Last year was a season of losses for me. It started in the spring when I was hospitalized 21 days for double pneumonia. The lung infection was bad enough, but the extended stay in bed left my right arm thick with lymphedema. Some of it was related to my long-ago therapy for cancer, but this was different. After my lungs cleared, I was sent home, but with a bulkier arm that was hard to lift.

Then in late summer, I developed a second respiratory infection, much worse than the first. During another lengthy hospital stay, I noticed more problems with my right arm. The doctors, however, stayed focused on the more life-threatening issue with my lungs. When the infection cleared and I was ready to go home, it was obvious my arm had suffered more damage. The already minuscule muscles I had used to feed myself were gone. Even with my hand splint, I could not lift the spoon to my mouth.

Decades ago, after suffering quadriplegia in the wake of my accident, doctors warned me that my partially paralyzed muscles would atrophy, and I knew that my “good” arm and my fragile lungs would eventually deteriorate. I just didn’t realize how hard it would be, losing the capacity to breathe well and losing my independence at mealtimes. Like I said, it was a tough year.

My flesh is wasting away, and who would blame me if I complained? Certainly not the world — it’s natural for them to expect an old lady in a wheelchair to grumble over her losses. But followers of Jesus Christ should expect more from me. Much more.

Why Do You Quarrel with God?

The Bible first addresses complaining in the book of Exodus. Things start off well enough after the Lord performs a great miracle at the Red Sea. At first, everyone’s ecstatic about walking through a sea parted on either side like glass skyscrapers. With their hearts bursting with joy, the entire fifteenth chapter is one long praise song:

I will sing to the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously;     the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea.The Lord is my strength and my song,     and he has become my salvation;this is my God, and I will praise him,     my father’s God, and I will exalt him. (Exodus 15:1–2)

A few verses later, though, their song fizzles. Only 72 hours of traveling in the desert without finding water, they grumble and demand of Moses, “What shall we drink?” (Exodus 15:24).

How ironic that they should complain about water! Didn’t they recall that God had just parted a whole sea of it? Their memory was jogged when God made bitter desert water good enough for them to drink. Yet only a couple of campsites later, they put up another stink about water. This time Moses replies, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?” (Exodus 17:2).

Moses sharply rebukes them for disputing with the God who has just wondrously rescued them out of slavery. So, “he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, ‘Is the Lord among us or not?’” (Exodus 17:7).

Do Not Harden Your Hearts

Nowadays, who among us would dare quarrel with God like that? Yet we do, every time we bellyache, quibble over some inequity, or whine about God’s timing or lack of provision. Even when we mutter (thinking it’s barely audible), all of our bemoaning is an assault against one Person: Jesus, the great I Am, who spilled a red sea of blood to wondrously rescue us out of slavery. When things don’t go our way and we grumble about it, we are inasmuch stamping our foot, crossing our arms, and demanding, “Lord, are you among us or not!”

Psalm 95:7–10 is a repeat of the Exodus debacle, except this time it’s not Moses speaking; it is Yahweh himself. And he has a message for us:

Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness, when your fathers put me to the test and put me to the proof, though they had seen my work. . . . They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways. (Psalm 95:8–10)

When God’s people make a habit of complaining, they’ve gone astray and abandoned God’s ways.

“If this is what Jesus endured to rescue me, I refuse to dignify any sin that impaled him to that cursed tree.”

“Wait a minute,” some might say. “Cut us some slack — we’re just letting off a little steam.” If complaining were only a slip of the tongue, I might understand — especially if that person were an immature believer. But when a Christian’s default setting is to grumble, it develops into a character trait — a complaining spirit. A rebellious spirit. Some Christians may not see themselves as stiff-necked rebels when they squawk if it rains on their picnic, but Scripture speaks of a complaining spirit far differently.

Trembling over Our Grumbling

Whenever a group of Christians tour Joni and Friends and stop by my office, I like to spend some time and explain to them the reason behind my smile in this wheelchair. After introductions and a few comments, I’ll pick out someone to reach for the Bible on my shelf and flip to the book of Jude (I have the page marked). Then I’ll ask, “Read the fifteenth verse, please.”

