Today was Week 106 of Rightly Dividing the Word of truth…our study / overview of Paul’s epistles to believers in this dispensation of the grace of God. As we walk through Philippians 3 it is imperative to understand Paul’s background of the Jewish religion. When the nation returned from exile in 539 BC, the system of temple worship and reestablishing the system of sacrifice was paramount. As Malachi closed out his prophetic letter, Israel went into a 400 year period of complete silence from God. It was during this period that the prominent religious groups came to the forefront.
The Sadducees rose to be the guardians of the temple and all the high holy days and feasts. They held to a strict observance of the Torah, and did not believe in the resurrection.
The Pharisees found their power in the establishment of local synagogues in all the towns round about Israel. The studied the Torah as well as memorizing and teaching the oral law, later to be written down as the Talmud.
The Zealots were a radical group that expressed violence as their way of righting the wrongs of Israel’s oppressors. Murder and assassination by a curved knife blade was their main weapon of dispatching the wrong doer. Nevi-im (The prophets), and the Ketuv-im (poetry and history books). The Qumran texts were discovered at an Essene enclave.
Saul of Tarsus grew up in the rabbinical system of established by the Pharisees. It was his life, and anyone who opposed or threatened that life was his enemy. His goal was to stamp out this fledgling religion that followed Jesus of Nazareth. But, as we saw in Philippians 3:3-6, Paul wrote of all that he could glory in, as a Hebrew of the Hebrews, a Pharisee, only to cast it on the waste pile in comparison to who he now was in Christ!
Philippians 3:7: But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.
V.8-11: He traded his false confidence in his accomplishments in the Jews’ religion for the true confidence that he had in Christ. His confidence was based on:
The knowledge of Christ – V.8.
The righteousness of Christ – V.9
The fellowship of Christ – V.10
The resurrection life found only in Christ – V.11
Paul was not without his personal trials and struggles with his flesh. He clearly explains in Romans 7:7-25 that his new life in Christ was a challenge, because he was now a new creature in Christ (2 Cor.5:17), and what was natural to him in his lost state, is now diametrically opposed to his new life in Christ.
Romans 7:14, 18, 24-25: For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
Paul lets us all know that struggling with our old Adamic nature, our sin nature doesn’t disappear just because we are saved. Allowing sin to camp out in our lives will cause all kinds of trouble! Only looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith, and keeping our sins confessed will we journey into a victorious life!
We will continue our discussion of Paul’s personal testimony and his focus on knowing Christ, and his resurrection power next Sunday.