Righteousness Through Faith In Christ Jesus

Well, good morning. Obviously, I'm not Vern, if you haven't noticed. If you're here for the first time, maybe you think I'm Vern. I'm Roger. So we have somebody different today. I'm not Mike. So today, we're going to look at a really neat passage. Actually, I didn't bring the clicker, which I'm going to need. Thank you, Bonnie.

In the class in Sunday School, we're studying the book of Philippians. We've actually finished the book of Philippians, and we're going through special topics. So when Vern said he was going to be gone today, we talked about what we were going to be presenting. And actually, we thought about this passage 3 through 9 in Philippians, because it kind of goes along with Vern's overall topic he's been teaching for the last almost a year now, which has been grace versus law.

And we're going to see that in this passage, Paul's going to talk about his life under law as a Pharisee, just the most incredible life you could ever think, something that we can hardly imagine. He was the most outstanding Pharisee ever to be, it seems like, according to his own account. But he gave that all up for Christ.

So we're going to see that contrast in these verses. So my notes are going here. So basically, I divided it into two sections. The first section will be Paul's self-righteousness. The second section will be Paul's righteousness in the Lord Jesus Christ.

So let's just kind of step into that. I've already read this, but I think I'll read it again in the first section. So we are the true circumcision who worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh. Although I myself might have confidence in the flesh, If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more circumcise the eighth day of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law of Pharisee, as to zeal of persecutor of the church, as to righteousness which is found in the law, blameless. So we're going to kind of step through this. You'll notice the first verse really is not necessarily talking about Paul's self-righteousness.

It's kind of an introduction to this section. And there's like three parts to this introduction. He's going to talk about this thing called the true circumcision. And if you haven't realized it before, every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ has been circumcised. Not a circumcision with hands, but a circumcision by the Holy Spirit. So we're going to see that toward the end here. Basically, a true circumcision, a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ has these three characteristics.

The first is, he worships in the Spirit of God, or in the Holy Spirit. Secondly, he glories in Christ Jesus, or he exalts Christ Jesus. Thirdly, he puts no confidence in the flesh. And that's kind of why I include this verse in this section, because that's going to talk about Paul putting no confidence in his flesh, even though his flesh was outstanding.

He would be considered the a Nobel Peace Prize winner of that day and age, if that was such a thing. So let's just kind of look at the very first part here in verse 3. So one question is, who's the we talking about? And it's pretty obvious, if you look through the book of Philippians, you'll see the we is Paul himself, plus the believers at Philippi. But by extension, that actually includes every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

So next it says, literally, the true is actually not there in the original. It's actually, we are the circumcision. And circumcision is a pretty basic word. It's a cutting around. So we know in the Old Testament, that was a practice that the Jews had for every male child. They were circumcised with hands, physically. But we're talking about a different circumcision here. And if you have your Bibles, I know this is, Vern makes you, you know, I don't want to make you work. I'm sorry. So if you have your Bibles, let's look at Colossians chapter 2, and let's read 11 and 12.

And it says, In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, in the removal of the body of flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.

So that center part there, the circumcision made without hands, is kind of the key part there. That's something that is not happening physically, but it's happening by the Spirit of God. And I believe it's talking about, you know, it's kind of neat when you go through scripture, I like to look at different translations, and the Weiss translation kind of brings it out maybe even more clearly. It's a putting off or a putting away, it's not actually a removal of the body of flesh, but a cutting away. So we're separated from this body of flesh, so that we can live to God.

And so that's kind of the main idea there. So after kind of describing what the true circumcision is, a true believer, then it's going to talk about the walk of a true believer. And the first thing is that it's literally the one worshiping who worships in the Spirit of God. So the ones again are all true believers, and it's in the Spirit of God, and if you If you remember, if you look in the Gospel of John, there's a passage which you probably already know. It says, God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth. So the only way a believer can worship is to worship in the spirit, in the Holy Spirit, by means of the Holy Spirit.

Another verse that kind of brings that home is in Romans. It talks about, in Romans 8, it says, however, you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. If indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you, the answer to that is yes, it does. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to him. So the Spirit of God is intimately involved in our lives to worship God.

And then next is to glory in Christ Jesus. You know, there's several words in the New Testament for glory. One is doxa, which is this bright, shiny expanse of who God is. That's not the word used here. This is the one that is actually, I'll just kind of go down, it's to boast or to exalt God, and that's what's being talked about here, about exalting God, to exalt God for who He is and what He's done. And in Galatians there it says, but may it never be that I would boast or glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world was crucified to me and I to the world. Another familiar one, he who boasts, let him boast in the Lord. So this talks about the getting excited about who God is and what He's done.

