The Great Race (08/09/25-08/10/25)

As is his habit, Paul presents his point with an analogy drawn of familiar imagery.  There are three, it seems to me, that find repeated application in his letters.  There are those examples drawn from the familiar example of the Roman army.  There are the analogies relating to bodily function.  And then, as here, there are references to the world of sports.  In this passage we are met with the picture of a footrace into which we have been entered.  It could be some part of Olympic competition.  It could be a marathon.  But it’s a race, and we are the racers.  Paul doesn’t simply come out and state it as such, but as we look at the phrasing it’s clear that these images are in mind.  There is a goal ahead.  There is a straining forward to gain the prize.  And, too, though it is perhaps less clearly addressed, there are lanes in which we run.

Now, I can’t say as to whether the ancient Greeks would have known of lanes in their running.  Probably not, in the case of the marathon.  But in competitions such as might attend at the local colosseum, or other such sporting events, I think it possible that this would have been as much a feature of the footrace then as it is now.  Lanes or no lanes, however, there is a course to be run, and there are rules governing the running.  Go back to the idea of the marathon, a familiar image for us here in the Boston area, as in many other places.  The race proceeds some 23 miles, through many towns, past myriad houses, but on specific roads.  There is a specific course, and to deviate from the course is to be disqualified.  You can’t cut across on some side road to shorten your run and thus gain on the competition.  You can’t hop into a waiting car for some portion of the run, to emerge somewhere down course.

Or, diverging somewhat from Paul’s picture, I could think back to the driving marathons my brother used to participate in.  There, the goal was not speed but rather navigation and attentiveness to speed limits and the like.  But there was a course laid out which must be followed.  There were checkpoints along the way to ensure that one wasn’t cheating, and timestamps to confirm that each leg had been done without violating the rules of the road.  Violation of the course or of its rules would be disqualifying.

All of this leads to the opening observation of Calvin’s comments on the passage.  Our life is, as it were, a race-course laid out by God.  Now, then, as it is He who has laid out the course, it is also He who sets the rules of the race.  It is also He who holds the position of judge at the finish line.  It is God’s race start to finish, and we either run the course He has declared in the way He has declared or we forfeit.

Now, it’s drawing from other uses of this analogy by Paul, but if we are entering into a race, our most urgent concern ought to be our readiness.  The runner trains before racing.  It may involve careful attention to diet.  I think of my childhood friend who competed in cross-country events.  There would be a bit of  carb loading in the days leading up to a race, as well as the more obvious preparations of conditioning himself by long runs both on the road and through the woods.  Now, here we find ourselves in a bit of trouble, when it comes to the heavenward race.  We didn’t have opportunity to train, at least not with conscious effort.  It’s the nature of our salvation that it comes upon us rather suddenly.  We are caught somewhat unawares by the call to come run this race.  Here we are, set at the starting line, and we didn’t know.  We have no way to be ready.

Put this in perspective from Paul’s viewpoint.  He thought he had been running already.  He thought he was doing rather well, thanks.  You can see it in his description of his former standing back in Philippians 3:4-6.  Man, I was doing it all, and I was good at it, better than most.  But it was the wrong preparation, and to the degree he raced, he was running the wrong course, even if he had the right goal in view.

And here is another aspect of this analogy of the race.  There is a goal.  The goal, I would note, is different than the prize.  The prize is what comes of reaching the goal, but the goal must be reached first.  On a track, it would be the ribbon marking the finish line.  On something more like a marathon, there might be a pole, perhaps a flag to mark it out as the point towards which you are racing.  As the race runs longer, that pole may become more visible in the distance, its nearness perhaps supplying us with an extra burst of energy to complete this last leg.  But there is a goal, and for those who reach it on the terms of the race, there is a prize, a reward.  It does no good simply to touch the goalpost.  A bystander watching the conclusion of the race will gain nothing by doing so.  A tourist wandering by, who happened upon that post would not thereby have claim on the prize.  Nor would one running for that goal on a different day obtain anything by it.

In a typical race, the goal itself is of little or no value.  It’s just a pole, a bit of tape, a chalk mark.  And for all that, the prize in these races wasn’t of any real value.  What did you get?  A wreath of greenage.  It doesn’t much matter what foliage they used, it would already be in process of dying when they gave it to you.  You might get to wear it for a week or two, show off a bit, and enjoy the appreciation of your efforts by those who see that wreath.  But apart from a rather small crowd, who will long note your win?  What will you have to show for it?  And so, we find that where this analogy pops up in Scripture, there is a contrast to be seen between the earthly example and its heavenly counterpart.

In that counterpart, the goal is in part the reward.  They may not be one and the same, but they are close.  And what is that goal?  The goal is to attain to the resurrection from the dead, that first resurrection which is unto life, and which is preserved from the second death.  Paul spoke of that immediately prior to this.  He expressed his urgent desire to know Christ, to know the power of His resurrection working in his own life, to participate in the fellowship of His sufferings, and to be conformed to His death so as to attain to the resurrection from the dead (Php 3:10-11).  That’s the goal, the unreached point that ends the race, this resurrection from the dead.  And the reward immediately attaches, being entry into eternal life, with a body now suited for eternal life.  And this life has a necessary feature that makes it a reward rather than a torment.  It is an eternity spent in the immediate presence of God, and in the fullness of fellowship with Him.  I think of Paul’s anticipation of that state, when, “I shall know fully just as I also have been fully known” (1Co 13:12).

Think about that!  Think how fully God knows you, has known you all along, having known you well before you ever came into being.  He knew you, we are told, from before the beginning, had already established this course for you, already determined that you would be called, as well as when and how that would come about.  And He who called, who set you on the starting line for this race, is faithful to see that you complete it (Php 1:6).  And observe, in that verse, that we come up against another application of perfection.  He who began the work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.  Now, that’s a topic for later in this set of considerations, but I just wanted to observe it in its setting there at the start of the letter.

So, then:  resurrection into fulness of life.  There is your goal, and there your reward.  I was a bit put off in reading through Clarke’s notes that he felt this goal that Paul was racing towards was a matter of martyrdom.  To be sure, there were plentiful occasions for martyrdom in those early years of the church, and there were those who rather longed for the opportunity to participate.  Whether that was right and holy is a separate question.  But we see that the Apostles, pretty much to a man, were martyred, and counted it an honor to face that end.  Here was fulness of participation in the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings, after all.  And others in the early centuries practically volunteered to be taken for execution due to their vocal and steadfast faith in Christ.  Count it all joy!  But I don’t see Paul making that his goal.  He is content with it, should that be what God has scheduled for him, but as we have seen, he’s just as content to continue on and live for Christ.  No.  He’s not racing towards death.  That’s not the point.  But the resurrection that awaits?  That’s a different story.

And so, while I disagree with Clarke’s focus on martyrdom, I have no disagreement with his conclusion that for Paul, whatever he had received from Christ thus far (and we must confess it was much), it remained incomplete until he would find himself in that resurrected body, and thus, the resurrection had become the sole focus of his life.  Okay, that last may be a bit too strong.  But it’s undeniable that this matter of resurrection was central to his worldview and his preaching.  This, I might note, would have held in some degree even when he was pursuing his Pharisaic training.  They, too, believed in the resurrection.  It was one thing that marked them out as distinct from the Sadducees.  We heard it from him back in Jerusalem.  “Brethren, I am a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees.  I am on trial for the hope and the resurrection of the dead!” (Ac 23:6).  That hadn’t changed.  His whole life was, as it were, a trial for the hope and the resurrection.  It was a race towards that goal.  But it was a marathon, not a speed trial.  And so, as he expresses throughout this letter, his whole life has become focused on that goal of resurrection, of doing whatever must be done to attain to that end.

Now, I wrote in earlier notes that the quality of our pursuits cannot exceed the value of the goal.  Well, consider this goal set before us.  Here is life, real life, set before you.  Here is victory over death obtained on your behalf.  Here is the promise that for him who believes, even if he dies yet shall he live (Jn 11:25).  Or, as we read last night, “To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the Paradise of God” (Rev 2:7).  Indeed, the promise comes repeatedly to the Church.  “Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life” (Rev 2:10).  “He who overcomes I will not erase from the book of life” (Rev 3:5).  “He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore” (Rev 3:12).  All of this presumes resurrection as entry into that life.  All of this looks to Christ as the firstborn from the dead.  He has made the way.

And He has set the course for us, by which we run from the starting point of salvation to this goal of the resurrection.  It’s a long run, viewed from our perspective.  However long earthly life may linger in us, it continues.  And how it shall be perceived by us in the rest of the grave, who can say?  Does time pass for the interred?  Or have they entered already into that blessed presence in the courts of heaven?  How does time even work there, in a realm outside of time?  I cannot say, nor is there any great value in trying to figure it out.  Here, though, we remain in the race.  Here, we seek to keep our invaluable goal in view so as to urge ourselves to utmost effort in pursuit of it.  And here, we have the great comfort of our Savior’s promises to keep us going.

He has set the course for us, and, as Calvin writes, “God does not permit us to wander about heedlessly.”  This is again a great comfort, but it is certainly no cause to become careless.  In fairness, I would have to say that God does permit us to wander for a season should we become so heedless as to do so.  But He will not permit us to wander so far as to be disqualified.  He will call us back to our course, remind us of our responsibility in this race.  And it is a responsibility.  The one entered into a race has a responsibility to complete it.  The analogy is by no means perfect, but the thought is there.  Perhaps if we saw ourselves as representing our sponsor, as we bear the sponsor’s mark upon us, we might sense more of our responsibility to run and to run well.  And this being the case, yes, we need to be actively ridding ourselves of anything that diverts our attention from the task at hand, anything which so occupies heart and mind as to disturb the exclusive hold of His calling upon us.