Adjusting her glasses, the reader will say,

Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him. (Jude 14–15)

“Who are these ungodly people?” I’ll ask. “Pedophiles? Mass murderers? Drug dealers in schoolyards?” A few will nod. I then turn to the one with the Bible and ask her to read the next verse: “These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires” (Jude 16).

I close the little lesson, explaining how we tend to think of sin on a sliding scale. We place on one side gross wickedness like barstool swearing and Satan worship, and on the other nitpicking (complaints that appear respectable). We think we are not as ungodly as those evil reprobates who take part in orgies and follow the horoscope. We’re not ungodly at all; we’re merely spewing off about things now and then.

Jude’s scathing judgment, however, proves that God does not split hairs when it comes to sin, especially the sin of complaining. So, he does what we’d consider scandalous: he places grumblers at the top of a sordid list of apostates, connivers, and loud-mouthed boasters “for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever” (Jude 13).

It should make us tremble.

My Life Is Not My Own

After those two times in the hospital, I began rigorous home therapy for my damaged lungs. Twice a day, I must wear a tight vest that violently vibrates my chest for fifteen minutes as I inhale steroids through a nebulizer. “How long do I have to keep this up?” I asked my pulmonologist.

“Indefinitely,” he replied, “if you want to live.”

I was numb. That first week I tried to ignore the whole routine, the terrible jackhammering of the vest-machine, as well as the pungent vapors from the nebulizer. I viewed the routine as an unpleasant detour, an inconvenient interruption until I could get back on the main road of life. Ah, but this is your life, I heard the Spirit whisper.

Did I have a right to complain? Actually, I possess no real rights. I laid them all at the foot of the cross, agreeing with 1 Corinthians 6:19–20: “You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” The Son of God was ripped to shreds, and then hung up to drain like a bloodied piece of meat on a hook. And if this is what Jesus endured to rescue me, I refuse to dignify any sin that impaled him to that cursed tree.

I will not coddle anything that helped drive the nails deeper. I relinquished my right to complain so that I might glorify Almighty God through my hardships. Anything less shrinks my soul.

Woes of a Complaining Spirit

A complaining spirit abuses the kindness of Christ, for God “raised us up with [Christ] . . . so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:6–7). God will one day raise us up to showcase the riches and kindness of his grace through us. I dare not diminish that glorious moment with a negative tongue. A grumbling spirit would only prove from heaven that I viewed his kindness as sorely lacking to me on earth.

A complaining spirit reveals a warped understanding of God’s ways with suffering. Through the years, Christ has used my quadriplegia to wrench my heart off of this world and affix it to his own. Jesus has captured my heart, totally ruining me for worldly delights (thus lessening any tendency to complain). My satisfaction is not bound to earthly things; I have been set free to pursue the joys of eternity (2 Corinthians 4:18). Complaining lessens the eternal reward my suffering might have gained. It shrinks my heavenly inheritance.

A complaining spirit weakens our confidence in God’s promises. Psalm 106:24–25 says, “Then they despised the pleasant land, having no faith in his promise. They murmured in their tents, and did not obey the voice of the Lord.” The Christian who wallows in complaining is tempted to believe that God might leave him, that God isn’t always helpful in times of trouble, or that divine grace is lacking for every need. He’s increasingly suspicious whether God’s word is always trustworthy. He feels that suffering is not worth what little eternal benefit it earns (Hebrews 13:5; Psalm 46:1; 2 Corinthians 12:9; Psalm 62:8; 2 Corinthians 4:17).

Chest-percussion therapy at home was a kick in the right direction. Without wasting another week, I decided to use that time to memorize Scripture. My husband opened the white three-ring binder containing passages I’ve either memorized or am in the process of learning by heart. He placed the binder on my bed where I could see it, and while the nebulizer hissed, and the vest rattled my chest, I memorized a batch of Scriptures. Ephesians 1 and part of chapter 2 have become an inoculation against any thought of murmuring, as has the Nicene Creed and Psalms 84, 92, and 121.

I’m sure you’d agree that suffering naturally contains the seeds of complaining. But when cultivated by the Spirit of God, suffering “yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it” (Hebrews 12:11).

