The Lord has certainly been faithful to us this weekend, and our brothers Stephen Kong and Ed Miller have shared some very wonderful words with us.
I was especially touched this morning by our brothers’ sharing about this need in the church for the true light, that we might walk in the light with renewed minds.
I remember when I was only a Christian for a couple of months, just born again, I heard Vance Havner speaking. I’ll never forget the first thing he said when he got up to the rostrum. You know, he was an old country preacher of revivals.
And he said, “You know, the church today is so subnormal that whenever a church becomes normal, everybody thinks they’re abnormal.” Such is the condition of the church today.
The normal Christian church should be a church walking in the light, with first love, lives laid down to the Lord, every saint functioning, and looking forward to the return of the Lord. This is the normal church.
Indeed, the Lord is trying to recover nothing less than a church that lives out of the goodness of His grace. And so, our brothers’ burden—may we take that home with us: to really see and be sure that, as we gather together, we ask for God’s light and ask for God to deal with our minds where these fortresses exist.
And then there could be no better exhortation than our brother Ed’s sharing with us that all of our pursuit is to have Jesus before us, clearly seen. As we will see tonight, as we continue in the testimony of Paul, this was, in fact, the object before Paul.
I suppose in the early days of Paul’s ministry, it was like many people—like myself, for sure. I would study the Word and try to find Jesus so that I could minister. But as Paul went on and on, he discovered that, rather, he found ministry opportunities—opportunities to find Jesus.
The end became the Lord, the Person, and the ministry became a means. So this is to be our life—our lives.
Tonight, I want to continue in this testimony of Paul and look specifically at the book of Philippians as a whole. The letter seems to testify in a very personal way of Paul’s renewed mind. So we want to read two passages in Philippians.
First, we will read that passage again in Philippians 2, beginning in verse 5.
Have this mind in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus,
who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men.
Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow,
of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
And then a little bit of some of his final thoughts, in Philippians 4, beginning in verse 1 through verse 9.
Therefore, my beloved brethren, whom I long to see, my joy and crown, in this way stand firm in the Lord, my beloved.
I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to live in harmony in the Lord.
Indeed, true yoke-fellow, I ask you also to help these women who have shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel, together with Clement also and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice!
Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near.
Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute—if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise—ponder these things.
The things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.
Father, we sense the presence of our Lord here tonight, whose desire is to shine His light upon our minds and renew them. Oh, we thank You so much for the dispensing of the Spirit for this very work, and then to bring us into all truth regarding the things of Christ.
In this time, Lord, we ask that You refresh our hearts and our minds to be able to take in even more of the Word of God tonight. Then we ask that You would work deeply within, in the way that only You can work, to transform us by the renewing of our minds.
We commit this time now into Your hands with anticipation of faith and dependence upon the Holy Spirit, in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
Last night I shared two exhortations. One was transformation that comes by presentation, because in fact this is the key to our lives.
You know, brothers and sisters, if we start to become introspective regarding our inward life, it will lead to paralysis. And I am amazed by the way the Lord takes things as we consciously, in good faith and with a good heart, present ourselves to the Lord.
One brother was talking this afternoon to me and saying, “Well, I present my body a living sacrifice. Let’s see, I’ve got a bad toe, and I’ve got all these problems. Is that really a very good sacrifice?”
But you know, all the Lord wants us to do is present ourselves as those who have been born again. For the heart that consciously means that we are truly laying down our lives, the Lord takes that at face value, even when He knows some sins may be lurking in our lives that we are not even conscious of yet.
You know, we cannot deal with things we do not know about. It is enough to deal with them when we are convicted about a sin. When the Spirit convicts us, we ask forgiveness, allow His precious blood to cleanse us, and then we go on.
We do not start picking inside, saying, “Oh, but there must be something wrong deeper.” We do pray, “Lord, show me my secret thoughts. Show me if there is any way that is not pleasing to You.” We pray that, but we wait for the Lord to expose these things. We do not try to self-analyze, or we surely get ourselves in trouble.
That is why I always like this objective beginning: “Give your life as a living sacrifice to the Lord.” “Lord, this is me. I lay it down. I know there is a lot in me I do not understand—a lot of things going on, a lot of warfare—but let me lay it down in Your hands so that You can begin to deal.”
Now, if we truly do that, then the Lord begins to do His work, which is this renewing of our mind. That is His work. It is done by the Holy Spirit, and it is done by the engineering of our circumstances.
Last night I tried to show something in the valley of exchange, where we are able to put off the old man and put on the new man because we see Christ down there as to who we really are. We discover who we really are now.
You know, the Lord is disciplining all of us, including myself. Brothers and sisters, sometimes you see something and feel like you understand it, but once you share it, you realize it was as clear as mud. I am afraid, for some of you, that valley has gotten pretty muddy.
I am always disciplined by the Lord about these things because my burden is to share in such a way that young people could understand. Whenever I get too deep in the valley of exchange and have things going around about the real me—well, let me put it this way: the Lord is disciplining me because we should be able to share clearly what we understand.
