Philippians: The Key to Joy - 2

From Last Week: A couple of central ideas that Pastor Steve covered in the intro last week:

●    We gain joy through a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. Joy is a byproduct.

●    We strive for relationships in Christ and partnership in the Gospel of Christ.

LISTEN! What does it look like for us to be serious and sterling friends with other believers?

Friends, we are grateful you're here today and what an encouraging thing that Isaac and Amy are doing. It's a big deal if you think about quitting your job mid career and making that transition. We are looking today at the first paragraph of the book of Philippians.

If you want to turn there be looking at Philippians chapter 1:3 to 11.

Pastor Steve looked at the first couple of verses last week as well as.

Introduced us to the whole book of Philippians. A couple of things he said last week. We gained joy through a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. The truth is that joy is always a byproduct of other processes. You can't chase joy itself. It's a byproduct of having a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. It's a byproduct of depending on the Spirit and therefore having the fruit of the Spirit working in our lives.

CS Lewis said joy is the serious business of heaven. I think it's also the serious business of Earth. We want to be joyful people because it's part of the fruit of the Spirit. Second thing he said last week is we strive for a relationship in Christ and partnership in the gospel of Christ. So as we are related to Christ, we're related to each other, we're in a partnership. We're going to say more about that today. The idea that we are people involved in a great, amazing, unbelievable endeavor that's been going on for millennia and who knows how

much longer it's going on, but we're partners in it.

So Philippians chapter 1, I want to start at verse one please.

“Paul and Timothy, bond servants of Christ Jesus. To all the Saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

(3)I thank my God in all my remembrance of you always offering prayer with joy in my every prayer for you all in view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now.

(6) For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.

(7) For it is only right for me to feel this way about you, because I have you in my heart,since both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers of grace with me.

(8) For God is my witness. How I long for you with all the affection of Christ Jesus.

(9) And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, (10) so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ, (11) having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God.

Let me pray for us. Lord, again we pause to say thank you for this book. Thank you that we have it in a language we can read. Thank you that you're so dedicated to communicating with us. Without your revelation, Father, we would be utterly lost. So thank you for it. Let us be serious students of it. Let us be people who understand what you said, and let us be people who live what we understand that you said. We're deeply grateful for this good day, for this good body of believers, and the chance that we have. We pray for it in Christ's name, Amen.

Want to talk to you today about this concept of what it means to be a great friend with another person in Christ? Because Paul, I think, is outlining 3 three things that are true of a person who is an amazing friend in Christ. Now there is a way to determine how good a friend's people are by watching them on the day you move. So you're moving in town, it's a Saturday, everyone's instructed to show up at 8:00, and then you're going to provide pizza and cookies and soda at noon, and then you're going to finish when you're done.

So the posers, the people who aren't really friends, show up about 11, they move a few things around for an hour, they eat a whole bunch of pizza, fill their pockets with cookies, take a couple sodas for the road, and they're gone. That's not a friend.

Your friends show up at 8:00, work hard till noon, have a little bit of pizza, and then they head off to their other stuff.

Your good friends show up at 8:00, they work hard till noon, they

have a little bit of pizza, then they work till 2-3 or four.

And your best friend. Shows up at 8:00. Work hard all day long. Eat some lunch. Work hard in the afternoon. Buys supper for all of you who are still there. Keeps working and at 1:00 in the morning this good friend helps you put the last box in the house. Set up the last bed so everyone has a bed to sleep in, move the boxes so all the doors can be locked, give you a hug and say goodnight. That's a great friend.

Because most friends don't make it till 1:00 AM and the work is generally not done until 1:00 AM. If you've ever moved, you know you need to put a bed up.

It's midnight. That's a test of a great friend.

Paul in this paragraph is going a level deeper. He's telling us about a better friend than even that person who stays that long and works that hard. He's telling us about 3 faithful habits of a person who is a serious and sterling friend.

First, I have you in my mind. (vs 3-6)

●     They think about you and they actually think about you in all of life the way that Jesus thinks about you.

