In the Apostle Paul’s letter to God’s church at Philippi he delivers a message from the Lord that Satan has used with ultimate success to move salvation seekers off of God’s track and onto his: “Wherefore my beloved, AS YOU HAVE ALWAYS OBEYED (God’s Word), not only in my presence, but much more in my absence, WORK OUT YOUR OWN (FUTURE) SALVATION WITH FEAR AND TREMBLING, for it is GOD Who WORKS IN YOU both to WILL and to DO HIS GOOD WILL” in the future.  Notice that Paul emphasizes that the people in the Philippian church had OBEYED GOD IN THE PAST.  Using their past obedience to Him as their foundation, they were to CONTINUE TO OBEY HIM in the future, thereby WORKING OUT their (future) salvation.  Their past obedience had placed them on the right track leading to eternal life.  The Lord had given them the will (determination) to remain on His track.  In order to arrive at the right destination, they must, with fear and trembling, continue on that track by obeying Him when the heat is turned up.

“Work, obey, fear, trembling, do ….”  Paul’s admonition to the church of his day is totally unacceptable to the modern church member.  Today’s Christian life is much more user friendly and effortless.  To be a believer in good standing one need only go to church on Sunday, read the Bible a few minutes each day, tithe, repent after each sin, smile, etc.  What is there to work out?  What is there to fear?  Why tremble?  None of Paul’s words relative to fear, trembling, etc.  makes sense to those in the Institutional Church.  Today’s churches are accepted by the societies in which they exist.  They wield considerable power in the political realm.  Their voices are heard, respected and courted by the churched and unchurched alike.  The unchurched accepts the churched without a second thought.  The churched are so much like the unchurched that it is hard to tell them apart.  They have a mutual acceptance agreement.  However, neither of them accept God’s people.

The explanation concerning working, fearing, etc. lies in the fact that the modern church rejects what God said about His true church.   They also do not know what they have gone through in the past.  Nor do they know what they are prophesied to experience in the near future.  Neither do they know what they themselves are prophesied to experience.  Why such Biblical ignorance?  Because they are not told these things by their leaders and do not know what God says about church prophecy.  Those who STUDY and BELIEVE the Bible know that the apostles, and Jesus Himself, continually warned the saints, then and now, that there would remain one constant in their lives–persecution.  And the persecutors would always be those who called themselves God’s people.  The Lord makes it clear what His people were to expect:  “WE (the church) MUST, THROUGH MUCH TRIBULATION, enter the Kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22).  “In the world YOU (DISCIPLES) WILL HAVE TRIBULATION” (Jn. 16:33).  “The (religious) world WILL HATE YOU AND SAY ALL MANNER OF EVIL AGAINST YOU FALSELY for My names’ sake” (Mat. 5:11).  In Matthew 10:22 and 24:13 Jesus tells His disciples, and those who would believe and obey them, that they will be HATED BY ALL MEN, but that he who retains his holiness while enduring such hate until the end of his life will receive salvation.  Question: Who persecuted the prophets? some unto death.  Jeremiah was thrown into a dry well and left there to die.  Isaiah is believed to have been sawn in half.  Who persecuted and killed God’s own Son?  Who stoned, beat, crucified, burned, etc. the apostles?  Who hounded God’s church wherever they went?  Who martyred some 50 million people, many of them God’s people, during the Inquisition?  Who accused God’s saints of serving Satan?  Who rejected their message?  Who persecuted the people written about in Hebrews 11?  Answer: Religious people who claimed to believe and serve the same God the saints believed and served.  Nothing has changed except the extent to which their hatred can be demonstrated.  Nothing raises the ire of the uber-religious more than those who believe, obey and speak God’s Truth.  Philosopher George Orwell stated that in a time of universal deception, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.  We are living in such a time.  Satan has deceived the whole world (Rev. 12:9).  To raise up God’s Word is indeed an act of revolution against the prevailing religious establishment.  Plato noted that no one is more hated than one who tells the truth.  Both men were right.  I have had the phone calls, letters and emails to prove it.

The Almighty has decreed that those who would spend eternity with Him must be tested and tried to see if they will stay true to Him while undergoing a “baptism by fire” (Mat. 3:11,12).  Here John the Baptist is warning those who wanted to be baptized by him that there would come One after him Who would baptize them with the Holy Spirit AND WITH FIRE.  Comparing  people coming for baptism to gathered wheat on a threshing floor, John said that this coming One would have His pitch fork in His hand and would remove the chaff (sins) from His wheat through testing.  Then He would gather the chaffless (sinless) wheat into His barn (church).   Jesus would later say that many would be called to be His true saints, but few would endure the crucible of fire that all God seekers are put through.

This brings us back to the subject of working out one’s future salvation.  Question: If those in the church at Philippi, whom Paul called “saints in Christ Jesus” (1:1), were already saved (as “sinners saved by grace” claim to be), why did they need to WORK OUT their salvation?  And why did Paul tell them that God had “BEGUN a good work in them” and would CONTINUE that work until the day when Jesus returned?  Jesus said that those who had endured severe testing, trials and Satan’s temptation with their holiness intact “shall (then) be saved” (Mat. 10:21,22).

God tests us and allows Satan to tempt us because it is “HIS GOOD WILL.”  Why does He put His people through such an ordeal?  Why does He allow Satan to tempt them to sin?  Why did He place the forbidden tree in the Garden of Eden, then allow Satan a chance to sway Adam and Eve?  A good answer to this question is found in the extreme training endured by the military’s Special Forces, known as the “point of the spear” in the theatre of war.  The testing one must go through in order to be accepted into those elite organizations is so rigorous and demanding that only a small percentage of those who enter the training can endure it to the end.  This ensures that those whom the nation puts forward in battle can “hack it.”  In order to spend eternity with God and His Son, we must prove that we can win the spiritual battles (tests, trials and temptations) in this life.  Those who do so will receive a crown of eternal life from the returning Christ.  Those who endure their baptism by fire are God’s Special Forces, His jewels, His peculiar treasure, His Very Elect saints.  These are those who “hunger and thirst for righteousness” and are filled with righteousness (Mat. 5:6).  They are filled because they DO THE WORK of obeying the Lord while Satan and their flesh try to lure them to take the easy way out.  Jesus said that only a few would “find” and “enter” this hard, restrictive way.  The many, He said, would choose Satan’s easy, accommodating way (Mat. 7:13,14). One must “WORK” and “DO GOOD WORKS” by remaining true to God’s Word during his testings, trials, tribulations, persecutions, etc.  See Persecution.  Trying salvation seekers enables Him to determine who are truly His and who are His in name only.  L.J.