Let me speak to this for a few
minutes, and it may not necessarily relate directly to the text that
we're in, but it's a soapbox that I'd like to stand upon for
just a moment, at least one foot. Why is that the case? Because
in the economy in which we live, the economy of our culture, not
just the financial economy, but it's really what powers and fuels
everything. And what helps Christmas be so
special is that we make a lot of money as retailers in this
world. A lot of businesses move from
the red to the black just through Christmas and through Black Friday
and through the holiday seasons. So what better way to capitalize
on the materialistic ideals of humanity than to, as soon as
one thing is over, go ahead and begin to press into the minds
and the hearts of people to do something different. Now, I'm
not being a Scrooge, and I'm not saying bah humbug. I think
there's nothing wrong with gathering together as family, eating a
meal, exchanging some gifts, cleaning your home, whatever
it might be that you like to do. But my problem comes when
we consider it a celebration of Christ. When we look at the
history of Christmas, Christmas was never even celebrated in
this country until the latter part of the 19th century. In
fact, it was prohibited up until that time because it was not
something that actually was considered a Christian holiday. It was the
history of Christmas, not what I'm here to talk about this morning.
But it is something that we have now seen become very pervasive,
not just in the culture, but in the church. And I believe
that when the Scripture teaches us that we're in the world and
not of it, that we need to be very careful to be discerning on the
areas of materialism and commerce and things of that nature, to
the point that we are careful not to just look like the rest
of the world. Now, I'm not going to be preaching a burden on you
to not celebrate Christmas. That is your conscience. That
is what you do if you so choose to do so. But understand that
the celebration of Christmas is not the celebration of the
birth of Christ. The celebration of the birth
of Christ, if we were to look at it biblically, is something
that we are not even to celebrate. It's not even been shown to us
as something that is the holiday of Christians. The very nature
of the holiday is something that the world has created. And as
you'll see, if you look very closely at your own lives and
hearts, it is not something that even reflects the nature of Christ
at all. So that being said, and the reason I bring that up is
because what we see in Philippians, what Paul is calling us to, is
to have the mind of Christ. And I will be here to tell you
by very explicit direction, not just Christmas, but Easter or
Thanksgiving or any other holiday that we celebrate as Americans
or as human beings, Christ would rebuke our idolatry of these
things. He would rebuke every bit of
them. Someone even said to me recently, three days ago, that
it is very, very disturbing to them that a pastor of the gospel
of Jesus would not honor and praise the day He was born. And
I said, well, the very nature of your words, my friend, show
that there's a problem with your understanding of what worship
is. If I'm going to worship a day,
I am not worshiping Christ. So we're not going to celebrate
the day. We're not going to celebrate the day of Christ's coming. We're
not going to celebrate the day of Christ's death. We're not
going to celebrate the day of Christ breaking the bread. We're
going to celebrate Christ. And my heart for you this holiday
season is that you would use the opportunity when commercialism
is just rampant, to when someone wishes you a Merry Christmas,
take that opportunity. Now that you mention Him, Let
me share with you what Christ is, who Christ is, and what this
season could represent, not just now, but every day. Because see,
the gospel of Jesus Christ does not create a few zealots. There's not this radical small
sect of people amongst the church who all of a sudden have a heart
for the gospel. Oh, we all want to be like Him.
No, when God saves you through the gospel, you become a zealot.
When God saves you through the power of His grace, and He gives
you the gift of faith, and you see Christ for what He is, you
can't help but breakdance about the greatness of Christ. You
can't help but share your faith. You cannot help but go and share
the gospel of Jesus. And so, in this day, in this
world, when everybody would rather spend time arguing about what
Starbucks is doing, rather than what God is at work doing, we
have lost our way. We have lost our way. And let
me tell you, there are greater things to concern ourselves with
as a church. Just as a way of looking at the world and the
landscape. Some of you I've spoken with
this week, either via text or Facebook or whatever, or phone
call, and we've seen had discussions on how bad the world is, how
bad things are going. Now we see this tragedy that
we have in France. We see all the things that are
happening on a global scale in the context of a diving morality,
a brokenness in our system of government, an absolute impossible
light at the end of any tunnel at all to be able to see any
hope for reform or moral standing. And France, a lot of times we
find ourselves talking about these things as though there
is no hope. Or worse, those that would speak of hope, speak of
hope of reforming the morality of the world through some other
means than the gospel. I will tell you this, but the
Bible says as bad people go from bad to worse, as evil goes from
dark to darker, the light of the gospel continues to shine.
And friends, what is going to cause persecution in the life
of the Christians of this day is when we stand firm, as Paul
is talking about this morning, on the righteousness of God by
faith in Jesus Christ alone, and that our mantra and our banner
is absolutely Jesus Christ. Nothing we do, nothing we say,
nothing we engage in, all these peripheral things that are absolutely
unnecessary in the context of living as a Christian church,
these things will become the main thing. These idols will
become the thing that we hold up. And when we stop doing that,
When we start putting our hope in Christ alone and don't get
fired up about the problems of the world, don't get worried
and start packing bombs underneath our beds, and we don't start...
You know, we're going to be looked at as people who are foolish,
and we're going to be looked at as people who have a peace
that should not be, and people will see our righteousness, and
they will hate us as Cain hated Abel, and then they will persecute
us and lock us away. And I'll tell you something,
church, there is no escaping such reality. There's no escaping
it. When we stand for righteousness,
when we press into the reality of the gospel, when we live for
Christ in everything, which includes having this mind of Christ and
living in contrast to the world as we saw last week, we will
be hated. And especially when people hate
us and then we love them in turn, they will hate us even more.