It's a critical difference between thinking about a person and thinking about them the way that Jesus thinks about them. Critical difference. It's extremely important. So a great friend is a person who has you in their mind. Friends all, all of our relationship struggles start with bad thinking. All of our sins are errors. Every mistake we make, it starts with bad thinking. Remember the disciples said to Jesus who sinned this man or his parents that he would be born blind. And Jesus said that's bad thinking. Nobody sinned. He was born blind to give glory to God. Jesus, if you read the gospels in this way, is habitually correcting bad thinking. And in this case we are called to be people

who treat other believers in a way that Christ would treat them because we think about them or the way that Christ would think about them.

If I'm thinking about a believer with contempt and with condemnation.

And with anger, and with injury, envy and hatred. I'm not thinking about them the way Jesus thinks about them. I want to read you a piece of thinking about another person. This person is a worthless jerk. I hope they burn in hell for all of eternity, and I hope that starts very soon.

Is that in the mind of Jesus or the mind of a person? It's not in the mind of Jesus because he doesn't think they're a worthless jerk. He thought they were worth dying for. He doesn't want him to burn in hell. God takes no delight in the death of the wicked.

When I find myself thinking in a contemptuous way about a believer, I am not thinking the way Jesus would have me.

●    I have the mind of Christ in all things.

The mind of Christ. 1st Corinthians 2:16 , “For we who has known the mind of the Lord, that will instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.”

When I trust Christ, I'm given the mind of Christ. I have the ability to think like Christ. I can have a mind that is full of truth, full of grace, unbroken joy, self sacrifice. Courageous statements, Patience, steady love, peace unchanging.

Kind, self controlled, gentleness, holy, good, merciful, wise, knowledgeable, discerning. I can have a new mind when I trust in Jesus. I can think about you the way that Jesus thinks about you. You can think about me the way Jesus thinks about me.

We're people who are given this opportunity to put our hope in Christ to be forgiven. Spend eternity with them. If we understand the bad news, I'm a Sinner. I've violated the standards of God. I've had my fist in His face since I was born, since I was conceived truthfully, I'm a Sinner. By nature, I'm a

Sinner. By standing. I'm a Sinner. By action. I mean three strikes against me.

Got my fist in the face of God and I can't fix it. I can't do anything about it. I spent my 1st 19 years trying to fix it. I will go to church, I will be good, I will give money, I will teach Sunday school, I will be a lay reader in church. I'll fix this and I couldn't. The harder I work to fix it the worse it gets.

When I was 19, I understood for the first time it wasn't about me working and being good. It was about the fact that Jesus had already paid for it. He offered me a gift. Put your trust in Jesus, reach out your hand and take this gift, and then you're forgiven. It's too easy. You say it's too cheap. Well, it's easy, but it's not cheap.

Cost Jesus his life, His blood. Cost the Heavenly Father, watching sin stacked on his holy Son. It was not cheap, the most expensive thing ever purchased. And he's saying to us, I could trust Christ. You could trust Christ today. If you haven't, you could talk to me afterwards. You can put your hope in Christ. And if you do that, you're given a place in heaven, forgiveness of sins, a new

mind, a new heart, new will, a new ability to honor Christ. And that's what Paul is talking about here, that we have a mind.

That thinks differently. Instead of an immoral imagination, we have a moral imagination. Here's the mind I'm commanded to have.

●    I have the mind of Christ and therefore I act like Christ and I feel like Christ.

Philippians 4:8, “Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there's any excellence, and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.”

The word dwell is the famous Greek word pronounced meno. It means to remain, to abide. It's the word they use when it says abide in Christ. As the branch abides in the vine, it's saying let your mind live here.

This is where you always think this is like driving your van up underneath a tree next to the river, putting it up on blocks, taking the wheels off and just saying this is where I live. I'm home, I'm going to be here and this is the command to us. I need to live. Where my mind is in that place, because

my mind is the rudder of my entire life. What I think controls what I do and it controls how I feel.

