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PHILIPPIANS Chapter 3:

Christ Our Goal and the Church Our Citizenry

(Overcomer Wu)

I. A Warning of a Hindrance to Our Goal

Paul opened this chapter by exhorting the saints to rejoice in the Lord, but immediately in verse 2, he had to warn them of what could stand in the way of their experiencing the joy in Christ. Paul said, “Beware of dogs.” Nowadays, esp. in US, when we think of dogs, we conjure up the picture of a cute little pet dog. And dog is so highly regarded that it has earned the title as “man's best friend” right? But the kind of dog that Paul had in mind and the kind of dog that is common in those days are the wild scavenging dogs that roam the streets. In other words, Paul is referring to a junkyard dog. They push over trash cans in search of food; they do their droppings wherever they feel like, and they harass and even bite people sometimes. From reading the immediate context of verses 2 and 3, we know that Paul was referring to the Judaizers. It was and still is the teaching of the Jews that a man can only be saved by keeping the countless deeds of the law of God in our self effort. Well, we might think that these verses don't apply to us because we don't have much of any Judaizers these days bothering us in the places where we live.

Therefore, Paul continued in verse 3 with more clarifications to show whether or not we are under the influence of the modern Judaizers or not. And essentially the test questions he posed to us are these: Do we serve by the Spirit of God or do we serve the Lord in our own self effort and our own strength? If we are still serving in our own self-effort and are self-reliant, then that shows that in our practice we have not fully experienced the cutting off of our flesh, which is what “circumcision” means in spiritual terms. Another test is where do we truly put our boast in? ... is it really in Christ or is it in our self? And another good acid test is where do we place our confidence in? Do we place our confidence in our own abilities, trainings, and accomplishments? Or do we wholly rely on Christ as our life moment by moment, drawing all our wisdom, strength, supply and life from Him to the point where we experience the reality of “apart from Him I can do nothing” (Jn 15:5)?

II. Paul's Qualifications for His Impending Verdict (3:4-6)

In mentioning his legacy, his position, his titles, and his attainments in these three verses, Paul was not at all boasting, because he just stated plainly that our boasting is in Christ Jesus alone in v.3. Rather, Paul listed all of his privileges, positions, and prestige in Judaism in order to show the Jews that he was highly-qualified to make a judgment of what the best that Judaism/religion has to offer when compared to Christ because he has “been there and done that.”

Paul's Authoritative Verdict on the Goal of Life – To Gain Christ and Be Found in Him (3:7-11)

After enumerating all of his qualifications in verses 4-6, the apostle Paul stood on the ground of a highly-qualified judge and jury, he gave the verdict in the following verse: “what things were gains to me, these I counted loss on account of Christ.”(3:7)

3:8 “But surely, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.”

Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss— Not only those things which he had just mentioned in vv 5-6, which he had obtained and attained, but everything else which one can conjure up in his wildest dream/imagination, he says he would be willing to renounce in order to gain Christ. With all the honor and wealth which he had and could apprehend as his, he was willing to renounce them on account of the excellency of Christ Jesus my Lord. The idea he is trying to convey is this: “What he did possess or might obtain, he regarded as loss in comparison what he had gained and continues to gain of Christ. We've read this verse many times before, but I just begin to realize what Paul meant by saying that he counted them as “loss.” I believe what he meant was that all those times, energy, and effort spent gaining all these other things that the worldly people and the religious people seek after was altogether a loss of his time, energy, and effort, since he could've spent them in gaining Christ!

For whom I have suffered the loss of all things— When Paul met Christ and became a
Christian, he willingly gave up the brilliant prospects of his career and his unlimited future in this life, and everything else which his heart had ever dream of gaining and attaining. He abandoned the hope of honor and prestige; he sacrificed every position and possession; and he was willing to alienate his dearest friends who had rejected Christ and all Christians. In other words, he was willing to sacrifice everything in order to gain Christ. Paul had not only acted on this principle when he first became a Christian, but he had ever afterward continued to be ready to give up everything in order that he might gain Christ to the uttermost.

