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Put the Gospel First

Philippians 1:1–26

Listen or read the following transcript as D. A. Carson speaks on the topic of Putting the Gospel First from Philippians 1:1–26


“I would like to buy about three dollars worth of gospel, please. Not too much. Just enough to make me happy but not so much I get addicted. I don’t want so much gospel I learn to really hate covetousness and lust. I certainly don’t want so much I start to love my enemies, cherish self-denial, contemplate missionary service in some alien clime. I want ecstasy, not repentance. I want transcendence, not transformation.

I would like to be cherished by some nice, loving, broad-minded people, but I, myself, don’t want to love those from different races, especially if they smell. I would like enough gospel to make my family secure and my children well behaved but not so much I find my ambitions reduced or my giving too greatly enlarged. I would like about three dollars worth of gospel, please.”

Of course, none of us is so crass as to put it quite that way, but most of us have felt the temptation to opt for a domesticated version of the gospel of Christ. In some ways, of course, this temptation is perennial, but perhaps it is especially strong today owing to a number of developments in the Western world.

1. Pressure has been building from the process of secularization.

Secularization does not refer to some social impetus driving us toward the abolition of religion. Rather, secularization refers to the processes that squeeze religion to the periphery of life. The result is not that we abandon religion or banish the gospel. Rather, religion is marginalized and privatized, and the gospel is rendered unimportance. The evidence for this is best seen if you ask and answer just one question … What drives the national discourse? What do people talk about in Australia?

The answer, of course, is almost everything but the gospel: economics, politics, entertainment, sports, sleaze, who’s in, who’s out, government. There is relatively little moral discourse and almost none that has to do with eternal perspectives, how to live in the light of death and the final judgment. Has that been in the newspaper recently? So when we insist on the supreme importance of the gospel when people go to church, we find many in our society skeptical and dismissive.

Unwittingly, partly to protect ourselves from their skepticism, partly because we ourselves are heavily influenced by the culture, whether we like it or not, we start espousing the gospel, formally confessing biblical religion is of infinite worth, while in reality we no longer are possessed by it, or we maintain the faith by privatizing it. It becomes uncivilized to talk about religion in polite company because we don’t want to hurt people’s feelings. We buy our three dollars worth of gospel, but it challenges us very little.

2. The sapping influences of self-indulgence throughout the Western church wield their power.

For many confessing Christians, it has become more important to be comfortable and secure than it is to be self-sacrificing and bold. Three dollars worth of gospel, please, but no more.

3. We are witnessing the rise of what some have called philosophical pluralism.

By this I do not mean our cultures are becoming more empirically pluralistic. That is to say, most Western countries, barring a few like Switzerland, have a greater diversity of cultures and races and languages in them than at any time in their history. I don’t mean to refer to that. That is merely a brute empirical fact, neither good nor bad by itself. Merely very interesting, with some opportunities and some dangers.

I am referring to something else. Philosophical pluralism is the subtle stance that insists in most areas of human knowledge, and perhaps in all of them, knowledge of objective truth is just flat-out impossible. Because it is impossible, it is wrong-headed and perhaps immoral to claim any ideology or religion is the truth.

If it suggests some other one that contradicts is it wrong, that is the one wrong thing. The sole heresy is the view there is heresy. In such a view, of course, you can’t evangelize. You can’t proselytize without feeling like a twit. Quiet insistence real truth exists is commonly written off as, at best, nineteenth century, and at worst, as benighted bigotry. So we retreat. $3 worth of gospel, please, but let’s not overdo it.

Paul recognized the insidious evil of rather similar pressures in the Roman Empire in his day. Like modern Western culture, the Roman Empire had begun to decay. Like ours, it was prepared to use religion for political ends, for social ends, but quite unwilling to be tamed by it, settling slowly into cultured self-indulgence, proud of the diversity of the empire, straining to keep it together by the demand for unhesitating loyalty to the emperor. Pluralism of several kinds made it unpopular to say there was only one way of salvation.

The Roman Empire itself arranged god-swaps. When it took over some new territory it insisted that area adopt some of the gods of the Roman pantheon, and the Roman pantheon adopted some of those pagan gods of well. There was a god-swap. That way you couldn’t get alignments of people and land and gods all together who might rebel against Rome. Pluralism triumphs, preserves the empire. That is Paul’s world when he writes to the Philippians. He hand founded the church in the city in AD 51 or 52, and he had visited it at least twice since then.

