Work out your salvation

(Please read Philippians 2:12-16 first)The English language has an interesting word for physical exercises. We talk about awork-out!In one of his books, Max Lucado talks about his daily work-

out. “I’m a runner,” he says. “More mornings thannot I drag myself out of bed and onto the street. I don’t run fast. And compared to marathoners, I don’t runfar. But I run. I run because I don’t like cardiologists. Since heart disease runs in our family, I run in our

ighbourhood. As the sun is rising, I am running. And as I am running, my body is groaning.”

I am supposed to start a new work-

out routine when I return from Nova Scotia in a week’s time in order to getrid of the few pounds I’ve put on lately. I’m more than just a little apprehensive about it, but I’ve made a

commitment. So wish me luck.A work-out routine can take on many different forms, but the point of it is to get regular, deliberate exercisethat will increase your fitness and overall health.Now, we usually think of a work-out in terms of physical exercises, but in his letter to the Philippians, Paul callsthe congregation to

work out your salvation with fear and trembling

(Phil 2:12). I must admit that I struggledwith this sentence at first. What does he mean work out your salvation? We are not responsible or able to

design and create our own salvation, are we? We can’t earn our salvation or make it happen, can we? Indeedwe can’t, it is the work of God. Paul states this clearly in the next line w

hen he says,

for it is God who works inyou to will and to act according his good purpose.

We cannot effect our own salvation, but there is a sense in

which we are called to join God’s salvation work in exercising and living out our salvation.

Our salvation work-out is the ongoing process by which we grow and develop spiritually, the process of joiningin the work that God is already doing in us through the Spirit.What would be the purpose of a salvation work-out? Paul describes it in these terms (Phil 2:13-16):

To will and to act according to Gods good purposeSo that you may become blameless and pure,

Children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation

In which you shine like starts in the universe as you hold out the word of life

So how do we work out our salvation? Besides the obvious spiritual disciplines of prayer, scripture reading,and worship, we work out our salvation by humbly serving others with the same attitude that was in JesusChrist (see Philippians 2:1-

10). We’ve got to

put our salvation into practice in the way we relate to one

Max Lucado. 2005. Mocha with Max. J. Countryman Press. p.69-70

another. A large part of Paul’s letter to this point is devoted to getting them to seek the unity of the church; to

have the same mind, the same heart, the same love, and the same purpose; to contend together for the faith;to become less self-serving and more servants of one another.One of the problems that threatened to undermine the faith and the work of the church in Philippi was theconstant arguing, complaining, and disagreements among some of its members. It threatened to tear thecongregation apart and got so bad that Paul had to single out two of the women, Euodia and Syntyche. Hepleaded with them to agree with each other (Phil 4:2) and had to call in the help of his fellow-workers to helpthese two sort out their differences.

Do everything without complaining and arguing,

writes Paul (Phil 2:14). Complaining and arguing. Does itsound familiar? It strikes me as one of the issues that we are facing in the church. There are a thousand andone complaints these days. We (and I include myself in this) are arguing over the silliest things. Most of it hasto do with wanting to get our own way; with what Paul calls

looking after our own interests first.

The effect is that it contaminates our souls, our hearts, and our minds. It infects the body of Christ with virusesof discontent; it disturbs the unity and makes us work against each other; it diverts our energy away from theservice of God and others. How can we contend together for the gospel if we complain and argue all the time?

How can we serve one another if we don’t seek each other’s interests first? What sort of light do we hold out

to the world when our own household is so divided?We have to guard against this kind of thing and continue to

work out our salvation with fear and trembling,

taking care to align ourselves in word and deed with the gospel of Christ.At the end of his letter, and over and against the negativity that he sensed among them, Paul has this advicefor the Christians in Philippi.

Rejoice in the Lord! Let your gentleness be evident to all! Do not be anxious but present your requests to God by prayer and petition and with thanksgiving. Fill your minds with whatever istrue, right, noble, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy

(paraphrase of Phil 4:4-9).Then the peace of God will guard our hearts and minds in Christ and we shall continue to work out oursalvation together to the glory of God.Gerard

HARD SAYINGS OF JESUS

In the 23

Chapter of Matthew Jesus denounces Scribes and Pharisees, the religious people of that time in no

uncertain terms. We have an image of “gentle Jesus, meek and mild” and really don’t give much consideration

to some of the hard things he had to say. In verses 27-28 he likens the would-be religious people to

“whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and

all kinds of filth. So you,

(

he continues)

also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of

hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

When I read these words I cannot help but wonder what he might say to us if he

appeared in the flesh before our congregation on a Sunday morning and announced: “I have

some things I

want to say, so today you will listen to me.”

Jesus is scathing in his denunciation of the very righteous-in-their-own-eyes religious folk who were so quickto judge others and lay upon them burdens which they themselves did not carry and standards which they

themselves did not measure up to. The word “hypocrite” in Jesus’ day was the word used of an actor on stage.

It identified one who took on and played the role of another character. So his accusation against the religiouspeople was that they were play acting, pretending to be something they were not.That is the problem with Jesus. He is not overly impressed with outward appearances but looks into the veryheart of a person, that place where secret thoughts, biases, prejudices dwell. One thing the religious of his daydid not like was to be exposed, told in blunt terms how they failed to live up to the expectations andresponsibilities demanded of them by God who had so graciously called them to be his people. It should notbe surprising that Jesus was killed. Many prophets before him had been sent to challenge the shallow faith of the people and their reluctance to serve the living God. They had responded by stoning and killing thoseprophets so Jesus knew his words would not be well received. It seems no one likes to be exposed for being ahypocrite. The truth can be very painful.We are called to be disciples of Jesus, servants of God. But I sometimes wonder who it is we serve. Certainlywe are very good at looking after our own creature comforts. We are quick to criticize when changes are madeto our order of service, forgetting perhaps that the worship service is just that, a worship service. It is notintended to be for our entertainment or designed to please us. Its sole purpose is to focus our attention uponGod, to challenge and uplift us to greater service in thankfulness and praise of thesaving grace of God that comes to us in Jesus Christ.

Gandhi said: “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so

unlike your Christ.” What damning indictment of the church!One writer, speaking of the church, said: “We’ve drifted away from being fishersof men to being keepers of the aquarium.” In other words we are very good at

looking after ourselves, our own needs, our own comfort, with little more thantoken consideration of those less fortunate than we are and those who are

longing to not only hear but see the good news of the gospel. But don’t take my

word for it. Read the 23

chapter of Matthew. And then ask yourself the

question: “What would Jesus see and what would he say were he to appear in theflesh before us as we gather to worship on a Sunday morning?”