Finally Brethren

Text: Philippians 3:20-4:1; 4:8-9

Theme: Believers are motivated to live a holy life because our citizenship is in heaven, and we await our Savior who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body.

Hopefully, this is not the last time you’ll hear me preach. In time, perhaps, I can be a guest preacher when your next pastor is on vacation. This is, however, the last message I’ll preach as your pastor (unless, of course, you choose to return for the evening worship)! Not long ago, I was asked, “What was the greatest challenge in pastoring the same church for thirty-five years?” The answer is simple—attempting to preach something every Sunday you hadn’t heard me preach before. At the very least, saying it in a different way, or with new insight, or with new application. That forced me deeper into the Scriptures, and in particular spending more time in the Old Testament.

OK ... so what do I say to ya all this morning? I’ve mulled over in my mind for weeks that which I needed to say, and wanted to say, and most of which I said last Sunday. In the end the answer was, Preach the Bible. I’ve chosen to preach from Paul’s letter to the Philippians this morning. The Christians at Philippi were Paul’s “joy and crown”—the congregation that he called “my beloved.” His closing remarks to them seem to be appropriate closing remarks to you, and so I’m just going to shamelessly plagiarize the Apostle Paul this morning.

As the Apostle closes out his letter to this congregation he encourages them to live exemplary lives for Christ. This morning, I want to encourage you to live exemplary lives for Christ.

1st, we are to live exemplary lives because we are ambassadors of another kingdom: our citizenship is in heaven

2nd, we are to live exemplary lives because our Savior rose again: we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. In Christ, we are a new creation ... we’re not what we were—sinners condemned unclean—but now we’re saints of God, and are to live as such.

3rd, we are to live exemplary lives out of gratitude for the promise that: our lowly body will be transformed to be like his glorious body.

4th, we are to live exemplary lives of practical faith: we are to practice what we’ve learned from faithful believers.

I. Live an Exemplary Life Because YOUR CITIZENSHIP IS IN HEAVEN

“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,” (Philippians 3:20, ESV)

ILLUS. Imagine two young men in their early twenties. Both are of comparable intelligence and natural ability. They live only 20 miles apart. But their circumstances are radically different. The first young man lives in a comfortable apartment, drives a decent car, has fine clothes in his closet, eats well, and is pursuing the career for which he has just been educated in college. The second young man lives in a dirt-floored shanty, has no car, has only one pair of jeans and several t-shirts, eats a minimal diet, has no hope for an education, and tries to find manual labor jobs to make ends meet.

1. what’s the difference between these two young men? ... Citizenship!

a. the first young man lives in San Diego, California, and is a United States citizen

b. the second young man lives in Tijuana, Mexico and is not a citizen of the United States

2. the way these men live is greatly affected by their respective citizenships

a. if the young man from Mexico could somehow move north, acquire his U.S. citizenship, and get an education and a better paying job, his life would change dramatically

3. Paul uses a similar analogy of citizenship to show that as citizens of heaven, we should live differently than those who are merely citizens of this earth

A. WE ARE CITIZENS OF A HEAVENLY KINGDOM

ILLUS. Handley Moule was an evangelical Anglican theologian, and Bishop of Durham in the early 20th century. He translated the first half of Phil. 3:20 as “Our city-home subsists in the heavens.” That captures the heart of what the Apostle is communicating.

1. the city of Philippi was a Roman Colony whose occupants had Roman citizenship

a. Roman citizenship was highly prized in the empire where as few as 10% of the empire’s population actually held Roman citizenship

b. the proudest boast a man could make in Paul’s era was civitas Romanus sum - that is“I am a Roman citizen”

c. the Apostle used the Philippian’s Roman citizenship as an illustration of their heavenly citizenship

“But our citizenship is in heaven ... ,” (Philippians 3:20, ESV)

2. just as the Philippians were proud of their Roman citizenship, and sought to live in a manner worthy of that citizenship, so too, they must remember that they are citizens of Christ's kingdom and must behave accordingly

a. just as Roman colonies were "little Romes" planted across the Empire, Christians are "little Christs" which is what the word "Christian" actually means

1) the term was first used as a term of derision, but the early church chose to warethe title “Christian” as a mark of honor and identity

b. Paul is essentially telling the Philippian believers that they are a colony of heaven planted in the Roman Empire

ILLUS. Think about that for a moment. Every New Testament Church in our community is a colony of heaven planted in Linn, MO.