That is the oddest thing that I've ever tried to understand
from a psychological point of view. And then philosophically,
I try to divide it up and say, well, maybe this and maybe this.
And I have many hypotheses as to why that happens, but God's
Word clearly settles a lot of hours of frustrating thinking
when it says that the heart of man is intrinsically wicked.
And that the mind is set on earthly things and is hostile toward
God. And that Jesus himself said, the world hates you because it
hates me. If you hate me, you're not going
to want to shake my hand. You're not going to want to wash
my feet. Because you'll hate my body too, not just my head.
Friends, when people hate the head of our body, Jesus Christ,
they will hate every fiber of our existence. And it is not
going to change. What will change is that through
this type of suffering in our world, God will bring great revival. And I'm saying revival as in
not what we think revival is. Great birth. Great rebirth. Great life in the midst of death.
And we see what's happening on the national scale. We see people
who are being shot and killed and the stuff that's happening
in Paris. And friends, it is reason. It is occasion for fear. It is occasion for doubt. It
is occasion for wonder and thinking, oh, woe is we. Woe are we. But friends, it is mostly an
occasion for worship. It is mostly an occasion for
worship that when people die and calamity comes, we understand
just how fragile a system of life we live in. And we know
that there is no hope except that God in His sovereignty stays
evil. and keeps it. The reason we're
sitting here today and not being destroyed as we learn the Bible,
as we worship God through song and through prayer, is because
God's sovereign hand of protection is upon us this very moment.
But when it does not come, His sovereign hand of providence
is still here. And there is no calamity come
to man that does not come by the authorship of our sovereign
God, even through the hands of wickedness. The Bible says in
the Old Testament that He even says to Israel, His chosen people,
that through your enemies I shall bring them like a rod of correction. He tells Israel that through
the Babylonians, their wicked hatefulness toward Israel will
be His rod of correction. What is correction? It's giving
us the fullness of joy that we so long desire, that nothing
in this world and no device of our humanity can bring, only
Christ can bring. And so as we think of that this
morning, as we think of these things, just sort of little temporary
side view pragmatic applied theology, think about how we live our lives.
Friends, I'm going to be honest with you. I really believe that
every aspect of our lives, everything we do is a response to or a product
of our true look at Christ. When we're able to engage in
sin, it is because of our true look of Christ. what we see Him
as, how we see Him. And sometimes that's a bad view. Sometimes we look at the world
or something or a lust or a temptation and we just totally throw Christ
away and we run after it head first. But by His grace, He brings
us back to repentance and brings us back and holds us into perseverance. But that is something that should
be abnormal in our lives. Not normal. And one of the things
that I see in the lives of the church throughout the years and
even my own life as the church, we are part of the church, is
that when I find myself in these slumps, I hate to even say that,
it's such a stupid, when I find myself in wicked thinking, it
is because I am failing to trust in Christ, evidenced by a failure
to invest in His Word, to invest in His people, and to fellowship
in prayer and worship. and life together, around the
Word, around the Gospel. And it is not something that
we need to take for granted because it will become more and more
difficult as time goes on for the church to fellowship together.
Even so much as many of you, as we've been praying for a group
of individuals over in Statesboro, things are really, really, really
hard for them. Ten, fifteen year friendships
are broken. 20 year relationships are severed because of doctrine. And it's very fitting because
this is where Paul goes right here in Philippians chapter 4.
He starts to give some practical application of some problems
in the church of Philippi and he gives pinpoint precision,
laser surgical precision on how we're to handle it and what we're
supposed to do. Friends, I believe this will apply to our lives
like no other message we've heard in a while. So let's pray that
God would show us exactly what we need to see. Let's go to the
Lord. Father, I just thank you for
your absolute sovereign, amazing, eternal, powerful, ineffable
mercy. Because Lord, if you would not
come into our hearts and opened our eyes to see the woe and the
dreariness and the death of our sin, Lord, we would be like the
rest of humanity, sons of disobedience, living in our own moral standard,
by our own righteousness, by our own religion, by our own
faith, by our own way, in our own communities, in our own focus,
for our own purpose, and we would be eternally damned. But Lord,
You are to be praised forevermore because You have saved us in
spite of us. You have saved us when we could
not even look Your way with favor. You looked our way with favor
and You saved us in great wisdom. Oh Father, bring us to the joy
of such salvation that this stinky little world that we live in
would be seen just as that. A small roadblock, a small stop,
a small wait in a vast eternity. And that we are citizens of heaven,
not of this world. We were born into this world,
but we were ripped out of it by the grace of Your love. And
I pray this morning that You would do what I cannot do through
the text here. And that You would help us all
see the glory of Christ Jesus. In His name we pray. Amen. Let's look at this text for a
moment. I want you to look at chapter 3, verse 17, and I'm
going to read down to verse 3 of chapter 4. Follow with me. Philippians
3, verse 17. Brothers, join in imitating me,
and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example
you have in us. For many of whom I often told
you, and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the
cross of Christ, Their end is destruction, their God is their
belly, and they glory in their shame with minds set on earthly
things. But our citizenship is in heaven,
and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will
transform our lowly bodies to be like His glorious body by
the power that enables Him even to subject all things to Himself.
Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and
my crown, stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved. I entreat
you, Odoia, Or are you Odiah, an intrigued Syntica, to agree
in the Lord? Yes, I ask you also, true companion,
help these women who have labored side by side with me in the gospel
together with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers whose
names are in the book of life." Now, I'm just going to stop there.
And what I need to do before I get into chapter 4, verse 2,
is I need to show you how that relates to what we just read.
Paul has given, in some sense, let's do a quick review of the
last few months. Paul has given the power, the
cause, the ability, the focus, the product, the fruit, all of
that of Jesus Christ. He's shown that the people of
God are indeed a product of God's work. And that there is an absolute
evidence of God's work in the lives of the church as we live
together, As we laugh together, as we fight together, as we grow
together, as we repent and forgive and worship, all of these things,
as we suffer together, there is God at work. Christ is at
work. The power of Christ has begun
to work and it will be completed. So as it's being completed, it's
not just this begin, fruit, fruit, fruit, fanfare, nothing, nothing,
nothing, boom, the end of time. There's always something. Did
you get that little example? I saw this big extravagant picture
of my mind when I was doing that, and there was nothing to show
you. So anyway, what I'm saying is that though there may be little
burnout spots, there may be little black dots of where we fizzle
out, or where we have moments, or days, or months, or sometimes
even years, Lord forbid, that we would be in this spiritual
slump. For the most part, we see this dynamic, supernatural
fruitfulness in Christ that is paramount in our lives, that
is on the forefront of our lives. that we're able to fight against
our own flesh, our own minds, our own hope, our own idolatry,
and that we're able to show that Christ is at work in us, not
because we're determined to show it, though there is a determination
that we need to have, there is a zeal that we need to have.
We recognize that it's Christ's. And so that we find ourselves
in the place where that's not there, we ought to do what Paul
has taught us to do, which is what? Trust in the sufficiency
and the power of Christ. And when we're unable to do that,
what do we do in our labor? We pray for one another that
we would have all discernment and wisdom, that our joy would
be complete, and we labor for each other, not just in prayer,
but in action. We go after each other, we work
together, we labor together, we talk about it, we preach the
gospel to ourselves and to each other so that Christ could continue
the work in us because it is only through the Word of God
and continually working in us this Word that God works in us
righteousness. And though we may live a righteous
life by the world's standards, even in the power of Christ,
it's nothing compared to the righteousness of Christ. So that
in the day of Christ, then He will set us right before Him
exactly as He is in holiness. So that when we say, Holy, Holy,
Holy is the Lord God Almighty, we in the day of Christ will
look just like that. Come on. See that. And so that
is our prize, that is our purpose, that is our hope, that is the
reason we were saved, that God would set us righteously before
Him to be perfect, blameless, without spot or blemish. And
He did it on the back and the life and the death and the resurrection
of Jesus Christ, so that it is an extremely costly thing. And now we look into our own
lives and we recognize that we're not going to ever obtain that
in our own way, but that Christ is doing it. And as Christ does
it, we strive for that. And as we fail and pick up the
pieces, we work together, we grow together, we rejoice in
these things. There's so much that Paul has
dealt with. I don't have three or four hours to just do it off
the top of my head here. But there are some things now
that need to be fresh in your mind as we move to this text.
And what these things are is that we are to be looking after,
in one mind, full of the Spirit, unity in Spirit, unity in theology,
unity in mission, unity in purpose, looking after other people's
interests, not our own. Are they coming back to you now? The teaching of this text? I
met with someone who visited a couple of weeks ago, and they
were like, how do I really apply what I heard? I said, well, you've
got 30 sermons ahead of that. So sometimes there might be a
puzzle piece a little bit missing when we're not here a lot. But
God is still faithful. You can still apply it. You just
may not know the whole story. But as we get to this place,
friends, many of you know the whole story. You know the reality
of what Paul is saying. And if you look there, he says,
we are to hold true to what we have attained. And what we have
attained is not perfection, but righteousness through Jesus Christ.
And every step we make, every stride we make, every gain we
make in Christ, we hold to it. And we also do that by holding
to Christ. We look to the future. We press
on to the prize of righteousness. I want you to hear this, church.
by looking and forgetting, not looking back, but forgetting
what lies behind. We press on. And I remember making this comment
when I preached that, is that we're not looking at our righteousness
yesterday, we're looking at our righteousness today and tomorrow.
We're looking at how we're living our lives for the sake and the
glory of Christ today, and as we press into the next moment.
Right now. It reminds me of the reality
that we see in the Old Testament where it's written, today is
the day of salvation. And I often thought about that,
and when I was about 16, it sort of hit me. I said, you know,
today is the day of salvation. Yesterday wasn't my salvation,
and I can't wait for tomorrow. Now, I'm saved today in Christ,
or I'm not saved at all. My hope is not in what I did
yesterday, or in the righteousness that I had yesterday, or in the
goodness that I had yesterday, or in the faith that I had yesterday,
and I'm not going to sit around and wait. Well, tomorrow I'll
get right with the Lord, because tomorrow may never come. Today,
this very moment is salvation. It's the only opportunity you
have for salvation. So if you find yourself today in this place,
hearing this voice, hearing the Word of God as you're about to
do, and you are not secure in Christ, you need to be secure
in Christ by faith alone. Christ alone secures your eternity.
