Partnership in the Gospel
Philippians 1:5–8
Philippians Lesson #009
June 16, 2022
Dr. Robert L. Dean, Jr.
www.deanbibleministries.org
Opening Prayer
“Our Father, we’re thankful we can be here tonight, where we can come together, we can study Your Word. We have the freedom to meet, to study, to freely proclaim the truth of Your Word, and then to go out as missionaries to the world around us, where we can shine as lights in the midst of a wicked and perverse generation.
“Father, we pray for this nation. We know that we are on a decline, and that it’s very unusual in history for there to be a return to biblical values. It has happened. It will happen again, but it may not happen here. And we need to be spiritually prepared for whatever does happen, especially in a worst-case scenario.
“So, Father, we need to know Your Word. We need to have our souls fortified by Your Word. And we need to practice trusting You, claiming promises day in and day out. We pray that we might be encouraged to do so and encouraged in our walk as we study tonight.
“In Christ’s name, Amen.”
Slide 2
Open your Bibles to Philippians 1. We are looking at the development of this important concept of partnership in the gospel that comes right out of Philippians 1:5. “… for your fellowship—or partnership—for the gospel”—is how it should be translated. I just copied that from the text.
It is not related to salvation. It is related to the function of the gospel ministry because they are supporting Paul so that he can do what he needs to do in taking the gospel where the Lord directs him.
Slide 3
We looked at Philippians 1:5–6 to some degree last week, mostly in light of a comparison and contrast between the opening introduction, which goes down through Philippians 1:11, in terms of the formal introduction. Then Philippians 1:12–26 brings us into a more personal introduction.
Starting in Philippians 1:27, there’s the main body of this Epistle.
All of those kinds of things seem kind of “off.” Why do we spend so much time on those kinds of things when we’re looking at the beginning of a book? That is because we need to understand what he is talking about.
Just like when we go somewhere, and you see some people you know, and you walk up in the middle of a conversation. You overhear what they’re saying. What is the first thing you’re doing in your mind? “What are they talking about?”
You don’t really know what the conversation is, sort of like when you may overhear a conversation in the house. Somebody else is on the phone, and all of a sudden something is said. “What are they talking about?”
You start guessing. You’ll guess, “They must be talking about this thing or that restaurant or a movie or something they read in the paper.”
Then when you get a little more information and a little more information, you suddenly realize your initial guess was way off, that they’re not talking about that at all. They’re talking about something completely different.
In more formal study of hermeneutics, that’s what’s called a “heurism,” which is just a fancy word for making a guess. When you read through a book in the Bible, you’re asking this question: “What’s he really talking about? I don’t understand this.”
All the parts of an Epistle feed into the main theme. If the main theme is X, and you think they’re talking about Z, and you interpret difficult or ambiguous passages within the Epistle as relating to Z, and he’s really talking about X, you’re going to be off base in your interpretation.
It doesn’t mean that you’re in heresy. There are all kinds of people who have used all kinds of verses over the centuries to say, “This teaches that.” What they’re saying it teaches is biblical, but it’s not what’s in that passage. That happens a lot.
Sometimes I thought I would like to do a series on all the famous theologians and preachers through the ages who got saved by some verse that has absolutely nothing to do with salvation. God the Holy Spirit is able to work around our inabilities to truly perceive what is being said.
It’s important when you get into an Epistle like Philippians. Philippians is notorious for being difficult. There are all kinds of books that have been published by different scholars.
Some say the theme of Philippians is joy. Others say the theme of Philippians is how you should think. Other people say the theme of Philippians is related to justification. Other people say, “It’s just a friendly letter. He’s talking about all kinds of different things.”
Does that remind you of any other Epistle? It ought to remind you of James, although I know that for most of you, you haven’t heard me teach James.
James is—often, you read in commentaries, “This is like the Proverbs of the New Testament. There is nothing unifying. It’s just a series of unrelated topics that are brought together.” But that’s not right.
This is one of the challenging things, I think, personally, as a pastor and a student of the Word: trying to discover in some of these Epistles, what that unifying theme is.
I have, over the years, thought that Philippians is about joy, and then it’s about this, about that. And just in terms of the study I’ve done in the last three or four weeks, realizing that it has to do with this partnership in the gospel. Everything that’s here can come under that theme.
There’s a lot there about unity, there’s a lot there about humility, there’s a lot there about joy. But those are secondary ideas to the main idea of this Epistle. Once you get that, it’s amazing how many things are more understandable, if you just realize what it is that they’re talking about.
