Philippian Studies Part 4

"Only let them order their life in a way worthy of the Gospel of Christ." "_Only_"; as if this were the one possible topic for him now.

This will content him; nothing else will. He "desires one thing of the Lord"--the practical holiness of his beloved converts; and he cannot possibly do otherwise, coming as he has just come from "the secret of the presence," felt in his own experience. Will they be watchful and prayerful? Will they renounce the life of self-will, and entirely live for their Lord's holy credit and glory? Will they particularly surrender a certain temptation to jealousies and divisions? Will they recollect that Christ has so committed Himself to them to manifest to the world that it is the "only" thing in life, after all, in the last resort, to be _practically_ true to Him? Then the Missionary will be happy; his "joy will be fulfilled."

What pastor, what evangelist, what worker of any true sort for G.o.d in the souls of others, does not know something of the meaning of that "only" of the Apostle's?

Then he pa.s.ses, by a transition easy indeed in the case of the Philippian saints, to the subject of suffering. In that difficult scene, the Roman _colonia_, to be perfectly consistent, must mean, in one measure or another, to suffer; it must mean to encounter "adversaries," such open adversaries, probably, as those who had dragged Paul and Silas to the judgment seat and the dungeon, ten years before. How were they to meet that experience, or anything resembling it? Not merely with resignation, nor even with resolution, but with a recognition of the joy, nay of the "_gift_," of "suffering for His sake."

Circ.u.mstances infinitely vary, and so therefore do sufferings. The Master a.s.signs their kinds and degrees, not arbitrarily indeed but sovereignly; and it is His manifest will that not all equally faithful Christians should equally encounter open violence, or even open shame, "for His sake." But it is His will also, definitely revealed, that suffering in some sort, "for His name's sake," should normally enter into the lot of "all that will live G.o.dly in Christ Jesus." Even in the Church there is the world. And the world does not like the allegiance to Christ which quite refuses, however modestly and meekly, to wors.h.i.+p its golden image. To the end, pain must be met with in the doing here on earth of the "beloved will of G.o.d."

But this very pain is "a gift" from the treasures of heaven. Not in itself; pain is never in itself a good; the perfect bliss will not include it; "there shall be no more pain." But in its relations and its effects it is "a gift" indeed. For to the disciple who meets it in the path of witness and of service for his Master amongst his fellows, it opens up, as nothing else can do, the fellows.h.i.+p of the faithful, and the heart of JESUS.

[1] Observe the aorist infinitive, _to apothanein_, of _the crisis_, dying, contrasted with the present infinitive, _to zen_, of _the process, living_.--It may be noticed that the renderings of Luther, _Christus ist mein Leben_, and Tindale, _Christ is to me lyfe_, are untenable, though expressing as a fact a deep and precious truth. The Apostle is obviously dealing with the characteristics, not the source, of "living."

[2] _Sunechomai_: literally, "I am confined, restricted from the two (sides)"; as if to say, "I am hindered as to my choice, whichever side you view me from."

[3] Literally, "having the desire"; not "a desire," which misses the point of the words. He means that his _epithymia_ lies in one direction, his conviction of call and duty in the other. _The_ desire, the element of personal longing in him, is for "departing."

[4] The Vulgate renders here, _cupio dissolvi_, as if _a.n.a.lysai_ meant, so to speak, to "a.n.a.lyse" myself into my elements, to separate my soul from my body. But the usage of the verb, in the Greek of the Apocrypha, is for the sense given in our Versions, and above; to "break up," in the sense of "setting out."

[5] Literally, "your progress and joy of the faith." The Greek suggests the connexion of both "progress" and "joy" with "faith." And St Paul's general use of the word _pistis_ favours its reference here not to the objective _creed_ but to the subjective _reliance_ of the holder of the creed.

[6] _Politeuesthe_: literally, "live your citizen-life." But in its usage the verb drops all _explicit_ reference to the _polites_, and means little more than "live"; in the sense however not of mere existence, or even of experience, but of a course of principle and order. See Acts xxiii. 1, the only other N.T. pa.s.sage where it occurs; and 2 Macc. vi. 1, xi. 25.

