July 12th, 2026

Pastor Michael Crocker

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Please stop, stop, stop. I'm here every week. Go ahead and have a seat. Um, thank you, Kendall, for being here. And uh, if y'all don't know, she is one of our kids. She came through confirmation here. We sent her off last year as one of our 12th graders going off to college. Uh, she has sung with our team back in the sanctuary um from time to time. So it's always fun and exciting to see uh one of our kids come back and step into that. So thanks, Kendall. Even after she survived freshman, she's been home for three days and she's like, This is my first stop. I'm like, Yes, it is. She didn't mention that she got through her first year by depending on the lesson she learned from Pastor Michael, but whatever. Um you have another service to make that up. Uh just gonna go ahead and put that note on your desk. Um, so we're in the uh this series we we stopped last week uh with Philippians because it was a big week, July 4th, 250 years, and and I just wanted to tell you that I was kind of a big deal, um, which is pretty much what I did uh if you were here. Really not me, but my family. Um and but we're gonna get back into this. And we talked about this. This is the letter, we're walking through this Defiant Joy series on the book of Philippians. It's a letter that Paul writes, if you remember, to the city of Philippi. And Philippi was his first church, Jesus community, that he plants in Eastern Europe. And it's a really important piece of the Christian puzzle because it's from there, because Philippi was a hugely strategic city. It was very strategic for um for shipping purposes. There was waterways and roads that traveled, and it was from that point that things would launch off to the rest of Europe. But it was also very strategic militarily. And so it was a stronghold of sorts for the Roman Empire. In fact, it was a Roman colony, and what that meant was that uh Rome would send soldiers. So soldiers who each reached the age of retirement, they'd done well, they served Caesar well. They would send them to these colonies to populate them around the world when they would put their mark on it. And that was a good deal of how they kept peace, is because they would send a whole lot of people that were very secure, very patriotic to the Roman way, who believed that Caesar was indeed emperor and king, and that they would enforce that wherever you installed them. They would give them land, they would give them some property, whatever it was, but you put all of these soldiers in these places, and it becomes a bastion of the Roman way of life. So Paul goes in there on his journey. This is told in the book of Acts, chapter 16. And he goes in, if you remember, the Holy Spirit drives him over to this place and he delivers this message. He creates this church, and it's Paul loved all of his churches, right? And you you see that in the letters of the ones he's writing back to the churches and to the people. He just had this deep love for the people with whom he shared the message of Jesus. But but this one was important to him because Philippi loved Paul in a way that some of the other churches didn't. They supported him and cared for him in ways that the other churches didn't. He goes in there, he sets the church up, he delivers the gospel message, he raises this church in a place that said, Caesar is king. This church would say, No, no, no, no. There is one king, and his name is Jesus. But because of that, because they were standing against this, that Jesus is king, no, Caesar is king against this great Roman Empire, there was a lot of persecution that happened with Paul while he's there, but definitely with the church once he leaves them. Because that was Paul's deal, right? As he would go, he would set up this church, he would get them going, he would install leaders, he would give them the firm foundation upon which to stand, and then he would go do it again. Because that's what Jesus asked him to do. He was uniquely situated and called by Jesus on that Damascus road when he's walking and he's blinded all of a sudden, and Jesus appears to him and goes, Yo, dude, why are you so angry with me? But he said it in Aramaic, so it sounded different. And he calls Paul to step into this role as planting these churches around Asia, around Europe, around this area of the world, so that the message of hope and love of Jesus would spread. So Paul sets this up in Philippi. And then he leaves. And if you remember, Miss Natalie just told us that he's riding back to the church from prison. So he's in jail. And a Roman jail was not a nice place. Like they didn't get, like, they didn't get meals. If a prisoner wanted to eat, they had to get their own food. So they had to pay for it themselves somehow while you're in jail making money. Or they had to depend on the kindness of others. And so while Paul is in prison, the church of Philippi sends him a gift. They send this guy Epaphroditus to him. And he travels from Philippi all the way to either Rome or Ephesus. There's debate on where Paul was in prison at this time. I believe he was in Ephesus. All the way to Ephesus. So that was a long journey. He had to cross the sea, he had to travel south and go into the city of Ephesus. And he goes into Ephesus and he delivers this gift to Paul. And then if you remember, Paul, uh Apaphroditus gets really sick to the point of death, but he recovers. And Paul writes this letter of thanks. Like I'm so grateful that you remember me. So grateful that in my time of need, you're sharing this gift with me. Thank you so much. Like you're the only church that does this. You're my favorite church. You think he said that to all the churches, though? You're my favorite church. And you say that to your kids, you're my favorite kid. Um whatever. Um and so this morning she said I was her favorite pastor. I said, I'm your only pastor. She goes, I know. Um, and that was great. So that was on my mind. Um, but he writes this to say, thank you so much for this. You