At this point, however, at the time of writing, he pens things from prison, probably in Rome, probably about 61. So the church at Philippi, at this point, is not more than 10 years old. Paul perceives a variety of pressures lurking in the wings, pressures that could damage this fledgling church. He can’t visit them, but he wants to encourage them to maintain basic Christian commitments and to be on guard against a variety of dangers, both from within and without.

Now what a person says while unjustly incarcerated and facing the possibility of death is likely to be given a little more weight than someone who speaks from a carefree ministry. So the fact Paul felt he had to write from prison to the Philippians probably reminded them what he was saying he had thought about and weighed carefully. Thus even in this dimension, his imprisonment was working out providentially for their good.

What, then, is his burden as he addresses the Philippians? What is God telling us by his Spirit as he addresses us through these same words 2,000 years later? The first thing this book says is put the gospel first. That’s the burden of the first chapter: put the gospel first. It will be helpful to trace this theme in four points:

1. Put the fellowship of the gospel at the center of your relationships with believers.

Verses 3–8. Now as often in his letters, Paul begins with a warm exposition, an expression of thanks to God for something in the lives of his readers. Here the grounds of his thanksgiving to God are three, though we’ll see all three are tied to the same theme.

A. Their faithful memory of him.

The NIV reads, “I thank my God every time I remember you,” verse 3. But other translations offer, “I thank my God every time you remember me,” or something similar. In fact, the original tongue here is ambiguous. It could be read either way. For reasons I shan’t go into, I think Paul is referring to their remembrance of him. That is certainly his point in chapter 4, when he reverts to this theme.

Later on, he will thank them explicitly for remembering to supply funds for the ministry, and so forth. But here the vision is broader. He perceives their interest in him is a reflection of their continued commitment to the gospel. That’s why he thanks God for them. The point becomes explicit in the second cause of his thanksgiving. Look at the text. Verses 4 and 5:

B. “In all my prayers for you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.”

Thus in the context, their remembrance of him is grounded in their partnership with him in the gospel. “From the first day …” They have been consistent in this regard. “I always pray with joy in this regard,” he says. The word rendered partnership is very often rendered fellowship elsewhere in the New Testament, and to grasp what Paul means we need to reflect on that word.

In the twentieth century, the term fellowship has been somewhat debased. If you invite a pagan neighbor to your home for a cup of tea, it’s friendship. If you invite a Christian neighbor for a cup of tea, it’s fellowship. If you have a cup of tea after a football game, it’s friendship. If you have a cup of tea after church, it’s fellowship. The conversation may be exactly the same in both cases, but because there are Christians present, you call it fellowship. But that is not quite what Paul had in mind.

In the first century, the term fellowship or partnership was, in the first instance, a commercial term. Harry and Joe go and buy a boat to set up a fishing business. They have entered into a fellowship. That is, a partnership. They have both sunk their savings into this boat. Now they have shared their commitments toward this common goal. Do you see? That’s a partnership. That’s a fellowship. That’s what they have done. Even in the New Testament, rather intriguingly, money matters are often tied to fellowship.

Thus when the Macedonian Christians send money to help the poor Christians in Jerusalem they are entering into fellowship with them; that is, into a shared partnership in the gospel. So the heart of true fellowship is self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision, and it is a vision of the gospel. Christian fellowship, then, is thus self-sacrificing conformity to the glorious truth that has made us free in Christ Jesus.

There may be overtones of warmth and intimacy, and there may even be some tea. But the heart of the matter is not the fluid; it is this vision that calls forth our commitment. So when Paul gives thanks with joy because of the Philippians’ partnership in the gospel, he calls it, or fellowship in the gospel, he is thanking God for the fact these brothers and sisters in Christ, from the moment of their conversion (note, “from the first day until now,” Paul writes) rolled up their sleeves and got involved in the advance of the gospel.

They continued their witness in Philippi. They persevered in their prayers for Paul. They sent money to support him in his ministry, all testifying to their shared vision of the importance and priority of the gospel. That’s more than enough reason to thank God, don’t you think? Now there is a third basis for Paul’s thanks:

C. It is nothing less than God’s continuing work in their lives.

In verse 3 he begins, “I thank my God …” And now adds (verse 6), “… being confidant of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” This is almost a definition of what a real Christian is. The New Testament affords not a few examples of people who made professions of faith that were spurious. They didn’t stick. They didn’t work out.

