.” Paul added to the faith of the Philippians the drink offering. This was to encourage the Philippians that although they had difficulties and sufferings for the sake of believing in the Lord, Paul’s suffering in his prison was even more than theirs. It was as if they were the burnt offerings, and he was the drink offering on top of the burnt offerings. This is what it means to be martyred. Actually, before Paul was martyred, he had been martyred already. In his feeling he was daily slaughtered; he was daily martyred.
However, we must see that this kind of martyrdom is salvation. If the ones who are living together among you always win and never are slaughtered, then you are all failures. If you are continually being slaughtered, it seems that you are being dealt with and terminated by others. It seems that you are defeated. But actually you are being saved.
Today the divorce rate in the United States is quite high. Many people remarry, even two or three times or even more. We have to realize that husbands and wives separate from each other because neither one would sacrifice. The word sacrifice in Chinese is very meaningful. It has as its root the word bull. This shows that it is a bull or a goat that is being used as a sacrifice. When the animal is put to death, the result is a sacrifice. This is the way of the cross.
Today our marriage life, family life, and church life are all a “slaughtering” life. Not only do we have to be saved through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, but we have to obey God as well and to learn to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. Paul says in Philippians 2, “So then, my beloved, even as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only but now much rather in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (v. 12). The word salvation here is the same as the one used in chapter 1. In the original language the words work out have the meaning of “live out.” In other words Paul hoped that the Philippians would live out their salvation.
We have to see that today our living is our working. When you live out your salvation, you are working out your salvation. When the Lord Jesus is in you, He is your salvation. But He has not been lived out as your outward salvation. For example, while you are having your dinner at the training center, a sister at the same table may have said something that hurt you very much. You may not have tried to explain anything. You may have forced yourself to be patient and to finish your meal. But after the meal you would go to a place where no one could see you, and then you would cry yourself out. After you cry, you may still act ostensibly as if nothing has happened. This shows that you have not lived out your salvation. Instead, you live out your “hypocrisy.”
Hence, living out our salvation, that is, working out our salvation, is a great spiritual work. In his hymn Simpson says that we are “to His death conformed to be” (Hymns, #481). This is the condition for working out our salvation. To work out our salvation, we have to be obedient unto death and remain in death. We have to be obedient to the portion that God has given us. This is to die. If we do not die, we are not being obedient. When a difficult situation arises, we have to say, “Praise the Lord!” We have to realize that it is prepared for us by the Lord. We have to work out our salvation through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.
In 2:13 Paul continues on to say, “It is God who operates in you both the willing and the working for His good pleasure.” The God mentioned here is the Spirit of Jesus Christ in chapter 1. He is also the Spirit with the bountiful supply, operating within us that we would accomplish His good pleasure, which is to live out our salvation. Today we are not saved by work. We are saved by the Spirit who operates within us. It is by the bountiful supply of our God that we can obey God’s ordination.
Death is God’s ordination for us today and His measure for us in all the environments. This is true in our marriage life. It is also true in our bearing and raising up of children. The more our self dies, the more we overcome and are spiritual and the more we can work out our salvation.
In Philippians 2:14 Paul says, “Do all things without murmurings and reasonings.” Although murmurings and reasonings are two small things, they are two real problems. There is hardly a couple that has no murmuring or reasoning between them. We have also seen that murmuring is from the emotion and comes mostly from the sisters. Reasoning is from the mind and comes mostly from the brothers. Problems in our family life arise frequently from the sisters opening up their mouths first. Once they open their mouths, murmurings come out. When the brothers answer, they often get into reasonings. Perhaps your life in the training center is not much different. But whenever we have murmurings and reasonings, we have not worked out our salvation.
Hence, Paul says in verses 15 and 16, “You shine as luminaries in the world, holding forth the word of life.” We the saved ones are the luminaries. We are qualified to reflect the divine light of Christ and to hold forth and demonstrate to others the word of life. To hold forth the word of God’s life is also a part of our salvation.
Philippians 1 tells us that to be saved is to magnify Christ. In chapter 2 to be saved is to live out salvation and to hold forth the word of life. In chapter 3 to be saved is to be found in Christ (v. 9). If we murmur or reason, others will not find us in Christ. We have to realize that the way God ordains for Christians is the way of salvation, which is also the way of expressing and magnifying Christ. The key to all these experiences is the death of our self. When that happens, others will see that we are a person in Christ. The righteousness in us will not be the result of our keeping the law. Rather, it will be through faith and based on God’s righteousness (v. 9). This is to be saved. This is also to magnify Christ and to live out salvation.
