SPEAKER_00: This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you have learned by imitation?
SPEAKER_01: That is, by watching someone else do something, be something, and you have repeated that and tried to be the same.
SPEAKER_01: Anybody?
SPEAKER_01: You all have.
SPEAKER_01: You're just too nervous to raise your hand.
SPEAKER_01: We all learn by imitation.
SPEAKER_01: In some form, in some fashion.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's it's merely in elementary school where you are you're copying what a teacher does on a board as you learn to make your letters.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's watching your parents and learning how they function in life.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's watching an elderly person at the end of their life, watching them as they learn what facing the end of life means.
SPEAKER_01: And so you watch them grow old gracefully.
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe not so gracefully in some cases.
SPEAKER_01: Don't turn there though.
SPEAKER_01: Turn to Acts 16.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna do something entirely different this morning, so bear with me.
SPEAKER_01: So open your Bibles to Acts 16, the passage that Anton read for us.
SPEAKER_01: As you do so, I want to remind you of Philippians chapter 4 and verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: You probably have that memorized if you've been in church for very long.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians 4.13 says, I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
SPEAKER_01: You've heard that.
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps you've seen it on television.
SPEAKER_01: It is one of the Bible's most abused and misused verses.
SPEAKER_01: I've seen students use it as encouragement before taking tests.
SPEAKER_01: I've seen athletes who have attached the verse to their lockers.
SPEAKER_01: And Christians of all kinds and all many different kinds of circumstances have employed that verse to strengthen their resolve and encourage their hearts in difficult times.
SPEAKER_01: But do we really know what the Apostle Paul meant when he said he could do everything through Christ's strength?
SPEAKER_01: I think sometimes as Christians we use that verse like the New Testament version of a couple of Old Testament verses that talk about jumping over a wall and tackling an army with God's help.
SPEAKER_01: For that matter, do we really understand anything that he wrote in the book of Philippians?
SPEAKER_01: Philippians is a deeply loved, deeply treasured book on unity, on joy.
SPEAKER_01: Did you know that Acts chapter 16, our passage for this morning, relates Paul's experience of proclaiming Christ in Asia, specifically in the Roman city of Philippi, to whom Paul wrote the book of Philippians?
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you've never made that connection.
SPEAKER_01: Paul's ministry in the city of Philippi resulted in deep, rich, and fruitful relationships that lasted for years.
SPEAKER_01: And Philippians, the apostle's letter to the believers in that city, grew from what we find recounted by Luke in Acts chapter 16.
SPEAKER_01: So if we are able to understand Acts chapter 16, then that means we should be able to understand the book of Philippians and vice versa.
SPEAKER_01: Several themes stand out in the letter to the Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: Most of us are familiar with that theme of joy, right?
SPEAKER_01: But this morning I want to introduce to us another prominent theme in Philippians that too often goes unnoticed.
SPEAKER_01: And that theme is the theme of imitation, of being an example that can be imitated.
SPEAKER_01: It's expressed most clearly, I think, in two locations in the book of Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 3 is one, and chapter 4 is another.
SPEAKER_01: In chapter 3, the Apostle Paul tells the believers in Philippi, join in imitating me.
SPEAKER_01: Not Christ, me.
SPEAKER_01: And keep your eyes on others who walk according to the example you have in us.
SPEAKER_01: Then later in chapter 4, he says, What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, do that.
SPEAKER_01: Imitate it.
SPEAKER_01: What you see, what you hear, what you've learned from my example, you go and do the same.
SPEAKER_01: Over the next three hours, I want to explore how the events related in Acts chapter 16.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, that was a bad joke.
SPEAKER_01: Go for it.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: We could spend several hours on this path with great fruitfulness.
SPEAKER_01: What I want to do is to connect what we find in Acts 16 with the book of Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: And at one point this week, I had identified 20 potential links between Acts 16 and the book of Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: Each one could be a single sermon.
SPEAKER_01: I've condensed those, eliminated several of them for our time this morning, and hopefully this survey will spur you on to see how connecting the parts of the Bible with the whole brings clarity and richness to its truths.
SPEAKER_01: You see, we must not just read a chapter in the morning or five chapters to get through our Bible reading.
SPEAKER_01: We need to put it in its whole context.
SPEAKER_01: And it opens up all kinds of rich doors for us.
SPEAKER_01: So Acts chapter 16 is our primary text.
