Resurrection and Exaltation in Philippians 3:20–21
(avg. read time: 8–16 mins.)
Previously, I have written on how Paul articulates the notion of making the gospel story our story in Phil 3:8–12. In that case and others (such as here), I noted how the same logic that had focused on conformation to the gospel story of crucifixion and resurrection was extended to include exaltation in the end of ch. 3. Today, we will be taking more of a focused look at the connection of resurrection and exaltation in Phil 3:20–21 in two contexts: the context of Philippians and the context of Paul’s theology.
Philippians 3:20–21 in the Context of Philippians
What feeds into the text from ch. 3 that I had highlighted previously is that Paul is indeed living in conformity with Christ’s sufferings and crucifixion by his perseverance in faithful, obedient suffering. After all, he is writing this letter from prison (1:7, 13–14, 17). Because of the gospel story he proclaims, he has confidence that the one who began in them a good work will bring it to completion up to the day of Christ Jesus (1:6). That dynamic of God’s inexorable, faithful love is inscribed in the gospel he proclaims. Those who are in participatory union with Christ thus follow that same dynamic. He sees this in his audience as he describes them as his partners in God’s grace as well as in his imprisonment and defense of the gospel (1:7). Thus, perseverance is a quality that they share with him, as also shown in how his imprisonment has contributed to the advancement of the gospel, since his brothers and sisters have shared in his perseverance in being emboldened by Paul’s imprisonment (1:12–14). We also see the role that the expectation of vindication plays in Paul’s perseverance in 1:19–21 in his expressed confidence that in his speaking with all boldness Christ will be exalted. But in the letter itself, he does not get to building on such a point about the union with Christ until ch. 2.
When Paul instructs the Philippians in ch. 2 to be humble and live in union with one another, he punctuates his point by directing them to have the mind of Christ Jesus. Paul explains what he means by the “mind of Christ Jesus” by giving the Philippians a summary of the gospel story in vv. 6–11. In this story, Christ humbled himself by emptying himself and taking on the form of a slave when he became human and dwelt among us, despite being in the very form of God, thus refusing to exploit his equality with God. He even submitted himself to crucifixion, the most shameful of executions designed for slaves and insurrectionists. He submitted to this death in obedience to God the Father, as he was the executor, the enactor of God’s will. For this reason, God exalted him after his death by resurrecting him, declaring him Lord, and causing him to ascend to his right hand, thereby reaffirming Christ’s equality with God. It is thus at the name of Jesus that every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that he is Lord, in agreement with what God has already declared of him.
He continues this teaching about our union in ch. 3 with the text previously examined. He shows in Phil 3:8–12 how the gospel story itself empowers, builds resilience, and inculcates perseverance, for the participatory union with Christ has this gospel pattern to it that Paul describes in terms of knowing Christ, the power of his resurrection, and the participation in his suffering, thereby being conformed to his death. It is by this story and the union of oneself to the Christ at the center of it that one can attain the resurrection that is “from out of the dead,” meaning the resurrection to everlasting life like Christ. Paul presses on towards this goal in perseverance because it is his hope, not something he has attained just yet. He calls on his audience to think in the same fashion, to be empowered by it to live into the gospel story and to press on towards the goal of its ending (3:12–15). To attain what we hope for, it is necessary to hold fast to what we have already attained (3:16).
This then leads to the substance of Paul’s teaching at the end of ch. 3. Paul presents himself as an example of perseverance alongside others that he calls for us to consider (3:17). It is such people who will reach the goal of the gospel story in sharing in the hope inscribed in it that we see in Christ Jesus. For there are those who are “enemies of the cross of Christ” (3:18), and their goal is destruction, for their god is the belly, their glory is their shame, and their minds are set on earthly things (3:19). They do not think beyond the present age, they are devoted to the sinful desires of the flesh that dominate this age, and thus they have no concept of what it is to live rightly in anticipation of vindication and exaltation. They have no goal beyond the destruction that is at the end of the path they have set themselves on. If they despise the cross of Christ, there is no salvation from God’s wrath expressed in destruction of the sin they have united themselves with. If they despise the cross of Christ, there is no resurrection to everlasting life to share in his exaltation either.
In yet another case where a cosmological contrast of heaven and earth and a temporal contrast of the present with the eschaton go hand in hand, Paul says that we have a hope that extends beyond those whose end is destruction because our citizenship is in the heavens, and it is from the heavens that we eagerly anticipate the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior (3:20). Our citizenship being in the heavens does not mean that that is where we will end up. Paul’s Philippian audience knew well that having a Roman citizenship did not mean one would necessarily go to live in Rome. Thus, he writes of the hope for the eschatological future we have from there, namely, the coming of our Lord. As Jesus taught us to pray, the hope is that the kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven, and thus it will be when Jesus comes from heaven to earth. This is also a reminder that our hope for the kingdom is tied to the renewal of creation and thus with new creation. With that new creation will come the hoped-for resurrection.