Grumbling Is a Contagious Disease

Every morning a girlfriend or two arrives at our home to start the coffee and give me a bed bath, do toileting routines, get me dressed, and sit me up in my wheelchair. Sometimes I can hear them in the kitchen getting things ready, and I think, Lord, I’m in enormous pain, and I have no strength for this day, let alone for these dear helpers. I have no smile for them. But you do! So, please let me borrow your smile.

By the time they open the bedroom door with a fresh cup of coffee, my attitude has been cast for the day. I have God’s smiling grace. I am ready to serve them as they serve me. Ephesians 4:16 says we are one with other believers, and we are expected to act like it: “From [Christ] the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” My work in the body is to build others up, facing my problems with them in mind.

If I were to growl about my pain and paralysis, it would diminish the spiritual walk of these girls. It would sow negative seeds of discord, releasing them to complain about their own headaches and hardships. This exact thing happened in Numbers 14:36–37: “The men whom Moses sent to spy out the land . . . returned and made all the congregation grumble against him by bringing up a bad report about the land.”

I cannot provide a better service to the people around me, including the girls who help me in the morning, than to not complain.

Will We Expect More of Us?

Whatever happened to my arm and the problem with feeding myself? Well, it never got better, but I don’t want any complaint to dare shrink my soul, dishonor my Lord, diminish my inheritance, or impact others negatively.

So, every Friday evening, my neighbor Kristen comes to our house around mealtime to cut up my food and lift it to my mouth so that I can enjoy dinner while my husband enjoys his. But to make sure I don’t allow myself a centimeter of self-pity, I’ll always take a moment to bless her hands: “Lord, shine your favor on Kristen, who is serving you tonight by serving me” (Colossians 3:23–24). The blessing probably helps me as much as it does her.

Do I sound like a saint on a pedestal? Hardly. For I should not be the exception. After all, Titus 2:7 was written for all of us: “Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works.” And there’s nothing good about a complaining spirit. Yes, followers of Jesus Christ should expect more from one another. Much more.

Audio Transcript

By far the hardest part of my work on this podcast is reading the sorrow-filled emails we get, and especially those from parents who have lost young children. Some of you who are listening are enduring tremendous pain, which is so evident in the stories you share with us. And the sorrow of losing a child is only made heavier when that loss may be connected to a parent’s own decision, as is the case in this email from an anonymous woman. “Pastor John, I have been passing through a very dark and hard time since the recent loss of my unborn baby girl. My expected delivery date passed, and I was told to go to the hospital for an induced labor. I delayed that decision, trusting that I would eventually deliver my baby girl without any forced labor needed. A week later, I was told my baby died in the womb.

“I was shattered by the news. I feel directly responsible for my child’s death. I feel God should have given me a sign or something. Why did he allow my baby to die? It’s been seven weeks, and it still feels like yesterday. The pain is fresh every day. My heart is broken. I cry whenever I remember the whole scenario. I find it hard to pray. When I do, I now doubt if God still hears me. I am weighed down to the point that I feel my faith failing.”

When I was in Africa in 1996 visiting missionaries, I met a young Quaker missionary couple who had been there for fifteen years. The year before I got there, their eighteen-month-old daughter was backed over in a car and killed by a visiting missionary in their front yard. And as I was visiting them those months later, their computer was broken, they had car trouble, their housing was being taken from them because the landlord had defaulted on a loan. And in all of that, this couple, to my utter astonishment, was radiant with hope and with the love of Jesus Christ. They had not even gone home to bury the baby. They buried the baby in Kenya and pressed on with the work.

Now, I’m very aware that this young woman who has written to us can respond to that story in two very different ways. She can be angry with me or upset, as though I were trying to shame her that she hasn’t yet felt that kind of hopeful. But she doesn’t have to respond that way to my story. She can respond by saying, “Thank you, God, that you gave to that Quaker couple such grace to survive that unspeakable tragedy and survive it in hope. I don’t feel that way, God, but I want to, and I ask for that miracle to happen in my life.” She could respond that way. I hope she does.

So, here are a few thoughts that I pray God would use to give this kind of sustaining grace to our brokenhearted mom.

1. We just don’t know.

First, we don’t know if your baby would have died anyway, and so we don’t know if you were part of the reason the baby died. We just don’t know. There are too many variables. You don’t know. As much as you feel responsible, you don’t know. Maybe, maybe not.