SPEAKER_01: But reading Philippians in light of Acts 16 motivates us to imitate the Apostle Paul.
SPEAKER_01: We can even take that a step further.
SPEAKER_01: Reading the New Testament in light of the book of Acts helps us live with the kind of faith that the early church possessed.
SPEAKER_01: So let's dive in with a brief review first of Acts chapter 16 that Anton read for us a few moments ago.
SPEAKER_01: Acts chapter 16, beginning in verse 6, really, is what I call mission redirection.
SPEAKER_01: The events of this section are the result of the Holy Spirit barring Paul and his missionary team from proclaiming the gospel in certain parts of Asia Minor.
SPEAKER_01: We see in verse 6, for example, they went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia because they had been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.
SPEAKER_01: They wanted to go one place, but God said, No, I don't want you to go there.
SPEAKER_01: Then again in verse 7, when they had come up to Mycenae, they attempted to go into Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.
SPEAKER_01: Friends, in one sense, the Christian's life is not his own.
SPEAKER_01: We sing that occasionally, right?
SPEAKER_01: Do you believe it?
SPEAKER_01: My life is not my own.
SPEAKER_01: We live our lives in the direction of the Lord through his spirit.
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes God uses our desires for his purposes.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes he reveals to us that our desires are not his desires.
SPEAKER_01: And he's doing something else.
SPEAKER_01: And we need to realign with his will.
SPEAKER_01: Acts 16, 11 through 40 is one of those examples of realignment.
SPEAKER_01: It's a redirection.
SPEAKER_01: Paul and his team went out with one purpose to visit and strengthen the churches that they had established on their previous missionary journey.
SPEAKER_01: But God is now redirecting them to northern Greece to take the gospel to a different continent for the first time.
SPEAKER_01: What are we talking about here?
SPEAKER_01: Hopefully you can see this tiny map.
SPEAKER_01: You see on the left-hand side there, Macedonia.
SPEAKER_01: That is what is known today as northern Greece.
SPEAKER_01: Down at the bottom right is Troas, that's a seacoast port city where they sailed off from.
SPEAKER_01: So this is northern Asia Minor, northeastern, or northwestern, I'm sorry, Asia Minor.
SPEAKER_01: They had traveled to that point and now they've taken a journey to the island of Samothrace and then across another portion of water to Neapolis, which is a seaport, and then to Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: Philippi is about 10 miles inland.
SPEAKER_01: It was named after Philip of Macedon, the father of Alexander the Great.
SPEAKER_01: But the Romans had taken control of this region at least by the time of the Lord Jesus' birth.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, there was a major battle between Roman leaders for who was going to be in charge of the Roman Empire.
SPEAKER_01: And it was because of a battle around Philippi that the Roman Republic died, and the Roman Empire came out of it.
SPEAKER_01: Caesar Augustus resettled the town primarily with retired Roman soldiers.
SPEAKER_01: And he declared it to be a Roman colony, which was a special designation that very few communities possessed.
SPEAKER_01: So, here in other words, in northern Greece, on the edge of Asia, was a mini Rome.
SPEAKER_01: A community with perhaps more Italians than Greeks.
SPEAKER_01: And Lydia's presence tells us that it was a community of influence and trade.
SPEAKER_01: You see, dealing in purple goods meant that Lydia interacted with the wealthy and the influential.
SPEAKER_01: She is herself from Asia Minor, but she's established a home in Philippi as a dealer in purple goods, which were colors of fabrics that only the wealthy and the privileged possessed.
SPEAKER_01: That meant that Lydia was likely well off herself.
SPEAKER_01: And the fact that Paul and his team went out of the city to find a place of prayer instead of going to his usual place in the synagogue suggests to us that there was no synagogue in Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: Why would there be no synagogue?
SPEAKER_01: There's been a synagogue everywhere he's gone.
SPEAKER_01: Well, likely it's because there were not enough Jewish people in Philippi for a synagogue to exist.
SPEAKER_01: Jewish law required a minimum of ten men for a Jewish synagogue to exist.
SPEAKER_01: Women didn't count.
SPEAKER_01: Sorry, ladies.
SPEAKER_01: That was just their requirement.
SPEAKER_01: You had to have a minimum of ten Jewish men for there to be a synagogue in any community.
SPEAKER_01: So that probably tells us there were not many Jews, if any, in Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, the accusations made against Paul and Silas reveal a very typical Roman antisemitism.