Now, it has to be said that many run just so exclusive and intensely pursued a race, but are racing towards the wrong goal.  This could be said, certainly, of anybody seeking heaven by some other religion.  But I can be said as well for many who could be accounted as Christians.  Indeed, the flavor of the last two verses in this passage suggest Paul has just such sorts in mind.  We might account them as possessed of zeal but not of understanding.  Such would I have to account those who still endeavor to earn heaven by their works; still lashed to action by a litany of, “you must, you must, you must.”  The pursuit such exercise is surely in earnest, and I will even allow that it is for the love of Christ that they strive so.  But if the goal is off, of what quality is the pursuit?  Of what value can it be to put so much energy into what cannot, in the end, draw you any closer to the goal?

Certainly, we can agree with Matthew Henry in that, “There is no getting to heaven as our home but by Christ as our way.”  But if He is our way, then we must attain to the goal His way.  He has, after all, laid the course, and He shall judge the race.  It will do no good, as we have observed, to show up at the finish line having done a different course.  It will do no good to have utilized the wrong means to arrive there, either.  We run His course His way, or we run in vain.  So, we arrive back at the tension of this life of faith.  We cannot work our way into His love, yet we are called constantly to work.  We rest in Him, yet we give it our all.  And that is to me a key factor.  We give it our all from a place of resting in Him.

Toward that end, I would focus our attention on the final clause of verse 12.  We are eagerly seeking to lay hold of that finish line, but observe!  It is for this that “I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.”  Let me present once more the Goodspeed translation of that statement.  I press on, you see, “because I have been captured by Jesus Christ.”  How I love that aspect of the this.  Christ has eagerly laid hold of me!  What a glorious thought!  And, of course that thought drives me to recall, “No one can snatch them out of My hand” (Jn 10:28).   No one is able.  “I have been captured by Jesus Christ.”  I am His.  He has made it so.  He has desired me to be His own, the gift given Him by the Father, and being a gift from the Father, He cherishes me, will not suffer me to be marred or lost.  No!  He has me in hand, He calls me towards the goal, encourages me in this race.  He has captured me, and now, I am a slave of righteousness, which shall surely result in sanctification (Ro 6:19).  But you see that this gracious gift of sanctification, this completing of the race set before me, comes not of me laying hold of Him, but rather, of me being laid hold of by Jesus.

This is the inescapability of our condition.  This is the core reality of the new birth.  He is evermore my Lord, in the fullest sense of that name.  It is for Him to set the course of my life and the course of my day.  That need not, I think, require me to get all super spiritual over the mundanities of daily living.  But it does require me to see them in a different light.  The workplace is not somehow separated from this course.  It’s part of the race.  The challenges of home life are not some separate matter, distracting me from my purpose.  They are part and parcel of my purpose.  They, too, are laid  out as part of the course I am to run.

How does this play out?  How am I to respond when it seems so many things in life are in fact acting as impediments to spiritual progress?  What am I to do when what should be strong supports in pursuit of godliness are proving a hindrance, or appear to me to be so?  How am I to resolve the conflict when those I love, those whom I account, in spite of their foibles, true Christians, become so fervent an opposition to my following the course set before me by my Lord?  What do I do when obedience to Him as I perceive it seems to conflict with other aspects of this call upon my life, but then, so does disobedience?

Lord, You know the things I am wrestling with at present.  And You know, as well, how utterly lost and helpless I am to resolve them.  Which is the way, here?  How can these divergent paths be brought into harmony?  What am I to do, Jesus?  I want to do as You have called me to do, and I do believe I’ve heard that call clearly.  But how it hurts at present, to contemplate that undertaking in the midst of such strife and division as it brings in the household.  It must be clear that one or the other of us is hearing You wrong, and it is inevitable that each of us supposes it must be the other.  I can only rely on You to sort it.  I know not of any counsel outside of You that could answer it, nor should they, I expect.  But I feel the resistance, the rising sorrow as I seek to obey Your call.  If I am wrong, correct me.  If I am right, Lord, comfort me, strengthen me, grant me the confidence in You to pursue Your lead whatever the cost.  You have, after all, captured me.  I am Yours.  Just let the course ahead come clearly into focus.  And I would plead with You that as it does, You would make it clear to those who see it otherwise at present.  Likewise, if that is not my course, I pray that You would make that clear to me.  But however You choose, so be it.  Thy will be done.  Amen.

What Lies Behind (08/10/25-08/12/25)

Paul speaks here of forgetting what lies behind.  That is something that must be heard with a full sense of context.  There are too many directions one could take that thought in isolation.  Certainly, we could find in it a reference to our former life of sin.  And to be sure, we are no longer slaves to sin.  It’s right there in that verse I mentioned from Romans.  Indeed, that whole chapter speaks to the point, doesn’t it?  “Consider yourselves to be dead to sin, alive to Christ” (Ro 6:11).  “Don’t let sin reign” (Ro 6:12).  “We have been freed from sin and enslaved to God” (Ro 6:22).  This is our present state, not our future, glorified state that is in view.  We have been freed from sin.  We are no longer its slave, compelled to obey its lusts.  At minimum, we have options now, awareness of the situation, and of a better course which we can choose.  Of course, we can also choose capitulation, and often do. 

It could be argued that our position has worsened.  Before, we could at least claim ignorance, or incapacity.  Now?  Those excuses are eliminated.  We cannot appeal on the basis of blindness, whose eyes have been opened by faith.  Is it not thus that we find Paul crying out, by the end of Romans 7, “Oh!  Wretched man that I am!  Who will set me free from this body of death?” (Ro 7:24).  Which, of course, comes with the answering response, “Thanks be to God through Christ Jesus our Lord!” (Ro 7:25).  God has answered.  Christ Jesus will set us free, has already begun the process.  And that process is the race, a race which He assures us we shall complete because He said so.

But I don’t think this is the behind aspect that Paul has in mind in our current epistle.  It’s not so much about the sins that weight us down, though these certainly render the race more difficult.  No, it’s been a focus on those misguided attempts to reach the goal which defined his former way of life.  Judaism, we might say, had the right goal, but the wrong means.  But no, even that won’t hold up.  The goal looked right, but was in fact wrong.  It was wrong because it led inevitably to a focus on self-effort and self-worth.  It found righteousness in the works, not in the character, and as such, proved false.

Now, at this stage of his life, Paul had plenty else that he might consider in reviewing life with a backward look.  He could recount myriad occasions of God’s power preserving, of God’s Spirit revealing, a litany of past successes.  He could, to be sure, list off any number of trials and perils weathered in pursuing the course of this race, and does so in a few of his epistles.  Here, we need but consider his circumstances as he writes, that he is now four years imprisoned, awaiting trial before Nero.  No matter one’s innocence, that would have to be a troubling thing to face.  Rome may have held justice as an ideal, but then, one must ask how Rome defined justice, and whether that justice would prove just in our case.  The evidence is ambiguous at best, and in the case of Nero, given his future deeds, we would look to the outcome here with great trepidation, knowing how he proved to be.  Of course, Paul does not have that future knowledge, which is a blessing for him.  Yet, he still knows his peril is real, and that justice in this life is never a guarantee, not even for the bondservant of Christ.  We might say, especially not for the bondservant of Christ.

So, then, there are, if you will, two bodies of material behind us.  The one is deadly, the other potentially dangerous, but also potentially beneficial.  Let me take them in order.  The deadly impact comes of being so enamored of past practices as to become entangled in them once more.  Paul, having just listed those credentials by which he thought himself to be progressing in sanctification is also listing those practices which these who troubled the churches sought to impose as requirements upon those who believed by faith.  Yes, that’s nice, but you must, you must, you must.  And Paul stands firm, so firm as to say, No, you mustn’t, you mustn’t, you mustn’t.  Follow their advice and you would but condemn yourself.  For all that they claim to follow Christ, they’re still trying to get their by their own merits, to gain life by the Law, and that way is futile.  Take on the mark of that covenant, and you bind yourself to its demands, demands that no man has ever proven able to meet.  Why do you suppose it was necessary – from before the outset – for Christ to come, to live this human life, to die so horrid a death, to be dead and buried?  And what do you suppose was the point of His resurrection?  All of this, were we capable of making our own way, would be the epitome of perversion, and that, at the hands of God.  But it is not so.  It was necessary precisely because the terms of that covenant could never save, only condemn.  We must go back prior to the Law, to the promise to Abraham, to find the real course.  “The righteous shall live by faith” (Ro 1:17, quoting Hab 2:4)  Or, if you really feel the need for some compelling work on our part.  “Abraham believed, and it was accounted to him as righteousness” (Ro 4:3, quoting Ge 15:6).

This is our course to righteousness and sanctification.  Believe.  Trust God.  Don’t try to work it out for yourself.  Trust.  Believe.  How I love the answer Jesus gave to the one who asked Him how they could do the works of God.  Now, doubtless, the one asking had in mind to perform such miraculous works as Jesus did.  But as ever, Jesus answer was to the real point, not the intent.  “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent” (Jn 6:29).  It’s not about signs and wonders.  It’s about faith believing.  It’s not about careful adherence to laws and traditions and ritual acts of empty sacrifice.  Salvation can’t come by the flesh, for it doesn’t receive the flesh.  It transforms the soul.  The flesh, the body, shall be left behind, to be replaced with a new body, properly fit for heaven.  Does it still retain the molecules that formed the old?  How would I know?  It seems somewhat implausible, given the myriad generations of human life, and how we understand organic matter to be recycled in the normal course of the created order.  Only believe.  Trust God to work it out.  And as you trust, strive.

This, it seems to me, is the primary focus of Paul’s letting go.  Think how far he had progressed in those things he thought would produce righteousness in him.  Think how hard it must have been for him to toss all that aside, to come to recognize it as just so much dung, utterly worthless, and in fact, disadvantageous to retain.  Who, after all, was ever benefited by collecting such refuse and carrying it with them?  So, there, certainly, is another aspect of what is behind.