That is what we looked at last time, this concept of the fellowship in the gospel. That is what Paul is thankful for in this opening prayer.
[Philippians 1:3] “I thank my God …” Then you skip Philippians 1:4. And Philippians 1:5 begins, “for your fellowship—your partnership, your participation, that’s what KOINŌNIA means—in—or for—the gospel from the first day until now.” We will talk a little bit more about how that develops.
Slide 4
We looked at these two questions last time:
1. For what is Paul thankful?
He’s thankful for their partnership in the gospel.
Slide 5
2. For what is he confident?
Is he talking about salvation, or sanctification, or maybe something else?
Slide 6
Usually, people take it that the “good work” is regeneration to glorification. We talked about the different phases or stages of salvation.
Slide 7
Phase one is justification, when we trust Christ as Savior. Then we have phase two, which is sanctification or the spiritual life, spiritual growth. And then glorification.
In justification, we are saved from the penalty of sin, so we don’t go to the Lake of Fire. In the spiritual life, we’re saved from the power of sin in this life. But it’s not until glorification that we’re saved from the presence of sin.
Slide 8
We saw that there are two forms here of sanctification where people approach that. One is that, in a more broad sense, general sense, God graciously works in the believer’s life to enable them to grow if they are willing. That is one that is consistent with a free grace gospel. It’s not a strong statement, that they will necessarily grow if they are truly saved. That’s the stronger Calvinist perseverance position.
Slide 9
The second option is the Calvinist lordship position. A genuine believer in Jesus Christ, who is truly regenerate, will persevere in faith and good works, until God glorifies them following their death or the Rapture.
Slide 10
This is articulated clearly in a Reformed—that means Calvinist—Confession of Faith (or doctrinal statement) for the French Huguenots of 1559, which states, “We believe also that faith is given to the elect …” Notice, if faith is not the product of your volition, God gives faith, saving faith to those who are the elect.
“… not only to introduce them into the right way, but also to make them—[notice that language, ‘make them’]—continue in it to the end.”
In other words, if you don’t continue, if you fail as a believer, and you decide after some years that you’re just going to go off and do your own thing, and you go into some sort of backsliding period, and you die, then you weren’t ever saved. You didn’t persevere to the end.
It goes on to say, “For as it is God who hath begun the work …” In their order, He regenerates you, and then He gives you the faith. Then you will persevere to the end.
Slide 11
John MacArthur, who is probably the most widely known and popular exponent of lordship salvation, which is another term for this Calvinist view of perseverance, says, “That ongoing work of grace in the Christian’s life is as much a certainty as justification, glorification, or any other aspect of God’s redeeming work.”
We know that our glorification is certain, but we don’t know that our spiritual growth is certain, unless you hold to a Calvinist form of perseverance.
He goes on to say, “Salvation is wholly God’s work, and He finishes what He starts. His grace is sufficient. And potent. It cannot be defective in any regard.” In other words, if you fail, then you weren’t ever truly saved.
The reason MacArthur reached that conclusion was an experiential thing, because he started off with a solid free grace gospel. Later in life, he started reading the Puritans a lot. He became convinced of what Jody Dillow calls their “experimental predestination,” which meant you really didn’t know if you were predestined and elect unless you looked at the experiment of your life, as it were.
If you see the right fruit, if you have the right evidence, then you can maybe say that you’re saved. But you can’t be 100% certain.
You have heard me tell you this story before. When MacArthur came out with his first book really articulating all of this, which was called The Gospel According to Jesus, it was promoted at the Christian booksellers convention that year, which was about 1988 in Dallas.
There was a pretty good Christian bookstore in Irving where I lived. They would have these events where they would invite pastors, and they would have breakfast for them. MacArthur spoke, and there wasn’t enough room for everybody.
So, a bunch of us were sitting on the floor. Tommy Ice and I were sitting on the floor right in front of MacArthur, right inside the “sneeze thing.” They didn’t really have one. I just say that. We were that close.
At the end, I asked him because of the statements he made. I said, “Dr. MacArthur, how certain are you that if you died right now, that you’ll go to Heaven?”
He said, “Hmm, about 98% sure.”
See, that’s all you get because your evidence of assurance comes from the fruit in your life, not from the promise of God. That’s part of the problem with lordship salvation.
There are a lot of good things that I’ve heard MacArthur teach, a lot of good things that he has said and done. He has become very popular. He was on Larry King quite a few times. And he was always defending the gospel.
And he didn’t get into it in a lordship way, so unless you knew what he said, you would miss it. But he was always defending the integrity of Scripture, the absolute truth of Scripture. You’ve got to respect somebody like that even if they’re off in some other areas.