But you alone will condemn it through unbelief. Your faith
is not in what you've done and what you have been. And your
faith is not in the hope of what you will become and please God
through, because you won't please Him anyway. No matter how good
you are, no matter how holy you might try to be, no matter how
religious your life might turn out, but your life is set in
who you are right now in Christ Jesus. Are you in Christ today? We hold fast to that. In verse
17 of chapter 3 it says, imitate me. And we looked at that. We're
not going to re-preach all this today. Imitate me. Imitate others. Imitate us. Imitate others who imitate us.
Talking about the apostles. Talking about maybe even these
two women in Clement. And whoever his true companion
is. We've got Timothy and Epaphroditus also mentioned in this text.
We've got a whole little crew here on Paul's mission team.
Planning the church there in Ephesus. Planning the church
there in Philippi. Playing the church all over Asia Minor and
Palestine. He says, join us, we're looking.
You know what? We talked about this a little last week. We are
to look at each other as each other look to Christ and we look.
You want to know how to deal with suffering, you look at the
Word of God, you see how Paul dealt with it, but then sometimes
there's something missing. Paul himself in Colossians says
this, he says, I'm suffering, and I'm going to paraphrase this
and then give you the exact quote, I'm suffering so that I may fill
up what is lacking in the suffering of Christ. I want you to hear
that and I want you to understand how it relates to this. What
Paul is saying to the church of Colossae is this. Christ is
not here. He is gone. His suffering is
not now. It was back then. He no longer
suffers. He's been raised to life and
He ascended to the Father. He sent Holy Spirit, God, to
dwell with us, to be the comforter, to be the power. And so now God
is with us. Jesus Christ is coming back.
But right now, the suffering that you see is not Christ's
suffering, but me suffering as Christ suffered, so that as you
see my suffering, you see Christ's suffering. And if we suffer like
Christ suffered, with the same mind, and the same attitude,
and the same heart, and the same eyes, then you will see the suffering
of Christ. That's what Paul is arguing to the Colossian church.
And I hate to hear people say, well, I don't need a friend in
Christ. I don't need a brother and a sister. That's a lie. That
is a lie from the Garden of Eden. That is a lie from eternity past
when Satan said, I'm going to be like God. I want to stand
next to you. I want to be beheld as a reflection
of the glory that you have because it's mine now. It's a lie. We are to look into the church
and we are to see each other. And in seeing each other as we
live for Christ, we are to worship Christ because we see Christ's
work. We don't look past each other
to Christ except when you or I move out of the way and Christ
is in front of us. You see how that works? So there
is a great command in every New Testament epistle. Every New
Testament epistle gives us absolute commands to follow the behaviors
of those who follow Christ. To look at the suffering of those
who suffer in Christ as we look at Christ and as we look at those
who walk in Christ. And it's not just that way, but
friend, here's the real kicker. Because there are men and women
and boys and girls in the fellowship of this congregation who look
at you. And there are people in this
community who know you are a Christian. And they know you attend what
they would call, attend a church. They know you are part of a spiritual
family. And they are watching you. And they are watching me. And they will say that Christ
is like we are. People are watching. And we are
watching each other. When you see how we suffer, if
I am suffering the way you are suffering, And you don't know
how to hold on. And I'm looking at Christ. I'm
looking at the Word of God. And then I'm seeing someone else
suffer the same way. And they're rejoicing in the
same way. And they're holding fast in the same way. And they're
standing firm in the same way. Wow, this isn't just this hypothetical
supernatural superhero. Paul, this is my brother. He's
suffering like Paul, so I can do this. I can walk this way. Would you walk with me? Would
you pray with me? Would you hold my hand during this valley? Well,
let's look to Christ. You see how we're supposed to
make disciples of each other? We're supposed to point each
other to Christ and walk together in these things. We're not lone
rangers. I would be so dogmatic to say
it is a sin to be a lone ranger in your suffering. And it's amazing
how sometimes people can suffer in the midst of even a home full
of people and feel so alone. when we ought to be always mindful
of how the gospel is going to empower us to empower other people
to suffer, to rejoice, to walk in righteousness, to press into
Christ. This is just recap. This isn't new. It's just recap.
He says there are people who look like Christ is at work. And those are the ones who you
are to follow. Don't look at these people who
are enemies of the cross. Who have idolatry as their God. Who have their flesh as their
God. Do you see that? Their God is their belly. That
means what they desire in their own mind and heart. This is what
I love. This is what I think. This is what I want. This is
what I know. Friends, Christ is our wisdom. Or the devil is
our father. Those are the words of Jesus
to the Jews, to the spiritual leaders of the Jews like Nicodemus
and the Pharisees and others. We are to not look at the enemies
of the cross because their end is destruction. Because their
glory and their shame and their minds are set on earthly things.
We are citizens of heaven. Now imagine this. Imagine what
this looks like. Can you see the picture of the
church? Can you see the picture of this in your own heart and
mind? Can you see the reality in your own relationships? Maybe
not now, but in the past. And if you haven't experienced
it yet, you will. There's a group of people gathering together
on a common basis and a common time, on a regular basis, not
common, with so much things in common in the context of spirituality
and Christ. And they say, oh, we're the church,
we're the church, and we're meeting together, and we're living together,
and we're helping each other grow, and we're teaching each
other, and we see the Word of God, and we're praying, and God's
answering prayers. And this entire spiritual community
of the church in this era, you see it. Can you picture it? And
it's extremely opposed to everything that was. It's opposed to Judaism,
because Judaism rejected Jesus as God. Rejected Jesus as Christ,
Emmanuel, the Holy, Anointed One of God, God with us. They
rejected Him. And then they were seen though
by all the culture and the non-Jewish people as the spiritual elite.
