490: Two Destinies | Tim Henderson

All right, anybody got a 20 on them as a one-time offer, boys and girls? You're on your own.

Hey, you guys have good news. If you look over in this general direction of the sanctuary, you might recognize a familiar face. Quig, welcome home. Guys, we love you, we miss you. Quig has always had a very extensive travel schedule because he's a bishop and oversees a number of other churches. And I can just hear you saying many times coming back, "There's no place like home." And so we would say to you, welcome home. It's good to see you, friend. We love you. Welcome back.

You guys, if you missed last week, we looked at the first half of Philippians 3, which Paul wrote to help us see that the things we treasure about ourselves are inconsequential compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus. Paul counted his own list of accomplishments as rubbish because they have no utility whatsoever in the most crucial thing that a human being could obtain in this world—namely, access to the world to come.

Our righteousness, the things that we love the most about ourselves, are entirely insufficient. There is simply no contest here. Our only hope is that a perfect man would give us credit for his perfect life and take upon himself our blame. All of the things that we treasure about ourselves instead of him will break our hearts and in the end leave us bereft of hope in the most important sorting that we will ever experience.

Our passage this morning, which is the second half of Philippians 3, builds on that case, and Paul applies it personally. As we follow Paul's argument through this paragraph, it will lead us inexorably to that sorting. And so this morning, in a way that you might not be particularly accustomed to and in a way that you might not particularly like, we are going to stare into the most bifurcated moment in the totality of the human story.

The sorting that is coming will be starker, more binary, more absolutely divisional than anything that has ever happened in the history of humankind. The temperature on the moon in the sunshine is 250 degrees. In the dark, it's 208 degrees below zero. The distinction in the coming sorting will be sharper than that. It will be for some more ominous and horrible, marked by weeping and gnashing of teeth, more so than anything they've ever suffered. And for others, it will be more joyful than their wildest dreams as their deepest longings are fulfilled and sorrow and sighing flee away.

We are going to look at that sorting, but first I want to show you how Paul gets there. He doesn't just airdrop into this. Paul was obviously not giving two sermons. He was writing a letter, and so the division from last week to this week—the seven days that elapsed—is an artificial division. What we're about to read is what Paul wrote one second after he wrote what we talked about last week. There's no split. This is all just one big thought flowing through.

So here's what he says in our passage this week, flowing directly out of what we talked about last week:

Not that I have already obtained this or I'm already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. — Philippians 3:12-14

What is he talking about? What is the thing? I haven't obtained it yet. I haven't grasped it yet. What is he talking about? It's actually a little bit complicated.

So recall, if you will, last week we talked about Thomas Chalmers. Do you remember that Chalmers said that we all love two things? The first thing is what you already possess, and the second thing is that which you desire but haven't obtained yet. I'm not letting go of this, and I'm never going to stop striving for that. In fact, as soon as I get this, I'm going to put it into this hand and then start getting something else.

Jesus fits into both of those categories. There is a sense in which you have him—present tense—and there is a sense in which we are seeking to get him—future tense. Both of those things are true.

So if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation—present tense. The old is gone; the new has already come. A huge amount of the Christian experience is already realized. We are his and he is ours. We are present tense, seated in Christ. And in another sense, it lies ahead. We are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling. We eagerly await a Savior from heaven. We are waiting for the blessed hope, the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own.

So it is simultaneously the case that the kingdom has come and the kingdom is coming. Paul already knows Christ and he wants to know him, right?

Now Sloop said something last week—just a little P.S. at the end—and the thing that he shared was so exactly on point, exactly correct. This thing about your endlessly grasping nature, your need for more. We always want more, we always want more, we always want more. That thing is not a brokenness. It's not a result of the fall. Now it very well could be that the particular thing that you want more of could be all jacked up. That's true. There is something wrong with us and we will apply that to the wrong things, but the sheer naked reality that you are always a grasping creature is by design. You are designed to be endlessly thirsty because there will always be more of him. It's how you were made.

If you are in Christ, you will be desiring more, discovering more, satisfied by more of him in a billion years than you can presently imagine. He is infinite and your endless quest for more will finally have found something that can never be exhausted.

And what Paul is saying is this: this quest of his own, to go further up and further in, is a quest that we should follow. And he says, when he's done a million times, for the hundredth time, he's going to invite us to train our eyes on godly examples, on himself, on a handful of others that he's named. This has been a pervasive theme of this letter. Follow the example.

We have seen, we've talked about this like every week, that the shape of the life of Jesus is down for the good of others and then up as God wills. We call it the J-curve. That pattern is repeated not just in Jesus' life but in Paul's life, in Timothy's life, in the life of Epaphroditus.

This time, he's going to say it again, and you're like, "Yeah, we've heard this a million times." I know. We keep saying it because Paul keeps saying it. But this time, the expression of it's going to be a little bit different. In fact, every time he talks about it, he's adding a new facet to it. This time, it's different because Paul is going to give us a new reason that we must follow this pattern.

