Good morning. If you have your
Bibles this morning, please turn to the Book of Philippians. Book of Philippians, Chapter
3. Book of Philippians, Chapter
3. Paul is an old man now. He's
sitting in a jail cell, and he's waiting on papers that for him
to be executed, and he wanted to write one last time to his
brethren at Philippi, and he wrote him a letter here. And
I find it amazing how he starts out. You know, he says, finally,
my brethren, beginning here in verse one, he says, finally,
my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. Here he is in a jail cell waiting
to be executed, and all he can think about is our Lord Jesus
Christ. And then over in the fourth chapter
of this same book, he says, rejoice in the Lord always. And again,
I say rejoice. We have so much to rejoice in. Sometimes we get so tied up in
this world and we get so much on our plate that we forget to
realize that Christ Jesus is our Lord and that he is in control
of everything. He is absolute sovereign and
that he does all things well. All things, regardless of...
We may not see it because His ways is so much higher than our
ways and His thoughts are so much higher than our thoughts,
but He does all things well. And Paul here says to rejoice
in the Lord. And we need to rejoice in the
Lord, not that we need to, we want to, because we know who
He is. The Bible says, neither is there
salvation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven
given among men, whereby we must be saved. Then over in the book
of John, the Lord Jesus says, I am the way, the truth, and
the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. He don't say, I am the way. He
said, I am. He don't say, I am a way. He
says, I am the way. He is the only way. And I thank
God for that. But we need to worship him, and
we need to rejoice in his person, in his work, in his sacrifice,
in his precious blood, because there is no remission of sin
without the blood. And he was the only one that
was qualified. 1 Corinthians 1.30 says, but
of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who has given us wisdom and righteousness,
sanctification and redemption. Let him that glory glory in the
Lord. So that's a reason to rejoice. He has given us all. He is the
offer of our faith. He is the giver of our faith,
He is the source of our faith, and He is the finish of our faith. Christ Jesus is our all. And
you know, we dare not go to God. Even in the Old Testament, you
know, no one was able to go to God except to a priest. And we
have a great high priest, Jesus, the Son of God. If you would,
turn over to Hebrews 4, chapter 14, just for a second. It's such
a privilege to know that we have a high priest that loves us so
much that he was willing to lay down his life and shed his blood
for us. But he's a high priest. But not only that, he took on
the flesh of our flesh and bone of our bone. And he knows exactly
what we go through. He knows what we face every day.
He says here, seeing then that we have a great high priest that
is passed into the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast
our profession. For we have not a high priest
which cannot be touched with the feelings of our infirmities,
but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. And look at the privilege it
says right here. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of
grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time
of need. That's reason to rejoice right
there, brothers and sisters. We need to rejoice in his greatness.
In His person, when He rejoiced in His incarnation, He was flesh
of our flesh and bone of our bones. And there are so many
promises in this book that are to His children, to His elect.
And God don't break promises. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday,
today, and forever. And we look for the blessings
of His glorious return. The Bible says in the book of
Titus, thank you for that blessed hope of looking for the glorious
return of our great God and our Savior, Jesus Christ. He's coming
back soon. You know, the Bible says that
this life is like a vapor. Some of us can relate to this.
Life's like a vapor. It appears for a little while,
then it is gone. But we've got someone that's
coming back for us, and I thank the Lord for that. It says here,
to write the same things to you, to me indeed, is not grievous.
Here in this first verse. For a man of God, it's been called
to preach the true gospel of Jesus Christ. There's no greater
privilege on the face of the earth. There's no more responsibility
than to stand before God's people and to proclaim His Word. And
it's not grievous. Jesus Christ and Him crucified. That's all we want to hear about.