Well, if they reject Him, what are we to do? We're already on
their bad side. They already won't walk down
the same side of the street as us. They already call us dogs
and we take it. What are we supposed to do now?
Believe this Jesus? And they did. Why? They could
not not believe. They were shown the beauty of
the glory of God face to face in Jesus Christ. They peered
into the face of Jesus from Nazareth and they saw the face of God.
And there was nothing they could do but fall on their face and
see. Because they were shown. If you're
able to see the glory of God in the face of Christ, you have
believed. And you will believe. And you will forever believe.
You will hold fast to Him. He will be the focus of your
absolute soul. And this is the thing that was
happening there, is that there were some, what people would
call ungodly, unclean people coming to faith in Jesus Christ,
of which the Philippians were. And now all of a sudden, here
they are, standing against many people. Not just the Jews, but
the Romans. They hated the Christians. Then
we saw in Philippi much of the Roman guard. had come to faith
in Jesus Christ because of the imprisonment of Paul, the Roman
guard, these people were actually the ones who put and took out
Caesars. They were the hand that rocked
the cradle, if you will. They made it happen. And now
they were following Christ. They were following this new,
they called the way in that day. Christianity was called the way
in the 1st, 2nd, 3rd century. Well, 1st, 2nd century. And they
were following this way, they were following these fools like
Paul, and Silas, and Timothy, and Paphroditus, and Apollos,
and Barnabas, and John. They were following these men
who had given everything up, and they looked like total idiots.
And they were suffering, and they're getting out of prison,
and their backs are bleeding open, and you can see their ribs through
their skin, and they're going out there and saying, now you're
going to get that again if you preach. And they're preaching in the
courtyards of the prison, and they're crazy. People say they're
nuts. And we're going to align with them, and now a lot of people
are saying, wow, that's pretty popular. We used to be nothing,
but now, get this, now we can be something if we follow this
way. Now, keep this in mind. This is sort of where I think
it came here. We can follow the way, and we'll become something. We won't just be the dog. We'll
never be a Jew. We can become part of the way.
It's pretty prestigious to be part of the church. It's pretty
prestigious, even though it's going to cost us something. We'll stand just
close enough to be liked. And when the heat gets too hot,
we'll sort of back up. We don't know you. And that's
what was happening. And there were some factions
taking place. Paul says these people who were among the church,
who were not living as Christ had saved them to live, were
enemies of the cross. Because that means that they
were saying that the power of the cross was theirs, but there
was no evidence of it. 1 John says the same thing. If
you say you have fellowship with us while you walk in darkness,
you lie. And the love of God is not in
you. The truth of God is not in you. You don't practice the
truth. All these phrases that John would say. Paul would say
there are people who are enemies of the cross. God is their belly.
They're sensual. They feel good. This is the way
they feel. This is what they want. They like this. I want
things my way. This is what I think we ought
to be doing. Well, the Bible is very clear on what we should
be doing. And when we deter from that, we become sensual. We walk
away. When we move to a cultural faith,
Which is where I started, which is why I talked about this little
soapbox thing I got on this morning. When we walk to a cultural drum,
we're following our flesh. Let's just be careful not to
call it Christ following. I mean, there's one thing to say, I just
like doing this. It's got nothing to do with Jesus. Call it what
it is. To thinking about how this even
looks, we start saying, wow, this is a pretty troubling time. The true Christians never got
a break. Because now people started, even
in their own circles, imagine that, started falling away. Paul
is saying, don't follow them. They are enemies of the cross.
Their end is destruction. God is their belly. What are we going to do with
that kind of stuff? Paul says, don't worry about it. Don't spend
your time worrying about how to deal with all this. A dear
woman told me years ago, right before I even got married, that
the squeaky wheel gets the oil. You know what that means? You
can have a thousand wheels running just fine, and one goes wee-wee-wee,
you're always oiling it. The same thing is true amongst
the church, and amongst the culture, and amongst the community, amongst
the teachers. We have a tendency to want to
go oil every wrong doing. We want to go oil every false
doctrine. You know what? 50,000 to 1 false doctrine will outnumber
truth. What does that mean? You do a
search for Christian, and if there are 60 million hits, 59
million of them are bad. What is your cause? I say that
it's a cause of insanity. It's what I like to say, a fool's
errand. We're not going to fix it. So what does Paul say? But
we're not those people. We don't have our minds set on
earthly things. And friends, I'm going to tell
you, sometimes when we put our focus and our emphasis on all
this wrong stuff, we actually put our focus on earthly things. Who cares what the color of a
cup is? When did a snowflake become a crown of righteousness? When did Jesus become a Republican? When did a flag become more important
than fellowship in Christ? We're citizens of heaven. And
we're not there yet, but we're heading there. We're not right
all the way yet, but we're heading there. And Christ is going to
come back and He's going to take all the trimmings, all the fixings
of our lives, He's going to set them perfect once, forever. We're done. No more will we be
in this stuff. We're going to glory in Christ,
not the world. We're going to glory in Christ,
not our righteousness, not our self-righteousness. We're not
going to glory in shameful things. We're going to keep our eyes
on the prize, who is Jesus Christ. And we're going to walk together,
continually pressing each other, encouraging each other. You see,
that's our job. Why does the church even gather? to the praise
of His glorious grace. What does the glorious grace
of God do? It helps us strive for righteousness together. Worship
together. Together! He says, who am I to love? Verse
1 of chapter 4. Here we are. Let's get started. And for my brothers whom I love
and I long for, my joy and my crown stand firm thus in the
Lord, my beloved." And I preached that last week, but I want to
get it going to where we are. Of course, Paul's not talking
ever. He's never made a discussion.
