Philippians 3:4b-16
David A. Davis
October 8, 2023
Jump to audio
A few years ago, the Davises and the Werners were together at McCarter Theater for a concert. That would be Noel, our director of Worship and Arts, and Wendi, my wife Cathy and me. We met for dinner somewhere in town and then headed over to McCarter for a concert that had the cellist Yo-Yo Ma in the billing. We knew that Yo-Yo Ma would not be there. It was a touring concert series that Yo-Yo Ma had something to do with starting. A group of musicians from around the world come together to play instruments and music from around the world. We didn’t really know what to expect. Noel probably did but he didn’t tell us. He didn’t warn us. I don’t really have the vocabulary to describe the music and the experience of listening to it. I can tell you that the bagpipes were amplified. Let’s just say it was a bit of tough slog. At intermission, Cathy remembered that since we had not gone home after work, we both had a car nearby. She leaned over to me and said, “I can’t listen anymore. I’m going home”. I said, “But what about Wendi and Noel?” Cathy said, “They can stay.” With some odd sense of obligation, I guess, I remained for the second set. I arrived home at the end of the concert to find Cathy listening to a recording of Yo-Yo Ma playing Bach’s Unaccompanied Cello Suites and sipping a glass of scotch. It was a combination of cleansing the palette and affirming that one can never get enough of Bach’s Cello Suites. Cathy sort of saying, “I want more of this!”
The third chapter of Philippians read like the Apostle Paul is sort of saying, “I want more of this!’ And the “this” is Jesus Christ. “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection…” Paul. Paul starts with his resume, his CV, his accomplishments, the stripes he has earned, his confidence. “If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more..” But “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection…” “Whatever gains I had, I have come to regard as loss because of Christ…I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord…I regard the loss of all things as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him…having a righteous not of my own but that comes through the faith of Jesus Christ….I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection…”
Paul’s aspirational longing. “Not that I have already obtained this or have already reached the goal, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own…Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on…I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection…”
It all sounds so personal. But you will remember that Philippians is a letter from prison to a congregation seeking to be faithful to the gospel. If a congregation is to stand strong in the face of outside pressures contrary to the gospel, if a congregation is able to mend and maintain relationships worthy of Christ, if a congregation is to exhibit a love overflowing more and more, if a congregation is to produce a harvest of righteousness in glory and praise to God, if a congregation is to witness to life in the face of loss and death, if a congregation is going to be able to rejoice in the Lord always, if a congregation is ever, somehow, to have the same mind that was in Christ Jesus…. according to Paul, there has to be this yearning to know Christ more and more. To know Christ and the power of his resurrection.
Samuel Wells was once the dean of Duke Chapel. When he was there he preached a sermon to the congregation entitled “I Want to Know Christ and the Power of His Resurrection.” Wells encouraged his listeners “feel the tentativeness of it”….I want to know Christ. The tentativeness of it. The preacher suggested that Paul doesn’t exaggerate his faith or claim the strength of his own faith here but acknowledges that he wants, he needs, he yearns to know more. Wells argued that the tentativeness also shows at the end of the sentence. “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in death, if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” If somehow…..I want to know Christ and his resurrection.
It is fair to say that the tentative take on Paul here in Philippians is not the common read. The Apostle Paul and “tentative” is not a common pairing. Most preachers and interpreters would go the other way with Paul’s confidence, arrogance, ego strength. As to this verse in Philippians, the favors Paul’s confidence and certainty. “The righteousness that I have comes from knowing Christ, the power of his resurrection, and the participation in his sufferings.” Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase rings the same bell. “I gave up all that inferior stuff so I could know Christ personally, experience his resurrection power, be a partner in his suffering, and go all the way with him to death itself.” A way confident Paul. But what about feeling the tentativeness of it. I want to know Christ, that I may come to know Christ, if somehow I can know Christ and the power of his resurrection!
Maybe tentative isn’t the right word. How about aspirational. Aspirational longing. Urgent aspirational longing. Feel the longing. It just makes Paul seem more accessible, more down to earth, more like you and me. Here in this place where we gather for worship and sing God’s praise, and tell of God’s love and point to God’s grace and proclaim God’s faithfulness and speak of God’s justice, all the while wanting, yearning, praying to know Christ more and more, to know Christ and the power of his resurrection….wanting more of that. And wanting it now!
Paul’s urgent aspirational longing in Philippians. It feels different than Paul writing about the future glory to be revealed. “For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is not seen. But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” (Romans 8:24-25) That kind of hope has a longer runaway than wanting to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. Wanting to know more and more now. Yes, Christ Jesus has made us his own. Yes, the only righteousness we have comes not from our own but from the righteous that comes to us in and through the faith of Jesus Christ. And yes, we press on everyday by God’s grace and in the power of the Holy Spirit knowing that nothing and no one can take God’s love away from us. God’s love revealed to us in Jesus Christ. But darn, don’t you want to know more. Need to know more. To know Christ and the power of his resurrection so that we might continue to live for and serve and see and experience the ever present and coming reign of God.
Urgent aspirational longing. It’s a bit different than hope because it is a yearning to know and see Christ’s resurrection power at work in your life and in the world now! Tapping into the strength today you know didn’’t come from you. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”. Experiencing a peace and contentment today that was far from your own creation. “My peace I give unto you, not as the world gives I unto you.” Rediscovering a purpose and meaning for these days of your life. A fresh sense of being today that helps you to rise above, step away, press on amid the fray, the rat race, the stress, the warrior-like expectations of work and home and life. “In all these things we are more than conquerors through Christ who loved us.” I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection today!
Like a parent who begs for the college student to text every now and then just “so I know everything is all right.” Is it too much to ask God, for just a glimpse of resurrection power today? Like the teacher who every now and then gets to see the face light up of a student who gains in confidence and understanding. Like the gardener who stands back and admires the beauty of what was planted months ago. Like an athlete on a team during a season of losing. Is it too much to ask, Lord? A win every now then? Some beauty every now and then? Some assurance and understanding? Our urgent aspirational longing, O God. It is know Christ and see the power of his resurrection at work in our lives and in the world!
When word of a diagnosis comes and you’re being flooded with terms you never had to think about before and trying to put together a schedule of tests and appointments in real time and trying to process the weightiest of thoughts and emotions….I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. When you’re being overwhelmed in a semester but simply by the overflowing syllabus but by an intellectual world so full of ideas, concepts and thoughts that can so easily rock the faith formed within you long ago…..I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. When you find yourself there in the pew and the congregation that surrounds you stands yet again to sing of the steadfast love of God and you wonder if you’re the only one in this room with big questions and honest doubts, the only one who feels like you’re just going through the motions…..I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection.
When your heart is heavy with grief that never seems to get any better, or your worried for a friend who always seems to have more than a reasonable share of loss, or the number of deaths among your circle of friends or your friends parents continues to mount….when death just seems to be adding up……I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. When it feels to you like the kingdom of God is not only nowhere at hand, but seems to be losing ground in the world and humanity’s efforts result in lack of civility, and poor or no decision making, and just getting along is hopeless and making progress is a joke…….I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. When you find yourself confronted at work or at school or in the public square or in a random way by the forces of darkness and evil, powers and principalities clearly working against the ways of God, the hair on your neck standing up because the hatred, or the bigotry, or the sin in the room is so palpable……I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection.
The beauty of Bach’s Unaccompanied Cello Suites is that when you hear it for the first time, it feels like you could listen to it forever. That’s how it is with the resurrection power of Christ at work in life and the world once you’ve witnessed it, experienced it, seen it. There’s this longing, this urgent aspirational longing for more it inn life and in the world.
To know Christ and the power of his resurrection.