Pressing On - Philippians 3:12-4:1

Introduction

Read Philippians 3:12-4:1

Philippians 3:12–4:1 (ESV)

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.

Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved.

Cool Runnings

Maturity in Christ is seen as a race more than as a final destination. There is a destination that we will reach, and it will be a wonderful and glorious destination.

But often we see the conversion of a person as the destination rather than as the beginning of a race or journey and somehow we end up stopping at conversion.

When the Jamaican team qualified to compete in the Olympic competitions, they simply began their journey towards the prize. It was not the end of that journey.

Often, when we give our testimonies, we talk about what happened when we prayed a prayer of repentance or walked down an aisle to talk with a pastor, but where does the story go from there? Are you getting to know and love Jesus more each day? How is God continuing to work in your life to draw you closer to Himself?

The Christian life is a pursuit after Christ and seeking to know Him more, not simply a one time decision.

Pursue the Prize of Knowing Christ (vv. 12-16)

A. The Goal of the Christian life - Philippians 3:8-9

Philippians 3:8–9 (ESV)

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—

The goal is not simply being able to show off how righteous we are, although if we are growing in our love and knowledge of Christ, He will be making us more righteous. But it will not be pride based on our own self-righteousness.

The goal is not simply forgiveness or heaven, although those are good gifts given to us by God for those who know and love Christ.

The goal is that we would know Christ and be found in Him. When people look at us, they should see our love for Christ and His righteousness shining through us. True maturity is growing in our affections for Jesus.

It is easy to be in control of our outward behaviors. It is impossible to change the natural disposition and affections of our hearts. And yet, to mature, we are called to pursue knowledge and love for Christ, which means to pursue God’s supernatural grace to change our hearts and affections so we will long to know Jesus better than we have before.

So how do we reach that goal?

B. Admit we haven’t arrived (vv. 12-13)

Philippians 3:12–13 (ESV)

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,

First, we have to admit that we haven’t made it to perfection yet.

There were some during Paul’s time that said they were already perfect. Paul himself is admitting that he hasn’t arrived at the goal yet.

He knows, as much as he loves Christ and wants to know Him, there is a long way to go as he grows in his love and knowledge of Christ.

If we think we have already arrived, it is going to keep us from growing in our love for Christ. If you think you’re there, why keep on going?

And really, when we think we have arrived, then our hearts aren’t really concerned about loving Christ. It has found some other idol to focus on.

But the more we grow to love Christ, the more we realize that we don’t love Him the way He deserves. And the more we know of Christ, the more we realize that we do not know of Him.

So the first step in pursuing the goal of maturing in Christ is admitting that we are not there and we still have a long way to go.

C. Don’t let the past keep you from going forward (v. 13)

Philippians 3:13 (ESV)

Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,

Next Paul tells us that he is forgetting what lies behind. He is leaving both his past successes and his past failures behind.

Successes

Our successes, if we can call them ours, which is more God’s gracious victories in our lives, can help encourage us to keep pressing on.

But they can also stunt our growth by tempting us to rest in that success.

We can look at a besetting sin that we struggled with and realize that God has freed us from that sin and we can begin to think, well, I’ve arrived so there’s nothing else for me to fight against.

It’s in that time of thinking that we will most likely be tempted to fall back into that sin or another sin just as wretched, if not more so, than the former.

It is like the fable of the Tortoise and the Hare. The Hare was so sure of his ability to run the race that he quit running and by the time he realized he was losing, it was too late to catch up to the Tortoise. He lost the race because he became too confident in what he had done in the past instead of running the race ahead of him.

Failures

The other way that the past can ruin us is by getting us to focus on our failures.

We can look at the past and begin to believe the lie that we have messed up too much for God to continue to work with us.

Just as there is no righteousness that we can perform to get God to love us more, there is also no sin that can get God to love us less.

Paul was certainly guilty of great sin against Christ and His church. But he refused to look back at his past. He repented of his past. He realized the mistakes and failures of his past. But he got up, shook the dust off himself, and kept on running.

Yes, we must confess our sin to God and recognize our sin for what it is, which is rebellion against a holy God. But when we confess our sin, we must also remember the grace that was poured out for us on the cross.

When Jesus died for you, He knew exactly what He was getting. He knew all of your sins and all of them are covered if you have received His grace by faith.

Learn from and repent from the sin you are guilty of and then get back up and look ahead towards what God has for you in Christ.

D. Press on (vv. 14-16)

Philippians 3:14–16 (ESV)

I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained.

Why?

We press on, not to earn salvation, but because we have received salvation by God’s grace

Philippians 3:12 (ESV)

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.

We press on because we want our hearts to love Christ more than what we currently do.

And we press on because we want to receive the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus, which is to know Christ and to be known by Him.

There should be no greater prize or blessing than to know Christ more.

How?

If the goal is to know and love Christ more, then we press on by finding those things that stir our affection for Christ.

Spiritual Disciplines

Bible reading

Prayer

Fasting

Giving

Reading good theological/devotional books

Fellowship

Corporate Worship

Singing

Worship in Solitude

Imitate Others Pursuing Christ (v. 17)

Philippians 3:17 (ESV)

Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us.

