Opening Bibles, if you would,
to Philippians chapter 2, the name and the message is all by
God's power. All by God's power. We'll continue
our study in this wonderful epistle written from Rome by Paul, inspired
by the Holy Spirit of God, to the saints that are at Philippi,
which is a Roman city. So he's writing to a mix of Jews
and Gentiles, mostly Gentiles. It's a Gentile church, or they're
all one now, right? Because there's neither Jew nor
Gentile in Christ. And so he's writing to them.
And we'll continue where we left off. We left off on Philippians
2, verse 12. Let's read verses 12 to 18 to
see the context of the verse which we'll look at today, which
is verse 13. Wherefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not
as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work
out your own salvation with fear and trembling. We saw the last
study which we had, which was I think about three or four weeks
ago, that that has nothing to do with our salvation in Christ. It has to do with unity within
the church, unity within the body. Because you see, when you
look at the whole context of the passage, he's talking about
having the mind of humility. And Vicki brought this up that
I didn't even realize I was saying it through the messages. Humility
leads to unity. And that's true. That's true.
When we humble ourselves, right, or God humbles us, it leads to
unity. And I was thinking about this.
Humility is the opposite. What's the opposite of humility?
Pride. And what does pride do? It causes division, doesn't it?
It causes division. And that's why Paul was writing,
under inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God, let this mind
be in you which was in Christ. Humble. He had a humble mind,
didn't he? He's sinless, but he was humble. He humbled himself, the scripture
tells us. And we looked at that whole section before. Now look
at this. For it is God which worketh in
you. Do you know God is actively working
in us? He's conforming us to the image
of Christ. But look at this. For it is God
which worketh in you, both to will and to do of His good pleasure. Oh my, what a verse. And then
he goes on. Do all things without murmuring
and disputing. that ye may be blameless and
harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked
and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world.
Now, isn't this amazing? In religion, it says, people
say, oh, don't complain. You have to be on the mountaintop
all the time. You got to be always happy. But here's the scripture
telling us not to do things with murmurings and disputing. It's
natural for us. See? We're going to be real,
aren't we? This is me sometimes. It's not
hard for me to murmur. Is it hard for you? No. It's
not hard for me to be argumentative. Right? Is it so for you too? Well, here's a word of exhortation
for us. We all do. We all suffer from
this. We're all plagued with this.
Right? Oh, that you may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God,
without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation,
among whom ye shine as lights in the world. We're lights in
this world, beloved. We're lights in this world. Holding
forth the word of life, that's Christ, that I may rejoice in
the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither labored
in vain. Yea, and if I be offered upon
the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice
with you all. For the same cause also do you
joy and rejoice with me. We're going to see that later
on. We all rejoice in Christ. We rejoice in the salvation we
have in him. We rejoice in the wonder of wonders. God saved us, Charlie. Brother
Charlie, God saved us. My goodness, that's wonderful.
Now we're still plagued with sin and we still confess our
sin. Right? Scripture exhorts us to do that.
We still confess our sin before our great God. In verse 12, we
see we're to live a life as safe sinners, trusting and resting
in Christ Jesus, because the only hope for we sinners is Christ.
Now, we sin, and that's 100% us. Do you know that? That's
100% us. I put an article in the Bolton
today, God's Sovereignty and Man's Responsibility. It's an excellent article if
you read it. It's really good. It's by Spurgeon, and he talks
about how we are fully responsible for our sins, beloved. Fully
responsible. And if we say, well, That's just, that's just me.
That's just, that's fatalism. We don't want to go off that
cliff, do we? No. That's why we still confess our
sins to God, even though we know we're totally forgiven. We still
confess our sins to our King. Oh. And, and Sin is 100% on us,
and this is why salvation through Christ is so amazing, because
we're undeserving, with no merit before God, for receiving salvation
through Christ in His redeeming blood. But yet God still has
mercy upon us. It's amazing. And to come to
know by God's revelation that the Son of God was sent by the
Father to save our souls leaves us in awe. It leaves us in awe
when we are shown that by God, the Holy Spirit, because the
law of God and the justice of God has a rightful claim upon
our souls to be punished. But Brother Brian, God had mercy
on us in Christ. That's amazing. Makes your heart
leap, doesn't it, sister? Makes your heart leap that all
our sins are forgiven. wondrous, washed under the blood
of Christ. And we are unable to save ourselves.
