PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
The Expositor's Bible: The Epistle to the Philippians
Rainy, Robert · 88,121 words · 123 reading sections
_No Confidence In The Flesh._
At this point the Apostle cannot but emphasise his own right to speak. He appeals to his remarkable history. He knows all about this Judaic religion, which glories in the flesh, and he knows also the better way. The experience which had transformed his life entitled him to a hearing; for, indeed, he, as no man else, ha…
783 wordsSECTION 62_No Confidence In The Flesh._
The difficulty for us here is to estimate worthily the elevation of that regard to Christ which had become the inspiration of the life of Paul. At the time when he was arrested on the road to Damascus, God revealed His Son to him and in him. Paul then became aware of Jesus as the Messiah of his people, against whom hi…
808 wordsSECTION 63_No Confidence In The Flesh._
This passage sets before us the essential nature of Christianity--the essential life of a Christian, as revealed by the effect it has on his esteem for other things. Many of us, one supposes, cannot consider it without a sense of deep disgrace. The view here given awakens many thoughts. Some aspects of the subject must…
733 wordsSECTION 64_No Confidence In The Flesh._
Yet this is not to be done or endeavoured by dismissing out of life all that gives character and movement to human existence. Not so: for indeed it is human life itself, with its complex of relations and activities, that is to receive the new inspiration. The decision is to be made by accepting the principle that life,…
680 wordsSECTION 65_The Knowledge Of Christ._
"Yea verily, and I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may gain Christ, and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of mine own, even that which is of the law, but that which is th…
856 wordsSECTION 66_The Knowledge Of Christ._
We, meanwhile, shall do well to imitate the charity of Mr. Knox, who cordially owned the Christian piety of those who might go too far either way. Few of us, indeed, can dispense with the charity that is tender to partial and imperfect views. But if we are to understand Paul, we must find our way into some sympathy wit…
759 wordsSECTION 67_The Knowledge Of Christ._
Hence, while in ver. 8 the Apostle speaks of himself as encountering all earthly loss that he may _know_ Christ, in ver. 9 it is that he may _gain_ Christ and may be _found in Him_. Christ so came into the field of his knowledge as to become the treasure of his life, replacing those things which heretofore had been gai…
820 wordsSECTION 68_The Knowledge Of Christ._
This vision, which the Gospels set before us, was also before the mind of Paul. And words of our Lord, delivered in His earthly ministry, and preserved by those who heard Him, were treasured by the Apostle of the Gentiles, and reproduced to guide the Churches as need required. Yet there is a sense in which we may say t…
657 wordsSECTION 69_The Knowledge Of Christ._
This also was Paul's condition, though he was an inspired man. He too was fain to improve his knowledge in this school. And when we take all three aspects together, we shall see how truly, for Paul and for us, the knowledge of Christ is, on the one hand, so excellent from the first, that it justifies the great decision…
733 wordsSECTION 70_The Knowledge Of Christ._
The first thing then which rises distinctly into view in connection with being found in Christ is the possession of the new righteousness. We have seen already that value for righteousness such as is of law, and hope of achieving it, had been associated with Paul's old days of Jewish zeal. He then stood on the law, and…
417 wordsSECTION 71_The Righteousness Of Faith._
"Not having a righteousness of mine own, even that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is of [from] God by [upon] faith."--PHIL. iii. 9 (R.V.). Righteousness is a term which is applied in different ways. Often it denotes excellence of personal character. So used, i…
706 wordsSECTION 72_The Righteousness Of Faith._
This relation to Himself God has founded for us sinful men in Christ, and specially in His atonement. It is part of what is divinely held out to us, as life or well-being in Christ. When we do awaken to it, our whole religious attitude towards God takes character from it, and is to be ordered accordingly. This way of b…
701 wordsSECTION 73_The Righteousness Of Faith._
In earlier days Paul sought righteousness--an approved and accepted standing with God--by the works of the law. That project failed when the great discovery on the road to Damascus showed him to himself as all astray; in particular, when the law itself, coming home to him in the fulness of its meaning, both revealed to…
799 wordsSECTION 74_The Righteousness Of Faith._
We need not conceal from ourselves, however, that many find the doctrine thus ascribed to Paul unacceptable. If they do not count it positively misleading, as some do, they yet regard it as unprofitable theory. Apart from objections drawn from theology or morals or texts, they argue, for example, that it is all in the…
750 wordsSECTION 75_The Righteousness Of Faith._
But then, in the next place, the forgiveness of sins itself is referred to the mediation of Christ, and the work accomplished in that mediation, as its known basis. Forgiveness of sins was to arise out of an order of grace, embodied in history--namely, in the history of the Incarnate Son of God; and we are not entitled…