Most of our commentaries seem to focus on a slightly different angle, that of longing regret for those things we let go of when first we believed.  And to be sure, those longings persist, and they can only prove a hindrance as we seek to race forward.  Such longing regrets will, as Calvin observes, tend to sap our energy as we seek to strive toward holiness.  If our waking moments are filled with fond recollections of those past times, what is to come of it?  Even if the fondness is replaced with regret, the situation is not much changed.  Honestly, regretful memories are likely to lead to fond recollection.  We regret because we have come to recognize the result toward which such things were leading.  “For the wages of sin is death” (Ro 6:23).  But as the thoughts linger, the pleasures are recalled, and since we have had direct experience of those pleasures, and not so of death, the fond memory of pleasure may swamp the warning of death.  In such a case, I think the conclusion of the JFB applies.  “Looking back ends in going back.”  And that, were it possible for one truly captured by Christ, would be deadly indeed.

There is yet another aspect to things behind which we must take heed to avoid, and that is to look at the progress made thus far, and to account it sufficient.  Matthew Henry observes that if we take the measure of our current state of grace and become content that this is sufficient, it leads us to stop, making no further effort, rather than pressing forward.  And this, he concludes, would be sin in itself.  My own thoughts have followed along that same line.  I see it when we become convinced that our progress is sufficient, our strength now able to handle the task of godliness on our own.  It’s that mindset which convinces us that, “I can handle this.”  I’ve got it covered.  For the man of God, it seems to me that this is an attitude that will find itself swiftly corrected, and that, of necessity.

But what happens if it is not corrected?  What happens if God lets it continue?  We will eventually arrive at this place of being so enrapt with our self-sufficiency that we conclude we need nothing else.  We may still acknowledge a need for God, but anything else?  Nah.  We don’t need the church.  We’ve got it.  We don’t need other believers, nor are we anymore able to receive from them.  It’s just me and God, and that’s enough.  Eventually, it will hit the point of feeling no need to pray, since He’s got it anyway.  He knows.  I can coast.  Now, that’s not something we would necessarily associate with this sense of self-sufficiency, but that self-sufficiency which wishes to pose as godliness must come to such a conclusion.  Its prayers, such as they are prove hollow and self-serving.  It will boldly denounce the pride in others, all the while failing to see the pride in its own actions.  And it will assuredly lead to a falling off from pursuit of the race set before us.

At bare minimum, we would have to recognize that such a mindset of self-reliance and rejection of those means of grace which God has so graciously provided is to reject the course laid out for this race, to reject the rulebook.  It is, then, a nullifying tendency.  However well we might run in this condition, it will avail nothing, for we have already disqualified ourselves as runners.  Let us, then, be aware of this propensity in ourselves.  We were made for fellowship, and God has seen to it that this need can be met, at least in some degree.  He has set us within a family, within a body called the church.  He has established His church to be a local, communal thing.  This is not something said after the ideas of the Communist.  It is a recognition of community, of fellowship, of mutual support as we seek to grow in the Lord.  And it is intended to model that fellowship which is found amongst the Persons of the Godhead.  There, you will find no bickering, no arguments over direction or style.  There, you will find harmonious unity perfected.  Here?  Well, we can try.  And we must.  We are in need of one another by God’s design, and we are supplied at that point of need by God’s design.  His design is perfect.  Our participation in that design too often has issues.

So, too, in the home.  Here is perhaps God’s finest provision of fellowship.  But this, too, is so often marred by sin that we may find it difficult indeed to account it a good thing.  We may find ourselves wondering why God arranged it thus.  Why have You set me here, Lord?  What is up with that?  And when we find ourselves struggling with this fellowship, find ourselves looking for an escape route, perhaps, or simply find ourselves dismayed and depressed by the failure in fellowship, it would be well to remember that God doesn’t make mistakes.  If He directs, and He does, then His hand was in the arranging of this fellowship.  This one.  Nor was it a temporary arrangement to be disposed of should it prove uncomfortable or unsatisfying.  No.  God does not make mistakes, and neither are there any unintended consequences to His arrangements.  Put differently, there is a reason.

I can think of no greater comfort as we navigate the trials of life, as we face the sorrows of loved ones gone astray from truth, as we cope with failures amongst our brother Christians, as we look upon the increasing darkness of the world around us.  There is a reason.  God is not like those capricious Greek deities, pursuing only His own entertainment.  He is not like those hard gods of the Canaanites, demanding to be appeased, or bought off.  There is purpose to all that He does, and to all that He brings into being.  That includes the worst aspects of our past.  That includes the most painful trials of the present.  That includes, as Paul observed earlier, the events leading to our death.

We look upon the death of a youth, and can only think it unfair.  Oh, he was so young!  It’s not right.  He had so much of life ahead.  Well, yes, he did, but neither you nor I have the slightest idea what might have become of him had life persisted.  We cannot know what evils God may have prevented by His choice to take this one home now.  What trials lay ahead for that young man for which he would not be prepared?  If God will not test us beyond our means, does it not occur to us that this might actually require Him taking us home a bit early by our estimates?  There is a reason.

If I look back on the news out of Texas some weeks back, of those young kids swept away from their Christian overnight camp in a raging flood, I confess it’s hard to see any good in it.  I confess as well that I find the propensity of some to insist that it is clearly an act of judgment on them – and that from Christian circles! – to be a grotesque overreach in claimed knowledge.  Indeed, I could as readily argue that it demonstrates a clear absence of true knowledge of God.  We are right to grieve, for every death is an offense against life.  But then, we have done no better at rightly defining life than we have at rightly defining good.  We are still measuring by our limited lights, our dimmed understanding.  God is not.

Okay.  I have been in rather a dark mood thus far this morning, and these contemplations of things behind, or things better left behind, must tend to produce such a mood, I suppose.  After all, we all of us have some of this baggage to deal with, and it’s not easy dealing.  But there is a positive aspect of things behind which we must take care not to throw out with the negative.  I have written often of that occasion of shoveling our driveway back on the Cape, that year when it seemed the snows would not let up.  The driveway was long and the snow deep, and this was supposed to have been a vacation time, a break from working all the time.  And instead, here I was again, out with my shovel to face the task for what seemed like the umpteenth day in a row.  And looking forward to the end was discouraging indeed.  Already shoveling for an hour, I would guess, and still so far to go.  And the worst, as always, right there at the end, when strength was gone.  But God prompted me to turn around for a moment, to look backwards.  It’s okay.  This wasn’t a timed race, more an endurance test.  But what did I see?  I saw, rather than how far I was from my goal, how far I had come thus far.  And that proved an encouragement to renewed effort.  Wow!  That much is done already?  Okay.  I can do this.  We’ll make it.

Take that to the spiritual plane, and we must first off shift our mindset from, “I can do this,” which is little more than a redirected, “Look what I have done.”  We must instead look back and see what God has done.  We see His past mercies.  We see those many trials He has brought us through in the past.  Can we see that they were part of His plan all along?   Perhaps.  Do we see them as our own proclivities having set us in harm’s way, and He having carried us through?  Probably.  Can we arrive at understanding that both of these hold together, that while it was our doing that put us at risk, it was yet His plan, set in place that we might, in due course, see our own weakness and His great strength?  Can we see that here was a lesson in regard to sin and forgiveness, evidence of His great love for us?  Can we recall those examples of His love actively engaged in our preservation even while we were yet His enemies?  These are things to encourage!  These are things to help produce in us the fruit of true godliness.  They must hammer away at our pride in self and produce instead a true humility, as we recognize just how downright stupid we were, and how gracious He was to preserve us.  They must also produce in us a sense of wonder in that He did so. Why Lord?  What did You see in me?  No, that won’t produce a particularly encouraging answer.  But, for what did You save me?  Ah, that leads to purpose, to seeking to see what lies ahead through His eyes.  And that, in turn, sets us back on our course with renewed vigor.

If, as the JFB suggested, looking back leads inevitably to turning back, where that looking back is a matter of longing regret, then this looking back, as it turns our attention forward, must lead to equally inevitable progress.  As Barnes suggests, progress is greater when we strive with eyes forward.  I mean, contemplated on the physical level, that’s rather obvious, isn’t it?  How well do you move even through your own house if you’re not looking where you’re going?  What comes of your driving if you’ve turned your head to find something in the back seat?  You see it with cyclists who turn their heads to see what may be coming up behind.  They can’t help but veer off course, and typically, that veering tends towards the lane which would be occupied were they to see something coming.  It seems the natural result that our body tends towards the direction our eyes are looking.  So, too, in the spiritual.  If your spiritual eyes are ever and always on the devil, what surprise is it that you’re constantly running into him and his minions?  If your eyes are on your worldly pleasures, what surprise is it that you make so little spiritual progress?  If your eyes are on matters of healing physical maladies, or circumstances that aren’t particularly to your liking, what surprise that you remain in the midst of maladies and unwanted circumstances?  Look forward.  Strive forward.  Look  heavenward.  Progress heavenward. 

Look not at your present contentment, but at the race ahead.  Don’t allow past failures to discourage you.  They were permitted as steps towards growth.  Neither let past successes puff you up, as if you had done them in your own strength, or as if they had brought you to such a place as you have laid hold of the goal already.  Keep running.  The Wycliffe Translators Commentary observes that, “past success does not remove the necessity for future striving.”  Yeah, that’s the point.  Had I looked back at my snow shoveling, and concluded that was good enough, the failure in judgment would be rather obvious, wouldn’t it?  To have run 22 miles in a marathon, and then decided, eh, close enough, who will account that sensible?  Now, obviously, there may be physical limits that have made such a decision a medical necessity, but we’re not talking about that.  We’re talking about just packing it in because we got bored with the business or some such.  We met our goal, or we reduced our goal to match our attainment, and yeah, even though the real goal might now be in sight?  Nah, forget it.  I’m done.

