A Formula For Your Joy

This week we took a look at Philippians 3:1-11. The key to understanding this passage is, perhaps, the easiest to miss. In all this passage about enemies of Christ, Paul’s transformation, suffering, resurrection, and more, two things keep standing out. First, is the command to rejoice (or Paul’s example of rejoicing). Second, the instruction to stand firm in the Lord, or fix our gaze on the things of God.

The whole second half of the letter is one long conclusion where Paul ties these two themes together. His conclusion, what we’re to do with all this, comes in the form of a repeated command: “Rejoice in the Lord.”

To rejoice, you must first find something worth rejoicing over. And that thing must be forefront on your mind, not obscured by distraction or pain. That’s how you come to rejoice, which is why Paul pairs the command to rejoice with instructions about where to fix our gaze. Friends, this is a formula for your joy.

We’ll find that joy doesn’t depend on our accomplishments and our circumstances - the places we naturally look for joy. It’s definitely possible to rejoice in those things. But it’s unwise - we can’t guarantee success in them, they aren’t permanent, they can be taken from us. So Paul is going to give us this formula for joy that doesn’t depend on what’s in flux.

In verses 4-6 Paul is showing all his works-righteousness, and how they’re hardly the formula for joy. A system where we contribute (even a little) to our acceptability before God is incompatible with true, enduring rejoicing. When you think it’s up to you - even a little bit - to make yourself acceptable to God, you will never be free from the need to perform. You can never let your guard down. Even when you think you’re doing well, that you’ve made yourself acceptable (by religious observance, by generosity, by avoiding a certain small set of sins for a while), you might still slip up. Even when you’re good, you might soon fall. So you’re always on alert, always afraid of falling. It’s very hard to rejoice when you’re under pressure.

So this idea, that we could contribute (even a little) to our standing with God, can never lead to our rejoicing. Not only that, but that mentality pushes us away from joy. How often do we avoid, delay going to God in prayer, because we feel we’ve become unacceptable? And distancing ourselves from God, well, he’s the fountain of all joys.

But take a look at verse 8. Thanks be to God, he offered to us that we could “gain Christ,” and be reconciled to him, not by our own righteousness, not by our own merits, but, by faith in Christ. He joins us to Christ, we are “found in him”, and he bestows upon us his own righteousness. Then we are welcome in the presence of the Lord of glory. Then heaven’s gates open to us. Then resurrection is our hope. Then our fate belongs to the One who governs history. Then we are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Christian, your salvation in Christ is an infinite well of blessing, bottomless in its depth, endless in its scope. 

So, Paul says, “Rejoice!”