Let's apply this to ourselves a bit: It's kind of like after you have studied so hard and attained to a Ph.D degree and then throw it all away at the Lord's bidding in order to gain Him and to serve Him. Or its like a business man having climbed the corporate ladder for decades to become the CEO of a big corporation and then gave it all up in order to carry our cross and follow the Lord. We all need to ask ourselves: Do we consider this a waste? Be truthful with yourself. If we even have a slightest thought that this is a waste, then it just shows that we have not have yet seen the excellency of Christ. Then we should repent and ask the Lord to have mercy on us and reveal Himself to us in all His surpassing worth and His unrivaled beauty.

Ex: many of us have read the story of our brother Watchman Nee in his biography. We know that Watchman Nee was a genius. He gets straight As even when he hardly ever had to study. At a latter point in his life, one of his former professors met him and saw him in a rather pitiful condition and walking with a cane... and the professor asked him, “What happen to you? We had so much hope in you as you have shown great potential and intellect. You could have risen to the highest position in the land if you wanted to. Why did you throw your life away to follow the Lord Jesus?(I'm paraphrasing here)? Then WatchmanNee felt almost regretful and was in tears, but at that moment he also experienced the Lord's great glory and joy that he had never experienced before. At the same time, he realized that it was not at all a waste for him to have invested all his life, his time, his effort, his blood, and even ultimately the sacrifice of his mortal life by being tortured for about 2 decades and eventually died in prison on behalf of the Lord.

And do count them but dung—The word used here—óêýâáëïí skubalon—occurs nowhere else in the New Testament. It means refuse; garbage; what is thrown away as worthless; or that which is thrown to the dogs. No language could express a more deep sense of the utter worthlessness of all that external advantages, positions, prosperity, and prestige in comparison to Christ. Paul is saying that all of heritage being of a certain blood line, his attainment to be a member of the elite society at that time – a Pharisee; his external morality, and his strict adherence to the law of God was so perfect that he was found to be blameless, are to be renounced, and are to be esteemed as vile and dog food on account of the excellency of Christ. It took the apostle Paul many decades to attained to all the great positions and privileges that he had, but he rather give them all up in order that he may gain Christ!

And the fellowship of his sufferings—That I may participate in the same kind of sufferings that he endured; that is, that I may in all things be identified with him. Paul wished to be just like his Savior. He felt that it was an honor to live as he did; to evince the spirit that he did, and to suffer in the same manner. All that Christ did and suffered was glorious in his view, and he wished in all things to resemble him. He did not desire merely to share his honors and triumphs in heaven, but, regarding his whole work as glorious, he wished to be wholly conformed to that, and, as far as possible, to be just like Christ. Many are willing to reign with Christ, out they would not be willing to suffer with him; many would be willing to wear a crown of glory like him, but not the crown of thorns; many would be willing to put on the robes of splendor which will be worn in heaven, but not the scarlet robe of contempt and mockery.

They would desire to share the glories and triumphs of Christ, but not His poverty, contempt, and persecution. This was not the feeling of Paul. He wished in all things to be just like Christ, and hence he counted it an honor to be permitted to suffer as he did. Thus Peter says, “Rejoice, inasmuch as you are partakers of Christ’s sufferings” (1 Pet. 4:13). And Paul says in Col. 1:24 that he rejoiced in his sufferings in behalf of his brethren, and desired “to fill up that which was behind, of the afflictions of Christ.” The idea is, that it is an honor to suffer on behalf of Christ; and that the true Christian will esteem it a privilege to be made like him, not only in glory, but in trial; indeed the path to glory is paved with trials. To this end, we need to ask ourselves: Are we merely seeking the honors of heaven, or are we esteeming it a privilege to be reproached and reviled as Christ was—to have our names trampled like His was—to be made the object of scorn and derision like He was—and to be held up to the contempt of a world like He was? If not, and we are merely seeking the crown of glory, we should doubt whether we have ever known anything of loving Christ to the uttermost with all our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mk 12:30) and consecrating ourselves to Him.

Our Lord’s Cross is the gateway into His life. His resurrection means that He has the power to convey His life to us. When we were born again, we received the very life of the risen Lord from Jesus Himself.

