Pressing On: Part II

Introduction

When I was 9 years old I remember standing outside of my mother’s Pontiac Firebird at a rest stop with a large unfolded, paper map. Back in the olden days, this is how you navigated across states. When you left the familiar streets of your town and started to travel the highways you needed a paper map.

I remember seeing all the crossed lines and small printed alpha numeric codes indicating different roads and thinking, “I’m glad I don’t have to figure this out.” I also remember thinking, “We’re kinda like pirates.”

If we were going to get from North Carolian to Georgia then we needed to travel the right path.

Last week we began working through our larger passage of Philippians 3:12-21. And we focused on I. The Right Path in last weeks sermon.

Today we are going to finish the passage in verses 18-21 as we look at the II. Dangerous Detour and III. The Prize We Press On For.

But before we continue on in the passage let’s recap what we learned last week.

I reminded you that in verses 12-17 Paul was essentially giving us trail blazes—markers to help us see the right path and avoid taking a dangerous detour.

And those blazes were: Shortly:

The Right Path is marked by humility. Like Jesus we are humble before others and our God. We don’t look to ourselves to know the right way. We look to God’s word and to Godly examples. We measure our steps as we follow Christ by these good helps that God has provided for us.

Also, walking the right path does not mean that we have a passive Christianity, but like Paul we aggresively chase after Jesus, boldly walking in his footsteps.

Walking the Right Path means forgetting the past and straining toward the future. We forget and neglect the past passions of the dead men and women that we used to be. We move away from taking pleasure in our sins. And when it doesn’t pervert justice we forget our past regrets because the power of them has been killed by the more powerful cross of Jesus Christ.

And we finished last week seeing that walking the Right Path means seeking to imitate godly examples and seeking to be godly examples who can be imitated.

That’s what we covered last week. If you want to hear those points teased out more you can find all our sermons on our website and our YouTube page.

But now as we turn to the rest of our passage let’s read it first.

Philippians 3:18–21 ESV

For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.

Let’s pray.

II. The Dangerous Detour (18-19)

Having laid out for us the the markers of the Right Path, Paul now turns his attention to those who are no longer walking on that Path but have turned to take the dangerous detour.

And I want to warn us here. The Bible gives us warnings to stay the path, to not stray away.

Proverbs 4:14-15 “Do not enter the path of the wicked, and do not walk in the way of the evil. Avoid it; do not go on it; turn away from it and pass on.”

Hebrews 2:1 “Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it.”

Matthew 7:13 ““Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.”

Friends, I don’t for one second believe that someone who is saved can lose their salvation. That is a misunderstanding of scripture where the power of salvation is rooted in our ability to keep it instead of rightly in the power of our God to accomplish it.

So why then is God warning believers who can’t lose their salvation to stay on the path that they can’t leave?

Friends, these warnings are real warnings for believers. Take them seriously. God means for you to see them, be warned by them, and when necessary to adjust the direction you are walking on so that you remain on The Right Path.

These warnings are the means that God uses to keep His people walking correctly. That has always been one purpose of His Word. To Instruct His people in the ways of righteousness.

So as we begin looking at the characteristics of those who are walking on the wrong path let you and I take them seriously and where we see them in ourselves—let us heed the warning and adjust our steps.

Philippians 3:18-19a “For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction...”

Many of us think that if we were in trouble—if we took a detour off of the Right Path of following Christ that we would be immediately aware of it—but the subtleness of the transition is what makes the detour so dangerous. It’s why the Bible is filled with warnings.

The first part of verse 19 says that the end of this path is destruction.

If people knew they were headed for destruction they would, surely, get off the path that they are on. No one, knowingly conntinues down a path that ends in a deadly drop.

Imagine that you were hiking through the woods and in Robert Frost-Ian fashion you came to place where the path divided. And now imagine that I was there and I could tell you what lie on both paths.

And as you inquired about the path to the right I said this path is full of hardship. There are some splendor filled views but there are also some really low valleys. There is pain and toil here on this path and sometimes it feels as if you can’t take another step.

And as you asked about the path to the left I said, “Well this path is a pleasant climb all the way to the top and frequently there are vistas and that will amaze your senses. There are some valleys, but usually there’s an elevator, a quick escape from the pain of climbing. This path is very comfortable.

Which path would you want to hike?

Now imagine that before you started on your trails. I said, “There’s one more thing. You need to know that this more comfortable path on the left ends in a fatal drop that no one escapes from. In fact most people drop off the deadly cliff completely unaware that their next step leads to certain death.”

But this path on the right always leads to glory. It leads to everlasting happiness and the complete fulfillment of your whole being.”

Now which path would you choose? Right.

Every person knowing and believing the words of this guide would always choose the harder path that ends in glory over the easier path that leads to certain death.

No one knowingly walks to their death.

Philippians 3:18-19 “For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction...”

Paul has tears for these people who formerly he would have called brothers and sisters until they revealed themselves to be “enemies of the cross”.