So, just erase that part of your notes. If you just have some kind of arrows going left and right, you know? And if you did understand it, then your mind may be just about as convoluted as mine. It should be much simpler than that.
But actually, even in recent days, the Lord is showing me something about the very center of who we are, and it is all Christ. It is something we need to see, but I am sorry, I just cannot quite describe it yet.
You know, it kind of reminds me of a story. Vance tells this story, and to me it is a wonderful anecdote. He says that at one time there was a ministers’ conference in England, and R. A. Torrey and Dwight Pentecost were the two speakers—two great men of God.
Friday night began with Dwight Pentecost. You know, Friday night, the opening meeting, can be kind of tough—people coming in late and one thing or another. It turns out that Dr. Pentecost started speaking, and he sort of rambled. His message was not all that clear, as it turned out—sort of like mine last night.
He went from here and there, and people got confused. He went on too long and kind of ended the meeting, and whew, you know. Oh, that is the way it goes.
Saturday morning, R. A. Torrey came up by train from London. Of course, he was not there Friday night. They sang a few hymns, and he got right up. He had just gotten off the train. He came up there, opened his Bible, read his text, and made a rhetorical statement to begin the message.
He said, “What did Pentecost mean?”
Well, he got the same response I just got now. He had no idea why the ministers started laughing, but everybody had wondered back in their room, “What did Pentecost mean?”
So I am afraid many of you said, “What did Dana mean?” I have no idea. Well, anyway, you see, I have to default on trying to be a testimony of spiritual-mindedness. So let us go back to Paul.
With Paul, you can see a mind that is clear. We mentioned that last night. His revelation of Jesus is so clear—so clear that he not only can describe it to his brothers, but he can walk in it.
The light is shining on his relationships in the Body. The light is shining in his relationship to his co-workers. The light is shining in all the details of his own sanctification in life.
We see in Paul a tremendous transformation. Here in Philippians, we can see a testimony of what has been going on in Paul’s life.
I want us to look in Philippians 4, because we read these verses that are very familiar to us. In verse 6, we find practical help:
Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Now, it has been said several times during this weekend that the fruit of minding the Spirit is life and peace. This is a very simple exhortation to the saints, but I think many of you have found, as I have, that these verses are very valuable in showing us how to deal with problems in our life.
When we give our lives as a living sacrifice to the Lord, objectively we have settled it. Now we walk through the day looking to the Lord to give us grace to be faithful, holy, and loving. We go through that day without getting introspective.
But how is the Lord then going to renew our mind—renew the spirit of our mind and do that deeper work? It is usually done through problems, through problems that come up in our lives.
It is during those problems that we begin to understand that the Lord is trying to deal with something in us. We all know the phrase that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. But this is exactly what it means.
These difficulties and problems that come our way are the things that shape our lives and cause us to see the Lord working more deeply in our lives. So Paul’s simple exhortation is: do not be anxious in things. When these crises and problems come up, take them to the Lord.
Pray to the Lord, then give Him thanks that now He has taken it into His hands. Let that peace of Christ rule your heart, even as God deals with the situation.
Now, we can see in the testimony of this letter to the Philippians that Paul has done this himself. I want to show, through this book, some of the difficulties Paul has gone through. Although we do not actually know at times the process he went through in coming into peace about them, we can see, obviously, that there has been that transforming work in his mind.
The very theme of this book, according to many Bible scholars—and according to the introduction in my own Bible here—is that the theme of Philippians is joy.
Actually, Paul did not write this with a theme, with Bible guys trying to analyze these things. Actually, this is the testimony of the joy of gaining Christ.
This is a testimony about Paul’s personal pursuit of the personal Christ, the One who apprehended him on the road to Damascus. Now he has found himself chasing after this One.
It is the result of chasing after Christ that this joy is so obvious in Paul’s life. It is not that he has joy because he is a happy person or because he has no problems. It is that superabounding, buoyant joy that keeps pressing Paul forward.
He says, “Well, you cannot stop me now. You have stoned me and held me down, put me in prison, and done every kind of thing. I am just not going to stop. I am going to run until I grab hold of Him.”
Paul had this kind of single-mindedness about gaining Christ. That becomes what this book is really about. It is a testimony of a man who is joyously pursuing the Christ by whom he has been captured.
It is true that when people try to organize Philippians, there are four very simple ways of organizing it:
Where do we get that from? Let us just look for a moment. In Philippians 1:21:
For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Christ, my life.
In Philippians 2:5, we see Christ, my mind:
Have this mind in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus.
In Philippians 3:14, we find Christ, my goal:
I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.
And in Philippians 4:13:
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
Christ, my provision.
Now, these sound very spiritual: Christ, my life; Christ, my mind; Christ, my goal; Christ, my provision. But this is his true testimony.
