Work Out
Summary
In this sermon, Mark Oshman explores the themes of humility, obedience, and the multifaceted nature of salvation as presented in Philippians chapter two. He emphasizes the importance of working out one's salvation with fear and trembling, while also highlighting the role of God's grace in the process of sanctification. The discussion encourages listeners to reflect on their personal faith journeys and the communal aspect of living out their beliefs in a world that often challenges Christian values.
Transcript
If you have a Bible, I hope you do. You can work your way to the Book of Philippians. We're in Philippians chapter two. It's our summer series as we're working through Philippians in a series called Enjoy Jesus. I mentioned last week that when we moved back nine years ago, our kids were not born in America. They weren't growing up to that point in America. And so one of the things that we wanted to do is kind of teach them about their home country.
Jen and I are both natives of Colorado. We're one of the few, the rare born here. And so we want to teach them some things about Colorado, Colorado history, Colorado culture. And so we did a lot of things that summer, but one of things we did, we found that, you know, there's nothing more quintessential historical Colorado than going in a gold mine. And so we found a gold mine called the Molly Kathleen gold mine outside of Cripple Creek. And I told just side note real quick.
Told Jennifer like on Friday. Hey, my opening illustration is gonna be about the Molly Kathleen goldmine and she looked horrified. I was like what what's the problem? She's like, you know, a lot of people died in that mine like four months ago I was like no, but I'm still going with it We did look it up someone did die and the tourists were stranded for six hours down in the mine But that's not anywhere in my illustration. So
When you go to the gold mine, well, you you've heard of the San Francisco 49ers, the gold rush of 1849 to California. That was mostly like panning for gold. That was the easy way apparently. Well, in the 1850s, they began to find gold near Boulder and Golden and Denver and Colorado Springs in the hills and in the mountains. And so 100,000 people.
left the East Coast, left their lives, their families, their careers in search of gold, in search of instant riches, 100,000 people. And so in Colorado, it's called the 59ers. 1859 is when they arrived, 100,000 people. Now, of course, most of them did not strike it rich. Many of them were left broken, destitute, and in terrible conditions, but a few did. There were
golden them their hills. so the cry was, Pike's Peak or bust. That was on advertisements on the East Coast. And so people began to make their way there. Well, in 1890, a woman by the name of Molly Kathleen, she becomes one of the first and only women who starts her own mine. And it becomes a booming mine. And when you go into the
the tourist attraction now, you go into the mineshaft elevator after putting on your helmet and getting a little bit of briefing. You go down with the guide and it drops a thousand feet. It's very fast. It feels like you're falling for a thousand feet in pitch black, which is, mean, Disney's got nothing on that. So then you, and they warn you like it's going to be black and you're going to feel like you're falling and it's all true. And so eventually you get to the bottom and you come out and it's cool.
Literally, it's cool, but you go around and I'm tall, so I'm always smacking my head on the caves. But what you start to get a sense of as they're explaining how they did it is just how incredibly difficult it was. At that time, they just had hand drills and dynamite to make their way and make the holes and...
And it was very, very dangerous. It difficult. Twelve hour days back breaking work, blowing up the rock, taking it out, all in search of gold or these veins of gold that would run at all sorts of angles and depths and go in all these different directions. And when they find a vein of gold, that they would just work that vein until the last ounce of gold would come out of the hills there.
At its peak, produced in its day, $500 million worth of gold. That's the equivalent of $17 billion today. In fact, as I was looking at it, I wanted to make sure that I was thinking of the same one that we had went to. And so I looked it up on Google Maps and you see the gold mine is still active, but now just very near it, you see it from the satellite view, it's all strip mining.
where they've stripped mine down a thousand feet and they still are just taking gold out of that place. Now, what does that have to do with our passage today? Well, actually, I think it's a lot. If you can understand the difficulty, the struggle, the danger of that, but also the worth and the treasure of doing that hard work, then you can start to understand what I think the apostle Paul is getting at here.
the apostle Paul, the spirit of God wants for all of us. We're going to come to this passage in Philippians chapter two that I think is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, on what it means for those of us that are currently followers of Christ. What does it mean in this time and this place to live? How now shall we live? But it is one of those passages that has a lot of landmines in it. When I used to travel around Cambodia,
We were living in Asia. There were these signs all over that are still there today. Danger mines everywhere from 1970s Civil War. And you would see the evidence of it all over Cambodia. People missing legs and this like that. There's still just mines all over the place. I feel like our passage today should have this sign in front of it. This is the one of the greatest passages on what it means to be a Christian. But if we're not careful.