Christ’s resurrection destiny—His foreordained purpose—was to bring “many sons to glory” (Heb 2:10). The fulfilling of His destiny gives Him the right to make us sons and daughters of God. We never have exactly the same relationship to God that the Son of God has, but we are brought by the Son into the relation of sonship. When our Lord rose from the dead, He rose to an absolutely new life—a life He had never lived before He was God Incarnate. He rose to a life that had never been before. And what His resurrection means for us is that we are raised to His risen life, not to our old life. One day we will have a body like His glorious body, but we can know here and now the power and effectiveness of His resurrection and can “walk in newness of life” (Rom 6:4). Paul’s determined purpose was to “know Him and the power of His resurrection” (Phi 3:10).

3. Pursuing Towards the Goal (3:12-16)

3:12 “Not that I have already obtained or am already perfected, but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me”

Never choose to be a worker for God, but once God has placed His call on you, woe be to you if you “turn aside to the right hand or to the left” (Deut 5:32). We are not here for God because we have chosen to do so, but because God has “laid hold of” us. In John 15:16 Jesus also told his disciples that “You did not choose me, but I have chosen you...”right? And what is the purpose of God in laying hold of us? It is in order for us to “lay hold of that for which we have been laid hold of by Christ Jesus.” And what is that? Paul already told us that in the previous verses from vv.8-11. In short, we can simply put it: to gain Christ to the uttermost or to the fullest extent. Christ is immeasurably vast and immense that we can never gain enough of Christ in this life or even for eternity! Therefore, we can never reckon ourselves to have already obtained or been perfected... at least not until we reach a certain point which I will mention later. And this is a healthy attitude, because “perfection precludes the possibility of progression.” (O.Wu)

3:13,“Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; ”

A Good Barometer for Our Spiritual Growth – An Insatiable Hunger for Christ. The more we grow in life, the more we will have this sensation that we are so short of Christ, because when we grow in greater maturity in life spiritually, the more we see of the vast expanse of Christ that we have yet to gain of Him. Thus, Paul seeing this great shortage inspite of His relatively mature stage when he wrote this epistle acclaimed that on account of Christ, he had suffered the loss of all things – in other words, he was willing to give up all things positive or negative, in order to gain more of Christ and be found in Him Phi 3:8-9. It also explains why the attitude of the apostle Paul is always that “ I do not count myself to have apprehended.” Some unbelievers hearing this kind of words may say that your Christ then does not satisfy your hunger and your true spiritual need. Otherwise, why do you have this constant hunger for more of Christ? Well, it is like this: We can say with assurance in our experience that Christ is the only One Who can satisfy our spiritual hunger and He is more than adequate to meet all of our needs, but the paradox is that we can never have enough of Him. In other words, Christ is enough to meet all of our needs, but we can never have enough of Him.

How does one know whether he or she is growing spiritually? One of the first indicators that you are maturing in your Christian walk is an increasing hunger to gain Christ. Do we cherish the time that you spend alone with the Lord? Do you linger at the close of your prayer time, wanting just a little more from Him? Do you seek out opportunities to commune with the Lord, listen to Him, or just sitting at His feet, like Mary, just to know more of Him? If you answered 'yes' to these questions, then it is a good sign that you are growing in your spiritual life.

Another indicator is an increasing desire to know the truth of God's Word. Do you find yourself meditating on the Word of God, hoping to glean more life and truth from them? Do we have an insatiable hunger for God's Word like the David in Psalms 19:10 says, that he desired the Word of God more than fine gold? Do you sisters consider the Word of God more precious than diamonds? And David also said in the same verse that it is sweeter also than honey. Do we find our time masticating on the Word of God sweet to our taste or do we find it a drudgery or simply a routine that we go through each day? The prophet Jeremiah in his book chapter 15:16, he also tells us the similar as David's experience right? That upon eating the Word of God, it is to him the “joy and the rejoicing of his heart.” If this is our experience, PTL! That is another good healthy sign that we are indeed growing in our Christian life.

Besides longing for a more intimate fellowship with God, a true mark of spiritual development is an awareness of your sinfulness or our shortage of God's grace in our life. The apostle Paul went from calling himself that he is not in anyway less than the super apostles in 2 Corinthians 11:5, 12:11, to calling himself “less than the least of all saints” in Ephesians 3:8, to eventually calling himself the “chief of sinners” in 1 Timothy 1:15. This is due to the fact that the more we learn about God's nature and the closer we draw to God, the more intense His light shines upon us and the more we'll see our short-comings and how much of ourselves that still remains to be transformed. In having these realizations, we should not be discouraged that we are becoming more aware of our weaknesses and folly, but to use that realization to gain more of Christ and to pursue Him with all our might.

