Troy a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more: Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee;Concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,
Phil 3:4-8 (KJV)
*Now keep this in mind. It didn't start out as loss, it was all in his profit column.
*So, here is his list of things once considered profit, now considered loss. And they are all his Jewish credentials. Look at verse 5 and I'm going to give you seven points, I want you to get them very carefully, they go by very fast...just brief.
*Number one, salvation is not by ritual...salvation is not by ritual. He says the first thing that was profit to me and I came to count as loss was that I was circumcised the eighth day. Now the literal Greek reads this way, "With respect to circumcision, an eighth dayer." With respect to circumcision I was an eighth dayer. You say, "What does he mean by that?" Well in Genesis 17:12, Genesis 21:4, Leviticus 12:31, God institutes circumcision, that physical operation as a sign of His people. And He said it is to be done on the eighth day after a male child is born. That was a strict Jewish rite. And what is Paul saying? He's saying...Hey, with regard to me, I went by the Mosaic book, I was circumcised on the eighth day. I went through THE basic ritual of Judaism, the rite and ceremony by which you are initiated into the covenant people. And by the way, he uses that one first because circumcision was the Judaizers big issue. So he says, "I'm no Ishmaelite." Ishmael, you'll remember, wasn't circumcised till after his thirteenth year, according to Genesis 27:25. I'm no pagan who proselytes to Judaism and in adulthood is circumcised. I am a legitimate Jew by birth, circumcised the eighth day, faithful to the cardinal ritual at birth, a true blooded Jew, nursed in the ceremonies of my ancestral religion. I followed that basic requirement, my parents had me circumcised.
*So he's saying I was born into Jewishness, I was born into the Jewish faith. I followed the rituals from the very beginning. I started with the most essential rite and sacrament which they felt was absolutely necessary for salvation. So he said I look at that circumcision that you see as so vital to salvation and I'm telling you it's rubbish...it's rubbish. Because salvation is not by ritual, it is not by rite, it is not by ceremony, it is not by symbol, it is not by sacraments, it is not by masses, it is not by routines and rituals and washings and baptisms. I don't care whether you're talking about Jewish symbols and Jewish sacraments and Jewish ordinances and rituals and ceremonies or whether you're talking about Roman Catholic ones, Roman Catholic rites and rituals, or whether you're talking about Protestant baptism or Protestant sacraments or the Lord's table or some other ritual, or whether you're talking about lighting candles or praying through beads or praying certain formula prayers, ceremonies, rites and rituals don't bring salvation. That's what he's saying. So I considered that truest Jewish rite of all rites, circumcision, as manure. As far as salvation is concerned it's useless. It's waste, it's garbage, throw it out, it can't help.
*Secondly, he says salvation is not by race either. If anybody had a right to boast I might because not only was I circumcised the eighth day, but I am of the nation of Israel. The implication here is that some of the Judaizers probably were Gentiles converted later. They were circumcised later in life and they weren't really of the nation Israel. They were proselytes. But Paul is saying, "I'm of the people of Israel." And you know as well as I do that the Old Testament is filled with the teaching that the children of Israel were the covenant people, they were God's chosen people, it was on them that He set His love. According to Romans chapter 9 verses 3 through 5 they are greatly blessed. It says they are the Israelites to whom belong the adoption as sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the temple service and the promises whose are the fathers and from whom is the Christ. They had all the privileges. "Israel only have I known," Amos 3:2. They were God's chosen beloved people, He loved them sovereignly. And so he says I'm an Israelite, I am of the nation of Israel.
*Could all the Judaizers claim such religious heritage? Do they possess by race the rights of God's chosen people? Paul did. And Paul understood the meaning of that.
* All true Jews came from Abraham through Isaac through Jacob because Jacob wrestled with an angel in Genesis 32 and after that wrestling, you remember, his struggle with God, his name was changed to...what?...to Israel.
*So that's where the children of Israel come from...Abraham through Isaac through Jacob who was Israel. There are other people who can trace their heritage back to Abraham because Abraham had another son by the name of Ishmael. He was an illegitimate son born of the handmaid Hagar. He fathered the Arab people. There are some people who can say I am a child of Abraham but the Ishmaelites are not the children of Israel, they are the children of Abraham through Hagar. There are some people who can say I am through Abraham and Isaac because Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau. And Esau produced the Edomites, more Arabic people. And there are people who can say I am of Esau, so I come through Abraham and Isaac. But only those who come through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are Israelites. So Paul is saying I am pure in terms of my Jewish heritage, pure descent from God's chosen people. That's a credential. And I'll tell you right now the Jews believed that if they were circumcised the eighth day and if they were of the pure line coming out of the loins of Jacob and coming through the twelve tribes that were the children of Jacob, they were therefore the chosen people of God who were the saved, the redeemed, the inheriters of eternal glory. Paul says...the fact of the matter is, that's useless, that is absolutely useless.
*No religious virtue is gained by birth. Understand that? There are people today who want to affirm household salvation. They twist the Philippian jailer's story that he was saved and his whole household and they assumed that when a family...when parents are saved that the children born of those parents are in covenant relationship to God. And that's why they engage in infant baptism which is a form of covenant identity. Infant baptism is how you identify a child as having been born into covenant identity, household salvation by virtue of parents. Not so...not so. Your religious family grants you no standing with God. The fact that you were born into a Christian nation grants you no standing with God. The fact that you were born into a Christian family grants you no standing with God, no salvation, it's useless, it's garbage, it's rubbish.
