SPEAKER_02: Philip Philippians 1 9 through 11, hear the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
SPEAKER_02: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Church, let's pray over the word.
SPEAKER_01: Heavenly Father, we're so thankful for the gathering today.
SPEAKER_01: Father, just so thankful for your word.
SPEAKER_01: So thankful for uh brothers like Dylan, who've labored over your word.
SPEAKER_01: And Father, we just pray for anointment over him and his delivering of what you have for us today.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we also pray that we're listening closely, Father, and that we're hearing your word, and that the Spirit is helping interpret your word.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we just love your truth and we love to learn more about you.
SPEAKER_01: Increase our love for one another and your people.
SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Good morning.
SPEAKER_00: You've already been seated.
SPEAKER_00: Good job.
SPEAKER_00: We are, as we uh, as my wife just read, we're in uh first Philippians, or not first Philippians, Philippians 1.
SPEAKER_00: I haven't preached in a while.
SPEAKER_00: 1 Philippians, Philippians 1.
SPEAKER_00: Bear with me.
SPEAKER_00: We're we're we're finishing up or looking at the last little bit of that opening prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Uh if you're reading in the ESV, that subheading, that thanksgiving in prayer that that bursts forth with this pastoral affection.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul's saying, I thank my God in all my remembrance of you.
SPEAKER_00: What a sweet, uh, endearing, affectionate love that the body of Christ has had for each other since its inception.
SPEAKER_00: There is an affection and a communal oneness that is expected among the body of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And we see that that is Paul's prayer for the Philippian church, and we can faithfully apply that as a prayer for ourselves this morning.
SPEAKER_00: And these three verses on with all that said, have made me quite uncomfortable this week.
SPEAKER_00: Sitting with them in study and in preparation to teach them the weight of Paul's prayer for the church of Philippi expands.
SPEAKER_00: He hopes they abound in love, not just that they love, that it's abounding and then more and more.
SPEAKER_00: He wants it to abound and then he wants it to grow from there.
SPEAKER_00: It's a big task.
SPEAKER_00: He wants them to make excellent choices, to be pure and blameless, to do those things through the power of Christ and to do them for God's glory and praise.
SPEAKER_00: This is our purpose.
SPEAKER_00: During this section of our existence here in our incarnate life, in this life that we have to live, I think and so we could summarize our work for God and towards each other in this way: abound in love, be pure and blameless, through the power of Christ to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: However, understood in their context and informed by Scripture, Paul's prayer for what he desires to see in the Philippian congregation and what we can faithfully apply to ourselves, what we would hope to see in ourselves is costly.
SPEAKER_00: As you layer in what it means to abound in love more and more, to approve what is excellent, to make wise choices, to be pure and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: Those are costly.
SPEAKER_00: But we are enabled and empowered through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, through the blood of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We are not, Paul doesn't stop with be pure and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: He goes on and says, through Christ Jesus and to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: That is weighty and it is costly.
SPEAKER_00: But to glorify God is to our good.
SPEAKER_00: But because we're still battling our flesh, to glorify God often costs us greatly regarding what we would choose for ourselves if left to our own devices.
SPEAKER_00: So, uh uh, by way of intro this morning, let me ask you a question.
SPEAKER_00: Is the glory of God worth it to you?
SPEAKER_00: That's not a that that's not a throwaway cliche.
SPEAKER_00: That's not, I'm not trying to shock jock this.
SPEAKER_00: The earnest question.
SPEAKER_00: It is the glory of God that as a trailing benefit is to your good, but to the glory of God, and so far that it costs you, it is costly to live our lives, not for us, but for the glory of God, is that worth it?
SPEAKER_00: Now, the easy answer, the Sunday morning answer is yes, of course.
SPEAKER_00: Take a moment to reflect.
SPEAKER_00: Does my life prove my answer to be honest?
SPEAKER_00: Do my actions and my choices and my priorities and how I spend my time and my efforts, and where does my heart go and pull me?
SPEAKER_00: And that way, can I truthfully answer that the glory of God is worth it to me and how I conduct myself.
SPEAKER_00: Fun start, huh?
SPEAKER_00: Hang in there.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look to our text in verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: Paul's heart for his brothers and sisters in Christ, again, is such an encouragement to me.
SPEAKER_00: This guy's in jail.
SPEAKER_00: I've never been in jail, so I don't know what it's like.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and I don't know what it would be like to be in jail for religious reasons.
SPEAKER_00: Paul knew that within reason, at some point in his life, jail probably meant death for him.
SPEAKER_00: It was religious treason that he was committing.
