‎Philippians: Paul's Prayer (Part 2)

Philippians: Paul's Prayer (Part 2)

By Sean Kelly

We're continuing Philippians chapter one this morning. Last week we talked the title was Paul's Prayer Part One, and we talked about just kind of the idea as he was remembering the church in Philippians, some of the things he was thinking about. And it related to his prayer because he started off by saying, I thank God for you, and then he says, I pray for you, verses nine through eleven here we're going to get a little bit more into the details of how he was praying, what he was praying for, maybe learn some things from how Paul prays.

So we're going to do that this morning, and I don't think I'm going to take the whole hour and a quarter until noon, so I'll probably let you out a little early or maybe not. We'll see. Let's go ahead and begin the class.

Lynn, will you open us in prayer? Lord, Father, we thank you for today, lord, thank you for Jordan bringing trials, desire. Lord, help us, Lord, to think about what Your will, Lord. Amen.

Is this too loud at all? Do I need to turn down? Okay, there's people that are saying no, it's great. Okay, we'll do that. So, Philippians one 9311, three verses.

Who would like to read those for us? Go ahead, Josiah. And this, I pray that your love may abound him more and more in knowledge, in all discernment, that you may approve the things that are excellent, that you may be sincere, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ to the glory and praise God. So here Paul transitions from talking generally about his prayers for the Philippians, which he did in the first part of this chapter, to giving them some of the specifics of how he should be praying or how he is praying for them.

So in this passage, we're going to see five aspects of the Christian life that Paul's praying would be true to the Philippian believers, and of course, by extension, that we think should be true for us as believers, too. That not only only would I think Paul be praying these kind of things for future believers, but that we ought to be praying these things for each other. So we're going to look at that before we get to the five points.

I have a pre-point. So that's why it doesn't have a letter by it. This is Paul's prayer.

And the reason I did this is because he does say in this, I pray. And I think that every word is important. So let's talk a little bit about prayer.

So this the idea of this is he's going to share with what he's going to give the content of his prayer here. He's sharing what he's praying, which is probably encouraging for the Philippians to know that, hey, Paul here is thinking about you, but he's also praying for you. And not only is he praying for you just in general, but he's praying for these specific things, so it's probably an encouragement.

It's probably also going to be a challenge for the Philippian Church because, okay, this is what Paul thinks is important. These are maybe things we need to work on in our lives and things that we need to get right with God. So Paul's giving us these five things, okay, we're not quite here on this point.

Maybe we need to work a little harder on that. So it's probably not only encouraging, but a challenge to the Philippian Church. The word pray here is a word that simply means talk to God.

It's a general term. In greater Greek writings, they would use the same word to pray to their false gods and stuff like that. It's just an idea of talking to God.

And Paul's just saying, this is when I talk to God. This is what I'm saying. This is what I'm asking him.

Now, we're commanded to pray, to pray by God. God's commanded us in various places to pray. I haven't given every reference of commands, but I think some interesting ones here that we'll see.

So let's look at a couple of these verses here, starting with Luke 18, verse one. Olivia, go ahead and read that. And he spoke a parable to them that men always ought to pray and not lose heart.

So he's speaking a parable, and the point of his parable is that men always ought to pray. Well, if we always ought to pray, then we should be praying, right? That's very close to the command there. This is what we should be doing, especially as Christians, we ought to be praying to God.

We ought to not live our lives apart from the communication and the working of God. So we need to pray. Looking at another passage, Romans 1212, we like to read that.

Nathan, go ahead. Rejoicing in hope. Patient in tribulation.

Continuing. Steadfastly in prayer. And I took this out of the context of the sentence, but he's telling the Roman Church, these are the type of things you're supposed to do.

And you look at the end there. Continuing. This is keep going.

This is keep doing what you're doing. Steadfastly. This is the idea of constant this is not erratic.

This is not a little bit on, a little bit off. This is steadfast. This is doing this.

So it's continually it's steadfast. It's being committed to doing this, being continually steadfast in prayer. Prayer ought to be a very important and very prime part of our Christian lives that we are talking to God, we are sharing with God.