sit and all this stuff. And also to tell you, hey, Epaphroditus is right, he's okay. He was sick. I'm sending him back, not because he failed in what you wanted him to do, stay here with me and be a disciple of mine, but because he was really sick. He almost died, and he really wants to see you all. And I just need to commend you to him to you so that you know he's great. But I also want to work on some other things. Like in Paul, we we call this defiant joy. The series is about defiant joy because if anyone had right to not be joyful, it was Paul. Anything could go wrong in your life, Paul experienced it multiple times. And in this letter, this epistle of joy, as it's called a lot of times, you hear the hurt and heartache coming from him, but at the same time he says, But I refuse to let that win. I am joyful. The world says I shouldn't be, circumstances say I shouldn't be, but I choose joy. It's that defiant joy. You're happy? Yes, I am, type thing. This is a great day, right? And he steps into that place and he gives them this encouragement that no matter what they face, because he knows that they continue to face persecution. They continue to stand against a Roman Empire who says, Caesar is God, Caesar is king. And they're like, No, we know who God is, and we know who the true king is. We can't bow down and submit to that way of life because that's not the way of Jesus. So he's giving them this encouragement. And he lays out this beautiful poem about to remind them, if you remember in chapter two, of who Jesus is and what Jesus does for us through his life, his death, and his resurrection. And then he gets to this point where he points to himself. And Paul does this a lot, by the way. Paul likes to talk about himself. I mean, we all do, right? I mean, that's something that we all like, enough about you, let's talk about me. Right? And that's kind of one of the things that just, you know, because yeah, you want to talk about the thing you know the best, and most of us know ourselves the best, and so we want to talk about ourselves, even if it's bad stuff or good stuff. That's kind of our, you know, our leaning is to lean into ourselves and tell you a story. In fact, let me tell you about my weekend. I'm just kidding, I'm not gonna do that. I know, I thought that was kind of funny too. But um, people are like, okay, well, tell us. You do that all the time. Um, so so uh you know, it's one of those things, and Paul does this, but what Paul does about himself is he talks about how awesome he is. I know what you're thinking, I do that also. Yeah. He talks about how great he is. And there's this one point where he does this in this letter to Philippians, that I just did I just love. It's this isn't, don't put the scripture up yet, Dave. Um, but there's right as he leads into what we're gonna talk about, he talks about like I was I wasn't just a Pharisee, which was the religious leaders of the day. If you remember, they were the ones who were kind of in charge of the religious way of life for Judaism. Like, I wasn't just the Pharisee, I was the greatest Pharisee who's ever walked. Like I studied under Gamliel, like I was amazing. If you knew the law, I knew the law better. How many laws are there? 632. All of them. Knew every single one of them. I have them tattooed on my back somewhere, you know, just all those different things. I followed everything, I never missed a step. In fact, I was so much of a Pharisee that I was persecuting those who weren't. That's gonna come up in a second. But I consider all of that garbage. The word he uses there doesn't mean garbage, it means poop. I consider all of that just garbage compared to knowing him. Sometimes people want us to remember who we were, but not who we are, or not who we're becoming. They want us to hold on to the things that have weighed us down in the past instead of stepping into the path that God has for us in the future. It's like when you're running a race, and this is gonna come into play here, right? When you're running a race, if you ever get knocked down into a ditch. Remember this? Um, here, I'm just gonna give you a few little notes, and you're all gonna know where I'm going. Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun. Anybody with me? Yeah. All right, yeah, okay, Chariots of Fire, right? Okay, so the young crowd, y'all never saw that movie. Watch more things, okay? Um, so in the Chariots of Fire, this wonderful, it's a true telling, true story of um these runners from England. Eric Liddell was the guy's name, right? Who is the famous one that came out of that, one of the famous ones. But if you remember, they're running the 440, which no longer exists, it's the 400 now, but if they're running the 440, and someone shoves them into a ditch, right? And let's be honest, if I'm running a race and someone shoves me into a ditch, staying in the ditch. Uh, I am not getting out of that ditch because I'm questioning why I was running a race in the first place. Um, and questioning a lot of life choices that brought me to this moment. But once you get like just the wind knocked out of you, you tumble down and it's just like this fall, and he goes down. But what does he do? Bam! He gets up and he beats them all. He uses it as fire. He's like, I'm not going to let you knock me down. I get knocked down, but I get up again. Right? He gets knocked down, but he gets up again and he he finishes the race. He doesn't let the things of the world hold him down or hold him back. See what's going on with Paul and why Paul just starts talking about I was the Pharisee of Pharisees, I was all these different things, but I count it all as garbage, is because people are trying to hang that around his neck. See, if you remember, there's teachers that come behind Paul and they show up in the different churches that he starts and they start to take, yeah, I know Paul taught you this, but really it's this. Remember the whole circumcision thing? We've talked about this in some of his different letters. That there's teachers that come behind him who