2. Waiting need not be negligence.

Second, you referred to your negligence. Maybe it was — I don’t know enough to pass judgment — but frankly I doubt it. I doubt that you were negligent. Millions of women have passed their due dates and waited for birth without inducement. All the Piper babies were late, some as much as three weeks. To wait for a natural readiness need not be negligence.

3. Your child’s life goes on.

Third, your baby’s life did not end. If you persevere in faith, you will be with your child in due time. I tried to spell out the reason for believing that in APJ 514. You can go listen to why I believe that. There are just many significant reasons, even biblical ones, that I think are compelling. Don’t assume your baby is dead — not ultimately and not eternally — and that you’ll never know what that baby would turn out to be as God mysteriously gives it mature life.

4. God reigns with goodness and wisdom.

Fourth, I don’t know what you have been taught about the sovereignty of God over life and death, but the biblical truth is that God is sovereign over who lives and who dies and when and how they die. James 4:15 says, “If the Lord wills, we will live.” This is why, when Job’s ten children died all at once in a collapsing house, Job arose, tore his robe, shaved his head, fell on the ground, and worshiped and said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21).

“God is doing a thousand things you cannot see. All of them are wise. All of them work for your good if you trust him.”

It is no true comfort to believe that death is controlled by the evil of Satan or the meaninglessness of chance. That is not a comfortable theology. What comforts us in death — ours and those we love — is that the all-wise, all-governing God has good reasons for whom he takes and whom he leaves and when he does it. Your baby did not die in vain. God is doing a thousand things — yes, ten thousand things — you cannot see. All of them are wise. All of them work for your good if you trust him.

5. God is not against you.

Fifth, even though we don’t know 99 percent of what God is doing in the calamities of our lives, we do know a few of his purposes, because he tells us in the Bible why he appoints suffering for his precious children. For example, James 1:12 says, “Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him.” Every loss is a test from God of our love for God. Our faith and love are being tested to prove that they are real and to make them stronger.

Paul said of his own experience of suffering, “We were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:8–9). God has dealt you, just like Paul, a very painful blow, just like he did Ruth and Naomi in the Old Testament. But he is not against you. He wants you to trust him even more deeply than you do now or ever have.

6. Regret need not paralyze.

Sixth, it is possible to live with a lifetime of regret and not be paralyzed or miserable. The apostle Paul regretted all his life that he had been a murdering persecutor of Christians. To the end of his life, he called himself the chief of sinners because of this horrible history in his life. But instead of paralyzing him, it made him even more effective, a more effective minister of mercy because of the mercy shown to him after his sin. He wished it had not happened, because it was sin. To kill Christians is sin. But he knew God could make even a history of sin serve his saving purposes. You can read that in 1 Timothy 1:12–17.

7. God cleanses and forgives.

Seventh, whatever measure of sin or guilt attaches to you because of your child’s death, God is ready to forgive it. We don’t know. I just don’t know — and I don’t think you know — what measure of involvement was there. But you do know this: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9). The slate wiped clean.

8. God promises his help.

And finally, what we can know for sure in this situation is that God’s will for you is that you fight the good fight of faith and that you win — you win (2 Timothy 4:7). He promises to help you. He speaks these words over you right now from Psalm 91:14: “Because you hold fast to me in love, I will deliver you.” Or again in Psalm 32:10: “Steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.” Or once more, Psalm 34:18: “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves” — he saves — “the crushed in spirit.” Or circling back to Job, who lost all ten of his children, James says this: “We consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful” (James 5:11).

So, be steadfast. Trust him. He’s going to bring you through this humble, strong, wise, kind, confident.

The Lord is risen! The Lord is risen indeed!

Whatever the origins of our English word Easter — and they are apparently too ancient and complicated to trace with certainty, even for Encyclopedia Britannica — Easter has come to function for us today as a two-syllable designation for “Resurrection Sunday.” That’s a good abbreviation: six syllables down to two.

Easter is the highest day in the church calendar, the one Sunday that we specially celebrate the reality that we seek to live in light of every day of the year: Jesus, the eternal Son of God, who lived on earth in full humanity, and died on the cross on Good Friday, rose again bodily on Sunday morning.