*Thirdly, salvation is not by rank. Salvation is not by rank. He says in verse 5, "Circumcised the eighth day of the nation of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin." Now this is a ranking tribe. Of all of the tribes, certainly the two most elite were Judah and Benjamin. We talk a lot about Judah because out of the line of Judah comes the Messiah, but we can't forget Benjamin. Benjamin was a very very elite tribe. Let me tell you why. Benjamin, first of all, was the younger of two sons born to Rachel. And you will remember the story in Genesis chapter 30 that Rachel was Jacob's favorite wife. And that made Benjamin a favorite child. In fact, he was the last and thus he was the baby of all and the baby of the beloved wife, the tenderly beloved Benjamin.
*Benjamin, furthermore, according to Genesis 35:9 to 19 was the only one of the sons of Jacob born in the promised land. And thus he had a very unique identity and title to that land. Benjamin furthermore was given unique military priority. Read Judges 5 verse 14, Hosea 5:8 and you will find that apparently when the troops went to battle, Benjamin was the front line. They must have been loyal, courageous, great soldiers. Furthermore, when they went to find a king to what tribe did they go? Benjamin. And they found Saul, 1 Samuel chapter 9, who was out of the tribe of Benjamin. You remember when God divided up the land, the promised land, He gave certain sections of the land to the tribes. I don't know if you remember this but the section He gave to Benjamin included the city of Jerusalem. So the holy city itself was in the territory of Benjamin and thus Benjamin was a very very noble tribe, for in their territory was the great holy city of Jerusalem, Judges 1:21 points that out to us.
*Furthermore, according to 1 Kings 12:21, you remember after Solomon the kingdom split because there was a revolution, and the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom were divided and Benjamin stayed loyal to the Davidic dynasty and stayed with Judah in the south. And Benjamin and Judah formed the legitimate southern kingdom, the northern kingdom went off in rebellion and eventually was carried away into captivity in 722 B.C. So Benjamin was loyal to David at the time of the kingdom being split. Benjamin and Judah then forming the southern kingdom.
*A very famous man came out of the tribe of Benjamin, the man that God used to spare the entire nation of Israel from being massacred, that man's name was Mordecai. And Mordecai was used by God in the story of Esther to preserve the people of Israel. Mordecai was of the tribe of Benjamin.
*So it was a noble group for a number of reasons, it stood above the other tribes. Not perfect by any means, and I don't want to be misunderstood, Shimei that fool who cursed David and threw rocks at him was a Benjamite, 2 Samuel chapter 16 and 19 record that. He did repent later on. But Shimei was a Benjamite, certainly not someone you'd want to claim. And maybe the worst of the activities of the Benjamites is recorded in Judges 19 and 20 where they perpetrated a gang rape that ended up in a victim being chopped into little pieces and mailed around to all the tribes. A gross thing, it ended up actually 25,100 Benjamites were massacred. So not all of the history of Benjamin is worthy of, you know, copying, but they were a noble group. They were considered a ranking tribe.
*What is also interesting is this, that by the time Paul wrote Philippians most of the Jews didn't know their tribe. Two reasons...the records were lost in the Babylonian captivity and secondly, intermarriage had blurred the lines, the tribal lines. What Paul is saying is I have never been involved and my family has never been involved in intermarriage, we have stayed pure Benjamites. So he is really a blue-blood. He is a Jew in the purest truest sense who even knows his tribe...which was not the case for all the Jews and perhaps the Judaizers in this case, none of them may have known their tribe, none of them been from the tribe of Benjamin perhaps as well.
*So, what's he saying? I come from a ranking tribe. I come from ranking people. I come from privileged class. That means nothing, that is not adequate to save me from sin, that is not adequate to make me right with God, that is worthless in that regard. The highest aristocracy in Israel couldn't make me a child of God and that's obvious even for us today. No noble religious heritage can make you right with God. You can even be a priest, you can even be a religious person, you can be a religious leader, you can be a teacher in a religion, you can be in a religious family, you can be a PK or an MK, that's a preacher's kid or a missionary's kid, you can be born into a religious family, a ministry family, God is not impressed. Rank has nothing to do with salvation. And where you are in the social strata of religiosity is immaterial to God...immaterial. He's not impressed. Being right with God is not gained by ritual, ceremony, rite. It is not gained by race, it is not gained by rank.
*Now all three of those are received by inheritance. Paul got all those, he really couldn't earn them. His parents circumcised him. His parents determined that he was in the nation of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin. So he says, "This I received by inheritance." But now, he says, here are four things I achieved by effort. So he adds to his inherited profit his achieved profit and then says I consider this rubbish, too.
*Number four, the last four he achieved. Number four, salvation is not by tradition...salvation is not by tradition. He says, "A Hebrew of Hebrews." Now there might be several ways to understand what he means by that, I prefer to think along with a number of commentators that what he is saying here is, "I am a Hebrew child of Hebrew parents." In other words, I've maintained my tradition, I have maintained my tradition. This is directed, by the way, at the dispersed Jews who had been scattered all around, including perhaps these in Philippi. And having been scattered around they were greatly impacted by Greek culture. Many of them lost the Hebrew language and when they lost the language they lost the culture, they lost their tradition. You have a lot of Jews today who are trying to get their tradition back but they'll never really get it back without the language. But they in those days had the same problem. They had become Hellenized from the Greek word hellen which means Gentile. They had become victims of Greek culture, so they lost their language, they lost their tradition. He is saying...Not me, I had Hebrew parents, I'm a Hebrew child. I am a Hebrew of the Hebrews, I maintained my tradition.