Let us instead be encouraged by the sight ahead, by the assurance we have that we shall in fact complete this race, as God supplies the strength.  He stands at the finish line encouraging us to keep going.  He coaches us, encouraging us to run this last leg as if we found ourselves just now starting.  I think of this video that came up yesterday or the day before, of some young girl entered in a rollerblade race.  She had stumbled badly at the start, and by the time she was back on her feet, the rest of the racers were well ahead of her.  Many of us, seeing such a situation, might simply have given up, and walked off the track.  Others might, perhaps, give it some desultory effort, fully convinced that the situation is hopeless, so we’ll put in enough to save face, but yeah, we’re already done.  But not this one.  No, she poured herself into that race, determined to give it her all, and, needless to say, else it would not be a video, she not only caught up, but proceeded to win the race by a significant margin.  Eyes on the prize!  Letting go of what lies behind, and striving forward for the goal.  There’s a reason such tales delight even those of us who have little use for sports.  They are visceral depictions of this race we are running, at least we who are seeking after God.  Past success does not remove the necessity for future striving, but neither do past failures remove the assurance of final victory.  Don’t give up.  Don’t turn back.  Don’t sit down.  Keep going, and give it your all.  The goal is worth it, and God assures us that we will in fact make it if we will keep going.  “He who began the good work in you will be faithful to complete it” (Php 1:6).

And let me just say, for your loved ones, whose progress seems to be in the wrong direction, or halted and stumbling, the same promise holds, if they are in fact His.  If He began that good work in them, He will perfect it.  He is faithful.  Their faithlessness at present does not preclude His achieving of His good end.  God may not incline to work in those who won’t run.  But then, He may.  If He did not, there would be no runners at all.  But He is best pleased when we are true teammates together with Him, neither running solo without Him nor sitting down on the track and waiting for Him to drag us to the goal line.

I must allow space to consider the biggest challenge that seems to face me most days; that of distraction.  We are in a world filled with distractions, driven to distraction, and it seeks for us to join the confusion.  Everywhere we turn we are beckoned by that which would keep us occupied, keep us from thinking too deeply or too long about anything of value.  We think it’s a modern problem, something perhaps brought on by all the technological advances that define our lives, and these certainly don’t help matters.  But the problem, it seems, is as old as man.  If I’m not recalling false memories, C.S. Lewis was writing of such issues back in the forties.  And that would push us back before even television had come to distract us, let alone the flood of cable or the tsunami of the internet.  For all that, reading Barnes, who was ministering back around the time of the Civil War, you get the same message.  “A man will accomplish little who allows his mind to be distracted by a multiplicity of objects.”  It’s not the stuff, don’t you see?  It’s not something being done to us.  It’s us.

We like to rant about the dangers of this or that development in the realm of technology and entertainment, and to be sure, there’s plenty there to rant about.  But at some level the ranting against this or that inanimate object is deflection.  It’s yet another distraction, preventing us from addressing or even contemplating the real issue.  How terrifyingly adept we are at this game.  We see the sinful, but rather than address the sin, we seek to address the circumstance, the environment.  We become like invalids, imbeciles who must have every corner padded, every step guided and guarded by another because we simply can’t manage enough awareness of our surroundings to remain safe and unharmed.  The problem is me.  The problem is sin.  It’s not the stuff that distracts me, it’s me happily seeking distraction.

Oh, we even make it a disease category now, so that we can excuse ourselves and even boast of our failings as somehow special.  Oh, oh, I’m neurodivergent.  Doesn’t that sound lovely?  Doesn’t that sound innocent?  And perhaps, I’ll grant, there are those whose mental issues truly are insurmountable.  But how odd that for long generations past, the answer was to train and supply with means to overcome, rather than to accept and celebrate.  I do not by any means intend to denigrate those who suffer such things.  Heck, I may be just such a one myself for all I know.  I see some of the memes regarding such difficulties (yeah, there’s those distractions), and to be sure, I can see some of myself in them.  But then, I’m not asking for accommodation.  I hope I’m not telling folks they’ll just have to deal with me as I am.  Maybe I do, though.  Maybe I do.

But I’m on the topic of distraction, because I know it’s an issue.  My days are filled with distraction.  My work life is a world of distraction, as every priority seemingly gets preempted by another until it seems the day is spent like those old acts on Ed Sullivan’s show, plates spinning on their sticks, and all this frenetic energy going into keeping them going.  There’s no progress, only an exhausting effort to maintain stasis.  Lots of movement with no direction.  Lots of thoughts, but to no particular purpose.  Hours spent with nothing to show.  And comes the end of the day, how do I feel about it?  Well, apart from exhausted, I could add disappointed.  For here was another day of opportunity lost.  But opportunity for what?  There were other distractions I could have been pursuing were I not so preoccupied with these distractions.  I see that I have become truly bothered by moments spent at full stop.  The idea of sitting in a chair alone with my thoughts may not terrify me, but it holds no interest for me, either.

And here’s the great danger.  All of that distraction, all of this business tends to push God and godliness right out of my mind.  I’m busy.  Come the end of this study time, it will be on to the next thing, and it really doesn’t take long before just about all sense of my Savior’s presence is packed away in a box somewhere until this evening, when we read the Bible together, or more likely, tomorrow when I get up and do it again.  Oh, there are times when the first hours abed are preoccupied with prayer, though that’s rare.  I am become rather notoriously able to nod off at the touch of head to pillow.  Is it exhaustion?  Is it boredom?  Is it desire to escape the frustration of being awake?  Probably a bit of all of these things as occasions vary.  But why?  Why the exhaustion?  Why the boredom?  Why the frustration?  These are symptoms, not the issue.  The issue is having lost focus.  We cannot press on towards the prize if our eyes are busy everywhere else.  We cannot be focused on the conversation we are having if our minds are skittering off to all our other concerns.  We cannot enjoy fellowship with Christ if our lives are filled to the brim with everything but.

So, I come back to things observed in my last pass through these verses.  Why?  Because the same perils remain.  To reiterate, “I mustn’t become so distracted by the stuff of life as to lose sight of that life which really matters.”  There’s plenty to be distracted by, isn’t there?  The news anymore is a flood of clamoring calls either to get riled up or to get involved, depending on one’s views.  The pace at work never slackens.  The repairs that seem unceasingly needful for the house, maintaining the property, and so on keep piling up.  My Saturday to do list never lacks for items, nor are very many of them checked off beyond the base necessities.  Why?  Too exhausted just looking at it.  Too distracted by some need to avoid the list.

And then, I can add the sundry duties, yes, let’s call them that, of faith.  These studies can become almost distracting.  You know, I come to this study this morning and see that it’s day three on just this subhead, and yeah, it hits a nerve of sorts.  Really need to wrap this part up and get to the next.  Why?  Did a schedule get dropped, and nobody told me?  Well, there are other matters of writing and preparation that need attending to, and they do have a schedule, and honestly, this seems about the only time of day I have for such things.  So, yeah, probably, once I wrap up this heading, I shall have to divert to those issues.

There’s preparation for serving on the worship team, and that’s been significant effort of late, as we have a lot of new music coming in, and a lot of chord sheets that need attention.  And with my part shifting largely to keyboard, there’s far more time involved both in learning the songs, and then, also in sifting through hundreds of voicings to find the right sounds for each, and to organize them for a clean flow come Sunday.  It takes time.  Man!  Saxophone was so easy.  Maybe someday, I’ll be allowed to relax back into that.  Oh, and perhaps I can add this business of learning the guitar under this head, though it’s not clear to me yet how that pursuit is going to be used by God, or if.  I do feel as though I had permit from Him, if you will, but I could be fooling myself in that department.  Music is, after all, my great passion, I might even say my prime preoccupation.  But I have, for the most part, felt that even with my music being of an instrumental nature, and not particularly driven by some intent to preach or teach, it still tends, at least in my thinking, to pursue biblical themes.  It’s all in how you choose to hear it, I suppose.

Then, there’s Africa, and our upcoming mission.  And this has been a very real tension of late, for reasons which really don’t need to be written here.  There is far more resistance this time around, suffice to say, and my path through to obedience is not entirely clear to me.  I stand at a fork, and whichever direction I choose, it seems, has elements both of obedience and disobedience.  And I am stymied.  Oh, God, how I need You!  But if, as I believe, the call to go remains God’s call for this hour, then there will be much preparation needed in a relatively short timeframe.  And if indeed this is His call, must I not answer?  And if indeed this is His call, must I not look to Him to address the hindrances that have had me so distraught?  Insofar as it lies with me, let me be a man of peace, seeking to uphold harmonious unity, even as this epistle has been urging.  But insofar as that course sets me at odds with God’s direction, no.   Here I must stand.  I can do no other.

So, Lord, I must ask again, and forgive me my weakness here, that You would make abundantly clear that here is the open door You would have me go through, and if not, Lord, I beg of You to slam it shut in no uncertain terms, for I have no desire to push forward with a work that You have not given me.  Yet, I know that I know that I know how You worked in and through me last time.  Yes, there were difficult times.  Yes, there were spiritual perils that we failed to take seriously at the time.  Well, then!  Forewarned is forearmed, as the saying goes.  But to go in a state of disharmony seems unwise, Father, and I am at a loss.  Clarify for me, please.  I feel as though that last paragraph may very well have been Your clarifying answer, and if so, then cement it home with me, please.  Grant me strength and grace to address the opposition in true godliness.  Let not anger rise up in me, either prideful or righteous.  It’s too easy and it destroys all effort to restore unity.  And I know it is a weakness, a residual sin in me that too readily reasserts.  It’s been just below the surface, roiling away for weeks now, and it needs to stop.  But I know, too, that where opposition arises most is where effectual work on behalf of the kingdom by Your leading and Your power is happening.  And I hear that old song, “No turning back, no turning back.”  But, Lord, if this whole venture is about me, about seeking after that spiritual high I knew towards the end of the last trip, then far be it from me!  I want what You want, nothing more, nothing less.  Just grant that I may stand firm in faith and truth, that I may worship You by word, by deed, by thought, in spirit and in truth.  You are my God, and I am Your servant.