3. the moment you accepted Jesus Christ as Lord of your life everything changed

a. you were instantly born again from above

1) God did something amazing in you—a supernatural miracle

2) He made you a new creation

a) your spirit came alive—he took out the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh—and you were redeemed and reconciled to God

b. not only that, you were rescued from the domain of darkness and transferred to the kingdom of God’s beloved Son

1) you are now under the rule and reign of God, but it gets even better

2) Jesus Christ gives you authority to become a child of God

3) you’ve been adopted by God and are His sons and daughters

c. you have a new family and all the wonderful blessings connected with that family

1) you’re now a citizen of heaven

2) you are part of God’s own family with all the rights and privileges that go along with it

4. people convinced of their heavenly citizenship are the kind of people who acknowledge that ...

“ ... they [are] strangers and exiles on the earth. 14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.” (Hebrews 11:13–16, ESV)

a. heaven is the country we belong in, the homeland we’ve been looking for all our lives

b. the color of our passport is blood red and our eternal entry visa has already been irrevocably stamped

5. because you’re God’s child, you can proudly declare, civitas Regno sum — I am a Kingdom citizen

B. WE ARE AMBASSADORS OF THAT HEAVENLY KINGDOM

1. right now we are pilgrims and strangers in a foreign land ... this world is not our final home

a. we are here as Heaven’s ambassadors

"Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God." (2 Corinthians 5:20, ESV)

b. nothing is more important for an ambassador of Christ then to present a consistent walk and conduct before the people of the land he serves in

c. an ambassador must behave so that those who see him will believe that all citizens of his country must be just like him

ILLUS. On the website of the U.S. State Department you can find a list of all the responsibilities of a U.S. Ambassador. The number-one duty is: All ambassadors officially represent the U.S. government on behalf of the president. As Christians we officially represent the Kingdom of God on behalf of the Lord, Jesus Christ.

2. to these Christians who lived in a city that took pride in its Roman citizenship, Paul is saying, “You have a higher citizenship than that of Rome. You are citizens of heaven. Just as your Roman citizenship greatly affects the way you live, even more so your heavenly citizenship should affect how you live. Don’t fall into the trap of living as those around you.”

a. every night we pitch our tent a day’s march nearer home

b. we are never to forget even for a moment where our citizenship lies

1) the thought of the Celestial Kingdom (as John Bunyan referred to it) ought to influence everything about us

2) it should help determine what we say, were we go, how we behave, what pleasures we permit, how we invest our talent, what we do with our money, how we treat other people, and the amount of time we spend in worship, ministry, Bible study and prayer

Our Citizenship Is in Heaven

II. Live an Exemplary Life Because WE EAGERLY AWAIT OUR SAVIOR

“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,” (Philippians 3:20, ESV)

ILLUS. By the time that Paul is writing to the Philippians, the chief religious rival to Christianity was the Imperial Cult. This was the worship of the Roman Emperor as a god. The Romans considered Emperor-worship a unifying factor in the Roman world. In an empire that had a diversity of regional gods to worship the emperor as god tied a diversity of peoples into a single empire. The primary title for the Roman emperor was lord and savior. You can understand how that might be a problem for the Christians. Their refusal to worship the Roman Emperor was the “sin” that would lead many Christians into the various arenas around the empire.

1. Paul reminds the Philippian believers that they have a Lord and Savior whose residence is in heaven, not in Rome, and that our King is coming again

a. the Christian’s Lord and Savior is going to subject all things to himself, and this includes the Roman lord and savior, Nero Caesar!

A. OUR BLESSED HOPE IS A RETURNING SAVIOR

1. our citizenship is in Heaven, and the King of that country is coming back to earth

a. at our Lord’s Ascension we hear the words of the angel ...

“ ... “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.”” (Acts 1:11, ESV)

2. the bodily return of Jesus Christ in power and glory is one of the most frequently emphasized truths in the New Testament

a. it is mentioned in twenty-three of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament

b. when Jesus came the first time men mocked him, crowned him with thorns and nailed him to a cross

1) but he rose triumphant

c. the NIV is more faithful to the original verb here when it says we eagerly await

1) the Apostle uses the same word in his Epistle to the Romans when he writes ...

