Is it something we do, or something God does in us? And if it’s something we do, how can God get the glory instead of us? Moreover, is obedience something we should actively seek, or should we simply “let go and let God”? If salvation is something God does from start to finish (Phil. 1:6), what does that leave for us to do?
Some things in the Bible are intuitive. Many statements in Proverbs, for example, could easily be discovered by personal experience (e.g., the wringing of the nose brings forth blood, Prov. 30:33). But some things in Scripture are so mind-bending that we’d probably never believe them if God hadn’t inspired them.
The relationship between God’s sovereignty and our responsibility is one of those things. How does Christian obedience work? Is it something we do, or something God does in us? And if it’s something we do, how can God get the glory instead of us? Moreover, is obedience something we should actively seek, or should we simply “let go and let God”? If salvation is something God does from start to finish (Phil. 1:6), what does that leave for us to do?
Philippians 2:12–13 speaks to these questions in a way almost no other passage does. Paul takes one of the strongest statements in all Scripture about our responsibility to obey, and then blows our mind by laying it right beside one of the strongest statements in all Scripture about God’s sovereignty over our obedience. And perhaps most important, he tells us how these two realities relate to each other.
Our Responsibility in Obedience
The main verb in verse 12 is the command: “Work out your own salvation.” Let the shock of that sink in. The Greek verb means to produce or bring about. It’s the same word Paul uses when he says “godly grief produces (or brings about) repentance” (2 Cor. 7:10; cf. Rom. 5:3). Only here, the thing we’re supposed to bring about is our salvation!
I would never have written it that way. But God didn’t seek my counsel when he breathed out holy writ. He says what he wants, and he expects us to humble ourselves and ask, “OK, God, given what you clearly say elsewhere, what do you mean by telling me to bring about my own salvation?”
We know that it involves obeying God, since it’s parallel to the word “obey” earlier in the verse: “Just as you’ve always obeyed . . . so now work out your own salvation.” We also know that it can’t be referring to how we first were saved, because Paul clearly teaches that we were saved (justified) by faith and not by works (Eph. 2:8; Titus 3:5–7). So when Paul says “work out your own salvation,” he’s not referring to past-tense salvation.
But salvation is also a present-tense reality we call sanctification (1 Cor. 1:18), as well as a future-tense reality we call glorification (Rom. 5:9; 13:11). If you’re a Christian, you’re someone who has been saved, is being saved, and will be saved.
