Now if you'll open your Bibles
to the book of Philippians, chapter 1. Philippi was a colony, a Roman
colony, and it was the chief city of Macedonia. The Apostle Paul had received
special instructions I think I'll ask you to turn to Acts
16. This is when we meet with the
little city of Philippi in the scriptures. Acts 16, beginning
with verse 9. Paul had special instructions
to go down to Philippi and down into Macedonia, and Philippi
was the leading city of Macedonia. In Acts 16, beginning with verse
9, and a vision appeared to Paul in the night. There stood a man
of Macedonia and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia
and help us. After he had seen the vision,
immediately we endeavored to go to Macedonia assuredly gathering
that the Lord had called us to preach the gospel to them. Therefore,
loosing from Troas, we came with a straight course to Samothracia,
the next day to Neapolis, and from thence to Philippi. There
is the city we are talking about, which is the chief city of that
part of Macedonia, and a colony And we were in that city abiding
certain days. Now you know what happened there.
Some of you are familiar with the 16th chapter of Acts. Paul
went down by the river and preached, and Lydia was converted, and
many people in her home. And then he went to the jail,
and there the Philippian jailer was converted, and these are
the people that formed the nucleus or foundation of this church
in Philippi. And now the years had gone by,
many years, this epistle to the Philippians was written about
60 A.D., and Paul was in prison. Many years had passed, and he
was now in prison in Rome. And this is where he wrote this
book of Philippians. He mentions in the book his chains,
He mentions being in Caesar's palace. He was an important prisoner. He mentions some of Caesar's
household believing, calling on the name of the Lord. And
he sends greetings to the church at Philippi from these believers
in Caesar's household. Now Paul was especially dear
to these people in Philippi. because he was the first preacher
to come and preach the gospel to them. He was very dear to
them. And upon hearing that he was in prison in Rome, they sent
their pastor. We'll run into his name some
more in this book. His name is Epaphroditus. They
sent their pastor to Rome to visit with Paul and to take him
some food and some books and some presents and good wishes.
And if Papadatus spent some time in Rome, where he was quite ill,
Paul said, now unto death. And then when he started back
to the church at Philippi, inspired by the Holy Spirit, Paul wrote
this book, this letter, this epistle, and sent it along with
the pastor to the people down in Philippi. Now the design of
this letter, as I can gather, is sevenfold. And I'll just give
you these briefly because we're going to be covering these during
the next few Wednesday nights. He writes this letter, I think,
for seven reasons. Of course, the Spirit of God
dictated the letter and led him to write it. But in this letter
he expresses seven things. Number one, he expresses, Paul
expresses his deep love and affection for these believers in Philippi.
They were very, very dear to him. Then secondly, he gives
them an account of his imprisonment and the results of it. And then
thirdly, he encourages them to bear up under afflictions and
persecutions. And then he encourages them to
love one another, to live in unity and peace with one another. And then he spends some time
in the latter part of the book, warning them against false teachers,
especially these people who were trying to mix the law and the
gospel, who were trying to revert back to Moses' law, and who were
trying to mix works and grace, and then he exhorts them to a
holy and honest life, and then he gives thanks for their gifts
and for their care of him. Now let's look at the first verse.
of the first chapter. First thing I wondered when I
looked at this chapter is, why does he mention Timothy? He begins
the salutation with these words, Paul and Timotheus. That's Timothy. Paul and Timothy. Timothy wasn't
in prison, and Timothy didn't have anything to do with the
writing of this book. So I looked up the reasons, and
I found three, I believe, for his mentioning Timothy in the
salutation. First of all, I found out Timothy
was with Paul when he went to Philippi to preach the first
time. You can check on that back in
Acts 16, but Timothy was with him. And it was Timothy and Paul
who went down to Macedonia, to Philippi, and preached the gospel
the first time to these people. And along with Paul, Timothy
was very dear to these people. And then secondly, I found out
that Paul was about to send Timothy back down there. He was on his
way down there to preach to these people. And then thirdly, Paul,
I believe, wanted to show the people of Philippi the continued
agreement, both doctrinally and affectionately, the agreement
between him and Timothy. Paul wanted to reassure these
people Because many of the teachers had forsaken Paul. I told you
about that last Sunday. And Paul wanted these people
to know Timothy was coming down. And he was coming from Paul.
