What Does Philippians 3:19 Mean?

(19) **Whose end is destruction. . . .**—The intense severity of this verse is only paralleled by such passages as 2Timothy 2:1-5; 2Peter 2:12-22; Jude 1:4; Jude 1:8; Jude 1:12-13. All express the burning indignation of a true servant of Christ against those who “turn the grace of God into lasciviousness,” and “after escaping the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, are again entangled therein and overcome.” **Whose God is their belly.**—A stronger reiteration of Romans 16:18, “They serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly.” Note the emphasis laid on “feasting and rioting” in 2Peter 2:13; Jude 1:12. **Whose glory is in their shame.**—As the preceding clause refers chiefly to self-indulgence, so this to impurity. Comp. Ephesians 5:12, “It is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret.” “To glory in their shame”—to boast, as a mark of spirituality, the unbridled license which is to all pure spirits a shame—is the hopeless condition of the reprobate, who “not only do these things, but have pleasure in those who do them” (Romans 1:32). **Who mind earthly things.**—This last phrase, which in itself might seem hardly strong enough for a climax to a passage so terribly emphatic, may perhaps be designed to bring out by contrast the glorious passage which follows. But it clearly marks the opposition between the high pretension to enlightened spirituality and the gross carnal temper which it covers, grovelling (so to speak) on earth, incapable of rising to heaven.