If you're like me, it's something I need to work on. So we don't pray enough. And then Romans here, Paul says, continue steadfastly in prayer, to be constantly in prayer, to be faithful in prayer, to be praying regularly, to be making that part of your lifestyle something that you do that's just consistent with who you are continually steadfast in prayer.

Ephesians 618. Who would like to read Ted's? The first one I saw go up, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit being watchful to this hand with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints. So here it's kind of you get double hit by the idea of prayer here.

First of all, the beginning of verse praying, and that says always. And again. We understand that always doesn't mean like 24 7365, because I hope you're not praying right now, but you're listening.

I hope that's your main focus here, because we're teaching God's Word. That's important. But the idea is that it's so constant, so regular in your life.

It is like you are always praying, so praying always. And then he says, with all prayer, which again is this generic word for prayer, just talking to God and supplication, which is bringing a request, making a plea, begging, talking to God and also asking God. God commands us to come to Him and say, hey, these are the things that are going my life.

These are the needs I have. These are the things that I can't do. I need your help.

God wants us to do that. As a parent, sometimes my kids will come to me with requests and I'm tired or I'm tired of hearing about their request, or I think that their requests are foolish things, and I get kind of annoyed by it. God doesn't get annoyed by our requests.

God commands us to bring our requests or supplications to Him. And that's pretty cool because he's just a gracious, patient, faithful God. So it says, being watchful this end with all perseverance, and then he brings up supplication again.

So twice in here, he tells us, make your request, make your please make beg to God. Do that. That's an important part of the believer's life.

We're commanded to pray. Philippians four six. Another reader, please.

Jonathan, go ahead. Let your request be made known to God. Okay, so here, and this is a neat verse just because it talks about be anxious for nothing.

How often are we anxious? How often are we worried about stuff? We tend to do this all the time, right? We're human. The cure for that is to not be anxious. But you go to God, pray to Him, bring your supplications to Him, bring your request to him with thanksgiving.

And it says again, let your request be made known to God. Go to God with it if you're worried about something, if you're concerned, if you're unsure, the first thing we ought to be doing is talking to God about it. The next verse says, and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

So it goes on to say, this is going to be a cure. You're worried. Well, God can give you peace, and he does that through us praying to Him and giving our burdens to him.

So Philippians four six reminds us of that. And then first Peter four seven. Another reader, please.

It's going to be a lot of readers this morning. Go ahead, Josiah. At the end of all things at hand, therefore, be serious and watchful in your prayer.

Okay. Peter is writing this first century Ad. He's saying the end of all things is at hand, is close by.

Well, we're 2000 years closer to the end of all things. His conclusion, because the end of all things is at hand is be serious and be watchful in your prayers. And so Peter says this is an important thing as God's plan is unfolding and we're getting to the end of things.

Be praying. You're supposed to be praying. So we're commanded to pray by God.

That's I think evident throughout the Bible. Again, I didn't give you every passage that talks about how we're supposed to pray. We could do a whole study on that, probably a whole multi week study on prayer.

But God wants us to pray. And Paul here in this passage is going to be an example of that. He's going to not only show us what to pray for, but he's going to show us that he is praying.

He's praying for this Philippian church. He cares about them. He wants God's best for them.

And so he's giving them an example. I pray for you this, I pray. Then he's going to give us what this is.

So what does he pray for? There are real points here. Number one, he prays for abounding love. And we see that in verse nine.

This I pray that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and all discernment. So this love is the word agape. This is the unconditional, unmerited love that God has, and he wants us to have it.

Also. We say that this love is an attribute of God. One John four seven and eight.

We'd like to read Nathan. Go ahead. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God, and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.

He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. Okay? So there's going to be a lot that we're going to unpack here in the next couple of mini points here. But verse eight there, it ends there.

For God is love. His character, who he is, is based on his love for us. So love is something that this is the attribute of God that we're to emulate, that we're to be like, we're supposed to have this love.

