Philippians 2:1-4
Matt Rawlings
· When I was a kid, our family used to go on long car rides
– and by long, I mean very long. I had a great childhood, we were a close
family, and we really loved each other. But there is nothing like a very long
car ride to challenge siblings love. I remember one particular trip that our
family took all the way to Oklahoma. My dad got the great idea of driving 24
hours straight, with my mom driving about an hour or two during the trip. The
idea was that we would all sleep and it would be harmonious. It was a good
idea, but the problem is, there were 6 of us crammed into a little Mazda
station wagon. It challenged everyone. We all had to really work to have good
attitudes. Everything from where we ate to what we did and sang and said was an
opportunity for conflict. It took a lot of effort to get along and when we did,
it was a source of great joy for my parents. When we didn’t, it was not a fun
trip.
·
In the Christian walk, we’ve all been made a part of an
adopted family that is very different.
· We are a different church, full of many
different kinds of people.
o
Differences in preference
o
Differences in background
o
Differences in status
o
Differences in homes and what we have
o
Differences in jobs
o
Differences in temperaments
o
Differences in our families
o
Disagreements – legitimate and sinful
o
Different agendas
· But, we are united by something powerful. More
powerful than any other brotherhood, fraternity or sorority. More powerful than
the fact that we are all descendents of Adam and all members of the human race.
· If you are a Christian, we are united because we
have become members of God’s chosen race, the people of Jesus Christ. The bond
that we have in Christ Jesus is unbreakable, because He is the unbreakable One
who has made us His own.
o
No matter what affiliation you hold dear, we
have a deeper more meaningful affiliation – we are brothers and sisters in
Christ Jesus.
o
Once we were not a people but now, we belong to
God’s royal priesthood.
o
We are a part of the most significant nation -
the holy nation of God.
o
We have an eternal kingdom and we a people for
His own possession that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called us
out of darkness and into His marvelous light.
o
Once we had not received mercy, but now, we have
received mercy.
o
God has poured out His love into our hearts.
o
We have experienced the tenderness and
compassion of Jesus.
· All of these things that unite us are what
really matters and these things are most important as we relate to each other.
· In our long car ride together as a family, our
awareness of what we had been given, our awareness of how good we had it, our
awareness of the blessings we had and our common bond as a family shaped (or
should have shaped) how we related to each other. Even though we were tempted
to disunity, we were united by these things.
· As fellow Christians, our church is bound
together as adopted brothers and sisters – a family – that has received much in
common. What the verses we read earlier in Philippians are saying is that even
though we will be tempted to disunity and division, we are to...
“So if
there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation
in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy...”
1. Live worthy of what you’ve received
· The “so” at the beginning of
the verse can also be translated as “therefore” and it points back to the
beginning of Paul’s thought, when he wrote: “Only let your manner of life be worthy
of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent,
I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind
striving side by side for the faith of the gospel...” (Philippians 1:27)
· If verse 27 was translated literally, it might
read, “Only behave, as citizens, worthy of the gospel.” So, what we have
received as citizens of His kingdom, as those who have been made a part of the
body of Christ by the good news of Jesus Christ, is more than we could ever
deserve.
· We are fellow citizens, joint heirs. And Paul is
telling us that as fellow citizens, as fellow members of God’s family, we have
received much.
· The “if there is” at the beginning of verse 1 in
chapter 2 should be read as “if, as is certainly the case” or
“since there is”. And what Paul is telling us is that since these things are
true, since these four things are true about every Christian, we should live
worthy of what we’ve received.
· He tells us in verse 1 of chapter 2, four things
that we’ve received – four things that we are to live worthy of – not to earn,
but in response to what we’ve received...
a. We have received Encouragement
in Christ
· Sin is the ultimate discourager. Sin condemns.
Sin tells us of our guilt.
·
But in Christ, we have received the ultimate encouragement
of knowing that our sins have been forgiven.
· Condemnation has been removed. Our guilt has
been taken away completely in Christ Jesus.
b. We have received Comfort
from God’s love
· Once you and I were haters of God and far from
God. But God chose to love us and draw us near to Him and His love is the
ultimate comfort.