There's some landmines. So I just want to give you that warning. Philippians chapter two in this book of Philippians. Paul is writing to a church that he loves and helped establish 10 years prior. He loves these people. He's currently in prison in terrible circumstances, wondering if this is going to be his last day, wondering where his next meal is going to come from. And the Philippian church has sent a gift, have sent him some
money so that he could eat while he was in prison because they don't feed you there. And so he's writing back to them and he's writing with this incredible, incredible sense of joy. In fact, it is the theme of the book that in spite of our circumstances, there can be joy in your life because joy is found in Jesus. And so that's what we talk about often here. Our website you'll see we exist to enjoy Jesus.
and make disciples or put it a few other ways. think John Piper is the one that coined the phrase God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him or happy in him or in older catechism the Westminster catechism question number one what is the chief in demand the chief in demand is to enjoy God and glorify him forever or enjoy God by glorifying him forever we were made for joy we were made to find
our joy in spite of our circumstances in the person the work of Jesus. And so that's where we've Now in chapter one verse 27 Paul had said this only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ. And we saw that it's this term for citizenship. Let you let you represent your heavenly kingdom well because you are citizens of the heavenly kingdom.
And the rest of Philippians is going to answer the question. Well, what does that actually look like? How do we let our manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ? And last week, Paul points to Jesus in that great hymn, that great theological rich hymn of Jesus who humbled himself and did not consider equality with God something to be clung onto, but emptied himself, taking on the form of a servant, becoming like a man and even
being obedient to death, even death on a cross. This was what Paul wanted us to look at. And it's right after that hymn of Christ's humility and then exaltation after his death, burial and resurrection that we come to our passage. And so this has not pulled out a context. The context is important. Paul says, therefore, therefore, and what in light of what you just heard about what Jesus has done, who left his throne in glory,
came and died in your place and now is reigning as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Therefore the word is host a it could be translated as a result as a result of looking at Christ his humility and his glory as a result. He gives them three things a commendation a command and a comfort. Here's the commendation he says my beloved therefore my beloved.
Agapetoi from the word Agape. Agapetoi, my beloved. Paul doesn't say this to everyone. The only other church he says this to is Thessalonians. He loves these people. He's like, I have such affection for this church, my beloved. He says, as you have always obeyed, because he's pointing back to Jesus' obedience, even obedience to the death, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence,
But much more in my absence. Continue to bathe is basically what he's saying. He says I remember when I came to to Philippi and you all became followers of Christ and there was just this strong desire to submit yourself to the lordship of Christ with each other and individually. And so he's just saying now I'm a thousand miles away. I'm in prison. But but as every father to sons or daughters because Paul is their spiritual father.
He wants to see when you grow up and mature, you still are obedient. You are still pressing on. And so he commends them. calls them his beloved. And you can see out of this his tender care for him. So what he says next is where the warning sign should be. Says, so as you have always obeyed, so now not only in my presence, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling. Work out your own salvation. Now, the reason we get uncomfortable with this is because there's just in the Greek, there's just one word between the word work and salvation. So, Therial, work and salvation. So, we get nervous like, what I thought, I thought salvation was, was all grace, all grace. Well, what is this? Why is work so closely tied to our salvation? This is where we
where we're careful. We tend to have a flat and linear view of salvation. We tend to think, well, I got saved and therefore when I get to heaven, I've got the Willy Wonka magic ticket that they got to let me in when I get to the Dick gate. And this is kind of a real simplified version, but this is what a lot of us think. Well, I did nothing. I got the ticket. I'm going to get into heaven. And on some rudimentary level, that's true.