It really was not until at the very end of Paul's life that the Lord gave him the realization that he has attained: he said in his very last epistle right before his martyrdom. Paul wrote in 2 Timothy 4:6-7 “I have fought a good fight, I have finished the course, and I have kept the faith.” May the Lord instill this insatiable hunger for more of Christ and His Word, that in the end, we too may be able to proclaim like the apostle Paul did, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished the course, and I have kept the faith.”

3:13 “Brothers, I do not yet reckon myself to have laid hold, but one thing – forgetting the things which are behind.”

By holding onto the past, we debilitate our advancement towards the future/goal. Illustrate: Just as a man cannot keep walking forward with his head turned backwards looking behind him all the time right? If he does, soon or later he will either fall into a ditch, run into a pole, or veer off the course that leads towards the goal. Sometimes, we have a tendency to hold on to the past, because we like to remember the good ol' days when there was no suffering, no troubles, no headaches or heartaches, but we were just rejoicing and enjoying the Lord all day long, right? Or negatively, we may still be feeling regretful of our past mistakes and where we have failed the Lord and our love ones. Either way, whether it's the good or the bad moments of the past, we cannot continue dwell on, because it will hold us back from advancing towards our goal of gaining Christ to the uttermost. It's alright to look back once in awhile for a short moment, because it is necessary for us to learn from our mistakes from the past, as Winston Churchill puts it very eloquently, “Forget our past mistakes, and we are condemned to repeat it.”

It is helpful to also once in awhile look at the good 'ol days of the church life in order to learn what we've done right and where we may have gone wrong in our present condition. So, we should look back only momentarily, but never dwell on it for too long or it will become a hindrance in our running of the spiritual race, because if we dwell on our past mistakes or injuries for too long, we are bound to be discouraged. And if we dwell on our past successes for too long, we will either become too content at how far we have come, which will then slow our progress. For example: In the olympic games, we often see certain teams that have won the world championship for several years in a row and are greatly favored to win again in this olympic contest; however, we've seen too many of these teams became too confident and perhaps they stop practicing as hard as they used to, so they ended up faltering and lose out on the gold medal. The Chinese gymnastic team in the 1996 olympic was an example of this.

Furthermore, the apostle Paul adds: "... and reaching forth to those things which are before" v.13. Paul forgot the things which were behind him (and he was referring to mostly the positive attainments he listed at the first part of this chapter 3 of Philippians) so as not to be content with present measures of Christ: his earnest aspiration is to gain Christ to the uttermost. So he continues to reach forward — the Greek word portrays an athelete exerting every ounce of energy he/she can summon up in order to reach for the finish line.

3:14 “I press towards the mark/goal...”

Like the apostle Paul, we should have this healthy attitude as those who look upon themselves to be in a state of imperfection and not having reach the goal of God's high-calling : "Not as though I had already attained, or am already perfected," v. 12. The best men in the world will readily own their imperfection in the present state. We have not yet attained, are not already perfect; there is still a great lack in all our gaining of Christ and of His grace. If Paul reckoned himself to not have attained to perfection (who had at the time of writing the epistle of Philippians already reached a great height of maturity), much less have we. Paul reiterated in v.13, "Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. “ Those who reckon themselves to have attained to a state where they have gain enough of Christ or have reached the ultimate state of maturity only give proof that they have attained to a little measure of grace of or of Christ; because, because one of the characteristics of a true spiritually mature person is that, the more of Christ they gain, the more they realize how short they are, because our Christ is immeasurably great and immense. We can never gain enough of Him. Thus, a healthy attitude we should always maintain is to keep pressing towards the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

The apostle’s goal in maintaining this healthy attitude and a continual endeavor of reaching forward is to press towards the mark/goal, "for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus" (3:14). As one who runs a race never lets up or ease off short of reaching the end, but is still progressing forward as fast as he can, so those who have prize of the high calling of God in view must constantly be pressing forward in constant vigilance and endeavor. The fitter we grow spiritually, the faster we will press towards the goal. Note that the prize of the high calling is "in Christ Jesus" ? Actually, I believe the prize is none other than Christ Himself as our exceedingly great reward. What more could we ask for? As the archer need to keep his eye fixed upon the mark/target he is aiming to hit, so we need to constantly keep our eyes focused and fixed on Christ.

