Philippians 1:18-26
The key words are life, death and body. Continuing from the previous paragraph, Paul continues in his rejoicing - first that, because of his imprisonment, the gospel is being preached more and more and now because he is sure that through the prayers of the Philippians and by the power of the Spirit, he will be delivered. I think this means that he will be delivered from jail although in the context of the rest of the paragraph, this could be a word play: either I will be delivered from jail or I will be delivered from this world.
Paul is struggling with two desires: one, to depart this world and be with Christ or two, to stay and minister to the Philippians so that they will grow in the joy of their faith. I know that I don't desire heaven like Paul did. There are days when I long to be there but that longing is more in the form of escapism: there is so much to do here and I am tired (or there is something I need to do that I was hoping to avoid) and so I just want to escape and go to heaven.
I also know that my desire to stay on earth isn't so much for the benefit of others but because there are things that I really enjoy about my life. I know that it's not wrong to enjoy this life but I think there may be something wrong when I enjoy it, or anticipate future enjoyment, so much that I would hesitate to go to heaven if Christ came back.
From this passage, I see the need to change my desires: first, that I would long for heaven because it is my home and because it is there that I will experience for the first time the fullness of Christ's presence. Second, that while I am on earth I would remember that Christ has created me to do the good works which he has prepared in advance for me to do. I have a purpose and until that purpose is fulfilled, I need to be here.
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2 comments:
Jer, I hear you 100% on this one. I often feel the same way, that I don't long for heaven like Paul did, and I don't always want to stay on earth just to live for Christ. It is hard, and I wish I had the passion Paul had as well. I guess it was a different time, not making excuses, but can you imagine being there when Christ was and then just after he arose from the dead, it had to have been pretty incredible.
Seriously! But it's no guarantee that I'd be any different than I am right now - Paul was around and he would have missed it completely except for God's direct intervention in the form of a blinding light and voice from heaven.
I don't even think it's a passion for heaven so much as a passion for Christ (I'm changing my mind from what I wrote earlier). If I am passionate about Christ then I would love to be with him AND I would love to be doing his work. That would be a terrible conflict!
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