Rev. Len Abrams Philippians 3:1-11, Hebrews 11: 1-3, 8-16
Where do you place your confidence?
Introduction
Many years ago when I first graduated as a civil engineer in South Africa, one of my early jobs was working on building a new railway marshalling yard where goods trains sort their cars like a post office sorting depot. It had miles and miles of rail track on it which all had to be precisely laid out. One of the features of the new marshalling yard was a steel pedestrian footbridge across the yard the length of 3 football pitches. We built large concrete footings with steel columns to hold the prefabricated footbridge sections. The bridge was manufactured in another city and railed to the site in separate sections.
The day came to lift the sections of the bridge with two large cranes and lower them onto the steel columns. We did it on a Sunday when there was less traffic but a lot of over-time costs. The middle section of the bridge, which had several spans, was the longest. The day had gone well with each section lifted up and lowered onto the columns and bolted into place. We lifted the middle section with the two massive cranes and began to lower it slowly into place – and it missed the columns and just kept going down. The distance between the columns was longer than the bridge span! Someone had made a major and very embarrassing mistake. I had done the layout of the columns so it was a nervous time. It turned out that the error had been made in the prefabricating yard. RELIEF!
Sometimes, even with the best made plans, what you have just does not fit what is needed. Paul, in his letter to the Philippians, talks of a similar situation.
Today we are continuing with the series based on Paul’s letter to the church in Philippi from the book “A life worth living”. Previous topics have included gaining new attitudes, friendships and responsibilities – today we will be looking at New Confidence.
Where do we put our trust, our confidence?
Paul starts off this section of his letter warning the new Christians in Philippi against the Christians from a Jewish background who insisted that all Christians should follow Jewish rites and traditions, chief of which was circumcision for the males which was a sign of entering into the Abrahamic covenant. Interestingly Paul calls them ‘dogs’ which were considered ritually unclean animals in strict Jewish tradition, inferring that they were not only incorrect in their zeal for Christians to become Jewish, but they were also unclean themselves for doing so.
Paul then recounts a series of reasons why, as a Jew, he had previously had confidence that he had met the criteria demanded by the strict ritualistic form of Judaism of which he was a part. They were as follows:
- He was circumcised on the 8th day:- He met the strict ritual requirements – the letter of the law;
- He was of the people of Israel – the right country, the right citizenship;
- He was of the tribe of Benjamin – the right class – all the tribes were not equal;
- He was a Hebrew – the right racial background;
- He was a Pharisee so that there was no questioning his spiritual credentials, nor his intensity or commitment.
All of these factors gave him confidence that he was righteous, that he was meeting the requirements of the Law and was right before God. He was doing ok – the bridge which he had spent a lifetime building would get him there. The bridge would fit the gap.
Now we may read these words and think that they relate to the first century world of a corner of the Roman empire and the ancient religion of the Hebrews but we are often attached to these very same things today. I am taking the funeral of a man on Tuesday who had been religious at one time in his life – many people say that they have been baptised, confirmed and married in church and attend occasionally at Christmas or Easter. They live in a “Christian” country (whatever that is), they are British after all, and well to do. Jolly nice people who have always done the right thing and never broken the law. These things may be fine in themselves, but they are more the criteria for membership of the Country Club than the Kingdom of Heaven – they are the wrong criteria, they do not fit.
What Paul is saying is that all these things at one time added to the PLUS side of the equation which made him righteous before God, as though God holds a scale for each of us and puts all the good things on one side and all the bad on the other. “He was such a good person.” Paul was convinced that his previous credentials and his actions were enough.
Instead, like so many marks of the Kingdom, the Gospel, the good news of Jesus, turns all this on its head. All of what Paul previously held as assets, he now knew were not – if anything they were blockages or impediments. Basically the criteria, the bridge to the Kingdom, is not of our making. God has built the bridge and it is the only bridge that fits – and the bridge is open to ALL God’s people, of every nation through all ages.
So the bridge is there – through the work which Jesus has done through the cross, which is confirmed through his resurrection. We cannot add to that bridge through any good we do, through deepening our prayer life, through fulfilling God’s will for our lives – the bridge is there. Neither can we do anything to weaken or break the bridge by what we do in our lives, by our rebellion, by neglect, by hate or through gross atrocity against humanity or God. We cannot add to or detract from the universal gift of love which God has already made.
We can, however, refuse to avail ourselves of the free gift: we can refuse to cross the bridge which is already there. We could spend our lives trying to build our own bridge – but however hard we try, when the time comes and the bridge is lowered into place, it will be too short. Too often we do avail ourselves of God’s Grace and recognise the beauty of the bridge but then start to try to improve it – we fall back into trying to earn our salvation through our spirituality.
Paul says he wants to “be found in Christ, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.” What is faith? The writer to the Hebrews in our first reading defines it as “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” It is not our purpose today to dig deeply into what faith is – libraries have been written on the topic over the centuries.
One illustration or analogy would be that we may search all the available evidence such as the documentation or design of a bridge, we may look at the experience of others, we may see other cars driving over the bridge, and come to believe that the bridge is safe and will carry our weight or the weight of our car. That is belief. Faith is driving across the bridge – it is putting the belief into action. You have faith in the bridge. It is not blind faith – in the case of the bridge it is faith built on the quality of the work of engineers and construction teams. Now of course the analogy of a bridge can only take us so far in understanding what faith is.
In Abrahams’ case it meant setting out towards a foreign land, towards a promise he would not receive in this life. Believing in the promise of God was not enough – the faith part was in setting out into the unknown. It meant giving belief feet!
To wrap up, I have one more point. I am always amazed at how, if we dig, we so often find new nuggets of gold in Scripture and preparing for this talk this morning I once again found something I had never seen before, notwithstanding Philippians being one of my favourite parts of the New Testament. Reading the very familiar passage of Paul “not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith”. My worry is that the degree of my righteousness seems to depend on MY FAITH. Now I am all too aware that I do not have great faith – Jesus said in Matthew 17:20 “Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” Now I have not moved anything like mountains so how small is my faith? And so this passage worried me and I went hunting to find out more.
It turns out that there is some controversy about the exact meaning of this passage and that different translations have chosen one of two alternative options – one is what we have had read to us “our righteousness is through faith in Christ”, the other is that this passage should be translated “our righteousness is through the faith of Christ” or the faithful work of Christ. I am far more confident in that second understanding – the faithfulness of Christ is what I must put my confidence in, not my own faithfulness which would tie me in knots and lead me down the dangerous path of trying to have a big enough faith to save myself when Jesus has already done it for me.
Jesus, through his love has built the bridge. He has done it all. Where my faith comes in is receiving the gift, availing myself of the grace and having the faith to step onto the bridge which, thankfully is not made of my faith.
AMEN
–oo0oo–
Philippians 3:1-11
1 Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. 2 Watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh.
3 For it is we who are the circumcision, we who serve God by his Spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh 4 though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.
7 But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.
10 I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.
Hebrews 11: 1-3, 8-16
The Meaning of Faith
11 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. 2 Indeed, by faith[a] our ancestors received approval. 3 By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.[b]
The Faith of Abraham
8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he stayed for a time in the land he had been promised, as in a foreign land, living in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he looked forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11 By faith he received power of procreation, even though he was too old—and Sarah herself was barren—because he considered him faithful who had promised.[e]
13 All of these died in faith without having received the promises, but from a distance they saw and greeted them. They confessed that they were strangers and foreigners on the earth, 14 for people who speak in this way make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of the land that they had left behind, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; indeed, he has prepared a city for them.