That's all we want to hear about. Because He is our all. And He
says, for you, But for you, it is safe. I love hearing the gospel. You know, I've been coming here
for seven years, and I love to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I know what I'm going to hear before I get here. And you know
what it is? It's what I want to hear. It's
what I need to hear. And it's what I need to get me
through the day, to know. He says, to keep your mind on
things above, not on things of this world, for you're dead and
your life is hidden with Christ in God. That brings us comfort. When we get down, we get out,
we get discouraged, we get too much on our plate, all we have
to do is think about our Lord Jesus. He done it all for us,
and He's there for us. And it's safe for us also, you
know, because it helps us, you know, whenever we talk about
the gospel, there ain't but one gospel. And when we talk about
the gospel, whenever we hear the gospel preached, we know
it's absolute truth, and it helps us because it shows us who He
is, and it shows us who we are. So it helps us with our self-righteousness,
you know. If you have your Bibles for a
minute, turn over to Galatians chapter one, just for a second
here. You know, in this world that
we live in today, but it happened in the world that Paul lived
in, and he was concerned about it. But there are so many different
gods in this world. There are so many different gospels
being preached, but there's only one gospel, and that's the gospel
for our Lord Jesus Christ. It says here in this first verse,
it says, in the third verse of 1st Galatians, it says, grace
be to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord
Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver
us from the present evil world according to the will of God
and our Father. to whom be glory forever and
ever. Amen. He says in verse 6 here,
I marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called
you into the grace of Christ and to another gospel, which
is not another, but there will be some that trouble you and
would pervert the gospel of Christ, But though we, or an angel from
heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have
preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before,
he actually says it twice. So I say I now again, if any
man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received,
let him be accursed. That's another reason that we
need to rejoice, and that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. One
thing that Paul was concerned about here, he said, beware of
dogs, be aware of evil workers, be aware of false concision. What these people are doing,
they're mixing works with grace. I heard a preacher say one time,
if it's 99.9% grace and 0.1% works, It's not of grace, because it
is all of grace. And you got people here that
they want God to do their part, and then they say, we have to
do our part. No, Jesus Christ said on the cross, what was his
last words that he said? It is finished. Our sanctification
is perfect in Christ Jesus, and the work is done. And I thank
Him. That brings us something else to rejoice in and to be
glad in. He says here to beware of evil
workers, beware of the concision. These were Jews. They were saying,
yes, we believe in your gospel, we believe in Jesus Christ, but
you have to be circumcised. That's a false lie. One thing
that false teachers do, they'll always have some truth for it.
but they'll always have some lies in it also. And like I said,
there's but one true gospel. And it says here that we are
the circumcision which worship God in the Spirit and rejoice
in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. And what he's saying
here is there is a spiritual circumcision, and that is the
elect of God. We have the circumcision of the
heart. You know, some people say that when a man gets saved,
that God changes his flesh. He don't change his flesh. His
flesh, He's got the same old flesh. We know that. We got two
natures. We battle it every day. But God comes in and He changes
it hard. He turns the heart of stone into
a heart of flesh. And that there's a part of us
that makes us want to love God. He wants us to be with God. He
wants us to trust God. He wants us to love Him. We want
that. We want that more than anything
in the world. Sometimes we get so aggravated because His flesh
gets in the way, but He gives us a new heart, you know, and
I thank Him for that right there. And it says that we worship God
in spirit, you know, and rejoice in Christ Jesus. We need to rejoice
and we want to rejoice in Christ Jesus. Just think about this
right here. This right here, you know, God is absolute sovereign
in providence, redemption, I mean, providence and salvation and
creation. He says that this is a day which
the Lord hath made. We will rejoice and be glad in
it. I thank the Lord for that. I
thank the Lord that we're able to gather together. You know,
we're gathered together in this building. This building is not
the church. We're the church. And I thank God for that. And
He's in the hearts of each and every one of us. You know, Joshua
said, be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed, for thy God
is with thee, wheresoever thou goest. It don't matter if it's
in an emergency room or if it's in sickness or health or whatever.
You know, we're able to rejoice in the Lord because we know He's
always there. He says, I have loved you with
an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness
have I drawn thee. He's always with us. What did
David say? The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. And I thank
Him for that. I thank Him for that. And it
says right here, It says right here that we have no confidence
in the flesh. He says that again, you know.
And we don't, we don't have a bit of confidence in the flesh. We
think, you know, we think, ah, I'm doing okay and everything.
And there's things that I don't know if it's happened in my body,
you know. We strive to be like Christ Jesus
because we love him so much. He put that love in us. We trust
him. We desire to be with him. We
desire to be like him. And one day we will be. But you
know, this flesh gets in the way so many times, you know,
but there's no confidence in the flesh because it changes,
you know, but Jesus Christ don't change. He said the same yesterday,
today, and forever. He don't change and His promises
don't change. And we will always be His people.