SPEAKER_00: But as much as I can kind of imagine what it would be like, I think my prayer would be, Lord, please get me out of jail.
SPEAKER_00: And if I'm in jail writing letters to y'all, my letters are saying, call an attorney, call the senator, well, get me out.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul's impulse is to say, I am praying for you to be Christ-like.
SPEAKER_00: It's convicting for me as a pastor.
SPEAKER_00: I'm praying, Paul says, that your love would grow, that you would be wise and pure and blameless, and that you would glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: It's Paul's greatest concern for the church of Philippi.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not even really driving this as a significant point here, but when is the last time you prayed something like this for someone else?
SPEAKER_00: When's the last time you prayed it for yourself?
SPEAKER_00: Lord, help me grow in love.
SPEAKER_00: Help my church family to grow together in love.
SPEAKER_00: That collective growth in love is the sense here of this passage.
SPEAKER_00: He's writing to the body, not to an individual.
SPEAKER_00: You as plural.
SPEAKER_00: You guys abound in love more and more together.
SPEAKER_00: So it's my prayer that your love may abound.
SPEAKER_00: Paul is praying for their growth, certainly, but he is uh is praying for growth that I think the modern church has largely decided as an afterthought.
SPEAKER_00: Love will trail or we'll go fix the love thing later.
SPEAKER_00: We gotta get the, we gotta get the organization set.
SPEAKER_00: We gotta get the organization healthy.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul's greatest concern for them is love abounding in it, informed by knowledge and discernment.
SPEAKER_00: Let's be honest with ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: If we pray for growth within this church, what's our impulse?
SPEAKER_00: Growth in attendance, and growth in offering, growth in baptisms and conversions, all wonderful, wonderful things.
SPEAKER_00: None are inherently sinful.
SPEAKER_00: That it's part of the Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: We should desire to see these seats filled with regenerate, life-changed Christians baptized in the water.
SPEAKER_00: But but are we forgetting in the midst of all that to pray that our love for one another and for the world around us abounds and grows?
SPEAKER_00: Abounding in love more and more.
SPEAKER_00: Interestingly, several of the commentaries I read in preparation pointed out that the sense in which this is being communicated is a sense of group attachment or communal oneness.
SPEAKER_00: That sounds a bit new agey, maybe a little mystical.
SPEAKER_00: Hang in there.
SPEAKER_00: We'll we'll layer that in in a second, in the second half of verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: But for now, let's consider Paul's exhortation to abound in love more and more, to grow in our group attachment as a body of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That is difficult.
SPEAKER_00: It's difficult in part because we're humans.
SPEAKER_00: That is reason one why growing in love together in communal oneness is difficult.
SPEAKER_00: Our sin and your sin and my sin, they all compete, and love gets strangled in those ways.
SPEAKER_00: None of these things uh keep us from moving towards love, but but are we praying for it in the way that Paul prayed for the Philippians to grow in that way?
SPEAKER_00: Scripture tells us of various ways in which this plays out.
SPEAKER_00: Husbands and wives are called to specific actions to abound in love for one another, parents and towards children, and children towards parents.
SPEAKER_00: We're to love the widows and the orphans, the sick and the hurting, the vulnerable and the weak.
SPEAKER_00: But in the most immediate context of our passage, we are called to love one another.
SPEAKER_00: The people in this room, if you are a member of this church, you are called to love one another, as we'll see, not in the ways that you would define, but according to God's wisdom and knowledge and discernment.
SPEAKER_00: We're to be growing in that way.
SPEAKER_00: It's not exclusively emotional sentimentality that ebbs and flows.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the love I feel for my church family may be quite high, might be quite low, depends on how the day went, depends on how that conversation went, depends on if my preferences were met, depends on if I like who I have to sit next to.
SPEAKER_00: And all that has to be set aside because it's not what we're called.
SPEAKER_00: We're not called to love when it works for us.
SPEAKER_00: We're called to lean into one another and abound in it one and more, uh more and more.
SPEAKER_00: It's a love that encourages and it admonishes, it exhorts and it corrects.
SPEAKER_00: One commentator wrote, Moral exhortation at this time was at the heart of ancient friendships, since friends were expected to cultivate moral virtue in one another.
SPEAKER_00: Whether or not that was common, there's only one commentary that noted that.
SPEAKER_00: Be careful not to use that as just gospel proof of something.
SPEAKER_00: But if even that is partly true, the idea of ancient friendships, it's a great phrase, by the way, we're expected to cultivate moral virtue.
SPEAKER_00: Is that how our relationships work within the body of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Or are we friendly and we share common interests?
SPEAKER_00: I like that guy because we both like the same team.