Paul was sending him. And here's another reason why
he mentioned Timothy. Paul was the writer of the book
of Philippians, to the letter to the Philippi church. But we're
not alone in the gospel, and Paul's emphasizing that. He's
not seeking his own. Turn to 1 Corinthians 3. Now,
as great as the apostle Paul was, as important as he was in
the kingdom of God, as learned as he was, as used by God as
he was, he never lost sight of the fact that he was nothing. He says in 1 Corinthians 3, verse
4, For while one saith, I am of Paul, and another, I am of
Apollos, are ye not carnal?" Is that not the natural way of
thinking? Who is Paul? Who is Apollos? Or who is Timothy? Who is John
and James and Peter? They're just ministered by whom
you believe, even as the Lord gave to every man. of Pallas
watered, but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth
anything, neither he that watereth." He's not anything, but God that
giveth the increase. That's the important one. So
he includes Timothy. When he writes this letter, he
doesn't say, Now I'm an apostle. And Timothy's not an apostle.
He just says, Paul and Timothy, Paul and Timothy. And then in
the next line, he says, we're servants. We're servants, and
the word here is bondservants. We're bondslaves of Jesus Christ. Paul didn't say, I'm an apostle,
and Timothy is less important, and some of you are still of
lesser importance. He chooses a character that fits
all of them. We are bondslaves of Jesus Christ. Now, where did this term, bondslaves,
come from? Turn to Exodus 21, and I'll show
you. In Exodus chapter 21, this is
where the bond slave originated, or what it's all about. In Exodus
21. What is a bond servant? How is
a bond servant different from a servant, or a bond slave different
from a slave? Well, Exodus 21 tells us, verse
2. Now, if you buy a Hebrew servant,
six years he'll serve you. In the seventh year, you've got
to turn him loose. He'll go out free for nothing.
Now then, verse five. If the servant shall plainly
say, this slave, this one you own, after serving you six years,
if he shall plainly say, not coerced in any way, not under
any kind of pressure, that he shall plainly, clearly say, I
love my master, my wife and my children, I will not go out free. Then his master shall bring him
to the judges, and he shall tell the judges what he wants to do,
bring him to the door and to the doorpost. His master shall
bore his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him forever."
He is now a bondservant, that is, a willing, loving slave who
chooses to be a servant to his master rather than going out
free. And that's what a bondservant
is. It's a servant, it's a slave, but it's a willing, loving bondslave. So Paul and Timothy, who are
the bondslaves of Jesus Christ, the willing, loving servants
of the Son of God, were writing to all the saints in Christ Jesus. Now then, it's amazing to me
how much these old wise fables and unbiblical superstitions,
they get a grip on people. I hear people say, well, I'm
a Christian, but I'm not a saint. And I heard them say, well, who
does she think she is, a saint or something? And then the Catholics
have made saints of people and called them Saint Jane and Saint
Jude and Saint Martha and Saint Mary and different ones. But
according to the Word of God, every believer is a saint. Every
believer consecrated and sanctified by Christ Jesus is a saint. And when Paul writes to the people
at Philippi, the believers, he addresses them as saints. Paul
and Timothy, the bondslaves of Jesus Christ to all the saints,
to all believers, to all who are sanctified, to all who are
in Christ Jesus. Every one of them are saints.
Everybody here tonight who is a believer in Christ is a saint.
The Bible calls us saints. And he's writing also to the
bishops and the deacons. Now, who are the bishops? The
bishops are the elders. The bishops and the pastors and
the elders are all one and the same in the Scripture. Turn to
Acts chapter 20. Let me show you that. The twentieth
chapter of Acts, reading verse seventeen. And from Miletus,
Paul sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the Now he's speaking
to the elders of the church here. In verse 28 he says, "...take
heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock over which
the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church
of God which he hath purchased with his own blood." There are
the people in the church, there are the deacons in the church
who are called the assistants or servants who take care of
the material matters of the church and so forth. and there are the
elders. And the elders sometimes are
called pastors, sometimes they're called bishops, and sometimes
they're called elders. But they're all overseers of
the church. That's the office of elder, pastor,
and bishop. And when the Bible speaks of
a bishop, it's talking about an elder. When it speaks of a
pastor, talking about an elder. When it speaks of an elder, it's
talking about a pastor and a bishop. The office is the same. Now in
verse 2 through 5, here is a prayer of thanksgiving and petition.