Don't be conformed to the image of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. To prove what the will of God is, that which is good

and acceptable and perfect. My mind is the rudder of my entire life and I need to think like Jesus thinks about you.

●    Again, I have the mind of Christ when I think about you.

You need to think like Jesus thinks about me. Think about each other like Jesus thinks about us. What's he think about us? Well, Philippians 2. Here's what he thinks about us. He thinks that he knows he's God. He lives in an exalted place in heaven. He thinks it's not worth grasping. He thinks he'd be willing to become a man for us. He thinks he'd be willing to die on the cross. The most powerful, ugly, embarrassing, humiliating, horrible, horrible possible way to go out. He thinks he would be willing to do all of that to help us. He thinks we're valuable. He thinks we're worth saving.

He thinks He wants to reach out to us and help us. He wants to give us mercy and grace and forgiveness again and again and again and again and again.

That's what he thinks about us. That's how his mind works about us. That's how he wants us to think about each other.

Same way he thought about us in Philippians 2:2. It all begins with what I.

Think about verse three, he says. I want you to think about yourself as a partner to me, and I want you to pray for one another. But we're going to look at that in verses 9 to 11 Critical issue verse 6.

●    I am confident of your maturing and your relationship with Jesus Christ. Until the day of Christ.

Now the day of Christ Jesus as used in the New Testament, speaks of when Jesus comes for us as believers, it's a great day. But the day of the Lord speaks to when the Lord comes to judge unbelievers. That's a bad day.

That's a rough day. We're talking about us persevering, maintaining all the way to the end of the finish line. When Jesus comes for us, we will make it to the end is what Paul is saying here in chapter 1 verse 6. It's a very challenging statement because some people say, no, you could lose your salvation. If you don't hold onto it and keep tied to it, you could lose it.

Friends, for me personally, I think that is biblically, theologically, absolutely untenable based on what the Bible says, based on God's part in the work of salvation. Based on my part in the work of salvation, it's untenable. I put a hand-out on the back table today if you're interested. 2 pages. A few of the reasons it is impossible for us to be snatched out of the hand of Jesus besides the fact that he said we can't be snatched out.

Handouts on there if you want it, you're welcome to look at it. Paul’s confidence in their full salvation isn't based on them, on the Philippians.

He is not saying, I know you're great people, you'll make it to the end.

It's based on God. He's a great God. He's got you in his hand. I know you're going to make it. It's not a license to live crazy. I've never been motivated to live crazy based on receiving grace. I've always been motivated to live for Christ based on having received grace. And their salvation to the end is based on who God is. It's based on his part in the work of salvation.

It's based on his commitments, based on his words. It's not based in any sense on who we are, friends. I know you know people who were flaming on fire for Christ when they were 17th and at 31 they walked away and then they said I don't even believe in God anymore.

And to that, you know, people look at that and say, OK, well, you can lose your salvation. And to that I say, we can never base theology on somebody we know. We always based theology on the book. Because somebody you knew, their life will be contradicted by somebody I knew.

We all knew somebody. If they were on fire for 10 years and then they walked away and said I don't even believe in God.

There's one of two possibilities biblically, either they never believed in Jesus or they still are saved. That's the options. Now I know some of you are saying a thing. You're an idiot, Dave, and that's valid. That's valid, but. Think about me the way Jesus thinks about me. I'm not saying this based on somebody I knew. I'm saying this based on the book papers out there. You're welcome to look at it. I hope you will look at it. I'm deeply convinced that part of what God is doing in our lives is making us like His Son. Romans 8:29, “Those whom he

foreknew, he also predestined to be like His son.” It ties in with verse 6.

You and I are on a collision course with Christ likeness. Once we trust Jesus, we have no choice. We will get there eventually. He is deeply committed to making us like His Son. God's purpose in life is not for us to be happy. It's for us to be holy. His purpose in life is for us to look like His son. He is working in that direction. We are going to get there eventually. Philippians 2:12 and 13. “So then, my beloved, just as you've always obeyed, not in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, workout your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”

When Paul says workout your salvation, he doesn't mean go to church, keep your checklist, tithe, be nice to your neighbor, etc. That's not it at all. He means God put salvation in us. And now we work it out in our regular everyday life.