Charles Spurgeon wrote on this very passage and said,

“Paul had to complain that, even in the church at Philippi, which was about as good as any, and in some respects much better than most of the churches, there were false teachers, and false-living men, who professed to be followers of Christ, but who were in fact the worst enemies of the cross of Christ.”

Paul has tears for these people because they are people in the church claiming Jesus by the words of their mouths, but denying Him by the testimony of their lived lives. He is in tears becasue these people think they are walking on the Right Path plodding down the dangerous detour, that leads to destruction, in opposition of the cross.

In 1 Corinthians 4:20 Paul reminds the Corinthians to examine their own lives and the lives of those they look to as leaders. He says, “The Kingdom of God does not consist in talk but in power.”

Translation: The lives of true believers is evidenced by the power of God in them. They don’t just talk the talk but they are walking the walk. We are called to be doers and not hearers only.

So now as we look at the rest of verse 19 let us see the markings of someone who is on the wrong path.

Philippians 3:19Philippians 3:19 “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.”

The first marker we see is that...

1. They are Driven by their Fleshly Desires.

Paul says their god is their belly. What does that mean?

Well have you ever been grocery shopping on an empty stomach? If you have a list you aren’t sticking to it.

The idea here is that the “hungers of the flesh” is the “god” that these people are led by and submitting to.

Their guide is not the scriptures which call us to deny the flesh, but the flesh which becomes the lens by which they interpret the scriptures.

Where the flesh wants something that scripture prohibits they deny the word or twist it to make it say what they want it to. They teach an easy, commitment free, gospel that says freedom in the gospel is freedom from feeing guilty about sin. Let me give you an example.

A famous false teacher with a huge church, radio program, and multiple best selling books writes about Genesis 3 and says that when God comes to Adam and Eve in the garden after they had sinned he is not most concerned about their sin, but that God is most concerned with how Adam and Eve felt.

They sin against God and they realize that they are naked. God comes to them and says, “Where are you?” And they reply, “We were afraid becasue we were naked so we hid.” God says, “Who told you that you were naked?”

The focus of Genesis 3 is that humanity has sinned against God and there are deadly consequences for Adam/Eve and all their seed. And the real star of Genesis 3 is verse 15 where God gives the first promise of the gospel.

But this false teacher says that God was most concerned about how Adam and Eve felt. He writes in one of his books saying,

“Back in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, they hid. In the cool of the day, God came to them and said, ‘Adam, Eve, where are you?’ They said, ‘God, we were hiding because we were naked.’

I love the way God answered them. He said, ‘Adam, who told you that you were naked?’ In other words, who told you that something was wrong with you? God immediately knew that the enemy had been talking to them.

God is saying to you today, Who told you that you don’t have what it takes to succeed?

Who told you that something is wrong with you? There isn’t anything wrong with you. This is the message that this false teacher pulls from Genesis 3. He takes a story about the evil and death of sin and turns it into a feel good message about how God says nothing is wrong with you and you can succeed at whatever you want.

This is the kind of false teacher we’re talking about. In Romans 16 Paul talks about them in a similar fashion as he does here in Philippians.

Romans 16:18 “For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.”

The premier desire of the belly, of the flesh, is to be justified in our sins. To feel ok about the wrong things we do.

I have had personal conversations with people who have left the faith because the sin that they loved was rejected by the Bible. Instead of fight their sin they chose to reject God so that they could feel okay about their sinful life.

And then you have teachers like this who say, “There’s nothing wrong with you. Don’t listen to the enemy. God made you the way that you are. And he wants you to be true to yourself and to follow your heart.”

These are all direct quotes from his writings.

Now what does this have to do with you and I? How is this a warning to us?

You probably, I hope you aren’t, consuming this false teacher’s garbage. His name is Joel Osteen.

But the same temptation this false teacher offers is one that we face too.

If you’re honest—have you ever caught yourself thinking, “Man, I wish this wasn’t a sin.”

That’s a dangerous place to be. That’s wrong thinking. That reveals that we really want to sin, but know that we shouldn’t.

That’s us looking off the right path and thinking, “man that detour looks pretty good.”

How do we recognize and fight this? By consuming right doctrine and teaching based off of God’s words.

Friends if we eat the nourishing food that God offers us—the junk food of the world doesn’t seem very appealing—when we are full of His word, and the sacraments, when we are full of the fellowship of the church—the temptations of our flesh are not all that tempting.

The second characteristic of those walking on the wrong path is...

2. They Celebrate What God Says is Sin

You can see how these are related.

Philippians 3:19 “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.”

Paul says they “glory in their shame”.

This is simple. What they should be ashamed of they celebrate.

There is a church in the South End of London called St. Marks and this church hosts an annual drag Queen event for children. The goal is to normalize and celebrate what God’s word says is wrong.

Unfortunately, St. Marks isn’t the only group of people who claim to follow God while rejecting the very Word that He inspired.

In our culture, sexuality, is where we see the most of this second marker, celebrating sin.

We see many professing followers of Jesus who will embrace deviant forms of sexuality. Sex is for the marriage bed between a man and a woman. Period. That’s what God’s word teaches. Everything else is a sin.

