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Philippians 2:12
“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”
We who profess faith in Christ but have not yet passed into glory constitute the visible church militant, called to wage war against the world, the flesh, and the devil (Eph. 6:10–20). Our goal is to one day join the church triumphant, that body of believers who have finished their lives and have died in faith, now ruling and reigning in heaven alongside the Lord Jesus (Rev. 20:4). But how do we die in faith? The answer is found in the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.
The biblical doctrine of perseverance has two sides: our duty to persevere and the preserving grace of God. We will look at the first of these sides today, considering Philippians 2:12. The Apostle Paul commands us to “work out [our] own salvation with fear and trembling.” Here the Apostle considers salvation as an ongoing process. Often we think of salvation as only a past event. We were saved on such and such a day because that is when we believed on Jesus for the first time and were converted. Yet the Bible’s language concerning salvation does not allow us to view it as something that happened only in the past. We “have been saved” in the past (regeneration and justification; Eph. 2:8–9), we “are being saved” in the present (sanctification; 1 Cor. 1:18), and we “will be saved” in the future (glorification; 1 Cor. 3:15). Ultimately, of course, one who truly experiences salvation in the past, present, or future always enjoys it across all three eras. Still, we cannot collapse our experience of salvation into the past, present, or future but must pay attention to God’s calling in each aspect of our redemption.
In the present, the Lord is working to thoroughly transform us, and He does this over a period of time wherein we engage in the ongoing response of faith and repentance. God calls us to persevere; we are not simply to believe in Christ and turn from sin once but are to continue in faith and repentance to the end. Only those who endure will enjoy final salvation (Matt. 24:13). We are not meant to be anxious over this; if we have truly believed, we will truly believe to the end. Instead, we should consider it a privilege that God has granted us a role in keeping ourselves in the faith, though as we will see in our next study, our role is undergirded by His working in us to keep us in the faith (Phil. 2:13). All those who have truly rested in Christ for salvation will persevere to the end, and only those who persevere to the end have truly rested in Christ.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Jesus commands us to take up our cross daily and follow Him (Luke 9:23). Serving the Lord is not a one-time decision but one that we are constantly making. If we have been truly converted, our lives in the main will show that we are continually choosing to follow Christ. We might fall into sin, but we will eventually repent and press on. If you trust in Christ, follow His call to persevere today by repenting of sin and continuing to rest in Him.
For further study
- Isaiah 2:5
- Hebrews 12:1–2
The bible in a year
- Daniel 5–6
- 1 John 4
- Daniel 7–10
- 1 John 5–2 John 1–13