How does Paul come to the place where this is his conclusion: “For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain”? For a person to come to the place where he can really say, “Christ is my life,” he has probably gone through experiences that stripped all else away from him.
He has discovered, “Christ is my life. Nothing changes. Take away my friends. Take away my health. Take away my freedom. I discover my life has not changed. Christ is my life.”
We do not know exactly when Paul came to this realization, but “for to me, to live is Christ” is really something marvelous to say. We can say it as a matter of faith, and may it be that we say that. But the Lord will bring us through lonely times and disappointing times until we know that it is true.
When you strip it down to the common denominator, Christ is my life.
Then there is the mind of Christ. How does somebody come to this servanthood? Can you imagine Paul? I picture Paul this way. I am sorry, but I think he was a very human person.
I think when he was first saved, he testified even in Damascus. He went immediately to the synagogue and testified like a ball of fire: “I have something to tell you!”
So the Lord took him into the desert for three years to teach him how to have a servant’s heart—the attitude of Christ, who laid down everything. The Lord, one by one, stripped things away from Paul.
“What tribe were you of?” “Benjamin.” “That is gone.”
“And do you know Hebrew?” “Yes.” “Too bad. I cannot use it anymore.”
The Lord stripped things away from Paul. I think the real stripping moment was when God said, “Paul, forget about the Jews. I am sending you to the Gentiles.”
Can you imagine what Paul went through to go to the Gentiles and eat McDonald’s and be part of the whole thing, when you know dim sum is the only way of life?
Paul realized, “I am doing something impossible here. It is because God has transformed my mind to lay down all of the status symbols I had in my life—to lay it all down. I used to be so proud of those things, but now what good do they do me in sharing with a Gentile? They do not know anything about the tribe of Benjamin.”
“But I need to share how I met that Christ on the road. That is what I will share.” You see, Christ became his mind.
Then Christ became his goal. I am sure Paul had several different goals before he was saved. What was his goal? I think from Philippians 3, we can surmise that his goal was for perfect acclaim to self-righteousness.
Now that is all in the dust. He found his goal as a Person, not an attainment. He is chasing after Christ—his goal.
And Christ is provision. How do you find out that Christ is the Lord who provides? In a time of need, for sure. Paul had his times of need.
He discovered, “Even when I am sick, I can still minister. Even with a stake in my side, by God’s grace, I can do anything through my provision.” It is not merely that Christ is my provider. He has gone beyond that. No, Christ is my provision.
“Okay, I need healing. Well, I am not healed, so I take Him as my healing.” You know, it was a very personal thing: Christ, my provision.
As our brother Ed shared this afternoon, all of these trials and crises in our lives bring us to the center of Christ: Christ, my life; Christ, my mind; Christ, my goal; Christ, my provision. It is not spiritual talk for Paul.
By God’s faithfulness and by the work of His Spirit, it becomes real to us as well.
Now, I want us to look, first of all, at eight circumstances that we can surmise in this letter to the Philippians where Paul had to wrestle in his mind to come to a Spirit-controlled contentment in situations that were over his head.
Our brother already shared on a few of them and sort of took the wind out of some of my message tonight, but he always does that. So I will just share what I can.
The first thing that we see in this letter, staring us right in the face, is that Paul was a prisoner.
Paul was a prisoner for a couple of years in Caesarea, which was in Israel. That was long enough. Then he was taken over to Rome through shipwrecks and ended up in Rome, sitting in a cell chained to a Roman soldier.
Why get on the altar every day and consecrate yourself when you are eating roasted mouse, and you only have this Roman soldier next to you, and the other disciples have fled? “Oh God, I give You my life as a living sacrifice today.” Would you do it in jail?
It could be pretty discouraging, especially since we know that some of his fellow servants left him after a while. Now he is just working this thing through himself.
I heard a great missionary and man of God named Norman Grubb when I was a young Christian. I heard him speak one time on “Christ is your life. Everything is Christ.”
I came up to him afterward and said, “Oh, brother, that is such a great thing. But when things come into my life that are problems, my mind takes a negative spin on things. How could you be so positive?”
He said, “You know, if you are a human being, you will take a negative spin on things. That is your initial reaction all the time. Trouble is an inconvenience, if nothing more. When something comes into your life, you always see a negative feel. That is just being human, and that is never going to change.”
“If you are a real person, when you have a problem that comes into your life, you do not say, ‘Oh boy!’”
Then he quoted James 1:2 from the Phillips translation. I cannot remember it exactly, but it says this:
When all kinds of trials and difficulties crowd into your life,
do not resent them as intruders;
welcome them as friends.
I said, “Oh man, how can you possibly do that?”
Paul had to wrestle over this imprisonment, especially as the days began to draw on. I suppose, and again I have to guess, that perhaps Paul’s weak spot in his mind was that he would be in jail because God was punishing him for persecuting Christians.
If there was any area where the devil would try to condemn Paul, the devil would immediately come to him in a crisis situation and say, “You see? You deserve it. God is finally letting justice fall. You persecuted Christians. You are no good, and God has put you on the sidelines.”