Hopefully that's not for me. Alright, so I think we've got that kind of covered. Basically, who worship in the Spirit of God, that's number one, and glory in Christ Jesus. And then here's kind of the one that kind of sets the stage for the rest of the message here, but puts no confidence in the flesh, or not having confidence in the flesh. So what's the flesh? So once again, I like to turn to scripture when we try to answer these questions. Let's look at Galatians. Galatians chapter 5 and verses 16 and 17. And this is a familiar passage.

It says, But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desires of the flesh. For the flesh sets its desires against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. For these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things you please." So we see a tension there in that verse. We see there's the flesh and the spirit. And the flesh, as Verne likes to say, is the sin nature working for our fleshly bodies. Every believer still has a sin nature, and there's a contention there between the flesh and the spirit.

So what Paul's saying here is, I put no confidence in that fleshly nature. And we're going to see that. He's going to give up everything, everything he gained in the flesh, for Christ. I put no faith or confidence in the fleshly nature. Okay, so let's go on to Paul's resume here. So Paul wasn't exactly a bodybuilder, but he did have an outstanding resume.

He says, although I myself, so Paul's going to make an argument here. He's going to say that he could have confidence in the things we're going to see, the things about being a Hebrew of Hebrews, being a Pharisee, and so on. His credentials in Judaism exceeded everyone else. He was the number one weightlifter in Judaism, so to speak. If we look at these two verses, verses five and six, you can divide those into kind of two sets. He's going to talk about his bloodline, who he was, where he came from. And secondly, he's going to talk about his ability to live the Jewish life and the Jewish tradition. So first of all, he was circumcised the eighth day. Second, he was in the nation of Israel. Thirdly, he was of the tribe of Benjamin. And fourth, he was a Hebrew of Hebrews. Then to his ability to obey the law, a strict adherence to the Mosaic law. He was a Pharisee, which we'll see shortly kind of define what that means. He was zealous for the church. He was zealous as a persecutor of the church, I should say. Persecuting Christians.

And then lastly, as to righteousness, which is in the law, he was found blameless. They could not find, we'll see, they could not find one single thing, this is pretty incredible, that he could be blamed for, legitimately blamed for. They could bring false accusations, but they could not bring one single accusation against him, which is pretty incredible. He was able to do that, and he's going to say, all that I attained, I'm going to give up for Christ. Okay, so we're going to step through these quickly here.

Circumcised the eighth day. Basically in Genesis 17 and verse 12 it says and every male among you Who is eight days old shall be circumcised through your generation that also was given to Moses in Leviticus 12 3 So he was circumcised eight days so that check one check two he was of the nation of Israel literally of the stock or out of the stock of Israel Paul was an Israel Israelite by birth and He was a pure descendant, a pure, he was a pure Jew by race and descent. He wasn't a proselytite. Oops, a little fast there.

So of the stock of Israel, that's number two. Then he's of the tribe of Benjamin and the Hebrew of Hebrews. The tribe of Benjamin, you know, there were 12 tribes. That was one of the, Benjamin was born to Jacob's favorite wife, Rachel, and was born in the promised land. The tribe of Benjamin remained loyal to David and was part of the restored nation of Israel. And as far as being a Hebrew of Hebrews, Paul was a son of Hebrew parents and retained the Hebrew language and customs.

So that's number three. Actually, that's number four. That's three and four. OK, so that was his pure blood line kind of designation. And as far as being a Pharisee, the Pharisees represented the strictest sects in Judaism. Here's one of those guys. I think this is from a movie. It's from Verne, too. I couldn't find all these things. It's pretty incredible. Verne is able to find all these pictures. So I liberally made use of some of his pictures.

So they weren't merely content with obeying the law. They bound themselves to obey every one of the myriad of laws. If you look through, and Verne's done this for us, there are 613 laws in the Pentateuch. So a Pharisee set their minds, I'm going to obey all 613.

I mean, it's a mind-boggling task. And Verne's gone through some of that, myriads of things, and it's just dizzying how you could ever think you could keep that. But amazingly enough, Paul was a Pharisee. And actually, as far as zeal, zeal is the idea of being hot or fervent. Now there's an evil sense, there's a good sense too, but many times zeal can have a negative, jealousy or anger. Paul at one time considered himself, it was meritorious to persecute the church.

