NOTES for Php 3:8-9

Paul tells us that no merits, no labors are anything in comparison with Christ and the Kingdom. It would seem that righteousness is righteousness; it is the same in every age, and the coming of the Messiah cannot change anything here.

But in this case the issue is not the way of righteousness as such, which is indeed one for all times, but the Kingdom and the One who brought it into the world. Now that the road into the Kingdom has been opened, the whole former experience of righteous life must be reconsidered radically in the context of this newly opened possibility. And all attempts to ignore it, to pretend that with Christ's coming nothing in the world has changed, prove spiritually dishonest from the start, in fact devaluing all efforts to live a righteous life by those who act this way.

Of course, the unwillingness to accept the obvious could also be connected with fears of losing everything acquired earlier, for the coming of the Messiah presupposed the necessity of beginning life practically from a blank page. A very widespread idea in religious circles at that time supposed that with the Messiah's coming the way of righteousness would be completed, and all the achievements acquired by righteous people would become a kind of spiritual currency with which one could pay for entrance into the Kingdom. But everything turned out differently: the Kingdom, as it proved, cannot be bought for any money or any achievements; it is simply offered freely to all who seek. But one can enter it only by beginning the spiritual path anew. And Paul understands perfectly well that salvation is still ahead, that it still has to be attained; the very fact of sharing in the life of the Kingdom presupposes not the completion of the path, but only its beginning, so that the main thing is still ahead. Righteousness is not devalued, but the path of the righteous person can now be only the path of the Kingdom, to which the apostle calls his readers.