Jeremy L. Berg

Pull up a slab of rock, light a candle and grab a quill, ink and a scrap of papyrus to take notes.  We’re journeying together back to the year AD 58 to a Roman prison cell to listen in as Paul pens his letter to his Christian brothers and sisters in the city of Philippi. What can his letter speak to us some 2,000 years later?   

“Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the overseers and deacons: Grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:1-2).

What’s your default title for this season in your life?  Student?  Mother?  Brother?  Pastor?  Teacher?  Friend?  If you were cornered by the press and asked, “Who are you?” and you couldn’t use your name to answer, what would you say?  Paul and Timothy wouldn’t hesitate.  They are SERVANTS of Christ Jesus.  Their life is defined by their complete loyalty and obedience to their master Jesus.  This is especially humbling for those of us serving in church leadership.  We enjoy the titles of reverend, pastor, director or doctor.  Yet, the great apostle Paul saw himself foremost as a humble servant — completely submitted and living to do God’s bidding. 

While Paul humbly takes the title of servant for himself, he turns the tables on us by bestowing the title of  “saints” to his recipients at Philippi.  Rid yourself immediately of stained glass images of Mother Mary or St. Peter or St. Francis of Assisi.  While the word “saint” often brings to mind the great martyrs, the Mother Theresas and other superheroes of the faith now enshrined in heaven with their crowns of glory, the word “saints” literally means “holy ones.”  That is little help, though, as the meaning of “Holy” is also quite abscure in our world today — including the church.  

“Holy” means set apart for a special purpose; not for common use.

With this definition of “Holy” in mind, let’s put our mind around Paul’s salutation to the Philippian Christians.  Paul views each human being through the grid of Christ’s redeeming sacrifice by which he purchased us by his blood and through whom we have eternal life.  Paul does not view the Philippians as ordinary, common people living ordinary lives of little significance.  Perish the thought!  We are all “holy ones” set apart by Christ for a special purpose.  Our lives are not for common use, but for a sacred calling. 

What does it mean for us to live out of this “holy” identity?  What if we viewed each other as “saints”?  No one captured in words the nature of this holy, set-apart identity better than C. S. Lewis in The Weight of Glory:  

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations–these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit–immortal horrors or everlasting splendours… Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour, he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat, the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.” 

So, let these two titles — servant and saint — always co-mingle and intermix in your hearts, grounding your attitude in humble servitude to Christ; while never forgetting our corporate calling to be holy, set apart people for His grand purposes in the world!