[7] The words suggest to us that the Apostle might have written, more fully and exactly, _hina ido_, _ean eltho_, _kai hina akouso_, _ean apo_. But it is best to retain in translation the somewhat lax grammatical form of the Greek.

[8] The parallels, 1 Cor. xii. 13, Eph. ii. 18, strongly favour the reference of _pneuma_ here to the Holy Spirit of G.o.d.

[9] It is of course possible to translate _synathlountes te piotei_, "wrestling side by side with the faith," as if "the faith" was the Comrade of the believers. But the context is not favourable to this; the emphasis seems to lie throughout on the believers' fellows.h.i.+p _with one another_.

[10] _Echaristhe_: the English perfect best represents here the Greek aorist.

[11] The Greek may be explained as if the Apostle had meant to write, _echaristhn to uper Christou paschein_, and then freely inserted the antecedent fact of _to pioieuein_.

[12] _Echontes_: the nominative participle takes us back grammatically to the construction previous to the sentences beginning _hetis eotin k.t.a._; which sentences may be treated as a parenthesis. I have attempted to convey this in a paraphrase.

[13] _Adieux_, ed. 1857, pp. 10-12.

[14] From the writer's volume of verse, _In the House of the Pilgrimage_.

"Lord, we expect to suffer here, Nor would we dare repine; But give us still to find Thee near, And own us still for Thine.

"Let us enjoy, and highly prize, These tokens of Thy love, Till Thou shalt bid our spirits rise To wors.h.i.+p Thee above."

NEWTON.

_UNITY IN SELF-FORGETFULNESS: THE EXAMPLE OF THE LORD_

"Our glorious Leader claims our praise For His own pattern giv'n; While the long cloud of witnesses Shew the same path to heav'n."

WATTS.

CHAPTER V

UNITY IN SELF-FORGETFULNESS: THE EXAMPLE OF THE LORD

PHILIPPIANS ii. 1-11

Dissensions incident to activity--Arguments for heart-union--"No plunderer's prize"--"The name"--The tone of the great pa.s.sage--What the "Kenosis" cannot be--It guarantees the infallibility--Doctrine and life--"Only thou"

In the section which we studied last we found the Apostle coming to the weak point of the Christian life of the Philippians. On the whole, he was full of thankful and happy thoughts about them. Theirs was no lukewarm religion; it abounded in practical benevolence, animated by love to Christ, and it was evidently ready for joyful witness to the Lord, in face of opposition and even of persecution. But there was a tendency towards dissension and internal separation in the Mission Church; a tendency which all through the Epistle betrays its presence by the stress which the Apostle everywhere lays upon holy unity, the unity of love, the unity whose secret lies in the individual's forgetfulness of self.

Such dangers are always present in the Christian Church, for everywhere and always saints are still sinners. And it is a sad but undeniable fact of Christian history that the spirit of difference, dissension, antagonism, within the ranks of the believing, is not least likely to be operative where there is a generally diffused life and vigour in the community. A state of spiritual chill or lukewarmness may even favour a certain exterior tranquillity; for where the energies of conviction are absent there will be little energy for discussion and resistance in matters not merely secular. But where Christian life and thought, and the expression of it, are in power, there, unless the Church is particularly watchful, the enemy has his occasion to put in the seeds of the tares amidst the golden grain. The Gospel itself has animated the disciples' affections, and also their intellects; and if the Gospel is not diligently used as guide as well as stimulus, there will a.s.suredly be collisions.

Almost every great crisis of life and blessing in the Church has shewn examples of this. It was thus in the period of the Reformation, the moment the law of love was forgotten by the powerful minds which were so wonderfully energized as well as liberated by the rediscovery of eternal truths long forgotten. It was thus again in the course of the Evangelical Revival in the last century, when holy men, whose whole natures had been warmed and vivified by a new insight for themselves into the fulness of Christ, were betrayed into discussions on the mysteries of grace carried on in the spirit rather of self than of love. "We that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burthened." The words are true of the believing individual; they are true also of the believing Church. That which is perfect is not yet come. In the inscrutable but holy progress of the plan of G.o.d in redemption towards its radiant goal, it is permitted that temptation should connect itself with our very blessings, both in the person and in the community. And our one antidote is to watch and pray, looking unto Jesus, and looking away from ourselves.