Slide 12
You have these different views I pointed out last time. They look at it as salvation. It’s either phase one justification—God began a good work, that’s regeneration, and they’ll use that to say regeneration precedes faith—or phase two sanctification, where the believer is going to grow. God began it when He regenerated them after they believed. They’re going to grow or not grow, but God is going to bring them to glorification.
The phase two I did doesn’t necessarily involve lordship.
Slide 13
This other view—I’ve run into several more scholarly commentaries that take this view this week—that Paul writes of a singular good work, not a plural good works. So, he’s talking about something different. He is not talking about the good works that you get, for example, as a result of salvation,
Slide 14
which we see in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, …” plural.
It’s singular here in Philippians 1:6, “He [began] a good work in you …”
Slide 16
Here is the basic organization where I am at this point. You have the whole introduction, Philippians 1:1–26. You have the introduction proper in Philippians 1:1–11, and then more of a personal introduction in Philippians 1:12–26.
Then you get into the main body. Then the conclusion is Philippians 4:10–20. They mirror each other just like James. I was studying this, and I said, “This is just like James.”
James 1:1–17 introduces vocabulary and concepts that are not mentioned in the body, but they’re all mentioned again in the end. It’s a beautifully written and organized Epistle.
Slide 17
Last time, we had to talk about this basic issue of “what does fellowship mean?” I think this is important because too often you have heard “fellowship” be defined as social interaction. And we hear it that way on the street.
But that’s not what fellowship means biblically. It’s much more than that. It is not simply social interaction. It is not even social interaction among believers engaged in discussion about the Bible or discussion about Scripture.
Slide 18
Fellowship has the idea of partnership, of people who are going to have the same goal. They’re going in the same direction, and they are working together to get there.
That is a great way of understanding the metaphor we have in Scripture, that we’re to walk by the Spirit. We’re going in the same direction.
When we stop walking by the Spirit, it’s because we’ve done an about-face, and we’re going in the other direction. Then we have to confess sin to reverse course. This is a great way to understand this.
Slide 19
We have forms of this word. The basic word is KOINŌNIA. We have also used several times in Philippians, SUGKOINONEA. This is the preposition s-u-n, which means “with, or together with.” So, it just intensifies the idea of this fellowship with one another. Those are these key ideas.
Last time, I went through a lot of the verses, if you remember, that translate one of these KOINŌNIA words. There are quite a few of them that talk about giving, translated as “contribution, sharing financially.” That is an important thing that was a new idea for me. I had not realized it was used that way that precisely.
Slide 20
We have examples here, like in Philippians 1:7, where Paul uses SYNKOINŌNOS, the noun. He says that “it is right for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart …”
This is a very personal verse here. He has a close relationship with the Philippians. He cares deeply about them. He says, “[I need to be concerned about you in this] because I have you in my heart.” In other words, “I think a lot about you, and I think much of you.”
“… inasmuch as both in my chains—that means he’s in prison in Rome and he’s under house arrest—and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers with me of grace.” That’s SYNKOINŌNOS.
Then you see the other side, Philippians 4:15. Now, pay attention to this verse. This is a really important verse. There’s stuff buried here that we miss.
It is coming to the end of the Epistle, and he says, “Now you Philippians know also that in the beginning of the gospel …” What does he mean by that? Is this the beginning of the presentation of the gospel?
The gospel has been going on for a long time. You have the gospel in the Old Testament. You have the gospel of the Kingdom in the period of the Gospels, the period of the Incarnation. Is this the beginning of the Church Age gospel when the Church Age began in Acts 2? What does he mean when he says, “in the beginning of the gospel”?
He’s talking about—it’s just shorthand—in the beginning of their participation in or for the gospel ministry, which he had stated at the beginning of the Epistle. And he says, “… you Philippians know also that in the beginning of the gospel,—and then he defines it—when I departed from Macedonia …” That’s not the beginning of the gospel. That’s the beginning of their participation in his gospel ministry.
It was when he departed from Macedonia. Where did he go? And where was he in Macedonia? He’s at Philippi. Where does he go from there? Where he goes from there is to Thessalonica. So, he walked down to Thessalonica, and he spent about two months in Thessalonica.
He initially started in the synagogue after two or three weeks. They kicked him out. Then the believers met separately.
So, he said, “when I departed from Macedonia …” Not “when I got to Thessalonica,” not “when I got to Berea,” which was the next one on the line. Not “when I got down to Athens” or “when I got to Corinth.”