None of the apostles in the New Testament, there's never a sentence
written to the audience of unbelievers in this. Okay? Did you hear that? No unbeliever has ever been written
a stitch of scripture. It's never been done and never
will be done. There's not the book for the
lost, the book for the evil, the book, the letter to the wicked.
It's nowhere to the saints, to the beloved, to the brothers,
to the sisters, to the church. Church, the called out ones.
That's what that means, y'all. The called out ones. to my siblings in Christ Jesus,
to the fruits of God, these people, brothers, Because we are not
citizens of this world. Because we have a Savior, Jesus
Christ. Because we have been saved by
grace. Because we have the mind of Christ.
Because we're concerned with each other's well-being and our
spiritual journeys. Because we pray in the power
of the gospel. Because God our Father has set
us apart for Jesus. Because we're suffering as Christ
has suffered. Because we are empowered with
all grace and all glory and all power forever. Because, because,
because, therefore, my brethren, My brothers whom I love." These
are people that Paul loves, and he's about to talk to some individually
here, which is rather odd, but he's going to do it. My brothers
whom I love. He says, I love you. He's already
said that. I love you with a love. I pray
that you have a... I love you with a love that is
in Christ. What does he say in verse 8 of
chapter 1? For God is my witness, how I
yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus. My brothers
whom I love and whom I long for. He's already said it. He's just
reminding his readers, listen, you've been given a tall order.
These commands are very high. And some of you are feeling very
unworthy and unable. I want you to know that I love
you. And it is out of this love, and the purpose of my love pushes
me and compels me to show you these things. I love you, and
the greatest love that I can show you is to share with you
the power of the Gospel, that Christ has given you a mind and
a heart and a focus and a purpose and a plan, and even in the midst
of suffering and imprisonment, you are gloriously free. gloriously joyful, gloriously
wise. So hold fast and stand firm in
these things. You can never, you can never...
I wonder what it would be like to preach an entire letter in
one standing. It would be a long day. Just
where the Lord would just open it and just go. It would be a
long day. It would be a good day. That's
the tag team. He says, I long for you. You
are my joy. and my crown. I see you are the first fruits
of the Holy Spirit. You are the fruits of God, whom
we preached, lest we labored in vain. Remember that? Hold
fast. I see you. You are a picture
of Christ's work, and I live to make Christ honored in my
life, in my body, whether I live or die. And you are a picture
of that. You are my joy because Christ
is my joy. And Christ's work, when I see
it, is my joy. So you are my joy. And I love
you because Christ loved you. And He gave Himself for you.
You are my crown. Stand firm in the Lord, my beloved. He tells them He loves them twice. Now look in verse 2. There's some really interesting
practical application here that relates to all of that. Many people take their faith
to be this personal, private, internal, me, myself, and Jesus
thing. And let me tell you that that
is born of a heart of flesh. Yes, me, myself, and Jesus is
real. Jesus is your Savior if you are
in Christ. Jesus is your Lord if He is indeed
your Savior. Jesus is your King. But there
is no King that rules a man. There is a King that rules a
kingdom. And if you are part of a kingdom,
friends, it is not America where our personal liberties begin
and end at the personal liberties of others. Our liberties are to be washed
away and thrown down for the sake of the joy of the next. Christ and his church are a community of faith. And what's happening in Philippi,
we don't know all the details. But we can infer some very clear
things based on some absolute evidence in the syntax of this
writing. Look what happens. I entreat, you odia, and I entreat, I implore. He uses the word in front of
both of their names. Syntica, if you ever wanted to
know how to say that. You odia and syntica. to agree in the
Lord. Have this mind among you, be
unified, be of one mind, be of one spirit, be focused. Paul's like, there's some people
among you who are very important, notice, very important to me,
and I need them to agree in the Lord. We don't know what the
conflict was. But Euodia and Sintica, women
in the church of Philippi had some problems with each other.
They had become divided. In this day and age, it would
have been a church split. And in Paul's mind, he's thinking,
there's a split about to take place and I'm going to have to
come down there, but I'm locked up. And I love these people, and
I love these women, and I love Clement, and I love others, and
I'm not wanting their joy to be shipwrecked, because their
faith is shipwrecked, because their selfishness gets in the
way of unity. So He commands them. He commands
both Euodia and Seneca to agree in the Lord. He said, whatever
your differences, you better dump them quick. But what if
they were doctrinal? You better dump them quick and
get about reconciliation. You better get through it. These
are sisters, they're not false teachers. And they may have been
warring over something, I doubt it. I bet it was more personal
in nature. It might have even been a little
bit of pride, but Paul, because of how he treated it, said they're
both in pride. Maybe they were getting a little
too haughty because they were on Paul's missions team. Well,
you get that. He says it right there. Yes.
And he's speaking to someone clearly, whoever was the actual
recipient of this letter to begin with that was supposed to read
it to. We don't know who that is. And it's funny how many arguments
have been made that it was Timothy. But he's going to send Timothy
to them. Why would he write to Timothy? Maybe it was Epaphroditus,
but no, Epaphroditus belonged there. He wasn't there already.