I think I shall leave off on this note.  There were other matters I had tucked away here for comment, but it is enough.  I will leave with some snippets of prayer collected from my prior notes, because they still hold, and still feel needful to recall to mind.

You are here with me, and more, as I pursue these various mundanities, even habits of the day, I do so as one who is with You.  I am not alone in my thoughts.  May I, in short, become less about me, and more about You.  Let me be such a one, Lord, as stretches out for this prize, and leaves behind all that might hinder me.  Let me be such a one as pushes forward for the finish line.  And let me be such a one as is true to Your Truth.  Amen.

What Lies Ahead (08/14/25-08/15/25)

If we are to stretch forward for the goal, we must know the goal.  You can’t run the race if you don’t know the course.  So, what is this goal?  Paul speaks of it as the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.  That by itself is ambiguous enough that some translations see it as being called on high, and others as being called from on high.  My sense is that both are missing the point.  Paul has already set the goal before us in the preceding verses, in fact, in the immediately preceding verse:  “In order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead” (Php 3:11).  Connect that with things he teaches elsewhere about this resurrection.  “We who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them [who have died] in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and thus we shall always be with the Lord” (1Th 4:17).  There is your upward call.  It’s the call to come, enter into the kingdom of heaven, enter into the inheritance prepared for you.  This is your goal.  This is my goal.  To reach home, to be found in Him on that day, assured of His love, and assured in His love.

There are, of course, those present conditions that pertain as well, to know Him, to fellowship in the power of His resurrection and His sufferings, to be ‘conformed to His death’ (Php 3:10).  These give cause for Paul’s first thought here:  “Not that I have already obtained it.  Not that I am already become perfect.”  No, there remains this glorious object head, and that must set our course.

And so we run.  But we run with a serious advantage to our running.  We have this assurance in knowing that the prize towards which we race is already ours.  There is only the one condition to the matter, really, and that is that we continue towards the finish line, continue until we reach the finish line.  But unlike most races we know, there is no competition to outrun here.  There is no concern for one coming up behind us and passing us before we can cross the line.  In point of fact, myriads upon myriads have done so.  And we can rejoice with them for having completed their race, of having entered into their reward.  We read last night, in Revelation, of the martyrs awaking in heaven at the breaking of the fifth seal (Rev 6:9-11).  Was it time, then?  No, not yet, and they were called upon to rest a bit longer.  Now, there is the cause given, that the number of the martyred was not yet complete, which might give pause.  But it ought not to do so, while I would not by any means suggest we ought to look forward to and seek after opportunity to be one of them.  If that’s God’s intent, it shall come about, and we shall be found sufficiently matured to withstand.  But then, in the end, must it not be the case, as we all must die as regards this flesh, that we shall all have been slain for the word of God?  That probably plays too loose with the intent of the passage, though.

Let me come back to this passage before us, this race Paul has in view.  We have as our birthright in this state of rebirth the assurance of a place prepared for us in heaven.  “If it were not so, I would not have told you…  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you to Myself” (Jn 14:2-3).  This is ours already.  We have but to complete the course, to persevere to the end, to stand fast in this faith which has been granted us by grace.  And our God is able to make us stand (Ro 14:4).  The LORD is my light, my salvation, whom shall I fear?  He is the defense of my life, whom shall I dread? (Ps 27:1)  Oh!  The glorious, joyful confidence that ought to be ours to realize the security of our position!  How can we not be excited to run this race, knowing that we must surely complete the course, must surely obtain this prize?  We shall be resurrected.  We shall reach home.  We shall enter into the fulness of His presence, into that beatific vision, there to bask and worship for all eternity.  So, press on.  Keep striving to see your present, lived reality brought closer to the promise of your birthright.  But strive in contentment.  Work from that place of rest into which our Lord has brought you.  The goal is still distant, but it is assuredly closer than it was, and more importantly, it is assuredly within reach.  You may not feel it is so.  I often don’t.  But we’re not dealing with feelings.  We’re dealing with certainties.  However impossible the finish line may seem, you shall reach it.  The end of the race will come in due time.  Just keep going, trusting the Lord, loving Him the more with each passing day, growing in wisdom and strength as He supplies both.  Press on!

Now, I’m going to linger a bit more on that opening of our passage.  I haven’t obtained it already, nor have I already become perfect.  Now, there is ever that sense of flawlessness in perfection, but the more prominent feature here is completeness, and that, I think, is a telling distinction as we consider this goal of resurrection.  Add to this that while the obtaining is an active voice matter, in which I do the action, this being made perfect is a passive voice affair.  Thus, I tend towards, “I have not yet been made complete.”  All thought of making ourselves so has been stripped from us.  That’s the stuff of works-righteousness, and the whole lead-up to this passage has been a rejection of that idea.  Those are the things behind, to be released and forgotten.  Those are the things that hold us back from the goal.  They do nothing to propel us forward.  No.  The reality of our walk, our race to the finish line, is this:  God will complete it.  There is utmost assurance in this.  You will be made complete.  God, the Master Craftsman, is seeing to it.  It is He, after all, who is at work in you, both to will and to work (Php 2:12).  Yes, we are still fundamentally on that same point here.  This is the confidence to persevere.  He is doing it.  He is our guide, our trainer, our strength and our stamina.  We need not fall into second guessing our every move, our every step.  We need not agonize over every least action of our day, wondering if it is within or without the will of God.  If we are His, He is our Shepherd, and we hear His voice and obey.

This is not to say that we have become incapable of error.  Far from it!  To believe this of yourself would require degrees of cognitive dissonance beyond all measure.  Indeed, to believe this, we should have to jettison the testimony of Scripture itself.  The one who says he has no sin deceives himself.  The truth is not in him (1Jn 1:8).  If we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar.  His word is not in us (1Jn 1:10).  This isn’t just confession of some past behavior.  This is daily.

I have not yet been made complete.  Yet, I am assured that I shall be, for this is God’s stated purpose in those whom He has called.  “For whom He foreknew, He predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born of many brethren.  And whom He predestined, He called, and whom He called, He justified, and whom He justified, He glorified” (Ro 8:29-30).  Note well.  He did it.  Every step of the way, it  is His doing.  And note well that these are all Aorist Indicatives.  They are statements of fact, covering events already done at some point in the past.  The part that remains future is our arriving at a realized state of that which is already determined for us: full conformance to the image of His Son.  Beloved, we shall be as He is in that day when we are changed in the twinkling of the eye (1Co 15:52), in that day when we see Him as He truly is (1Jn 3:2), know Him as fully as we have been known (1Co 13:12).  Until that time, we press on.  We grow as He guides us into growth.

Lord, You have drawn me down a path of wonder this morning, as I consider the assured hope set before me.  Thank You.  Thank You for these reminders of Your sure guidance.  I praise You for You are magnificent.  And I know that with all the care and concern I have had of late, and even the trepidation I have felt at the need to stand firm in that to which You are calling me to pursue, You have been at work.  You are glorious, and Your ways are a marvel.  I pray that You minister to my beloved, help her with her emotions, her fears and concerns.  I know You are able, and I know that Your desire is that there be harmony and unity in this house, in this smallest of churches that is the home, even if the course you have set for each of us seems so very different.  And with that in mind, I pray that You would likewise minister to my doubts and concerns.  I know You have us both in hand, and I know our hearts are Yours.  Let me, then, hold fast with the encouragement of the closing verses of this passage, trusting that You will reveal Your truth more fully to us both, and bringing us to a place of joyful confidence in those bedrock matters of faith in which we are one.  We both of us have need of instruction, Father.  You know that.  I know that.  I’m sure she knows that as well.  Grant us ears to hear, and discernment to dismiss that which is not from You.  I pray that somehow, by such ways as You choose, You might knit us together more closely than ever in these later years of our sharing.  But however it falls out, be Though glorified.

We know this assurance, then.  We know our God has us in hand and will bring us to this goal He has set before us.  Yet, assurance must not become in us an excuse for idleness.  It will not do to become satisfied with such stage of growth as we have attained.  However far we have progressed, there is more to come, more to grow.  Christ within us stirs us to longing for a greater maturity, a more complete knowledge of Him, a fuller wisdom supplying a greater liberation from the entangling embrace of sin.  As a child, I expect many of us knew a longing for adulthood.  Mind you, as an adult, we may well long for the simpler days of childhood, but still, there is awareness that we are now more than what we were, and also an awareness that whatever we have become, there remains yet a greater, a healthier self ahead.  That healthier aspect certainly does not apply in regard to this present physical plant.  That, as Paul observes somewhere, is growing weaker, and for most of us, has been doing so for some time now.  But the spirit grows stronger.  The soul grows wiser.  The kingdom draws nearer.  And so, like the child anxious to know the freedom of adulthood, we stretch forward to this future of full maturity, when we shall  know fully our freedom from sin and our entry into true holiness.