He says, “when I departed from Macedonia, no church shared—(there’s our word KOINŌNIA) no church partnered with me, no church participated—with me concerning giving and receiving but you only.” That means none of these other churches that he started are sending him a penny to help him and to defray the cost of his ministry, other than the Philippians.
The word there for sharing financially with Paul to support his ministry is the word KOINŌNIA for “fellowship.”
Slide 21
When we look at that closing section, Philippians 4:14 in the New King James says, “Nevertheless you have done well that you shared in my distress.” That is, his imprisonment.
The ESV English Standard Version—fairly recent translation—said, “Yet it was kind of you to share my trouble.” Then they have this note. They have a little A by the word “share,” and they have this note in the margin of the ESV that says, “ ‘Share’ means to have fellowship in Paul’s adversity.”
We don’t think of fellowship as something you have in adversity. We think of fellowship too often as some sort of social interaction. But they are partnering, they are participating in Paul’s adversity. They’re helping him carry the load, as it were.
Slide 22
He says, “… you have done well that you shared in my distress” The word there is this long word, SUGKOINŌNEŌ. It’s a participle.
“You have done well.” That’s the main verb. It’s an aorist tense. It’s a past tense, and so is the participle.
There is a basic rule in Greek. These rules on participles (have) no exceptions. If you have an aorist tense verb and an aorist tense participle, the participle either happens at the same time as the verb, or it happens before the verb.
Here, it would be at the same time. When they did well in the past, that what they did well was, they were sharing. That’s what they did. They participated in Paul’s ministry.
Slide 23
Then in the next verse, which we read a little earlier, Philippians 4:15, he says, “no church shared with me.” So, they shared, but “no [other] church[es] shared with me.” And this is the active indicative form of this verb. No other church gave money or contributed or were partners in his ministry.
So, it’s very clear that the concept of fellowship in Philippians is not social interaction. They’re not just praying for Paul. They are financially committed to making sure they can do what they can.
We’re going to go over to 2 Corinthians 8 to understand where Paul brags on them in order to give a positive example to the Corinthians, who are not doing any giving.
Slide 24
Back to the beginning. (Philippians 1:5) He says, “for your partnership [for] the gospel from the first day until now.”
When we take a look at this and we’re trying to understand what goes on in this particular passage in Philippians 1:5, we have this EIS clause. That is translated “in the gospel,” but that’s ambiguous. And it’s not really good. EIS means “for,” or “with,” or “toward something.”
Slide 25
You have this same word, KOINŌNIA, used with an EIS clause in Romans 15:26 and in 2 Corinthians 9:13.
In Romans 15:26, it’s talking about a contribution. It’s financial. A contribution “for” the poor. It’s not "in”; it’s “for” the poor.
In 2 Corinthians 9:13, it’s translated “liberal sharing” or liberal giving, generous giving. Again, it’s a financial concept in 2 Corinthians 9:13, liberal sharing. And here, it’s “with” them.
This phraseology is really important. Because the way we normally read this in New King James or in most of the other modern translations, New American Standard, NIV or ESV, any of those, it translates it pretty much traditionally.
You all know why they have a tendency not to change too radically what the translation is, don’t you? They won’t sell any Bibles. It’s a business. They have to print the Bibles. That costs money. They’re going to sell the Bibles.
That happened when the RSV came out. Because back in the 50s when the Revised Standard Version came out, in Isaiah 7:14 they translated PARTHENOS, the word for virgin, as “maiden.” No evangelical conservative wanted to see that the Messiah was going to be born from a maiden and not a virgin. So, all the conservatives were up in arms, and nobody bought the RSV because of that.
So, the publisher lost a lot of money. Or maybe they just didn’t make any money. But it was a huge issue.
So, this word now … We have changed, I hope, our understanding of what the Bible talks about with fellowship. That, number one, it doesn’t have anything to do with social interaction, whether it’s with believers or not with believers. It has to do with a partnership toward a common goal, which should be spiritual growth and edification.
Slide 26
Philippians 1:5 then gives a time frame and says that he’s thankful for their “partnership [for] the gospel from the first day until now.” What happens here is a couple of things that we need to pay attention to.
First of all, he’s not talking about them individually. He’s talking about the church as a corporate entity. We’ve seen that a lot in our study of Ephesians on Sunday morning. They’re talking about the body of Christ as an entity and not talking necessarily to individuals. It doesn’t exclude individual application, but the focal point is what you, as a body of believers, are doing in a local church.
We’re going to see this on Sunday morning. We’re shifting to the next section in Ephesians 4:17. That’s a passage that I’ve been wrestling with for at least two years because of the language that’s there, realizing that there’s probably a good chance that how I’ve understood that for the last 40 years is wrong.