Take a look at it in verse 17. Paul says:

"Brothers, join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us." — Philippians 3:17

That's standard. That's the old part. So far, so good. What's new comes in verse 18. He says:

"For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you, even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ." — Philippians 3:18

You guys, one reason that we must fix our eyes on the good examples is that we are surrounded by a sea of bad examples. The J-curve is down and then up. Jesus took the lowest place and therefore he was exalted to the highest place. But down for the good of others and then up as God wills is not the only pattern. Not the only possible pattern. In fact, you are absolutely surrounded by people who think that that is a ridiculous pattern.

In fact, what Jesus displayed on the cross is foolishness to most people. Jews demand miraculous signs. Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified and it looks like idiocy. So much so that this way of being is not only something that people ignore, but it is something that they actively oppose. They are, in Paul's language, enemies of the cross of Christ. Not just enemies of Christ, but enemies of his cross—enemies of the cruciform life.

You guys, countless people run their businesses, live their lives, do everything they ever do as if the way up is up. Paul is warning them. Warning the Philippians: do not look to them, but instead keep your eyes on those who walk according to this example.

Two Destinies

So before we look at the darkness of the outcomes between these two groups of people—between the followers of Christ and the enemies of his cross—I want you to notice three things about the setup because I don't think we can go forward without really grappling with what he says in verse 18.

First, it concerns many. Verse 18:

"For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears walk as enemies of the cross of Christ." — Philippians 3:18

You guys, this is not some small sliver of the population that we might just kind of disregard. It's many. Our Lord Himself says this:

"Wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction and many enter through it." — Matthew 7:13

Second, Paul talked about this a lot. He says, "For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears walk as enemies of the cross of Christ." You guys, the coming judgment was a frequent topic of Paul's. We speak of it too little. We think of it too little. We teach on it too little. We avoid it too much.

And third, it made him weep. Paul says, "For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears walk as enemies of the cross of Christ." Now it may be just as well that we speak of it little.

If we do not speak of it with tears, there must be no glee when we describe the terrors that await the lost. It should bring us to tears. It did Paul. Romans, the entire book of Romans, is Paul working out his grief. It is angst about people being lost. He says this in Romans 9:

"I speak the truth in Christ. I am not lying. My conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit. I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, the people of Israel." — Romans 9

Paul suffered terrible things so that the people who hated him and abused him could come to know the Savior. In city after city, he took the hit so that those who hated him could find the grace that he had found. You guys, it was because what he hated more than his own present suffering was their future suffering.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, the great English pastor, put it like this:

"If sinners be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our dead bodies. And if they perish, let them perish with our arms wrapped about their knees, imploring them to stay. If hell must be filled, let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions and let not one go there unwarned and unprayed for."

And our Lord, when he arrived in Jerusalem on the eve of his crucifixion, wept—not for himself, but for the city, for he foresaw the coming destruction. The judgment concerns many. We must not ignore it, and we should speak of it with tears.

Two Destinies

Behold now the bifurcation, verse 19:

"Their end is destruction. Their God is their belly, they glory in their shame with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself." — Philippians 3:19-21

Because according to Paul, the fate that awaits the enemies of the cross of Christ is destruction. He says this over and over through his letters. Here he says, "Their end is destruction." The Greek word for end is "telos." It means the final ultimate conclusion from which there is no reversal.

Earlier in Philippians, he said the same thing referencing this same sorting. In fact, very often when Paul talks about one he talks about the other. He will often pair the horrors of being lost, of being under judgment with the glories of the redeemed. They're often paired together. So in Philippians 1, he says:

"This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved, and that by God." — Philippians 1

He told the Galatians in chapter 6:

"The one who sows to please his sinful nature from that nature will reap destruction. And the one who sows to please the Spirit from the Spirit will reap eternal life." — Galatians 6

It is just all over his letters. And it's not just Paul. All of the New Testament writers spoke about this, and they spoke about it just like this. Here's how the author of Hebrews puts it in chapter 10:

"If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but hear this: only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God." — Hebrews 10

Peter referenced the destructive fires of Sodom and Gomorrah to make the same point in 2 Peter 2:

"God condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly." — 2 Peter 2

And Jesus himself said:

"Do not be afraid of those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the one—namely the Father—who can destroy both soul and body in hell." — Matthew 10:28

You guys, the end that awaits the enemies of the cross of Christ is destruction. After the general resurrection, they will be destroyed. Paul says this concerning many. He says it often. He says it with tears, and he says it in contrast to the glory that awaits the redeemed.

Look at how radically different this is. He says:

"But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him to subject all things to himself." — Philippians 3:20-21

Friends, the most important thing that we can obtain in this world is access to the world to come. Whatever you count as your righteousness, whatever you pride yourself in, whatever games you play as a hedge against your insufficiencies, your failures, your sins, your selfishness, your rebellion—it is a joke. It will never work. What you need is a Savior. You need someone outside of yourself who will enter into your story, who will interrupt your story, and rescue you.

