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broken up, and the man who, without knowing it, was living on, and kept alive by, the high-seasoned food of meetings, conferences, etc., has, like Philip, been called away from animating, bustling scenes, to go unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert — I have seen such a one languish as if that God whom he thought he loved, and that Saviour for whom he thought he had given up all, were confined to the little society, and located in the spot from which he had been severed ; so that the heathen well might say. Where is now thy God? It is to save them from this snare that the Apostle presses the Philippians to work out, each man for himself, his own salvation ; to cultivate, each man for himself, a religion which connects him, individually and apart from all others, with his God.^
^ The truth is that men are apt to look (1) in edifices of wood and stone, (2) in great and ancient institutions, for that perfection which, if it can be found at all on earth, is to be sought in the lives of individuals. The true temple of God is the heart of man, and there the image of Christ may be renewed again and again, and effaced again and again. Neither is there any limit to the perfection which is attainable by any one of us, for Christ says : " Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." But there is a limit to the perfection of outward institutions. These seem to be at their best when the goodness or genius of some one or two men has inspired them. . . . All institutions flourish when they are ordered by men who have great aims, who understand their true character ; and know how to derive a strength from them, and to impart a strength of their own to them. They are not mere abstractions, but communities of living beings ; and a common spirit or soul animates them. And sometimes they fall into corruption and decay; their schools and churches are unroofed, their very stones are carted away, and there is nothing to indicate the place where they once stood.^
I.
The Gkeat Achievement of Life.
" Your own salvation."
1. One of Paul's fundamental doctrines is this, that salvation is a free gift, due to the grace of God. In this Epistle he is addressing, not unbelievers, but "saints," and the salvation he ^ H. "Woodward, Sermons, 450. ^ B. Jowett, Miscellaneous Sermons, 285.
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speaks of is something they already possess. Salvation is of God as respects supreme agency, while our part in it is merely instrumental and subordinate. The satisfaction Christ has afforded to the law of God in the room of the ungodly is the whole ground of our acceptance with Him. We are pardoned and blessed only for His substitutionary and perfect righteousness, and this one consideration interdicts all boasting : for if we have paid none of the price how can we have any of the merit ? But we find from this passage that the intervention of Godhead in the work of our salvation does not terminate with the coming or the dying of Christ. God, the Holy Spirit, still works in us, enabling us to believe the Gospel, and purifying our hearts by faith. He does not, however, work apart from us ; far less, by physical force, does He control and compel. He is a " free Spirit " Himself, and He preserves to us a moral freedom, not superseding our faculties but qualifying them for rational exercise, showing us the truth and reforming us by its influence. But in all this we are occupied. He works in us, or, as the words may import, by us ; and as long as our own powers are denied Him for implements of agency He is not working savingly in us at all.
^ It is an interesting fact that in all the versions of the New Testament, which were composed in different dialects of the language spoken by our Lord, the word " salvation " is almost always rendered by a word which signifies " life," and the verb " to save " by the verb " to impart life," or " to restore to life and health." Only a few times is a verb used which means "to rescue " or " deliver." This seems to justify us in the belief that in the mind of our Lord, and also of the Apostle Paul, the thought of a new and higher life was present in many of the instances where the Greek word "salvation" is employed; and we are justified in assigning to the word "salvation," more -frequently, perhaps, than has been our wont, the idea of "participation in the life and character of God." ^
^ Here is a slave who is set to work out his own freedom. He may have encouragements. His master may even give him assistance. But his freedom is to be the reward of his own exertions. He will pay for it by his own toil. He will work it out in the sense of securing it as the wages of years of labour. If this were the sense in which we are to work out our salvation,