For example, at the end of John 2, many people saw the miracles Jesus was performing, and they put their faith in him. But Jesus did not entrust himself to them because he knew what was in them and he knew they weren’t genuine. It’s not uncommon. A few chapters later Jesus says, “If you hold to my teaching, if you continue in my teaching, you are my disciples indeed.” Genuine believers, by definition, stick.

Oh, there may be hiccups and so on along the line. Christian maturation is not all necessarily in a straight gradation, but it perseveres. Or, as Hebrews 3:14 puts it, “We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first.” In the parable of the sower, Jesus depicts some who hear the Word and “… at once receive it with joy. But since they have no root they last only for a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away.”

Speedily they receive the Word; speedily they fall away. They don’t really count. They don’t produce fruit. But not so the Philippians. Paul is convinced they will persevere, he says (verse 6), and the reason is God is preserving them. Paul gives thanks to God because he is entirely confidant, as he has observed the Philippians, God did, indeed, begin a good work in them and he will pursue it right to the end.

Now it is worth pausing, too, to reflect on the fact that as Paul gives thanks, his stance is not merely mechanical or ritualistic. Look at verse 4. “In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy.” The words are reminiscent of what John writes in his third epistle. “I have no greater joy than to hear my children are walking in the truth.” Of course, implicitly, that asks us … From what do you derive your greatest joy? Personal success? Victory for your children? Acquisition of material things?

Perhaps when you’re really depressed, you go on a shopping spree in order to find some joy. Not Paul. Not John. “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking according to the truth,” John writes. Paul reflects exactly the same attitude. “It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart.” Verse 7. Probably this was written against the background of stoic influence in the first century that was cautious about whole-life commitments, especially if they involved the passions. Be cool. Do not be vulnerable. Do not get hurt. Do not be emotionally committed.

But it wasn’t Paul’s way. “It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart …” That is, my whole life and being and hope, my affections, my mind, are bound up with you. Paul’s circumstances, thus, will not affect his joyful and prayerful regard for the Philippians believers. “… for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel …” He will adopt the same stance.

So strongly does he want the Philippians to recognize his devotion to them, he actually puts himself under an oath. Verse 8: “God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.” The purpose of the oath is not because otherwise he might lie, as if Paul is saying, “If I don’t swear, you might think I’m telling a fib,” but rather it is a way of helping them, really, to see how intense he is by his protestation. So also with God, who puts himself under an oath.

Do you recall what is said about God in the epistle to the Hebrews? God swears an oath when he gives certain promises to his people. Not because otherwise God might lie. God isn’t going to lie, but rather so that by two immutable things we might have confidence in the Word of God. The failure is with us. We might not believe God, so God puts himself under an oath so we’ll have an extra reason to believe.

The person who tells the truth all the time may not be believed, but if the person says, “Truly, I mean it! I swear to God! So help me God!” then we may believe it just because he has put himself under an oath. That is what Paul does here. “God is my witness how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.”

So here is no mere professionalism. Nor is this an act, a bit of showmanship to turn them on. Rather, it is something that repeatedly bubbles through Paul’s arguments. It recurs in chapter 4. “Therefore, my brothers, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, that is how you should stand firm in the Lord, dear friends!”

So both from Paul’s example and from the Philippians’ example (that is, their example in being partnered with him in the gospel and his example of being so committed to them), we must learn this point. The fellowship of the gospel, the partnership of the gospel must be put at the center of our relationships with other believers. That is the point. That is the burden of these opening verses.

Paul does not commend them for the fine times they had shared watching games in the arena. He doesn’t mention their literature discussion groups or the excellent meals they had. What lies at the center of all his ties with them, doubtless including meals and discussion, is this passion for gospel, this partnership in the gospel.

Now what ties us together? What do we talk about when we meet, even after a church service? Mere civilities? The weather? The Cup results? Our careers? Our children? Our aches and pains? None of these topics should be excluded, of course. In sharing all of life, these things inevitably come up. That’s right. It is good. But what must tie us together as Christians is this passion for the gospel, this fellowship in the gospel.