This is a crazy thing, friends. I am called to cooperate with the God of the universe in my sanctification. It's crazy to me that Almighty God would give me peace in this process. I mowed the lawn here a couple years ago with my granddaughter. She was, I don't know, she was 4, maybe she wanted to mow the lawn with me. So she's got the handles up here like this. How much, how

much push can you get on a lawnmower when you're doing this? She's teaching the handle that way. I'm straddling her, pushing the mower. It took me an hour to do the lawn because we're just every time we have to turn, it was a fight. I let her be a part of it. She was the happiest child in the world.

“I helped grandpa mow the lawn.”

I think that's a pretty good metaphor of me helping God when he grows me up. I mean, I'm motivated, I got my hands on the handle. I'm not giving much pressure on it, but I'm motivated and God in his kindness lets me have a part of it. He's letting me be part of this whole issue. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. God is working for you willing to do in his good pleasure. And so I have to say to myself, I'm going to throw myself into this process, whatever part I can do.

Second, I have you in my heart. (vs 7,8)

Prayer, worship, fellowship, Fasting service. I'll throw myself into the Word of God, understanding and memorizing the word of God.

First of all, he said. I have you in my mind. Secondly, he says verses 7 and 8, I have you in my heart.

●    Because you have partnered with me since we knew each other in the Gospel work

First of all, verse 7 in the gospel. We love the people that we win great victories with. This is the band of brothers who take a hill. This is the band of sisters who start a pregnancy center. This is the band of athletes who, against the odds, win the state championship. This is the band of searchers who find a little child safely after four days.

This is the band of believers who bring the gospel to a new area.

●    Because you, like me, have been rescued by God’s grace.

We love each other because we're tied

together in this remarkable process of participating. Verse 5. Participating

verse 7, uses that word again. It's the famous fellowship word. It's Koinonia,

but in this setting it means.They gave money to support Paul. They

participated, they prayed, they gave him funds, they encouraged him. They were

co-laborers with him. We are co-laborers with Isaac and Amy. A bunch of us gave

them funds. A bunch of us pray for them. We're Co laboring together with them.

And this is what Paul is talking about here is that I love you. You're in my

heart because you are helping me bring Christ to lost people. This is a very

powerful concept that we help people who are bringing the gospel. There's

literally a Greek world, a Greek word pronounced propempo, which means to help

a missionary along their way. The missionary comes into town, they tell you

what they're doing, you give them some cash, and they go on and keep doing it.

Propempo Paul uses it about five times. I'm very familiar with it as a supported missionary for 17 years. I rolled into some towns with no money and ball tires, not making this up, and I rolled out of town in the generosity of God's people with some gas money and new tires. They helped me along my way. And I'm saying all this because these people helped Paul along this way and because we have a huge number of people in our body who are involved in gospel ministry.

Isaac and Amy we have other people here with. We have people here who are going out on short term trips. We have 24 students and adults headed to Ecuador in August. They need some more support. We have two groups of people going out this summer with Expansion International, one in the summer, one in the fall. We have five of us who are headed to the Island of Old Cars in November to share the gospel.

There's a lot of people in this body who are involved in ministry in that way and God is saying to us, how do I help? If the Lord convicts you, e-mail the office and just say, how do I be a part of helping some of these people as they're going out along the way to share Christ.

An author named Ralph Martin said, “We today might take a lesson to heart that the sign of our professed love for the gospel.” Is the measure of sacrifice we are prepared to make. In order to help in its progress, we rejoice that we have come to know the Savior. What are we doing to make Him known to others? I am a person who is involved with the gospel message.

●    Because the affection of Jesus is overflowing out of me toward you.

Verse 7. He says, “I love you because we have been rescued by God's grace together. We love people with whom we have been rescued together out of a great struggle.” It's a fascinating story.