But many churches, and increasingly more, take it as a badge of honor to fly the rainbow flag and say, “We embrace those who embrace the LGBTQ+ agenda. And God does too!”

Let me be clear, we are not called to hate those who have SSA or those who are tempted to reject their gender or those who believe that sex should be free and flowing outside of marriage. We are called to love them by rightly telling them the truth.

I’ve been reading in Jeremiah lately in my own time with God in the Word.

Jeremiah 8:11 “They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”

Here God is talking about the leaders in Israel during the prophet Jeremiah’s time.

God raises Jeremiah up because Israel has their belly as their god. The nation has become one that worships false gods alongside of Yahweh in His temple. They embrace sin and call it good.

And God is upset with the teachers and leaders and he charges them saying

Jeremiah 8:11 “They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying, ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”

Like bad doctors they say, “Your wound is healed when it really isn’t. You have peace with God when they really don’t.”

If we really love our neighbors then with much grace and mercy and humility we will tell them that they do not have peace with God—that if they continue embracing and celebrating sin they can only expect judgment from God.

If we really love them we will introduce them to the one they were really made to love.

Those who are on the wrong path follow their fleshly desires and celebrate sin making no excuse for it and...

3. Think in a worldly way.

Philippians 3:19 “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.”

Again we see how these go together. They are successive steps on the dangerous detour.

You can tell that you are probably in danger of leaving the right path if you look for your wisdom everywhere but the Bible.

If you put more faith in Psychology Today than the Bible something is wrong.

If your enneagram is a better tool for understanding yourself, rather than scripture, something is wrong.

If you’d rather hear from Oprah than Paul, something is wrong.

Friends, Paul is warning us here to examine our lives and see. Am I being led by my flesh or God? Am I rejecting any teaching of God’s word. Am I actually using God’s word to support sin? Do I neglect the Word and look to the world for my thinking?

Friends where we see these things in our lives the call is for you and I to kill these things. To put them to death and to return to the right path that follows Jesus.

Transition: Last week we saw what the right path looks like, this morning we’ve seen the markings of the wrong path, and before we end In our passage this morning Paul wants to remind us of...

III. The Prize We Press On For (20-21)

Philippians 3:20-21 “But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.”

Sometimes when we are on the right path we think that all there is to this existence is the valleys and the hard climbs.

But Paul wants us to be aware that we are citizens of a heavenly kingdom where God himself is the king.

Friends, we need the reminder that this broken place is not our home. The deadly effects of sin do not last forever.

This path that we are on that follows Jesus doesn’t end in destruction—it ends in a heavenly kingdom where we are already citizens.

There’s a scene in Lord of the Rings where Gandalf and Pippin are facing almost immanent death. And Pippin says to Gandalf, “I didn’t think it would end this way.”

Gandalf replies, “End? No, the journey doesn’t end here. Death is just another path, one that we all must take. The grey rain curtain of this world rolls back and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it.” Enamored, Pippin says, “What? Gandalf? See what?

“White shores, and beyond, a far green country under a swift sunrise.”

“Well that isn’t so bad”, Pippin says.

“No, no it isn’t.”

It’s one of the most endearing scenes of the three movies and for Christians it should evoke this great stirring in our hearts as we know the truth that Tolkien was writing about is a biblical one.

We have a home being prepared for us even now.

Revelation 21:1-2 “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”

Our future exists in a physical place perfectly suited for us. A place where God dwells and His people live with him. What the garden was supposed to be, the new heaven and new earth will be.

But it gets even better.

Our text says that “Christ will transform our lowly bodies to be like His glorious body”

In this new creation that is free from sin, friends, you and I will have bodies that likewise are free from sin.

And I don’t even know how to describe it to you. Because we can’t truly know what that will be like. We often associate our bodies free from sin to mean that we won’t be in pain, or be sick and I do believe that is true.

But it is so much more than that. Having always had bodies that are affected by sin in ways we don’t even comprehend it’s impossible to know how good our sinless bodies will be. We just know that it will be like Jesus glorious body.

This is great news. A heavenly kingdom. Heavenly bodies. But sometimes it can be so hard to focus on those distant truths. Because of course we are not there yet and we still do experience lives where we are beset by sin.

And sometimes it feels as if we can’t take one more step on the right path. Sometimes it feels too hard to continue on.

But Paul reminds us. The power of continuing in Christ, in walking the right path does not come from our own power. Look again.

Philippians 3:21 “who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.”

The power we are sustained by is the same power that enables Christ to subject all things to Himself.

John 6:39 “And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day.”

This is a promises that we can rest in and be sure of. It is the prize that every follower of Jesus presses on for and receives.

Conclusion

Friends, when the hike seems hard cry out to your good God. When the the easier path of the detour seems appealing. When you feel tempted to find your comfort in your sin—cry out to God and know that not only does God save you by the power of God, but He also sustains you by the power of God.

Friends, let us resolve to stay firmly on the right path, following Jesus wherever he leads us. Let us look away from the detours that lead to destruction and let us be sustained by the power of God as we press on for the prize of the upward call of Christ Jesus.

Let’s pray.