Do not think Paul did not have to wrestle with that. Do not think Paul was such a big person that he simply said, “Oh no, it could not be.” There was some point in Paul’s life where he really had to wrestle over this issue: “Is God doing this to me because I know I deserve it?”
Somehow, we find in 1 Timothy that he wrestled through this to the point where he realized God said, “No, Paul, you did it in ignorance. Paul, I am using you as an example of grace—how I can save a persecutor and make him a lover of Me.”
Paul came to resolution. You see, when a problem like prison comes, here is the problem with our mind when the “I” is sitting on there: our mind dwells on things. We steep in it.
“This is wrong. When am I getting out of here? Lord, what are You doing?” If our mind keeps doing this for two years, we will go crazy and be counting the cracks in the wall.
How do you resolve these things? Somehow, Paul brought this thing to the Lord and came to a resolution regarding his imprisonment. It is a simple twofold resolution.
Brothers and sisters, if you and I came to this resolution right now in our crisis, we would be halfway home to peace of mind.
Paul had to come to this place. I imagine that Paul, with his mind, even tried in the initial days to think about ways of getting out—claiming his Roman citizenship, sending papers out to people he had known, people who had been indebted to him, Sergius Paulus or some governor or something.
He probably thought, “I have to get out of here. I have a lot of important work to do. This church has to be built.” But then: “This is the will of God for me. I prayed. I said, ‘God, deliver me.’ He did not. This is the will of God for me, and there is nothing I can do about it”—that is, nothing I can do to get out.
At that point, he found peace. Paul began to say, “Well, what can I do while I am here?”
He began to make acquaintance with these Roman soldiers, which led to acquaintance with the Praetorian Guard, which led to acquaintances and preaching the gospel to Caesar’s household.
I love Philippians 4:22:
All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar’s household.
He found something to do. He was preaching the gospel, and some in Caesar’s household had been saved. Isn’t that wonderful?
He could have steeped in resentment and felt abandoned, but no—he became a witness where he was. Not only that, we know from Paul’s other letters the two other things he did.
First, from Colossians, we know that he would daily pray for the churches and spiritually wrestle for the churches and their growth as he received reports about things going on. He spent a good amount of time praying for the saints in the various churches. That kind of sped his days through.
Then he still had a little time to kill, so he said, “Well, what should I do? Maybe I will write a letter or two.”
Now I ask you, looking back on it, was Paul’s time wasted at all? We have the Bible because of Paul.
But for Paul, this issue had to be resolved. Until he had that resolved, he could not write letters and he could not witness. Do you know what I mean? When your whole thing has been turned upside down, until you take these things to God—be anxious for nothing, bring everything to Him with prayer and supplication, and then be thankful to Him—the peace of Christ rules your heart, and the will of God is found where you are.
You see, that is how the mind is renewed. He discovered he had a purpose even in prison.
When I think of all the years Brother Watchman Nee spent in prison, they seem like totally wasted years. I do not know the end of the issue, but there was prayer going on, and there were some things that happened even there that are bearing fruit even today.
Sometimes we get into situations that we think are a waste of time, but they are never a waste of time. It is the Lord doing something more deeply in our lives. That is very precious time.
The second problem is very self-evident here. We see it in Philippians 1:14-18:
Most of the brethren, trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment, have far more courage to speak the word of God without fear.
Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from good will.
The latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel;
the former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition rather than from pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment.
What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in this I rejoice.
Paul’s imprisonment caused some brothers to be raised up who perhaps had not been so clearly noticed before. With his imprisonment, these brothers were raised up and began to preach the gospel with greater anointing than they had before.
But then there were these others. We do not really know who they were, but the suspicion is that they were Judaizers who preached the gospel but added onto it: “Now, when you are saved, you have to be circumcised.”
When they found Paul was in prison, they not only went out preaching this Judaizing gospel, but somehow communicated back to the prison that they were preaching the real gospel—the Judaizing gospel: salvation and circumcision, something along that line.
They had probably read Paul’s letter to the Galatians, which was very powerful in defense of the gospel of grace without circumcision. Now they were putting in the screws, making Paul feel bad. It was a personal attack.
How was Paul going to deal with this thing? Again, he had to drum that around for a few days when he heard that report. By the time he wrote his letter, he said, “Well, praise God. Jesus Christ is being preached. I rejoice.”
How does he come to that? A personal attack, and that is his response. I am sure those Judaizers really felt deflated about that.
But what they misunderstood was this: Paul does not care for himself. His strong message to the Galatians was not because he was offended. It was for the defense of the gospel that he spoke so strongly.
If you are going to attack him and preach the gospel in such a way as to get him, you have nothing to touch. He does not care if his reputation is damaged. It is damaged already. He is in jail.
He did not consider himself of any account, but he surely was thankful that you could not stop the preaching of the gospel. So he said, “I rejoice.”
