Day 2 – Philippians 1:7-11

Tues 12th May Read Philippians 1:7-11

V7-8: He expresses his heartfelt love and longing for them, grounded in their shared experience of God’s grace, and this real gospel partnership – he is no different from them in Christ, and in His service – remains true in his imprisonment. He is in Caesar’s prison because of his goslel witness – and he is confident they still bear that witness, standing for the truth of the gospel. But note the depth of his love for them – he can call on God as witness to that love. Do we have, and show, that same love to one another in Christ?

V9: And he prays that they may continue to grow in their love, yes for one another and for Him, but surely for the Lord too. (Compare Ephesians 3 v17-19.) This love is not a “fuzzy warm feeling”. It is – as in Ephesians 3 – grounded in knowledge, true and growing knowledge of the Lord, and in spiritual discernment, given to us by the Holy Spirit Himself.

V10: This discernment enables them – and us – to approve the real truth of the gospel (nothing is more “excellent” than that. Yes, to approve it with our minds, to hold it and agree with it, but also to live by it, as God enables us. Only by His work in us, that ministry of the Spirit in making us more Christ-like as we walk in obedience, can we be ” pure and blameless” before Him when He comes again. Not by our own efforts,
but by His work in us – which, as v7, He will complete.

V11: The “fruit of righteousness ” is not our own righteousness, of course. We have none. It is Christ’s righteousness, given to us as He took our sin upon Him and made us “right with God”. (See 2 Corinthians 5:21.) How amazing, that this is not only to the praise of God, but to His glory – the glory He has set in the finished work of His Son, and our salvation!