Brother Travis, we can't save ourselves, can we? We have no
way to save ourselves. But he saved us from the law
and justice, his own law and justice, by totally satisfying
everything God demanded for the salvation of our eternal souls.
That's what the Lord Jesus Christ did for us. It's marvelous. when he satisfied the law and
justice of God and died in our Roman place by his, again, perfect,
sin-atoning work. It was perfect. There's nothing
to be added to it. It's finished, isn't it, Brother
Brian? It's done. Now let's read verses 12 and 13 again together. Wherefore, my beloved, as ye
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's God which worketh in
you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Now we see
practical Christianity in verse 12, don't we? We see man's responsibility. Right there. And then we see
God's sovereignty in verse 13. Oh my. Look at this. Do you remember
the commercials? I remember when I was a kid,
and you still see them now that we're older, we see the Energizer
Bunny. Do you remember those? Buy the
Energizer batteries and your toys and systems will be energized
for longer than the competition, which was Duracell, right? And
Endurosol came out with their own commercial saying, well,
we lost, we're a copperhead, and I can't remember what it
was. Anyways, we last longer than Energizer. Right? They both made the same claim,
didn't they? But they both did the same thing.
They energized things, didn't they? You take them batteries out of
them toys, they don't work, do they? And the kids let you know. Right? I need more batteries,
Dad. I need more batteries, Mom. Right? Do you know those battery companies
are like false religion? Oh, my. Which tells you that
what they believe, false religion, says, well, what we believe will lead to
your salvation. when meanwhile it leads to your
damnation. Because what they have, there's no energizing power
by God. And batteries eventually wear
out, don't they? Now I'm heading somewhere here. I'm heading somewhere
here. Oh my. In verse 13 we have a
wonderful truth set before us here. A wonderful truth of divine
enablement. You remember John chapter 5,
verse 15? Very, very important to remember
what that says. I'll read it to us. In light
of this verse, I'll read verse 13 again. For it is God which
worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure, right? John 15, 5 says this. I am the vine. You are the branches. He that abides in me, and I in
him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. For without me, you
can do nothing." Nothing. Nothing, eh, brother
Charlie? We can't save ourselves. We can't
redeem ourselves. We can't make ourselves born
again. Right? We can't justify ourselves before
God. Our righteousness is like filthy rags before the Lord. Sister Dee, it says, Christ himself
said, without me you can do nothing. And we know that now, don't we?
By the grace of God. There's a wonderful truth put
forth here in verse 13. See the word worketh in verse 13 and do in
verse 13. Let's read that again. For it
is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good
pleasure. The word work there and the word
do are the same Greek word. The same Greek word. It means
to energize. To energize. It goes on to say
to work effectively. Kind of like them batteries,
eh? It's actually where we get the word energy from. The word energy is derived from
this Greek word. And the word energizes too. The words to will are the translation
of a Greek word meaning to desire. Look at that. God desires to
energize us. Because without him, we can what?
Do nothing. Oh, Energizer battery's got nothing
on the Lord's power, doesn't it? Think of this. You buy a toaster,
right? You take it home, and you set
it on the counter, and you put bread in that toaster, and you
push it down, and you don't plug it in. What's going to happen? Needs to be energized, doesn't
it? Needs to be plugged into the power source. Irons. Remember they used to
have those irons that they heated up on the, and then they come
out with the electric iron. Right? You have an electric iron,
and you just put it on the ironing board, without plugging it, what's
gonna happen? Nothing. Needs to be energized,
doesn't it, brother? Needs power. We need power, beloved. We can't,
people always, you ever hear people say, well, I wanna know
what the will of God is for my life. He's working out his will
in our lives. We don't have to know what it
is. He's working it according to his good pleasure because
he's energizing us, beloved. He's giving us the grace and
the strength to move forward. See, that's why you must be born
again. It's God's power, isn't it? The
power of God, the Holy Spirit regenerated us, Brother Charlie.
It's amazing. And you ever think of this too?
I was talking to Vicki about this. There's a lot of reformation
going on, but no transformation. And reformation without transformation
is religion. Turn to Romans, chapter 12. Look at this. Verses one and two. I beseech
you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present
your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which
is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this
world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind
that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect
will of God. There are a lot of people in
this world that do reformation, don't they? They try to reform
prisoners, don't they? People always talking about it.
