The first thing to know about Philippians is
that Paul wrote it from prison. He was
incarcerated because of his Gospel preaching, but we don’t know where, exactly,
it was. We do know that it was in a Roman jail, because he speaks of the
imperial guard (in Greek, the Praetorium), who know he’s in jail for
Christ. We do have some idea of when it
was written, though: probably about 62 CE, around thirty years after the
crucifixion and ten years after Paul and Timothy established the Philippian church
which, being in Greece, had the distinction of being the first Christian
congregation established in Europe.
It is clear that Paul had a special
relationship with that congregation; he visited the church twice—in 56 and
57–after he founded it, and speaks fondly of their relationship in the verses
before our passage. “I thank my God
every time I remember you,” he says “because of your sharing in the gospel from
the first day until now . . . You hold
me in your heart, for all of you share in God’s grace with me.” He longs to see them, to be with them, and
prays that their “love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full
insight,” and assures them that his imprisonment has actually helped spread the
Gospel, because the local sisters and brothers had been emboldened by his example,
and enabled to preach without fear.
As the letter goes on, it becomes clear that he
doesn’t know his fate, that he’s probably awaiting sentencing or something, and
his bravado begins to appear a bit hollow.
“It is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be put to shame in
any way, but that . . . Christ will be exalted now as always in my body,
whether by life or by death.”
As our passage begins, he muses about which one
it’ll be, and lets us in on a little secret: he’d kinda prefer it to be death. “For to me, living is Christ and dying is
gain.” Dying is gain. His desire is “to
depart and be with Christ,” as he puts it, “for that is far better.” Life is hard, there is sickness and hardship
and suffering, and Paul knows a lot about that, too . . . in that famous
passage in Second Corinthians he describes it, saying he’s been “afflicted9 in
every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted,
but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.” Oy. If
anybody had cause to want to die and be with Christ, it’s Paul.
And yet . . . This sort of thinking has
pervaded Christianity for a long time.
Early on, in the popular conception, it became all about getting to that
better place, all about pie in the sky by and by. Fire-sale Christianity, it’s called—the idea
that you do all this stuff on Earth so you’ll get to go to heaven. Though most Christians at least profess to
believe in Martin Luther’s sola gracia, there’s
often an underlying conviction that you gotta be good enough. It’s reflected in the way we speak about it, when
a calamity befalls us saying “why me” and when Uncle Monty dies, he’s gone on to his great reward.
Of course, this has taken the next, inevitable
step: called prosperity doctrine, it’s when that eternal reward gets pushed
forward to our life here on earth. If
God rewards you for being a good little minion after death, what’s to stop God
from doing it while we’re still kicking? Think Creflo Dollar—has there ever
been a more apt name?—think Creflo Dollar and his 65 million dollar plane or
Joel Osteen and his 17,000 square foot “family home.”
The problem is that prosperity-doctrine
thinking forgets the other part of the formula: if dying is gain, living is Christ, and he didn’t
live in no 10.5 million dollar house, or ask Peter and James to buy him a
private jet. No: the incarnate Christ
hoofed it around Palestine, healing folks and preaching the Kingdom, and so did
Paul. And though we don’t know what Jesus did to support himself—he
doubtless learned his father’s trade before he left home—we know Paul worked as a tent-maker while at the
same time running around the Middle East establishing churches.
And after engaging in a little wist-ful
thinking, he assures himself—and the Philippians of his confidence that God
will keep him around for the sake of the gospel, to continue to do more of the earthly
labor which, we know today, was crucial to the development of the church. More specifically, he says, remaining in the
flesh is “more necessary” for the church at Philippi. “Since I am convinced of this,” he says, “I
know that I will remain and continue with all of you for your progress and joy
in faith.” Paul has a genuine love and
regard for the fledgling Christians at Philippi, and an unshakable faith that
God will do what is right by them, whatever
God does with he himself. They don’t call him a saint for nothing.
And he really wants to come visit them again,
so he can share in their joy and celebration of Christ, or as he puts it, their
boasting in Christ Jesus. But just in case, he begins to exhort them,
to encourage them, ‘cause exhorting and encouraging is what he does best. And I wonder if he’s doing the same for himself, if he’s giving himself a bit of
a pep talk to shake himself out of his momentary doubt.
Whatever the case, he urges them—and himself?—to
live their “life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ” so that whether he
gets to come and see them or not, he’ll know that they’re standing firm in one
spirit, striving side by side with one mind for the faith of the gospel. And notice that he’s speaking, as he almost always
is in his letters, to a group, to a congregation, not to individuals, and that here, as elsewhere—notably First
Corinthians—he expects unity, that
they’ll work in one spirit and with one mind for the Gospel. He doesn’t expect purity of belief, but he does expect them to get along.
He also
expects them not to be intimidated by their
opponents, whoever they are, and reminds them that It’s a privilege not only to
believe in Christ but to suffer for him as well. And though this sounds a little foreign to
our modern ears, in a time and place that spends great amounts of time and
capital to circumvent it, Paul is adamant that suffering is good for one, that it
builds faith and character, that it fosters advancement along life’s
journey. And after all, Paul isn’t
preaching from a gilt-edged set or some crystal cathedral. He’s lived those words, he’s experienced
suffering, and has emerged stronger from the other side.
And yet
. . . There’s still that hope, that after all is said and done. After we’ve run the race, done our best, there’s
still the hope we will go home. He speaks of it explicitly just before our
passage, and for him, this expectation that God will do what is best for his
beloved Philippians is coupled with that way real hope. And Paul
knows a lot about hope; he wrote powerfully
about it over in Romans: “hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what
is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with
patience.” He is waiting for his fate
with patience, he doesn’t see it yet, he doesn’t know which it’ll be, he
doesn’t know whether he’ll continue to witness for Christ by his life or by his
death, but through it all he is filled
with hope.
This is an invitation to focus on that hope, to
find hope—and yes, joy—in the
uncertainties of our lives. And when our
own prison moments come, we are
invited to model for others, and for ourselves, what it means to face them with
hope. Like Paul, we can choose life. We
can choose to look beyond our circumstances and believe that God will show us a
way that will lead us out of our prisons, out of those valleys of shadow and
death in which we all sometimes find
ourselves. In those times, it is our faith and conviction that God will lead us
out. Amen.
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