The Bible Top 40
Philippians 1:6
If you watched the Milwaukee news on Wednesday morning, you doubtless saw coverage of a huge fire that required over 200 firefighters from 18 departments in two counties more than 12 hours to extinguish. The fire consumed a huge 600,000 square foot residential structure, the Rainbow Springs resort. For many of us, it was the first we had heard of this place, but the story about it is just incredible.
The Mukwonago resort was built in the late 1960s by developer Francis Schroedel, who poured millions of dollars into the project, only to run out of money before he could make his longtime dream a reality. I saw an interview of a friend of Schroedel’s who said that a lot of people offered to help him finish the resort back in the mid ‘70’s, but he wanted to do it himself. He died without it ever being completed. Subsequent owners also failed to finish the project and open the entire resort, which included the 760-room hotel, lodge and convention center on 900 acres. The hotel complex sat unoccupied for 40 years until it was destroyed on Wednesday.
And I felt bad when it took over a year to finish painting the trim work around the windows on my house!
All of us can probably identify a couple of projects we did not complete over the years. Those of you who can’t think of a single project you’ve left unfinished – just nod your head and humor me! Most of us start projects and get distracted, or run out of time or money. Other times we get a shot of inspiration, start a wonderful, exciting project, but then lose the passion, or the inspiration to continue.
This is nothing new – as long as there have been people and projects, there have been unfinished work. Back in 1463 in Florence, Italy, a sculptor named Agostino D’Antonio saw a marvelous piece of marble. At 18 feet long, 4 feet thick and 5 feet wide, some sculptors thought it was to thin and narrow, but D’Antonio was sure he could sculpt something great from it. And so he began to work on it. Nothing seemed to work. The marble was too tough, the size all wrong. Finally, D’Antonio tossed down his hammer and chisel and said, “I can do nothing with it.” A few other sculptors in Florence tried, too, but with the same results. The huge slab of marble was placed in a pile of rejected slabs, leftover scraps and other trash.
Unfinished work. It seems to be a universal.
We have just come through the Easter Season, and one of the subjects that many people focus on during the days leading up to Easter are the last words of Jesus. There were 8 statements made by Christ as he suffered on the cross. One of the statements that he made was the next to the last, when he said, “It is finished.” The Greek word is tetelestai, and it was a word that a sculptor or a carpenter would use when they would work on a project, and then, after all the sawing, and planning and hammering, and sanding were complete, he would stand back, look at it, cross his arms and with a sigh of fulfillment say, “tetelastai,” “it is finished.” The work is complete. I have finished the task. It is the statement of a person who has been intent on a goal, and that goal has been achieved.
Jesus was one who finished what he started. He was determined from the early days of His ministry to complete the work He was sent to do. From the time he was 12 he told his parents, “Did you not know that I would be about my Father’s business?” You also will find in John 9:4 these words, “I must work the work of Him who sent me…” And in John chapter 17, as He prayed to the Father on the night before His death, Jesus said, “I have finished the work you gave me to do.”
Jesus was one who finished His work. He was not one to start something and not complete it. And today, in our study of passages of Scripture that everyone ought to know, we are going to look at a particular work of Christ’s that is still under way, and one that we can be sure He will complete.
It is a verse of Scripture that we have already shared this morning. We sang the words as part of our worship. The verse is found in Philippians 1:6, page 790 in the Bibles you will find provided around the sanctuary.
Philippians 1:6 reads, “being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.”
I want to point out three things from this verse.
1. First, it is God who has begun the work in you. The good work that Paul is referring to is the work of salvation, and salvation begins and ends with the Lord. Once a person was asked to share how they came to know the Lord. He said, “Well God did his part, and I did mine.” “What parts were those?” he was asked. “My part was running from God, and His part was coming after me.”
There is nothing we can do to save ourselves. Nothing we can do can be good enough to satisfy an eternal, holy, righteous God. We have all done things that were hurtful to another, or that we knew were wrong. And that sin separates us from a God who is holy. But God initiated a plan to bring us back to Himself. He became flesh, in the person of His Son Jesus Christ, and dwelt among us. He walked this earth, experienced for Himself our human condition, faced temptation as we do, dealt with loss as we do, experienced the pain of rejection and anger at injustice. He faced every situation we face, but lived a life without sin. And then, in that sinless condition, He who knew no sin became sin for us, willingly taking our sins on Himself as he went to the cross and paid the price for our sin with His own blood, so that we can be called children of God.
It is easy to say, “Yeah, Jesus died for all our sins.” It is quite another to personalize it, and say, “It was my sin that put him on that cross.” When I am brought to a place by the work of the Holy Spirit where I realize all that God has done for me, and we humbly ask Him to forgive me and to apply that payment that Jesus made to my account, to forgive me, the work of God in salvation begins at that point. But it is just the beginning.