682 wordsSECTION 76_The Righteousness Of Faith._
But in Christian religion we are aware, as of strength which can remedy our weakness, so of forgiveness which can put away our sins. "There is forgiveness with Thee." "Through this Man is preached to us the forgiveness of sins." It is clear also that this forgiveness comes, wherever it comes, as full and free forgivene…
707 wordsSECTION 77_The Righteousness Of Faith._
The Apostle's course of thought has not led us to raise any question about the nature and the virtue of the faith which apprehends and receives the righteousness of God. It is a subject on which much has been said. What seems needful here may be soon spoken. The only way of entering on new relations with God, or ourse…
365 wordsSECTION 78_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
"That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death; if by any means I may attain unto the resurrection from the dead."--PHIL. iii. 10, 11. We have still other aspects to consider of that "gain" which the Apostle descried in Christ, for th…
661 wordsSECTION 79_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
The resurrection of Christ marked the acceptance of His work by the Father, and revealed the triumph in which that work ended. Death and all the power of the enemy were overcome, and victory was attained. For one thing, the resurrection of Christ made sure the righteousness of faith. He rose again for our justification…
728 wordsSECTION 80_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
The life in view is first of all goodness in its ordinary sense, or what we call common morality--common honesty, common truthfulness, common kindness. "Let him that stole steal no more, but rather let him labour"; "Not slothful in business"; "Lie not one to another, seeing ye have put off the old man with his deeds." …
681 wordsSECTION 81_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
We know that in Scripture a distinction is made between the resurrection of the righteous and the resurrection of the wicked. A solemn obscurity rests on the manner and the principles of the latter, the resurrection to shame. But the resurrection of the just takes place in virtue of their union to Christ; it is after t…
736 wordsSECTION 82_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
Paul, then, was eager to go forward in a life intense and mighty, drawing on a great power to sustain it, and rising into splendid effects and results. But yet, in respect of some of its aspects, it rather seemed to the Apostle to be a certain deliberate and blessed dying. At least, the life must fulfil and realise its…
888 wordsSECTION 83_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
And yet, when one thinks of the beauty and sweetness of much that pertains to our earthly existence, and of the goodness of God in material or temporal gifts, and of the thankfulness with which Christian hearts are to take these when they are given, and are to walk with God in the use of them, one feels the risk of inv…
652 wordsSECTION 84_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
The truth is, there is no ready-made theory here for any of us. All our attainments in it are tentative and provisional; which does not hinder, however, that they may be very real. When we believe in Christ we become aware that there is a lesson in this department to be learned, and we become willing, in a measure, to …
661 wordsSECTION 85_Resurrection Life And Daily Dying._
Some such view of the ends of Christ in regard to separation from sin and disengagement from the life which is doomed to die, we suppose to have been before Paul's mind. He had come to Christ for life, abundant and victorious, such as should be answerable to the power of Christ's resurrection. But he saw that such life…
378 wordsSECTION 86_Christian Life A Race._
"Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect: but I press on, if so be that I may apprehend that for which also I was apprehended by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I count not myself yet to have apprehended: but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things w…
841 wordsSECTION 87_Christian Life A Race._
The question may here be put how the consistency of the gospel can be made out if we are called to rest and rejoice in Christ, and if, at the same time, we find ourselves committed to so absorbing a struggle for a prize. If God will have us, it may be said, to seek and strive that we may obtain, then we must do so beca…
855 wordsSECTION 88_Christian Life A Race._
As usual in the case of illustrations, this one will not hold in all points. For instance, in a race one only wins, and all the rest are defeated and disappointed. This is not so in the Christian race. The analogies lie elsewhere. In order to run well the runners submit to preparation in which everything is done to bri…
688 wordsSECTION 89_Christian Life A Race._
It is true that a complete gift of eternal life is held out to us in Christ, and it is faith's part to accept that gift and to rest in it. But yet part of that gift itself is an emancipation of the soul; in virtue of this the man becomes actively responsive to the high calling, reiterates his fundamental decision all a…
900 wordsSECTION 90_Christian Life A Race._