*He was raised in a pagan city. He was raised in Greek culture in Tarsus, in Cilicia which is near Galatia on the northeastern part of the Mediterranean Sea, not in the land of Israel. He was raised in Gentile territory under Greek culture and Roman rule. But he says, you know his testimony, "I was faithful and personally committed to the tradition of Judaism and the language of my parents." You remember according to Acts 22:3 he left his country and he went to Jerusalem to study under Gamaliel who was the chief teacher among the Jews. According to Acts 21:40 he could speak Hebrew fluently. He was a Jew. He was a Hebrew son of Hebrew parents. He followed the language, he followed the traditions, he followed the customs, he never deviated. According to Acts 26, listen to this in verses 4 and 5, he says, "All Jews know my manner of life from my youth up, which from the beginning was spent among my own nation and at Jerusalem since they have known about me for a long time previously, if they are willing to testify that I lived as a Pharisee according to the strictest sect of our religion." He was an unwavering Hebrew. And everybody knows it, he says. All the Jews know it. He was a well-known young man because he had eminent gifts. He was known widely even as a young Jew. And everyone knew his devotion to tradition.
*You know what God said? I'm not impressed. I'm not impressed. No manner of loyalty to your traditional religion can save you. No amount of loyalty to your ancestral worship can save you. This is worthless. This is rubbish, manure, garbage, get rid of it. There's no treasure there. There's no pearl there. Just because you're loyal to your parents Catholicism or your parents Judaism or your traditional Protestant background, you're a Lutheran because your parents are Lutheran, or you're a Presbyterian because your family has always been that way, or you're Baptist because everybody's been Baptists, that kind of loyalty to a tradition is worthless as far as a means of salvation. It's worthless. Salvation doesn't come in those terms.
*Number five, salvation is not by religion. Not only not by tradition but by religion, but on a religious level Paul had really achieved, look at verse 5, "As to the law, a Pharisee." I just read out of 26:5 of Acts where he said he lived his life according to the Pharisaic law and here he says the same thing. He says, "When it comes to the law, I was a Pharisee." In other words, when it comes to my view of God's Word, I took the Pharisaic perspective. What does that mean? That is the highest level of religious achievement in Judaism. You can't get any higher than being a Pharisee. The Pharisee was the religious radical fundamentalist, that was the Pharisee, the narrow-minded legalistic literalist fundamentalist who interpreted the Word of God specifically, directly to life. You know where they came from? They came out of the intertestamental period between the end of the Old and the beginning of the New, there was 400 years in there when there was no writing going on. And during that time the Jews began to drift into liberalism, they began to question the authority of Scripture, they began to compromise and at that time came this group called Pharisees which comes to mean separatists. And they were affirming that there must be an adherence to Scripture, that there must be an adherence to the Word of God, that there could be no deviation so they felt they had to guard the Scripture, they had to study the Scripture, they had to interpret the Scripture, they had to proclaim the Scripture, they had to apply the Scripture, they had to castigate people who didn't apply it, that was the Pharisees. They started out with a noble cause, they started out as noble men. Obviously over a period of time they degenerated and the point of their degeneration was when they came to believe that their strict adherence to the law was what saved them. That was the fatal flaw.
*They were a very elite group. During the time of Christ the best estimate is that there were no more than 6,000 of them, that's all. No more than 6,000. Because it was such a strict demanding circumscribed legalistic life style that very few people desired to live according to that standard. Paul says, "My view of the law, a Pharisee, that means I know the law, I can interpret the law, I have guarded the law, and I have lived by its strictest interpretation.
*Not all of the Pharisees were snakes and vipers and fools and hypocrites and blind leaders and robbers and envious, jealous, proud fakers. Some of them were serious minded. They were trying their best to achieve status with God through religion. So this little small group of elite people included in their number Paul. And not only Paul, but apparently he says not only was I a Pharisee but I come from a line of Pharisees. We don't know whether he's talking about other Pharisees in the line of Pharisees or the fact that his father may have been a Pharisee as well. But you read it in Acts 22:3, Acts 23:6, Acts 26:5, Galatians 1:14, he often refers to his Pharisaic background. So he said I took religion to the highest level, very religious.
*Do you ever look around the world and see people like this? Very religious...up to their ears in religion, you see them all over the world, wearing robes and doing all of their religious activities, many of them functioning as priests, sacrificing, taking on themselves unbearable burdens, living in poverty and loneliness. Many of them in pain and deprivation, functioning to fulfill a religious pattern that they believe will please God. The bottom line, He's not impressed. He's not impressed with any of it...whether it's Judaistic religion, whether it's Buddhistic religion, whether it's Islam, whether it's Roman Catholicism, whether it's Protestantism, the religious form does not impress God. And religious devotion can't save you. Paul says I considered my Pharisaic devotion to the law of God as rubbish...rubbish.
*Number six, salvation is not by sincerity...salvation is not by sincerity. In verse 6 he says, "As to zeal, boy, if anybody should have confidence I should, because as to zeal, I was a persecutor of the church." I was a persecutor of the church. How zealous were you, Paul? So zealous I killed Christians. That's pretty zealous. That's pretty zealous. By the way, to the Jew zeal, zelos, zeal was...mark it...the single highest virtue of religion. Did you get that? What is zeal? It's two sides of a coin, okay? Zeal is the coin. One side is love, the other side is hate. What do I mean? Zeal says I love God so much I hate whatever offends Him...that's zeal. I love God so much I hate whatever offends Him. Paul loved God, he loved the law of God, he loved the community of God, that's the Jewish people, he loved all that God had revealed to such a degree that he hated anything he thought offended God and he thought Christians offended God. Why did he kill Christians? Because of zeal. He loved Judaism so much that he hated anything that threatened it and Christianity threatened it. So he persecuted Christians. To what degree? Read the book of Acts. He breathed out threatening and slaughter on them. He created havoc in the church. He killed Christians. He pursued them. He chased them. He wanted to take their life. Hey, he's one up on the Judaizers. All the Judaizers did was proselyte. He persecuted. You think you've got zeal? I've got more. I went after them to kill them.