There's a whole movement called the Reform Movement. I have several
people I love dearly that are in that. And there's several
that like us don't believe you're under the law, but there's some
that believe that you have to reform yourself. God's working in us, beloved,
to do his will in power. Isn't that amazing? We are being
conformed to the image of Christ. We can't conform ourselves to
the image of Christ. But he conforms us. And he even
energizes us. Brother Brian, you were telling
me, you get up in the morning, you're singing, you're happy. That's God giving
you that, putting that in your soul, brother. That's the Lord
doing that. I rejoice when you tell me, because
I know he sets us on fire, doesn't he? He makes our heart leap when
we hear the gospel preached. We can be down here and hear
the gospel preached and be praising God. Oh my. So the word will there is a translation
of the Greek word meaning to desire. God desires for his will
and purpose to be worked out in us, and he energizes us through
that. It's amazing. So if we doubt
that salvation is of the Lord, if someone doubts that, take
him right here. And then take him to John chapter
one, where it says that it's not the will of man, It's God who makes the difference. Oh my. And the words to will refer to a
desire that comes from one's emotions rather than one's reasons.
So we are emotionally invested. God is emotionally invested in
us. And we in him. He makes us will
in a day of his power. Isn't that amazing? So then think
of that too. Thy people shall be made willing
in the day of thy power. Power. Power. We are dead and
we're made alive by the power of God. Isn't this amazing? That same power that took us
from our dead natural state and made us alive in Christ is the
same power that keeps us going to do the will and purpose of
God. It's amazing. And yet we make
choices every day. Our sin's 100% us, isn't it?
But you know, anything good that we do that we don't know we do
comes from God. Isn't that amazing? according to his will and purpose.
Remember, he's ordained us to good works. We don't know when
we do them. Remember the fellows that were
standing there, they said, Lord, when did we do these things to you?
Well, when you went and visited the sick, when you did this,
when you did, oh my. Isn't that amazing? When you
just gave a cup of water to your brother or sister. And don't
go around giving cups of water just to think you're gonna, Right?
People do that stuff in religion. I'm telling you. I'm going to
get a blessing. Here's a cup of water, Brian. No, that's the
wrong motive. But I've seen people do that.
I saw a young man. He said his buddy got to a door
before him and opened the door for an older lady. And he said,
man, that guy got the reward and I didn't. Oh, that's just
awful. That's just awful. Our reward
is Christ, isn't it? Praise his mighty name. And if
we think we're doing something good, we ain't doing something
good, because it's filled with our pride. Just live the normal
Christian life and love people, love your neighbor as yourself.
Love God first and foremost, and love your neighbor as yourself.
Oh my. So again, think of that. A toaster
without energy, it's useless, without power. An iron without
energy, it's just a tool. A stove without energy, we know
that when our power goes out, what happens? Everything stops
working, doesn't it? And we're like, well, what am
I gonna do? The kids are one, my machines
aren't working anymore. Grab a book, son. I'm blessed
because Josh does that. He just grabs a book and starts
reading. But oh my. When we were kids,
Charlie, and the power went out, we just went outside and ran
around and played. Right, Travis? We just did that,
didn't we? Oh my. Turn, if you would, to 2 Corinthians.
2 Corinthians chapter 4. Oh my. So all those items I mentioned,
they do nothing without power. They need to be, and the only
way we can be lights in the world is to be energized by God. That's
the only way. And to be born again. And then
it's not even us, is it, Travis? It's the Lord working in us to
do his will and good purpose. So he gets all the glory, doesn't
he? Oh my. My, and we're born again and
we struggle with sin in this life and trials and tribulations,
temptations. Oh my, we know we're forgiven
of all our sins, but we still flee to Christ and say, Lord,
help me, help me. I'm struggling. And marvel that
at the fact that's presented here before us, God is working
in us to do his will and purpose, beloved. He's having us grow
in Christ. He's conforming us to the image
of the Son. Through trials and tribulations.
This is brought forth in this chapter. Look at this. Starting
in verse 7. 2 Corinthians 4 verse 7. We have
this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power
may be of God and not us. Look at that. The excellency
of the power may be of God and not us. The gospel is called
the treasure here. Mary Jane, we have a treasure,
sister. The gospel in Christ. Sister Barb, it's wonderful,
isn't it? Oh my. It's wonderful. And it's rich. It's a treasure beyond value. It's a treasure beyond value,
beloved. It has rich blessings such as redemption. Sanctification,
justification, it consists of rich and precious promises of
God. It shows forth the riches of God's mercy and grace in Christ.