SPEAKER_01: There were a few women who were God fearers, Gentile women who worshiped the Jewish God.
SPEAKER_01: It may be that some of those women in verse 13 were Jewish, but Luke doesn't state that for us.
SPEAKER_01: It's all an assumption.
SPEAKER_01: But whatever the case, God moves Lydia near a small river outside of Philippi to listen to Paul.
SPEAKER_01: This wealthy woman believes the gospel as do those in her household, and they become the first people in the church at Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: I'll just time out there.
SPEAKER_01: Notice in Acts 16 some of the fascinating social dynamics at play here.
SPEAKER_01: First, Lydia is on the bottom of the rung of religious society.
SPEAKER_01: She's a Gentile worshiping the Jewish God.
SPEAKER_01: Her husband is not mentioned anywhere in the text.
SPEAKER_01: We don't know if she was a widow.
SPEAKER_01: We don't know if she was married and her husband just didn't participate in religious activities with her, but she is alone, and as a woman in that society, she's on the bottom rung of the stratus there.
SPEAKER_01: According to Jewish law, it couldn't exist if there were 10 Jewish women, only 10 Jewish men.
SPEAKER_01: Yet, Lydia is a dealer in purple cloth, which meant that she routinely rubbed shoulders with the rich and famous.
SPEAKER_01: God used both of those aspects as Lydia came to trust in Jesus, the Jewish Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: And so it began a church in her home as she became a financial supporter of God's mission.
SPEAKER_01: Fascinating.
SPEAKER_01: Now contrast Lydia with the Philippian jailer.
SPEAKER_01: The jailer is likely a Roman.
SPEAKER_01: As a Roman, he would likely worship the Roman pantheon of false gods.
SPEAKER_01: Perhaps having a military background, and he sleeps on the job.
SPEAKER_01: What a contrast.
SPEAKER_01: And yet, these are the first two converts to Christ in this community.
SPEAKER_01: The Apostle Paul mimics the ministry of Jesus and the apostles.
SPEAKER_01: He enters a new realm, a new location in Satan's realm.
SPEAKER_01: The demons know exactly who they are and exactly what they're doing.
SPEAKER_01: And as Jesus and Peter have already done in the book of Acts, so does Paul.
SPEAKER_01: He calls on the power of Christ to remove the demon from the enslaved girl.
SPEAKER_01: Notice the implied spiritual battle.
SPEAKER_01: Or maybe, maybe more accurately, the battle of the spirits.
SPEAKER_01: Paul and his team are in Philippi because the spirit of Jesus drove them there.
SPEAKER_01: The spirit of Jesus has driven them to Philippi to free people imprisoned to sin, Satan, and death.
SPEAKER_01: But it is an evil spirit who has the run of the place and who provokes Paul.
SPEAKER_01: You have the battle of the spirit of Jesus and this demon and this slave girl.
SPEAKER_01: Ultimately, it's the spirit of Jesus to whom the demon must submit.
SPEAKER_01: That's the case in all the Gospels in the book of Acts.
SPEAKER_01: But that angers the men who profited from their fortune-telling slave girl.
SPEAKER_01: And so they stir up the city with nationalistic and anti-Semitic fervor.
SPEAKER_01: Paul and Silas are beaten.
SPEAKER_01: We would call that today a caning.
SPEAKER_01: They were taking taking a wooden rod to the bare back of a man and hitting him with it over and over again.
SPEAKER_01: Then they're put in prison, but God rescues them through a divine earthquake.
SPEAKER_01: Fascinatingly, the earthquake doesn't just shake the ground and so release the doors that closed off prison spaces.
SPEAKER_01: It also releases shackles and releases the what's the word?
SPEAKER_01: The stalks.
SPEAKER_01: That's the word.
SPEAKER_01: The stalks that Paul and Silas's feet are in.
SPEAKER_01: How does an earthquake do that?
SPEAKER_01: The answer is it doesn't.
SPEAKER_01: God does.
SPEAKER_01: The jailer has moved from fear to faith, and his household is also added to Lydia's household as the church plant grows in Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul goes a step further.
SPEAKER_01: He even ensures the continued safety of new believers by standing firmly not on God's law, not on Jewish law, but on Roman law.
SPEAKER_01: He adds credence to the Christian faith by pointing out his and Silas's Roman citizenship and the illegality of his beating and imprisonment.
SPEAKER_01: That act shifts the Christian faith away from the Jewish world and the antisemitism directed towards it to a small level of respectability with the Romans.
