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This is one of my favourite passages in the Bible.
It tells us what it means to be a Christian. But even more than that, it tells us something about life itself—how we are called to live in this world. And I think this passage speaks especially powerfully to immigrants and to the children of immigrants.
What does it mean to become a Christian? Is it simply changing from being a bad person to a good person?
That was not what happened to Paul.
Paul was not an immoral person. He was deeply religious, disciplined, committed, and respected. He was “a Hebrew born of Hebrews.” He was a Pharisee. As to righteousness under the law, he considered himself blameless.
Paul’s conversion was something deeper. It was a movement from settlement to journey. He moved from believing that he had arrived to realizing that God was calling him forward.
Being settled → Taking a journey
Yes, Christian conversion is the change from being settled to taking a journey. Christ unsettles us and calls us into a journey.
When you look at today’s passage, vv. 4-6 describes a settled life.
If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. (Philippians 3:4-6)
Very well established. He was confident. He was right in the centre of his society. He was at the top of the class of his society.
But when you look at vv. 7-8, his settlement shattered.
Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss… I regard them as rubbish, …
He threw away his well established existence and started a new journey. And he described the journey in vv. 12-14.
I press on toward the goal…
What shattered his well-established life? He found Christ. Or he was found in Christ.
It was Christ who shattered Paul’s well established life and called him to take a bold journey. And Paul lived out that calling. Literally and physically, he took a journey of all the different cities of the world.
vv. 4–6 — Settlement:
Paul knows who he is. He has identity, status, achievement, righteousness, belonging.
vv. 7–11 — Disruption:
Christ enters his life and changes the value of everything. What was “gain” becomes “loss.”
vv. 12–14 — Journey:
“I have not already obtained this… I press on.”
This became a good guidance for me.
As an immigrant, I lived on the margin, experiencing the in-betweenness. I felt many times that I don’t belong to either world, Canada or Korea.
Dr. Sang Hyun Lee, who was a professor at Princeton called it a liminal existence.
“Liminality is the situation of being in between two or more worlds, and includes the meaning of being located at the periphery or edge of a society.”
This liminal existence used to bother me. I didn’t feel like I was fully accepted by both worlds. When I visited Korea, I felt that. I often feel that here.
My wife used to do ministry in a Canadian church. She told me, “I am like a missionary in a foreign land.”
But I realized Marginality is not something we merely accept and endure. It can become a creative space from which something new becomes possible. From the margin, you can sometimes see what people at the centre cannot see.
This marginalized existence is what being a Christian means. Paul became a marginalized person. Early Christians became marginalized people. Jesus chose to be marginalized by coming to this world. He emptied himself and entered fully into our human condition.
He did not establish himself at the centre of power but carried out much of his ministry from Galilee. At that time Galilee was a marginalized region. Anything good can come from Nazareth in Galilee? Not like Jerusalem, the Centre.
The temptation of the centre is settlement.
Privilege can make us believe that nothing needs to change. People in the centre want to be settled.
Life on the margins can give us a different kind of openness—the ability to imagine that things do not have to remain as they are.
That is very important in living a Christian life. Not only a Christian life but a meaningful life.
Settlement can be a temptation.
Paul used to think that he was fine. Not only fine, he was confident about himself. He was so confident that he persecuted Christians, thinking they were wrong. He even considered that as his righteousness.
But when he met Christ, everything changed. He clearly saw that he was wrong. He saw the bigger reality. He realized that he was far from being perfect. He realized that the idea that he was blameless and faultless was rubbish.
A few weeks ago, I shared with you about Moses’ calling. His 40 years in Midian was a life of settlement. But his settlement was a settlement of denial.
God woke him up. God opened his eyes. From then on, Moses’ life was a life of journey, a journey through the desert. In that journey, he experienced the real life. He met God in a meaningful way.
My friends, are you settled into an oasis?
Then, that’s a big mistake. Oasis is a temporary place for you to rest but you have to go on with your journey. You cannot settle there. You have to move on.
There is no life you can settle into. Life is a constant journey. You have not reached the goal yet. Do not settle too early. You need to press on.
I used to take young people to Algonquin. Sometimes we took more than 30 people. We even did the capture the flag between two islands.
One day, I was out in the lake all by myself. The water was calm and my canoe did not move at all. It was so peaceful, so I lied down and slept.
After about 15 minutes, I woke up. And I was at a totally different place and I couldn’t recognize where I was. I thought I was standing still. But the whole time, the current was carrying me somewhere.
Life always moves like a current underneath. You cannot just wish that everything will be the same.
Life always changes. Situations always change. There is no neutral place in life where we simply remain as we are.
Even when we think we are settled, life is moving. The question is not whether we will move. The question is whether we will journey consciously with Christ.
My friends, do not be afraid of living on the margins. Do not spend your whole life trying to get to the centre. Do not make success, security, recognition, or belonging, the final destination of your journey.
If God gives you these things, receive them with gratitude. But do not settle there.
An oasis is a wonderful place to rest, but it is a terrible place to stop your journey.
Paul had everything that could make a person feel settled. He had identity, status, conviction, and righteousness. He thought he had arrived.
Then he met Christ. And suddenly he realized that there was so much more.
“I want to know Christ,” he said.
That became the journey of his life.
My friends, there is still more of Christ for you to know. There is still more truth for you to discover. There are still ways in which your eyes need to be opened. There are still things within you that need to change. There is still work God wants to do through you.
So don’t settle too soon.
When you feel like you are standing at the edge rather than at the centre. Do not despise that place. God may use that very place to open your eyes to things you could never see from the centre.
Let your marginal experience become a source of spiritual creativity. Let it give you new eyes, new imagination, and a new way of seeing the world.
And from there, take your journey. Not merely a journey toward success. Not merely a journey toward the centre. Take the journey toward Christ.
Like Paul, leave behind the illusion that you have already arrived. Press on.
There is more to know. There is more to become. There is more to love. There is more of Christ waiting for you on the journey.
Do not settle. Press on.
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