And then we see that at the end of this verse, that whatever
is accomplished in the proclamation of the gospel by frail man is
the work of God. Isn't that wonderful, Brother
Travis? When we teach and preach, we just stand up and proclaim,
knowing it's not by us. but it's by God's power that
he's gonna take that and use it for his glory. I may stumble
around and fall around with things I say, but God's still gonna
use it. He's gonna redeem it. Oh, my, why? That God might be praised and
not man. Isn't that wonderful? That's
wonderful, isn't it? Then it goes on in verses eight
and nine. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed.
We are perplexed, but not in despair. Notice the word but
there. Oh my. Persecuted, but not forsaken. Cast down, but not destroyed. We're never free from one trial
or another. As Scott Richardson used to say, we're either in
trial, coming out of a trial, or going back into another one.
We're ever in that in this life. And we all know that, don't we?
We've experienced that. Oh my. But notice, we're not distressed. Oh my. That's the talk of the
Steve, and even when Kathy and Dan went through their cancer
treatments, they're just like, God's on the throne. That's God giving
us grace, isn't it, during those times. Oh my. And we have the
peace of God. We have the manifestations of
his love and care. A freedom to go to his throne
for every trial. Notice that we are perplexed.
This word signifies doubting and uncertainty. You ever had
that? Oh, we all do, don't we? Yeah. Oh, yeah. We are uncertain and we can doubt
very easily. It's in all of us. It will happen
to all of us. And sometimes we don't know what
to do. We're brought to a place where we just are an absolute,
Lord, this is in your hands. But you know what? Do you know
how we know that our needs will be provided? Look at the words. Not in despair. Not in despair. We don't despair
of Christ's leadership. He's sovereign. He's Lord. We
don't despair of his help or his presence. He's ever with
us. You know, He's with us in all
circumstances. No matter what we go through in this life, Christ
is with us. Even before we were saved. That's amazing. And whatever the condition of
God's children in the world, they have a but not. Did you
know that? Look at those words again. Trouble
on every side, yet not distressed. Perplexed, but not in despair. Persecuted, but not forsaken.
Cast down, but not destroyed. We have a but not in our lives,
beloved. And how? How are we not destroyed
in circumstances we go through? Because we're kept by God, as
our verse says. We're energized by God. by His
power. These are things that we can
look back on and go, well, it destroyed me before the Lord
saved me. But it's His will and purpose being wrought out in
us. I was talking to Barbara Kirkpatrick and Kevin this week,
and we don't understand the circumstances that we go through. We have no
idea. We don't understand them, beloved.
But we can rest in the fact, even though our understanding
is extremely limited, that those things are working out for our
good and for God's glory. I understand why I lost my voice.
I know it's a cold and a virus, but this is everything to me
to preach the gospel of Christ. Well, it was humbling. And the Lord took me through
it, though, and by His grace, having the saints pray, and here
I am. I can preach again, thankfully.
And you guys are going through various trials in your life,
too. And we don't always understand why they're happening, but they
are happening for a reason that we don't understand. And I'll
tell you why. If God tells us they're working
out for our good, then they are. Right? Even if we can't understand
it. Even if we're perplexed. Right? Even if we're persecuted. And even if we're cast down and
troubled on every side, but not. But not destroyed, but not forsaken,
not distressed, not in despair. Oh my. So the born-again blood-washed
believer's case may be bad, but we're not hopeless, beloved.
We're not hopeless. Look at verses 10 and 11. Always
bearing in the body the dying of our Lord Jesus Christ, Lord
Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest
in our body. For we which live are always
delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus
might be manifest in our mortal flesh. So Paul is here speaking
of the afflictions and sufferings he's went through. These are
all happening for the furtherance of the gospel, beloved. All for
the furtherance of the gospel. The world hates Christ, it'll
hate us. Oh my. Don't expect any better
treatment than what our Lord got. My oh my. My oh my. Now look at verse 12
there. And the word, The word which means energize in our text
is used here in the word worketh. So then death worketh in us,
but life in you. Now look at that. Paul is setting
before the saints here at Philippi that our death is your life. And it's God that's working that
out. Don't forget, God's will and purpose is being worked out
in Paul and these guys' life during these persecutions. But he's saying, our sufferings
are for your advantage. We're preaching the gospel to
you. And we will continue to preach
the gospel, even if we're suffering. Because God is energizing us.