SPEAKER_01: That's a very, very brief survey.
SPEAKER_01: Now let's move to how these events led Paul to write to the Philippians to imitate him.
SPEAKER_01: And by extension, for us to imitate him.
SPEAKER_01: We can categorize the links between Luke's retelling of events in Acts 16 and Paul's letter to the Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: I've tried to narrow the links to two categories.
SPEAKER_01: We are called to mimic Paul's spirit and his focus.
SPEAKER_01: Let's consider his spirit first.
SPEAKER_01: Now by Paul's spirit, I mean the collective qualities he displays in all of the various circumstances of life.
SPEAKER_01: So spirit then is part attitude and part character.
SPEAKER_01: Attitude is how you, as a person, direct your feelings about anything.
SPEAKER_01: Character is what you become over time due to your attitudes and your beliefs impacting you.
SPEAKER_01: Character, as one person has said, is what spills out when you get bumped.
SPEAKER_01: That's what we're talking about when I mean Paul's spirit.
SPEAKER_01: So we're making parallels now, joining Acts 16 with Philippians.
SPEAKER_01: So look, you don't have to flip there.
SPEAKER_01: We're going to go back and forth.
SPEAKER_01: I'll show them to you.
SPEAKER_01: You can go there if you want.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians chapter 1.
SPEAKER_01: The first thing that we should mimic about Paul's spirit is his trust.
SPEAKER_01: His trust.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to know, brothers, he says in Philippians chapter 1, verses 12 and 13, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: So Paul trusts that the circumstances of his life, particularly his imprisonments, are for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Paul trusts that everything in life, especially the hardest and most difficult and painful things, are for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Now in Acts 16, the imprisonment is because he was meant, he was used by Jesus to bring a kind of salvation to that slave girl.
SPEAKER_01: He saved her from the dominion of a demon.
SPEAKER_01: In Philippians, it's Roman imprisonment.
SPEAKER_01: Paul is imprisoned.
SPEAKER_01: In Rome.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus imprisoned him in Rome so the gospel would impact the entire imperial guard.
SPEAKER_01: That's Caesar's own guard.
SPEAKER_01: So one aspect of imitation that Paul calls us to mirror in him is his trust that Jesus has us right where we are in any moment for his purposes.
SPEAKER_01: If Paul trusted that his imprisonment was for Christ, can't we trust him with our circumstances?
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, what you've seen and learned and heard from me, practice that.
SPEAKER_01: Practice trusting that God has you right where he has you in exactly what you're experiencing for his purposes.
SPEAKER_01: There's another aspect of Paul's spirit that we should imitate, and that is his hope.
SPEAKER_01: He says in Philippians chapter 1, beginning in verse 20, he says, It is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage, now as always, Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.
SPEAKER_01: For, here's the reason, it doesn't matter if I live or die.
SPEAKER_01: For me to live as Christ and to die is to gain.
SPEAKER_01: You see, Paul put his hope in the reality and grandeur of a life that exceeds this one.
SPEAKER_01: His hope was bound to Christ's glory and honor.
SPEAKER_01: It did not matter if Paul was successful.
SPEAKER_01: It did not matter if Paul was honored.
SPEAKER_01: It did not matter if Paul was wealthy.
SPEAKER_01: His life was bound entirely to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, friends, his body was wrecked for Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Already in Acts, we've seen that he was stoned and left for dead.
SPEAKER_01: His body is beaten in Philippi merely for rescuing a girl from the dominion of demons.
SPEAKER_01: After they're beaten with rods, they're placed in stocks.
SPEAKER_01: That is, their feet are placed in stocks.
SPEAKER_01: Specifically, they have to sit on the ground and their feet are locked in place.
SPEAKER_01: So wounded and bleeding, like Christ their Lord, they're put into an immovable position, likely bringing muscle cramps among all kinds of other agonies.
SPEAKER_01: And his ministry is just getting started.
SPEAKER_01: This shows us how the Philippians are to honor Christ with their bodies by putting their hope in the greater reality of eternal life where Christ is honored.
SPEAKER_01: So we are called to imitate Paul.
SPEAKER_01: So whatever the circumstances of life are, we have our hope not here, but in him.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians chapter 3, finally rejoice in the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Paul's a great preacher because he keeps going on for another 25% of his letter.
SPEAKER_01: After his finely.