There is between this world and the next a river that you cannot swim. You will be swept away. Among other things, what you need is for this unfit vessel to be transformed—to become the sort of thing that can live forever, that will live forever, that will survive in his presence for ages and ages.

You guys, the sun is 93 million miles away, and you can't look at it for three seconds without burning out your eyeballs. How long do you think you would survive in His presence in a body like this? You need to be transformed. Your tent is breaking down. What you need is someone with power and authority who is also willing to take your weak and mortal body, fallen and impermanent and transform it. The good news is there is such a person. You need someone that will transform your lowly body to be like His glorious body.

And because Jesus died for you and rose from the dead with a new body, He was given all authority. He went to the lowest place and He was therefore exalted to the highest place. Everything has been made subject to Him. And inside His universal mandate of absolute power is the ability to choose from the sea of rebels, men, women and children, to whom He will grant eternal life and whose lowly bodies He will change to be like His glorious body. He will give you credit for His perfections. He will erase the shame of your sin and He will transform you. And if you get that, you get everything. Everything. This is the most all or nothing game that will ever be played. It will be the most consequential sorting in the story of humanity. Everlasting life or eternal death.

Here's how C.S. Lewis puts it:

It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter. It is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbor. The load or weight or burden of my neighbor's glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it and the backs of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses. To remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which if you saw it now you would be strongly tempted to worship or else a horror and a corruption such as you now made if at all only in a nightmare all day long. We are in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. It is in light of these overwhelming possibilities. It is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them that we should conduct all of our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all plays, all politics. There are no ordinary people.

So what do we do about something so vast, so spread, so enormous that we almost never can bring ourselves to talk about it? What are we to do with that? I want to suggest two things.

Two Things to Do

Number one: Believe the gospel. Friends, His mercy is yours for the asking. It is His pleasure to extend you grace and Jesus's atoning death was not just sufficient. It was sufficient for you. This could be the day His grace. This eternal life cannot be earned or purchased. It is a gift given by grace and received by faith.

Isaiah puts it like this:

Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters. And you who have no money, come. Buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Why spend your money on what is not bread and your labor on what does not satisfy? Listen, listen to me and eat what is good and your soul will delight in the richest fare. Come, give ear and come to me. Hear me, that your soul may live and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, My faithful love promised to David. — Isaiah 55

Friends, why perish? Believe the gospel and live forever.

Second thing that I think we are to do: I've already mentioned it—speak of it to many. Speak of it often. Speak of it with tears.

Hudson Taylor—is his name familiar to you? Do you know Hudson Taylor? He was a great missionary, probably responsible more than any other person for opening China to the gospel in the 1800s. Just massive influence around the world. And before he was a missionary, he was actually a medical assistant. But it didn't particularly matter if he was here, if he was there, if his profession was missionary or medical man. He was always an evangelist.

He told a story that he had a particular patient, an old atheist man who had a gangrenous foot. And when Taylor would bandage his wounds and care for him, he would also speak to him of Christ. But this guy didn't want to hear it. So Taylor would come back and care for him, and this guy was just a grumpy old man who had no time for these fairy tales. But Taylor persisted until he couldn't bear it any longer, and while bandaging this man's foot, he himself burst into tears because he was so grieved—not just about his foot, but about his soul. And it was his tears that finally softened this old atheist's heart and he finally yielded his life to Christ.

Taylor reflected on that and he wrote this: "Often in my early work in China, when circumstances rendered me almost hopeless of success, I have thought of this man's conversion and have been encouraged to persevere. Speaking the word, whether men would hear or whether they would forbear."

Perhaps if we had more of that intense distress for souls that leads to tears, we should more frequently see the results we desire. Sometimes it may be that while we are complaining of the hardness of the hearts of those we are seeking to benefit, the hardness of our own hearts and our own feeble apprehension of the solemn reality of eternal things may be the true cause of our lack of success.

Perhaps we would more frequently see the results we desire if God would give us an apprehension of the glories of his love and the dread terror of being apart from him.

Prayer

Lord Jesus, we have nothing apart from you. We have no hope. And I pray for any that are here today, that they might see the miseries of being apart from you, but they would also see your unbelievable graciousness. You are simultaneously the most exclusive and inclusive man who has ever lived. You would welcome all and any from any place, regardless of what we've done. But you are the only bridge. There is no way across the chasm apart from you.

We would ask you, Lord, not just for us but for others that might hear from our lips all that you would do for them. I pray that you would first terrify them with your wrath, warn them to flee what is coming, and then you would console them and comfort them, that in you is found all that we need.

Jesus, you and you alone meet our deepest needs. We praise you. We love you. We lift you up. Amen.