We have to understand it under the rubric that we’ve been seeing all through Ephesians, that this is corporate and not individual. That’s going to rattle our cages a little bit.
This is corporate. He’s thankful to the congregation because they’re taking up a collection. It’s not individual envelopes from different people and different families. It’s one gift from the whole congregation. So, it’s corporate.
These ideas about individual issues related to unity, and related to suffering, and related to the gospel are secondary ideas. This is talking about the fact that the church needs to be unified, and is unified in this process of giving.
So, it can’t be talking about individual salvation from the beginning until now. It can’t be talking about when each one of you first got saved and were regenerate.
It’s talking about the beginning of what? What we saw in Philippians 4:15. It’s the beginning of their financial contribution to Paul. Once he left Macedonia on his way to Thessalonica, they are contributing.
This is really not talking about some sort of individual phase one salvation or individual phase two salvation. This is talking about their participation and partnership with Paul financially in the gospel. From the first day, the congregation, from the very beginning of his trip after he left Philippi, is sending financial contributions.
Slide 27
In Philippians 1:6 then, he goes on to say, “being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.” The “good work” that’s beginning isn’t the good work of regeneration or the good work of spiritual growth. It’s the good work of being a financial partner in Paul’s ministry.
Another observation we should make is, if it’s talking about individual salvation and individual spiritual growth, when does that end? When does your spiritual growth end? “… absent from the body, [face to face] with the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 5:8) Phase three.
What does he say in Philippians 1:6? “Until the day of Christ.” So, what he’s talking about here is that God is completing the work He began with them then. And He’s going to complete it the 2nd century, 3rd century, 4th century, 5th century, all the way down to the 20th and the 21st centuries, until the day of Christ.
So, that which they are bearing, that which they are doing to help Paul is going to bear fruit from generation to generation to generation. That all accrues to them in terms of rewards at the Judgment Seat of Christ, which is what we’ll see the “day of Christ” is referencing.
The other thing we should see is, when you have Philippians 1:6 that is talking about beginning a good work, that verse is sandwiched between Philippians 1:5 and Philippians 1:7.
Slide 28
In Philippians 1:5 and Philippians 1:7, the focal point is on this partnership with the gospel ministry. If you have these brackets talking about partnership in the gospel ministry, and it’s all part of the same sentence, the middle section is not going to talk about something that is completely different.
So, what he’s writing here is, he wants them to have this unity because there’s a lack of unity. But in order for this corporate partnership, for the church’s partnership with his gospel ministry to be effective as much as it can, the people have to quit bickering and have to be unified.
We have talked a lot about unity over in Ephesians 4. Unity doesn’t mean they have to agree, that they all have to be the same, they all have to act the same way, or they all have to have the same opinions. But it does mean that they’re unified on the basics of Scripture and the basics of doctrine, the basics of the gospel and who Jesus Christ is and what He has done.
So, what he says is, “He began a good work” …
Slide 29
I ran across this quote I thought I’d throw up here to show that A, I’ve done my homework, and B, this isn’t something I’m just inventing out of thin air. This is Hawthorne, who is the author of the volume, the commentary on Philippians in the Word Biblical Commentary Series, which is a highly respected scholarly commentary series.
He says, “Rather, ERGON AGATHON—that’s the Greek for good work, singular—finds its explanation in the fact that the Philippians were partners with Paul in the gospel (Philippians 1:5), and shared their resources with him to make the proclamation of the gospel possible. This ‘sharing in the gospel’ is the good work referred to here.”
Then he references 2 Corinthians 8:6. I guess we’ll have to go to 2 Corinthians 8:6 and look at that passage.
Slide 30
2 Corinthians 8–9 is the most thorough discussion of giving in the New Testament. There’s a lot there. The similarities of language with what we find in the beginning and the end of Philippians is really amazing.
We look at 2 Corinthians 8:6, and Paul is writing, “So we urged Titus …” Titus was one of his trainees that he was working with, who later became pastor of the church in Crete. “So we urged Titus, that as he had begun, so he would also complete this grace in you as well.”
What we have in Philippians 1:6 is “… confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will—what? —complete it …” You have those two words here and in Philippians 1:6 that show a similarity.
Slide 31
“So we urge Titus, that as he had begun …” This is the word on the left, PROENARCHOMAI, which has the idea basically “to begin something.” Then the word for “complete” is the word on the right, EPITELEŌ. We run into TELEŌ and TELEIOS a lot, and we know that means “to complete” or “to bring to completion” or “to bring to maturity.”
