Philippians 3:12-15| Chasing the Finish Line
Philippians Scriptura Sermon Series • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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We are continuing in the book of Philippians today
We are in Philippians3:12-15
We have been looking at this letter that Paul has been writing to the church at Philippi.
Today Paul is continuing his line of thinking from the section before, but now we see him take it to another level.
So to understand what we are looking at today we need to look at the context of what he said in verse.
If you remember from last week, Paul is talking about how the goal for the believer is the resurrection of the dead, that is what he is striving for.
So with that in mind, look at how he continues this thought in verse 12.
Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected;
In reference to the fact that he is striving after a resurrection, he says this, not that I have already obtained, or am already perfected.
So we see his clear goal, glorification.
What Paul is searching after, the ultimate goal is something he doesn’t have
And what that is, is perfection.
Now this brings up a mindset that especially in our culture is nearly impossible for us to grasp.
In this world, everything is based on time.
Everything has a beginning, a past, a future, and an end.
This is a simple concept.
But when you apply this mindset to the goals of our lives, it narrows the available finish lines.
The premise is this.
If our existence, wether in reality, or in practice, is restricted by our time here on earth, than the only ultimate goal we can reach must be something we can obtain on this earth.
And this is traditionally the default for most.
If I were to ask most people what is the goal in your life.
Wether I am asking a believer or an unbeleiver, most likely they will respond with someone only obtainable on this earth.
Possible responses....
To be rich
To be successful
To be famous
Maybe for the believer....
To be obedient
To serve God and others
Maybe even just to glorify God
But here is the problem, if your goal, if your finish line is something that can clearly be obtained on this end, then that means if you are succesful, the race is over.
I want you to shift your mindset in how you view what true success in this life is.
EX: When a runner is running a race, if they win the race, and pass the finish line, do they keep running?
No? Why do runners stop running when they reach the finish line? Becasue the race is over, they crossed the finish line of the race.
And here is the problem in the christian life, if we set an achievable finish line in the christian life, then only one of 2 things can happen
We never reach it and lose the race
We reach it and the race is over
And in light of your relationship with Christ, and what you are trying to do for him in this life, I dont think anyone would want to say well I hop one day I win this race so I don’t have to run anymore, or I hope I lose this race.
This passage ties back to another of Paul’s letters to the church at Corinth, where he references this very same idea in a more detailed way....
Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.
So it kinda seems like Paul is saying the opposite here.
This seems like a clear end goal, a clear finish line.
He is saying run the race, and trie to win the prize, try to finish the race in 1st place.
But notice how he references this prize....
And everyone who competes for the prize is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a perishable crown, but we for an imperishable crown.
So we have another reference back to this idea of a finite finish line.
Others, they run to get a crown, and even that crown fades away, it has an end.
BUT WE, run for an imperishable crown.
An eternal benefit
So we are faced with really a single conclusion that requires an answer for the christian.
What is our finish line?
What is our goal?
What are we working towards?
We have already read that...
scripture calls it an imperishable crown,
it is something where the prize is eternal,
and we have uncovered that it can’t be something that goes away wants its obtained,
so what is measured as success for the christian, what is our goal?
Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.
Paul says he clearly isn’t there yet, he hasn’t reached the goal, so he presses on.
Now this tells us a lot already, because if Paul hadn’t reached the finish line at this point in his life in regards to service to Christ, than we never will.
Paul is writing this from prison, awaiting an almost certain death because of his sharing of the gospel of Christ.
So if this finish line, this marker was something we could obtain, Paul would have got it already, but he says no.....
EVEN HE IS STILL RUNNING
And he is running after the very thing that Jesus requires of him
Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do,
No we don’t quite have the clear picture of what the goal is yet.
We know Paul hasn’t reached it yet
We know that it offers a prize that last forever
We know it is something that Jesus has called us personally to reach
But it still seems a little vague as to exactly what the finish line is
Like Paul could have said I am pressing toward the goal which is to....
share the gospel with 500 people.
go to church every Sunday
read through the whole Bible
But it isn’t that clear, and all of these things could be accomplished, which would result in Christians finishing the race and checking out
But we do get another clue as to how we reach the finish line, and it tells us a lot about what the finish line is....
Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead,
We reach the finish line by forgetting was was begin, and reaching for what is ahead
EX: Now if know anything about sports, you know that looking the things which were behind is really important,.
How does a team get better? They play a game, then they go to practice to work on the things that they messed up on or need to improve on.
They will also spend time in practice watching film of games of themselves and the team they are going to face next to see what had happened in the past
But what if every practice, the coach gathers everyone around, and he says....
“Oh don’t worry about what happened last game, just forget all of it, we are going to act like it never happened
Don’t watch film of the other team because all of that is in the past, it doesn’t matter”
The team would most definitely lose every game if they had this mindset, why?
Becasuse there is no improvement in the areas where they are lacking
This tells us so much about this finish line we are running towards as Christians.
Because we are told to do the exact opposite, Paul writes that to reach the finish line, we need to forget everything in the past and just work towards what is ahead
But wouldn’t it be a lot easier to prepare for what is ahead if we dwelled in the past and worked on improving where we went wrong?
Well it would...… if the finish line was something we could obtain in this life.
If that finish line was something that we had the full ability to run after and reach in this life, it would make sense to learn from our mistakes so we can reach it faster.
So what does this tell us, this finish line, the goal for the believer is not something that we can cross in this life.
Becasue if we could......
We would be commanded to consistently learn from our mistakes, focus in the past, and improve so we can reach it.