He was sending Epaphroditus back so that they could rejoice, see,
because they were worried about him. And him not responding to
them gave them more burden. He says, I'm going to send him
back. I don't need him. They sent Epaphroditus to tend
to Paul, and he got sick and nearly died. And Paul had to
tend to him. And then he was going to send
him back. so that they could rejoice in
the power of God to heal him. So Epaphroditus' presence back
in Philippi would be a blessing to the church. He didn't need
the blessing of Epaphroditus. So I don't think it's him. So
who is it? Well, maybe it's Silas. Maybe
Silas stayed there in Philippi. We don't know. So you know what
we do? We don't say. What does it matter? What matters
is this, that Paul is saying now personally to someone who
he calls a true companion. Now higher critics would say,
oh, that's just the phrase for the whole church of Philippi. So thousands of people are supposed
to embark on these two women? That's a mob. That's like Frankenstein
stuff. No, I believe Paul had one person in mind here, and
he said to them, he entreated them, the women. He said, Euodia
and Syntica, I want you to agree in the Lord. You must agree in
the Lord. Yes. Now I ask you, my true companion,
help these women. And so that when there's conflict
in the church, the Bible commands that those people are to work
it out between them. They are to reconcile. Because
there's nothing more blasphemous in the body of Christ than two
people who profess to be in Christ that can't fellowship together.
Here's the deal, if you can't worship with me, you're not my
sibling. If you can't pray with me, you
don't belong to my Christ. And I don't belong to yours. That doesn't mean that you might
not want to ascend under my teaching because I might be ignorant.
I'm talking about interpersonal relationships. Something is wrong
when the gospel of Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit cannot
enable us to reconcile our differences. And this is not a suggestion.
This is a command of Paul. He says, you fix it now. It has
to be fixed. And he's getting someone else
involved. Isn't that something? What do we do in our culture?
Mind your own business. This is my business. This is my body. You're trying to pull my fingers
off. Get off my fingers. Can you imagine these two fingers
trying to pull each other off the hand? That's how silly it
is when the church disagrees. But yet, He didn't say not have
a disagreement, but when you have a disagreement, come to
an agreement. Let it go. And I'll be honest
with you, Church, very few times, unless it is just absolute heretical
stuff, is there a disagreement amongst the Church of Jesus Christ
that just can't be forgotten and forgiven? Somebody said something
to you that you took the wrong way? Well, you sinfully took
it the wrong way. And they sinfully had no wisdom in their tongue.
So you both repent and love each other and die so that you can
live together. That's what Paul says the marriage
is like. The husband is the head of the wife. He can't lord over
her. He's supposed to die like Christ. The Lord died. What? I thought it came with a pop
whip. Too bad. Sorry guys, no pop whip. Feather
duster maybe. Hit her in the face. Don't even
do that. Don't even put your finger in her face. We don't
have that kind of authority. It's a role, not an authority. We don't have that kind of authority
in the church. We can't go snatch people up by the church and hold
them by the collar and say, straighten your behind out. Now I've had
some mentors in my life who have done that. And that's okay. Big strong men with long beards.
You know, okay, you got it. You got it. You're done. But
it wasn't their authority that straightened me out. It was the
power of Christ. Work this stuff out. That really should be all
they had, but they worked and they didn't do it. They weren't
reconciling. So he says, I need you, my true companion, to help
these women. And he defines them, not just
by name, but their actions, their priorities, and their purpose. These women who have labored
side by side with me in the gospel. Do you see that? These women
were on the missions team with Paul. They weren't just people
who were sitting there just in Philippi who came to faith. Somehow
they had some vital role with Paul's ministry. We don't know
what it was. Why? Because it's not important. Oh,
that's our director of evangelism. That's our senior pastor. The
Dr. Reverend Wright. Who cares? You're a sheep, I'm a sheep,
we're all a sheep. Let's go to heaven together. We're nothings who bring to nothing
the things that are, so that Christ is glorified. And we're
the body of Christ, so that makes us something. Something more
glorious than this world can comprehend. We are beautifully
empowered to forgive each other and to bring unity of mind when
the world says, how did you do it? How did you do it? These women who have labored
side by side together with me in the gospel together with me
and Clement and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are
in the book of life. So he mentions Clement. This
man, we don't know who he is. We just know that they knew who
he was. These women were known in the
church of Philippi. They were known to start having
quabbles. And so now what we can assume
is taking place is that here are these two people, probably
left there to do some ministry work in Philippi as ministers,
as deaconesses, as whatever the role that they were given, either
way, people knew them and loved them and saw them with Clement
and Paul working together side by side in the ministry as the
church was planted, then all of a sudden these women are at
odds. Senior pastors, student pastors,
associate pastors, and they start having odds. You know what that
looks like? And these are people in the church,
fellowship of the saints. People who have no title or authority
or role in the sense of office, have no office in the church.
These are citizens of heaven working together. And the church
saw them, and now they see them in a different light. And Paul
is saying, we don't live like that. You put it to bed. And whoever the true commandment
is, you help them. And not only all of you who work
together with me, all of you whose names are in the book of
life, you all are in the Lamb's book of life. That ought to tell
us something, church. When we have these factions,
we have this division, we have these feelings that get hurt,
we get all frustrated. We need to remember who's listed
with us in Christ's book. And of course, that's an imagery
of eternal life. I mean, God's not going to come
out there, tippins, tippins, mmm. Well, it looks like you've been
blotted out. That's a whole other class. But your name's in Christ. If you're in Christ, you're in
Christ. He is the Lamb of God. He has eternal life in His hands. And if you are a fellow co-worker,
if you are a fellow saint, if you are a fellow Christian, your
name is there with mine. And how is it that we, the body,
can war against itself? You know what that's called when
the body destroys itself? It's called cancer. That's not normal. It's abnormal. Fix it. Because if you don't
fix it, you are always looked at, I believe Paul is thinking,
it's going to split you all up. You're my joy and my crown. You're my beloved in Christ Jesus.