*In fact, he says, "I am the least of the Apostles," 1 Corinthians 15:9, "I am the least of all Apostles." Why? "Because I persecuted the church, I'm not even worthy to be named as an Apostle. I persecuted the church." Why did you do it, Paul? "Zeal for God, I loved Judaism so much I hated Christianity because it threatened it. That's zeal." You know what? He was sincere, wasn't he? I hear people say, "Well, it doesn't really matter what religion you are, as long as you're sincere." It's like saying it doesn't matter what poison you drink as long as you're sincere, you'll be all right. Mental attitude has nothing to do with it, it's a matter of truth. Paul was sincere, he was zealous for God. He was so zealous for Judaism that there was nothing he wouldn't do and relentlessly unsparingly untiringly and mercilessly he tried to stamp out Christianity because of his zeal for God...very sincere.
*The world is filled with the religiously sincere, people very sincere in their religion, make great effort, personal sacrifice, high cost, pay the price...wanting to please God. Very sincere. Go to church, some people, every day...every day, many Catholics go every day. People in religions pray certain prayers every day. Protestants go to church every day...every week, I should say, on the Lord's day...fulfilling a function. Very sincere in their heart, wanting to do what is right. God is not impressed. God is not impressed. Salvation is not by ritual. Salvation is not by race. Salvation is not by rank. Salvation is not by maintaining tradition. Salvation does not come through religion and salvation does not come by sincerity. You can have a lot of zeal and be absolutely wrong, and Paul says, "I thought it was right, I considered it garbage when I met Christ."
*Lastly, salvation is not by law-righteousness...salvation is not by law-righteousness. Or you could say righteous works. Verse 6, "As to the righteousness which is in the law...what was my approach?...I was found blameless." What does that mean? Found has the idea of those who watched his life couldn't find anything to hold against him as a transgression. Outwardly the man lived according to the law.
*Now he's not saying I was sinless. He's not advocating sinless perfection. He's not saying, "Before I was saved I was sinlessly perfect," otherwise he wouldn't have needed to be saved. And by the way, read Romans 7:5 to 11, when he's giving his preconversion definition of himself, he says, "I was fighting sin on the inside and when I came across the law of God, sin was in me revived and I died, boy, I was in a battle with sin." He's never denying sin in him. That would be denial of Jewish theology, that would be a denial of his personal testimony in Romans 7:5 though 11 where he says as an unbeliever he was battling sin that was in him. But what he is saying is this, that in general with regard to the righteousness which is advocated by God's law or the standard of righteous living advocated by the law of God, no one could find me blameable. I lived a blameless life. By human judgment I was a model Jew and lived by God's law.
*Boy, this is some testimony. Listen, if you could be saved by works, he would have been saved, right? What a list. This guy's got the profit column filled. And he says..."Look, I was fine, I had filled up my profit column with all the things that earned my salvation until I met Christ and I found out that the righteousness of my own wasn't adequate but there was a righteousness in Christ by grace given to me by faith received and that was the pearl of great price and that was the true treasure and so I counted all this other stuff as manure and I came to Christ." Verse 7, "Whatever things were gain to me, all the stuff of verses 5 and 6, those things I have counted as loss, they aren't a plus, they aren't a positive, they are a negative." Why? They damn you. They send you to hell under deception, under an illusion. And so I saw them for what they were, they were detractors, they were loss not gain for the sake of Christ. "And I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish in order that I might gain Christ." That's it.
*Could I give you a final contrast? Two men, two men came to the same crossroads. Paul was one, the other that I would like you to think about is a rich young ruler in Matthew 19. Jesus came to a rich young ruler and He said to him, "You must obey the law." He said, "Which part of the law?" Jesus gave him some commandments, he said, "All those things have I kept." In other words, I've been blameless, as to the righteousness which is in the law, I've been found blameless. Here was a man who had his profit column all filled up. He too was likely a Jew. He too perhaps faithful to the tradition. Certainly he was a young ruler which means he was probably a ruler in the synagogue which mean that he was a very honored, ranking, traditional, faithful Jew or he wouldn't have ascended to that level. He was extremely religious and he was very sincere or he never would have come to Jesus and asked how to get eternal life. So you had a sincere, religious, traditional, loyal Jew called the rich young ruler in Matthew 19. And he comes to Jesus and Jesus asks him about his life and he says I've always kept the law, just like Paul. And then Jesus shows him a better way. He says, "Give up everything you have and follow Me." And the young man said no, walked away.
*Paul said just the opposite. Paul said I've got all these credentials, man, I've got race, rank, ritual, I've got tradition, religion, sincerity, works-righteousness, I've got my profit column filled up. Jesus said, "Drop it all and follow Me." Paul said yes. And he counted it all but loss to gain Christ. The rich young ruler counted it all gain and forsook Christ. Every person in the world is in one of those two categories. When you meet Christ you either drop all the stuff that you've been counting on for your salvation and take Christ alone, or you hold to all the stuff you've been holding on to for your salvation and turn your back on Christ. Those two categories, you're in one of them, everyone is. That's it.
*So, whose child are you? The child of Paul? Or the child of the rich young ruler? What are you counting on, who are you counting on for your salvation? You're either trusting yourself and your achievements, or Christ. And when you come to trust Christ, all the achievements become rubbish. That's the exchange.