We will always be His people. He is, as I said before, and
I'm gonna say it again now, you think about this. You know, we
say love and things like that, but His love is so much higher
than our love. You know that? It's so much higher
than in our life. But I thank Him for that. And
then Paul, you know, he was a very religious man here. He's getting
ready to go into that. He was a very religious man here.
And he said, you know, he put all of his confidence in the
things that he did in the outer flesh. He was a very religious
man. But true worship comes from within. and comes out. It don't come
out and go within. And that's where our Lord is. He said, what know ye not that
your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you,
which you have got? You're not your own and we're
not. We belong to Christ Jesus because we was hanging on that
cross with him when he suffered and died for us. And he paid
our sin debt for us in full. And that's something that we
need to, that's something as Christians in this life that we live in
and the things that we go through and everything, As I say this
before, if we just keep our mind on Him, I have found out that
every time that I get down and out and I get discouraged and
I think, what am I going to do? I don't know if any of you do
this, and sometimes I think I just get overwhelmed with things.
Just take a deep breath and think about our Lord Jesus Christ and
what He has done for us, what He's doing for us, and what He's
going to do for us. and that will bring you peace.
He says, peace I give unto you, my peace I give unto you, not
as a world give I to you. Let not your heart be troubled
and never let it be afraid. We have a desire to love him
more. We have a desire to trust him more. We have a desire to
be with him. We have a desire to be like him.
And I thank him for this desire because you know who gives that
to us? He does, because nothing in His flesh is no good thing.
Ain't nothing in His flesh that can please our God. But I thank
God. I thank God for the Spirit of
the Lord that lives within us. He gets us through the day. I
don't know about you, but I need Him each step of the way and
each moment of the day. Because the Bible says a man
that is born of this world, his days are few and full of trouble.
And we get over one thing and then we face another. But you
know what that's for? That's to grow us away from this
world and grow us closer to Him. You know, and it works, you know,
it works. It does get us closer to Him
because we know who's in control of everything. And we know it's
not us. And I thank God it's not us.
And especially when it comes to salvation, these people out
here that wants to mix works with grace, you know, God does
His part. He'll take, I take the first
step and He'll take the rest, you know. If I take the first
step, I don't need God to take the rest. I need God to help
me to take that first step. I need Him to open my eyes up.
He said, for you have He quickened and made alive that was dead
in trespasses and sins. It's all of the Lord Jesus Christ,
the precious blood, His perfect righteousness, His perfect obedience
to the Father was our righteousness. His blood sacrifice was our justification. His grace is our salvation. It's
all of Him, and I thank Him for that. I truly thank Him for that. Then Paul talks about right here,
you know, these people, these false teachers, you know, mixing
grace with work. He talks about Him. He says here
in the 4th, 5th, and 6th verse, he says, though I might also
have confidence in the flesh, if any other man thinketh that
he hath thorough, he might trust in the flesh, I more. And then
he talks about his credentials here. He says, circumcised the
eighth day as a stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew
of the Hebrews, as touching the law, a Pharisee, concerning zeal,
persecuting the church, touching the righteousness, which is of
the law, blameless. He come to find out, he come
to find out that all of this was useless. What happened to
him? He was on his road to Damascus. He ran into somebody he hadn't
planned on running into. He had papers to persecute the
Jews and to throw them in jail, but he ran into our Lord Jesus
Christ. And you know, I believe the Lord
saved him right then because you know what he done? He had,
as rebellious as he was, he looked up at the Lord and he said, what
will thou have me to do, Lord? He seen who he was. He seen that
he was God in the flesh. He knew that he was Lord. And
he knew at that moment, he knew that everything that he had done
in the flesh, that it was rubbish, it was trash. And that's what
he says right here. He says, but what things were
gained to me, those I counted lost for Christ. He come out
ahead on that deal, didn't he? And he says, yet doubtless and
I count all things but lost for the excellency of the knowledge
of Jesus Christ my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss
of all things and do count them but done that I may win Christ. and be found in Him. That is
all of our hope. It's our good hope. And as a
preacher, as the brother said Wednesday night, it's more than
just a wish. It's an expectation. And it's
because our confidence, our trust, And their assurance is not in
anything that we have done, but it's in God. It's in His Word.
