Discipleship Week 14: Imitate those whose confidence is in Christ alone

Philippians 3:7-9

“But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.”

As we seek to have mature Christian influences in our lives we should seek out people whose confidence is in Christ alone. And this point comes out of Paul’s discussion of his Jewish opponents. It seemed to be a common practice that they would follow Paul in his travels, and after he left a city they would go to the Christians there and try to convince them that to truly be a part of God’s people they essentially had to become Jewish first, and be circumcised. To truly follow God they also had to follow the Jewish law.

Now this raises two issues. One is the theological issue, the question of how we are made righteous in order to be accepted by God. Clearly we must be righteous in order to stand before a perfect, holy, just God. But how do we become righteous? The Jewish answer is that righteousness comes through obedience to the law, hence the emphasis on circumcision and the zeal of the Pharisees to follow the law to the letter. This is somewhat ironic given that throughout Israel’s history they had a massive problem in obeying this very law.

And Paul rejects such thinking, both here and more fully in other epistles. Righteousness does not come from following the law, but comes from God through faith in Jesus Christ. We are accepted by God and drawn into his family, not on the basis of our own efforts to keep the law, but because of Jesus Christ. That is why Paul can say that we are the circumcision, even though the vast majority of Gentiles were not physically circumcised. God has circumcised our hearts through faith in Jesus Christ, and therefore we are his people. All of this is completely by his lavish grace. So any effort to focus on righteousness through the human effort of law keeping severely undermines the gospel message.

The second issue flows out of the theological issue, and it addresses where we place our confidence. What do we stand on for our status and our self-identity? How can we be confident that we are right with God? Paul rightly argues that the only thing that we can be confident in is Christ alone. The only thing we should boast of is Christ, for it is only through Christ that we can come to God. Paul points out that if he wanted to stand on his Jewish resume, he had far more qualifications than any of his opponents. But he calls those qualifications garbage. Rubbish.

Now as D.A. Carson notes, most of us probably are not seriously tempted to boast about Jewish religious heritage and circumcision. But all of us have things in our lives that we do boast about and place our confidence in for our status. Dr. Sheldon Cooper from the TV show Big Bang Theory is a perfect example of this. Despite being socially clueless, he is a brilliant theoretical physicist, and he uses his vast intelligence to establish his status over and above everyone else. Knowing that he is smarter than everyone else is one of the keys to his self-identity. And he is quite vocal about it!

Now I think one of the reasons Sheldon is so loved by fans of the show is because in some ways he makes us feel better about ourselves. We may have our social failures and struggles, but surely we’re not as arrogant and narcissistic as he is! Surely we do not boast about ourselves as much as Sheldon does! But… if we boast in anything other than Christ, we are Sheldon. When we place our identity and status and confidence in anything other than Christ, we are Sheldon. And while this boasting is sometimes vocal, it often takes place deep in our heart. These are the things that make us feel superior to others. We boast about the quality of our church’s worship. We boast about the outreaches that our church is doing. We boast in our pastor’s preaching ability. We boast about the strength of our family, and we boast about the awesomeness of our spouse or significant other. None of these things are bad…it is great to have a church that has great worship, strong preaching, local and global outreach, and healthy families and relationships. We can take joy from these things, because ultimately these things are good gifts from our heavenly Father. But when we begin to find our identity in these things over and above Christ, when we begin to place our spiritual status in these things over and above Christ, and when we use these things to elevate ourselves spiritually instead of pointing others to Christ, then we face the same problem as those who opposed Paul…we are finding our identity in our own efforts, and not in Christ.

So we need to take an honest inventory, and ask what those things are in our lives that we are boasting about that we need to consider as garbage. And then we need to actually make them garbage, and turn to the only one we can and should place our confidence in: Jesus Christ. And as we seek to have mature Christian influences in our lives, we need to seek out people whose only confidence is in Christ. Having a strong spiritual resume is not a bad thing for a potential role model to have, in fact it is quite important! But if that resume is their identity instead of Christ, then they will not point you to Christ but to themselves, and that is not someone you want to imitate.

1. What are some things the world puts its confidence in? What are some things Christians put their confidence in that is not Christ?

2. When a person only has confidence in Christ, how do they look different than others? What qualities make them good role models?

3. What are things in your life that you boast about (either publicly or privately) that you need to “consider them garbage” this week?