He Who Began a Good Work

Philippians 1:1-6 || Sunday, September 20

This week, we kicked off our study of the book of Philippians, which contains some of the most memorable (and often-memorized) verses in all of Paul’s letters. One of those verses, which anchored our message on Sunday, is Philippians 1:6, where Paul writes, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.”

This verse has been a personal encouragement more times than I can count. One of the greatest enemies to our faith is the fear that God has abandoned the work that he started in us. We find ourselves struggling with a sin that we thought we’d overcome, or we keep running into roadblocks everywhere we turn, or we simply feel a sense of distance from the Lord — and we start to wonder, “Has God given up on me?”

Paul answers this fear by reminding us that the God who began the good work of our salvation — sending his Son to die for us on the cross — will continue that work through our sanctification — through which, little by little, his Spirit shapes us to look more like Jesus — until he completes the work in our glorification. On that day, we’ll see the fulfillment of another astonishing promise, this time from John: “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2).

Let’s live and hope and trust him now in light of then, when we will be like him and we will see him as he is.

In Christ,

Noah