You will go there. for Paul and for the New Testament writers salvation, this word has much more depth and breadth and width that we sit in often. for example, Paul will often talk about this word soteri in the past tense. So let me give you an example of that. So Ephesians 2, 8, 9, the great one. So in the past tense, for by grace you have been saved, past tense, you have been saved.
through faith. And this is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of work so that no one may boast. So is Paul just contradicting himself in the letter to Philippians? No, he's talking about this in the past tense. more than the past tense, in fact, most often this word is in the future tense. the next slide. So in the future, here's one example, Romans 5, 9. Since therefore we have been
justified, that's past tense, salvation, by His blood, much more shall we will be saved. One day is coming, we're going to be saved by Him from the wrath of God. And I love this one as well because we shall be saved by who? God. From what or who? God. You're going to be saved by God, from God, for God. So this is actually the most common
Tense of the word salvation you're going to be said you you have been saved. That's justification You will be saved that's called glorification But here Paul talks about the present tense That there's a present tense to it. For example 2nd Corinthians 2 15 for we are the aroma of Christ to to God among those who are being saved we are in process being saved and we
call this sanctification. There's height, depth and breadth to this word. And in the present tense, it's sanctification. are being saved. So when we are justified, we get the righteousness of Christ. We get the absolute righteousness of Christ. That's our position. But practically, we're not there yet. None of us are there yet. And sanctification is the process, we'll see, empowered by the Spirit, of becoming
practically what we are positionally in Christ. Becoming practically holy, practically righteous, even though we have the holiness and righteousness of Christ. And one day we will fully have the holiness and righteousness of Christ. But we live in the present. We live in the sanctification period. And so Paul says, work out your salvation. Work it out. Now, that makes me think of...
the Molly Kathleen mine. In the first century, there was a philosopher and historian named Strabo. Strabo wrote a 17 volume encyclopedia of the world at that time. And in volume three, Strabo is writing about the mines in Spain and about the workers going into the hills and bringing out gold and silver. And you know what he says? They worked out
gold and silver. He uses the same word that Paul uses. Now you can start to think about it. The gold and silver in the Mollie Kathleen mine, it was put there by God. It's there. But it takes work, a lot of work to get it out. Notice Paul doesn't say work for your salvation or work up your salvation. He says work out
what God has worked in to your life in Christ. You have the righteousness of Christ, in Christ. you have the presence of Christ and we are called to work out. But maybe you're still uncomfortable with even that language. But the New Testament is not uncomfortable with it. New Testament will often talk about this effort that is involved. So Hebrews 12 14 strive for holiness.
without which no one will see the Lord. There should be a striving in our Christian lives. First Timothy 4 7. Train yourself for godliness. And he uses these parallels between athletes and soldiers who go into this training mode so that they can win the prize that there is work to be done. We train ourselves. Second Peter 1 5. Make every effort. Which effort should you make? Every one.
every effort to supplement your faith with virtue. There is this working out what God has worked into us and he says and do this with fear and trembling. Again there's landmines here. Often maybe you've heard well when the Bible says fear the Lord it doesn't really mean fear it means just be in awe of the majesty and glory
God. But the problem with that is there's other words for awe in Greek and Hebrew. Paul knows these words. 35 times in the Old Testament we are commanded to fear the Lord.
when because he's the Lord. He is the sovereign one. He is the holy one. And every now and again every every now and again the veil between heaven and earth gets pulled back in the Bible and people get just the slightest glimpse of who God actually is. And you know what they experience fear and trembling Isaiah in the year King Uzziah died in Isaiah chapter six. He goes into the temple just to
a normal day to church like you might go to and all of sudden God decides this is the day I'm going to pull back the veil and God's glory fills the temple. And you know what Isaiah does? He isn't like, that's awesome. I'm in awe of you, Lord. No, no. He gets on his face. He sucks dirt. He says, woe is me. I'm undone.
I'm a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean lips. I have seen the Lord and I'm dead. I don't know how I'm still breathing in this moment. He thinks he's done. There is some fear in trembling when he sees the majesty, glory and holiness, just the glimpse of God. This is the right response. I mean, even in the New Testament, John, John who writes the gospel of John, John who refers to himself as
the disciple whom Jesus loved. I love that humble brag. I don't want to put myself in the gospel. I'll just say the guy that just really loved. But this guy, John, man, he and Jesus did love him. He was one of the inner three. Like we have scenes in the gospel of John where John's like leaning, lounging with Jesus as they're eating, like next to him, shoulder to shoulder, head on his shoulder, like all that stuff like.