“For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.” (Romans 8:19, ESV)

2) Paul pictured all nature standing, as it were, on tiptoe to catch a glimpse of the sons of God coming into their eternal inheritance

3. the Christians of the 1st century anticipated that his coming would be in their lifetime

a. since then, I think, almost every generation of Christians have longed to be the generation alive at the Lord’s coming

4. while there may be debate over the particulars, there is no debate over the certainty of His bodily return

B. OUR RETURNING SAVIOR IS SOVEREIGN LORD

1. there are approximated fourteen Messianic Psalms in the Book of Psalms

a. one of those, Psalm 18, speaks of the Christ’s Lordship over the nations of the world

“The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be God my Savior! 47 He is the God who avenges me, who subdues nations under me, 48 who saves me from my enemies. You exalted me above my foes; from violent men you rescued me. 49 Therefore I will praise you among the nations, O LORD; I will sing praises to your name.” (Psalm 18:46–49, NIV84)

b. Jesus isn’t merely Lord of the “Christian world” ... Jesus is Lord of all the world

2. the first time Jesus came it is was as God’s suffering servant, but the next time he comes it will be as God’s conquering King

a. when that happens God the Father tells God the Son that He will make our Lord’s enemies his footstool

ILLUS. Throughout the middle east ancient kings often depicted themselves as having their right foot foot on the neck of a defeated enemy. It was their way of depicting their victory over their enemies, and sovereignty over a conquered land.

b. God has also given His son a mighty scepter which represents his authority and sovereignty over all things

3. the choice for every man is, being crushed beneath his foot, or being exalted to set with him on his throne—it is better to sit on his throne then to be his footstool (Alexander Maclaren, 19th century Baptist preacher)

a. it will be bad enough to be a lost sinner who must bow a knee to the Savior, but woe to those who are responsible for the affliction of God’s people

... We Eagerly Await Our Savior So Live an Exemplary Life

III. Live an Exemplary Life Because OUR BODIES WILL BE TRANSFORMED

“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.” (Philippians 3:21, ESV)

1. when Jesus comes, it will be in power to rule and reign

a. two things will happen

1) 1st, He will transform our “lowly bodies,” which are subject to disease and death and prone toward sin, into conformity to His resurrection body

a) this will involve not only an outward, physical transformation, in which we receive bodies not subject to disease and death

b) this will also involve an inward, spiritual transformation, in which we are delivered finally and forever from sin’s power

c) if you wonder how God will do it, Paul simply states that it is by the power that enables him

2) 2nd, he will subject all things to Himself

a) if you are not willingly subject to Him now, you will be forced into subjection to Him

b) his enemies will bow before Him

c) he will reign as King over kings and Lord over lords

2. from the time he emerged from the womb, Jesus had a human body—a body that felt pain, that grew tired, that needed sustenance, and which could experience temptation

a. this was all for our benefit

“For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people. 18 Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.” (Hebrews 2:17–18, NIV84)

3. from the time he emerged from the tomb, Jesus had a glorified body—a return to the glory he had with the Father before the incarnation

a. right now we have what Paul calls our lowly body (literally our body of humiliation)

ILLUS. John Phillips writes, “We are humbled by this body’s needs and limitations. And we are humbled by the fact that all too often this body is the handmaiden of lust and sin.”

b. but our lowly body is going to be changed—not thrown away, but changed to be like our Lord’s own glorious body

“I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality.” (1 Corinthians 15:50–53, ESV)

1) unbelief looks at the corpse in the casket and declares “That’s it. This is all here is.”

2) faith looks at the same corpse and says, “This is not the end—for me, it is the beginning of life”

... Our Bodies Will Be Transformed so live an exemplary life!

IV. Live an Exemplary Life Because WE NEED TO PRACTICE OUR FAITH

1. living the Christian life involves both faith and practice

a. this is essentially what the book of James is all about

2. we receive eternal life in Christ through faith

a. we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, according to the Scriptures alone, to the glory of God alone

1) we bring nothing of any worth to the cross ... only our sin

ILLUS. When Augustus Toplady wrote Rock of Ages, Cleft for Me, it contained four

stanzas. In our Baptist hymnal the best stanza is missing ...

Nothing in my hands I bring,

Simply to Thy cross I cling;

Naked, come to Thee for dress,

Helpless, look to Thee for grace:

Foul, I to the fountain fly,

Wash me, Savior, or I die

b. faith, and faith alone is the means of our salvation

2. we express our eternal life through practice

a. how does the world know we’ve experience true saving faith in Christ?

“Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” (Philippians 4:8, ESV)

b. the word think about here means to consider something with the express intent of putting it to practice

1) as Christian we don’t merely think about the commands of God of think to ourselves, “Oh, that’s a nice bit of advise or wisdom. Maybe some day I’ll get around to doing some of these things”

2) no, no, no ... if the Word tells us to do these things our calling is to put them into practice in our own life

“Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.” (1 Peter 2:12, NIV84)

... We Need to Practice Our Faith So Live an Exemplary Life

Con. I am not a perfect Christian. I have my failing and my foibles. But I hope that I can say with Paul, “Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.” (Philippians 4:9, NIV84)