So putting all of this together, what do we know about this finish line for the christian, what are we working towards?
We reach it by not focusing on the past.
The reward for reaching it is an imperishable crown,
And it can’t be something that obtainable in this life
So why run?
And I think a deeper level, maybe even subconsciously this is where a lot of christians land.
Have you ever felt a sense of hopelessness in the christian life
Like you will always sin
You will always fall into temptation
You know you will never be perfect
You know your works will never be enough to please God
So whats the point
Its like if you started a race and they said you might as well not even run becasue you can’t win.
Thats where a lot of chrsitians end up falling back into sin becasue of a sense of hopelessness that they are unable to reach whatever finish line they are supposed to.
Like what it is that we can reach, that we can do, that will actually make my life a success for God?
I press toward the goal for the prize
He presses toward the finish line, to earn the prize.
It’s all about the prize, not the race
Now even this is counteractive to how we would normally view success in sports.
The team doesn’t try to win the championship for the trophy itself.
They are trying to win so they can feel the success and honor and satisfaction of being the best.
The trophy is cool, but they aren’t doing all of that just for a big piece of metal, the big piece of metal just represents what they were chasing, the satisfaction and glory of winning and being the best
But this is the opposite with this Christian race
In this race, it’s all about the prize
It has nothing to do with the glory of winning, or self satisfaction, its all about the prize
So what is the prize....
I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
The prize is the upward call of God, in Christ Jesus.
Simply put, the prize is being called into perfection, glorification, because of, and to be with, Christ.
Christ is the prize at the finish line, he is why we run.
You see we tend to look at this chrstian life as Christ standing on the sideline yelling at us to run faster toward the finish line of....
Obedience
Service
But if that was the case, Christ would be calling you to a finish line you would never reach, in this life or the next.
If the finish line, the goal for the christian was just to be the best servant or the most obedient, we would never reach it and the race would be pointless
Isaiah 64:6 “But we are all like an unclean thing, And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags; We all fade as a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, Have taken us away.”
Romans 3:10–12 “As it is written: “There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable; There is none who does good, no, not one.””
Romans 3:20 “Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.”
Galatians 2:16 “knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.”
Ephesians 2:8–9 “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”
Titus 3:5 “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,”
John 15:5 ““I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.”
Jesus is not standing on the sideline yelling at you to run after some finish line of your own works.
And we actually earned last week what the finish line was, and this is why this passage is really just a continuation of last week.
that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
What is the finish line? = Death
There is nothing we can do on this earth to cross the finish line.
We already established that if there was, then we could cross the line and hang up our running shoes becasue the race is over
But even Paul in his immense life of service, says he still has a race to run
And we see in verses 10 and 11 that the goal is what, knowing him, being conformed to his death, so that he could what? Recieve the ressurection fo the dead
But remember the christian is running the race for the glory of finishing, they are running the race for the prize
And what is the prize? It is Christ
You see Jesus is standing at the finish line of death, that is the what all believers are inevitably running toward, and he is calling us to him, drawing us closer to him, so that once we cross that finish line, we would recieve the prize of Christ, and ressurection of eternal life in him.
But you say Zach that takes me out of the whole picture.
EXACTLY
THAT’S THE WHOLE POINT
Nothing in this christian life is about what we can accomplish
IT IS ALL ABOUT CHRIST
and that is what this whole race is about
and that is why we can’t reach the finish line until death
Because if our prize is Christ, and our finish line is death, than doing more good works doesn’t bring us any closer to the prize, but striving for the prize of Christ will result in us doing the good works.
This isn’t to say we can just live in sin because once we die we will reach Christ
No there is a race, and we are called to run it
but what we must understand is that our goal is to not to reach some level of perfection in our works, but our goal is to run as hard and as fast as physically possible toward Christ
And you will never reach that finish line in this life, it will keep moving, and the more you run the further that finish keeps moving away, but that just means you have covered more ground drawing near to christ.
Now Paul knows this will cause some confusion, because this is a concept we cant really understand.
How can we run a race that we are unable of reaching the finish line, and the prize is something we are incapable of earning on our own?
Well when you think of this in terms of our works and what we are limited to in this life that is a valid question. No race can be won that way here on earth.
So Paul has to clarify and warn against a misunderstanding here.
Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you.
He says its going to take some maturity to have this mindset.
It isn’t natural for us to run a race we know we can’t finish ourselves
It isn’t natural for us to chase after a prize we are unable of earning on our own
So it is going to take a mind of maturity in understanding that we may not get it, it may not make sense to us, but that is what makes the race, and the prize so amazing
This isn’t just some average race, where there is a finish line, you run toward that line, you cross it and you get a prize.
No this is so much more
This race gives you a purpose in this life that ensures you will never be able to reach it.
This is important because Paul was at a point where he could say.… I think I have done enough to reach the finish line.… but instead he says, even in his position that he isn’t there yet, he still has a purpose, a goal, a finish line to reach
And this race gives you a prize that is so much better than some glory of winning, or some metal trophy, this race gives you the God of creation, and perfection in him
So what is our goal in this life?
What is our purpose?
When you go home today, what is it that you place in front of your eyes as success?
Is it going to church more
Is it giving more
Is it being more obedient
Is it serving more
Is it reading your Bible more
You can spend your life chasing after these things but you will never win the race if this is your finish line, because you will never achieve perfection through your works
But if your finish line is the end of your life, and that prize waiting there is Christ, and that is what you spend your life striving towards, then you can know for sure that every minute of your life will be spent running the race that is before you, and you will win the prize.