On the face of it, nothing else is strong enough to hold together the extraordinary diversity of people in many of our churches: men and women, young and old, blue-collars and white-collars, educated, uneducated, the healthy and the ill, the fit and the flabby, people from different races, with different incomes, different levels of education, different personalities.

What holds us together? The gospel. If we are sold out to the gospel and to the Christ of the gospel, we will be committed to each other. If we are not, we’re far more likely to split. It is the gospel, the good news, that in Jesus Christ himself God has reconciled us to himself. This brings about a precious God-centeredness we share with other believers.

This means in our conversations we ought regularly to be sharing in the gospel, delighting in God, sharing with one another what we’ve learned that week in our devotions, in our prayer times, in our family, joining in prayer for the advance of the gospel, bearing one another’s burdens, encouraging one another in obedience and maturing discipleship, bearing one another’s burdens and growing in self-sacrificial love for those who are hurting in the fellowship. In short, we must put the gospel first, and that means we must put the fellowship of the gospel at the center of our relationships with other believers.

2. Put the priorities of the gospel at the center of your prayer life.

Verses 9–11. Now already in verse 4 Paul has insisted whenever he prays for the Philippians he does so with joy and thanksgiving. Now he gives us the content of his prayers for them.

He writes, “This is my prayer: that your love my abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” Now this is stunning. Paul’s petitions reflect the priorities, again, of the gospel. Observe three features of this prayer:

A. Paul prays the love of the Philippians may abound more and more.

Note there is no direct object: the love of the Philippians for one another or the love of the Philippians for God. He doesn’t say that. I suspect he leaves the object open precisely because he would not want to restrict the prayer to one or the other. It’s a whole package. From a Christian point of view, growing love for God must be reflected in growing love for fellow believers. However wonderful this congregation has been, and it is one with which Paul has very close ties, Paul prays their love may abound more and more. That’s the first thing he prays for.

B. What Paul has in mind is not mere sentimentalism or the rush of pleasure spawned by a large conference or the like.

He says, “I pray that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight.” The kind of love Paul has in mind, then, is the love that becomes more knowledgeable. Of course, Paul is not thinking of any kind of knowledge. He is not hoping they will learn more about nuclear physics or sea turtles. What he has in mind is knowledge of God.

What he wants them to enjoy is insight into God’s words and ways and, thus, how to live in their light. His assumption, evidently, is you cannot grow in your knowledge of God if you’re full of bitterness or self-pity or other self-centered sins. You can’t do it; there is a moral element in knowing God. Of course, a person might memorize Scripture or teach Sunday school somewhere or earn a degree of theology in the local theological college or divinity school, but that is not necessarily the same thing as growing in the knowledge of God.

It may be growing in the knowledge of a theological discipline. Such growth requires repentance, demands a lessening of our characteristic self-focus. Or, to put it positively, it demands an increase in love, which is another way of referring to a decrease in our self-focus. Just as knowledge of God and his Word serves as an incentive to Christian love, so Christian love is necessary for a deepening knowledge of God.

This is the reason is it is exceedingly difficult in the Christian way to advance on only one front. Christians cannot say, “I will improve my prayer life but not my morality.” Christians cannot say, “I will increase in my knowledge of God but not in my obedience.” Christians can’t say, “I will grow in love for others but not in purity or in my knowledge of God.” They cannot do it.

The Christian life, by definition, embraces every facet of our existence. That’s what we mean when we say Jesus is Lord. All of our living and doing and thinking and speaking is to be discharged in joyful submission to God and to his Son. So Paul prays the Philippians’ love may abound more and more, and then he adds, “… in knowledge and depth of insight.”

C. For Paul, this prayer has a further end in view.

He lifts these petitions to God. He tells the Philippians, “… so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ.” Clearly, Paul does not want the Philippians to be satisfied with mediocrity. He cannot be satisfied, even in a fallen world, with the status quo. He wants these believers to move on, to become more and more discerning, proving in their own experience, he says, what is best.

He wants them to pursue what is best in the knowledge of God, what is best in their relationships with other believers, what is best in joyful obedience, what is best in truth, what is best in conduct, what is best in their families, what is best in their priorities, what is best in their value systems, for ultimately, what he wants from them is perfection. He prays they may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ.