SPEAKER_01: Then he says in chapter 4, rejoice in the Lord always.
SPEAKER_01: And in case you don't get it yet, again I will say, rejoice.
SPEAKER_01: Many Christians are familiar with the theme of joy and rejoicing in Philippians, but not everyone is familiar with the circumstances of that joy.
SPEAKER_01: Paul is writing that command from a Roman prison.
SPEAKER_01: He's writing that command from a history of following Jesus through agony and pain and redirection.
SPEAKER_01: Acts chapter 16 shows us that Paul's spirit of joy was authentic.
SPEAKER_01: Because in Acts 16, verses 25 and 26, Paul and Silas were singing in prison in stocks after having been beaten, and they're still awake at midnight and singing no less.
SPEAKER_01: I would be moaning and groaning and complaining that I can't fall asleep.
SPEAKER_01: But they're rejoicing.
SPEAKER_01: They're rejoicing because they have redirected their emotions to have their joy not in what's here, but in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And we are called to imitate that spirit rather than complain.
SPEAKER_01: Let me give you another one.
SPEAKER_01: We must imitate Paul's reasonableness.
SPEAKER_01: In Philippians chapter 4, verse 5, he says, Let your reasonableness be known to everyone.
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, as followers of Christ, we ought to be known as the most reasonable of people.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if that could be said of me.
SPEAKER_01: I want it to be.
SPEAKER_01: Reasonableness in Philippians 4.
SPEAKER_01: Reasonableness is likely connected to unreasonable people and unreasonable situations.
SPEAKER_01: See, in Philippians chapter 4, where Paul writes about reasonableness, he starts that out by telling the Philippian church that he wants two women in Philippi to work things out between them by putting the Lord first.
SPEAKER_01: Be reasonable.
SPEAKER_01: We see a similar spirit of reasonableness in Acts 16 when Paul wanted the community leaders to respect Roman law.
SPEAKER_01: They had acted with a vigilante spirit rather than respect for Roman law.
SPEAKER_01: So Paul, after the imprisonment, reasons with them, not out of spite, but with reasonableness.
SPEAKER_01: He says, listen, this is the Roman law.
SPEAKER_01: Why did you not follow the Roman law?
SPEAKER_01: This is a Roman colony.
SPEAKER_01: He's reasonable.
SPEAKER_01: We ought to be known for the same spirit.
SPEAKER_01: And I think it's significant that Paul suffered for Jesus here without complaint.
SPEAKER_01: He was imprisoned for Jesus, not for doing something illegal.
SPEAKER_01: But he handled the aftermath with reasonableness.
SPEAKER_01: One more aspect of Paul's spirit that we should mimic, and that is his spiritual-mindedness.
SPEAKER_01: In Philippians chapter 2, verse 14, he says, Do all things without grumbling or complaining or disputing.
SPEAKER_01: Later on, he says in chapter 4, verse 6, don't be anxious for anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.
SPEAKER_01: So think about those two verses from the perspective of Acts 16.
SPEAKER_01: Paul had a chance to grumble when the Spirit blocked them from going where they wanted to go.
SPEAKER_01: Come on God.
SPEAKER_01: You know how they need the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: This is a good thing.
SPEAKER_01: Why wouldn't you want us to do a good thing?
SPEAKER_01: He had the opportunity to dispute when being imprisoned for rescuing a girl from Satan, but he didn't.
SPEAKER_01: While in prison, they're praying and singing.
SPEAKER_01: So Paul calls for Lydia, for the jailer, for their believing families, and all the Christians in Philippi and in Grand Forks to be spiritually minded.
SPEAKER_01: Consider each moment of your life through the lens of your spiritual life in light of eternity, not in light of the moment.
SPEAKER_01: That's so hard, isn't it?
SPEAKER_01: That's why we're called to imitate.
SPEAKER_01: Look at Paul, learn from Paul, see what he's doing, and practice those things.
SPEAKER_01: Now let's shift from Paul's spirit to Paul's focus.
SPEAKER_01: Focus is a center of attention, a place of concentration.
SPEAKER_01: But we start with Paul's spirit because it is his spirit that directs his focus.
SPEAKER_01: And we find his focus in the book of Philippians not on himself, but on others.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians chapter 2.
SPEAKER_01: So if there's any encouragement in Christ, if there's any comfort from love, if there's any participation in the Spirit, if there's any affection and sympathy, all of those things should be present.
SPEAKER_01: Right?