As part of Jesus’s coming from heaven to earth, we have the promise that he will transform the body of our humility in conformity to the body of his glory, in accordance with the activity he has to act powerfully and to subject all things to himself (3:21). This is how the hope to know the power of his resurrection is brought to fruition, for resurrection is intertwined with transformation. That transformation involves conformation, namely of our body to his body. If we are those who are defined by the cross of Christ, we are also those who will be conformed to his resurrection, and thus we are also those who will be conformed to his exaltation. That is, we will not only be raised, and we will not only be raised to everlasting life, but we will be raised to an everlasting life of sharing in his glory, which is related to his exaltation. Paul implied this already in 2:5–11 and he reiterates it here with explicit reference to resurrection. As Christ humbled himself to death on a cross and was exalted above everyone, so too those who humble themselves in conformity to him will have their humble bodies conformed to his glorious body when they share in his resurrection and exaltation as they have shared in his cruciform life. The path that Jesus trod was one from humble obedience, even humiliation, to death, to vindication in resurrection (which was necessary to his vindication because of his death), and finally to exaltation, and this is the story set out for his disciples as well.
But the connection between resurrection and exaltation has another dimension to it, which I alluded to earlier. That is, Paul links Jesus’s resurrecting and transforming power with his power to subject all things to himself. This is another way of connecting resurrection with the kingdom of God/new creation. Jesus’s resurrection is related to his exaltation and thus to his reign in the present time, which, per Phil 2:10–11, will eventually be recognized by all. But his power to resurrect the dead and transform both the living and the dead is also related to his power to consummate the promise of the kingdom, and thus to bring the new creation to completion. The eschatological resurrection is indispensable to the kingdom project, and it is part and parcel of Jesus’s power to bring it about. Indeed, the kingdom comes and God’s will is done when Jesus takes God’s action in him and writes it large on the cosmic scale. Just as his resurrection was crucial to the inauguration of the kingdom, his resurrection of the dead will be crucial to the consummation of the kingdom. The pattern of the gospel story will be enlarged to encompass creation in the same narrative dynamics.
Philippians 3:20–21 in the Context of Paul’s Resurrection Theology
I have given an overview of Paul’s theology of resurrection elsewhere, and so I will only briefly address how this text relates to that context. First, it should be noted that the immediate context of this text shows an implicit idea, which Paul probably taught the Philippians on another occasion, of the final judgment related to the resurrection. That is, there is a contrast in fates between destruction and conformation to the resurrection of Jesus. This is reminiscent of his teaching in 2 Thess 1:5–10, which we will discuss another time. In the other Thessalonian letter, Paul makes reference to the coming wrath (1 Thess 1:10). The coming day of the Lord is also connected with resurrection—as well as the bifurcated outcomes of salvation and wrath—in 1 Thess 4:13–5:11. Likewise, Paul speaks of the time when God will repay all according to their deeds, giving some immortality/everlasting life and others wrath (Rom 2:6–10), and he more directly links this to his teaching on resurrection in 2 Cor 5:10. Paul also uses the prospect of judgment as a basis for ethical instruction in Rom 14:10–12; 2 Cor 5:10; and 2 Tim 4:1. And so it is here that Paul implicitly links the hope of resurrection and exaltation to the final judgment. After all, that final judgment is part of God’s project in establishing the kingdom, and resurrection of the dead is necessary for the final judgment. And as in Dan 12:2–3, both vindication and exaltation will be demonstrated in the most public of fashions in this judgment.
Second, this text is one of several in the Pauline corpus (and beyond) that follows the gospel progression in which Jesus’s resurrection defeats death and precedes exaltation, both for himself and for those in union with him (Rom 1:1–4; 8:34; 1 Cor 15:20–28; Eph 1:17–23; Col 1:18–20; 2:11–15; cf. Matt 28:16–18; Acts 1:3–11; 2:31–36; 5:28–32; 7:55–56; 13:30–39; 17:31–32; Heb 2:5–12; 7:23–27; 12:2; 1 Pet 1:18–21; 3:18–22; Rev 1:5; 3:21; 5:5–12; 17:14). Christ’s resurrection is the foundation of our own resurrection, after all, as Paul declares most extensively in 1 Cor 15:12–23. And as Jesus’s own resurrection was the prelude to his exaltation to his heavenly reign as signified by his ascension, our own resurrection in conformity to his serves as a prelude to the realization of the kingdom of God, wherein God will be “all in all.” In the language of this text, the transformation of our bodies to be made like his is of one piece with his power to subject all things to himself in establishing God’s kingdom.