SPEAKER_00: I like that guy because he's funny in the lobby on Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: It is something much deeper that we are called to.
SPEAKER_00: To spur one another on to good works, this is a biblical concept.
SPEAKER_00: That love expects something from one another.
SPEAKER_00: Not in selfish ways, but I want to see you thrive and you want to see me thrive.
SPEAKER_00: And all of that is for the glory and the praise of God through the power of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Is that your heart for your church body, for the men and women and the kids sitting around you in this room this morning?
SPEAKER_00: It's the obvious thrust of Scripture's commands for our relationships.
SPEAKER_00: We we spur one another on, we grieve with each other, we rejoice with one another, we correct, we confront, we're patient, we overlook, we bear with one another, we turn each other's eyes upon Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: But this love, unfortunately, does not come natural to us.
SPEAKER_00: The natural state of our heart is sinful and therefore selfish and self-demanding.
SPEAKER_00: Love me how I define it.
SPEAKER_00: Love me in the way that I want you to.
SPEAKER_00: Our expressions of love are selfish.
SPEAKER_00: If if we are wanting to receive love, we want it on our terms.
SPEAKER_00: And in those cases, what we usually mean is love me by endorsing my decisions.
SPEAKER_00: Love me by telling me it wasn't my fault.
SPEAKER_00: Love me by telling me I had no other choice but to do what I did.
SPEAKER_00: Love me by not saying that anything, not saying anything to me that might make me feel like I was wrong, even though I was.
SPEAKER_00: Flip side of that, when we dispense love, we do similar things.
SPEAKER_00: I will love you as I see fit when I see fit.
SPEAKER_00: I will love you when it's convenient for me.
SPEAKER_00: I will love you, but I'm not going to require anything that would hold you accountable.
SPEAKER_00: I will love you unless loving you disrupts my peace.
SPEAKER_00: I will love you unless you don't respond how I want you to, and then I will curse you.
SPEAKER_00: This sounds hyperbolic, but perhaps it is to an extent.
SPEAKER_00: There's obvious nuance to these lists.
SPEAKER_00: Scripture draws boundaries, there's wisdom in knowing when to love and how to love, but scripture defines those, not the inclinations of our human fleshly heart.
SPEAKER_00: There's certainly times to be wise and shrewd about how we do these things.
SPEAKER_00: That's for another sermon.
SPEAKER_00: But I would guess that at least one of those things I just rattled off probably hits you in the gut.
SPEAKER_00: Assuming that you're listening with your ears and not just staring at me with your eyes.
SPEAKER_00: I wrote that line earlier this week.
SPEAKER_00: It sounds harsher as it comes out of my mouth, but if it grabs your attention, I'll take it.
SPEAKER_00: Further, that list I just rattled off sounds so normal, according to the world, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: If we are only using the lens of what is considered currently in 2026, how the world defines what love is and what to expect and what to demand, that list sounds so normal.
SPEAKER_00: But laid against the word of God, we we hear the perversion of what scriptural, biblical, Christ-like love means.
SPEAKER_00: We'll get to that in a bit.
SPEAKER_00: None of these things I said is meant to bury any of us, but to draw our attention to what is Paul suggesting here when he says to abound in love more and more.
SPEAKER_00: It's devastating then if we allow worldly expressions of love that are separated from righteousness to shape how we love one another as a church body.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've experienced that in church life.
SPEAKER_00: I'll be frank, as a pastor, I experience and hear it and engage with it somewhat frequently, that I'm not, I don't have anyone in particular in mind.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just this church, anywhere I've served.
SPEAKER_00: I've had church members demand that they either give or receive love according to worldly standards.
SPEAKER_00: And people don't like it when that is confronted.
SPEAKER_00: We don't choose what it means to love in the way that Christ has called us to.
SPEAKER_00: God does that.
SPEAKER_00: And what a wonderful thing to take it outside of ourselves, to take it outside of my limited, uh finite, fallible brain.
SPEAKER_00: I don't have to know what Christ-like love is by my own definition.
SPEAKER_00: The word gives it to us.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul prays for it, and we should pray for it for ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: And we don't have to guess because as we read on, it's informed by God's word and Christ's example.
SPEAKER_00: Other parts of Scripture say that knowledge puffs up.
SPEAKER_00: So the context here must be that it's God's knowledge and discernment.
SPEAKER_00: Be careful as we read this, not to assume that when we get to uh that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment.
SPEAKER_00: We're not talking about our knowledge, we're not talking about our discernment.
SPEAKER_00: When we preach through 1 Corinthians, we saw the folly of the world's wisdom and knowledge.