Do not tell me Paul did not have to get that thing worked right in his mind and renewed when a personal attack came. But he got the victory out on the other side.
The third thing we see is in Philippians 1:21-24. Paul had to face death squarely.
For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.
But if I am to live on in the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose.
But I am hard-pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better;
yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake.
Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy in the faith.
Death is the last enemy, and Paul had to face death. Of course, he had already faced it a number of times. Every time you face death and the Lord delivers you, it takes a little more of the sting of death out. Another stinger goes.
But now he was there, and the new Caesar was beginning to persecute Christians in Rome. The news was coming that things looked pretty grim. It was unlikely Paul was going to get a fair defense before Caesar. He had to face death very squarely.
The facing of death—sometimes in an illness or something—can cause sleepless nights. It causes wrestling. Let us not take lightly these crises that come into our life: the facing of realistic death when we hear we have cancer, things like that. It is something that has to be looked at. We try to hide from this, but no, you have to look at it.
Paul took this matter to the Lord. “Lord, I feel like I have fruitful service still to do. I am still young enough. I still have a heart to serve. But I am facing death right now. Lord, what is Your will? What do You want?”
“I just leave that with You, Lord. Nothing I can do. I wait to defend myself in front of Caesar. I leave the rest with You, Lord. What should I do? I have to face death now. It may be the end. Have I done everything I needed to do? Am I sure I am clear with You in everything?”
Somehow the Lord made it clear to him in the renewing of his mind, in this most wonderful passage that many of us find such consolation. He said, “To live is Christ; to die is gain.”
“What is my choice? If I die, I go to be with Christ. Oh, that is wonderful. If I live, I live for Christ, running after Him while I am here. That is wonderful. It is a win-win situation.”
Brothers and sisters, for us Christians, death is a win situation. How Paul saw that. We can talk the talk, but when you are facing death, you have to see that. And you know something? You will.
Paul was expecting the Lord to return while he was still alive. That was his hope. He was not looking forward to dying. Yet he had to face dying, and it was a win-win situation.
When he presented that and said, “Lord, it is a win-win situation. I want to be with You, and I also want to help the saints,” the Lord seemed to put a little impression in his heart: “You will get to help the saints.”
So he said, “I think the Lord is telling me I will get to see you again. I do not know, but I think so. Pray for me.”
The Lord did speak to him about that, that probably he would be released. We think probably he was, but we do not know for sure. But is it not wonderful how the Lord settles the mind and gives one peace even in the face of something as bad as death?
We come to the fourth difficulty, in Philippians 2:19-30:
I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly, so that I also may be encouraged when I learn of your condition.
For I have no one else of kindred spirit who will genuinely be concerned for your welfare.
For they all seek after their own interests, not those of Christ Jesus.
But you know of Timothy’s proven worth, that he served with me in the furtherance of the gospel like a child serving his father.
Therefore I hope to send him immediately, as soon as I see how things go with me;
and I trust in the Lord that I myself also will be coming shortly.
But I thought it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother and fellow worker and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger and minister to my need,
because he was longing for you all and was distressed because you had heard that he was sick.
We know the circumstance here. Paul does not make too much about it at this particular point, but when you work together serving the Lord with co-workers, and then they leave—it is difficult.
Paul was there for a while, and probably a number of them stayed there and helped. Timothy remained. Epaphroditus came later with some supplies. There were others who were there for a while, but eventually, as Paul said, they all had their own things to do, not really the work of the Lord.
When things got tough, they went back home, and they left him all alone.
I have seen workers faithfully serve, and nothing seems to get them so depressed as when there is a breakup among workers—some kind of disappointment.
For Paul, these were men in whom he had invested a lot of time, heart, and prayer—encouraging, helping, correcting. A lot of investment. But it was not merely the investment that made him say, “What a waste. I worked on so-and-so, and now they have gone back into the world.” It was that the family had been broken.
Whenever the Lord raises up such a team, the enemy is always trying to break it up so that we all suffer weakness, because we do not have the fullness we used to have. I am sure Paul was disappointed about it, even broken-hearted.
When you love somebody and they no longer want to be with you, it is a difficult thing.
But what was Paul’s response to the disappointment of the workers who abandoned him while he was in jail? It is incredible when you look at it, but his response was this: “These other men left before I had the opportunity to give them away.”
He said, “You know what? Timothy is like my son. I want to send him to you as soon as I can. I give him to you. And Epaphroditus—thank you for sending him here. He helped me out so much. Then he got sick and almost died.”
“Thank God he is better. I would have been so devastated if my brother had died. But I know you are concerned about him, so I want to send him to you immediately. Here he goes. He is taking the letter.”
You can see how he is. “That leaves me just with Timothy, and I am going to send Timothy just as soon as I can, because I am not here collecting my men. What I want to do is give them to you for your ministry.”
That is the way Paul felt. These other guys did not give him the chance; they took off.
