Ready to begin whenever you're
ready for me to? Okay. If you'll open your Bibles to
Philippians chapter 1. Philippians chapter 1. I pray, Father, this morning
that you would bless this study of your scriptures. May all distracting thoughts
be removed, and may we gain a clear understanding of what you've
left recorded for us. In Christ's name, amen. Now, the book of Philippians
was written from prison. I don't know which of the imprisonments
in Rome that Paul was experiencing. He was imprisoned at least twice
in Rome. I don't know which one of them it was, but it was written
by him while he was in prison. Now by way of introduction, let's
take note of two verses in chapter one. Being confident of this,
that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion
until the day of Christ Jesus. And then down in verse 19, he says, for I know that through
your prayers and the help given by the spirit of Jesus Christ,
what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. Now, these two words or these
two verses are connected and kind of give much of the theme
of this book. These, the Philippians were, as the
rest of the Roman Empire, they were under Nero at this time. Nero was an insane, Christ-hating
emperor. Therefore, he persecuted believers
at every opportunity. And among the persecutions was
Paul, had him imprisoned. Of course, there's never any
reason for any leader to be fearful of a believer as though a believer
will prove to be an insurrectionist. Now, I understand why they fear
the message. They fear the message of the
church because It releases those who believe it from bondage. Now, that doesn't mean that we
are free from the duty to obey the leaders that God has put
over us, but there's limits to that obedience. That is, we obey
those in places of authority until they require us to do something
contrary to what God has told us to do. Well, leaders of the
world, they want absolute authority. They don't even want it to be
that you would say, I will obey you until you tell me to do something
contrary to what God has said. So, If they get a little crazy,
like Nero was, they initiate persecution. They want to eliminate
this message, lest enough people believe it that he feels he will
lose his power. Now, this church had both outward
and inward troubles. The outward ones, the persecution
arising from Nero. And then secondly, there were
some Judaizers that crept into the church. Now, you see this
happening in the book of Galatians. You see it happening in the book
of Colossians. It was in the book of Hebrews. This was one
of the problems that the early church had. Remember, Christianity,
if you look at it as people who study the discipline called comparative
religion, they see Christianity as simply an outworking of Judaism. In a sense, it is. But it was
not an outworking of the Judaism that existed in that day. The
Judaism of the day of our Lord was an apostate version of what
God had commanded. But when the church first began,
most people viewed the church as simply a sect or a denomination
of Judaism. They didn't see it as a distinct
religion. Therefore, When churches would
be established in Gentile cities, quite often there were Jews involved. They would see that Christianity
was merely a polished up form of their Judaism. Now some of
them, and remember Paul would almost always go to the synagogue
first. And that's going to be predominantly
Jews in the synagogue. He preached that message. I never
heard of an entire synagogue converting and just becoming
a church. There was always a hubbub and some would leave with Paul.
Some of those who left did so because they actually believed,
they understood and believed the distinct message that Paul
gave. But some of them left and went
with them because they saw certain parts of it they kind of liked. And they were, you know, happy
to leave maybe the strictness of the Judaism that they were
acquainted with or whatever, but they left. The thing is,
when they got into these churches, they brought their Judaism with
them. They brought their legalism with them. I heard a few of you talking
about how many of, like living in California now
and some of the states where it's very expensive to live,
due to high taxation and such, they're moving to places like
Texas and Tennessee. And when they get there, you
ask them, why did you leave? Oh, it's too expensive. The taxes
are too high. And yet they vote for politicians
that will initiate policies that raise taxes and make it expensive
to live in their new place. Well, that's kind of the same
thing that some of these Jewish people did. They left the synagogue. They thought, this is great,
we're going to be free. But when they got over here to the church,
they tried to institute the very policies they thought they were
getting away from. How foolish is man? He'll do
that. And so they wanted to bring in
circumcision and the keeping of days and that sort of thing.