And so Paul's praying that they would have this agape type of love in their life, it's also a motivation for providing salvation. And I didn't put the reference there, but that's Romans five eight, which I did put the verse in the margin. So Lynn you want to read that god demonstrates his own love towards us while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

So God demonstrates his own agape love towards us. And that while we were still sinners, while we had provided nothing, while we had done nothing, that made God say, hey, there's Sean, he's pretty cool, I think I'll die for Him. I didn't do any of that.

I was a sinner. I was rebelling against God. I was doing nothing right in God's eyes.

But because of his love, he sent His Son Jesus Christ to die for me, because he loved me and he cared about me and he saw what my greatest need was, and that was for salvation, for my sins to be forgiven, for his righteousness to come to me. So God demonstrates his own agape love towards us, and it's a motivation for providing salvation again based on his character, because he is love. It's also a characteristic that should be true of Christians.

We read first John four, seven and eight. Let's add verse 16 onto that. Who would like to read verse 16? Olivia, go ahead.

We have known and believed the love that God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love, abides in God, and God is in. So if you go back to the top there in seven, eight, beloved, let us love one another.

So there is the command there, we should love one another again, this agape love for love is of God, and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. So if you're born of God, you ought to be showing the love of God and vice versa. If you see somebody that's showing the love of God, you can tell that they're born of God.

It's a characteristic that ought to be true of Christians. In fact, in verse eight, he goes to give the counterpoint if he who does not love does not know God. So if you're not showing love in your life, you're saying to people, I don't know who God is, because God is love.

Number 16, we have known and believed that the love that God has for us, god is love. There it is again, he's love. And he who abides or he who remains or he who dwells or lives in his love, abides, dwells, remains in God and God in Him.

So as Christians, we want to be in a good relationship with God. We want to be under his power and influence. We want to have Him working in our life.

We need to abide in his love. So it's commanded, it's a characteristic of Christians. And then one last point, and I added this on after reading one of the commentaries, that love is given by God's spirit.

So Romans five five, who wants to read? I'm sorry, didn't ask who wants to read? So there's a lot of readers this morning, so don't feel bad about doing two or three or four passages. It may seem like a tall task at times to love the way God loves, to have that kind of sacrificial love that shows a concerning care for others. But God has given us his Holy Spirit that we can love that way, that we can have that love.

And so when Paul prays that your love may abound, that you have that love that God has, he's praying for something not only that is a good thing for us. Not only is a characteristic of who we should be, but something that's attainable because we have God working in our lives through his Holy Spirit. So we have a prayer for abounding love.

The word abound here (Perisuao) I don't know if I pronounced that right, but it means to be left over or be more than enough. To be left over is like overflowing. Like, you throw in a bowl of Cheerios and you're distracted and now it's starting to overflow.

And get out of the bowl, you pick it up. What's left over that says, hey, I poured too much because there's stuff left over. This is the idea.

It's over and abounding. It's overflowing for us. Paul prays for the Philippians to have this overflowing love that's more and more than even is needed.

So he says that he says that it may abound more and more. So this is another continued increase. Not only is it abounding, not only is overflowing, but there's more and more of it going on, that the love continues and continues to grow and continues to be something that's evident in our lives.

So this idea of growth that it continues to grow in our lives more and more and more and more until the love is just over-pouring and overflowing out of our lives. That's what he's praying for now. He prays interestingly, he says, I pray that your love may abound still more and more.

And then he adds a couple of preparational phrases in here in knowledge and in all discernment. So how does our love come about? Well, it starts with knowledge. The word knowledge is epigenosis.

I have knowledge, recognition and consciousness. But it has an idea of a full knowledge. Again, if you're married or if you have kids and somebody came to you that you met like a year ago, and they say, oh yeah, I know you, I know your kids, I know your wife.

You'd say, yeah, you know who they are, but I know my wife, I know my husband, I know my kids, because I really know who they are. I have an idea of what their likes or dislikes, what their habits are, what kind of things I'm thinking of my wife here, what kind of things I just adore her for, and what kind of things I'm like, oh, I wish you wouldn't do that. You have a full knowledge of somebody because you spent time with them, you've understood who they are, you've interacted with them.

Well, that's what God's talking about here that our love may be because of a full knowledge. Not that I know who God is, not that I know the basic facts about God, but that I truly know and understand God. And that's what produces that love.