Isn’t that marvelous? Paul was not looking to have his little group of guys who were his servants. He was finding opportunities to give them away. “Oh, I have to send Timothy out there. He is a good man. He has really been with me in heart. I send him out.”
What an attitude. You know he had to pray about that. Imagine giving away Timothy. “I want to give him away just as soon as I find out what is going to happen.” He needed somebody there, I am sure, to help him. But his heart was to give them all away. They were not his; they were the Lord’s.
Sometimes we have this thing in Christianity where people have their disciples. I think that causes a great mess in the church after a while. But Paul was quite clear: even though Timothy was like his son in the Lord, he gave him away.
He said, “No, no, he is not mine. He is yours. Here, here, here. He will tell you what has happened.” I think that is a renewed mind, do not you think? What a beautiful spirit Paul has.
Paul gets accused of not liking women, being against marriage, and all this. Paul is one of the most misunderstood men around. That is not at all what his exhortations regarding marriage and abstaining from marriage mean.
It has nothing to do with being against marriage. No, nothing to do with it. He is concerned that you and I serve the Lord with undistracted devotion. We need to know his heart.
This man does not do things for himself, or grind axes that are in his favor. He just wants the truth for us all.
Then in Philippians 3:2-4, we get the sense of yet another problem:
Beware of the dogs, beware of the evil workers, beware of the false circumcision;
for we are the true circumcision, who worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh,
although I myself might have confidence even in the flesh. If anyone else has a mind to put confidence in the flesh, I far more.
Paul says, “Now, if these circumcising Judaizers want to set up their credentials and show how Jewish they are, I could sit up here and give my credentials, and I can beat your credentials.”
He goes on to talk about being a Jew, a Hebrew, of the tribe of Benjamin, and a Pharisee under the Law. What credentials! He takes the sword out: “All right, you guys, you want to fight?”
Having pulled out the sword so everybody can see, he throws it down on the ground. “So that is the basis of who you are going to follow? You can go with them, but as for me, I will tell you my credential: I am running after Jesus.”
“I have decided all this stuff is refuse, that I might win Christ. Forget that sword. I am no King Saul. I am little Paul, running after a great Lord. Will you join me in the race?”
That is the true circumcision—those who do not boast in their credentials.
I believe this probably got as close to Paul’s flesh as anything could. He had quite a reputation. He was really quite an outstanding man before he gave it all up.
I do not know what this would be like in the United States, but it would be somebody who was an absolute superstar in Hollywood, then became governor of California, and then—well, and then he gives it all up.
He gives all the money away, gives all the reputation away, and says all that stuff was of the world. “I am running after Jesus because I found the goal of my life.”
When these guys came at him with this Jewish stuff, he knew how to wield the Jewish sword. But he did not, because he was not trying to win a battle and divide things.
In the end, he was a real example of those who put no trust in the flesh. “Come on, this is not the way to righteousness. I will show you the way to righteousness. I want to know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death. I am pressing on.”
Now there is a real soldier. I think the saints in Philippi were more inspired by that soldier than by the circumcision who came around wielding a sword. It is the Spirit, not the sword, that is the credential of the apostle Paul.
Then we come to circumstance number six, in Philippians 3:18-20. When we read these verses, we have read them enough that we do not immediately think about what Paul is saying.
For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ,
whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things.
For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ;
who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.
Brothers and sisters, could we talk about this soberly for a moment? He is talking about Christians who have become enemies of the cross of Christ. Their lives are lived completely by the flesh. They are running after money, success, and the things of this world. Their interest is in accumulating the most toys.
Paul says that weeping. Paul’s heart desires that all Christians understand that their citizenship is in heaven.
Paul understands that people need things. You have families and everything. But the whole point is that if you are seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, these things are added to you. But if you are seeking after those things, he weeps.
Brothers and sisters, you and I may not be so disposed to weep now, but it is a sad state that many true believers live completely for themselves. It is a burden to the Lord, and it should be a burden to us.
Paul says these things weeping. He is not mad at them. He is not trying to get back at them. He is not talking about the backslidden church while we are the remnant going forward. “Never mind them.” No, his heart is weeping for such people, living completely for this life.
As Jesus said, if you live for this life, you lose the reward of the kingdom in the next life. But our citizenship—actually, I like the translation, “our kingdom”—is in heaven. We eagerly wait, and we serve and live for the coming of that kingdom.
Paul had to deal with this continually within the church. Sometimes we think the early church was the perfect church. Already, by this time, around 60 A.D., there were Christians who were saved and said, “Well, praise God, I am saved. I am under the blood. I am forgiven. I am going to heaven when I die. I am going to live completely for myself the rest of my life.”
It seems impossible to say, but in fact, this is reality.
May we weep—and not only weep, but especially if you have somebody in your family or somebody where you work who is one of these casual Christians, pray for them. Share the Lord with them. Sometimes they just have not tasted and seen that the Lord is good.
They have just heard that little gospel of salvation, and they have a Christ that big, as our brothers shared. One thing I love about Brother Ed is that he and I speak at a men’s retreat once a year in the spring.