Well, this was, of course, all troublesome to the church, the
outward persecution. the inward heresy, and Paul wrote
this to assure them that none of this was going to result in
the overthrow of the church of God. He said, he who began a
good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ. Now, this beginning of the work
on the one hand you could say it begins with regeneration and
yet the work of God in saving his people began before there
was time. It was begun in eternity and
all this business of time is is a succession of events that
bring to pass that which God purposed and began in eternity.
And even though Things arise that look like they're in opposition
to the purpose of grace and the salvation of God's people. They
are actually the very things that God is using in order to
bring about the salvation of his people. So he says to them,
don't worry about these things. Now he's not saying to them,
you know, It's okay that these things happen. That is, if you
have people in the church that are trying to bring in false
doctrine, you've got to deal with it. But don't look at it
as though it will in any way affect God's purpose of salvation
for his sheep. What these things often do, what
they often prove to be, is God purifying his church. He allows
these heretics to rise up. Why? So that they will draw away
after them those who weren't really believers. One time in Danville, Kentucky,
where Brother Don Fortner was pastoring, they began a new church. Some
organization came in, began a new church, and they were one of
these, you know, we're going to build a big church, and you know, really aggressively
evangelism and all that, and they were going door-to-door
handing out tracts and trying to get people to come to church.
Somebody got a little worried about it, somebody in Don's church,
and brought one of those tracts to him. One of those invitations,
Don looked at it and said, they can have everybody they can get.
Well, that sounds strange. Well, Don could say that because
he is confident that they cannot get. any of God's people. You
cannot take them away from the gospel. And so that's kind of what Paul
is saying here. He's like one who's sitting on
a mountain looking at the big picture. He didn't, you know,
he wasn't trying to explain all this from the perspective of
a prison cell in Rome. He is looking at things like
God looks at things. The whole picture and all of
these little details, all these troubles are being worked together
by God for the eternal good of his people. And therefore he
says, don't worry, don't fret about these things. Remember
in verse 19, he says, actually end of verse 18, Yes,
and I will continue to rejoice for I know that through your
prayers and the help given by the Spirit of Jesus Christ, what
has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance. Now, does that mean that he expected
that he was going to be released from jail? No, he didn't know. In fact, in other parts of the
scriptures, He says, you know, I hope to, but whatever happens,
conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel. Whether
I'm ever released or not, you conduct yourselves according
to the gospel. Here's what he's saying. Whether I get let out
of prison or they cut my head off, either way, it's working
for my eternal salvation, for my deliverance from everything
that is a trouble to me. And that's the way we need to
look at things. Sure, we prefer what we call
the good times. But as I've pointed out, there's
no such thing as bad times for believers. There's unpleasant
times. But there's nothing bad in the
life of a believer. It's all good. These trials that came their
way were for the purpose of doing them in the church Good. People look at trials and say,
how can I fix this trial? Well, trials are not things to
be fixed. Trials are what God uses to fix
things. Now you think on that a minute.
Trials are not to be fixed. There's not a remedy for trial.
Trial is the remedy to fix some problems. And that's why Paul says, in
everything give thanks, even in the midst of trial, give thanks.
Why? Well, God's doing something good. He's fixing a problem.
We may not even know what the problem is, but he's fixing it. Now, it starts out and he says,
Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus. Now, Paul is in
prison, Timothy is not, but they're, They're together, they've worked
together. Now Paul does not, in this particular book, introduce
himself as an apostle like he does in many of the other books.
He says Paul and Timothy and he calls himself by a title that
was applicable both to him and to Timothy. Servants, bondservants
of Christ Jesus. Now a bondservant was a special
kind of servant. A bond servant, it didn't mean
that he had been bound to his servitude by someone else. It
meant he had bound himself. He bound himself to his servitude.