SPEAKER_01: It says, listen, these things ought to exist in your church in Philippi.
SPEAKER_01: They ought to exist in your church in Grand Forks.
SPEAKER_01: So if there's any of that, complete, bring to fulfillment my joy.
SPEAKER_01: How?
SPEAKER_01: By being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
SPEAKER_01: How does that happen?
SPEAKER_01: Very simply.
SPEAKER_01: Do nothing from selfish ambition, do nothing from conceit, but rather in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
SPEAKER_01: You can look to your own interests, that's fine, but never forget the interests of others.
SPEAKER_01: We could argue that Paul's ministry-mindedness alone helps us see his focus on others, but there's one particular part of Acts 16 that I think more clearly highlights the apostle's focus on others.
SPEAKER_01: And that is his almost prison escape.
SPEAKER_01: It's the middle of the night.
SPEAKER_01: It's dark.
SPEAKER_01: There are no electric lights.
SPEAKER_01: There are no street lights.
SPEAKER_01: Most people are in bed and sleeping.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone in the city, however, would be instantly focused on the earthquake and the aftermath of the earthquake when the ground begins to shake.
SPEAKER_01: The prison doors are flung open.
SPEAKER_01: Shackles are undone.
SPEAKER_01: Prisoners can walk free.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul and Silas were there unjustly.
SPEAKER_01: And God had opened the doors and released them from their stocks.
SPEAKER_01: It wasn't an angel like it was with Peter, but it was clearly God's work.
SPEAKER_01: Paul and Silas could have just walked right on out the prison doors with all the other prisoners.
SPEAKER_01: Paul's focus was not on himself, was it?
SPEAKER_01: His focus was on others.
SPEAKER_01: First of all, he knows that all the other prisoners are still there.
SPEAKER_01: But for another, he was more focused on the jailer than on anything else.
SPEAKER_01: It seems the jailer was about to take his own life because as a jailer whose prisoners have escaped, living would be worse than dying.
SPEAKER_01: He would likely be executed, or worse.
SPEAKER_01: But Paul considered his jailer more significant than himself.
SPEAKER_01: He looked out for the jailer's interest.
SPEAKER_01: And it wasn't merely for his momentary interests, but for his eternal interests.
SPEAKER_01: How easy it is for us to look out for our own interests and neglect the interests of others.
SPEAKER_01: We're really good at looking out for our own interests, aren't we?
SPEAKER_01: We love ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: We're really great at making sure that our interests, our cares, our concerns are met.
SPEAKER_01: But so often we do that to the exclusion of the interests of others.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we go back to counting others more significant.
SPEAKER_01: That's how Paul lived.
SPEAKER_01: Our interests include whatever is important to us, whatever motivates us.
SPEAKER_01: We don't do some things because of others, and we do other things because of others.
SPEAKER_01: And so we should ask ourselves in every situation, in every statement that we make, in every decision that we can come to, with every choice that is presented to us, am I considering others more significant than myself?
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, But you've heard and learned and seen in me, practice these things.
SPEAKER_01: Another of his foci belonging.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians chapter 3, verses 7 through 11.
SPEAKER_01: But whatever gain I had, I counted it as loss for the sake of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.
SPEAKER_01: So for his sake, I have suffered the loss of all things, and I count them as rubbish, as trash, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.
SPEAKER_01: Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from following God's law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith, so that I might know him and the power of his righteousness and may share in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, so that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection of the dead.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if we look at the life of Paul, this seems very clear, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01: He's been stoned and left for dead in Asia Minor.
SPEAKER_01: He's beaten and imprisoned here, all for Jesus, all for speaking the truth of the good news of salvation in Christ alone.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul says nothing in this world is more valuable than Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Even if Jesus says no to some things in your life, in order to redirect you into beatings and imprisonments.
SPEAKER_01: Paul wanted to be like Jesus in every way, even in how he suffered.
SPEAKER_01: He wanted his sufferings in life to be an imitation of sorts of Christ's sufferings.
SPEAKER_01: And so he suffered the loss of all things to become more like Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Oh Lord, please make me more like you without the sufferings.
SPEAKER_01: Now that's not Paul's prayer.
SPEAKER_01: He says, if I'm going to be made like Jesus, then I need to become like Jesus by imitating him and his sufferings too.
SPEAKER_01: Brothers and sisters in Philippi, imitate me in your sufferings.