He's close with Jesus. But you know what? When John's an old man and he's on the island of Patmos, God says, OK, now I'm going to pull back the veil a little bit. I'm going to give you a glimpse. He pulls back the veil, gives him a vision in the Book of Revelation. Revelation chapter one, John sees the glorified, resurrected King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Jesus. And what does John do? He doesn't say, Jesus, my homeboy, I'm the one you love.
No. In that moment, he gets on his face and he's like, he says, I fell as though dead until Jesus lifts him up. There is a kind of of fear that is good fear, and it is not exclusive of of love. Right. But like there is just like a recognition that this is a dangerous thing. Like a great example of this is
Chronicles of Narnia, Aslan. He's not a tame lion. He's not a safe lion. He's a lion. But he's good. He's good. When my kids were little, our church was also connected to our house in Okinawa. And so my office was upstairs in the church. every now and again, with four little girls, my wife would be exhausted trying to discipline these kids. And so she would say, go tell your father what you did.
And I always knew, because I'd be in my office and I had a window and I could see the stairs come up. I'd see this little head come up very slowly. Very, very slowly. And then it turned and it faced me and there'd be tears in their eyes. I'd be like, I know what's going on here. But I play dumb. And they open the door and it's like, hey, Zoe, Abby, Hannah, whatever, what you doing? Mom sent me up here. Yeah?
Yeah. Why'd she send you up here?
bit my sister.
Hmm. So she sent you up here to be disciplined. Yeah. What do you think we should do? I don't know.
And I would explain, well, you know, I love you, right? Yeah. And because I love you, I can't let you live in rebellion to your mom because we're training you to live in obedience to your heavenly father. So I have to discipline you, right? Yeah. So there can be fear and love in the room at the same time. Or even take creation. Like a few years ago, again, we were trying to teach our kids about America, so we drove to...
The Grand Canyon. mean, this is majestic. It's awesome. It's beautiful. But there are places where it's not just at the tourist center where it's just a cliff and it just drops off and there's a ton of fear like because one slip and you're dead. But there's no other place you'd want to be in that moment. It gets glorious, but you don't play around with it. So Paul says, work out your salvation.
take work out what God has worked into your life. Do this with fear and trembling. Now if this was the only verse that we had on sanctification we would be a sad lot. We would leave here and be like man I got to I got to really try harder and be afraid apparently and tremble.
But this isn't the only verse. In fact, the very next verse is meant for our comfort. The very next verse, verse 13 says, so after you work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both the will and to work for his good pleasure. It is God who works in you. This is
Good news, this is gospel. We are saved by grace. We will be saved by grace, but even our sanctification is grace. The word work, there is inner gone. We get the word energy from. It is God who pours energy into us. So if I had a miter saw up here and some two by fours and I started to try to cut it, if I don't plug it in, it does nothing.
But the moment I plug it in, it's got energy. I put on my goggles and I chop it in a half a second. It goes through. This is the kind of work that God wants to put in you. He doesn't leave us on our own. He doesn't save us and say, okay, work it out on your own. And when you die, then I'll meet you there. No, His spirit lives in us to energize us to will and to work. This is a comprehensive working of the spirit in our lives. I love
What Charles Spurgeon says about this verse, he says, assistance of divine grace is not given to us to put aside our own efforts, but to excite them. God comes to us to work in us. What? To work in us to be indifferent? no. To work in us with will, with resolution and firmness. Does he work in us having willed to sit still?
no, he works in us to do. The direct effect of the influence of grace upon the heart is to make a man active. And the more divine grace he has, the more energetic he becomes. A man will never overcome sin except by energy. We have the source of all energy. We have the power to conquer all that keeps us down. We have the Spirit of God.