Verse 2, let's look at it. Grace be unto you, and peace
from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Now these
next few verses is an attitude that every believer needs to
cultivate. Instead of a critical spirit,
We, when we think of the people of God, we need to think of them
in this way. We need to thank God for them
and pray God's grace and peace and mercy be upon them. Now listen
to Paul as he prays for this church. Grace be unto you and
peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. I
thank my God upon every remembrance of you. Always in every prayer
of mine for you all. making requests with joy for
your fellowship in the gospel from the first day that I met
you until now. I thank God for you, for your
fellowship in the gospel. I pray for you, making requests
with joy, and I pray that grace and peace might be upon you. You are vital to the advancement
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now look at verse six. Here's
a verse that we could stay on for the rest of the evening.
Look at it carefully. Being confident, Paul said, of
this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you
will perform it, or will finish it, unto the day of Jesus Christ. Now, this good work is the forming
of Christ in the believer. Paul's not speaking here of the
building of a church. He's not speaking here of the
establishment of a witness in a city. He's talking about regeneration. He's talking about the new birth.
He's talking about eternal life. He's talking about salvation.
He's talking about that new man created in Christ Jesus. This
is the good work. And this good work is begun It's
not finished. It's begun. He that hath begun
a good work in you. It's not finished. It won't be
finished till we're made like Christ. We have been saved. We are being saved. And our salvation
is nearer than when we believe. And he hath begun this work,
watch it now, in you. It's not a work for you. It's
a work in you. Yes, Christ died for us, Christ
justified us, Christ intercedes for us, but he also worked in
us, sanctifying, changing our wills, our attitudes, our affections,
our thoughts. It is a good work in you. And who does the work? Being
confident of this very thing, that he that hath begun that
work will perfect it. He shall complete it." Salvations
of the Lord. David prayed, create, O God,
create in me a clean heart. Renew in me a right spirit. Paul said in Ephesians, it's
God that worketh in you, both to will and to do His good pleasure. Now look at the last statement.
Paul said, I'm confident of this very thing, that He God, which
hath begun, started, a saving work, a redeeming work in you. God revealed his Son in me. Paul said this, I prevail till
Christ be formed in you. And he that hath begun that work
will perfect it. He will finish it in the day
of Jesus Christ. Turn to Philippians 3. Chapter
3, verse 20. Look at this verse here. Our conversation, our citizenship,
is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it may be
fashioned like unto his glorious body. That's when that works.
will be perfected and will be completed. Now let's look at
verse seven. Even as it is meet, now the word
meet sometimes is translated sufficient. Here it's translated
appropriate. Even as it is appropriate, it
is right for me to think this of you all. Now Paul has spoken
very highly of these people. He's thanked God for them. He
says he prays for them with joy. He thanks God for their fellowship.
He says, I'm confident, I'm confident that he that has begun a good
work in you is going to perfect it, going to finish it. And now
he says, it's right and appropriate for me to think this of you,
and he gives two reasons. The first reason is this, because
I have you in my heart. I have you in my heart." The
apostle says, it is much as both in my bonds and in the defense
and confirmation of the gospel. He said, whether I'm in prison
or whether I'm out on the field, whether I'm in prison or whether
I'm in the pulpit, God keeps you on my heart. I'm confident
it is appropriate, it is right for me to think these high thoughts
of you because you're always on my heart," Paul said. I'm
always thinking about you. God has kept you on my heart
continually, and the second reason why he says it's appropriate
for me to think this of you is that you have stood by me in
the defense of the gospel. Thus the two read, you all are
partakers of my grace, or with me of grace. You've stood by
me in the gospel." And that's the reason he says it's appropriate
and right for me to be confident that God's going to perform a
work of grace, finish it, on your behalf because you're always
on my heart and because you have stood by me in the gospel. Now look at the next line. For
God is my record, God is my witness. how greatly I long after you
all in the bowels of Jesus Christ." Let me read that to you in the
amplified translation. Philippians, that's verse eight. God is my witness, how I long
for and pursue you all with love in the tender mercies of Christ
Jesus our Lord." What he is saying is this. I speak the truth. God is my witness. I love you