SPEAKER_00: So, in context here, we are speaking of the knowledge of God and the discernment that comes through the embodiment of Christ in us as we read on.
SPEAKER_00: And it is through Christ that we accomplish these things.
SPEAKER_00: It looks like what we see in Scripture, period.
SPEAKER_00: Scriptural love is sacrificial.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, as the as the example of sacrificial, servant-minded love, equal with God, steps down from his throne.
SPEAKER_00: On the night that he was betrayed, he knew he was to be betrayed and he went to the cross anyways.
SPEAKER_00: He he was beaten and ridiculed and killed for things he didn't do out of sacrificial love for us.
SPEAKER_00: And it uh frankly, there are days I can't be bothered to inconvenience myself in the slightest to love someone else within my church family.
SPEAKER_00: That's convicting to me.
SPEAKER_00: Biblical love is warm and comforting.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus says, Come to me.
SPEAKER_00: Those who are weary and heavy laden.
SPEAKER_00: We are to grieve with those who grieve.
SPEAKER_00: We we serve widows and orphans, we we we we attend to one another in grief.
SPEAKER_00: Biblical love for one another is comforting and warm.
SPEAKER_00: Also, it is not permissive.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, when he heals, says, Go and sin no more.
SPEAKER_00: It is corrective, it is admonishing, it gives us the way to endure temptation.
SPEAKER_00: This is where love often gets rejected if we are in our worldly self according to biblical love, because biblical love, similar to biblical parenting, is not permissive.
SPEAKER_00: It is corrective, it's warm, it's supportive, it is gracious and patient and forgiving.
SPEAKER_00: It's all these things, obviously.
SPEAKER_00: And underneath it is corrective and admonishment, and we hold one another accountable.
SPEAKER_00: It has to be a part of what we mean by growing and abounding in love, because that's what it means in Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: We we hold all these things according to the knowledge and the discernment that we receive through Christ by the living word of God.
SPEAKER_00: We grow in love tempered by knowledge and discernment, so that, and we read on in verse 10, and so that we may approve what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: There is a purpose that Paul has in mind here.
SPEAKER_00: As you grow in love, tempered with knowledge and discernment, you do that so that, here's the result, we can approve what is excellent and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Uh verse 10 is a good reminder not to memorize singular verses out of context.
SPEAKER_00: If we just memorize approve what is excellent, uh that we we would we all have a different idea of what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: Right now, if I took a poll of what color we should paint the walls, we we would all have an idea of what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: But in context, it says, according to love, informed by knowledge and discernment, empowered by Christ, approve what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: What does Paul mean here?
SPEAKER_00: Approving is to test and to affirm and to determine that something is good.
SPEAKER_00: We have inspected it and we have determined it to be excellent.
SPEAKER_00: Don't approve things that are not excellent amongst the body of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That takes love tempered with knowledge and discernment.
SPEAKER_00: We want to discern what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: But here's what I think maybe happens.
SPEAKER_00: Many of us instead will spend our lives on cruise control, approving all kinds of things that are less than excellent.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be alert.
SPEAKER_00: We had eyes open and heads up, leaning into the love that we are called to give, and leaning into the love that we are to receive from others.
SPEAKER_00: And in that way, collectively, they're still in the plural, he's addressing all the church.
SPEAKER_00: You, plural, may discern what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: Believers, take a moment and think of what you approved of before Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Don't get so far down the, don't beat yourself up, but just take a moment to reflect, just for so that you can wrap your mind around what is different post-Jesus in your life.
SPEAKER_00: The things that we used to approve of, as this is fine or this is good, or maybe even this is excellent, look so dramatically different, or hopefully they do, once Christ has poured his blood over your life and you have been redeemed, and the old has been put away, and the new life and the new creation has taken hold of you.
SPEAKER_00: It is different, is it not?
SPEAKER_00: It should be.
SPEAKER_00: And if you are a believer and your answer is I approve all the same things, let's talk.
SPEAKER_00: Let's talk.
SPEAKER_00: When we live like that, Philippians 1, 9 through 10 gets all distorted.
SPEAKER_00: And so we'll approve what is less than excellent.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps even we'll approve what is grotesque and damaging or even evil.
SPEAKER_00: Or we'll approve, again, all manner of things that are just less than excellent because we're blinded by foolishness, or we're we're lazy in our endeavors to pray for, Lord, may my love abound for my church family, may our knowledge and discernment grow, that we can collectively approve what is excellent through you, Jesus, so that we can glorify and praise God through our testimony.
SPEAKER_00: That is the chief end of what we are here to do until we go and glorify Him forever.
SPEAKER_00: I I this week uh I was in my garage.