In Acts 7.58, that's where Paul was, it's not a very expansive verse, it just talks about the fact that he was collecting the coats of all those who were stoning Stephen. That's where Stephen was stoned and he saw the Lord. Anyway, he was collecting the coats of those who were stoning Stephen. So he went from that to being a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then lastly, as to righteousness which is found in the law blameless. This is kind of interesting. Paul's obedience to the law of Moses. was without blame. And it kind of comes from the fact that that word blameless is amentos, which is the idea of free from any valid charge. No valid charge could be brought against Paul. So that was Paul's resume, this incredible resume.

So now we're going to kind of switch gears here, and we're going to see that Paul is going to say, knowing Christ is so valuable, I'm willing to give all this up, all this earthly privilege, I would give up to know Christ. So let's go ahead and read that. But whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in the view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish, so that I may gain Christ. and may be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.

OK, so let's take a peek at these verses here. OK, so the very first part here is going to go through verse 7 here. So I'm going to kind of rearrange verse 7 a little bit. I'm going to just look at the part that says, look at the whole part. First I want to look at, but I have counted.

And this word but, every word in scripture sometimes is valuable and instructive. And this pops up occasionally here and there. There are several words for but, and this one is in sharp contrast. So he's saying in sharp contrast to what I've showed you about my life in Judaism, I'm going to show you a life in Christ.

But I have counted. That's the idea, to consider, to reckon. I have counted. There's another place that this word is used, or actually several places, but one of the interesting places is in James. And this is a very familiar verse. Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials. So this is a considering, a reckoning, a counting upon, which may not be logical sometimes, but to Paul it was so valuable.

He counted upon. the loss of his Judaism to gain Christ. And the verb tense here is an interesting one. This shows that it was a firm conviction in Paul's life. It's this idea of he was convinced of that in the past, and this action abides to the present and up into the future. So he was firmly convinced that he was counting what he gained in Judaism for the sake of Christ. So it says, whatever things were gained to me. And I think that part is basically what we talked about in verses four through six. We talked about his resume as a pure-bred Jew and his adherence to the law.

And he counts at his loss. And that would be a good number to get sometimes when you step on the scale, maybe. Otherwise, you may not live. But OK. And actually, in Acts 27, that word is used as a physical loss. Paul talks about there, he's on a ship, and he says, men, there may be loss of life, there may be loss of a variety of things. So that's actually, that was truly a loss. His gains in the flesh were truly a loss. It wasn't a made-up loss, it was a true loss. Okay.

So, whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted loss for the sake of Christ. Or it could be on the count of Christ. You know, Christ is of immeasurable value. And one of my favorite passages here in light of that is in Colossians. And if you have your Bibles, you could turn to that. Colossians chapter 1, 15 through 20.

It says, he, speaking of Christ, he is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation, for by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on the earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.

All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is also the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that He Himself will come to first place in everything. For it was the Father's good pleasure for all the fullness to dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross, through Him, I say, whether things on earth or things in heaven."

So we see that Christ is truly of immeasurable value. And this is just a small little subset of what we could present here. So for the sake of Christ, he counted at loss. So now, he doesn't just stop there. If you think about it, he starts here. He says, all these things I had in Judaism, I had all these honors in Judaism. Now I'm going to go one step beyond that. I'm just not going to say, I'm going to strip and lose everything I had in Judaism. I'm going to say, anything that I gained In my life, I'm going to count as loss.

And so he's going to talk about that now, which is pretty amazing. And the first part, the first three or four words there in the original, but even more so, it's kind of an emphatic way of saying this is over the top, so to speak. I count all things. And the present tense there is the idea that it's continually, he's continually reminding himself of the value of Christ. And it's for his benefit. And so what are the all things? Actually, any one of you could fill in the all things here. I kind of thought of all things. Think of your life. What might you gain in life? You might gain wealth. You might gain power. You might gain prestige. You might gain knowledge.

Paul says all things of that in comparison with Christ, knowing Christ, are loss. I have my loss and my gain. I'm going to count them all as loss. And it's on the account of, or in view of, another superlative, the surpassing value, the immeasurable value, value that cannot be counted, not be measured, that which exceeds all others. And we see it in Philippians, another kind of use of that superlative word. And it's talking about God's peace, the superlative of God's peace. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." So this value of knowing Christ, it exceeds all else. So how is that accomplished? How do we know Christ?

Well, the obvious way is we know Him by His Word. And we trust in His Word to come to know Him as our Savior. And then secondly, the what? You know, I always think of the intimacy that we have with our Savior as we read His Word. We see who Christ is. We see what He's done. And marvelously, we see how we're part of that. We're not just people on the sidelines. We're intimately involved with our Savior and who we are in Him. And that's the how and the what I see of knowing our Savior.