This is found right in the middle of this long two-chapter discussion on giving. Paul is encouraging the Corinthians with their giving.
Slide 32
We’re just going to read our way through 2 Corinthians 8:1–12. I’m not going to take you through 2 Corinthians 8:8–9.
He said (2 Corinthians 8:1), “Moreover, brethren, we make known to you the grace of God …” That’s not talking about salvation. It’s talking about giving, grace giving. The word for “grace” is used six times in 2 Corinthians 8–9.
He said, “Moreover, brethren, we make known to you the grace of God which had already been given—past tense, this has already happened, the giving of God’s grace—(among) the churches in Macedonia.”
Who lives in Macedonia? The Philippians. He said (2 Corinthians 8:1–2), “… we make known to you the grace of God which has already been given—in the past—among the churches in Macedonia: that in a great trial—or test—of affliction …”
They’re going through adversity testing. They’re going through a situation where maybe the money is being devalued, and they’re seeing the rising costs of fuel and food and all kinds of other things that they can’t afford. We don’t know if they went through a famine, or what the situation is, but they were having a financial test.
He says (2 Corinthians 8:2), “that in a great trial of affliction …” I love the way this verse reads. There are so many opposites here.
“In a great trial of affliction, the abundance of their whining.” That isn’t what it says. That must be somebody in Houston.
“… that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty …” They’re not just poor. They are in deep poverty. They don’t know how they’re going to put a gallon of gas in their car in the next week.
“… the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty—you have affliction and joy, then poverty, and then riches—abounded in the riches of their liberality—or their generosity.”
They weren’t sitting there going, “I’m losing a lot of money right now because the stock market is down. My 401k is down. I don’t have the money. Gas prices, food prices, everything else is going up, and I’m being squeezed. I guess the first thing we’ll do is cut how much money I’m giving to the church or to missions.”
That’s not their attitude.
He says (Corinthians 8:2–3), “… that in a great trial of affliction the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded in the riches of their [generosity]. For I bear witness that according to their ability, yes, and beyond their ability, they were freely willing,”
Slide 33
2 Corinthians 8:4, “imploring us with much urgency that we would receive the gift …” How many times do you know somebody who is really poor, (and you say to them) “No, no, no, no, no. I know you can’t afford it. Don’t give it to me”?
They’re begging, “Paul, you take this money. We’re giving it to you.”
“… receive the gift and the fellowship—KOINONIA, that relates to this financial offering—the fellowship of the ministering to the saints.”
They’re saying, “Paul, we read some of that letter that you wrote to the Ephesians. That said that you’re equipping us to do the work of ministry. Part of the work of ministry is making sure you’ve got food on the table, and you can take care of your financial needs. So, we have taken up a collection, and we’re giving it to you so that you can pay the bills. That’s our ministry. You trained us to do this.”
That’s the partnership of the ministry. Same word as you have in Ephesians 4:12 to the saints.
Then Paul says (2 Corinthians 8:5), “And not only as we had hoped …” He’s really blasting the Corinthians with this because they’re not doing this. He’s using what the Philippians are doing as an example of what the Corinthians ought to be doing.
The Corinthians are saying, “We’re going through hard economic times. There’s a recession. We just don’t have the money.”
So, Paul goes, “Well, look at the Philippians. They don’t have the money either. And look how much they’re coming up with.”
He says, “And not only as we had hoped, but they first gave themselves to the Lord, and then to us by the will of God.” Notice the order there.
When you go to churches and you hear these awful sermons, where they’re haranguing the people and dunning the people for all kinds of money, for all kinds of pet projects, they’re not dealing with it on a spiritual basis.
There’s an order here. First, you have to give yourself to the Lord. In other words, you have to go from being a spiritual baby to recognizing there are some inherent responsibilities in the Christian life. It doesn’t mean that your salvation is dependent upon it, but that you’re responsible to grow.
If you’re not responsible to grow, Paul’s going to call you some dirty names. He’s going to call you “a little baby,” like he did the Corinthians. Then you have to grow up and mature.
He said, “they first gave themselves to the Lord.” They were committed to walking worthy of the Lord, of the calling with which they have been called. “… they first gave themselves to the Lord, and then to us.”
What happens is, a lot of people think, “First I’m going to give to the church, and then I’ve got to figure out where I am in my relationship with the Lord.”
First thing, you’ve got to get your relationship to the Lord right. And then as a consequence of that, you decide what you’re going to do with the treasure and the talents that God has given you.