and long for your fellowship in person. And it's not just
a human and natural affection, but it is a love which comes
from Christ, from the tender mercies of Christ. This love
is known and shared by few people and is the love of Christ for
his body. And it's the love which Paul
is talking about in 1 Corinthians 13. I'm going to read that out
of the amplified translation because I think it's a better
one. Here's the definition of this kind of love. Paul says,
God is my witness. God is my witness. I speak the
truth. I love you. and long for your
fellowship as Christ loves his church in the tender mercies
of Christ for his body. And here is the kind of love
he's talking about, known by very few people. Love endures
long, is patient and kind. Love is never envious and does
not boil over with jealousy. Love is not boastful, does not
display itself haughtily. It is not conceited, arrogant,
inflated with pride. Love is never rude. It does not
act in an unbecoming manner. Love does not insist on its own
rights or having its own way, for it's not self-seeking. It is not touchy, fretful, and
resentful. It takes no account of the evil
done to it and pays no attention to a suffered wrong. It does
not rejoice at injustice and unrighteousness and evil, but
love rejoices when right and truth prevail. True love bears
up unto anything and everything that comes. It is always ready
to believe the best of every person. its hopes are fadeless
under all circumstances, it endures everything without weakening,
and it will never fail, it will never fade away, it will never
become obsolete, and it will never come to an end." Now let's
look at verse 9. Verse 9 through 11 is another
prayer which he prays for this church, and I'm going to spend
ten minutes or so in closing on this prayer, because it has
some things in it that are very vital to us today. And this I pray, that your love,
he's just been talking about his love for them, which is not
just a human affection, but a love which comes from Christ, a love,
as one writer said, that's known and shared by few people. Paul
puts up this prayer for them. He said, This I pray, that your
love may abound. What does the word abound mean?
Well, in this particular incident, it means increase, increase,
overflow, more and more. Where the Spirit of God is, there
is love, and where there is not love, God is not, because God
is love. And this love of God which is
shed abroad in the Holy Spirit, by the Holy Spirit in the believer,
is not only in words but in expression and deed and truth. And we grow
in love even as we grow in grace. We grow in love even as we grow
in knowledge. We grow in love even as we grow
in maturity in Christ. That's what he's praying here,
that your love may increase, that it may overflow, that it
may enlarge, that it may be greater. Christ said, by this shall all
men know you, my disciples, if you love one another. Then a
pretty good indication that a person's not a disciple of Christ is when
he doesn't love people. And then he says this, and something
I noticed here, I pray this, that your love may increase,
that it may overflow more and more. Look at these two words,
in knowledge and in judgment. How would you apply that? I pray that your love may increase
more and more in knowledge and judgment. Well, here is the best
translation of that. True love is not blind. It's
not ignorant. True, sincere, Christ-given love
increases with knowledge. We know Christ, and the more
we know Him, the more we love Him. The more we know Him, the
more we love Him. The more we know of him, of his
power, of his purpose, of his providence, the more we love
him. Your love increases with knowledge. And also the people of God, if
we really love them. We know them to be frail, to
be weak, to be sinful, and yet the more we know them, the more
we see Christ in them. And the more we know them, the
more we love them. They're nothing, we know it,
they confess it, we're aware of it, but they're in him. And
we see him in them. And as we grow in a knowledge
of them, and as we grow in an understanding of them, our love
grows for them. How many people have you seen
that they meet someone and they're just taken with them like that?
And then a few days pass, or a few weeks, and they begin to
know them better, and the first thing you know, they've marked
them off. As they grew to know that person,
their love diminished and ceased. Paul said, I pray that your love
may increase more and more in knowledge. The more you know
Christ, the more you know his people, the more you love them.
The more you're with them, the more your love increases for
them. It's not only based on knowledge,
but it's based on judgment. Listen to this. Our love grows
as we're able to discern. The word judge is the word discern. Turn back to 2 Corinthians. Let
me show you that. In 1 Corinthians, I believe it is,
chapter 2, verse 14. Verse 15, the word judge is discerned. He that is spiritual discerneth,
discerneth all things. Yet he himself is understood,
or discerned, of no man. Now here's what Paul is saying.
