Koinonia and Coredemption in Paul’s Letter to the Philippians

2) Participation in the Sufferings of Christ

What I have dubbed a mediatorial reading means that the sharing or participation in Paul's imprisoned ministry on the part of the Philippians possesses not only a horizontal or human cooperation but that the horizontal is based on a vertical participation. By "vertical" I mean that participating in the apostolic ministry is rooted in a deeper kind of participation, one that shares in the Paschal Mystery. Most all NT scholars would agree that Paul teaches that the Christian life possesses a participation in Christ's death and resurrection (cf. Rom 6:1-5). In Philippians, the language used to express this participation takes on a powerful dimension.

In 1:29, Paul speaks of suffering in the name of Christ in the context of an exhortation to unity and in the face of opposition by pagans:

Because it was given to you in behalf of Christ not only to believe in him but also to suffer on his behalf.

This verse acts as an explanation for verse 28, "do not be intimidated in any way by the opposition which is a sign of their destruction but of your salvation. This comes from God." And the larger context from 1:27 to 2:4 treats the need for unity in the face of pagan opposition at Philippi.¹ Paul can speak authoritatively about such suffering because their struggle against pagan persecution is matched by his own (see 1:30).

The syntax of verse 29 moves us closer to Paul's view of participation. His choice of the verb "bestowed" or "granted" (echaristhe) may reflect a more exalted language than simply "being given" (edothe) and could be translated "given or bestowed as a gift." If such a distinction is lexically justified, Paul is choosing the verb to contrast the nature of suffering with the normal human expectation. In case the Philippians do not see that faith in Christ entails suffering, Paul reminds them of this intimate connection. The Philippians may not be inclined to regard suffering as a gift, but Paul wishes them to see with new vision, a vision that looks on circumstances, not as an inevitable fact but as divine donation.² Further, the actual phraseology of verse 29 emphasizes the centrality of Christ in their suffering. A more literal (almost too literal) translation reveals its structure:

This for Christ (to hyper christou) was granted to you, not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him (to hyper autou).

The prepositional phrases with the article are difficult to render in modern English, but the word order of the verse suggests that, for Paul, one's whole life is for Christ (to hyper Christou) as he expressed verse 21 "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain." That faith in Christ is a gift, may have been well understood, but the fact of suffering persecution may have caught the Philippians by surprise. By the order of the sentence, Paul wanted to stress that they have been given an additional gift of suffering as well as that of faith.

What does it mean to suffer "in behalf of Christ"? The preposition hyper (+ genitive) would suggest substitution in certain contexts but it is difficult to imagine any sense in which the Christian suffers in Christ's place. Perhaps Paul simply means that the Christian represents Christ on earth so that persecution of the Christian is, in effect, persecution of Christ. Such would not have been surprising since this idea had been expressed to Paul on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:4, 5). From the vantage point of human action, one could be a substitute for the other. However, sharing in the sufferings of Christ finds an even more mystical expression in 3:10.

Philippians 3:10 contains one of the most explicit expressions of sharing in Christ's sufferings in the epistle. The immediate and proper context of verse 10 begins with the purpose clause, beginning at the end of verse 8:

that I may gain Christ, (v. 9) and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is from the law but the one that is through faith in Christ, the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith, (v. 10) to know him and the power of his resurrection, and the participation (koinonia) in his sufferings while being conformed to his death (v. 11) if possible to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

These verses occur within a broader contrast between Paul's Jewish achievements (e.g., persecuting the Church, blameless with regard to the law) and his present gaining of Christ. But this passage stresses that, for Paul, gaining Christ is still a goal to be achieved and such striving (see 3:12) requires the total renunciation of all claims to self-boasting.

Close attention to the syntax and structure of these verses will show that "participation (fellowship) in his sufferings" functions as a singular means of attaining the righteousness which can be found only in Christ. Furthermore, such suffering is not an incidental addition to the imprisonment Paul is experiencing. Rather, the latter suffering is the temporal means of embodying the koinonia with the cross of Christ. In other words, Philippians 3:10 gives the ultimate ground of the more general expression of suffering mentioned in 1:29.

Let us examine verses 10 and 11 first. These verses have a chiastic structure which is based on the semantic similarity of the two A portions (A and A') and the two B portions (B and B') of the chiasm:

A. The power of his resurrection

B. The participation in his sufferings.

B' Made conformable to his death.

A' If somehow I might attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Paul probably uses this chiastic structure to emphasize that the resurrection from the dead is the final goal of his relentless pursuit of Christ. Sharing in Christ's resurrected life is the highest calling for the Apostle, but it is only achievable by sharing in His suffering as well. The resurrection and its power, along with participation in Christ's sufferings, are further explications of the phrase "to know him" (or "that I may know him").³ Thus, Paul seems to be using the verb "know" (ginosko) in the sense of intimate and experiential knowledge rather than as simple intellectual recognition (cf. John 17:3). If this is true, then Paul wants to know Christ in all His life, death, and resurrection.