For Paul, this is not an idolatrous prayer. For some perfectionists, it is. For some people, perfection, at least in some arenas where they excel, becomes a kind of fetish, even an idol. They whip themselves unless they get things really up to speed. But this isn’t the case with Paul. The excellence for which he prays for himself and for others is then defined in verse 11.

Look at this. “… being filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ.” Nor will any of this enhance our reputations, for, sad to say, some people are more interested in a reputation for holiness than in holiness, but all such petty alternatives are swept aside in Paul’s final comment. The prayer is offered up “to the glory and praise of God.” That’s what Paul prays for.

It takes only a moment’s reflection to see all of these petitions are gospel-centered, aren’t they? What is this but the outworking of the gospel? They are prayers offered to advance the work of the gospel in the lives of the Philippian believers. That’s what they are. By asking for gospel fruit in their lives, the ultimate purpose of these petitions is to bring glory to the God who redeemed them. So the question we must ask ourselves is … How much do such petitions feature in my praying?

When was the last time you prayed that the brothers and sisters in Christ in your congregation would abound in love more and more, in knowledge and depth of insight so they might discern the best things and prove in their own experience what is excellent. What do we pray for? Oh, I’m sure there are some in your church who do pray exactly along these lines.

But many Christians devote much of their time, in private and in public, to personal matters largely removed from gospel interest: mortgages, physical safety, good health, employment for ourselves, our children, someone else. Now all of these are legitimate subjects of prayer. We serve a God who says, according to 1 Peter 5:7, we are to cast all our cares on him because he cares for us.

They are all legitimate, but where is our gospel focus? Read through the prayers of Paul. Just read through the letters of Paul and copy out his prayers and observe how much of his praying has this broad gospel focus, the outworking of the gospel in our lives. Are we being faithful to Scripture if most of our prayers are not similarly patterned? Put the gospel first, and that means you must put the priorities of the gospel at the center of your prayer life.

3. Put the advance of the gospel at the center of your aspirations.

Verses 12–18. Here it is the flow of Paul’s argument that is remarkable. Apparently (verse 12), some of his critics thought Paul had let the side down rather badly for getting arrested. If, as if likely, he is writing from prison in Rome, he is awaiting trial before the emperor. Paul is in this situation, because, if you recall the account in Acts, Paul himself appealed to the emperor. He could have kept his big mouth shut.

One can easily imagine the reasoning of the critics. Depending on how this case turns out, Paul’s appeal to the emperor could bring Christianity into bad odor. Paul is constantly rushing headlong into situations where a wiser, cooler, saner head might have held back and waited to see how the land would lie. “Why did he have to go up to Jerusalem and get himself arrested there anyway? He knew the Jews there were going to give him a hard time.”

But Paul has few regrets. Verse 12: “Now I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.” See this gospel focus again? It’s advance the gospel. That’s what he cares about. Not his own comfort. The advance of the gospel. He offers two reasons in defense of this judgment:

A. His arrest and imprisonment in Rome has meant the full Praetorian Guard has heard he has been arrested for Christ’s sake.

Verse 13: “It has become clear throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ.” Because the full Praetorian Guard, when it was at strength, numbered close to 9,000 troops, many commentators wryly criticize that Paul must be speaking hyperbolically.

Even if you cycled four guards through every eight hours or so, there is no way you could get through 9,000 guards and Paul talks to all of them. Surely this must be a bit of an exaggeration, or maybe it was just a small detachment of the guard he had in mind. But Paul’s reference to the palace guard, I suspect, is far simpler. Paul has proved to be a rather extraordinary prisoner, and his witness is beginning to spread.

He wasn’t your average ruffian, some kind of sleazeball who gets picked up every once in a while, not a hardened criminal, not some white-collar swindler. Instead, he doesn’t even bother protesting his innocence or gauging his chances of impressing Caesar’s court or trying to bribe the guards to get a little extra chocolate in. None of these things. He spends his time talking about a Jew called Jesus from the eastern end of the Mediterranean, who, Paul says, was crucified. Now there’s a sleazeball for you, by definition.