This is the progress for which we strive.  This is the future towards which we run.  As I say, something in us knows that there must be more.  Something in us knows that as marvelous as is this new life lived in awareness of Christ’s love and redemption, there lies ahead a life the marvel of which will make this present wonder comparatively trivial.  We know that there is yet a state in which we should be, a realizing the fulness of that change begun in us.  And so, we seek that which ought to be ours.  It begins with knowledge, to be sure.  We see it repeatedly in Paul’s prayers.  We were reading it even last week in Colossians 1.  “I pray for you and ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding” (Col 1:9).  You heard and understood the grace of God in truth (Col 1:6).  It continues in the next chapter as well.  He prays for hearts encouraged, knit together in love, attaining to “all the wealth that comes from the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge of God’s mystery, which is Christ Himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:2-3).  That just happens to be fresh in mind, and so becomes my example here.

But observe that it’s never knowledge alone.  Knowing is not enough, though it is assuredly necessary.  But wisdom accompanies.  Wisdom consists in both understanding how our knowledge is to be applied to our present situation and also in taking action on that understanding.  Put it together.  We know Christ – not just of Him, not  just fact sheets about Him, but deep and familiar knowledge of Him, His character, His ways, His voice, the experience of His goodness, all of this.  Wisdom draws from this deep well of knowledge, and let me observe how this comes of true knowledge, of epignosis, that knowledge so deep as to change a life, and perceives how what is known applies to what is faced.  Life brings trials.  This we are promised.  But trials bring opportunities for wisdom’s exercise.  And wisdom, having been exercised, joins with a conscience informed by the Holy Spirit to produce actions in keeping with wisdom’s advice.  This is no recipe for idleness.  This has nothing in it to support that poorly thought-out adage, “let go and let God.”  I mean, there is just enough of a grain of truth to that saying to prevent it’s being an outright falsehood, but in practice it’s a call to cease from straining forward, to sit back and wait.  And no, this we must not do!  Press on towards the goal!  Don’t become self-satisfied, as if what lays behind was enough and we can coast the rest of the way.  Desire full maturity, and desiring it, seek that you may indeed mature into your fulness.  That doesn’t happen by doing nothing.  That doesn’t happen by simply continuing to do the things you’ve been doing.  It requires exercising new skills, new degrees of understanding, new depths of reliance upon Christ Who leads, Christ Who supplies everything needful for life and godliness.

In all this, we are but becoming who we are.  But nothing could be sadder than to fail of doing so.  We read often of that inner self of ours, what we may refer to as our true self.  There are the thoughts and desires and motivations of which nobody but ourselves and our Lord will ever be aware.  I must include the Lord in that awareness, for surely, He knows our inmost thoughts.  “The Lord searches all hearts, and understands every intent of the thoughts” (1Chr 28:9).  So, David instructed Solomon, his son, with the further admonition, “If you seek Him, He will let you find Him.  But if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever.”  But how wonderful!  He knows not just our inmost thoughts, but the intent.  Beloved, even where we err in our thinking as we contemplate this race ahead, still God knows our intent.  As He observed of His closest companions, “The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak” (Mt 26:41).  There is cause to pray, but cause to pray with the confident assurance that God hears, and does not reject, rather hears the intent and answers according to His will; His will which is for you good and not for evil (Jer 29:11), for a future and a hope.  And it is for that future hope that we exercise ourselves in this pursuit.

In this race of life we work, we push onward, but not as if by doing so we shall earn our salvation.  No!  We do so as the fruit of salvation already obtained.  We do so fully aware that what remains to be achieved in us is yet, is ever beyond us to achieve.  We know, if anything, more fully just how utterly dependent we are on our Savior to bring to completion this work He has begun in us.  But we know, as well, that we have a part in this effort.  He does not call us to passivity, but to action.  As the Wycliffe Translators Commentary says, “The condition for future enlightenment is to walk according to present light.”  There is the course of wisdom.  Would you have greater knowledge of Christ?  Walk more fully in that which you have.  Live in accordance with the wisdom that has been given you, and there will be more given.  Apply yourself.  I’ll end with this, from the proverbs of Solomon.  “A slothful man does not roast his prey, but the precious possession of a man is diligence.  In the way of righteousness is life, and in its pathway there is no death” (Pr 12:27-28).  Let us, therefore, set ourselves to be diligent in pursuing this righteous race to the finish, Christ ever before us, Christ ever beside us, faithful to the end.

Perfected and Mature (08/16/25-08/17/25)

Honestly, I must someday come to a point where I can reduce and refine the thigs upon which I find need to comment in these studies.  But today is not that day.  I will begin this morning with something not far removed from what I considered yesterday.  As I have considered the things behind and the things ahead, one danger I mentioned was that of becoming satisfied with our progress to date, the tendency to think, “Good enough.”  This may well be one of our greatest dangers as we mature.  We have learned enough, one hopes, to recognize the deadly risk in going back.  But perhaps to stop here would be okay.  Perhaps just sitting on the ball and letting the clock run out would be acceptable at this stage.  But, beloved, the rulebook allows for no such thing.  The prize is to him who overcomes (Rev 2:7, etc.).  Only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the Gospel of Christ (Php 1:27).  “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith” (2Ti 4:7).

Perhaps we are in danger of lifting Paul to too high a place in our thinking.  I’m sure that he had his moments, as do we all.  But Scripture, the expression of God’s love, covered them.  I mean, yes, we know of his former penchant for persecuting Christians, but I’m thinking more those times of stumbling after having come to faith.  We all know them.  And, as John writes, if we think to claim otherwise, we make God a liar, and the truth is not in us (1Jn 1:10).  I know I have brought that point up already in this study, but it bears remembering.  We stumble.  But if indeed we have been granted to have wisdom, then we know that this is not the end for us, merely a momentary setback.  We have stumbled, but we’re still in the race.  We are not disqualified, and we are not left pursuing a forlorn hope.  We are in pursuit of that which is our certain hope, for that prize which awaits us is already ours in heaven.  We can press on, as Paul urges here, towards the prize of that upward call.  We can press on to maturity (Heb 6:1), not laying again a foundation of repentance from works and faith toward God, for that foundation is well and truly laid and already built upon.  Yet, maturity remains ahead, further maturity.  It remains ahead regardless the progress to date.  As we grow older it may seem to us that the maturation process has completed and we are now left to cope with the decline.  So it goes in physical life.  But in the life of the spirit, no.  The body is failing, but godliness is increasing.  We must press on, and we shall for God is at work in us, and God is calling us forward.  He’s in this together with us, and because He is, we shall indeed finish the course set before us.  We shall be found ready, for He shall have made us ready.  We shall stand, for He is able to make us stand.

We keep on, because we know that in pursuit of godliness, there is no good enough.  There is only the perfect.  God is perfectly holy, and we are called to like perfection of holiness.  Now, I cannot but attest to the fundamental fact that true, personal perfection is already a lost cause in us, and was before ever we were born.  But we have been reborn!  And yet, we remain in this flesh, we remain in possession of all that we were before, in spite of our understanding that the old has passed away (2Co 5:17).  Yes, new things have come, but that which has passed away yet clings to us.  Perhaps we resonate with Paul’s anguished cry.  “Who will set me free from the body of this death?” (Ro 7:24).  If so, then resonate as well with His answer from on high.  “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Ro 7:25).  Keep on!  Don’t give up and don’t give in.  Don’t settle.  There remains a place for us to know Christ perfectly, and knowing Him perfectly, to abide in Him perfectly, to be matured into His image perfectly.  And knowing this is ahead, there can be no settling for less.

Now, there is much to consider as we touch on this matter of perfection.  I don’t generally do syntax in these later notes, but here it may prove useful.  We are considering teteleiomai, in the case of verse 12, and teleioi in verse 15.  They are obviously related terms, sharing a common root.  But one is a verb, the other an adjective.  As to the verb, it comes in the perfect tense, indicating the present result of completed past action, which suits the flow of that sentence.  As I believe I have already observed, it is a passive verb, a being made perfect, such that now, as I continue this walk, I just reflect that perfection already achieved.  But I observe this, also, that it has that mai ending, which suggests more the results of having been made perfect, or the effects of having been made perfect.  And indeed, that action ties back to our adjective, which considers completeness of labor or growth.  Yes, it has application here to matters of character, of thought and morality.  But observe well that the character flows from what is being done in and to us.

This, however, does not relieve us of the duty to exercise that character which is developed to date.  I already brought up this point as expressed by the Wycliffe Translators Commentary yesterday.  Today, let me add the JFB.  “God reveals more to those who walk up to the revelation they already have.”  There is a point to recognize here, and one that I think is good preparation for this upcoming trip to Africa, which by all appearances has been given the go-ahead by our Lord and King.  But, not to be side-tracked by that, there is something for the daily pursuit of the believer.  Revelation, for which I might give preference to inspiration to avoid any unwarranted conceits, is but a piece.  Knowledge without wisdom is dangerous.  We have become perhaps too familiar with the concerns that attach to our scientific and technological advances as a society.  Just because we can does not necessitate that we should.  Indeed, wisdom may very well dictate that we mustn’t.  But that sort of wisdom requires humility, doesn’t it?  It requires clear sight of our own limitations, and our sad propensity for failing to recognize or even consider the unintended consequences of our actions.  But beyond this, there remains the third step:  Wisdom having applied our knowledge to what is before us, it remains for us to act upon wisdom’s advice.  If I were to put it in tradition theological terms, orthodoxy must proceed to orthopraxy.  Knowledge must inform and impel action.  And so, the final admonition of this passage.  “Let us keep living by the same standard to which we have attained.”  By all means make progress as God provides.  But at bare minimum, hold the ground you have covered.

But we come to the question of just what it is that Paul has in view as perfection, and perhaps as a side question, what he means to address in speaking to ‘as many as are perfect.’  What is perfection here?  Is it the same in verse 12 and verse 15?  I touch on this because in reviewing my older notes after considering the commentaries, I find need for a correction to my own thinking.  I had taken that latter verse as being a bit ironic or snarky.  Oh, I know you’ve got those among you who think themselves perfected, or at least farther advanced than I am. But we’ve compared our credentials, so hey, if they think they’re perfect, they must agree with me!  But that has more to do with my own tendency towards snark and dry humor than with Paul’s purpose.  That said, the commentaries are not entirely of one accord as to what this perfection entails.