Amen
Troy
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Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more: Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee;Concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,
Phil 3:4-8 (KJV)
*Now keep this in mind. It didn't start out as loss, it was all in his profit column.
*So, here is his list of things once considered profit, now considered loss. And they are all his Jewish credentials. Look at verse 5 and I'm going to give you seven points, I want you to get them very carefully, they go by very fast...just brief.
*Number one, salvation is not by ritual...salvation is not by ritual. He says the first thing that was profit to me and I came to count as loss was that I was circumcised the eighth day. Now the literal Greek reads this way, "With respect to circumcision, an eighth dayer." With respect to circumcision I was an eighth dayer. You say, "What does he mean by that?" Well in Genesis 17:12, Genesis 21:4, Leviticus 12:31, God institutes circumcision, that physical operation as a sign of His people. And He said it is to be done on the eighth day after a male child is born. That was a strict Jewish rite. And what is Paul saying? He's saying...Hey, with regard to me, I went by the Mosaic book, I was circumcised on the eighth day. I went through THE basic ritual of Judaism, the rite and ceremony by which you are initiated into the covenant people. And by the way, he uses that one first because circumcision was the Judaizers big issue. So he says, "I'm no Ishmaelite." Ishmael, you'll remember, wasn't circumcised till after his thirteenth year, according to Genesis 27:25. I'm no pagan who proselytes to Judaism and in adulthood is circumcised. I am a legitimate Jew by birth, circumcised the eighth day, faithful to the cardinal ritual at birth, a true blooded Jew, nursed in the ceremonies of my ancestral religion. I followed that basic requirement, my parents had me circumcised.
*So he's saying I was born into Jewishness, I was born into the Jewish faith. I followed the rituals from the very beginning. I started with the most essential rite and sacrament which they felt was absolutely necessary for salvation. So he said I look at that circumcision that you see as so vital to salvation and I'm telling you it's rubbish...it's rubbish. Because salvation is not by ritual, it is not by rite, it is not by ceremony, it is not by symbol, it is not by sacraments, it is not by masses, it is not by routines and rituals and washings and baptisms. I don't care whether you're talking about Jewish symbols and Jewish sacraments and Jewish ordinances and rituals and ceremonies or whether you're talking about Roman Catholic ones, Roman Catholic rites and rituals, or whether you're talking about Protestant baptism or Protestant sacraments or the Lord's table or some other ritual, or whether you're talking about lighting candles or praying through beads or praying certain formula prayers, ceremonies, rites and rituals don't bring salvation. That's what he's saying. So I considered that truest Jewish rite of all rites, circumcision, as manure. As far as salvation is concerned it's useless. It's waste, it's garbage, throw it out, it can't help.
*Secondly, he says salvation is not by race either. If anybody had a right to boast I might because not only was I circumcised the eighth day, but I am of the nation of Israel. The implication here is that some of the Judaizers probably were Gentiles converted later. They were circumcised later in life and they weren't really of the nation Israel. They were proselytes. But Paul is saying, "I'm of the people of Israel." And you know as well as I do that the Old Testament is filled with the teaching that the children of Israel were the covenant people, they were God's chosen people, it was on them that He set His love. According to Romans chapter 9 verses 3 through 5 they are greatly blessed. It says they are the Israelites to whom belong the adoption as sons and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the temple service and the promises whose are the fathers and from whom is the Christ. They had all the privileges. "Israel only have I known," Amos 3:2. They were God's chosen beloved people, He loved them sovereignly. And so he says I'm an Israelite, I am of the nation of Israel.
*Could all the Judaizers claim such religious heritage? Do they possess by race the rights of God's chosen people? Paul did. And Paul understood the meaning of that.
* All true Jews came from Abraham through Isaac through Jacob because Jacob wrestled with an angel in Genesis 32 and after that wrestling, you remember, his struggle with God, his name was changed to...what?...to Israel.
*So that's where the children of Israel come from...Abraham through Isaac through Jacob who was Israel. There are other people who can trace their heritage back to Abraham because Abraham had another son by the name of Ishmael. He was an illegitimate son born of the handmaid Hagar. He fathered the Arab people. There are some people who can say I am a child of Abraham but the Ishmaelites are not the children of Israel, they are the children of Abraham through Hagar. There are some people who can say I am through Abraham and Isaac because Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau. And Esau produced the Edomites, more Arabic people. And there are people who can say I am of Esau, so I come through Abraham and Isaac. But only those who come through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are Israelites. So Paul is saying I am pure in terms of my Jewish heritage, pure descent from God's chosen people. That's a credential. And I'll tell you right now the Jews believed that if they were circumcised the eighth day and if they were of the pure line coming out of the loins of Jacob and coming through the twelve tribes that were the children of Jacob, they were therefore the chosen people of God who were the saved, the redeemed, the inheriters of eternal glory. Paul says...the fact of the matter is, that's useless, that is absolutely useless.
*No religious virtue is gained by birth. Understand that? There are people today who want to affirm household salvation. They twist the Philippian jailer's story that he was saved and his whole household and they assumed that when a family...when parents are saved that the children born of those parents are in covenant relationship to God. And that's why they engage in infant baptism which is a form of covenant identity. Infant baptism is how you identify a child as having been born into covenant identity, household salvation by virtue of parents. Not so...not so. Your religious family grants you no standing with God. The fact that you were born into a Christian nation grants you no standing with God. The fact that you were born into a Christian family grants you no standing with God, no salvation, it's useless, it's garbage, it's rubbish.