In Philippians 3:10 Paul continues on to say, “To know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death.” In this passage we see further the secret to experiencing Christ. One of the secrets is the power of resurrection. The other is the conformation to His death, which is the conformation to His cross. Stanza 1 in Hymns, #631 says, “If I’d know Christ’s risen power, / I must ever love the Cross.” The power of resurrection is our riches. If you are a rich man, you will spend your money gladly. To be conformed to the cross is the way our riches are spent. This passage tells us the experience of Paul. It shows us that if we do not know the power of resurrection and do not live in resurrection, there is no way for us to die by ourselves. It is the power of resurrection that bears us on to death and that takes us on the way of the cross.
Today the reality of Christ’s resurrection is the Holy Spirit. When you live in the Spirit, you live in the reality of resurrection. The last stanza of Hymns, #631 says, “If God thru th’ Eternal Spirit / Nail me ever with the Lord.” It is the Spirit who nails you. Hence, it is not your colleagues or your husband or wife who is dealing with you. Rather, it is the Holy Spirit in you who is taking you on in the experience of the Lord’s death so that you can be conformed to His death. Therefore, the conformation to the cross comes about through the power of resurrection.
This is why we must learn to exercise our spirit, experience the Spirit, and receive the killing of the cross. If we would not receive the cross but would only exercise our spirit, this experience of the spirit would not be reliable. The result of a true exercise of the spirit will surely cause us to die and to be crucified. The cross and the Holy Spirit go together. The two also follow one another. On the one hand, we must receive the cross before the Holy Spirit will fill us up. On the other hand, we must be full of the power of the Holy Spirit before we can receive the cross. The two complement each other. From Philippians 3:10 we see that the power of resurrection is the Spirit, and the conformation to the cross is death. This is the secret to our experience of Christ.
By the end of Philippians Paul was full of wisdom and mentions six virtues: “What things are true, what things are dignified, what things are righteous, what things are pure, what things are lovely, what things are well spoken of” (4:8). These six items are the proper humanity of a Christian. But all of these virtues can be achieved only through the cross. Hence, Paul goes on to say, “In everything and in all things I have learned the secret...I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me” (vv. 12-13). The secret here is the experience of death and resurrection. We are conformed to the cross by the power of resurrection. We live out salvation by the God who operates within, and we live out the likeness of His death; that is, we magnify Christ through the bountiful supply of the Spirit.
We have to see that this kind of experience of Christ is totally different from the cultivation of the bright virtue taught by the Chinese Confucianists. No matter how much the Confucianists improve themselves, they have no resurrection power within, which is the Spirit with the bountiful supply. They can develop only the conscience that is within them by nature. However, this is quite limited. For us, we are obeying the God who operates within us. The Spirit with the bountiful supply is our conscience and inner sensation. When we experience the Spirit day by day, we live out a life with an uplifted humanity.
Paul uses the highest and topmost expressions within this short Epistle to the Philippians: the bountiful supply of the Spirit, the God who operates, the power of resurrection, and the Christ who empowers us. They are used to show the Philippians how to experience Christ. A servant of the Lord must be familiar with these truths. At the same time we have to see that this is the humanity we who serve the Lord should have. Our humanity is the expression of the work of the Triune God in us. As far as the Spirit is concerned, He is the bountiful supply. As far as the Father is concerned, He is the operating God. As far as the Son is concerned, He is the One who empowers me. In the end the Triune God becomes my power within in resurrection. I am being conformed to His death through this power.
This operating God, bountifully supplying Spirit, and empowering Christ work in me continually. In the end the Triune God becomes in me the resurrected One, supplying me daily with the resurrection power. If I live by this power, I will surely love the conformation to the cross. In the end salvation is lived out, and Christ is magnified in me. I will have the highest humanity, and whatever is true, dignified, righteous, pure, lovely, and well spoken of will be found in me.
Although the book of Philippians is a short book, I hope that you would fellowship about it in depth. Not only should you learn these truths; you have to get into the light revealed in these truths so that from your youth you would build up a proper humanity and would even be able to possess the highest humanity.