So he talks about having a full knowledge, and then he also says in discernment. And so there's also a discernment in love that we know what's right, what's wrong. We love the things that are right.

We love the things that are wrong. So not only should we have a knowledge of who God is, but we should have a discernment first. Thessalonians 521 and 22.

Olivia so this idea here of testing all things is that we don't just nowadays I think that the difference is nowadays when people talk about we need to be loving towards people, and they oftentimes talk about that's very hateful. The idea is accepting. If you love somebody, you accept everything about them.

Even if you disagree with it, even if you think it's wrong, you accept them for who they are. Well, love has discernment. It knows what's right and what's wrong.

If my kids are doing something wrong, I don't say, hey, that's great, I love you, go ahead, do that, it's fine. Oh, you want to run out into the busy highway? No, that's fine because that's who you are and I accept and I love you for that. No, I'm going to tell them, don't do that, that's wrong, that's hurtful.

That's not going to be good for you. That's part of love, too, that there's discernment in love. And so Paul says it's not just a love that just lets and go.

Even God's agape love is like that because God is still a holy God, he's a righteous God. And people who have not trusted Christ as their savior are going to face consequences before God. His love doesn't say, though, that's okay, I know you didn't trust Christ, but I love you anyway.

No, there's discernment in even God's love. And so that's something that Paul prays for us to have. This abounding gonna I keep forgetting to stop for questions and stuff through the teaching because I get going, but are there any questions on that? Does that make sense? Any thoughts? Okay, not going to give you a lot of time, but I will stop for a second and ask.

Number two, excellent thinking, I guess thinking is on your list. So excellence. The word excellent thinking, verse ten, it says that you may approve the things that are excellent and that you may be sincere without offense to the day of Christ.

And we're going to get to that in a second. But the first part, they're excellent thinking. It says that you may approve the things that are excellent.

So not only should you have love, but you should approve the things that are excellent. The word approve means to test or examine. So just getting off this discernment now, Paul's praying that I want you to know, I want you to be able to test, I want you to be able to understand the things that are going on around you, whether it's a good thing, whether it's a bad thing, whether it's the right thing, whether it's a wrong thing.

I want you to be able to know that. I want you to be able to discern that. I want you to be able to tell apart what's evil and what's good.

So he's praying for them for that. And I think that's a good thing for us to have that we know what's right, we know what's wrong, we know what's true, we know what's false, we know what's good, we know what's bad. And that helps us to make sure, and we're going to talk about a little bit, that God wants us on the right path, he wants us on the good path, he wants us on the holy path.

And we need to be able to tell that we can't just be so muddled in our theology and our belief that we don't know what's good and what's bad, what sounds right and wrong and get confused by it. We need to know, and Paul's praying that they would know that they'd be able to think through and see what is right and what is wrong. MacArthur I'm going to reference him a couple of times in his commentary.

He says in classical Greek this was used of a saying, metals to determine purity, or of testing coins for both the purity of metals and for their genuineness. I think of the idea, I don't know if you've been to a store recently and you give them a $20 bill and they have that pen, right, and they swipe it with the pen because they want to make sure that you're not giving them counterfeit money. They want to discern, is this good money, is this bad money? And you can't always look at it and go, yeah, that'll spine.

So they give you the special pen that it marks, and if it leaves the mark, I guess it's bad or what. I don't know how it works, I've never worked with that. But however it works, they're able to just swipe that and go, yes, that's a genuine American $20 bill, because they want to know what's truth, they want to know what's right.

And this is the idea of that word. Romans twelve two. Another reader.

Elizabeth, go ahead. So here there's a lot in this verse. I'm not going to try to unpack it all here, but don't be conformed to the world.

Don't be conformed to the world's way of thinking that's I think where this is going, this verse, but be transformed by the renewing your mind, that your mind is changing, it's renewed, it's new in Christ. And the point of that is so that you may prove what is good, what is acceptable, and what is perfect according to what God says. That's what God wants us.

He wants to have a mind that can look at it and say, hey, this is what's right. This is what's wrong, okay? This is wrong. I want to stay away from this.