SPEAKER_00: I've got a little workbench in the corner that has my fishing stuff.
SPEAKER_00: Been fishing since just for forever, when I was this tall to now I'm this tall, fishing the whole time.
SPEAKER_00: I I it's like one thing that I'm like pretty good at.
SPEAKER_00: And specifically within fishing, I can tie a mean knot.
SPEAKER_00: And this isn't, I'm not being hyperbolic.
SPEAKER_00: I think a lot about knots when I'm fishing.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you fish, especially if you fish seriously, you understand that most frequently that is your weakest point in that chain between the reel and the rod and the line and the lure and the fish.
SPEAKER_00: If I'm gonna lose a fish, it's gonna be because that knot broke often.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm very specific and I've practiced for years, and I tie a mean knot, and my hooks will straighten out before my knots will break.
SPEAKER_00: And every time I tie a knot, I make sure to inspect it afterwards and I approve it.
SPEAKER_00: And if that knot is not up to snuff for me, I'm gonna cut it off and retie it.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll retie it over and over if I have to until that knot is approved.
SPEAKER_00: And I, this week, with this passage in mind, not looking for an illustration, was cleaning up fishing stuff and thought, man, I put so Much effort into approving fishing knots.
SPEAKER_00: I put so much thought and care and practice and a lifetime of study and learning to know good knots so I can catch an animal.
SPEAKER_00: And often I throw it back.
SPEAKER_00: What am I even giving a fraction of that level of care to approving what is excellent and things of just more eternal importance than fishing could possibly ever provide for me?
SPEAKER_00: Am I taking that level of care and concern to approve what is excellent in my own life and then to also contribute to this body of Christ that says, hey, in the ways that I can love and grow in my love for you as a church family, my contribution is I will do the work and put in the effort to inform myself with the word of God that I may contribute.
SPEAKER_00: I am one of many voices that makes up the body of this Christ to discern what is excellent for our actions, for our worship, for our sending, for our evangelism, through the power of Christ, to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: Are we giving it that much effort?
SPEAKER_00: Because here's what is uh we're called to do, moving on into perhaps for me was the most difficult bit of this.
SPEAKER_00: When we approve what is excellent and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Does anyone feel pure and blameless?
SPEAKER_00: That this is a startling.
SPEAKER_00: I these types of verses are uncomfortable for me.
SPEAKER_00: Even as a, I've spent a long time as a Bible student in formal ways and as a as a vocational preacher, and these still make me uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_00: I don't feel pure and blameless, but it sure seems like Paul is telling me to be that for when Christ comes back.
SPEAKER_00: What are we supposed to do with that?
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to think this pulpit has been just richly saturated with the message of salvation by grace through faith, not by works.
SPEAKER_00: And it would be wise to clarify it every time we have the opportunity, because one might say, man, this sentence right here, be pure and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: Sounds like works-based merit, out of context.
SPEAKER_00: But we are saved unto good works, not by them.
SPEAKER_00: We're saved unto them, and we are energized towards them through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, through the enabling of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And now when we return to that phrase, it says, And so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, meaning purity, according to scholars and in study, purity carries a sense of an inwardly clean conscience.
SPEAKER_00: And blameless carries a sense of an outwardly honorable life.
SPEAKER_00: And in that way, understood in context, we it is it is less about am I perfect and more about am I pursuing Christ-likeness through the power of Christ Himself?
SPEAKER_00: Am I running towards Christ under the power of Christ to the glory of God?
SPEAKER_00: The commentary that's out here on the resource wall, we make that available to y'all.
SPEAKER_00: In that book, it speaks to that the purity here specifically is the idea of having no hidden inward motives, that we are not self-serving, rather that we are God honoring.
SPEAKER_00: Are we pure and blameless then in that way?
SPEAKER_00: Is your heart tuned towards less of me and more of God?
SPEAKER_00: Frankly, that's not much easier of a question to answer than the first form of it.
SPEAKER_00: To be pure and blameless is to honor God with our hearts, with our minds, with our decision making, with our discernment, with our love.
SPEAKER_00: It is to anticipate the return of Jesus by conducting ourselves in Christ-likeness.
SPEAKER_00: It does not save us.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna fail at it.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna fail at it so much.
SPEAKER_00: That we're gonna fail at it so much.
SPEAKER_00: But praise God that faith that He is faithful to forgive.
SPEAKER_00: He knows we're going to fail.
SPEAKER_00: And in parts of Scripture throughout Paul's writing, and we see the testimony throughout all of Scripture is that God redeems and he helps us along and he provides the way.
SPEAKER_00: This is not about uh uh moral effort, it is about leaning into the indwelling of Christ in your life that you may live for him.