You may remember August 5, 2010. A mine collapses in northern Chile. 33

men trapped underground. They're trapped in a small space 2300 feet from the surface and three miles from the entrance of The Cave. 33 of them down there and they know they're down there so they start drilling boreholes trying to get to them and after about 11 days they got a hole, A 6 inch hole went through to their chamber and when this drill bit comes into their chamber and stops.

They tape a note on it that says, “we are alive and well in the refuge comma the 33.” Famous note They pull it up and they, Oh my goodness, they're alive. They're alive in the well, in the refuge. They bored a bigger hole down there,

21-22 inches in diameter. Sent a capsule down.

It took him 60-9 days to bring those 33 men to the surface. They had lost an average of 18 lbs each. They've been living together in a cave 2300 foot underground. Can you imagine the bonding? Having lived together 69 days in the dark waiting for help, food and water coming down a little 6 inch hole while they're waiting to get you out. Can you imagine the bonding? What Paul is saying to us is we together, all of us, and billions of us. Were rescued from

a far worse situation. We were in a little hole in the ground, no way to get out.

We were facing eternity without Christ. Nothing we could do. Hopeless, helpless despair. God stepped in with the blood of his Son. He rescued us, all

of us. We're out. More than 33 more like billions and billions were out and were saved together and that's why we are one of the reasons we have compassion for each other. He says the affection of Jesus is overflowing.

Verse 8, out of me toward you. You're in the center of my heart and he says two things. You're in the center of my heart and you're in the center of my gut. I have a heart compassion for you. I have a gut level visceral love for you.

That's the kind of friends you are. I love you. In a crazy way, this is not sentimental love. This is holding people in your heart to whom you have ministered.

The critical issue in being a minister, I said to Isaac and Amy earlier today. I want to be a person who knows I'm a servant, I know I'm a steward. I want to be faithful and I want to hold the people to whom I minister in my heart.

My stance toward you and your stance toward the people you minister to is critical.

If I'm up here saying you guys are all idiots, you're not as good as me.

I wish you were better Christians. I've been trying to help you. I've been trying to help you. We watched a tape of a guy. Oh my goodness, he said. He said “I'm trying to get this through your thick skulls”.

To which I say, now there's a Christian minister. Your skulls aren't as thick as mine, friends. I hold you in my heart. We need to hold each other in our hearts. And Paul says I hold you in my heart, he said.

Third, I have you in my prayers (vs 9-11)

I have you in my prayers. I pray for you on a habitual, regular basis. He's not praying for the American dream for them. He's not praying to get into law school, get a bigger house, get, get, get, get, get, get, get. It's not what he's praying for them. Here's what he's praying for.

●    …that your love may abound.

That this famous agape love of the New Testament would overflow running over there would be there would be just. Too much of it. You would love each other so much that you would be overflowing in your service to each other.

Friends, we built our own house in 1991. It was a massive flight. We got it done. The church gave us all kinds of help. All these work days, we got it done. We fill out the application for the loan from this bank in Utah. We send them the picture and the paperwork, and we get a message back that says this house has to be repainted or we're not going to make a loan to you.

Friends, the house is like 2 days old and they saw a blurry Polaroid picture and says it must be repainted or we're going to deny the loan. I'm thinking to myself, I have asked this church to help me so much, I can't ask anymore.

And so I go Friday after work and I get my ladder up and I start painting. I had to paint the entire outside of a house by Monday night when I had go back to work.

About 7:00. A woman comes over to give something to my wife. She said, What are you doing, Dave? Painting the new house? Well, the bank said they're not gonna loan to me if I do. Oh, that's terrible, she says. She leaves the next morning at 9:00. Forty people from our church show up. With ladders, brushes, rollers and painted in three hours.

Three hours. I was not going to have it done by Monday night, friends.

It was the overflowing love of Christ in these people that just said we're going to take care of this, we're going to help you. You didn't ask us to help, but we want to help, and Paul is saying we need to have an abounding, overflowing love for each other. Here's his next prayer.