say, no, no, no, if you want to follow Jesus, you must be circumcised. And Paul's like, why are you putting Jewish laws on people that aren't even Jewish? You're trying to twist the things that I taught and twist the message of the good news message of Jesus. So time and time again, these teachers start to come in and they start to manipulate the words of Jesus through Paul. And they start to shake the foundation of what he's teaching. And they try to hold him back by going, but that dude was persecuting you. This is the guy who was stoning people who believed in Jesus to death. You're gonna believe him. Chapter 3, verse 12. He says this. I don't mean to say that I've already achieved these things or that I've already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I've not achieved it. But I focus on this one thing forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead. I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God through Christ Jesus is calling us. Let all who are spiritually mature agree on these things. If you disagree at some point, I believe God will make it plain to you. But we must hold on to the progress we have already made. Right here, you have this. He says, Look, I don't forget who I was, but I don't let it define me. The world is trying to remind me of the mistakes I've made in the past. And because of that, well, you're not worthy of what Jesus has called you to. See, and this is one of the big things that Paul points out here is like, I'm trying to grab hold of what Jesus has already grabbed hold of me for. Like Jesus called him into a way of life and called him to very specific purpose. By the way, he has you also. Every single one of you, Jesus has said, Oh my goodness. I can't wait to see what she does with the gifts I have given her. I caused her to live in this day, in this age, in this community with these gifts and talents and talents. I can't wait to see how she steps into that. Oh, I can't wait to see what he does with what I've given him because there is a purpose on his life. I say this all the time, that every single one of us was created on purpose for a purpose. And if we let the ways of the world and the weight of the world knock us into the ditch, a lot of times we miss stepping into that purpose. And Paul's like, uh-uh-uh-uh-uh. I know that there's noise about this. There's words going on about me, about who I was and the things that I did. People are knocking me down in a ditch, but it fires me up to step into what God has for me. I don't let my past determine the future I have with Jesus. Now, look, some of you have wonderful pasts. Some of you lived way better lives than I did. And you never did anything wrong. You believed in Jesus as soon as you came out of your mother's womb. You were quoting scripture. It was just amazing. You've never done it, like you followed along the path of righteousness for his name's sake and all these different things, and I'm so proud of you. We all like to sit in your glory and bask in it. Thank you for being here with us today. I did not live that life. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life. One of the greatest jokes I think that there exists in the kingdom of God is that my official title is Reverend. I think every time I introduce myself as Reverend Michael Crocker, somewhere up in heaven, people are like, there's no way. That guy? Yeah, that guy. I don't let the things of my past weigh me down from the promise of my future. Because that's what the cross is for. The cross came to cleanse me and to write my name in the book of heaven that cannot be erased. So I don't let, and this is what Paul is telling them. Don't let the things of the past, the way, the Roman way that's trying to get you to focus on these different things, these teachers that are trying to focus you on different stuff, don't let that turn you away from where God has called you. Press on to that prize. Press on to the way that He has called you to live. By the way, she's not in the room right here. I'm going to disagree with her for a second. That prize isn't heaven. The prize is the new creation. And the new creation isn't someday. The new creation began when Jesus walked out of the grave. Like we're not pressing on towards something that will eventually find us. We're pressing on towards something that is here now. And when we get in our understanding or in our head around that, it opens up this defiant joy that Paul is leading us to. Because when you have the understanding that heaven isn't something that I have to wait for, that heaven is available to me right now, what does Jesus say when he teaches us to pray? On earth as it is in heaven. Someday at some point when I come back for a second time. That's not in his prayer. He prays it as if it were available now. Because it is. And yet we in our Western world have been so inundated with thoughts and intellectualism and enlightenment that we believe that heaven is someplace that we'll fly away to at some point in time because the powers of the kingdom of God are not available to us in this world. You wonder why miracles happen way more frequently in third world countries? It's because they believe it more. And please don't hear me say that we don't believe enough for God to move. Because I hate when somebody told me in Jenna that one time when we were praying for grace to be healed, and say, Well, you just don't believe enough. I said, Let me take you outside and show you how much I believe. Let me tell you something. I believe. Like I believe enough. God is going to answer his prayer when God answers his prayer. And God's time. But don't let the things of this world dissuade us and discourage us from pressing on to what God has for us. But then he says this, verse 17. He says, Dear brothers and sisters, pattern your lives after mine and learn from those who follow our example. For I've told you often before, and I say it again with tears in my eyes, that there are many whose conduct shows they are really enemies of the cross of Christ. They are headed