All these men get into bunk beds and do not sleep all weekend. By about two or three days, they are very malleable—you know, crying and weeping. What Ed always does is come and share Christ. He tries to share a bigger Christ with many men who are successful businessmen, primarily from the Maryland area.
You know what? They have never met a bigger Christ, because in their church they have heard some little guy. When they hear the bigger Guy, it is amazing. Some of these people who are living completely for the world become so hungry for the Lord.
It is a wonderful thing to see, is it not? It is absolutely transforming. Men say, “Well, this is life. This is what life is all about. I never knew.” Many Christians who are just living for the world have never heard anything else.
May the Lord help us and encourage all the brothers and sisters. It is so wonderful to come and be among people like this morning, when we sang “Maranatha.” We believe it.
That is so wonderful—to be assembled with people who believe Jesus is coming back soon. Oh, I am constrained to believe there are many other believers who, if they only knew the truth, would join and swell and sing these hymns along with us.
May we be faithful as those citizens of heaven, to show the better way even upon this earth.
Number seven: in Philippians 4:2-3, our brother mentioned this in some detail regarding Euodia and Syntyche—translated “Sweetie” and “Lucky,” as I call them. “Good odor” and “good luck” are their names there.
I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to live in harmony in the Lord.
Indeed, true yoke-fellow, I ask you also to help these women who have shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel, together with Clement also and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.
We do not know what the problem was between Euodia and Syntyche, but I can tell you this: it pales as little, if nothing, compared to the preciousness of the bonding and oneness of being yoked together in the gospel.
When you serve the Lord together with somebody, there is something the Lord does in putting you together.
When a situation develops, and probably the church at Philippi developed somewhat as a group and grew, perhaps they were arguing over pre-tribulation rapture or mid-tribulation rapture. Probably not a doctrine. Probably the way things were done.
Sweetie liked to do things sort of as the Lord leads. Lucky liked to do things like that. We do not really know. But whatever they were, they were small matters compared with the largeness of us being one together in the gospel.
So Paul says, “Look, sisters, you are bigger than that. Do not you see how precious it is to serve together in the gospel? There is no higher calling than to serve together in the gospel, and you were absolutely one with me in that.”
“Stand on the bigger ground, and let us settle those differences. Clement, come on, help them here. Help them. It is obviously something they think is big, and their minds will wrestle over it and they are struggling over it. But it is nothing compared to working together in the gospel.”
Brothers and sisters, we will have differences in every assembly we are part of. There are many differences we have because of temperament, background, teaching, and all kinds of things.
We always have to resort back to the fact that we are one in the Spirit by the grace of the Lord. We need to maintain that oneness. There is a common denominator: we are one in Christ.
When all these other things start to separate us, we need to come back to that common ground. We are one together by the blood of the Lamb. We have been bought together, we are owned together, and we are one together.
Many times we are tried as assemblies along this very line. Are you going to separate over some truth, over some experience, or are you going to stand as one?
Paul tries to help these brothers and sisters look higher and sense the unity. Can you imagine these sisters out there in the street? Paul is preaching the gospel, and these sisters are handing out tracts, preaching, leading people to the Lord, working, and seeing God do miraculous things.
They were so one together. I mean, when Euodia stopped, Syntyche started. What a team God had forged. Oh, let us not be divided over little things. The Lord has put together something wonderful there. Paul was trying to keep them in awareness of that.
Then one more thing: in Philippians 4:10-13.
My point in mentioning all of these is that when we go through trials, we have to bring them to the Lord. Otherwise, if our mind dwells on them, oh, how foul things can get. What a darkness can come over us. What a sense of abandonment.
What would this do to you if you were out there serving the Lord and got stuck in some far-off place, or even thrown in jail? It seems like you are out of sight and out of mind.
But I rejoiced in the Lord greatly, that now at last you have revived your concern for me; indeed, you were concerned before, but you lacked opportunity.
Not that I speak from want, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am.
I know how to get along with humble means, and I also know how to live in prosperity;
in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need.
I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
The young churches Paul had been to—many times he had gone and worked with his own hands, preached the gospel, and gone on from place to place—were young. Many of them did not have a sense of responsibility for the larger work.
Most of them were poor; many of them were slaves. They met together in their towns—Thessalonica, Berea, and so forth—and were concerned with helping their own and the situations of their local fellowship.
When Paul got far away from those cities, he was forgotten. Well, he was not forgotten. I am sure they prayed for him in the prayer meeting. But many times younger churches are not so sensitive to the larger work.
Paul got out there, and when he got into prison, he did not have anything of his own, so to speak. It put him through some tough times. He went through some days when he probably did not eat. He did not have anything.
Then somebody would come with a package, or Timothy had gone out and caught a chicken or something. They would eat a little bit, eat okay for a while, and then there would be another little time.