Third, on that point about conformation to Jesus, this is one of those texts in Paul that refers to the ultimate goal of our incorporative, identifying, and participatory union with him that is assumed. Indeed, this is a point Paul makes elsewhere in describing God’s purpose in conforming us to the image of his Son in Rom 8:29, as well as with his description of how the Spirit transforms us in accordance with Christ in 2 Cor 3:18. In 1 Cor 15 as well, Paul promises that we will be transformed by being fully conformed to the image of Christ in being conformed to his resurrection at his Second Coming (vv. 20–23, 42–57; cf. 1:8; 4:5; 5:5; 11:26). There is a sense in which we know where we are going, and we know what awaits us in the ultimate future, because of the risen Christ. He has shown himself to us and has thus shown what God’s will for humanity in the new creation is. He has also shown that this purpose will be achieved by him raising us from the dead to everlasting life in conformity to the risen Jesus. This is the fulfillment of that union we pledge ourselves to in our baptism, as we signify in dying to sin with him, being buried with him, and rising to walk in the newness of life that is his life in us. Our conformity to his resurrection body and our exaltation with him will consummate this pledge.
Fourth, the contrast of humility and glory in conformation to Jesus is another piece that fits with Paul’s teaching in 1 Cor 15 about the resurrection body, as I have noted elsewhere. Indeed, the only texts in which he makes such a specific contrast, with some different terminology in the first parts of each pair, are 1 Cor 15:43 and Phil 3:21. The first part befits those conformed to the image of the crucified Jesus and are currently part of a created order that bears the marks of dishonor, disgrace, disdain, humiliation, and shame as humans are under the domination of sin, living in denial of their proper function and glory as God’s image-bearers. But with the resurrection of the dead to everlasting life and the transformation of the living for everlasting life, we will fulfill our proper glory of bearing God’s image and likeness by being conformed to the image and likeness of his Son and becoming the proper viceregents we were made to be. As our dysfunctional sin affects the rest of creation, so our glorification and bodily redemption will affect the rest of creation in bringing about its redemption, as Paul also indicates with the use of “glory” in reference to resurrection and new creation in Rom 8:18, 21.
Fifth, both Phil 3 and 1 Cor 15, in different ways, remind us that it is only in the cosmic context of God’s kingdom and new creation that resurrection to everlasting life makes the sense that it does (besides the aforementioned post on the resurrection body, see here). In the case of Philippians, this is conveyed by the inherent link of Jesus’s power to conform our bodies to his with his power to subject all things to himself. Without our transformation for the new cosmic context, we could not participate in this hoped-for reality. The resurrection of Jesus will be writ large on a cosmic scale in the form of new creation. If believers participate in this gospel story and they believe that the goal of it is the kingdom of God and new creation, they must also believe that their resurrection is necessary to God’s larger cosmic project and to their inheritance of it. Furthermore, the subjection of enemies in Paul’s argument, both in 1 Cor 15 and Phil 3, ultimately happens by resurrection, since the last enemy to be subjected—namely, through being destroyed by the divestment of its power—is death. Only when all enemies are thus subjected will the Scriptures be consummately fulfilled, meaning that not only is Jesus’s resurrection necessary for their fulfillment, but the believers’ resurrection is also necessary.
What Paul teaches is also similar to the influential kingdom expectation of Dan 7, which describes a representative of God’s people receiving the kingdom of God. The major new wrinkle introduced by comparison in Paul—besides the explicit influence of resurrection on this picture—is that the inaugurated eschatology of Paul’s framework requires another step in this process, where the representative is now the agent of God’s subjugation of enemies and is one who will subject himself to God in contrast to the rebellious ones. The consummation of God’s kingdom will only be made possible when the executor of God’s will in heaven and on earth unifies creation in accordance with God’s will and nullifies all opposition to that will. A cosmos in which God is all in all can only come to be when God’s image-bearers are conformed to Christ rather than to Adam, to the death-conquering life that is of God rather than to the death that separates from God. Only then can the grand narrative be brought full circle and God’s creation fulfill God’s creative will of a world of proper order with God as Lord and the image-bearers as true, subjected image-bearers at one with God’s will in representing him.
Finally, although the language for transformation differs in 1 Cor 15 and Phil 3, both texts remind us of God’s promise to all his faithful ones that they will be transformed. In the former text, as we have reviewed previously, not everyone will be resurrected at the resurrection of the dead. But all believers, whether living or dead, will be transformed. In the latter text, Paul makes more explicit what was implicit in 1 Cor 15, that our transformation will be in conformation to Jesus’s resurrected body. Our transformation will be necessary for receiving in full the promise of everlasting life in the new creation. And as our bodies will be made like his glorious body, our transformation is also the prelude to our exaltation in conformity with his exaltation, which will be the realization of the purpose for which we were created. We can only find such transformation, conformation, and exaltation in him whose story is made our story as we are in faithful union with the one who died, rose, and sat at the right hand of the Father.