SPEAKER_00: Are we pure and blameless through our abounding in love, through our knowledge and wisdom, through the things that we approve being excellent?
SPEAKER_00: Again, am I suggesting a legalistic, works-based moral Christianity?
SPEAKER_00: Or is that what Paul is saying?
SPEAKER_00: There are interpreters who think Paul is going in that direction.
SPEAKER_00: Of course not, frankly.
SPEAKER_00: Look back at verses six and seven, just from this passage.
SPEAKER_00: Paul wrote, in the context of the whole prayer, Paul says, He, God, began the good work of righteousness in you, and on the day of Christ, it's that same day that he's telling us to be prepared for with purity and blamelessness.
SPEAKER_00: It is he who will bring it to completion.
SPEAKER_00: And then in verse 7, that is done through our partaking of grace.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God.
SPEAKER_00: Our purity and blamelessness is through the power and the blood of Christ, not our effort, not our goodness, not our inherent lack of sin, but our growing in Christ-likeness.
SPEAKER_00: He saved us unto himself and four good works that he has prepared for us ahead of time.
SPEAKER_00: We are called to something.
SPEAKER_00: We are naturally sinful, disobedient, we're rebellious against God, but in his love, he poured out his grace in the person of Jesus Christ, the Son of God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus lived a life we couldn't live, pure and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: He qualified as a sufficient sacrifice for our debt that we owed to God.
SPEAKER_00: And after a sinless life, he was crucified.
SPEAKER_00: He was put to debt to pay our debt, or put to death to pay our debt.
SPEAKER_00: He was the great high priest and the spotless lamb, all sufficient, both offerer and offering, and he took our sins and he died for them.
SPEAKER_00: And then he conquered death.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God.
SPEAKER_00: He conquered death.
SPEAKER_00: It could not hold him, and sin could not stain him.
SPEAKER_00: And in his resurrection, Jesus bursts forth in victory over death, and then he offers that accomplishment to us.
SPEAKER_00: That is wild to me.
SPEAKER_00: And if you will slow down just long enough this week to think about who am I at my core?
SPEAKER_00: I am not pure and blameless outside of the blood of Christ, but covered in the blood of Christ, I am counted pure and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: That that should be earth-shattering news to us.
SPEAKER_00: And so the question is the glory of God worth it?
SPEAKER_00: Might move, and we when we can get this, I am pure and blameless because of what Jesus did for me.
SPEAKER_00: And therefore the glory of God begins to, this must be worth it.
SPEAKER_00: Or at least in the hint of this might be worth it.
SPEAKER_00: As we continue to chase and plumb the depths of what God saved us from, the glory of God will begin to more and more, through our abounding in love and through our knowledge and wisdom, through discerning what is excellent, the glory of God will become eternally worth it.
SPEAKER_00: I want to be a body of Christ obsessed with the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: I want it to the just, it's not that we can never talk about anything else, but I would love to not be able to walk through this hall without hearing conversations about glorifying God and bringing praise to his name and celebrating our purity and blamelessness through the blood of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And in that way we grow in love and we abound in it one uh more and more as a body here together.
SPEAKER_00: This is on offer to all sinners.
SPEAKER_00: It's this if we repent and we acknowledge that we are a sinner separated from God, if you believe that Jesus is who he said he is, the Son of God, he is our righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: And if you received his gift of grace through faith, Jesus takes his righteousness and he lays it over you, and it is counted as yours.
SPEAKER_00: You can use this, Jesus said.
SPEAKER_00: You can use this before the Father to become a son or a daughter of the creator of the universe.
SPEAKER_00: And so we read on into verse 11 our purity and blamelessness for the day of Christ is given and enabled by Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We are filled, Paul said, with the fruit of the righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We can be obedient to Paul's exhortation towards purity and blamelessness through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: We can be obedient to approve what is excellent with knowledge and discernment and abounding in love through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Because we are filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: The glory of God was worth it enough to Jesus that he died for it, sinless and blameless.
SPEAKER_00: He was falsely accused, but the glory and the praise of God was so worth it to the Son of God that he marched to the cross anyways in obedience, knowing what would come.
SPEAKER_00: It was to the glory of God and to our good.
SPEAKER_00: I think then we must ask ourselves, can we call ourselves followers of Jesus and yet not be willing to do things to the glory of God that Jesus himself called us to do?
SPEAKER_00: Jesus, I want your benefits, but I don't want you to be my Lord and tell me what to do with my life.
SPEAKER_00: Sort of incongruent.
SPEAKER_00: It is a, can you still get to heaven and not have been incredibly obedient to God on earth?