That’s the context for what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 8:6, which is what I mentioned. “So we urge Titus, that as he had begun …” Begun what? Begun in his ministry, not begun in his Christian life, but begun in his missionary endeavors. “… so he would also complete this grace in you as well.” Grace related to spiritual life, spiritual growth.
Slide 34
2 Corinthians 8:7, “But as you—that is, you Corinthians—abound in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, and in all diligence,—remember, they had all the spiritual gifts and more; they were making them up—and in your love for us—see that you abound in this grace also.”
What’s “this grace”? It’s the giving from the right vantage point, where first you give yourself to the Lord, and then to support Paul.
2 Corinthians 8:8, “I speak not by commandment ...” It’s grace. It’s an individual decision, your individual responsibility. “I speak not by commandment, but I am evaluating the sincerity of your love …”
I think most translations translate that word as “testing.” It’s DOKIMAZŌ. It’s an evaluation to show what’s good and not what’s lacking. It’s the same word that’s used for the Judgment Seat of Christ in 1 Corinthians 3:13. God is exposing the gold, silver, and precious stones. He’s not exposing the wood, hay, and straw. That’s what’s burned up.
“… I am evaluating the sincerity of your love by the diligence of others.” Paul is saying, “I know other believers, like in Philippi. They don’t have what you have, so maybe you had better check things.”
(2 Corinthians 8:9) “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich—that is, rich because He is in Heaven with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit; He has everything—though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor—He entered into this cesspool of Satan’s world—He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.”
Not financially rich, but rich in terms of the abundant life.
Slide 35
Paul then says (2 Corinthians 8:10), “And in this I give advice: It is to your advantage not only to be doing what you began and were desiring to do a year ago ...” That must refer to their desire to financially contribute.
You see this “beginning.” We’ve seen it in Philippians, we’ve seen it with Titus, and we see it here. It’s not talking about regeneration, the beginning of your Christian life.
Remember, this is 2 Corinthians. Actually, it’s probably third Corinthians. There are two epistles that are alluded to that were not kept, that were not part of the Scripture. So you really have 1 Corinthians. Second Corinthians got lost. So, then third Corinthians became 2 Corinthians, and then fourth Corinthians got lost. Are you confused now?
In all of that, if he’s writing this in 2 Corinthians about something they started a year ago, it’s been a couple years or more since he wrote 1 Corinthians, and it’s been a couple years before that that he was there. So, they should have grown. In 1 Corinthians he got all over them because he said, “Three years ago I was here, and you should be mature by now.”
2 Corinthians 8:11, “but now you also must complete the doing of it …” God is going to bring it to completion. It’s not the regeneration to maturity. It has to do with bringing to completion the mission of giving. “… now you also must complete the doing of it: that as there was a readiness to desire it, so there also may be a completion out of what you have.”
I could go through this—we could take about four weeks, but I’m not going to do it—and we could go through all the parallels between 2 Corinthians 8–9 and Philippians 1:5–7. They are financial issues.
Slide 36
We have two key words in Philippians and 2 Corinthians 8:6. That in conjunction with one another focus fellowship on financial contribution. Those are the words “to begin” and “to begin a good work.” The word “begin” and then “to complete it.” Those two words connect the dots.
Slide 37
Second thing that we said is, that in the [second] Epistle to the Corinthians the example for giving is the Philippian church: the poor people down there in Philippi, who are going through all kinds of problems. And yet, they’re giving out of their poverty.
Slide 38
Thirdly, these two chapters in 2 Corinthians have all the major ideas which are in Philippians 1:6 and in the conclusion in Philippians 4.
Slide 39
Then last, we see that the term “good work”—singular—of Philippians 1:6 is also used in 2 Corinthians 9:8.
Slide 40
(2 Corinthians 9:8) “And God is able to make all grace—it’s used eight times in 2 Corinthians 8–9—God is able to make all grace abound toward you,—that’s because God is sufficient—that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work.”
Not plural. “Good work.”
Slide 41
You have the same phrase, ERGON AGATHOS, that you have in Philippians 1:6. And it goes until the day of Jesus Christ. What does that describe?
Slide 42
William Hendrickson—who has a lot of interesting stuff, well studied, a lot of interesting information in his commentaries—in his commentary on Philippians—and remember, he’s Reformed, he’s amillennial, lordship, all of those things—he gives this list.
This is what the day of Christ refers to. He just blends all these things together. He doesn’t recognize there is a distinction between “the day of the Lord” and “the day of Christ.” But he has this summary here.
You have the phrase” day of Christ” in Philippians 1:10, and we’ll run into it again in Philippians 2:16.
