God’s Values
But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Lord Jesus Christ … Philippians 3:20
There are two ways of understanding this verse, and each reflects a completely different worldview.
The first worldview sees the earth as basically a bad place, filled with temptation and evil. There’s really nothing good for us here. After all, we’re not from the earth. Our true home is heaven. We have heaven’s blood in our veins now and can’t wait to be taken off this dark place. When Jesus returns we will be forever finished with earth. While here we must keep ourselves separate from the world and worldly people. While monasticism might be going a little too far, this kind of separated lifestyle is really appealing.
The second worldview and another way of approaching the same verse reflects a Roman tradition. The Romans were extremely proud of their social, cultural and political approach to life. They were the conquering power of their day and Paul only evangelised lands and cities under Roman rule. When a new land was conquered, Romans changed the lifestyle of that land to reflect Roman values. They wanted what they saw as the splendour and benefits of Roman culture to infiltrate and change the culture of the conquered area. So when Paul wrote to this Roman colony, Philippi, he was encouraging the Christians to spread God’s culture and values throughout the city, to evangelise and disciple the converts so fully that the Kingdom of God was established in their hearts.
Which do you think was behind Paul’s thinking?
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