· When people around us reject us and don’t accept
us, we find comfort in knowing that He loves us and He accepts us completely. God
has accepted all that Jesus did and credited it all to us, so that we don’t
earn His love at all, because Jesus earned His love for us.
c. We have received Participation
in the Holy Spirit
·
Everyone who has placed their trust in Jesus and
has been born again, has been given the gift of the Holy Spirit.
·
The first way that we participate in the Spirit
is that the Spirit makes us alive, and then the Spirit of God comes to live in
us and be with us continually.
·
We have received participation in the Holy
Spirit.
d. We have received Affection
and Sympathy
· God doesn’t just
choose to love us. He sets His affections on us. And we know from Hebrews that
Jesus Himself sympathizes with us in our weaknesses.
· What marvelous gifts we have been given as
fellow members of God’s family.
· We have received encouragement
in Christ, comfort from the love of God, and participation in the Holy Spirit.
· These things mirror 2
Corinthians 13:14, where it says, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and
the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
· There has been a great activity of the whole Trinity to
bring about our salvation and make it so that we are now “in Christ”. Because of
this, we experience the comforts of God’s love and the reality of the
fellowship that we have because of the Spirit’s work to recreate us and now
live in us.
· As a church, we are taking time aside from going through
a book of the Bible for a few weeks to focus on a mini-series entitled Living at Peace Together, as Disciples in
Community. The reason we are focusing on this is because one of the most
evident fruits of being a disciple of Jesus is that it changes how we relate to
others.
· And what Paul is telling us is that since these things
are true, since these four things are true about every Christian, we should
live worthy of what we’ve received. And these things are the foundation for our
unity, the foundation of the peace we are to pursue with one another as we seek
to live our lives out in the community He has called us to.
2. Be united for the sake of joy
“Complete my joy by being of the same mind,
having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.”
· As Christians, we aren’t called to be united
around our preferences, or united around our opinions, or even united around
our causes. Paul tells us that we are called to be of the same mind, having the
same love, to be in full accord or agreement and to be of one mind or purpose.
a. Be of the same mind
· For all of you star-trek fans, it is not that somehow we
are now part of the Borg collective and we all hear each other's thoughts as
part of the collective – that’s not it.
· We don’t all somehow remove our brains and stop thinking
for ourselves – instead we are to be of the same intent and disposition.
o
We are to have the same intent on seeing the gospel of
Jesus Christ define who we are and how we live.
o
We are to all have the same disposition that seeks to
grow in Him
o
And we are all to have the same intent of making
disciples.
b. Having the same love
· We have all received the love of God in Jesus
Christ. And we are all to have this same kind of love that Jesus has for us
towards each other.
· We possess the same kind of love together and we
are to be having the same kind of love towards each other.
· Someone once said, “love begins when someone
else’s needs are more important than my own”.
c. Be in full accord
· We are to agree on what is important.
· We have many differences and preferences.
o
Some of you may watch Downton Abbey on TV, while
others think Duck Dynasty is the greatest, and still others don’t believe in
watching TV because it will rot your brain.
o
Some of you like Classical Music and think that
it is the only kind of godly music. Some of you like metal, some like rap, some
like indie music, some like jazz, and some like instrumental guitar.
o
Some of you think that everyone should send
their kids to public school, some think that private school is the only way to
go, and others think that only homeschooling is right.
o
Some like spicy, ethnic foods and some like meat
and potatoes only.
o
Some of you think that Jane Eyre-type movies are
the best, while others think that movies like the Avengers are the only worthy
films.
o
Some like modern art, where there are colors
splashed on a canvas, while others prefer Rembrandt.
o
Some really love digging into their ancestry and
some love highlighting their ethnicity.
· All of these things are fine and permissible for
Christians. It is ok for us to have preferences. But none of these things are
to divide us or separate us from fellowship. And none of these preferences are
the source of our unity.
· Thankfully, all of these are not the things that
we are to be in full accord on. We are to be in full agreement on what the
gospel is. We are to be in full agreement that God has called us to live worthy
of the gospel.
d. Be of one mind/purpose
· He wants you, with everything that you are, to
be set on the same thing. Like a laser-guided missile, we are to be focused on
one purpose.