for destruction. Their God is their appetite. They brag about shameful things and they think only about the life here on earth. But we are citizens of heaven where the Lord Jesus Christ lives, and we are eagerly waiting for him to return as our Savior. He will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like his own, using the same power with which he will bring everything under his control. He says, Don't let the things of the past knock you into a ditch and cause you to stay there. But then also don't follow those people who say, hey, this is the way of Paul, that seems a little hard. You know, I know, look, living as a Christian in the kingdom of the world is difficult. Because everything that Jesus, remember when Jesus comes to the Sermon on the Mount and he starts explaining what the kingdom of heaven is like? And he starts saying, hey, the kingdom of heaven is like this. The king of heaven is like this. And everything that we assume the kingdom of heaven would be like, he's like, no, it's actually like this. Hey, the meek will inherit the world. That's not what the world tells us. The world tells us you got to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps and get yours. And Jesus says, that's not the way of God. The kingdom of heaven is so often opposite from what we think it is. We want to fit it into our understanding of the way the world works. And Jesus says, but that's not how I work. We find strength through death. Paul says, don't fall for those TikTok cheat codes that exist out there. Don't fall for those hacks in life that say, hey, your life can be easier. And yes, sometimes we can do things to make our life easier. But Paul says that's not the goal. The goal isn't to satisfy our worldly desires and our fleshly longings. The goal is to be who God called us to be. The goal is to step into the new creation and understand that the same power who raised Jesus from the dead dwells inside of us. That's a lot of power. And yet so often we walk away from it because it's scary. And really we don't know what to do with it all the time. What if we started living into that? What if we started living into that new creation? That new life that Paul says is coming upon us. He doesn't say when. He just says it's coming. Now, Paul thought it would have already happened by now. Jesus coming back for the second time. I gotta be honest. I'm glad it hadn't. Because I would have missed out on it. But now I'm like, okay. Anytime you're ready, big guy. You ever get like that? You ever have those moments where you're like, all right, Jesus, now's a good time to come. Like, like you come rolling into finals week and you call the students, like, alright, Jesus, now's a good time to come. Alright, you got that big presentation. Okay, big guy, let's go. There's those moments in our life, but what Paul is encouraging us to do is just live as if it is now. Live our life as if it is now. That the kingdom of God has invaded the kingdom of earth because it has. That the new creation has already begun because it has. That the power of God dwells inside of us to raise people from the dead, to heal cancer, to mend relationships, because it already does. But we don't live like it because we allow the ways of the world to trump the ways of the kingdom of God, because living as if you believe that stuff makes you look crazy. But maybe we need to be a little bit crazy. Because when you have this mindset that you're working, look, the things that I've done in the past do not hold me. The world cannot define me because God does. At the end of the day, when everything burns, I get to step into new creation because I have Jesus. Sometimes I feel like the world around me is burning, and there is joy knowing that it's not the end. I was just with my mom this weekend. And she's, you know, she's it's fresh. Her losing my dad after 60 years. And she said a lot, she's said multiple times, I've just lived too long. I've just lived too long. I didn't expect to live this long. I just wish I went with dad. I just wish I went with dad. I said, you say it one more time, we're gonna make you meet him. It's like, mom, but live for him now. Like you still have an opportunity to have joy in this life. Yes, I know, and I don't get it. I don't. I can't get there. Jenna and I have been married 26 years, not nearly as long, and Jenna isn't nearly as cool as my dad was. Don't tell her I said that. She's kidding, she's awesome, she's wonderful. I don't understand that, but I think this is what Paul's trying to tell us. We can look back with love and reverence and excitement over the things that have happened to us. We can look back with embarrassment, with shame, with guilt over those things that we have done. But Paul's like, don't focus on those things. Focus on what's coming and where God is leading you. Because when you look at that, when you look at that price, whoo, I can keep running. I can put one foot in front of the other. Heck, I might even, I might even enter a race. It's not true, I'm not gonna do that. But I can keep going because I know when that time comes, I don't just get to see the new creation. I get to see the new creation complete. That's running a race for Jesus. Let us pray. Gracious and heavenly Father, we thank you and praise you. For Paul, for his witness, for his example, for his faith in the midst of darkness. He continued to choose you and to be defiantly joyful. Because he focused his way of life on your way of life. God, give us the strength to walk away from the ways of the world, to not let the whispers or the words of the world hold us back, to make us ashamed or guilt-ridden over what we've done or where we've been. But let us see where you've called us and where you're moving us. Whatever age or stage of life we are in, you have purpose for us. So let us continue to run the race, to find those brothers and sisters that we can look to as examples to follow in your ways, that we might enter into your new creation. We thank you and praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.