Finally, a package came with Epaphroditus from Philippi. It had his favorite kind of chocolates, some money for food, a blanket, and the love of the saints from Philippi.
Paul says, “You know what? I am almost drunk with love because of your kindness to me. I am overflowing with joy and thanksgiving.”
But rather than be bitter and say, “I am so glad you are helping me, because the rest of them, I would like to kick them,” he says, “Since you have given to me, can I just share with you? I have learned a secret.”
“In your life and my life, we will go through times of plenty, and we will go through times of want. Sometimes God allows want in our life—lack.”
When Paul says, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” he does not mean, “I can be rich all the time if I have faith.” You know, the faith teachings say you should buy a Cadillac or Mercedes-Benz to prove that God is your supply.
Paul knew how to walk from place to place and occasionally have cab fare. But he learned a secret.
For somebody who serves the Lord, inevitably we learn the secret. We are always looking to people for supply and everything. Sometimes a raven comes in, and sometimes no supply comes in. Somewhere along the line, when you are praying, “God, provide my daily bread,” this secret comes across.
It is this: I survive whether it is want or abundance. Abundance or want is not a mark of my doing the will of God. It is not a sign of whether I am a success or a failure.
“I have found out I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. As long as I know it is His will, I just continue on. Sometimes it is through adversity.”
Commonly, as Christians, we have this thing: “Okay, if a door opens, it must be the Lord.” You know, “I am only making sixty thousand dollars a year on this job. Now a guy has offered me a job, and he lives in Timbuktu. I do not know any fellowship in Timbuktu. I do not know anybody there, but it is eighty thousand. If the door opens, it must be God’s will.”
Wrong.
Sometimes God would say, “If you want to serve Me, you need to stay where you are, not take that promotion.” It sounds strange to American ears, you see. Even now, somebody is saying, “What did Pentecost mean?”
On the other side, sometimes when we run into adversity, we say, “Oh, this cannot be the Lord’s will. Look at all the problems that have come up.”
“I said, ‘Let’s get together and have a prayer meeting in my house,’ and suddenly everything goes wrong with your house. Problems come up, appointments come up, you get a second job at night, and all kinds of things.”
You say, “This cannot be the will of God. I must have made a mistake.” But sometimes we do the will of God through great adversity.
The secret is not adversity, success, open doors, or tough times. It is the will of God. “I can do all things through Christ.” He is my provision.
You cannot stop me by need, and you cannot stop me by abundance, because Christ has become my provision. There is a wonderful lesson.
Actually, I had two more sets of eights that I was going to bring up here, but I do not think we have time for them. One was to think on those things mentioned in Philippians 4:8-9. Our brother already shared that this morning.
One other thing, maybe I can give you as a homework assignment of your own. Paul not only sees in Philippians that Christ is his life, Christ is his mind, Christ is his goal, and Christ is his provision; he also sees that Christ is very near.
His life is lived in the light of Christ’s soon coming. In eight passages in the book of Philippians, there is reference to Christ’s soon coming. Is that not wonderful?
There is a renewed mind. We set our clock. You ready? Set your watches. “My Christ is coming soon. Be faithful. He is coming soon. Let the gentleness of your spirit be known to all men. He is coming soon.”
Read those passages and see: Paul is full of a sense that Christ is very near, even at the doors. Everything we do should be marked by the expectancy of Christ’s soon coming.
Now there is a mind that is renewed.
What is spiritual-mindedness? It is having the Holy Spirit captivating these thoughts to the obedience of Christ. When you are languishing in prison, you think on the true, the noble, and the good rather than thinking on the times you are missing and the friends you are missing.
When your mind is set on Christ, it can be clear. It can be disciplined. You come to the place where you can set your mind on a matter, take it off, and set your mind on something else.
But this takes a discipline of the Holy Spirit, a renewing in our lives. It is something He will do for everybody who, in good faith and with a good heart, comes and says, “Lord, I present myself a living sacrifice.”
“Oh, take my life. Take my mind. Check it out. When You lead me through circumstances, I am not going to think anything was just a circumstance. It is Your hand teaching me a little lesson, a valuable lesson, a place where I need to trust You more.”
Oh Lord, as we come to You and see Paul’s testimony, we realize that it is by the grace of God that You gave him such a mind. It is not the genius of his mind that amazes us; it is the transformation of his mind.
He could take these very difficult crises and see Your hand in them.
Oh Lord, in the days ahead, in whatever we go through in terms of our life, our health, our fellowship, our jobs, and our families, give us the wisdom, as we come to these difficulties, to come before You.
Teach us not to be anxious, but to take these things and pray, placing them in Your hands with thanksgiving, and finding that peace as You resolve and show us what You are trying to do.
We thank You, Lord, that Your plans for us are plans of glory. Your plans for us are plans of transformation. So, Lord, we place our lives in Your hands with that confidence. You know what You are doing.
Where we are is the will of God right now, unless You tell us differently. There is nothing we can do about it. So teach us how to be Your people where we are.
We pray in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.