'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,
13. For it is God which worketh in you both to
will and to do of His good pleasure.'--PHIL. ii.
12, 13.
'What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder!' Here are,
joined together, in the compass of one practical exhortation, the truths
which, put asunder, have been the war-cries and shibboleths of
contending sects ever since. _Faith_ in a finished salvation, and yet
_work_; God working all _in_ me, and yet I able and bound to work
likewise; God upholding and sustaining His child to the very end;
'perfecting that which concerns him,' making his salvation certain and
sure, and yet the Christian working 'with fear and trembling,' lest he
should be a castaway and come short of the grace of God;--who does not
recognise in these phrases the mottoes that have been written on the
opposing banners in many a fierce theological battle, waged with much
harm to both sides, and ending in no clear victory for either? Yet here
they are blended in the words of one who was no less profound a thinker
than any that have come after, and who had the gift of a divine
inspiration to boot.
Not less remarkable than the fusion here of apparent antagonisms, the
harmonising of apparent opposites, is the intensely practical character
of the purpose for which they are adduced at all. Paul has no idea of
giving his disciples a lesson in abstract theology, or laying for them a
foundation of a philosophy of free will and divine sovereignty; he is
not merely communicating to these Philippians truths for their creed,
but precepts for their deeds. The Bible knows nothing of an unpractical
theology, but, on the other hand, the Bible knows still less of an
untheological morality. It digs deep, bottoming the simplest right
action upon right thinking, and going down to the mountain bases on
which the very pillars of the universe rest, in order to lay there, firm
and immovable, the courses of the temple of a holy life. Just as little
as Scripture gives countenance to the error that makes religion theology
rather than life, just so little does it give countenance to the far
more contemptible and shallower error common in our day, which _says_,
Religion is not theology, but life; and _means_, 'Therefore, it does
not matter what theology you have, you can work a good life out with any
creed!' The Bible never teaches unpractical speculations, and the Bible
never gives precepts which do not rest on the profoundest truths. Would
God, brethren, that we all had souls as wide as would take in the whole
of the many-sided scriptural representation of the truths of the Gospel,
and so avoid the narrowness of petty, partial views of God's infinite
counsel; and that we had as close, direct, and as free communication
between head, and heart, and hand, as the Scripture has between precept
and practice!
But in reference more especially to my text. Keeping in view these two
points I have already suggested, namely,--that it is the reconciling of
apparent opposites, and that it is intensely practical, I find in it
these three thoughts;--First, a Christian has his whole salvation
accomplished for him, and yet he is to work it out. Secondly, a
Christian has everything done in him by God, and yet he is to work.
Lastly, a Christian has his salvation certainly secured, and yet he is
to fear and tremble.
I. In the first place, A Christian man has his whole salvation already
accomplished for him in Christ, and yet he is to work it out.
There are two points absolutely necessary to be kept in view in order to
a right understanding of the words before us, for the want of noticing
which it has become the occasion of terrible mistakes. These are--the
persons to whom it is addressed, and the force of the scriptural
expression 'salvation.' As to the first, this exhortation has been
misapplied by being addressed to those who have no claim to be
Christians, and by having such teaching deduced from it as, You do your
part, and God will do His; You work, and God will certainly help you;
You co-operate in the great work of your salvation, and you will get
grace and pardon through Jesus Christ. Now let us remember the very
simple thing, but very important to the right understanding of these
words, that none but Christian people have anything to do with them. To
all others, to all who are not already resting on the finished salvation
of Jesus Christ, this injunction is utterly inapplicable. It is
addressed to the 'beloved, who have always obeyed'; to the 'saints in
Christ Jesus, which are at Philippi.' The whole Epistle is addressed,
and this injunction with the rest, to Christian men. That is the first
thing to be remembered. If there be any of you, who have thought that
these words of Paul's to those who had believed on Christ contained a
rule of action for you, though you have not rested your souls on Him,
and exhorted you to try to win salvation by your own doings, let me
remind you of what Christ said when the Jews came to Him in a similar
spirit and asked Him, 'What shall we do that we may work the works of
God?' His answer to them was, and His answer to you, my brother, is,
'_This_ is the work of God, that ye should _believe_ in Him whom He hath
sent.' That is the first lesson: Not _work_, but _faith_; unless there
be faith, no work. Unless you are a Christian, the passage has nothing
to do with you.
But now, if this injunction be addressed to those who are looking for
their salvation only to the perfect work of Christ, how can they be
exhorted to work it out themselves? Is not the oft-recurring burden of
Paul's teaching 'not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but
by His mercy He saved us'? How does this text harmonise with these
constantly repeated assertions that Christ has done all for us, and
that we have nothing to do, and can do nothing? To answer this question,
we have to remember that that scriptural expression, 'salvation,' is
used with considerable width and complexity of signification. It
sometimes means the whole of the process, from the beginning to the end,
by which we are delivered from sin in all its aspects, and are set safe
and stable at the right hand of God. It sometimes means one or other of
three different parts of that process--either deliverance from the
guilt, punishment, condemnation of sin; or secondly, the gradual process
of deliverance from its power in our own hearts; or thirdly, the
completion of that process by the final and perfect deliverance from sin
and sorrow, from death and the body, from earth and all its weariness
and troubles, which is achieved when we are landed on the other side of
the river. Salvation, in one aspect, is a thing _past_ to the Christian;
in another, it is a thing _present_; in a third, it is a thing _future_.
But all these three are one; all are elements of the one
deliverance--the one mighty and perfect act which includes them all.
These three all come equally from Christ Himself. These three all depend
equally on His work and His power. These three are all given to a
Christian man in the first act of faith. But the attitude in which he
stands in reference to that _accomplished_ salvation which means
deliverance from sin as a penalty and a curse, and that in which he
stands to the continuing and progressive salvation which means
deliverance from the power of evil in his own heart, are somewhat
different. In regard to the one, he has only to take the finished
blessing. He has to exercise faith and faith alone. He has nothing to
do, nothing to add, in order to fit himself for it, but simply to
receive the gift of God, and to believe on Him whom He hath sent. But
then, though that reception involves what shall come after it, and
though every one who has and holds the first thing, the pardon of his
transgression, has and holds thereby and therein his growing sanctifying
and his final glory, yet the salvation which means our being delivered
from the evil that is in our hearts, and having our souls made like unto
Christ, is one which--free gift though it be--is not ours on the sole
condition of an initial act of faith, but is ours on the condition of
continuous faithful reception and daily effort, not in our own strength,
but in God's strength, to become like Him, and to make our own that
which God has given us, and which Christ is continually bestowing upon
us.
The two things, then, are not inconsistent--an accomplished salvation, a
full, free, perfect redemption, with which a man has nothing to do at
all, but to take it;--and, on the other hand, the injunction to them who
have received this divine gift: 'Work out your own salvation.' Work, as
well as believe, and in the daily practice of faithful obedience, in the
daily subjugation of your own spirits to His divine power, in the daily
crucifixion of your flesh with its affections and lusts, in the daily
straining after loftier heights of godliness and purer atmospheres of
devotion and love--make more thoroughly your own that which you possess.
Work into the substance of your souls that which you _have_. Apprehend
that for which you are apprehended of Christ. 'Give all diligence to
make your calling and election sure'; and remember that not a past act
of faith, but a present and continuous life of loving, faithful work in
Christ, which is His and yet yours, is the 'holding fast the beginning
of your confidence firm unto the end.'