●    …in real knowledge.

Request that your love will abound, in real knowledge, that you will have an actual knowledge of things ethical and divine. Not that you'll know how to find some obscure verse, but that your mind and your heart will overthrow the knowledge of things that are ethical and divine, and you will live them out.

One of my Bible professors used to say I know too many people who are trafficking in unlived truth. They know the Greek words. They know the Hebrew words. They got it all written down. They got it all figured out. They got the sentence structure down. They can explain it to you. But they don't live it. They're trafficking in unleave, proof, truth.

●    …in all discernment.

Verse 9, I pray that you abound in discernment, real perception.

●    …in approving the things that are excellent

Verse 10, “I pray that you abound in approving things that are excellent, that you will test things, understand them, approve them. Because you know, I brought this idea into the light and saw it was good or it was bad. I'm praying that you will be that kind of person.”

●    …resulting in you being sincere and blameless until the day of Christ.

●    …resulting in you being filled with the fruit of righteousness through Jesus Christ

Verse 10. “I'm praying that your love will abound, resulting in you being sincere and blameless until the day of Christ. That you be a person, he's saying, who's without impurities, not that you've never sinned, but you have a pure life, and that you be a person who's blameless, not that you'll never sin, but that you won't cause other people to stumble. That's the kind of person I'm praying that you will be.

This is his request for us, verse 11. I’m praying that your love will abound, resulting in the fruitless righteousness of Jesus Christ in your life. That you have this standing of forgiveness and now you have a life that shows a life of

forgiveness. That this fruit will just be flowing out of you. Behavioral integrity

●    …ultimately resulting in the glory of God.

verse 11 that your love will abound, ultimately resulting in the glory of God.

People will look at the way you're living and say. I love the music of their lives. I wonder what the words are. I love the music of their lives. I wonder what the words are.

We're living in the kind of way that is attractive. It's salt, it's light. People are looking at it saying, boy, I don't know what's going on with them, but I'd like to live that way. I'd like to have that kind of joy.

Here's Paul's score idea, I think. To be great friends with you, I must have you

in my mind and in my heart and in my prayers. I must think about you. I must remember you. I must care for you. And I must speak to the Father about you.

That's the kind of friend that he's inviting us to be. I want to close with an example of that kind of friend. It comes from Philippians. Well, part of it from Philippians 2.

Here's an example of a great friend. Jesus is our great friend who remembers us. The thief was saying to Jesus, Remember Me when you come into my Kingdom, Jesus said to him, Truly, I say to you today, you should be with me in paradise.

Jesus thinks about us. He remembers us. This famous thing going around the Internet right now where the thief shows up at the pearly gates and Saint Peter says, why are you here? He says the guy in the middle of the cross said I could be here.

That's why we're here, because He remembers us. The second thing, Jesus is our great friend because we're in his heart. Revelation 1:5. And from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the first born of the dead, the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To Him who loves us present tense. He didn't just love us and die for us, He loves us in the present tense. Right now, He has freed us from our sins.

Jesus loves us, He thinks about us, He loves us, and finally, he's our great friend because he prays for us.

Romans 8:34, “Christ Jesus is the one who died more than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who is indeed interceding for us right now.”

Or John 17:20 “I do not ask Jesus praying for the disciples. I do not ask on behalf of these alone. But for those who will believe in me through their word, that's us.” Jesus praying for us.

“That they may be one even as you, Father, are in me, and I in you. That they may also be in us. So that the world may believe that you sent me. Jesus prays for us, remembers us. He thinks about us, cares for us. And he prays for us.

If I want to be your great friend, I have to be that same kind of a person.

To remember you. To love you and to pray for you. Let's pray together.

We're grateful, Father, for this paragraph. For the words of Paul, empowered by the Holy Spirit, we are grateful, especially for the example of Jesus. Who remembers us? Who loves us and who prays for us? We give you thanks

in Jesus' name, Amen.