As we're able to discern true spiritual values, true spiritual
values, as we're able to discern and to understand true spiritual
values, a person's real relationship with Christ, and his relationship
with us in Christ, and Christ in him, as we're able to see
these spiritual things. Our love is not cluttered up
with a selfish, material, physical thing, but it's the great family
of God in Christ. We're able to discern Christ
in that individual. We're able to understand the
presence of the Lord. We're able to understand that
person's pursuit of God, that person's interest in God. And
that leads us to overlook the fickle things and the feeble
things and the physical things and the things that really don't
matter. And we love And we don't fall
out with them because of these physical failures and these natural
failures, because we're able to judge and discern in that
person deeper values and more beautiful things. We see Christ
in them and these other things. Now then, a person who doesn't
have that judgment and who doesn't have that discernment of spiritual
life and of Christ, Here's all he sees. He sees the outer thing. He sees this failure, and that
failure, and this failure, and that failure. And if you look
close enough, you'll soon fall out with everybody, because everybody's
got failures. And the more you know them, the
more failures you're going to see. The more you're around them,
the more failures you're going to observe. The more they're
with you, the more they're going to antagonize you, and not going
to see things as you see them, or do things as you do them,
and all these things. You're going to be able to pick
them to pieces, and after a while, you won't have a friend left.
because you don't have any knowledge of spiritual things. You don't
have any judgment or discernment of real spiritual life and value,
and therefore you're going to base your relationship with that
person on whether or not walks like you think he ought to walk,
or whether he drives the kind of car you think he ought to
drive, or whether he shines his shoes like you think he ought
to, or whether he talks like you think, or whether he likes
baseball or football, or whether he likes this or that or the
other, or whether he gets up early or sleeps late, or whether
he goes to bed late or sleeps early. All these little things
are going to be picky, picky things that will make you lose
your interest in that individual and lose your relationship. But
Paul said in this verse here, If you have Christ in you, and
that person has Christ in him or her, you're going to be drawn
to one another because you're going to grow in a knowledge,
and you're going to have some spiritual discernment, some spiritual
conception, some spiritual understanding of what is really valuable about
that individual. And that's what you're going
to love, and that's what's going to attract you. that real spiritual
life, and that real spiritual heartbeat, and that real Christ
present in that individual, you're going to love that, and the more
you love that, the more you're with him, the more you're going
to see it, the more you're around him, the more you're going to
see it, and the less these things will bother you. And I'll just
be perfectly honest with you, the more these things bother
you, the more you indicate that you don't know anything about
spiritual life. When I hear people always picking other folks to
pieces about little things, physical, material, natural things, it's
because that's the world in which they live. They live in a natural,
physical world, and that's the reason it bothers them. and heaven
and earth is going to pass away. These things are going to pass
away someday, but that life of Christ is going to live. And
Paul says, I want your love to grow, to increase more in knowledge. In knowledge. Not in petty agreements
or disagreements, but in real knowledge and judgment. Judgment. Now, the next thing. He says,
now watch this, and this is, like I said, this is really the
most important part of the chapter here, verse 10, 9, 10, 11, that you may approve things that
are excellent. And I confess to you, I looked
at that for about 30 minutes and got up and walked around,
came back and looked at it a little bit more. Over here in the center
reference, the word approve is try. T-R-Y. And the word excellent
is translated different. And John Gill says, that's correct,
that you may try things that are different. That you may try,
trial, T-R-I-L, that you may judge or put to trial and understand
things that are different. And this translation is correct,
too, that you may approve, and you try things in order to approve
them. And things that are different,
you want to pick the excellent things. Things that are different,
one of them is more excellent than the other. And here's what
he's saying. Paul said, that you may be able
to approve those things that are excellent when you see the
difference, when you try these things that are different. Now
watch it. And there's a difference, there's a difference in morality
and grace. And very few people know the
difference. There's a difference in morality
and grace. There's a difference in our righteousness
and God's righteousness. The average person out there
on the street, you start talking about righteousness, you know
what they're thinking about? They're thinking about one thing,
and that's how good I am so that I can go to heaven. There's very
few people know anything about God's righteousness, and these
are different. Our righteousness, the Bible
has a lot to say about righteousness, but it has a lot to say about
God's righteousness. And you and I have got to see
the difference. And the Bible has a lot to say
about these two things. Do you know the difference? Do
you know the difference in self-love and Christian love? Can you discern
the difference? Can you tell whether a person
loves you because it's a self-love or loves
you because it's a Christian love? Our Lord said, If you love
those that love you, nothing to that. You give to people from
whom you hope to receive something in return, nothing to that. Can
you discern the difference? Do you know the difference in
religious works? I hear people say, well, she
just works for the church all the time. Do you know the difference
in that and real laboring for God's glory? You know the difference
in religious works and that prayer and fasting and giving that's
for God's glory? There's a difference. Do you
know the difference in a profession of Christ and a real heart possession
of Christ? You know the difference. Do you
know the difference in knowing the doctrine of Christ and knowing
the Christ of the doctrine? Do you know the difference in
believing in the cross of Christ and believing in the Christ of
the cross? There's a difference. And that's what he's talking
about here. He's praying that the people of this church may
increase in a love that's based upon real knowledge and spiritual
discernment, and that they may be able to see the difference.