*Thirdly, salvation is not by rank. Salvation is not by rank. He says in verse 5, "Circumcised the eighth day of the nation of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin." Now this is a ranking tribe. Of all of the tribes, certainly the two most elite were Judah and Benjamin. We talk a lot about Judah because out of the line of Judah comes the Messiah, but we can't forget Benjamin. Benjamin was a very very elite tribe. Let me tell you why. Benjamin, first of all, was the younger of two sons born to Rachel. And you will remember the story in Genesis chapter 30 that Rachel was Jacob's favorite wife. And that made Benjamin a favorite child. In fact, he was the last and thus he was the baby of all and the baby of the beloved wife, the tenderly beloved Benjamin.
*Benjamin, furthermore, according to Genesis 35:9 to 19 was the only one of the sons of Jacob born in the promised land. And thus he had a very unique identity and title to that land. Benjamin furthermore was given unique military priority. Read Judges 5 verse 14, Hosea 5:8 and you will find that apparently when the troops went to battle, Benjamin was the front line. They must have been loyal, courageous, great soldiers. Furthermore, when they went to find a king to what tribe did they go? Benjamin. And they found Saul, 1 Samuel chapter 9, who was out of the tribe of Benjamin. You remember when God divided up the land, the promised land, He gave certain sections of the land to the tribes. I don't know if you remember this but the section He gave to Benjamin included the city of Jerusalem. So the holy city itself was in the territory of Benjamin and thus Benjamin was a very very noble tribe, for in their territory was the great holy city of Jerusalem, Judges 1:21 points that out to us.
*Furthermore, according to 1 Kings 12:21, you remember after Solomon the kingdom split because there was a revolution, and the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom were divided and Benjamin stayed loyal to the Davidic dynasty and stayed with Judah in the south. And Benjamin and Judah formed the legitimate southern kingdom, the northern kingdom went off in rebellion and eventually was carried away into captivity in 722 B.C. So Benjamin was loyal to David at the time of the kingdom being split. Benjamin and Judah then forming the southern kingdom.
*A very famous man came out of the tribe of Benjamin, the man that God used to spare the entire nation of Israel from being massacred, that man's name was Mordecai. And Mordecai was used by God in the story of Esther to preserve the people of Israel. Mordecai was of the tribe of Benjamin.
*So it was a noble group for a number of reasons, it stood above the other tribes. Not perfect by any means, and I don't want to be misunderstood, Shimei that fool who cursed David and threw rocks at him was a Benjamite, 2 Samuel chapter 16 and 19 record that. He did repent later on. But Shimei was a Benjamite, certainly not someone you'd want to claim. And maybe the worst of the activities of the Benjamites is recorded in Judges 19 and 20 where they perpetrated a gang rape that ended up in a victim being chopped into little pieces and mailed around to all the tribes. A gross thing, it ended up actually 25,100 Benjamites were massacred. So not all of the history of Benjamin is worthy of, you know, copying, but they were a noble group. They were considered a ranking tribe.
*What is also interesting is this, that by the time Paul wrote Philippians most of the Jews didn't know their tribe. Two reasons...the records were lost in the Babylonian captivity and secondly, intermarriage had blurred the lines, the tribal lines. What Paul is saying is I have never been involved and my family has never been involved in intermarriage, we have stayed pure Benjamites. So he is really a blue-blood. He is a Jew in the purest truest sense who even knows his tribe...which was not the case for all the Jews and perhaps the Judaizers in this case, none of them may have known their tribe, none of them been from the tribe of Benjamin perhaps as well.
*So, what's he saying? I come from a ranking tribe. I come from ranking people. I come from privileged class. That means nothing, that is not adequate to save me from sin, that is not adequate to make me right with God, that is worthless in that regard. The highest aristocracy in Israel couldn't make me a child of God and that's obvious even for us today. No noble religious heritage can make you right with God. You can even be a priest, you can even be a religious person, you can be a religious leader, you can be a teacher in a religion, you can be in a religious family, you can be a PK or an MK, that's a preacher's kid or a missionary's kid, you can be born into a religious family, a ministry family, God is not impressed. Rank has nothing to do with salvation. And where you are in the social strata of religiosity is immaterial to God...immaterial. He's not impressed. Being right with God is not gained by ritual, ceremony, rite. It is not gained by race, it is not gained by rank.
*Now all three of those are received by inheritance. Paul got all those, he really couldn't earn them. His parents circumcised him. His parents determined that he was in the nation of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin. So he says, "This I received by inheritance." But now, he says, here are four things I achieved by effort. So he adds to his inherited profit his achieved profit and then says I consider this rubbish, too.
*Number four, the last four he achieved. Number four, salvation is not by tradition...salvation is not by tradition. He says, "A Hebrew of Hebrews." Now there might be several ways to understand what he means by that, I prefer to think along with a number of commentators that what he is saying here is, "I am a Hebrew child of Hebrew parents." In other words, I've maintained my tradition, I have maintained my tradition. This is directed, by the way, at the dispersed Jews who had been scattered all around, including perhaps these in Philippi. And having been scattered around they were greatly impacted by Greek culture. Many of them lost the Hebrew language and when they lost the language they lost the culture, they lost their tradition. You have a lot of Jews today who are trying to get their tradition back but they'll never really get it back without the language. But they in those days had the same problem. They had become Hellenized from the Greek word hellen which means Gentile. They had become victims of Greek culture, so they lost their language, they lost their tradition. He is saying...Not me, I had Hebrew parents, I'm a Hebrew child. I am a Hebrew of the Hebrews, I maintained my tradition.