He has the phrase “the day of our Lord Jesus”—and there’s a textual variant there for “Jesus Christ”—in 1 Corinthians 1:8 and 2 Corinthians 1:14. Those passages are talking about one distinct event, which is the Rapture, which is immediately followed by the Judgment Seat of Christ.
Then you have the other passages. In 1 Thessalonians 5 and 2 Thessalonians 1–2, “the day of the Lord,” “the day,” and “that day.” Those are describing judgment. That’s what the day of the Lord is.
“The day of the Lord” is not the same as “the day of Christ.” The day of Christ is when Jesus Christ returns in the air to gather to Himself His church. That’s at the Rapture, which is immediately followed by the Judgment Seat of Christ.
Slide 43
He’s going to use this again in Philippians 1:10: “that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere and without offense till the day of Christ.” That makes the day of Christ sound like a positive thing and not a negative thing. The day of the Lord is a real negative thing.
Slide 44
Philippians 2:16, “holding fast the word of life, so that I may rejoice in the day of Christ …” I don’t know anybody who’s going to be rejoicing in the day of the Lord. That’s the Tribulation period, the day of the Lord.
Slide 45
1 Corinthians 1:8, “who will also confirm you to the end, that you may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.” That’s talking about the reward aspect that occurs with the Judgment Seat of Christ.
Slide 46
In 2 Corinthians 1:14, “(as also you have understood us in part), that we are your boast as you also are ours, in the day of the Lord Jesus.” That’s talking about the Rapture, and then the Judgment Seat of Christ which follows.
Slide 47
“The day of Christ” is different from “the day of the Lord.” The day of the Lord describes the horrible time of judgment culminating in the battle of Armageddon. The day of Christ is when Christ comes for His own at the Rapture, which is immediately followed by the Judgment Seat of Christ, when we are rewarded.
Slide 48
Back to our passage. The reference to the day of Christ in Philippians 1:6 is mirrored by the fact that Paul is saying, that because of their financial partnership with him, the fruit of that abounds to their account. That account is going to be checked at the Judgment Seat of Christ.
Slide 49
Then we come to Philippians 1:7. This is a very intimate statement about his care and concern for the Philippians. He says, “just as it is right for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart …”
The word “heart” has a lot of meanings in English, not all of which apply to Greek. It’s the idea of the center of something, and it really relates to our soul and primarily to the thinking part of the soul.
So, he’s thinking about them. That’s what he’s saying in a more intimate way than just saying, “I think about you.” “I think about you in my heart” indicates a more intimate concern.
And he says, “… inasmuch as both in my chains …” That’s just a metaphor for his imprisonment. I don’t think he was in chains under house arrest in Rome. But that doesn’t mean that he wasn’t at some times, from that whole two-year period at Caesarea after he’s arrested in Jerusalem. Then you have the period on the ship and the shipwreck, and then he’s finally taken to Rome. So, he just uses that as a metaphor for his imprisonment.
Slide 52
“… and in the defense—that is, the APOLOGIA—the defense … of the gospel …” It’s a legal defense. I think it’s a little bit of a double entendre here because he’s going to have to have a legal defense before Caesar. And it’s a defense of his gospel ministry and refuting the charges of the legalistic Pharisees and Sadducees in Jerusalem.
Slide 53
Then the word “confirmation.” The word for confirmation (BEBAIŌSIS) has the idea of this process of establishing or confirming something, or validating it. So, the two words together: he’s giving a legal defense of the truth of the gospel, validating it as absolute reality.
As he concludes that, he says, “you all are partakers with me of grace.” You’re partners in this whole operation.
Slide 54
Then he concludes (Philippians 1:8), “For God is my witness, how greatly I long for you all with the affection of Jesus Christ.”
Slide 55
He uses a standard phrase, “the bowels of Christ,” “the entrails.” When you feel something deeply, you feel it in your gut, right? So, they would refer to compassion with this term that relates to your kidneys. That’s what it means, is deeply felt affection that he has for the Philippians.
This takes us down to through Philippians 1:8. Next time, we’ll look at the rest of this opening introduction in Philippians 1:9–11.
Closing Prayer
“Father, we thank You for this opportunity to look at these things, and to be challenged with our understanding of fellowship, challenged in the area of giving, challenged in the area of making sure that our focal point is first and foremost, to honor and glorify You and serve You.
“And then second, to carry out whatever other ministries of giving or teaching or helping. Whatever it may be, that that’s second.
“First, we give ourselves to You. We pray You would challenge us with this.
“In Christ’s name, Amen.”