But Paul insists he rose from the dead, that he is one with God, that he will be our judge, the judge even of these troops! In short, Paul is proving to be such an extraordinary prisoner the stories about him begin to circulate around the palace. Not only stories about him, but the gospel story, as well. And that, Paul insists, is wonderful. There has been an advance in the circulation of the gospel, Paul says, because I am in chains. Now there’s a second reason why Paul insists his incarceration has advanced the gospel. Verse 14:

B. “Because of my chains, most of the brothers in the Lord have been encouraged to speak the word of God more courageously and fearlessly.”

A whiff of persecution sometimes puts backbone into otherwise timid Christians. A few of you may remember the five Wheaton College graduates in the 1950s who lost their lives in an attempt to bring the gospel to the Auca Indians of South America, of Ecuador.

Among the excellent, unforeseen results was the very high number of Wheaton graduates, year after year after year after year who offered themselves, in consequence, for missionary service. There are hundreds all over the world today serving Christ because of the sacrifice of the Auca Five. They were encouraged to speak the Word of God more courageously and fearlessly. And for that, Paul gives thanks.

Do you see? His criteria for assessing things are gospel criteria. Nevertheless, Paul is a realist; he is not dreamy-eyed. He squarely faces the fact that not every consequence of his imprisonment was rosy in every respect. Thus he writes (verse 15), “It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. The latter do so in love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel.

The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice.” Now who are these curious preachers who preach Christ but do so out of the most astonishing motives?

It is important to recognize they’re not heretics. That is, they’re not preaching another Christ or another gospel that is really no gospel at all. As for those who proclaim some gospel other than the apostolic gospel, Paul elsewhere can say, “Let them be anathema,” Galatians 1:8–9. The issues are too serious to play around with some kind of popular first-century pluralism. Our eternal destiny depends on them. So when there is another gospel or another Jesus at stake, Paul draws the line in the sand.

Paul is not open to commending every preacher who offers some show of piety and who preaches Jesus. He wants to know which Jesus. We would ask ourselves today, “Is it the Mormon Jesus? Is it the Jehovah’s Witness Jesus? Is it the liberal Jesus? Is it the health, wealth, and prosperity Jesus? Which Jesus is it?” So the fact Paul can offer these preachers a sort of backhanded compliment shows they’re not heretics or dangerous false teachers. If they had been, Paul would have exposed them.

No, in this case, the people Paul has in mind are those that are understood to lie behind verse 12. They think Paul has done damage simply because he has been arrested. Probably they magnify their own ministry by putting Paul down. We can imagine their reasoning. “It really is sad so great a man as Paul has frittered away his gospel opportunity simply because he is so inflexible.

He could be taking the gospel to Spain instead of sitting there on his backside in a prison for two years. Even then, the verdict may be against the entire church! He has brought the whole matter to public light. Far better to be discreet. Clearly one must assume Paul has a deep character flaw that puts him in the path of trouble. My ministry is being blessed, while he languishes in prison. It tells you something, doesn’t it?”

Thus, the more they speak, the more their own ways are justified, and the more Paul is made to look like a twit. How does Paul handle this? Is he wounded? Oh, doubtless he has feelings like everyone else, but he is a man of deep principle. He perceives that whether by preachers like this or by preachers who align themselves with the apostle, the gospel’s getting out.

That is more important than whether or not he himself achieves universal respect in the church. He is more committed to seeing the gospel advance and Christ lifted up than he is to having a great reputation. That’s the bottom line. He says, “The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached.” Verse 18. Then he adds, “And because of this I rejoice.”

Paul’s example is impressive, and it is clear: Put the advance of the gospel at the center of your aspirations. Our own comfort, our bruised feelings, our reputations, the misunderstanding of our motives … All of these are insignificant in comparison with the advance and splendor of the gospel. What are your aspirations? To make money? To get married? To travel? To see your grandchildren grow up? To find a new job? To retire early?

None of these is inadmissible. None is to be despised. They’re part of the normal cycles of life. The question is not whether any of these is legitimate but whether they become so devouring the Christian’s central aspiration is squeezed to the periphery or choked out of existence entirely. I recall a Christian some years ago who always gave the same response when he was asked the numbing question, “What do you do?” Invariably, he replied, “I am a Christian.”

“Yes, but I didn’t ask your religion. I asked what you do.

“I am a Christian.”

“Do you mean you’re in vocational ministry?”

“No, I’m not in vocational ministry, but I’m a Christian full time.”

“Oh. But what do you do vocationally?”

“Oh. Vocationally. Well, I’m a Christian full time, but I pack pork to pay expenses.”

