Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ…not frightened in anything by your opponents… Do nothing from rivalry or conceit … Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent … Rejoice in the Lord… Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone… Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God… What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me – practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.
Philippians 1:27-30, 2:3, 2:14-16, 3:1-2, 4:4-7 & 4:8-9
- Unafraid of opponents but nevertheless cautious of evildoers, especially those who pervert the Christian faith.
- Looking to the interests of others (loving our neighbours as ourselves), not acting out of rivalry or conceit and without grumbling or questioning.
- Transparently reasonable, blameless and innocent, even living in a crooked and twisted generation.
- Not anxious about anything but committing everything to God and letting the peace of God guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
- Meditating on (focusing on) what is true, honourable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent and praiseworthy.
- Practising things learned from Paul; living the life - actually living as one of Jesus’ disciples.
- Rejoicing in the Lord... Rejoicing always!
I’ve been a Christian since 1968 and I think it’s true to say that throughout most of that time the way to live has become clearer and more straightforward. It can be simply summed up as Jesus Himself summed it up: loving our neighbours as ourselves and treating others we'd like to be treated. A few times, St Paul wrote that loving our neighbours fulfils all the requirements of God’s law. Reading the New Testament letters, it seems to me that, on the whole, this simply requires us to be honest and sexually restrained.
We read in Romans 12-15, for example, about humility, using the gifts that God gives us for everyone’s benefit, genuine love to everyone, including those who persecute us, submission to authority, sexual purity, judgementalism, causing others to stumble in their walk with God and bearing with the weak. We read in Ephesians 5-6 and Colossians 3-4 about promoting good social relationships.
Or we can read in 1 Corinthians 6, Galatians 5 and Ephesians 5 about the sorts of behaviour that prevent Christians from inheriting the Kingdom of God. I've put the list into alphabetical order and eliminated the duplication: adultery, angry fits, coveting, drunkenness, enmity, envy, greed,
idolatry, jealousy, orgies, revilery, rivalry, sensuality, sexual immoralities, sorcery,
strife, swindling and theft. Most if not all of these involve money, sex or power - all the motivations of a capitalist, consumer society!
Prayer, Bible reading, worship and Christian fellowship are all very important to Christians lifestyle but they need to be within the context of living as Jesus described, not supplementing an otherwise secular way or living.
I must add that although I believe that how Jesus wants His followers to live is straightforward and simple to understand, I don't believe that it’s necessarily easy to do. But, as St Paul assured his readers, ‘What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.’ We all ought to be very content with that!
© Copyright Philip Evans 2015.
What is freely received should be freely shared and not sold for profit, so please feel free to copy these Reflections freely and without cost to others. Unless otherwise stated, Scripture quotations in these Reflections are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