See the difference. in those things that appear to
men to be alike, but that are different. One is more excellent.
A man must be regenerated and transformed by the renewing of
his spiritual mind to discern and approve that which is excellent. A man's got to be born again
to see the difference in grace and morality, in God's righteousness
and our righteousness. in possessing Christ and professing
Christ. They're people going to hell
who have publicly professed and who actually believe that Christ
died on the cross. They're trusting the finished
work of Christ. They're not trusting the Christ
of the finished work. And some of you know what I'm
talking about. There is a difference. There is a difference. And then
in verse, the latter part of that verse, he says, I pray that
you may be sincere. Boy, that needs to be underscored.
That your desires after God, that your seeking of divine things,
God help us if we're not sincere. Barney just said, God have mercy,
but he won't. that your desires after God,
that your seeking after divine things, that your affection for
Christ and His kingdom, that it be real, that it be sincere,
that it proceed from your heart otherwise. Look at that next
line. You're going to give an offense.
I pray that you might be sincere and without offense. You're going
to be a stumbling block, because sooner or later, Men are going
to detect insincerity, and when they do, that winds it up. Now, you can detect weakness. It's in every man and woman.
You can detect fallibility. You can detect ignorance. You can detect those things.
But when you detect insincerity, Affectation in the spiritual
realm is an abomination. It's the most offensive thing
there is. Let affectation and showmanship
be reserved for the stage and the theater, but not for the
pulpit or the pew. I pray that you might be sincere. I tell you, my friend, if you're
going to be wrong, be sincerely wrong. It's far better to be
wrong and be sincerely wrong than to be right and be affectatious
and insincere. And then he prays that you might
be filled with the fruits of righteousness. They're called
fruits. These good works are called fruits
because they spring from the seed of grace planted in the
soul by the Holy Spirit. And look at the next line, I
pray that you might be filled with the works of righteousness
which are by Christ Jesus. These works are not of us, they're
Christ in us, and they're not done for our glory, they're done
for the glory of our Lord, and they're done for his praise.
And Paul wants us to be filled with these good works. You know,
I thought as I looked at that verse, what have I done today
to lift somebody's burden? What
have I done today to make—I'm not talking about my family now
and earning bread for my children, that's a duty, that's a responsibility,
which we enjoy and which we love, but that's not—I'm talking about
above and beyond this responsibility, this world of duty in which we
live. What have I done to contribute
to somebody's happiness this day? To lift somebody's burden,
to make somebody smile, to give somebody a helping hand. I think
when we come to the end of each day, we ought to ask ourselves
that question. What have I done today as far
as this thing of reaching out? a helping hand, an affectionate
hand, a loving hand, a word, a deed of kindness, something
in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, something for the glory
of God, something for the praise of Christ, something where I'll
get out of my own world and my own circle and extend myself
towards somebody else. Those are the fruits of righteousness. Our Father, we thank Thee for
Thy Word. a challenge, convicting, and
yet thy word gives us confidence in Christ. And these things which
Paul speaks about, we detect the cloud as a man's hand, we
detect the seedling, the sapling growing, we detect thy presence,
we detect the grace that thou hast planted and the work thou
hast begun. Grant, O Lord, as Paul prayed
for this early church, that we too may increase in real affection,
that we may be able to love in sincerity and beauty and truth
in a Christlike manner, that the fruits of righteousness for
the glory of our Lord, not for our own praise to be seen of
men, nor to merit eternal life, this is thy gift to us in Christ. But because we love Christ, and
because we love people, and because we want to share their burden
and help them carry their load,