This is right. I want to head this direction. God wants us to know god wants us to be able to discern that, to approve so that you approve the things that are excellent.

This word excellent means to be worth more or to be superior to it, the stuff that is superior to the normal stuff in the world. Here, look at Philippians four eight. Another reader, please.

Nathan, go ahead. Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good, report if there is any virtue and if there is anything, praiseworthy. Meditate on these things.

So the idea here and Paul gives a list of different attributes, different types of things that know whatever things are true, noble going on. He says, meditate dwell on these things, chew on these things, hash them out over and over in your mind. Have your mind focus on what is good and what is right and what is true, excellent things.

We're going to, thankfully, in a few months or whenever we get to Philippians four, we'll talk more about this passage and talk about what these things are. But there's an idea that we need to have the right mindset, we need to be thinking the right way, and we need to be able to see, does this line up with whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is pure, whatever is praiseworthy, blah, blah, blah, all those things. Does this line up with that? If it doesn't, I'm throwing it out.

I'm getting rid of it, and I'm going to find stuff that fits that category, that fits the things that are excellent, that God wants me to think about. And so he prays that you may approve those things that are excellent, that you may test and you may know, you may understand what is good, what is right, what is true, and what is worthy of God. Does that make sense? Good.

Everybody's nodding. Yeah, we got that. We know that.

Okay, good. This is a review of everything you guys know, so that's good. Number three, I had something else here originally, but I changed it.

I'm not sure if I like that I changed it, but I did. And based on, again, something I read in one of the commentaries. This is integrity.

He prays for integrity for the church. I don't like big words, but big words are good sometimes. So what do I mean? Here the end of verse ten, that you may be sincere and without offense until the day of Christ.

So he gives two terms here that kind of reflect not only how we live, but how we're seen how our reputation is, how people look at us. The word sincere has the idea of being testing something by sunlight, which you're going, what does that mean? Well, the idea is it was used a pottery, of all things. When you make pottery, you want pottery that's not cracked, right? If you're going to use it for something, if you're going to put water in it, especially, you don't want to crack pottery, right? Well, sometimes what they would do in New Testament times is if they had something that was cracked, they would fill it with wax to kind of COVID up the crack and kind of then they could glaze over it or whatever, and nobody would see the crack.

However, that wasn't good, that was a bad pot and that would cause problems later. So what you could do is you would hold it up to the sunlight and kind of turn around, and when you see the crack, it would kind of shine through that wax there and you go, oh, that's not sincere. That's not right.

And so there were actually people that would advertise and they'd use this word that they have sincere pottery that they guarantee there's no cracks in it, and then you go to them and be like, your money back guarantee, I guess. So that's the idea, is that when our lives are tested, do we see cracks in our life? Do we see areas where we're not living the way God wants us to, where we're not doing the things we should be doing? Or is our life sincere? Are we living consistently with what God's Word tells us we're supposed to be doing our lives? And how do we test that? We test that by the word of God. Hebrews 412.

This came up in another context yesterday with Abigail, but we're not going to talk about that context. Go ahead, Josiah. That's for another day.

Go ahead, Josiah. For the word of God is blessing and powerful and sharper than any two edged sword, piercing into the division of soul and spirits and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. So this passage obviously about the Word of God, and at the end here, it says it's a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

So how do we test if we're living the way God wants us to it's by His Word. We ought to be in there and saying, do I line up with what God's Word is telling me? Do I do the things God wants me to do based on His Word? Am I living the way that God commands me to live? The Word of God is that discerner of our hearts and our intents. And even I believe it in Romans, that the idea that we can't even know our heart is desperately wicked.

Who can know it? You can't even know your own heart, but God's Word. Is a discerner of the heart. God's Word can show you where you're not living up to the things of God and need to change.

God's Word can show you what you need to continue to do to be consistent and be living for God. So to be sincere and then to be without offense kind of another side of this coin here, to be blameless. And this is kind of when this word appears in Scripture, this is what people are seeing in us, that people can't go to us and say, well, you say you're a Christian, but you sure don't look like one.

You do everything that we do as non Christians. You live like us, you talk like us, you act like us. You're not blameless, you're not without offense.