Clarke seems to me as off course with his idea as I was in mine, perceiving this perfection as a reference to martyrdom.  He suggests that this was what Paul would esteem as the perfection of his career, and so firmly so as to be, and I quote, “led to view everything as imperfect or unfinished until this had taken place.”  But honestly, given this appears to apply primarily in verse 12, it leads to rather a bizarre take on what Paul clearly writes.  “Not that I have already obtained, or have already been martyred.”  I mean, what would be the point of him saying that?  Obviously, he has not been martyred already.  He’s writing a letter!  Dead men don’t write letters, no matter how death comes about.  So, no, I can’t accept this idea as meeting the context.

Calvin turns in a different direction, and one firmly anchored in the setting of the preceding verses.  He suggests this perfection concerns the mortification of the flesh, and that fellowship of Christ’s sufferings which He had addressed as his goal (Php 3:10).  After all, it’s not as though Paul has suddenly veered off on some new topic here.  I may break these sections apart for purposes of study, but Paul wasn’t writing over weeks and months.  It may not have even been over hours.  And he’s well-trained in the matter of presenting his points.  This much should be clear, then, that what he writes in verse 12 is of course connected to what he had just written.  Here is his goal.  Here is the goal.  Here is the prerequisite, if you will, of that upward call which is the prize, “to attain to the resurrection of the dead” (Php 3:11).

Yet, as we come to verse 15, the definition of perfection changes somewhat in Calvin’s view, coming to this, that we think the same, walk according to the same rule of life; that we are one in doctrine and one in practice.  Note again how doctrine and practice are interlocked.  Doctrine establishes worldview, and worldview defines action, defines character and response.  And here, Clarke is indeed in agreement, seeing in this perfection a thoroughness of instruction such as sets us free of dependence on the law for our salvation or our sanctification, either one, and also from any other ‘fleshly system,’ supposing to produce or earn our salvation.

Now, when we consider perfection, our consideration tends to be whether the thing is flawless.  If I am mixing a song, which I have not been doing of late, what with this and that going on, there is that point towards which I am striving, where all is in its perfect place in the sonic landscape, each contributing element sounding its best and set in correct relation to every other.  I know, after all, how often I am likely to listen to the resulting song, and how much anything left at merely, ‘good enough,’ will rankle.  And we know, as well, that as regards the holiness required of us by God, perfection, absolute and complete accord with every last detail of His Law is indeed the only acceptable performance.  It’s enough to lead us to despair, for it’s already too late before we’ve even made a start, if that is our standard.  There is no place in this for making up for past sins.  If this were such a system, every man is doomed, and has been doomed from the outset.  But, as the old song says, God has made a way where there seemed to be no way.  We could make it stronger.  He made a way where there was no way.  We could not attain.  We had no means to address those failings already to our account, let alone maturing ourselves so as to avoid future incidents.  Were it not so then Christ would not have come, would not have achieved perfection on our behalf, and put paid to our debt of sin.  His death would have been pointless and perverse, and our faith would be misplaced, our future still a matter of certain terror and eternal doom.  But this is not the case.  God knew our futile state before ever the experiment of Creation was begun, and He, in the unified, covenanted determination of the Triune Godhead, determined to establish this Way, for Christ to come and live, a man among men, the federal head of a new creation, His righteousness applying to our account, just as Adam’s sin applies to our account.  The debt is paid, and the Way made clear, that we may indeed attain to this state of full-grown maturity, becoming fully established in the things of God.  But it remains a life-long process.

Perfection, as considered here, addresses ideas of completeness, rather than flawlessness.  It is a matter of fulfillment, of being in a state where nothing could be added, nothing has been left undone, all is fully accomplished.  The result is, “an inward and outward separation from all that is contrary to the mind of God,” as Ironside sets it.  Now, some may approach that more nearly than others in this life, but it remains a certainty that not one can claim to have truly and fully obtained such a state.  This process of maturing faith, which we term sanctification, is lifelong.  Whatever the degree of one’s attainments in this, there remains more to go.  The goal lies ever ahead of us.

But lest we should lose hope or become discouraged by the distance remaining, let us consider the nature of this race, the course before us, and the equipping by which we run.  What shall be our marker?  After all, though we strive towards this separation of all that is contrary, to fully achieve such a state we must take ourselves out of the world, and that way is not open to us.  Perhaps if we try for the condition suggested by the Wycliffe Translators Commentary.  There, the idea is put forward that perfection consists in full knowledge and full conformity.  Again, I see we are brought back to this junction of knowledge, wisdom, and practice.  And still, it must appear to us that the achieving of this goal is so far and away beyond us as to really be such as to be out of our hands.  We cannot know except as God chooses to make known.  And even then, given the spirit of the age, we will be hard-pressed to perceive proper application except as the Spirit makes the connections for us and whispers to our conscience.  And strength?  Well, as Jesus Himself said of His disciples, the spirit is willing enough, but the flesh is weak (Mk 14:38).  It will need the power supplies us by God Himself to see wisdom put into action.

Let’s try Clarke again, shall we?  He looks at this perfection and sees one who is not regulated nor even influenced by others, only moved by Christ his Master, and only pursuing the work given him by Christ.  Surely, as we consider those things undertaken directly in the service of worship, or in the work of ministry, this ought to be our aim and our practice.  And just as surely, we fall short.  Oh, we desire that it would be so.  As I consider that shortly, I shall be serving once more as an instrument of worship, I know my failings.  I know the limitations of my preparation.  Honestly, it’s a bit of a challenge to prepare instrumentally, when the style is shifting.  But that speaks to technical ability, and training the fingers to go where they’re supposed to go at any given moment, perhaps training them to do so without having to take eyes off the page, thereby avoiding that habit of losing my place.  And that’s all to the good, so far as the mechanics of the matter go.  But that’s not going far enough.  The goal is to pursue the work given me by Christ, and to do so as He directs.  That doesn’t mean one becomes belligerent or unruly.  After all, His direction includes the pursuit of harmony and order in His church.  It’s not a free-for-all.  It’s not a place of anarchy.  For God is not a god of confusion, but of order, of peace (1Co 14:33).  You can attempt to argue that peace isn’t about order, but then, you’d be wrong.  Peace, in this divine perspective, is a state of everything as it should be.  It is, then, divinely orderly.  Towards this, we are called to strive.  Even in what we have read to date in this current epistle, it is a strong emphasis.  Why else, the concern to consider others as more important?  Or, looking forward, we might look to what follows in the next chapter, with the urging t live in harmony in the Lord (Php 4:2).  After all, we are one church under one Head in Christ.  On what, basis, then, shall we justify our divergent deeds?

Ah, but understand this.  We are regulated and influenced by Christ our Master.  It is our ideal, yes, but it is also our state of being, we who are born anew into this resurrection life in the Spirit.  We are as yet imperfect, it is true, and we know only too well how differently we may seem to be led individually.  I have been, and remain in such a state here at home, as my wife and I are on what appear to be wildly divergent courses, yet both regulated and influenced by Christ our mutual Master.  And as such, it is on that last part that we must focus, rather than on the divergence.  Christ is in us, and that must, whatever the disagreements we may have, result in shared joy, harmonious collaboration.  Whatever the appearance, this holds.  As He is, so we are in this world.  We are not so perfectly.  The image is as yet incomplete.  But still it holds.  We walk forth in the confidence of Christ’s direction and company.  We are not alone and, all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, we are not in conflict, not as to things which truly matter.

We are too readily moved by fears, it is true.  We may even fear the disagreement.  We may fear the fact that we cannot simply accede each to the other’s wishes.  But that would be to fall back into being influenced by others, rather than by Christ, would it not?  And then, there is this.  “Perfect love casts out fear” (1Jn 4:16-18), and why?  Because fear involves punishment.  But coming back to the context of that recognition, we hear that love is perfected with us.  I’m working backwards from the conclusion here.  Love is perfected with us in that, “we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us.”  And we abide in His love as He abides in us.  This is present state.  This is our condition as we race.  Love is perfected with us, because God is in us, His love is in and upon us.  That was the prayer of our Lord as He faced the ultimate expression of love, that for which Creation was created, and to which He had covenanted together with Father and Spirit.  Hear His prayer for His brethren, for His church, for you.  “I in them, You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, and the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them even as You have loved Me” (Jn 17:23).  Rest on that final piece.  “You loved them even as You have loved Me.”  There is perfect love, complete with nothing lacking.  There, indeed, is love in flawless perfection.  And this is yours in Christ.  God loves you.  He loves you perfectly, without limit, without exception, even though you, like me, have so far to go before attaining to the perfection that is our birthright.  But having come to know His love, having the Spirit to guide us into the wisdom by which we apply His overflowing love to those around us, and move as those powered and directed by His love, we race onward towards the goal of eternity which lies yet ahead.

In This Together (08/18/25)

As I near the end of what has proven a lengthy exercise, I want to settle in on the  last two verses of our passage, beginning in the latter half of verse 15. “If in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you, but let us keep living by the same standard to which we have attained.”  This is not a rebuke, nor is it peevishness on Paul’s part.  It is a call to the sort of tolerance which befits the pursuit of harmonious unity.  It’s not, then, suggesting that we just let everybody do their thing.  That’s not the point.  There is a standard, and it is the same standard.  But there are also many things upon which those of sound faith may yet disagree.  We may feel it incumbent upon us to forgive the brother we perceive as being yet in ignorance.  We would be wise, though, to consider that our brother likely feels much the same about us.  And we are not so perfect in our understanding as to be certain which of us is right.

