So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
Philippians 2:12–13, LSB
Our greatest enemy is our will. We take pride in the fact that we have a free will and the temptation is to think it applies to God. In Christ, we work out our will to be in line with the will of God. Our free will is bound up in sin and the temptations that stand ever before us. We are called to exercise this from ourselves. It is the “working out” of our salvation as we see the hopeless state in which we stand if it were not for God’s working within us. God doesn’t desire us to feel as though our salvation is dependent upon ourselves and that He only completes a portion of it. He has done it all and it is in our obedience to Him we may find comfort in our living. As we come before the Lord with great fear and trembling it is an awesome reverence that we are expressing as it is a sign of how great we understand the work that has been done for us. We work out our salvation in our submission and our obedience to God as we are humbled. None of us is righteous and no one is deserving of salvation, but our Lord has begun the good work in us that shapes us, and He will continue as we prepare to enter into His glory. It is in this that we may find our peace.
Let us pray. I thank you, my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, your dear Son, that you have kept me this night from all harm and danger, and I ask you to protect me this day also from sin and every evil, that in all I do today, I may please you. For into your hands, I commend myself, my body and soul, and all that is mine. Let your holy angel watch over me, that the wicked foe have no power over me. Amen.