God has given us, by his power, the will to do this. Do you think
many people, after Paul got stoned, do you think many of us would,
and think of this in, it's hard to imagine this because we wouldn't
be preaching unsaved, but do you think any of us, after Paul
got stoned, would walk right back in the city? Remember? I think it was Derby, was it?
Right back in. They thought he was dead, didn't
they, Brother Brian? He got up and walked right back in. What
did he do? I'm going to keep preaching the gospel. The folks
need to hear the gospel in here. Oh, my. So even their trials and even
their deaths is the means of bringing the gospel of life to
you. That's what Paul's saying. Who has the power over life and
death? God does. In God alone. And God is working His will and
purpose in them by His almighty power, even in their death and
persecution. Now let's keep reading. all the
way to 15. We, having the same spirit of
faith, according as it is written, I believe and therefore have
I spoken, we also believe and therefore speak, knowing that
he which raised up Lord Jesus shall raise us up also by Jesus
and shall present us with you. For all things are for your sakes,
that the abundant grace might, through the thanksgiving of many,
redound. That's just, redound there is
just overwhelming grace, overwhelming. to the glory of God. Let's go
back to our verses now, quickly. I got a few more minutes here.
Let's go back and read verses 12 and 13 again. Wherefore, my
beloved, of Philippians chapter 2, Wherefore, my beloved, as
ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only. So he's
saying, when I'm there, you don't do a showy thing like, oh, we're
obeying God. He's saying, you obey God even
when I'm not here. Right? So in our everyday lives.
See, this is very practical for us, isn't it? Oh. But now much more in my absence,
work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is
God which worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good
pleasure. So if working out our salvation
in fear and trembling, we were to secure our own salvation by
anything we do, then there would be no need for Christ to die.
But we can't save ourselves, and the scripture's not saying
that we can. Because that would go contrary
to all the other scriptures, right? So we know it has nothing
to do with our salvation. Because our salvation is clearly
in Christ. We cannot save ourselves. And
the scriptures destroy man-made religious lies that say you can
do something to be saved. The scriptures destroy that by
saying salvation's only in Christ and him alone. only by his merit
and by his righteousness and by his shed blood. And if it
be God which worketh in me to do his good pleasure, to will
and to do his good pleasure, without him giving me the energy,
us the energy, to have that come to pass, then our labor, our
work, is not the work and labor of
merit, is it? It's our reasonable service.
Remember we saw that in Romans? It's our reasonable service.
God saved us. We serve him because we love him. We serve him. My oh my. And in no way does this working
out your salvation in verse 12 recommend you to God or give
you any merit and favor before God, none of that. Our merit
and favor only comes through Christ, beloved, doesn't it?
In Him alone. That which we do now as born-again,
blood-washed believers, we do by the power of God. Our sin
is wholly ours. We do that by our own flesh.
But anything we do for Him, anything good, comes from Him. So there's
no boasting, is there? We gotta give Him all the glory
and honor and praise. Remember I read that? I beseech
you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present
your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God, which
is your reasonable service. and be not conformed to this
world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that
ye may prove what is good and acceptable and perfect will of
God. So this text is truly a blessing, because we find through grace
the Lord working in us, both to will and to do His good pleasure. And he works in his people to
show, you know why he works in us? To show us our utter helplessness. Because without me, he says,
you can do nothing. Think of what you know now about
Christ and the gospel, which we only know a little bit, don't
we? But think about what we do know, though, from before we
were saved. Well, I didn't know nothing.
And everything I know now, God's revealed it to me. And all through
that, has He not shown us, Travis, our utter helplessness without
Him? Through all that He's revealed to us? And He just keeps showing
us that, doesn't He? He keeps just showing us, Brother
Jim, that we can't do nothing without Him. We can't do nothing. Our complete all-sufficiency
is in the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone. Oh. And we feel the Lord's grace
prompting us to an unceasing desire for the Lord, don't we?
We keep desiring the Lord. Why do we keep desiring the Lord?
Because he's put that in us. Ah. So may we humbly go through
our days as one who hath an object of our salvation before us, the
Lord Jesus Christ. And may we rejoice in knowing
that as the Greek literal Bible, listen to the Greek literal Bible
for this verse, for God is the one working in you, both to will
and to work according to his good pleasure. Praise his mighty
name. Praise his mighty name. Brother
Brian, can you close us in prayer?