But, for the sake of argument, let it be supposed that we are right, that we are the farther advanced party.  Here is your call, then:  Bear with your brother.  Give them time.  There is a tendency to reject those who cannot agree, and that tendency runs rampant in the world around us.  It should not, however, run rampant in the house of God.  It seems that in the current atmosphere, many would renounce even familial connections over what amount to minor differences of opinion.  Be it politics, or social structures, or whatever it may be, the whole world seems to have spun up into a, “My way or the highway,” mentality that leaves no room for tolerance.  And, to make matters worse, neither does it leave room for repentance, for the possibility of change.  Rejection is full and final.  That mindset must, however, deny the fundamental nature of man, for man is ever changing, never frozen in place in his present state.  Who I am is most assuredly not who I was, though I am sure who I was remains recognizable.  Who I shall be some years hence will no more be who I am today.  One prays the change is, in both cases, for the better.

But the point here is to break away from the spirit of the age.  And honestly, it’s not like this is some new phenomenon.  There have always been disagreements, and nowhere so much as in matters of faith and the seeking to explain the nature of God.  There’s a reason so many denominations pertain, and while we can argue the merit of such a condition, we can hardly deny its reality.  There are strongly held views on various sides of various matters of doctrine, the which would make peaceable coexistence challenging in the extreme.  I won’t say impossible, but certainly challenging.  And it may well be that the better course for maintaining fellowship in the Spirit is to separate in the flesh.  But there is no call for renouncing as antichrist that one with whom you disagree, at least not for most such matters as have been with the Church pretty much as long as the Church has been with man.  Predestination or free will:  Who can honestly claim to have a lock on the truth of the matter?  It’s difficult.  Were it not so, there would be no disagreement.  The erroneous view would have long since been rejected with sound and irrefutable testimony from Scripture.  But it’s ambiguous enough that the debate continues.  So what?  Does that render either camp rejected of God?  No.  Does one party or the other have to ultimately prove wrong?  At least one.  Quite possibly both.  Does that make any of us any less redeemed?  No.  Bear with your brother.  If you account him ignorant, forgive his ignorance.  And pray that he can likewise forgive yours.  More, pray that God will forgive you both for your mutual ignorance.  There’s room for humility here.  Indeed, there is call for utmost humility.  But be that as it may, remain brothers, for brothers you are.

Obviously, there are bounds to this mindset.  There are certainly things that call themselves churches at present which must, in their current condition, be accounted synagogues of Satan, to borrow the phrase from the Revelation.  For those?  No tolerance, but prayer; prayer that God might yet see fit to bring them to repentance and a true faith in the true God, and into submission to His true Lordship.  I could say the same for those who push a prosperity gospel, or take to the pulpit to promote themselves and line their pockets.  Might God deign to get hold of them, shake them free of their self-serving ways, and set them on a course towards heaven.  But if not, may He shake the Church free of their influence.

Here’s a true challenge for us.  We cannot speak with quite the confidence that Paul could on this matter.  He had the benefit of true divine revelation.  Many today try and claim the same, but without authorization and without authority.  At best, we have an understanding richly supplied by the inspiration and illuminating tutelage of the Holy Spirit.  At worst, we have fever dreams and vain imaginations.  But let’s stick with the positive, if we can.  We have illumination.  But we also have limitation.  It is thus that two brothers, both with the great benefit of the Holy Spirit’s illumination, may yet land on opposite sides of an issue, or at least at divergent perspectives.  That’s the sort of difference we’re talking about here.  It’s not Christian versus Antichrist, though we may, in our foolishness, seek to elevate it to that state.  No, it’s two parties of like faith in one God, two brothers reborn of the same Spirit, but as yet still seeing dimly, as in a mirror.  We do our best to connect the dots, to perceive the full picture, and proclaim the full truth, but God is so much bigger than us, His ways still so far beyond our ways, that it’s no wonder our understanding falls short.

And so we have this call set before us.  Don’t seek to lord it over your brother.  Don’t suppose you can bludgeon him into agreement.  Neither simply capitulate and abandon the dictates of your own conscience, for conscience is the pathway of the Spirit to speak to you, and it is never safe to dismiss His advice.  Never.  We may need to learn to distinguish our own views from His voice, and certainly, a seared conscience can hardly be counted a reliable guide, but that’s not what we’re dealing with here.  We’re dealing with believers, with those whom God has called by name, those who are in His hands, whatever the present situation may appear to be.  This being the case, I would run with Matthew Henry’s advice, which is, after all, just echoing God’s own, given through Paul.  Where you differ, he suggests, wait on God for greater understanding, and while you wait, “you must go together in the ways of God, join together in all the great things in which you are agreed, and wait for further light in the minor things wherein you differ.”

Now, make no mistake.  Those things may not seem minor to you in the moment.  And it may be that waiting for agreement is going to prove the wrong course.  A clear and harmonious answer may not come about in such fashion as allows for waiting, which is to say, waiting for such a state may well simply reduce both parties to self-enforced idleness.  Nothing is done for the kingdom by such a state, nor is either party the better for it.  So, understand the bounds on this advice.  Certainly, harmonious unity is always to be the goal, so far as harmonious unity permits of adhering to those core truths of sound doctrine as leave us both pursuing God in earnest, in Spirit and in truth.

There is a risk here, and it’s not merely a risk on the part of the other guy.  Ironside writes of the state of our differing brother.  “To live for Him and to seek His glory are the only things that count in their estimation.”  Well, one certainly hopes so!  And one would hope the same could be said of us.  But then comes the warning shot.  For all that holy fervor, they may yet err in judgment, may yet err in practice, may reach wrong conclusions and fabricate those into their worldview.  They may be under the influence of the surrounding culture and not even realize it.  And indeed, their error may even apply to matters of doctrine.  And still, for all that, if indeed God has called them, they have the mind of Christ.  And beloved, understand full well that everything said of them could just as easily apply to you, not just in theory, but in reality.  You may be erring in judgment.  You may be erring in practice.  You may have reached wrong conclusions, influenced more by culture than by the truth of Scripture.  You may err in your doctrine.  It’s happened before, hasn’t it?  And yet, if God has called you, you have the mind of Christ.  So, pray.  Be patient.  Seek understanding and wisdom, and then, as Paul urges, keep living by what you have attained to thus far.

We need only consider Paul’s example.  He was fervent in his faith prior to coming to Christ.  No doubt about it.  He was certain of his doctrine, absolutely convinced of the rightness of his ways.  “As to that righteousness which is in the Law, I was blameless” (Php 3:6).  Hyperbole, perhaps, but such was his thinking.  But then came Christ.  Then came the call.  And all of that had to be stripped away, left behind.  Perhaps for him the only thing strong enough to accomplish what needed accomplishing was to be drawn into heaven for revelation such as Isaiah had seen, such as Moses had known.  What else was going to shake him from his confidence than full-on exposure to the direct testimony of Christ Jesus Himself?  So, yes, he has reason for confidence as to his doctrine, reason far beyond what you or I can muster.  And how does he proceed in this new and more fully founded confidence?  With utmost patience.  “God will reveal it to you.”  Honestly, if He will not, there’s only so much I can do.  I have spoken truth.  It’s up to God to open your ears to hear it.  Isn’t that rather the way of things with this call to spread the Gospel?  Whether it’s breaking new ground or watering that which has been sown, the task is much the same.  Do your part, but leave the result to God.

For the first time, I’ve been trying my hand at a bit of gardening this year.  Nothing much, but a dear sister in Christ saw fit to bless me with some dahlia tubers, and it felt necessary to try.  And behold!  One puts the tubers in the dirt, tries to remember to water them day by day.  But what results is really out of my hands beyond that.  Some have been flowering already, others have had me wondering whether they would be anything but foliage.  It’s not my call.  I can only do what I know to do, and frankly, my knowledge on this front is pretty limited.

I’ve watched my wife in her years-long pursuit of getting hydrangeas to blossom.  It only seems fair.  Others around us have glorious blooms for seemingly minimal effort.  And it seems each has some advice to offer on how to get them to bloom next year.  One would advise cutting away the deadwood at year’s end, others say leave it, that’s where next year’s blooms will be.  It clearly depends on the varietal.  Some seem to want more shade others more sun.  Who really knows what these particular plants want?  And frankly, you could put them in the perfect situation and still the story would not change.  It’s not up to your performance of such duties as these plants need.  As Paul observed to the Corinthians, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gives the growth” (1Co 3:6).

So, then, in these areas of difference, walk in unity so far as that remains possible.  Trust God where it does not.  And leave room for God to work in you as well as in that one with whom you disagree.  There is plentiful space for variation in this life of faith, and even in how we perceive some of these matters of doctrine.  It’s okay if we have different perspectives, different understandings.  We remain in the grip of Christ.  We both of us have the blessed provision of the mind of Christ.  There is no need for denouncements, angry or otherwise.  There is no place for demanding compliance.  As to the fundamentals, of course there must be agreement.  And if that’s as far as you can maintain it, then maintain it there.  Walk harmoniously.  Focus not on the differences but on the commonalities.  There is one God, who is Father of all.  There is one Spirit who indwells all.  There is one Name given under heaven by which we must be saved, Jesus Christ, the Messiah of God.  And, for all its differing manifestations, there is one Church, Christ its Head, with one mission to proclaim one Truth to a world in need of hearing it.

Let us devote ourselves to this, to walking forward in harmony, wherever we find true brotherhood, whatever our differing perspectives may be.  Let neither of us be found condoning sin in ourselves, nor excusing sin in our fellows, but we are in this race together, not as competitors such that for one to win the other must lose, but as teammates, encouraging one another to finish well.  And as we finish, may God have the glory of it, all the glory, for He had done it!