as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honoured in my body, whether by life or by death.
Philippians 1:20
The verse begins with two nouns with almost the same meaning. Eager expectation means the same thing as hope. We can say that eager expectation is like an intense form of hope or in other words active hope. I believe a little background study on this word would give us a cleared understanding.
In olden times, when somebody would see something on the horizon coming, like an army or a group of emissaries approaching, people would stand on the walls and stretch their heads our, and they'd see, what's happening out there? Is that a war or is that a letter coming or what is it?
It's the same thing if you go to watch a game of cricket and the batsman hits the ball up in the sky, and everybody's head goes where the ball it travelling. They're kind of anticipating, where is it going to go? Is it a six or is the batsman going to be caught.
So here is Paul looking to his future, saying, I have an active hope. My neck and head are stretched out and I have an eager hope and anticipation. And what is Paul anticipating?
That in nothing he shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now Christ will be magnified in his body whether by life or by death. Here's what he's saying, "I look to the future. The one great concern that I hope for more than anything else is that I will be a faithful witness for Christ, that I won't be ashamed, but that I will be bold."
It's amazing that Paul says this. He didn't say, I have one great hope and that is that I get out of jail. I have one great hope that I can escape this pain and suffering. He said, I have one great hope whether i live or die. I want to be a witness for Christ. I'm looking for opportunities to represent Christ. What I hope for is that I might express my faith and exalt my Saviour.
I studied in a school where I was the only Christian in my class. My mom and dad never allowed me to skip Sunday service or Sunday School. We used to have matches on Sunday. But I was not allowed to go since it was during the church service. To be frank there were times I was embarrassed to say I have to go to church. To be honest, I was embarrassed. I was embarrassed about the Gospel. The reason I was embarrassed is because I was afraid, now when I look back is not that they would reject the message, but that they would reject me. For me at that time being our with friends was more important than being in with Christ. But thanks to my parents that they forced me to be in church which made it possible for me to be a witness now.
Howard G Hendricks in his book Taking a Stand: What God can do through Ordinary you puts it this way: "In the midst of a generation screaming for answers, Christians are stuttering." I stuttered and I do believe that many of us have stuttered and might be stuttering now. But, Paul is saying, my great hope for the future us that I will not stutter, but that I will be bold.
We need to be bold. While the world is breaking bad, we need to be breaking bold. The world is bold about what it believes, and they are becoming bolder. They are not ashamed of what they believe it. They will use every opportunity they can, every song they write, every news program, every sitcom, every movie to further their agenda. They are not afraid, they are bold to share their values on abortion, on homosexuality, on promiscuity, on living in relationship and so on.
Paul's earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing he shall be ashamed and Christ should be magnified. Yes he wants Christ to be MAGNIFIED. That's really what it means. It means to enlarge something, to make it bigger that it is, to enlarge it, to make it greater. But there's a small problem with that. How can we make the greatest person in the world greater? How can we magnify Christ in our body? He is already great. How can we make him greater?
A small illustration might help us to understand this. If we look up tonight at the stars we can see some of the stars flickering though they are enormous in actual size. Some of those stars are 1000 million miles in diameter or 12000 times larger than the sun. Yet when we look at them, they just twinkle or flicker. We can barely see them. In such an instance if we want to see them better what do we look through? A telescope. When we look through a telescope what happens? They get magnified. We're magnifying them. We are enlarging them. When we enlarge them, it seems like we have brought them closer.
So here's how it works. To most people in this world, Jesus Christ is 2000 years ago fellow. He's so far away. He's so in the distance. He's so un-apprehendable. He's so irrelevant. That happened 2000 years ag0 - until we show up. The people when they look at us Jesus Christ is either magnified, brought closer, becomes clearer or mini-fied.
Dear Friends, are we like Paul looking for opportunities to represent Christ because we want the great one to be even greater through our body? Let us give Christ our hands, our feet, our mouthpiece, let him use our life. Let us present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable, so that Christ is magnified.
God Bless you.
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