*He was raised in a pagan city. He was raised in Greek culture in Tarsus, in Cilicia which is near Galatia on the northeastern part of the Mediterranean Sea, not in the land of Israel. He was raised in Gentile territory under Greek culture and Roman rule. But he says, you know his testimony, "I was faithful and personally committed to the tradition of Judaism and the language of my parents." You remember according to Acts 22:3 he left his country and he went to Jerusalem to study under Gamaliel who was the chief teacher among the Jews. According to Acts 21:40 he could speak Hebrew fluently. He was a Jew. He was a Hebrew son of Hebrew parents. He followed the language, he followed the traditions, he followed the customs, he never deviated. According to Acts 26, listen to this in verses 4 and 5, he says, "All Jews know my manner of life from my youth up, which from the beginning was spent among my own nation and at Jerusalem since they have known about me for a long time previously, if they are willing to testify that I lived as a Pharisee according to the strictest sect of our religion." He was an unwavering Hebrew. And everybody knows it, he says. All the Jews know it. He was a well-known young man because he had eminent gifts. He was known widely even as a young Jew. And everyone knew his devotion to tradition.
*You know what God said? I'm not impressed. I'm not impressed. No manner of loyalty to your traditional religion can save you. No amount of loyalty to your ancestral worship can save you. This is worthless. This is rubbish, manure, garbage, get rid of it. There's no treasure there. There's no pearl there. Just because you're loyal to your parents Catholicism or your parents Judaism or your traditional Protestant background, you're a Lutheran because your parents are Lutheran, or you're a Presbyterian because your family has always been that way, or you're Baptist because everybody's been Baptists, that kind of loyalty to a tradition is worthless as far as a means of salvation. It's worthless. Salvation doesn't come in those terms.
*Number five, salvation is not by religion. Not only not by tradition but by religion, but on a religious level Paul had really achieved, look at verse 5, "As to the law, a Pharisee." I just read out of 26:5 of Acts where he said he lived his life according to the Pharisaic law and here he says the same thing. He says, "When it comes to the law, I was a Pharisee." In other words, when it comes to my view of God's Word, I took the Pharisaic perspective. What does that mean? That is the highest level of religious achievement in Judaism. You can't get any higher than being a Pharisee. The Pharisee was the religious radical fundamentalist, that was the Pharisee, the narrow-minded legalistic literalist fundamentalist who interpreted the Word of God specifically, directly to life. You know where they came from? They came out of the intertestamental period between the end of the Old and the beginning of the New, there was 400 years in there when there was no writing going on. And during that time the Jews began to drift into liberalism, they began to question the authority of Scripture, they began to compromise and at that time came this group called Pharisees which comes to mean separatists. And they were affirming that there must be an adherence to Scripture, that there must be an adherence to the Word of God, that there could be no deviation so they felt they had to guard the Scripture, they had to study the Scripture, they had to interpret the Scripture, they had to proclaim the Scripture, they had to apply the Scripture, they had to castigate people who didn't apply it, that was the Pharisees. They started out with a noble cause, they started out as noble men. Obviously over a period of time they degenerated and the point of their degeneration was when they came to believe that their strict adherence to the law was what saved them. That was the fatal flaw.
*They were a very elite group. During the time of Christ the best estimate is that there were no more than 6,000 of them, that's all. No more than 6,000. Because it was such a strict demanding circumscribed legalistic life style that very few people desired to live according to that standard. Paul says, "My view of the law, a Pharisee, that means I know the law, I can interpret the law, I have guarded the law, and I have lived by its strictest interpretation.
*Not all of the Pharisees were snakes and vipers and fools and hypocrites and blind leaders and robbers and envious, jealous, proud fakers. Some of them were serious minded. They were trying their best to achieve status with God through religion. So this little small group of elite people included in their number Paul. And not only Paul, but apparently he says not only was I a Pharisee but I come from a line of Pharisees. We don't know whether he's talking about other Pharisees in the line of Pharisees or the fact that his father may have been a Pharisee as well. But you read it in Acts 22:3, Acts 23:6, Acts 26:5, Galatians 1:14, he often refers to his Pharisaic background. So he said I took religion to the highest level, very religious.
*Do you ever look around the world and see people like this? Very religious...up to their ears in religion, you see them all over the world, wearing robes and doing all of their religious activities, many of them functioning as priests, sacrificing, taking on themselves unbearable burdens, living in poverty and loneliness. Many of them in pain and deprivation, functioning to fulfill a religious pattern that they believe will please God. The bottom line, He's not impressed. He's not impressed with any of it...whether it's Judaistic religion, whether it's Buddhistic religion, whether it's Islam, whether it's Roman Catholicism, whether it's Protestantism, the religious form does not impress God. And religious devotion can't save you. Paul says I considered my Pharisaic devotion to the law of God as rubbish...rubbish.
*Number six, salvation is not by sincerity...salvation is not by sincerity. In verse 6 he says, "As to zeal, boy, if anybody should have confidence I should, because as to zeal, I was a persecutor of the church." I was a persecutor of the church. How zealous were you, Paul? So zealous I killed Christians. That's pretty zealous. That's pretty zealous. By the way, to the Jew zeal, zelos, zeal was...mark it...the single highest virtue of religion. Did you get that? What is zeal? It's two sides of a coin, okay? Zeal is the coin. One side is love, the other side is hate. What do I mean? Zeal says I love God so much I hate whatever offends Him...that's zeal. I love God so much I hate whatever offends Him. Paul loved God, he loved the law of God, he loved the community of God, that's the Jewish people, he loved all that God had revealed to such a degree that he hated anything he thought offended God and he thought Christians offended God. Why did he kill Christians? Because of zeal. He loved Judaism so much that he hated anything that threatened it and Christianity threatened it. So he persecuted Christians. To what degree? Read the book of Acts. He breathed out threatening and slaughter on them. He created havoc in the church. He killed Christians. He pursued them. He chased them. He wanted to take their life. Hey, he's one up on the Judaizers. All the Judaizers did was proselyte. He persecuted. You think you've got zeal? I've got more. I went after them to kill them.