The new covenant is God has removed a heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh. He has put in his spirit so that to to will and to act so not just to give us energy but also to give us the desire. Did you see that this is to will and to work so to have a desire and to actually get to work for his good pleasure. God's good pleasure and our good pleasure are not opposite of each other. They are one in the same. When he
wills and he works in us. do what theologians say is this confluent operation with the spirit. So for example, if I ask you who wrote the book of Philippians, Paul or God? You'd say yes.
So when I say by the spirit in your sanctification as you work for holiness as you make war with your sin as you as you as you strive to to reflect in your life what God has done in you and justification as you do that who's doing that work God or you. The answer is yes. Yes. And if we have any desire for holiness this verse just said well God put it there. Well praise God give me more desire God.
If we have any success in breaking down the hard granite hearts and bringing out the gold, it's God who did that. This is all good news to Will and to work. Well, then Paul goes to an application for the Philippians church. if Jesus is the one who humbled himself, who was obedient to death and is now
reigning as king of kings and lord of lords and we are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling but we do it with the Spirit's energy power and desire how now shall we live verse 14 he says do all things if if Christ really is sovereign over all it means he's sovereign over all every thought every action every desire every conversation every relationship every dollar like he is sovereign over
all. We bring it all under His rule and His reign. We do all things. Now when Paul's writing, we tend to view this only through an individualistic lens, and there's a place for that, but he's writing to a church that as a church needed to work out their salvation, bring out what God has worked into them. And for them, he says this, do all things without grumbling or disputing.
that you may be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. Paul has gotten word of this church that he loves with the immense pressure that they're facing. They're starting to be some fracturing. There's some disunity. There's some grumbling. There's some gossip. They're losing the narrative. Now, we might not think of grumbling and disunity and gossip as that big a deal, but God takes it very, very seriously.
Because Jesus with his blood bought his bride and has sent his bride on mission and nothing derails mission more than these things. And he says so because Jesus is Lord do all things without grumbling or disputing that you may be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. He says among whom you shine as lights in the world. I like what.
The Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper said about this, said, there is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not cry, mine. Mine. It's all his. And when we live in light of that truth, did you see what happens? In a world that is crooked and twisted, that has lost.
their way in a world of brokenness and darkness. When we work out our salvation when we put forth the good that God has put in us we are a light to the world. This is our distinct contribution to the world. But if we if we're not working out our salvation if we are living like all of our neighbors and friends and that don't know the Lord then then there's no distinction there. Jesus put it this way if salt loses its saltiness what is it good for. Nothing.
No one lights a lamp and puts it under a bowl, right? He says, no, you are a city on the hill. But when we work out our salvation, our light shines forth and the world can look on. You know, when you go down into the Molly Kathleen mine and you go through the different tunnels, there's a moment where they say, all right, everybody, turn off your lights. We're going to turn off all the lights. And it's unsettling. I don't know if you've ever been a place where it's absolute darkness and you can sense no movement.
whatsoever. And it doesn't take long to let you just sit in that darkness for a moment where you're like, okay, can we turn on our lights now? And then the guy lights a single match. He's walked down the tunnel a long way and you see this single match and you're just kind of like walking towards it because you're this is, you're just drawn to the light. Like this is our role. This is our distinct calling by God.
in Parker, Colorado in 2025 to work out our salvation, to work out what God has worked in so that we might be a light to the world. So what does that look like for you and for me? I don't know. I don't know all the answers. Maybe you're aware of an area where the Spirit is saying, this is where we're going to do the hard work in your heart, in your mind, in your life, in a relationship. Maybe you're already aware of that. And that's good. So ask God to
to work into will in you. Maybe you don't know and so you just begin to pray. Listen none of us have arrived. All of us are in process but with fear and trembling we want to work out our salvation. So we ask the Lord Lord what area do you want to work on in my life in my church in me.
Maybe it's you do foster care. Maybe you are reaching out to neighbors. Maybe the Lord is saying, I want you to be more bold in your witness and in opening your mouth. I want you to be a better father. I want you to shine the light as a mother to your children. Like there are 10 million applications to this passage and the spirit will work with you in showing those things. So for the glory of God.
and the joy of all people, let's work out what God has worked in, amen? Amen, let me pray for us to that end.