For is there such a thing attainable here as a Christian perfectness, a ripe fulness of the Christian life, which exhibits that working of it, in its various forces, which was designed for this stage of our history? If so, what must it be? That man surely is the perfect man who fully apprehends the position in which th…
739 wordsSECTION 91_Christian Life A Race._
"Let us be thus minded." Let Christians be admonished who have for some time been Christians, and especially those who are passing through middle life, or from middle life into older years. There is enchanted ground here, in passing over which too many of Christ's servants go to sleep. Leave that which is behind. Let …
662 wordsSECTION 92_Christian Life A Race._
Moreover, when progress has been made here it imposes responsibility. Have you been carried forward to such and such degrees of this subjective insight? Then this ought to be for you a fruitful attainment. Do not neglect its suggestions, do not prove careless and untrue to insight attained. Whereto we have attained, "b…
540 wordsSECTION 93_Enemies Of The Cross._
"For many walk, of whom I told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ: whose end is perdition, whose god is the belly, and whose glory is in their shame, who mind earthly things."--PHIL. iii. 18, 19 (R.V.). The New Testament writers, and not least the Apostle Paul…
809 wordsSECTION 94_Enemies Of The Cross._
Under this influence we take up our cross; which is substantially the same as renouncing or denying ourselves (Matt. xvi. 24) carried practically out. It is self-denial for Christ's sake and after Christ's example, accepted as a principle, and carried out in the forms in which God calls us to it. This, as we have seen,…
690 wordsSECTION 95_Enemies Of The Cross._
In the case of those whom Paul thinks of there was no room for doubt as to the real nature of the case; and therefore the Apostle cannot too emphatically bring it out. He puts first the most startling view of it. Their end is destruction. Not salvation, but destruction is before them, although they name the name of Chr…
708 wordsSECTION 96_Enemies Of The Cross._
In a word, their character is summed up in this, that they mind earthly things. That is the region in which their minds are conversant and to which they have regard. The higher world of truths and forces and objects which Christ reveals is for them inoperative. It does not appeal to them, it does not awe them, it does …
766 wordsSECTION 97_Enemies Of The Cross._
There is real truth here; for, no doubt, it lies in the destiny of man to bring the world into experience according to God's order: if this is not to be done in ways of sin and transgression, it is yet to be done in right ways; and in doing it, man is designed to be gladdened by the beauty of God's handiwork and by the…
718 wordsSECTION 98_Enemies Of The Cross._
This is one of the reasons why we must not judge one another about these things; why we must not lay down absolute rules about them; why even our recommendations must be provisional and prudential only. It is at the same time a reason for the more fidelity in each of us towards himself, to see that we do not trifle wit…
448 wordsSECTION 99_Our City And Our Coming King._
"For our citizenship is in heaven; from whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of His glory, according to the working whereby He is able even to subject all things unto Himself."--PHIL. iii. 20, 21 (R.V.). T…
781 wordsSECTION 100_Our City And Our Coming King._
Therefore, according to the Apostle, the standard of our living, and its sanctions, and its way of thinking and proceeding, and, in a word, our city, with its interests and its objects, being in heaven, the earnest business of our life is there. We have to do with earth constantly and in ways most various; but, as Chri…
731 wordsSECTION 101_Our City And Our Coming King._
Some harm has been done, perhaps, by the degree in which attention has been concentrated on debatable points about the time of the Lord's coming, or the order of events in relation to it; but more by the measure in which Christians have allowed the world's unbelieving temper to affect on this point the habit of their o…
1,112 wordsSECTION 102_Our City And Our Coming King._
One thing must be said. It is vain for us to suppose we can adjust beforehand, to our own satisfaction, the elements which enter into the future, so as to make a well-fitted scheme of it. That was not designed. And in this case two ways of looking at the future are apt to strive together. The man who is occupied with p…
842 wordsSECTION 103_Our City And Our Coming King._
The body, then, by which we hold converse with the world, and by which we give expression to our mental life, has shared in the evil that comes by sin. We find it to be the body of our humiliation. It is not only liable to pain, decay, and death, not only subject to much that is humbling and distressing, but it has bec…
657 wordsSECTION 104_Peace And Joy._
"I exhort Euodia, and I exhort Syntyche, to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yea, I beseech thee also, true yokefellow, help these women, for they laboured with me in the gospel, with Clement also, and the rest of my fellow-workers whose names are in the book of life. "Rejoice in the Lord alway: again I will say, …
718 wordsSECTION 105_Peace And Joy._
In difficulties between Christians, as between other people, wise and loving friendship may perform the most important services. Selfishness shrinks from rendering these; and on the other hand, meddlesomeness, which is a form of egotism combined with coarseness, rushes in only to do harm. Wisdom is needed, mainly the w…
