The Value of Knowing Christ

Finally, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! To write this again is no trouble to me, and it is a safeguard for you.
Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of those who mutilate the flesh! For we are the circumcision, the ones who worship by the Spirit of God, exult in Christ Jesus, and do not rely on human credentials – though mine too are significant. If someone thinks he has good reasons to put confidence in human credentials, I have more: I was circumcised on the eighth day, from the people of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews. I lived according to the law as a Pharisee. In my zeal for God I persecuted the church. According to the righteousness stipulated in the law I was blameless.
But these assets I have come to regard as liabilities because of Christ. More than that, I now regard all things as liabilities compared to the far greater value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things– indeed, I regard them as dung! – that I may gain Christ, and be found in him, not because I have my own righteousness derived from the law, but because I have the righteousness that comes by way of Christ’s faithfulness – a righteousness from God that is in fact based on Christ’s faithfulness (Philippians 3:1-9).

“Judaizing” teachers were traveling about, and Paul already had to deal with their fallout in other congregations. He wanted to prepare the Philippian Christians accordingly and provided valuable exhortation in the process.

Philippi was a Roman colony in Macedonia (part of modern Greece); Paul first visited the area and preached Jesus around 51 (cf. Acts 16:11-40). Paul wrote to the Christians in Philippi most likely around 60-61 from Rome while living under house arrest there (cf. Philippians 1:1). In Philippians 1:1-26, Paul thanked the Philippian Christians for their joint participation in his work, prayed for them to abound in love and act wisely, and reported as favorably as possible regarding his circumstances. Paul then established his primary exhortation: they should live as faithful citizens of the Gospel together and suffer for Him well (Philippians 1:27-30). Paul then argued and reasoned on the basis of his primary exhortation (rhetorically called the probatio): the Philippian Christians should share the same mind and seek the best interests of one another, rooted in the example of Jesus in His humiliation and exaltation, as they saw embodied in himself, Timothy, and Epaphroditus (Philippians 2:1-30).

Paul began to shift into what we consider Philippians 3:1-4:1 with to loipon in Greek. Literally “that which remains or is left,” it is most often translated, as in the NET, as “finally.” While to loipon can, and has, been used to indicate a transition into a conclusion, by Paul’s time it was also simply a way of making a transition between arguments or points. Perhaps Paul, as a good preacher, began signaling toward a conclusion long before he reached it; but since so much of his Letter to the Philippians remains, we will consider Paul as simply transitioning into a new argument.

Paul’s transitionary exhortation encouraged the Philippian Christians to rejoice in the Lord (Philippians 3:1). He will repeat this exhortation, with emphasis, in Philippians 4:4. He felt as if he was repeating things he had already taught them, but was not bothered by it: it was safer for them to have the important things reinforced time and time again (Philippians 3:1). We do not need to choose whether Paul felt this way regarding what he had just finished encouraging or regarding his impending warning; the sentiment would be appropriate either way, or for both.

While Philippians 3:1-21 remains part of his probatio, Paul shifted away from a more general exhortation about Christian life and faithfulness toward warnings regarding a prospective danger, countering potential arguments before they would arise. Paul warned the Philippian Christians to beware, or watch out, for the “dogs,” the “evil workers,” those who “mutilate the flesh,” in Philippians 3:2. These are not separate categories, but all refer to the same group or type of people: “Judaizing” teachers, the kind who had already sown discord and confusion among the churches of Galatia and in Corinth (cf. 2 Corinthians, Galatians). Normally Jewish people would speak of Gentile pagans as “dogs” (cf. Mark 7:27), and not the well-behaved indoor kind; we believe Paul thus reversed the expected imagery by speaking of these opponents as “mutilators of the flesh,” with the Greek katatome sounding very much like the standard word for circumcision (peritome). These are very strong and sharp words from Paul, and must be appropriately contextualized in our interpretation. As Paul would go on to indicate shortly, he himself was circumcised (Philippians 3:5); he had Timothy circumcised so he could more effectively minister with Paul (Acts 16:3); he was on record declaring how neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counted for anything, but faith working through love (Galatians 5:6). Paul’s strong language here intended to condemn not Judaism or circumcision itself but the imposition of circumcision upon Gentile Christians.

Paul would then go on to appropriate circumcision, in a sense, for all Christians: we are the circumcision; we provide religious service before God by His Spirit; we exult in Jesus; we do not put our faith or confidence in the flesh, that is, we do not rely on human standards of merit or standing (Philippians 3:3). In this way Paul would counter any suggestion the Philippian Christians proved deficient unless and until they received circumcision and observed the Law of Moses, for they were already signed and sealed into the covenant between God and all people in Christ Jesus through His Spirit.