You can't be divided. Like divorced children. That doesn't work in the church. This kind of stuff. How many
people have ever preached this text? I should look for sermons
on Philippians 4 too. Usually it's just a segue into
rejoicing the Lord always. Yeah, we can preach two or three
weeks on that. But that rejoicing the Lord always is in the context
of getting together as one mind with thanksgiving. Not division. You know what I honestly think?
That's not what I want to say. You know what? Honestly, the
Scripture teaches that when we're rejoicing, we're not complaining. Do all things without grumbling
and complaining. And friends, we can put our mouth
and face in check. We can do this while we have
a complaining heart. And not every time we're doing
this are we having a complaining heart. Most of the time people
know when we're complaining because we're talking about it. If we recorded ourselves all
day long, how many complaints would be on the books? Well,
friends, those complaints are on the books, whether you say
them or not. They're on the book of your heart.
They're on the book of your conscience. They're on the book of the eyes
of God. Quorum Deo. We live in the face
of God. He sees all. He sees the hidden
things. And yet He loves us. And in His
love and mercy, He gave Christ to set us free from those very
complainful thoughts. That very discord spirit that
just wells up in our mind. When I say spirit, I mean attitude,
not supernatural. A very frustrated attitude that
wells up in our hearts. And He convicts us of that and
brings us under conviction and then we repent and we are free. Do all things You owe Dion and
Seneca to agree in the Lord. Do all things, you two women
who labored with me in the gospel, to be of one mind. And you, my
faithful companion, help them in this. Hold them accountable
to this. Bring them back to the joy of Christ. That they would
forget their differences because they are watching you. And they
are imitating you. You see back in verse 17 of chapter
3. They see what you're doing and they will do likewise. And
you will be responsible for leading them down a false hope. I want
you to think about that for a minute. And over the next few minutes,
I want you to think about how we live. How we live outside these
walls. How we live outside our fellowship
around churchy stuff. And we often feel weak and unable
to really put a finger on why our spiritual lives... Friends,
most of the time our spiritual lives are damaged because of
our sin. Sin and doing things that we
know does not please God. And we war with them. They're
not accidental. We're not accidentally going home to engage in sin,
going out to engage in sin. There is some, but we usually
don't even notice them. We notice what we know we do. Friends, the hope is not in us
getting that out of our lives either. Some brothers on Facebook, it's
a bad place to be sometimes, One brother made a comment about
another brother who had a national platform, and it was very rude. And then what happens when somebody
that we love is attacked by somebody we don't know? We're in their
corner. Don't you talk about my mama,
you know? Don't you talk about my friend? We don't know the
other guy either. So this brother just rebuked
this man and what's amazing is all this junk that started to
happen, this guy just deleted the whole post and put a post
and said, I sinned against God and against this brother. He
is a fellow heir with Christ with me and I need you all to
forgive me for my sin. You know what the conversation
is about now with almost a thousand comments? The grace of God. Wow, I've never seen this on
Facebook before, one person said. You people are real Christians,
one guy said. And that's on a social media
site. How much more powerful would it be if it happened right
here? How much more powerful would it be? And you know what
I think it needs to do for a lot of us? I think it needs to start
with ourselves and recognizing that we are our own worst enemy,
and that if we hold ourselves hostage to unforgiveness, we
are saying that Christ is not sufficient to forgive us. And
I only say that because it just came to mind, and I want you
to know, friends, you cannot stand guilty before the Lord
if you are His. So don't hold yourself in guilt.
Be free today. Because it's always the caution
after we hear a sermon to go home and find that brick wall
and beat our head upon it for days. When what we need to do
is to jump ourselves up out of our seat, click our heels together,
fall on our face and worship Christ for His glorious grace
that that sin that we have lived in is paid forevermore. and we
are no longer slaves to it, and we can get help walking in that
temptation, and we can be about the Father's business from now
until forever. I want you to be that free, church. Because let me tell you what
guilt will do. Guilt will ruin you. And Christ has set us free. Live in that freedom. by faith
that Christ has satisfied the judgment against you. Believe
in Christ because the gospel is, as I said this past week,
an explicit, focused truth about what God has done to save you
through Jesus Christ, His Son. It is not some ambiguous, mystical
nuance. It's a focused reality. And you
either believe that God has saved you through Christ, or there's
no hope for you. Christ. And you don't put your
faith even in your own faith. You put your faith in the faithfulness
of Christ. Make it real. Let's pray. Lord, You are sovereign. And so though I cannot really,
as much as my heart wants to just be able to reach into every
soul, turn on the switch, you have to do it. So pray, I pray, Father, that
you would do that today. That your gospel would be effectual. That your spirit would bring
to life dead people as we sit here. And Lord, that your grace
would suffice. To bring us to a place where
we who are in Christ would rejoice, we would forgive, we would be
at one with each other, we would work and labor together, even
when there is division, we would do it by putting it away. We
would live and work toward reconciling. So that your power would be evident
in our lives. And we pray these things in the
name of Christ. Amen.