SPEAKER_00: I think we at some level have to accept that as true.
SPEAKER_00: The the thief on the cross had no time to be obedient.
SPEAKER_00: He had no time to express the fruits of the Spirit, and yet he was with Jesus today in paradise.
SPEAKER_00: However, for most of us, for many of us, when you come to Christ and receive that blood that is the forgiveness of your sins, you have some time to work with.
SPEAKER_00: Why in the world, in response to a gift we could never secure for ourselves, a gift of internal significance, would we look for the easiest and lowest effort way to respond to that for the rest of our lives?
SPEAKER_00: I want what Paul encourages.
SPEAKER_00: I want this, I want our response to Jesus to be, man, Heartland church is abounding in love.
SPEAKER_00: And every time I go in there, it's more and more.
SPEAKER_00: And man, those people know scripture not to be legalistic and not to win theological battles, but to inform wise and discerning, approving of what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: And they do it through the power of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And Heartland is solely concerned with the glory and the praise of God.
SPEAKER_00: What a testimony that would be of this place.
SPEAKER_00: I think that is the testimony of this place, but we must spur each other on to grow more and more.
SPEAKER_00: More and more.
SPEAKER_00: Through Christ, who gave his righteousness to us, we have this hope.
SPEAKER_00: So that is that is how we are enabled towards purity and blamelessness.
SPEAKER_00: But again, if we've already been saved, I think it's not maybe not a fair question, but it's a question that may come up.
SPEAKER_00: Why then are we called to purity and righteousness?
SPEAKER_00: If it's been given to us, if we're secured in the blood of Jesus, if we're saying that we we can't attain purity and righteousness for ourselves, anyways, why are we doing this?
SPEAKER_00: The glory and praise of God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, this kind of love, this kind of discernment, regular decisions about what is excellent, purity, blamelessness, these things are difficult.
SPEAKER_00: They will bring discomfort.
SPEAKER_00: They will sometimes hurt to love according to scripture, to receive love according to scripture, to be wise, to be discerning, to lean into one another.
SPEAKER_00: If you have tried to do any of those things, I bet you you would have a story of how that hurt you, or that was difficult, or how somebody ripped your head off, and then all he thought you were doing was being loving, or how maybe you rip someone's head off.
SPEAKER_00: The Christian life inherently is not meant to be difficult, but it brings with it difficulty, not because God wants to impose a heavy burden on us.
SPEAKER_00: It's the opposite.
SPEAKER_00: What it is is we're our internal selfish, there's still the old man to some degree floating around in us.
SPEAKER_00: We lean into the power of Christ through the blood of Christ to be that new creation that steps outside of a selfish love and into the sacrificial one that Paul is calling his church to hear.
SPEAKER_00: If you're wondering how you're doing in this area, take a moment, just right now.
SPEAKER_00: Take a moment and ask yourself this.
SPEAKER_00: Once again, is the glory of God worth it?
SPEAKER_00: Or more pointedly, am I living like is the testimony of my life?
SPEAKER_00: Does it say to the world around me that the glory of God is the most important thing in his or her life?
SPEAKER_00: The glory of God is for our good, but it is for God.
SPEAKER_00: The good that we will receive is on the other side of this life, and suffering here is assured.
SPEAKER_00: So is the glory of God, which is to your ultimate, but maybe not immediate good, is it worth it to you?
SPEAKER_00: Can we take a longer view than my current discomfort?
SPEAKER_00: To have to love sacrificially, which is inconvenient, it's costly, it's devastating, is that worth the glory of God?
SPEAKER_00: To have to do the hard and humbling work of making yourself knowledgeable of what this book says, which just frankly most of us don't.
SPEAKER_00: To do the hard work of learning what this book says that we may discern according to the living and active word of God what is excellent, is that worth the glory of God?
SPEAKER_00: It was to Paul.
SPEAKER_00: We later on in chapter three, he wrote, from chapter three, verse two, and down.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read this kind of in closing, give a a concluding thought as we move into communion.
SPEAKER_00: But uh if you were to ask Paul, is the glory of God worth it?
SPEAKER_00: In chapter three, verse two, he says, Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh, for we are the circumcision who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus, and put no confidence in the flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Though I myself has re have reason for confidence in the flesh also.
SPEAKER_00: If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more.
SPEAKER_00: He was circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law, a Pharisee, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law, he was blameless.
SPEAKER_00: Paul is giving his resume in the context and the world and the culture in which he lived, he was a big deal before Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And he lists his resume in it, verse 7, he says, But whatever gain I had, I counted it as loss for the sake of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Paul surrendered everything because the glory of God was worth it to him.