It's in the person, the work, the sacrifice, and the blood
of the precious Lamb of God, the unspeakable gift, Jesus Christ
our Lord. And that's what Paul come to
realize. And that's what happens when God opens up our eyes. He
opens it from the heart. He opens the heart up and we
see the truth. And that's one thing that helps
us to hear the gospel of Christ over and over. When we get out
in this world, when we hear a lie, we'll recognize it, won't we?
Because we know what the truth is. And I thank Him for that
right there. I thank Him so much for that.
You know, at one time, he thought that he was doing God a favor.
You know, you don't do God favors. God don't need us. We need him,
we need him. It's not what we do for God,
it's what God has done for us. And he gave his only begotten
son on the cross, allowed him to bleed and to be our sacrifice
for us and I thank him for that. It says that he renounced everything
that he had done in religion and he counted him nothing but
useless. And in verse nine and 10 right here he says, and be
found in him. Not having my own righteousness,
he realizes it now, not finding my own righteousness, which is
of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ,
the righteousness which is of God by faith, that I may know
him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his suffering,
being made formidable unto his death. It says here that as believers,
our purpose, our desire, our sincere hope is that we may obtain
Christ and be found in Him. Look at Galatians 2, 16-20. Galatians
2, 16-20. It says here, It says, knowing that a man is
not justified by the works of the law, Paul found this out,
but by faith of Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Jesus
Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not
by the works of the law. For by the works of the law shall
no flesh be justified. But if all we seek to be justified
by Christ, we ourself also are found sinners. Is therefore Christ
the minister of sin? God forbid. For if I build again
the things which I destroy, I make myself a crown dresser. For I
fought the law. For I fought the law. and dead
to the law, but I might live unto God. I am crucified with
Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth
in me, in the flesh which I now live in the flesh. In the life which I now live
in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me
and gave himself for me. He done it all, and I thank him
for that. As God's elect, we want to be
like Christ. We want to be like him in attitude.
We want to be like him in spirit. We want to be like him in heart.
That's our desire. That's the new heart that God
has put into us. Is that right there? Read 2 Timothy
verse 7. 2 Timothy verse 7, we're about
finished. 2 Timothy verse 7. We'll just read verse 10. It
says, therefore, I endear all things for the elect's sake,
that they may also obtain the salvation which is in Christ
Jesus with eternal glory. Everything is about Christ. He
done it all, and I thank him for that. He says here in verse
11, If by any means I may attain the resurrection of the dead,
not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect,
but I follow after, if I may apprehend that for which also
I am apprehended of Christ. Brethren, I count not myself
to have apprehended, but this one thing I do, forgetting those
things which are behind and reaching forth into those things which
are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high
calling of Christ Jesus, our Lord, of God in Christ Jesus. It's not talking about salvation
here, as we said before, that's a finished deal. But as disciples
of Jesus Christ, as ambassadors to Jesus Christ, and for what
he has done for us, and what he's doing for us, we have a
desire. He's already grabbed hold of
us, but we have a desire to grab hold of him. And we do that by
coming together when we can. We love the brethren, don't we?
We love each other, you know. And what's so great about this
church is, right here, is the unity. It has the same focus. And that is Jesus Christ and
Him crucified. We want to know Him. We truly
want to know Him. We want to love Him. And we do.
We do know Him. We do love Him. We do trust Him. But we're never satisfied with
where we stand at with Christ. We always want to love Him more.
We want to trust Him more. We don't want Him to be a part
of our life. We want Him to be our life. We have that desire. And one
day, one day, I love that verse over in John, where it says,
Beloved now are ye the sons of God, and it doeth not yet appear
what ye shall be. But when he shall appear, you
shall be like him. Can you imagine? You shall be
like him, for you shall see him as he is. Do we not have a lot
to rejoice after? We have a lot to rejoice for.
I thank God. I thank God for His mercy, for
His grace, for His love, because it's everlasting. Amen. Your dispense.