Actually, the word loss occurs three times in verses 7 and 8. He's not talking about loss again. He's back on that idea of showing you the loss that he puts aside for the gaining of Christ. For whom? On the account of. I have suffered the loss of all things. Once again, reminding of that. He forfeited. He's forfeited that. It's in the passive voice. And actually, it could be rendered, I have been caused to forfeit. So is it right for God to forfeit? He gives us no. You know, we go before God. He doesn't count anything, and this is pretty amazing, anything that you have done outside of Him. He counts none of that. None of that gets counted.

And the place that's kind of interesting, you look at that in the Bema, the judgment seat. Can I put it on there? Yeah. If you have your Bibles, this is a passage on the Bema, the place of rewards, a reward ceremony for believers. But he talks about that process. And it's kind of veiled in the way it speaks, but let me just read it.

Each man's work will become evident, for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire. And the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work. And there's two possibilities we're going to see here, one that burns up, one that goes forward to be with you in glory. If any man's work which he has built upon Remains he will receive a reward if any man's work is burned up.

He will suffer loss and that's our word right here So this is real loss. So you think in your life all these things you may and how many times we don't know I mean to be honest, you know, you don't know When you maybe you're walking, you know, you're uncertain Well, did I was that really follow the Lord in this or was that me and I'm not saying you can absolutely define it but there is a loss and there but all that stuff that is you didn't do, God will take care of. You don't have to worry. You won't drag one of those guys into glory. They're going to be taken care of. So that's a wonderful thing. And that's what Paul said.

These are real losses, real losses of anything he had in his life outside of Christ. And so he kind of gives a reckoning here, how he's going to count them, how he's going to sum them up. He says, I'm still counting, present tense, He counts them as rubbish, and I count them but rubbish. And there's actually some disagreement on the origin of that word. It could mean dung, it could mean leaving after a feast, it could be scraps thrown to dogs, a variety of things. I showed a trash dump. It's rubbish. It's not of value to God.

So that, with a purpose that, I may gain Christ. So what does that mean, to gain Christ? It occurred to me that basically gaining Christ... I think we're talking about coming to know Him as our Savior. So basically, I saw it as Christ in us. So that's kind of the first part. I call that part one. It says, I count them but rubbish so that, with a purpose that, I may gain Christ. That's part one.

And the rest of the verse is, and be found in Him. So two parts. I may gain Christ and be found in Him. And found in Him is passive voice. So what does this mean? I've got some more verses for you here, you're probably tired by now. But basically it talks about maybe found in Him. So what does that kind of bring to mind, being found in Him? I thought these verses kind of spoke to that.

It says, for you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. And then in John 17 it talks about the fact that that we're in them. He says, the Father's in me and I'm in the Father, Christ speaking, and He said, and you're in us. So it talks about our being in Him, in Christ.

So that was part two, I called it. So I kind of saw this kind of combination that I may gain Christ and be found in Him. It's this relationship of Christ in us and we in Christ, this intimate relationship we have with our Savior, that we have this duality, that He's in us and we're in Him.

It's something that's mind-boggling, to say the least. So Paul continues here. He goes back and kind of repeats a little bit, and he's going to talk about righteousness now. He says, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the law. So first we have righteousness of my own. What's the source? Law. Versus righteousness, which is through faith in Christ. Two different dominions. Law versus grace. Faith operating in a grace system. And then he kind of wraps it up here. The righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith. So this righteousness is a gift from God. And how is it administered? God is the source of the righteousness, not the man keeping the law. And it's on the basis of faith.

So I thought, maybe kind of in closing here, There's a verse that I like in Colossians chapter 2. It kind of talks about the Christian life, how we come to know Him as our Savior, and then we go on from there. It's not a very complicated verse. It says, Therefore, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him. So you say, well, how did I receive Christ Jesus the Lord? I received Him by faith. Faith in the person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. How do I walk or how do I conduct my Christian life? I conduct it by faith. Simple faith in who Christ is and who I am in Him. So that's the Christian life. And that's what Paul's saying. All these things I've earned, I count as loss for the value of Christ. All right, so let's close.

Dear Father, we thank you so much, Lord. We thank you for the blessings we have in our Savior, Father. We thank you that we can trust you in all things and that you have You have a marvelous system, Lord, which kind of defies maybe our logic to some degree, that You count nothing that we do in our flesh, in our fleshly nature. Not that it can't be noteworthy, but it doesn't glorify You. And all that glorifies You is what You've done through us, Father. We thank You for that. In Christ's name, Amen.