And this Easter, we find ourselves at the halfway point of Philippians. In meditating on these verses, with Easter in view, I’ve paused over this word safe in verse 1. What does Paul mean that his “writ[ing] the same things . . . is safe”?

Appeal to Safety

As I was pondering Easter safety this week, I started seeing the word everywhere. Apparently, we are a people very conscious of safety, and very interested in safety, and we perhaps hardly realize how much. In the news just this week was more of the Boeing “safety crisis.” And I saw headlines that read,

“Eclipse safety: NYS task force has been working since 2022 to prepare for April 8”
“Senators say Meta’s Zuckerberg is slow-walking child safety inquiries”

And I found appeals to safety in my own inbox:

The city of Minneapolis directed me to get an HVAC “safety check” as part of a home inspection.
I saw a message from SportsEngine with this call to action: “Keep your athlete safe.”
And I received unwanted marketing emails that offered the option to “Safely Unsubscribe” (in small print at the bottom, if you can find it).

Some of our constant pursuit of safety is, of course, shallow and misguided and overly fearful. Our modern lives can be filled with petty and disordered desires for safety. And at the same time, there are wise, holy, reasonable desires for safety. That’s what Paul appeals to in verse 1:

Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you.

Easter Joy

Before we focus on “Easter safety,” which will be our theme this morning, let me first say something about “Finally” at the beginning of verse 1. I know there’s a preacher joke here. “Just like a preacher! Paul says ‘Finally’ when he’s only halfway done!”

However, this “finally” is actually a loose connecting phrase that can mean “finally” in some contexts, but in others, it can be “so then” or “in addition” or “above all.” The key here is that Paul just mentioned joy and rejoicing in 2:28–29. And before then, he mentioned gladness and rejoicing, twice each, in 2:17–18. And before that, he made a double mention of his own rejoicing in 1:18. Have you noticed how often Paul not only talks about joy in Philippians, but does it in pairs? We’ll see it again in 4:4: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.” It’s like he just can’t say it enough. To say it just once doesn’t seem to do it. He needs to say it again.

And Paul is aware of how often he’s talking about rejoicing, and doing so in pairs, and so after saying “rejoice in the Lord” in 3:1, he adds a little bit of a defense for it. He wants his readers to know he’s aware he might sound like a broken record, but he means it, in the best of ways. He’s not being lazy or simpleminded. He doesn’t want to bore them, but to help them, to make them safe. He overcomes whatever dislike or distaste he might have for obvious repetition, and says, “To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you.”

It’s safe to keep saying, “Rejoice in the Lord.” It’s for your good. You can’t overdo rejoicing in the Lord. Now, you can underdo all sorts of other things while rejoicing in the Lord. You can underdo sorrow and grieving. You can underdo seriousness. And you can overdo all those. You can overdo all sorts of good things. But joy in Christ, rightly understood, truly experienced, you cannot overdo. You cannot overdo rejoicing in Jesus.

Three Safeties

Our question this morning on Easter is, Safe from what? What does Easter joy — the double joy, the repeated joy, the great joy of the resurrection of Jesus, which is the beating heart of the joy of Christianity — what does joy in the risen Christ give safety from and how?

I see three threats in these verses, and so three safeties for us in the Easter joy of rejoicing in the risen Christ.

1. Easter joy gives us safety from foes.

To be clear, foes, or opponents (1:28), in and of themselves, are the least concern of these three threats. They’re still real, but the least troubling on their own. So, Paul says in verse 2,

Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh.

So, who are these “dogs” nipping at the Philippians’ heels?

“You cannot overdo rejoicing in Jesus.”

My family and good friends will tell you I’m not a dog person. I recognize that many of you are dog people. I can respect that — to a degree. Sometimes when dogs come up, I like to say, with a smile, Well, you know what the Bible says about dogs, don’t you?

Let’s just say the picture is very negative — but it does have a twist. Dogs were the scum of ancient cities. They were unclean and nasty, like we think of rats today. Dogs would devour dead flesh and lick up spilled blood. And perhaps related to this, the Jews came to associate Gentiles (non-Jews) with dogs. Gentiles were unclean, according to the old covenant; they were outsiders. You may recall Jesus’s interaction with the Canaanite (Gentile) woman in Matthew 15 (and Mark 7), where he says, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. . . . It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” — the Gentiles (Matthew 15:24, 26).