It was thus in measure at Philippi. And St Paul cannot rest about it.

He plies them with every loving argument for the unity of love, ranging from the plea of attachment to himself up to the supreme plea of "the mind that was in Christ Jesus" when He came down from heaven. He has begun to address them thus already. And in the wonderful pa.s.sage now before us he is to develope his appeal to the utmost, in the Lord's name.

Ver. 1. +If therefore+, in connexion with this theme of holy oneness of love and life, +there is such a thing as comfort+, encouragement (_paraklesis_), +in Christ+, drawn from our common union with the Lord, if +there is such a thing as love's consolation+, the tender cheer which love can give to a beloved one by meeting his inmost wish, +if there is such a thing as Spirit-sharing+,[1] +if there are such things as hearts+ (_splagchna_, _viscera_) +and compa.s.sions+, feelings of human tenderness and attachment, through which I may appeal to you simply as a friend, and a friend in trouble,

Ver. 2. calling for your pity; +make full my joy+, drop this last ingredient into the cup of my thankful happiness for you, and bring the wine to the brim, +by being[2] of the same mind+ (_phronma_, feeling, att.i.tude of mind), +feeling+ (_echontes_) +the same love+, "the same" on all sides, soul and soul together (_sympsychoi_) +in a+

Ver. 3. +mind which is unity itself+.[3] +Nothing+ (_muden_, implying of course prohibition) +in the way of+ (_kata_) +personal or party spirit;[4] rather+ (_alla_), +as regards your+ (_tu_) +humblemindedness+, your view of yourselves learnt at the feet of your Saviour, +reckon[5]

each other superior to yourselves+; as a.s.suredly you will do, with a logic true to the soul, when each sees himself, the personality he knows best, in the light of eternal holiness

Ver. 4. and love. +Not to your own+ interests +look+ (_skopountes_), +each circle of you, but each circle[6] to those+

Ver. 5. +of others also. Have this mind+ (_phroneite_) in +you+, this moral att.i.tude in each soul, +which+ was, and is,[7] +also in Christ Jesus+, (in that eternal Messiah whom I name already with His human Name, JESUS; for in the will of His Father, and in the unity of His own Person, it was as it were His Name already

Ver. 6. from everlasting,) +who in G.o.d's manifested Being[8]

subsisting+,[9] _seeming_ divine, because He _was_ divine, in the full sense of Deity, in that eternal world, +reckoned it no plunderer's prize[10] to be on an equality with G.o.d+;[11] no, He viewed His possession of the fulness of the Eternal Nature as securely and inalienably His own, and _so_ He dealt with it for our sakes with a sublime and _restful_ remembrance of others; far from thinking of it as for Himself alone, as one who claimed it unlawfully would have done,

Ver. 7. +He rather (_alla_) made Himself void by His own act+,[12] void of the manifestation and exercise of Deity as it was His on the throne,[13] +taking[14] Bond-servant's+ (_doulou_) +manifested being+ (_morphe_), that is to say, the veritable Human Nature which, as a creaturely nature, is essentially bound to the service of the Creator, the _bond_service of the Father; +coming to be+, becoming, _genomenos_, +in men's similitude+, so truly human as not only to be but _to seem_ Man, accepting all the conditions involved in a truly human _exterior_,

Ver. 8. "pleased _as Man with men_ to appear." +And+ then, further, +being found+, as He offered Himself to view, +in respect of guise+ (_scheati_), in respect of outward shape, and habit, and address, +as Man+, He went further, He stooped yet lower, even from Humanity to Death; +He humbled Himself, in becoming obedient+,[15] obedient to Him whose Bondservant He now was as Man, +to the length[16] of death, aye+ (_de_), +death of Cross+, that death of unimaginable pain and of utmost shame, the death which to the Jew was the symbol of the curse of G.o.d upon the victim, and to the Roman was a horror of degradation which should be "far not only from the bodies but from the imaginations of citizens of Rome."[17]

So He came, and so He suffered, because "He