Paul made mention of such human standards of merit or standing because he well anticipated how the “Judaizing” teachers might come and commend themselves on the basis of their standing as Israelites, descended from Abraham, observing the Law. To that end Paul reminded the Philippian Christians of his own Israelite credentials: he was circumcised on the eighth day (thus born into Israel, not a proselyte), a Benjaminite of Israel; a “Hebrew of Hebrews” (which most likely meant he and his family were conversant with Hebrew and Aramaic, and not only Greek like many Hellenistic Jewish people); a Pharisee by confession and practice; a persecutor of the church in zeal; reckoned blameless by the standard of observance of the Law of Moses (Philippians 3:4-6). Saul of Tarsus, therefore, could easily match and argue the finer points of Jewish faith and practice with any of these “Judaizing” teachers; in fact, it would have been less disruptive in life for Paul to have been among them and to have maintained similar viewpoints as they had.

Yet Paul no longer maintained those viewpoints. Paul confessed how he had valued everything about his life as a devout Pharisee as Greek kerde, a term used in accounting to refer to gain or profit, but now he reckoned it as Greek zemia, the contrasting accounting term for loss, debit, or liability (Philippians 3:7). Thus we should understand the decision of the NET to translate these terms as “assets” and “liabilities” according to the custom of accounting: it does not mean or demand Paul considered his former standing in Judaism as holding him back or dragging him down as a Christian, as a problem or something from which he needed to escape or hide. It was not even just about his standing and position in Judaism: Paul intensified his message doubly, for he considered everything now as not merely zemia, as loss, debit, or liability, but even as skubala! Greek skubala was a vulgar word which could be used to describe feces but was more often used in reference to decaying and spoiled food.

We must avoid saying something Paul himself did not say. He did not say he was trash, or that everything in his life really was trash. His point was less to denigrate the life he had lived before Jesus and much more to emphasize the surpassing importance and value of knowing Christ Jesus the Lord, for whom Paul suffered the loss of all things (Philippians 3:8). Paul would never stop being an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin, well educated in the customs of Moses and the conventions of Greek rhetoric. If we denigrate Paul’s standing in Judaism as useless, we invalidate the power of Paul’s comparison; this whole premise only works if there were some actual value perceived in his standing as an Israelite and a Pharisee. Paul’s point was not about how useless it was to be Jewish; it was how he perceived everything as useless in comparison to knowing Christ Jesus as his Lord and to gain and be found in Him, not by righteousness he could attempt to claim by observing the Law of Moses, but the righteousness from God which comes from Christ’s own righteousness (Philippians 3:9).

Paul’s insistence on “knowing” Jesus did not merely involve knowing facts about Jesus, or intellectually grasping ideas or realities about Jesus; as God is one in relational unity, God called Paul and all of us to share in relational unity with Him and one another, and so Paul sought to know Jesus relationally and thus share in and with Him. The understanding of Greek dia pisteos Christou has been argued for generations, whether the genitive should be understood as through the faith of Christ which Paul, and all believers should have in Him, or as the faithfulness of Christ Himself. Neither would prove theologically inaccurate in any way: believers must maintain faith and confidence in Christ Jesus, and Christ indeed proved faithful and such is the basis on which we can be saved (e.g. Romans 3:21-31, 8:1-11, 10:9-10). The Reformers tended to insist on the former, which has colored the perspective on this passage in many translations and in a lot of Christian discourse; nevertheless, in context, the latter, as seen in the NET, makes better sense. Jesus’ faithfulness allowed and facilitated the advancement, promotion, and acceptance of faith in Jesus; Paul could only maintain faith in Jesus to stand before Him without any expectation works of the Law of Moses could justify him because of it (cf. Romans 8:1-11).

In this way Paul was using his own story and theological and doctrinal formulations to both prepare the Philippian Christians to resist any of the arguments the “Judaizing” teachers might use while also providing valuable instruction in the contrast between attempts to stand justified before God by observing works of the Law and standing before God by faith in Jesus based on Jesus’ faithfulness in His life, death, resurrection, ascension, lordship, and imminent return. For Paul to have learned of Christ and all God had accomplished in Christ but then to expect and insist upon observance of the Law of Moses to obtain justification would prove discordant; if it were so for someone with exquisite Jewish qualifications, how much more discordant would it prove for Gentile Christians who were never made subject to the Law of Moses, and who had learned of Jesus and received the Spirit of God without having first submitted to the Law of Moses?

So we can appreciate the immense value in knowing Christ and sharing in His sufferings so we might gain Him and the resurrection of life. We also should consider any earthly credentials or standing as loss or liability, even as decaying trash in comparison to the immeasurable value of knowing Jesus Christ as Lord and gaining Him and the resurrection in Him. No other thing we have on earth will be able to redeem us, save us, or allow us to stand before God on the final day. If we have nothing other than Jesus, we still have everything we ever need; we need to allow this truth to settle deeply in our minds and in our faith, and to apply it appropriately both in terms of our doctrine and teaching and how we live our lives. May we always rejoice in the Lord Jesus, and be found in Him and share in the resurrection of life on that final day!

Ethan R. Longhenry