· And what is that one purpose? The one purpose is
to see the kingdom of God come.
· The same purpose we are called to is to be
disciples who are growing and making disciples. The same purpose is the purpose
of the gospel message – to bring all things in subjection to Jesus Christ – to
see Jesus Christ exalted above everyone and everything else.
· Unity is the natural by-product of understanding
and being affected by the gospel. But it does not come automatically – it must
be cultivated, practiced and pursued with effort. We must seek to be united in
the same mind, the same love, and to be in full accord and of one mind. Unity
begins with each of us changing the way we think and the way we feel.
· If we are not united in the same mind, if we
don’t have the same love, if we are not in full accord and of one mind, we will
have disunity, discord, disharmony, and we will lack joy – but most of all, we
will be displeasing to God.
· Be of the same mind… of one mind… think the same
thing about the truth. Being like-minded is to have a shared disposition toward
something or a certain way of thinking. There is a unity of purpose and
disposition that we are called to.
· It is unity of the gospel and our heavenly
citizenship – it does not mean having the same opinions about everything but it
does mean agreeing on what is most important – the unity that we have in Christ
Jesus that we receive through applying the good news about Jesus Christ.
· What tempts us to disunity? Rivalry,
competition, one-upmanship and pride, they all tempt us to disunity.
· So, Scripture cuts like a knife and calls us to,
“Do
nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant
than yourselves.”
3. Be united by pursuing humility
· Unity and harmony
like this can only be attained if we reject all self-seeking and self-interest
and instead count others as more important than ourselves in the way that we
think, feel, and act.
· But God knows that we are all tempted by selfish
motivations, so He had Paul write “Do nothing from rivalry" – or do
nothing from selfish ambition.
a. Don’t be motivated by rivalry/selfish ambition
· Selfish ambition or rivalry is to do things out of envy.
· Selfish ambition is at the very core of our fallenness as
humans.
· It is seeking our worth in who we are, instead of who
Jesus is.
b. Don’t be motivated by conceit (your own glory)
· Conceit is thinking too highly of ourselves
o
Seeking our own glorification
o
Seeking to draw attention to ourselves and make ourselves
out to be great
o
Seeking to get credit, seeking to be noticed
o
Seeking our worth in what we do
· This is a great enemy of humility and a great cause for
disunity and division.
“The truly humble show themselves by resting their case
with God rather than trusting their own strength and machinations.” -Gordon Fee
c. Count others as more significant than yourself
· Counting others as more significant than yourself doesn’t
mean that you aren’t as worthwhile as they are. But it does mean that you count
the needs of others and the care of others as a more significant priority than yourself.
· The pattern of treating each other with humility is the
humility of Jesus Christ.
4. Be united by pursuing the good of others
“Let each of you look
not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”
· You already naturally look out for your own
interests. Now, look out for the interests of others.
o "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law
of Christ." (Galatians 6:2)
o "All things are lawful, but not all things are
helpful. All things are lawful, but not all things build up. Let no one seek
his own good, but the good of his neighbor."
(1 Corinthians 10:23-24)
o “…It does not
insist on its own way…” (1 Corinthians
13:5)
· “a distinguishing mark of love is that it is not
self-seeking” – O’Brien
· Look out for, notice, keep your eyes on, fix
your attention on the interests of others.
· This implies effort – to be aware of and pursue
the interests of others – not that you don’t have any interests, but that you
count their interests as more significant for the sake of Jesus Christ.
Live worthy of what you’ve received, united through pursuing
humility, and the interests of others.
Church, our goal isn’t uniformity but it is a real unity
that isn’t based on where we come from, or the color of our skin, or the money
in our bank accounts, or the car we drive, or the preferences we have, or
thankfully, what sports team we follow – even if you root for Michigan, that
shouldn’t affect our unity. We have a unity we have been given in Jesus Christ. We share
the same love and we participate together in the Holy Spirit. These are the
things that should govern our relationships with each other. These are the foundational things that are the basis for
living at peace with each other. These are the things we want to build on and
by God’s grace we will - Amen!