SPEAKER_01: Brothers and Christers, brothers and sisters in Grand Forks, what you've heard and learned and seen in me.
SPEAKER_01: Practice your suffering to be like Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: The believers in Philippi witnessed this singular focus in Paul, and he wanted them to imitate it.
SPEAKER_01: I wonder, what could the Lord do through us if we had such a focus?
SPEAKER_01: It's worth it to suffer the loss of all things and gain Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Another focus is his reliance on Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Philippians chapter 4, verses 12 and 13.
SPEAKER_01: I know how to be brought low.
SPEAKER_01: Makes sense, right?
SPEAKER_01: If anything, Paul knows how to be brought low.
SPEAKER_01: I know how to abound.
SPEAKER_01: I don't have ever how how it feels to have everything I need.
SPEAKER_01: Then he goes on to say, in in any in every circumstance, I've learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.
SPEAKER_01: Now, hopefully, we can begin to grasp what the apostle meant when he said, I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
SPEAKER_01: This statement ties together his spirit and his character together with his focus.
SPEAKER_01: So first, the all things refers to all circumstances.
SPEAKER_01: Whether it's preaching Christ in a community without Jews in a synagogue or singing in a prison, whether beaten or imprisoned without cause or released with an apology, whether hungry or full, whether having sickness or having full health.
SPEAKER_01: He says his character and his spirit is focused on contentment.
SPEAKER_01: Because he can rely on Christ's provision for every moment.
SPEAKER_01: He so trusted Jesus that he knew that whatever was there in the moment was there because Jesus had brought it and Jesus knew Paul needed it.
SPEAKER_01: The apostle wanted the Philippians to remember that we can learn, because contentment and reliance are learned traits.
SPEAKER_01: We can learn that Christ strengthens us for whatever he calls us to for his name's sake.
SPEAKER_01: To be content whether we have a lot or have little, to be content whether we're in prison or free to go wherever we want to go, whether we imprisoned unjustly or whether we're beaten because we genuinely proclaimed Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Paul's time in Philippi and in a Roman prison confirmed that truth that Paul learned he could rely on Jesus and take care of any situation because he trusted.
SPEAKER_01: He had learned to be content.
SPEAKER_01: So that the truth of doing all things through him who strengthens us is not because suddenly we're empowered to jump over a wall or to go against an army, but because we are empowered with Christ's Spirit to live out the fruit of the Spirit, to trust Him and to be content with what He's given.
SPEAKER_01: So that then brings us full circle to Paul's example.
SPEAKER_01: What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me.
SPEAKER_01: Practice these things.
SPEAKER_01: And as you practice them, the God of all peace will be with you.
SPEAKER_01: Paul directed the Philippian believers to look to and imitate Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he does in Philippians 2.
SPEAKER_01: And then he directs them to imitate him, because he's imitating and learning from Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And then he directs them in Philippians chapter 2 to listen to and imitate Timothy and Epaphroditus, who are ministers along with him.
SPEAKER_01: He says, You know Timothy, how as a son in the faith he has served with me in the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: He's endured everything I have.
SPEAKER_01: He's been faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Look at Timothy.
SPEAKER_01: Imitate Timothy, because they've imitated me and they imitate Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And then he says, look around you and find somebody who imitates Jesus, who imitates Paul, who imitates Timothy, and you imitate them.
SPEAKER_01: And friends, we are called to imitate because someone else is always watching.
SPEAKER_01: And the Lord has called us to live out our faith so that others can see and know how to faithfully follow Jesus no matter what he brings to us.
SPEAKER_01: But especially when he redirects our paths to further his work through our hardship.
SPEAKER_01: Because it's when we are forced to rely on Jesus, whether through hardship, through difficulties, through pain, through redirection of life, it's there that Christ's glory shines ever brighter.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_01: Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: May our eyes always be directed towards those who follow you.
SPEAKER_01: And may you give us the desire to be like them.
SPEAKER_01: Not because they're someone special.
SPEAKER_01: Not because you've made them to stand out, but because they follow you and they imitate you.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, may it be true of all of us who have placed our faith and trust in you here at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, that we would be a city on a hill and that all would know that we are your disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Because we imitate you and Paul and Timothy and Epaphroditus and all of your faithful saints.
SPEAKER_01: Enable us to learn from one another, to grow in grace and knowledge so that you will be glorified forever and ever.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.
SPEAKER_00: Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You can learn more by visiting our website at faithfree.com.