III. The Church – Our Citizenry (3:17-21) (definition: citizenry – a whole body of citizens.)

3:20 “For our citizenship is in the heavens...” We must always remember that this world is not our home. Our citizenship and our country is in the heavens and from which we eagerly await the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior and our King. This means that we must live the tent life. We can give a whole message just on living a tent life with all the examples of the O.T. saints like Abraham. I will not get into that right now but only briefly say this: that living a tent life means that we are not be rooted on this earth. This does not mean that you should not buy a house and settle down in a place, but rather it is more of a heart's desire and condition that counts. Is your heart's desire set on the things above or on the things on this earth? How are we investing your time, your energy, and your resources? Are we spending them on the advancement of our career or on the advancement of the gospel? Are we investing our resources (including our time, which is a resource) on the perishable things on this earth or are we investing them on things that will last for all eternity? If we are a wise investor, we will of course do the invest on things that will last for eternity right? But investing on things of eternal value usually means that we will not see the reward and the result instantly at this time and some we will not see until the next age. On the other hand, all the world around us would impel us to invest on things that will give you instant gratification and immediate results. Well sorry to say that that kind of a life-style the worldly people seek after and invest in are very short-sighted and foolish. If they are wise, how can they choose a few years or maybe even a few decades of perishable and short-lived rewards on this earth and give up all eternity to suffer in the unquenchable lake of fire? This of course, applies to us Christians as well because we can squander a few years left of time that we have on this earth before the Lord comes and miss out on the marriage feast of the Lamb and to enjoy the millenial kingdom as rulers under the kingship of Christ? So, we too need to be constantly reminded to live the life of a tent and that our citizenship is in the heavens not on this earth.

As citizens of the kingdom of the heavens, it also means that our loyalty is firstly to Christ, our King. However, the people to whom Paul and Peter wrote were experiencing increased persecution and oppression at the hands of Rome. Yet the apostles told them not only to be loyal and law-abiding citizens but helpful citizens as well. The early church did not start an insurrection against Rome or a campaign against slavery, wicked and cruel as those practices are. In fact, the Holy Spirit took the words of slavery (slave, bond-slave, bondage, servant, etc.) and made them the symbols of Christian dedication and submission. In His omniscient providence God also used the pagan Romans to spread the Greek language, a universal language used to record His Word and carry it to the ends of the known world of that day God used them to build a system of roads over which His messengers could easily travel as they carried the good news throughout the empire. And God used the Pax Romana, or Roman peace, to allow those messengers to travel in relative safety.

As Peter declared early in his ministry, there are obvious limits to a believer’s submission to human authority When he and John had been charged by the Jewish authorities in Jerusalem not to preach the gospel, the two men responded, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to give heed to you rather than to God, you be the judge; for we cannot stop speaking what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:19-20; cf. 5:28-29). Many believers in the early church lost their freedom, their possessions, and even their lives because they refused to offer incense to Caesar. They would honor him as a human leader, but they would not worship him as a god.

The Christian’s first obligation is to obey God, and when His law is directly opposed by men’s laws, God’s law must prevail. The Christian, for example, has no right to lie, steal, commit murder, or worship a false god, no matter what the dictates of a human government might be and no matter what the consequences for disobedience might be. However, being a citizen of God’s kingdom does not exempt a Christian from responsibility to human kingdoms. In fact His being a citizen of God’s kingdom gives him a special obligation to human government (Rom 13), because those, too, belong to God and are ordained by Him. By being a good citizen the believer shows love for his fellow men, even those who are unjust and even our enemies. By being a good citizen we show respect for God's-ordained human government, even when its leaders are ungodly, corrupt, and oppressive. In the light of such testimony the on-looking world cannot but be amazed at the greatness of God's love shown through our living and some unbelievers will be drawn to Him through our living testimony.