For instance, and this is from the old covenant law, say due
to some debt you had incurred, you were under bondage, that
is, you were made someone else's slave or indentured servant until
the debt was paid off. So you work through your indenture,
the debts paid off, but you really like your master. Turns out it
was good working in his household. And you say, I don't want to
leave here. And so, uh, from what I understand,
they would bore a hole in their earlobe, probably to put a ring
in it. It was an indication. that they
were a bond servant. And so that person was bound
to his master, not by obligation, but by willingness. As one person pointed out in
a commentary I was reading on the book of Romans, it speaks
of one whose debt is already paid. Now, we are bondservants of God. Now, we're not bondservants because
we served out our indenture. Somebody else did it for us,
but here's the point. We are under no obligation. There's no legal obligation on
us anymore. But when we learn that, when
the gospel teaches us that by the the life and death of Jesus
Christ, our debt was paid, we suddenly realized we like it
in the Master's house. We like it better in serving
Him than we liked it before when we were out serving ourselves.
And so we say, I'm a bondservant of God. I'm a bondservant of
Jesus Christ. And he writes this to all the
saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and
deacons. In Acts chapter 16, you read
the account of Paul going to Philippi. The first convert there
was that woman named Lydia. She and her household, and then
there was, we read about the Philippian jailer. A remarkable story. Paul had been
put in prison there for preaching the gospel. Jailer had been put
in charge of him. And the rule back then was if
you were guarding prisoners and they got away, you were killed. So the Lord miraculously opens the
doors of all the cells in that prison, not just Paul's, all
of them. And when the jailer runs down
there to see what all the commotion is about, all that noise of doors
opening and stuff like that. He's ready to kill himself. He'd
rather commit suicide than go through the humiliation of an
execution. And Paul said, don't harm yourself. And this is a
remarkable thing, he says, we are all here. And he didn't mean
he and his brothers who might have been in jail with him for
the sake of the Gospel, all the criminals, none of them left
either. Now, that was a miraculous work
of God to open those doors, and it was a miraculous work of God
to keep all those criminals from leaving. Why? That Philippian
jailer belonged to him, belonged to God, and he would not let
him die apart from hearing and believing the gospel. And sure
enough, that Philippian jailer, he, you know, Paul says, don't
kill yourself, don't harm yourself. We're all here. And he's shocked. And then he says, well, what
must I do to be saved? And Paul said, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. And the same goes for
your household. And so the Philippian jailer,
he believed the gospel and the people in his household believed
the gospel and they were all baptized, became members of the
church. So that's how that church got started. Now, I don't know
how many years later this may have been, but the church had
not only been started because a few people had believed, Paul
had instructed them enough and left leadership behind. There
were these overseers, in King James they translated bishops,
and deacons. Overseers are the same thing
as pastors and elders. They're all the same thing, just
their jobs described in different ways. They are generally those
in charge of the spiritual well-being of the church. They're teachers.
They administrate the affairs of the church as an organization.
And the deacons, generally speaking, their job is in the practical
matters of the church. The first deacons were chosen
in order to make sure that the money for the widows was distributed
properly. And then all of them are called
saints. Now, in a Roman church, you don't
become a saint till the church says you're one. Isn't that remarkable? People die. I'm not absolutely
sure, but I believe they have that doctrine of purgatory. And
so even if you're a really good person, you still got some sin
to purge, to burn off. Because remember the word purge
comes from the Greek word for fire, just like our word purify
comes from the same word. So purgatory or purgatory is
a place where you burn off whatever remains of your sins that you
didn't make up for with good works or, you know, saying your
rosary enough and stuff like that. Well, what's a saint? That's someone who finally got
done with purgatory. And they have been beatified.