For Paul, there is an insightful irony in calling these foes “dogs,” because they presume that they are the insiders, and that Gentiles, like the Philippians and us, are the outsiders. We’re the dogs, unclean and unsafe, they think — unless we add old-covenant law-keeping (marked by circumcision) to faith in Jesus.

We call these opponents “Judaizers.” They tried to Judaize Christianity; they tried to put Christ-believing Gentiles back under old-covenant Judaism, rather than letting them just be Gentile Christians in the new covenant without the baggage of the previous era. These Judaizers went around telling Gentile Christians that, essentially, they needed to become Jews physically in order to be truly saved, and safe.

And these Judaizers often dogged Paul’s ministry. They followed him around. After he’d bring the gospel to Gentiles, and move on to the next town, they’d sweep in and try to get new Gentile Christians to think they needed to add Judaism to their faith.

So, when Paul calls them “dogs,” he’s not aiming to insult them but to use instructive irony for the sake of his readers. He’s turning the tables to make the point that believing Gentiles are actually the true Jews (spiritually), and these Judaizers have become the new Gentiles, the outsiders, the dogs. Now Christ has come, and been raised, and inaugurated a new covenant. With Easter Sunday, old is gone; behold, new has come.

And these Judaizing foes might think of themselves as doing good works, according to the old covenant, but in fact they are “evil workers.” In trying to circumcise Gentile flesh in obedience to the old covenant, they are, in fact, mutilators of the flesh. They have missed how Good Friday and Easter have remade the world.

So, how does Easter joy, rejoicing in the risen Christ, make us safe from such foes — these and a thousand others? Specifically, rejoicing in the real Jesus fortifies our souls against trying to add anything to the grounds of our rejoicing. In rejoicing in him — in who he is, in what he accomplished for us at the cross, in his rising back to life, and in that he is alive today and our living Lord on the throne of the universe — we come to know a fullness of joy that will not be flanked or supplemented by anything else. Being satisfied in the risen Christ keeps us from being deceived by other shallow appeals to joy, and keeps us from temptations to try to add to him.

Rejoicing in Jesus is practical. Are you seeking to rejoice in him? Do you aim at this, and pray for this? When you open the Bible, when you pray, when you gather with fellow Christians, and when we come to worship together on Sunday mornings, and when you go to work, and when you live the rest of life, are you seeking to rejoice, to be satisfied, to be happy in the risen Christ?

So, Easter joy gives us safety from foes.

2. Easter joy gives us safety from our own flesh.

This is a greater concern — the danger of self-ruin, the threat of our own sinful hearts, various habits and patterns that would lead us to trust in ourselves for salvation. Or, we might say, the way that foes are a real threat to our souls is through our own sin. Foes harm us by deception. Then, being deceived, we move to trust in ourselves. Verse 3:

For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.

Remember from verse 2 that these Judaizing foes — who claim to be God’s true people, his Israel, the circumcision — they are actually the dogs, the new Gentile outsiders. Because, Paul says, in verse 3, with emphasis, we are the circumcision. We Christians, both Jews like Paul and Gentiles like the Philippians, who — and this is such an important “who” with the sequence that follows.

Here we get to the heart of the Christian life, which is the human heart. Oh, get this clear on Easter Sunday. Get this heart. Get what it means to be God’s new-covenant people. Circumcision of the flesh is not what makes and defines us. Human deeds and efforts and abilities do not make us and define us. Rather, what circumcision of the flesh had been pointing to all along is circumcision of the heart. That is, a new heart, new desires. A born-again soul. New creation in you. God opens the eyes of your soul to the wonder of his risen Son. He changes your heart to marvel at Jesus and rejoice in him. So, here in verse 3, we get three marks of what it means to really be a Christian.

One, we “worship [live, walk, serve] by the Spirit of God.” That is, God has put his own Spirit in us. He dwells in us. We have the Holy Spirit. Can you believe that? If you are in Christ, you have the Holy Spirit. God himself, in his Spirit, somehow “dwells in” you. We saw it in 2:13: “It is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” What power against sin! What power to rejoice in the risen Christ! What power for taking the initiative to love and serve others and gladly do what Christ calls us to do.