Now, at one level, of course, his answer was somewhat perverse, because everybody knows what the question, “What do you do?” means. Moreover, in God’s universe all morally good and useful work in honorable, including packing pork. Whether it’s packing pork or writing computer programs or baking a pie or changing a baby’s nappy, it’s still work rightly offered up to God. Yet, having insisted on that point, there are some elements of what we do that are more directly tied to the gospel than our other things that we do. They have direct, eternal significance.

As the apostle preserves these gospel priorities in his prayers, so he preserves them in his aspirations, and we must do the same. Do you know, in quite a lot of Western evangelicalism, this has now become a major problem. I have a colleague in the missions department at Trinity by the name of Paul Hiebert. Paul comes from Mennonite stock, and he analyzes his background in Mennonite heritage this way. (Now he would be the first to say it’s a caricature, but it’s a useful caricature.)

The first generation of Mennonites, he said, believed the gospel and thought there were certain social entailments. The second generation assumed the gospel and focused on the entailments, identified with the entailments. The third generation denied the gospel, and all they had left was the entailments when there was nothing left for the entailments to be entailed to.

Now evangelicalism, of course, focused on the gospel, goes back to the church itself. But as a movement in the twentieth century, it experienced a remarkable resurgence 40 years ago. In his analysis of where we are, we are at stage two. That is to say, we assume the gospel, but we focus on the entailments. As a result in many, many countries today in the Western world, there are all kinds of people who call themselves evangelicals, but what they focus on are the relatively peripheral things.

Those are the things they are passionate about: social justice, green, women’s ministry (for or against), abortion issues, homeschooling, whatever. It depends on the country. They vary a bit from place to place. It’s not, I insist, that Christian’s shouldn’t be thinking about these things.

In the history of evangelicalism at its strength, let’s say, in the wake of the Whitefield and Wesley Great Awakening in Britain and other similar movements, there were massive changes in the social arena brought about by Christians who were the periphery.

So this is not a sudden appeal for a denuded gospel, a merely privatized gospel, a gospel without social ramifications. Not at all. But it is an appeal for putting the gospel at the center of your aspirations. What do you dream about? What turns you on? What gets you going in debate? What do you read? What’s your passion? It may be God has called you to be a homemaker or an engineer or a chemist or a ditch-digger. It may be you will take some significant role in, say, the rising field of bioethics.

But although the gospel directly effects how you will discharge your duties in each case, none of these is to displace the gospel that is central to every thoughtful Christian. You will put the gospel first in your aspirations, and then you will be able to endure affliction and persecution and even misunderstanding and misrepresentation because, at the end of the day, what is important to you is not how well you are cherished or how highly you are esteemed but the advance of the gospel.

You will say with Paul (verse 12), “I want you to know that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel.” That’s Paul’s third point. Put the advance of the gospel at the center of your aspirations.

4. Put the converts of the gospel at the center of your principled self-denial.

Once again it is the flow of the passage that is striking. Paul has just declared in the first part of verse 18 that he will rejoice if Christ is preached. But that’s not the only source of Paul’s rejoicing, as wonderful as it is, for he now adds, “Yes, I will continue to rejoice, for I know that through your prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance.”

In this context, deliverance does not necessarily mean release from imprisonment, but something more important, his ultimate vindication, whether in life or in death. This, he says, will come about through their prayers. Not least their prayers and the consequent help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, he says, so that Paul will be faithful and that he will be entirely vindicated before God in the end. That’s why Paul wants, above all, to be found faithful.

Verse 20: “I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.” In other words, Paul’s driving concern is not that he should be released from prison … that’s not his driving concern … or that if he must die he should a relatively painless death but that he should do nothing of which he would someday be ashamed.

He wants courage, he says, so Christ may be exalted in his body whether by life or death. He wants to hear Christ’s, “Well done” on the last day, and he openly solicits the prayers of the Philippians to that end. Then almost as if he feels he must articulate and defend this vision of what is important, he summarizes his values. Verse 21: “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.”

In this context, to live is Christ, surely means that for Paul to keep on living here means ministry, Christ-centered ministry, Christ-empowered ministry, Christ’s presence in his ministry. And to die? The ministry comes to an end, but even so, there is only gain. The ministry is not an end in itself, and it is now swallowed up in the glorious delight in the unshielded presence of the exalted Jesus himself. It’s only gain.