SPEAKER_00: Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.
SPEAKER_00: For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith, that I may know him in the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: It's convicting to read about Paul's life.
SPEAKER_00: We're not all called to the kind of work and the kind of situations that Paul found himself in.
SPEAKER_00: The world is different.
SPEAKER_00: We live in a different part of the world.
SPEAKER_00: However, at the core of that, Paul says, All the things that the world can offer, I count them as loss as compared to knowing and being known by Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus had no greater concern on his earthly ministry than to glorify the Father.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus loves me, and I love Jesus, and I want to love the things that Jesus loves.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus loves his church.
SPEAKER_00: We're called to love one another, to abound in that love more and more.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus loves righteousness and discernment.
SPEAKER_00: What is pure and correct?
SPEAKER_00: I want to I want to chase after those things, even if it cost me something.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus loved the glory of the Father to the degree that he would die for it.
SPEAKER_00: Do I have that same, uh do I have that same gravity, that weight of the glory of God in my life and how I act and conduct myself throughout my days here?
SPEAKER_00: Is the glory of God worth it?
SPEAKER_00: And is my life bear testimony to my answer?
SPEAKER_00: It's a question we need to answer for ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: The question we need to answer for ourselves as a body of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Again, I'm asking you to reflect individually, but this letter and this sermon is for us.
SPEAKER_00: It is collective.
SPEAKER_00: Be praying for one another, to abound in love, to approve what is excellent, to do it through the power of Christ and to the glory of God.
SPEAKER_00: His glory is our good, and he is worth it.
SPEAKER_00: We're about to observe communion here in a moment and take the Lord's Supper.
SPEAKER_00: Christ secured our righteousness through obedience to the Father and love for us, and it was costly.
SPEAKER_00: I'm struck by the records of the Last Supper and the Gospels, record often on the night that he was betrayed.
SPEAKER_00: On the night that he was betrayed, he loved selflessly, anyways.
SPEAKER_00: On the night that he was mocked and ridiculed and beaten, he loved selflessly, anyways.
SPEAKER_00: For the glory of God and for the good of us.
SPEAKER_00: Your salvation was on Jesus on that cross as well.
SPEAKER_00: To God's glory and to your good.
SPEAKER_00: Is that worth it to you?
SPEAKER_00: Is your faith more than fire insurance?
SPEAKER_00: I've been baptized, I'm saved, I'm good to go.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want the bare minimum for my Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: I would love nothing more that when I die, the eulogy without being about me is that the glory of God was worth it to Dylan Shaw.
SPEAKER_00: The glory of God was worth it to Heartland Church.
SPEAKER_00: There's great joy in pursuing these things.
SPEAKER_00: I know that the perhaps the tone I have carried this morning is all ominous.
SPEAKER_00: Buckle up, this is a bummer, here we go.
SPEAKER_00: Don't hear that.
SPEAKER_00: There's great joy and peace and confidence that comes in knowing, regardless of what comes, if we love one another according to scripture and we approve what is excellent according to scripture, and we do that through the power of Christ, not through our own efforts.
SPEAKER_00: And we do it for the glory of God and we let Him handle what happens.
SPEAKER_00: What a wonderful and joyful and worthy way to spend your days.
SPEAKER_00: If you have years left or days, what a worthy way to spend your days, that at the end of all of them, our testimony together and individually was the glory of God is worth it.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray for us.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you that your glory is for our goods.
SPEAKER_00: That whatever makes great your name, whatever brings you praise, whatever is honorable, whatever is excellent in our love for one another, as you are lifted up, it is to our goods.
SPEAKER_00: And we will trust that whatever comes will be to our goods.
SPEAKER_00: Father, we thank you that that we are called to high standards as believers.
SPEAKER_00: We are called to be something other.
SPEAKER_00: We are called out and called up as a body of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for that.
SPEAKER_00: But thank you also that you enable us through the blood of Christ, through the power of Christ, through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Because pure and blameless, I am not, but covered in the righteousness of Jesus are we.
SPEAKER_00: And so we go forward, able to glorify you.
SPEAKER_00: What a privilege.
SPEAKER_00: What a privilege that while I wait for eternity in paradise, I have the privilege of glorifying the King of the universe as one saved in the blood of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Father, please grow that desire in us as a church.
SPEAKER_00: Please grow that desire in us to look for ways to biblically love one another better and more and more.
SPEAKER_00: And please guide us in knowledge and discernment as we approve what is excellent.
SPEAKER_00: That your main be made great in the neighborhoods around this church, in this county, and across the world.
SPEAKER_00: We love you and we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.