2. Second, God takes personal responsibility for completing his work in you. This should be a comforting thought to each of us. God is doing a "good work" that he intends to accomplish in your life and in mine. God intends that all his children be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, and he will not rest until that "good work" is finally finished. This is the on-going work of salvation – theologians call it “Sanctification.” It is the process by which we become more and more the people God wants us to be. Maybe you’ve seen the bumper stickers that read, "Please be patient. God isn’t finished with me yet." Thank God, it’s true. I may not look like much—but God isn’t finished with me yet. And when you look in the mirror—and even deeper into your own soul, you may not like what you see, but no matter. God isn’t finished with you yet.
There is good news and bad news in this truth. The good news is that since God isn’t finished yet, we have great hope for the future. We can be sure that just as Jesus was intent on completing the work that God gave Him to do, He is just as intent on finishing this work in us. The bad news is that since God isn’t finished yet, he won’t let us stay as we are today. He’s going to keep chipping away at us until we are conformed to the image of Himself. Most of us have a long way to go—and some of us have an enormous distance to travel. But it doesn’t matter. If you find yourself in the muck and mire of personal defeat, be encouraged. We can find great confidence in the midst of the crisis when we realize that God is still working on us. He is doing His work in our lives. God is not finished with you yet. When a pitcher is having a bad game, sometimes he gets pulled out of the starting rotation, he gets extra attention, and then once he’s learned how to correct the problem, he gets back in. Maybe God is giving you a little extra attention these days. You feel like you’ve been benched. God is doing His work in you.
Be confident, as Paul is, that He who began this work by saving you from death, is continuing His work by saving you for life! His work in us is to make us more like Christ:
Think of the life of Jesus. All those wonderful qualities He demonstrated. God wants us to walk as He walked – in His steps. That is the work of Sanctification – that is the work He will complete in us.
Third, God guarantees the outcome of his work in you. Not only does God start the process, and continue the process, he also guarantees its ultimate outcome. He will "carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus." This means that God won’t be turned aside by difficulties of any kind. He is so determined to make you like Jesus that even your own backsliding won’t ultimately hinder the accomplishment of his purpose. It also means that this work won’t ultimately be completed until the day we reach heaven. Someday you and I will stand before Jesus Christ as redeemed children of God—holy, blameless, and complete in every way. We’re far from that today. But a better day is coming for the people of God. What is incomplete will be made complete. What is unfinished will be finished. What is lacking will be made full. What is partial will be made whole. What is less than enough will be far more than adequate. What is broken will be fixed. What is hurt will be healed. What is weak will be made strong. What is temporary will be made permanent.
The question for us, then is this – how much work will we allow God to complete in us before that day? Yes, God will complete His work in us when we stand before Him in glory, but His desire is to be about that work NOW, while we are here. A little later in this same chapter, in verse 27, Paul encourages these same Philippians to “let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ…” The word “conduct” was a word that was used by Roman law that refers to “behaving like a citizen.” Paul tells us that while God will one day complete His work in us, and we will all be conformed to the image of Christ in total, we are to live like citizens of heaven today! We need to be willing participants in God’s work, allowing Him to do that work in us that He will one day complete.
God has promised to finish it and he cannot lie.
Has the work of God begun in your life? If you have never come to that starting point of Salvation, then why not do it today? Recognizing that none of us is good enough, none of us is powerful enough to please Him on our own, humbly ask Him to begin His work in you today. Maybe you feel like that big slab of marble that D’Antonio tried to work on and gave up on. Tossed in the scrap pile of the world. God doesn’t think so. He loves you so much that He gave His own life to purchase the right to do His work in you.
Maybe you’re a believer but you feel incomplete and unfinished? Maybe you are stuck in a crisis and have lost hope. Be confident of this very thing, He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.
That reminds me. I forgot to finish the story about the big slab of marble in Florence.
In 1501, the city of
Florence commissioned a young artist named Michelangelo to sculpt a statue of
David. They had adopted the Biblical figure as their city's symbol to tell the
world, and their neighbors who were constantly fighting with them, that though
Florence was but a small city, it was fierce and would take on any giant of an
enemy who dared to challenge them.
They presented the artist with a banged up, chipped 18 foot block of marble
that had lain abandoned in a work yard for 35 years! Undaunted, Michelangelo
took on the project. For three years, he etched the marble, bringing forth his
own unique vision of the Biblical hero, and creating the epitome of the Renaissance
ideal of man in the process.
I think it is more than coincidence that Jesus was born to the home of a carpenter. God is in the creative business. He loves to take that which others have rejected, and make something wonderful from it. Even me. Even you. Let’s allow him to do His work, and be confident of His ability to complete it.