What do you possibly do with a Christian like that? How are you going to shut him up? Kill him? You have just done him a favor! Christ means too much for them. You see, when I come across a congregation that is really reluctant to evangelize, what it really means is they don’t really cherish the gospel enough. That’s what it means. As for Paul, it is not in his power to choose between service here and departing to be with Christ, between living and dying, between being released from prison for more gospel ministry and paying the ultimate price.

Yet, suppose he could choose, he asks rhetorically. What would he do? “I don’t know,” he says. Verse 22. He doesn’t know because he has no word from the Lord as to what is going to happen, and therefore, what he ought to choose. He says in verse 23, “I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far; but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.” That is, that he be acquitted before the imperial court and released from prison and, thereby, free to return to his apostolic ministry to the benefit of the Philippians and others.

Now what is striking about all of this reasoning is how deeply it is tied to Paul’s perceptions of what would be for the well-being of other converts. That’s what is striking, and in this Paul is imitating his master. “Convinced of this …” That is, convinced that my remaining alive will be best for you. He says, “… I know that I will remain. I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith …”

Or, better translated, “Convinced of this, that it would be better for you, I know that I expect to remain …” I think that’s the way the text should be rendered. “… and expect to continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith …” Even this progress in faith Paul covets for the Philippians he construes as a cause for their joy. “… so that through my being with you again your joy in Christ Jesus will overflow on account of me.” Do you see the lesson? Put the converts of the gospel at the center of your principled self-denial.

Paul’s deepest hopes for his own immediate future turn neither on the bliss of immediately gaining heaven’s portals nor on returning to a fulfilling ministry. It disturbs me when I ask young men and women in our seminary, “Why are you studying this subject?” “Oh, I think the ministry would be very fulfilling.” I don’t know. It led the founder to a cross! That’s not Paul’s reasoning at all.

His assessments are being worked out in terms of what would be best for his converts. So often we are tempted to evaluate alternatives by thinking through what seems best for us. How often do we raise, as the first principle, what is best for the church? When faced with, say, a job offer that would take us to another city or with mortal illness that calls forth our diligent intercession, how quickly do we deploy Paul’s criterion here established?

What would be best for the church? What would be best for others? What would be best for my brothers and sisters in Christ? It’s just not the way we think. There is a kind of asceticism that is frankly idolatrous. Some people gain a kind of spiritual high out of self-denial. But the self-denial that is motivated by the spiritual good of others in unqualifiedly godly. You see, there is a kind of self-denial that … Some people feel better if they whip themselves. That’s useless.

But a kind of principled self-denial that is a denying of self for the sake of others’ advance in the gospel? That’s wonderful, and that is what Paul displays. So here then, is the burden of the passage: Put the gospel first. In particular, put the fellowship of the gospel at the center of your relationships with believers. Put the priorities of the gospel at the center of your prayer life. Put the advance of the gospel at the center of your aspirations. Put the converts of the gospel at the center of your principled self-denial. Put the gospel first.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, such evaluation of the gospel ought not to be the exception in the church but the rule. We are talking about the good news, the gospel that reconciles lost men and women to the eternal God. We are confessing the gospel that God himself has provided a Redeemer who died, the just for the unjust that we might be reconciled to him and be raised on the last day and enjoy the bliss of the new heaven and the new earth, world without end, because of the death of a crucified Creator.

Without this gospel, we are cut off. Without this gospel, we have no hope in this world or the next. Without this gospel, we are utterly undone. Compared with this good news, what could possibly compete? Put the gospel first. One remembers what an aging Christian said to John G. Patton in the last century when Patton was planning to go as a missionary to the South Sea Islands. “You’ll be eaten by cannibals!” Patton was told.

Patton replied, “Mr. Dickson, you are advanced in years now and your own prospect is soon to be laid in the grave, there to be eaten by worms; I confess to you, that if I can but live and die serving and honoring the Lord Jesus, it will make no difference to me whether I am eaten by cannibals or by worms. And in the Great Day, my resurrection body will arise as fair as yours in the likeness of the Redeemer.” Put the gospel first.

Only one life, ‘twill soon be passed;

Only what’s done for Christ will last.

Put the gospel first.