A. Find others who are growing in their love for Christ

Paul tells the Philippians to imitate him and others who are walking and growing in their love for Christ. Listen, we can hear all day long what we need to do, but we are a people who need more than being told what to do, we need to be shown how to do it.

So we need to find and surround ourselves with others who are maturing in Christ, who are pressing on in growing in their knowledge and love for Christ.

This is especially true for our younger generations. Children, God has ideally given you someone at home in which to follow, your parents. Which is why Paul writes in Ephesians 6:1

Ephesians 6:1 (ESV)

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

Your parents, while not perfect, are people God has placed in your life to follow and imitate.

And this is not just for our kids, its for our teenagers and even college students as well. Now, of course, not every parent is growing in Christ, but we are called to look to them first.

But whether your parents are in Christ or not, seek to find other adults in the church in which you can learn from and imitate as you grow in your relationship with Christ.

But even us as adults need to find others we can follow and imitate, which we have discussed before. We are not called to live the Christian life alone, but rather in community where we are learning from others as we grow in our walk with Christ.

B. Be Someone That Others Can Follow

The flip side of this is that we all need to be growing into someone that others can look to and imitate.

Parents, whether you realize it or not, your kids are imitating you! May we be filled with mothers and fathers and grandparents and uncles and aunts who are demonstrating what it means to love and obey Christ with our lives. You are discipling your children, the question is in which direction are you discipling and teaching them. Are you teaching them to love Christ well or to love sports, academics, or friends amore? What are you demonstrating is the greatest love in your life? We should enjoy the good gifts of God in life, but we need to be careful that we are not loving the gifts of God more than we are loving God Himself. Our kids will pick up what we enjoy and love more and they will begin to develop those same loves. If we are always prioritizing our extra curricular activities over meeting with God’s people, they will begin to develop a heart that loves those things more than they do God. Let’s help them learn to love God more than His gifts.

Our parents, however, also need to learn from other people who have gone down that road. We need senior adults who are willing to develop relationships with parents to walk with them during their parenting years and to help them learn how to love Christ and to disciple their children to love Christ.

We also need individuals who are willing to demonstrate God’s love to new believers, to children and students in Sunday school and Awana, to the single man or woman in our congregation. Every one of us should either be following the example of someone growing in Christ, or we need to be showing someone else what it means to be growing in Christ.

There are no sideline spectator Christians. We are either running the race with each other, or we are not running the race at all.

Refuse to Quit Pursuing Christ (vv. 3:18-4:1)

A. We are called to stand firm and endure to the end (3:20-4:1)

The Christian life is not about how you start, but how you finish.

This does not mean that we can lose our salvation, but if we are truly saved, we are going to stand firm and endure to the end, which means we are going to continue to grow in our knowledge of and our love for Christ Jesus.

And we know that if we love Jesus, we will be growing in our obedience to Him.

If we are truly saved and are counted as citizens of heaven, we are being transformed into His likeness. Yes, that means that one day, He will take our perishable bodies and make them imperishable. But it also means that He is transforming us even now to live lives that reflect His character and mind. If we belong to Christ, then He will preserve us and give us the grace necessary to remain faithful to Him to the end.

B. There are many who claim to follow Christ, but are living for their own earthly desires (vv. 18-19)

There are those who claim to believe in Jesus, yet they choose to love other things more than Him. Those things might include good gifts from God that they have placed above God.

Remember, Isaac was a good gift from God to Abraham. But God called Abraham to love God more than he loved Isaac and he helped Abraham to show that he loved God more. We can love and worship our family above God.

We can love our hobbies, activities, sports, work, possessions, all the good things God has given to us can become idols that replace our love for Christ.

Or it might be certain sins that we are unwilling to give up. Maybe we know we struggle with sins like anger or gossip. We shrug it off saying things like, God made me this way. Maybe it’s even a sin of an immoral relationship with a boyfriend or girlfriend or even a homosexual relationship that is clearly spelled out in God’s Word as against how God has designed it.

Listen, we all struggle with different kinds of sin. The question we must ask is, how are we going to deal with it. Paul says that these enemies of the cross are those who claim to follow Jesus, but they have their idols and their sins and they’re alright with them. They do not see them as wrong and they refuse to kill their sin or their idolatry, which shows they actually love their sin or their gods more than they love Christ. These people who refuse to repent cannot truly claim to follow Christ.

Matthew 7:21–23 ESV

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

To stand firm and to keep running this race, we must fight against the sins that keep us from loving Christ. We will never perfectly love Christ in this life, but we are called to grow in that love and knowledge of Him. If there is no desire to grow, no desire to kill and fight against sin, then we must ask ourselves if we truly belong to Him.

Conclusion

Paul’s encouragement to us is to keep running for the prize of knowing Christ. Christ is the one we are living for. Stand firm in Him and do not allow the things of this world to distract you from running hard after Christ.

Seek to grow in your love for Christ. Acknowledge that you are not there and find the things that help you focus on Him and to know Him better.