*In fact, he says, "I am the least of the Apostles," 1 Corinthians 15:9, "I am the least of all Apostles." Why? "Because I persecuted the church, I'm not even worthy to be named as an Apostle. I persecuted the church." Why did you do it, Paul? "Zeal for God, I loved Judaism so much I hated Christianity because it threatened it. That's zeal." You know what? He was sincere, wasn't he? I hear people say, "Well, it doesn't really matter what religion you are, as long as you're sincere." It's like saying it doesn't matter what poison you drink as long as you're sincere, you'll be all right. Mental attitude has nothing to do with it, it's a matter of truth. Paul was sincere, he was zealous for God. He was so zealous for Judaism that there was nothing he wouldn't do and relentlessly unsparingly untiringly and mercilessly he tried to stamp out Christianity because of his zeal for God...very sincere.
*The world is filled with the religiously sincere, people very sincere in their religion, make great effort, personal sacrifice, high cost, pay the price...wanting to please God. Very sincere. Go to church, some people, every day...every day, many Catholics go every day. People in religions pray certain prayers every day. Protestants go to church every day...every week, I should say, on the Lord's day...fulfilling a function. Very sincere in their heart, wanting to do what is right. God is not impressed. God is not impressed. Salvation is not by ritual. Salvation is not by race. Salvation is not by rank. Salvation is not by maintaining tradition. Salvation does not come through religion and salvation does not come by sincerity. You can have a lot of zeal and be absolutely wrong, and Paul says, "I thought it was right, I considered it garbage when I met Christ."
*Lastly, salvation is not by law-righteousness...salvation is not by law-righteousness. Or you could say righteous works. Verse 6, "As to the righteousness which is in the law...what was my approach?...I was found blameless." What does that mean? Found has the idea of those who watched his life couldn't find anything to hold against him as a transgression. Outwardly the man lived according to the law.
*Now he's not saying I was sinless. He's not advocating sinless perfection. He's not saying, "Before I was saved I was sinlessly perfect," otherwise he wouldn't have needed to be saved. And by the way, read Romans 7:5 to 11, when he's giving his preconversion definition of himself, he says, "I was fighting sin on the inside and when I came across the law of God, sin was in me revived and I died, boy, I was in a battle with sin." He's never denying sin in him. That would be denial of Jewish theology, that would be a denial of his personal testimony in Romans 7:5 though 11 where he says as an unbeliever he was battling sin that was in him. But what he is saying is this, that in general with regard to the righteousness which is advocated by God's law or the standard of righteous living advocated by the law of God, no one could find me blameable. I lived a blameless life. By human judgment I was a model Jew and lived by God's law.
*Boy, this is some testimony. Listen, if you could be saved by works, he would have been saved, right? What a list. This guy's got the profit column filled. And he says..."Look, I was fine, I had filled up my profit column with all the things that earned my salvation until I met Christ and I found out that the righteousness of my own wasn't adequate but there was a righteousness in Christ by grace given to me by faith received and that was the pearl of great price and that was the true treasure and so I counted all this other stuff as manure and I came to Christ." Verse 7, "Whatever things were gain to me, all the stuff of verses 5 and 6, those things I have counted as loss, they aren't a plus, they aren't a positive, they are a negative." Why? They damn you. They send you to hell under deception, under an illusion. And so I saw them for what they were, they were detractors, they were loss not gain for the sake of Christ. "And I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish in order that I might gain Christ." That's it.
*Could I give you a final contrast? Two men, two men came to the same crossroads. Paul was one, the other that I would like you to think about is a rich young ruler in Matthew 19. Jesus came to a rich young ruler and He said to him, "You must obey the law." He said, "Which part of the law?" Jesus gave him some commandments, he said, "All those things have I kept." In other words, I've been blameless, as to the righteousness which is in the law, I've been found blameless. Here was a man who had his profit column all filled up. He too was likely a Jew. He too perhaps faithful to the tradition. Certainly he was a young ruler which means he was probably a ruler in the synagogue which mean that he was a very honored, ranking, traditional, faithful Jew or he wouldn't have ascended to that level. He was extremely religious and he was very sincere or he never would have come to Jesus and asked how to get eternal life. So you had a sincere, religious, traditional, loyal Jew called the rich young ruler in Matthew 19. And he comes to Jesus and Jesus asks him about his life and he says I've always kept the law, just like Paul. And then Jesus shows him a better way. He says, "Give up everything you have and follow Me." And the young man said no, walked away.
*Paul said just the opposite. Paul said I've got all these credentials, man, I've got race, rank, ritual, I've got tradition, religion, sincerity, works-righteousness, I've got my profit column filled up. Jesus said, "Drop it all and follow Me." Paul said yes. And he counted it all but loss to gain Christ. The rich young ruler counted it all gain and forsook Christ. Every person in the world is in one of those two categories. When you meet Christ you either drop all the stuff that you've been counting on for your salvation and take Christ alone, or you hold to all the stuff you've been holding on to for your salvation and turn your back on Christ. Those two categories, you're in one of them, everyone is. That's it.
*So, whose child are you? The child of Paul? Or the child of the rich young ruler? What are you counting on, who are you counting on for your salvation? You're either trusting yourself and your achievements, or Christ. And when you come to trust Christ, all the achievements become rubbish. That's the exchange.
Amen
Troy
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