That is, they've been taken to heaven. And the church figures out when
that happens. I heard it's something out of
that church operates. Of course, like I said, they're
just honest about what they do. Other churches do the same kind
of thing. They just try to cover it up. But the story is told,
you know, about a fellow that died and he was a businessman
and kind of crooked and all that. So his family thought, well,
it's going to take a lot to get him out of purgatory. By the
way, that's another way to get him out. You can give money to
the church. And whatever good that was gets credited to whoever
you appoint it to in purgatory. Get them out quicker. And so
this family kept donating lots and lots of money because it
was a rich family. And, uh, one time the priest
visited him. They said, well, we've been given
all this money. He said, uh, how much progress do you think
dad made? Priest said, well, he may have
his foot out of purgatory. Well, of course, they could see
where that was going. It was going to take a lot of money to get the rest
of them out. And they said, well, knowing Dad, if he got his foot
out, he can get the rest of it done. And they never did give
any more. The church doesn't choose who
are saints. God makes saints. They were set
apart by Him in His eternal purpose, set apart by Him or by the blood
of Christ, set apart by the call of the Spirit. And that's what
the word holy means, set apart. Every believer is a saint. Verse three, I thank my God every
time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of
you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel
from the first day until now, being confident of this, that
he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion
until the day of Christ. Now, I don't know if there were any
churches that whenever Paul remembered them, it brought him down rather
than lifted him up. But certainly the church at Philippi
is one of those churches. Whenever he thought of that group
of people, it just, it encouraged his heart and it caused him to
give thanks to God for what was going on there. Give thanks to
God for those people. He says, I pray with joy. Now we pray for our brothers
and sisters, we pray for the churches, whether it's with joy
because of how well things are going, or sorrow because of all
the troubles that may be encompassing them. But he says, I always pray for
you guys with joy. And he says, it's because of
your partnership. That's the word normally translated fellowship.
And it could simply mean that they believe the same gospel
as he does. And all believers fellowship
in the one faith that unites them all. We have fellowship
with one another because we have this thing in common, the gospel
of Jesus Christ. I like the way that our translation
handles it by using the word partnership, which is a legitimate
way to handle it, because not only did they believe the gospel,
we find out later that from the very beginning they have been
supporting him in his gospel ministry. There were many churches
who never gave him anything. They may have taken care of him
while he was in town, but when he leaves town, He never hears
from them again. He brought them the glorious
gospel of the blessed God. They said, thank you ever so
much. And that was the end of it. These people, they were not
only partners in believing, they were partners with him in ministry. You see, when a preacher preaches,
when a missionary goes out, it's not just him going out. It's
everybody that's praying for him, everybody that's sending
him money, all the churches that take care. I mean, you know,
they don't eat the air. They got to have money to buy
food and stuff. So that's what he's saying. From
the very beginning, you all have supported me. You've taken care
of my physical needs, my natural needs, so that I can give myself
to the spiritual work. And of course, that created joy
in his heart. And that also gave him confidence
that a good work had been begun among them, and that therefore
it would continue, and God would bring it on to completion at
the day of Christ. Verse 7, it's right for me to
feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart.
For whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the
gospel, All of you share in God's grace with me." Once again, we
share the same grace of salvation, but he's also talking about,
he said by grace he'd been given, or mercy and grace, he'd been
given a ministry, and he says, you're sharing in that grace
with me. The grace of being a part of the work of preaching the
gospel. Now, I'm pastor here. I'm very
nearly the only one who preaches here. I mean, if you go by percentages
of the time the pulpit's occupied. But I'm not the only minister
in this church. Everyone who supports this church
is a partaker, a participator in the ministry of this church,
whether supported by prayers, supported by gifts or whatever. That's one reason I say there's
no one in the church, in God's church, who doesn't have something
to do. We may not know what, we know
some of the things we're supposed to do, but we may not know the
particular part of the body that we occupy. But the whole church
is involved in the ministry of the gospel, even though it may
only be one or two people that you hear from. God can testify, this is verse
eight, God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection
of Jesus Christ. Paul would have enjoyed, I think,
and maybe if this was his final imprisonment, he was probably
in his mid-60s, somewhere in that, called himself Paul the
Aged. So he's my age. And who knows? He may have been thinking, sure,
it would be nice to settle down somewhere. And I think Paul might have thought,
if I settle down somewhere, if I think that the Lord would have
me no longer travel, but just go somewhere and sit there and
minister to people there, I'm going to Philippi. That's where
I want to be. He longed for them. with the
affection of Christ Jesus. All right, we will end there,
pick it up there next week. You're dismissed until the regular
service.