Sermon Starters: God Is Working Among You

I spoke at the Honors College Chapel this week from Philippians 2:12-18. I won't reproduce the entire outline. The heart of the message was certain thoughts on the "you" of the statements: "work out your salvation with fear and trembling" and "God is working among you both to will and to do according to His good pleasure."

Anyone who has had much exposure to me will have heard me often mention that this "you" is plural. They will also know that Paul's use of salvation is primarily future oriented around the Day of Wrath (Rom. 5:9), which is at the same time the Day of Salvation. So Paul encourages the Philippian church, just as they have always obeyed whether Paul was present or absent, to continue to work together so that they are all saved on the Day of Wrath.

Although I left the subject open ended on Wednesday, most will know that Paul considered it a possibility that even he might not be saved after he had preached to so many others (1 Cor. 9:24-27). There is thus a real sense of striving together, of urging each other on to finish the race and win the prize. I also believe that much of our debates over whether a person is saved by faith or works is misguided. A person may be justified by faith, but the overall tenor of Paul's writings is that "fruit" and indeed "good works" (Eph. 2:9) are an essential component in making it to the Day of Salvation (Eph. 2:8 is mentioned below).

But the heart of the sermon was to point out how many of the "you's" of the NT are plural.

"You are the temple of the Lord, and God's Spirit lives in you" (1 Cor. 3:16). Of course God's Spirit is in us individually as well (cf. Rom. 8:9). But the in you plural is arguably more central to Paul's theology than the you singular. More than in my individual body, it is in the body of Christ that the Spirit of God dwells.

Here we might as a side note mention the Spirit fillings of Acts. Have you ever noticed that not a single person receives the Spirit (and thus becomes a Christian) alone? Paul does not receive the Holy Spirit during his vision on the road to Damascus. He does not become a Christian at that point technically. He cannot baptize himself. It is not until another Christian--Ananias--lays hands on him that he receives the Holy Spirit.

Indeed, we have good reason, I think, to see the laying on of hands as the sacramental sign that the early Christians understood to facilitate the reception of the Holy Spirit. Hebrews 6:2 mentions it as one of the beginning teachings of Christianity (cf. 10:22 also). Notice that in Samaria (Acts 8) it is only after the apostles Peter and John lay hands on them that they receive the Holy Spirit.

So on the Day of Pentecost in Acts 2, the refreshing of the disciples in Acts 4, with the Samaritans of Acts 8, with the Gentiles of Acts 10, and with the John the Baptist followers in Acts 19--in all these cases the Holy Spirit comes corporately or when another Christian lays hands on someone. No one ever receives the Holy Spirit all by themselves in the book of Acts. This is an important consideration for those who think they can just as well meet God out on a lake as in a gathering of other Christians.

Another interesting passage is in 1 Corinthians 6:19: "Your body is a temple of the Lord." While the word "body" is singular, the word your is plural. I do not think that this verse is simply saying, your bodies are temples (and thus, don't smoke or drink). It is rather a double entendre: 1) your individual body is the church's body too. When you visit a prostitute, you are taking the body of Christ and the church to the prostitute with you, but also 2) your body of Christ, the collective body of the church at Corinth, is the temple of the Spirit.

The kingdom of God is inside you (Luke 17:21). This is a favorite verse of those who want to say that the kingdom of God is an individual thing. It's a matter of God inside your heart. Unfortunately, this is a plural you. The kingdom of God is inside you all collectively, among you, in your midst (e.g., TNIV). Another strike out for the current trend toward lone ranger Christians.

Finally, by grace you have been saved (Eph. 2:8). I have been contemplating this plural this week. I suspect that Ephesians is not focusing on individuals, but on Christians as a whole and, arguably, even primarily on Gentiles as a whole. I believe the primary sense of this verse is, "You Gentiles have been saved by grace through faith... not of works so that no one can boast."

Some interpretive notes:
1. saved here is either proleptic--such a certain inheritance that we can speak of it in the past tense--or Ephesians is working from a "realized" eschatology atypical of Paul's other writings (things are already accomplished rather than waiting to be accomplished).

2. "By grace" in the ancient patron-client context meant neither that the client had done nothing to solicit the patronage, nor did it mean that there were no strings attached. We should not thereby think that God's grace here came "irresistably" or that it came without expectation--grace could be severed if the client gave inappropriate response to the patron.

3. through faith--I still tend to take this as a reference to the faith of humans, but simply mention that one might argue that it is a reference to Christ's faith--by grace you have been saved on the basis of Christ's faithfulness.

4. not of works--notice that Ephesians does not say, not of works of law, which is Paul's usual phrase in Romans and Galatians. I think it is precisely because this discussion is not aimed at the Jewish question of law but at Gentiles who stand somewhat beyond or outside that debate. In that sense, Ephesians is closer to Augustine and Luther's interpetation of Paul than Paul's other writings are.

5. As a complete side-note, I suspect that Tychichus served as the primary writer of Ephesians (6:21). That need not mean that Ephesians is pseudonymous, for Paul could have assigned him the task of writing. This would explain the differences in style and theological/perspectival shifts such as these in Ephesians. Further, it would account for my sense that Ephesians has primarily been composed on the basis of Colossians, which already is somewhat different from Paul's other writings in terms of style and perspective (Dunn suggests Timothy may have had more to do with its composition than Paul: 1:1). In short, I strongly insist that we should not use Ephesians as the starting point for understanding Paul's theology (thus my befuddlement at John McRay, Wheaton emeritus' approach to Paul in Paul: His Life and Teachings).

I am sympathetic to the argument that Ephesians was meant as somewhat of a circular letter without so much of a specific destination. The words "at Ephesus" are missing from several early manuscripts, even while "to those who are" is there. Further, it seems incredible to suppose that Paul would have written 3:2 to the Ephesians--"Surely you have heard of the inheritance of the grace of God given to me toward you..." He spent over two years with them--they hadn't heard of it; they'd experienced it. I suspect then that this letter was broadly meant for Asia Minor and perhaps found its home primarily in Ephesus.

So Ephesians 2:8 seems to me primarily a reminder to its Gentile audiences that it is only by way of the grace of God that they have been given the promise of salvation. God has destroyed the dividing wall of the law that separated them from Israel. So it is only by secondary connotation that "you have been saved by grace" applies to me as an individual. It is of course true of me as an individual, but it was not originally focused on individuals but on the Gentile race as a whole and, then, on all humans.