The risen Christ has poured out his Spirit, and ushered in a new era of history following Easter. Now, God’s people are no longer under the tutelage of the old-covenant law, but have his own Spirit at work in us. We do not worship and live in the old era but in the new, with God’s own Spirit dwelling in us.

And so, two, we “glory in Christ Jesus.” Which is more joy language, but elevated. “Glory” is literally “boast” — we boast in Christ Jesus. “Boasting” is tricky in English because it has negative connotations. So, the ESV translates it “glory” (as in 1:26). What makes boasting, or glorying, good or bad is its object. And so we boast, The Lord is risen! The Lord is risen indeed!

True Christians are those who glory in Christ Jesus as the sole grounds of our full acceptance with God. So, when someone asks, How do I get right with God? Or, How can I be truly safe — not in the little trivialities of this life but forever? We boast in Christ. “On my own, I’m ruined. But I glory in the risen Christ. I boast in the one who died for me and rose again. He is worthy. I glory in him!”

So, “boasting” or “glorying” is stronger language for the rejoicing of verse 1. This is Easter joy. This is double joy. This is joy intensified, joy magnified, joy heightened, joy expanded, joy enriched, joy elevated, joy resurrected.

Which means, third, by contrast, Christians are people who “put no confidence in the flesh.” We boast in the risen Christ, not self, for ultimate safety. And if you wonder what “flesh” means here, Paul will make it clear in verses 4–6, as we’ll see next week. In sum: putting “no confidence in the flesh” means not trusting in ourselves or any mere human effort or energy to get and keep us right with God. Not any privilege of our birth, nor any natural ability, nor hard work, nor achievement, nor human wisdom — nothing in us or related to us, whether who we are or what we’ve done. Rather, we glory in Jesus.

Which leads then to one last safety that’s implicit beneath the first two.

3. Easter joy gives us safety from God’s righteous fury against our sin.

This is the greatest threat of all: omnipotent wrath. The offense of our sin against the holy God is the final danger beneath the other dangers. The reason foes could be a danger is they might deceive us to put confidence in ourselves and our actions. And the reason putting confidence in ourselves is a danger is that this discounts the depth of our sin and leaves us unshielded, unsafe before the righteous justice of God against our rebellion.

When Paul says that rejoicing in the Lord “is safe for you,” what’s at bottom is ultimate safety, final safety, eternal safety, safety of soul, safety from the divine justice that our sin deserves.

But Easter joy keeps us safe from the righteous fury we deserve, because rejoicing in the risen Christ is the way we take cover in the Son of God who came, and died, and was raised, to deal with our sin and usher us safely with him into the very presence of God.

You might put it this way: the safest soul in all the universe is the one that rejoices in the risen Christ.

“Being satisfied in the risen Christ keeps us from being deceived by other shallow appeals to joy.”

Rejoicing in the Lord is a place of great safety, shielded from every real threat, even the greatest. God will not destroy those who delight in him. Delight in him is a stronghold (Nehemiah 8:10), a fortress, a safe place, because God always preserves those who delight in him.

So, Cities Church, rejoice in the risen Christ! To say it again is no trouble for me, and safe for you.

The Lord is risen! The Lord is risen indeed!

Seeds of Joy at the Table

As we come to the Table, let’s address a question some of us have on a high feast day like Easter, and in a book like Philippians, which accents the importance of rejoicing in the Lord. What if you’re not feeling it? What if you don’t feel happy in the risen Christ? Perhaps you want to rejoice in Jesus, you want to glory in him, but you’re a sinner; your heart’s not where you want it to be. One answer, among others, is this Table.

This Table is not only for those who are boiling over with Easter delight, overflowing with joy in Jesus. It’s also for those who feel their hearts to be sluggish, and know they’re not rejoicing in the Lord like they want to, or like they should. And yet, in the ache of that desire is the seed of joy. In the longing, in the wanting is the seed of Easter joy that we come to nourish and strengthen at this Table.

If you would say with us this morning, “I claim the risen Christ. However high or low my rejoicing, I know myself undeserving. I put no confidence in my flesh. But I do put my confidence, for final safety, in the risen Christ,” then we would have you eat and drink with us, for joy.