His reference to sufferings in the inner brackets of the chiasm (B and B') function to highlight the power of Christ's resurrection, not simply as a past event or a future hope but as a present reality of his apostolic life. The phrase "participation in his sufferings" (koinonian ton pathematon autou) is further defined and explicated by the following phrase "made conformable to his death" (summorphizomenos to thanato autou). The suffering through which Paul can know Christ better involves the work of conformation of his person to the agony of the cross. This conformity reminds us of 2:8 where the kenosis of the Son of God means obedience to the shameful death on the cross. Paul also uses the cognate "conformable" (summorphos) in speaking of the eschatological transformation of the faithful from a "body of humility" to the "body of his glory" (3:21). If in Paul's mind, the conforming of the believer's body to Christ's glorious body, brings about the full possession of one's heavenly citizenship (3:20 politeuma), then the present conforming of the person (body and soul) to the death of Christ, surely means a full participation in the mystical body of Christ in which the redemptive work of Jesus is manifested. Nor can one read Philippians 3:10 without thinking of Second Corinthians 4:10 where Paul describes the vicissitudes of his life as "always carrying around in the body the dying (nekrosis) of Jesus that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in the body."

After looking closely at the syntax of these verses, now we can ask what this suffering is that Paul envisions and what is involved in Paul's participation in it. It is here that we see the contrast between the ways in which different theologies read this text. Numerous Reformed commentators have given competent exegeses of this text. Few would disagree with Jac Mueller's statement that all suffering, both bodily and spiritual, is characteristic of the Christian life.⁴ Another South African Reformed scholar, Groenewald, in his study Koinonia by Paulus averred that "the nature of the suffering can be twofold: purely spiritual and inward as a struggle against and grief over sin in the heart, or otherwise outward and real, as privations owing to persecution or bodily pain in the struggle against the world."⁵ Similarly, the nineteenth century British biblical scholar, Lightfoot, sees the complete passion of Christ as communicable to the believer when he says, "it implies all the pangs and afflictions undergone in the struggle against sin either within or without. The agony of Gethsemane, no less than the agony of Calvary, will be reproduced, however faintly, in the faithful servant of Christ."⁶

These Reformed writers and many others recognize the inexpungable place of suffering in Paul's theology, but they always take pains to emphasize that Paul does not mean anything redemptive in the sufferings of the faithful. For example, Mueller says:

This [suffering] does not mean sharing the atoning and redemptive suffering of Christ on the cross, but it means a personal dying to sin (mortificatio), the crucifying of the flesh, and suffering for the sake of Christ and his cause ... the expression "becoming conformed unto his death" ... does not mean that the believer must die as Christ did, and if need be die on the cross.⁷

Consistent with the conceptual structure of Reformed theology, Mueller is denying that the believer's suffering is anything more than being the recipient of the benefits of Christ's death. In that theological system, only Christ's death on the cross has redemptive value. Any claim to the redemptive value of a believer's sufferings would be denied. Paul's fellowship in the sufferings of Christ would be for his benefit only.

There are several problems with this reading of Philippians 3:10. First, such an exegesis of Paul leaves loose ends in the Apostle's theology. A Reformed reading of koinonia 3:10 is unrelated to the koinonia in the gospel mentioned in 1:5 or the sugkoinonos of 1:17 or the sugkoinoneo of 4:14. In that theology, there are different senses of participation or sharing that are not theologically interrelated. Second, such a reading does not take seriously the phrase "being conformed to his death" (summorphizomenos to thanato autou) in 3:10. What kind of death did Jesus die? It was a redemptive death, an atoning death. If the Apostle is being conformed to Christ's death on the cross, then it is reasonable to take his own sufferings as being, in some sense, redemptive like Christ's death. Finally, a Reformed reading which sees no redemptive value in Paul's suffering, eliminates the inner bond between Christian suffering and ecclesiology in the Apostle's mind. That connection is very explicit in Colossians 1:24 where Paul's sufferings "fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ ... in behalf of his body."

A mediatorial reading of Philippians 3:10, on the other hand, makes central that which is driven to the periphery in a nonmediatorial reading. The apostolic-mediatorial interpretation unites the different uses of koinonia in the Pauline corpus. In this reading, Paul's participation in the sufferings of Christ, makes his daily life conform to the death of Christ (cf. 2 Cor 4:10) and this union allows him to share with the whole Church the graces which flow from that union. Thus, the Philippians share in those graces not only because they have received the gospel from Paul, as in 1:5, but also because they are his fellow participants (sugkoinonous) in his imprisonment (desmois in 1:7) and trials (thlipsis in 4:14). This sharing in the redemptive sacrifice of Christ's death has a reciprocal effect as well. Not only is the Apostle a conduit of grace in the lives of the Philippian Christians but they, too, are conduits of grace (through prayer in 1:19) for him so that he might achieve the salvation promised him by Christ. The best explanation for this reciprocity of grace lies in Paul's view of the Church as the mystical body, in which each member fosters the salvation of others through meritorious acts. Such realistic language by Paul is further seen in his use of sacrifice in Philippians.