858 wordsSECTION 106_Peace And Joy._
The Apostle reverts to the significant "good-bye" which was heard at the beginning of the third chapter. "Rejoice," "Be of good cheer," was the usual farewell salute. He had begun to use it, in the third chapter, with an emphasis on the native signification of the word. Now he resumes it more emphatically still, for he…
670 wordsSECTION 107_Peace And Joy._
And, in particular, how influential this is to preserve men from being unduly moved and swayed by the passing things of time! These sway us by joy and grief, by hope and fear; and what an inordinate measure of those affections they do beget in us! But let the great joy of the Lord have its place, and then those lesser …
747 wordsSECTION 108_Peace And Joy._
For believers, as we have already seen, the coming of the Lord is, according to the New Testament, the great hope. Then the joy in the Lord is to be complete and crowned. Those who apprehend that glad day as near are not supposed to be capable of yielding up their hearts to the uncontrolled sway of mere earthly interes…
670 wordsSECTION 109_Peace And Joy._
We are apt to ask why the words of warning and encouragement in reference to the future are not connected with the prospect of death, rather than with that of the Lord's return; for death certainly is the topic generally selected for such purposes by moralists and preachers of more recent days. The answer may partly be…
763 wordsSECTION 110_Peace And Joy._
It is this second article of the doctrine of prayer that is chiefly in view here. The prayer of faith must be a prayer of thanksgiving, because faith knows how much it owes to God. "Thou hast not dealt with us after our sins." At the same time it has supplications and requests, over and above the great petition for lif…
550 wordsSECTION 111_The Things To Fix Upon._
"Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honourable [venerable], whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. The things which ye bot…
807 wordsSECTION 112_The Things To Fix Upon._
We may be helped to fix more firmly the point of view from which this striking catalogue of good things is drawn up, if we observe that the Apostle collects all these excellences under the notion of "a virtue and a praise." Let us consider how men are trained to progressive conceptions of virtue and praise. For virtue …
717 wordsSECTION 113_The Things To Fix Upon._
Thus we find in the world not merely a sense of duty, but something that has spurred men on to things counted for a virtue and a praise. Outside of all Christian influences, wonderful examples are found of self-sacrificing devotion to the noble and the true. Men have eagerly pursued the nicest discriminations of duty a…
762 wordsSECTION 114_The Things To Fix Upon._
When our Lord's mind and heart are said to be the test, this does not exclude our profiting by our fellows, accepting the admonition contained in human judgments, and especially in those of Christian people. Great good comes to us in such channels. Only now the judgment of our fellows is to refer itself always to a fur…
676 wordsSECTION 115_The Things To Fix Upon._
That this is so, appears from the Apostle's way of arranging the particulars of his exhortation. He does not merely desire his disciples to discern what is right in general: but he would have them grow into a vital knowledge, so as to feel the right in those matters where the shading becomes delicate; where it may be d…
656 wordsSECTION 116_Gifts And Sacrifices._
"But I rejoice in the Lord greatly, that now at length ye have revived your thought for me; wherein ye did indeed take thought, but ye lacked opportunity. Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therein to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know also how to abound:…
281 wordsSECTION 117_Gifts And Sacrifices._
The Apostle had urged joy in the Lord, and a moderation visible to all men. If any one supposes that in doing so he recommended a stoical temper, insensible to the impressions of passing things, the passage which now comes before us will correct that error. It shows us how the Apostle could "rejoice in the Lord," and y…
800 wordsSECTION 118_Gifts And Sacrifices._
If we would know by what discipline the Lord trained Paul to this mind, we may listen to what Paul himself says of it (1 Cor. iv. 9-13): "I think God hath set forth us the apostles last of all, as men doomed to death: for we are made a spectacle unto the world.... Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst,…
731 wordsSECTION 119_Gifts And Sacrifices._
* * * * * Now, in virtue of this liberality, Paul had all and abounded. He had desired to see the old spirit flourish again, and he had his wish. "I have all: I feel greatly enriched since I received the things sent by Epaphroditus." What gladdened him was not the outward comfort which these gifts supplied, but much m…
784 wordsSECTION 120_Gifts And Sacrifices._
Nor must we omit the comfort to all who serve God in their generation arising from the view which the Apostle is here led to take. There may be trials from without and trials from within. Still God careth for His servant. God will provide for him out of that which is peculiarly His own. God so identifies him with Himse…
786 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
Project Gutenberg source record →
Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.