That's kind of this idea. I gave three passages for this one. Corinthians 1032.

So another breeder, please. Nathan, go ahead again. Give no offense either to the Jews or to the Greeks or to the Church of God.

So this idea of no offense again, same terminology here. Give no offense ear to the Jews. This would probably be the unbelieving Jews, the Greeks, the unbelieving Greeks, or the Church of God.

Those are three different groups and what their expectations are and what they think of you. But Paul says don't give offense to them. And how do we do that? We do that by living right according to what God wants us to.

Acts 20 416 another reader Olivia, this be so I myself always strive to have conscious without offense towards God and men. So Paul's giving a speech here before, I believe, one of the magistrates in the Roman Empire. And he's talking about that he's strived to have a conscience without offense towards God, to do what's right by what God wants him to do, but also men, that he's not giving offense to them, that there's nothing there that they can poke at and say, Paul, you're not living the way you say you're living.

And he's doing his best to live and look like a Christian the best he can. Philippians one six. Another reader and I actually jumped ahead there because I put verse six in the notes and didn't see Philippians one six.

So that's good. You read it. We'll talk about that here.

He adds at the end here that we ought to be doing until the day of Christ. This is a continual action, continual process that we're living sincere and without fence each and every day until Christ returns. Once Christ returns, he's going to change us.

He's going to glorify us, and we're going to be able to do that without sin. So it's going to be much different circumstances because we will just be naturally able to follow Christ. Until then, we need to work at being sincere.

We need to work at being without offense to others as much as possible. Now, the gospel does offend, so we know that as we live for Christ and we share the gospel and we share the truth of God's word, that people aren't going to like it. I think it reflects on where they're at, and they see that they don't live up the standard of God, and in some sense they know that and it's offensive to them.

They don't want to see people that are actually doing what's right. So there is that offense. But as far as we're not giving offense because we're doing something wrong, if we give offense, it's because of the right things that we're doing that people don't want to see, people living for God.

But this needs to happen till the day of Christ. And I went back to Philippians one six here, because he talked about this already in this chapter, that he who's begun a good work in you will continue to work until the day of Christ. He's continuing to work in you.

You need to be working also in yourself and working with God to be the type of people God wants to be until he returns. This is a continual process that goes on throughout our life. There's no retirement from doing the things of God.

There's no days off. There's no eight weeks of vacation each year that we don't have to do it. This is continual until Christ returns.

Every single day, every single moment, every single thought, every single action that we're seeking to be sincere and without cause, that God again, verse six is going to work in you. He's going to complete that work in you that he's already started. So integrity, does that make sense to everybody? Okay, number four here I have a divine result.

Verse eleven says, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Christ Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God. We're going to take the first part of that verse, being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ. So Paul prays that they would be filled, and this word filled, the idea of the verb here is this is something that's happened in the past, but has continuing results in the present.

If you're a Greek scholar, you know exactly what I'm saying because they talk about that a lot. You have been filled and you are continuing to be filled with the fruits of righteousness. That's what Paul's praying for.

That's happened already. You've got this in place now. I continue that you continue to be filled each and every day, each and every moment with the fruits of righteousness.

So what are the fruits of righteousness? Well, it's an interesting phrase that occurs three times or two times in the Scripture. Well, three times kind of in this passage. I was right.

First Amos 612. Yes. We're going to the Old Testament.

Who would like to read that? Jonathan? Go ahead. The horses round rocks, just one plow there of oxen, yet he has turned justice into gall and the fruit of righteousness into. So here Amos is bringing a charge against the nation of Israel, and he's saying that you're not doing what's right.

And part of that is the fruit of righteousness, whatever that is, which we'll discuss in a second. You're turning into wormwood. You're destroying that.

Now, I want to stop here because I wanted to talk about something first before we got here. But that's okay. Don't always remember fruit.

What is fruit? It's yummy stuff, but what is fruit? Fruit is the whole there's the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Yes, fruit are seeds of plants, right? The plants produce fruit when they're healthy, when they're growing, when they're reproducing and they're mature, they produce the fruit so that they can make more plants. So if fruits are the seeds of plants, what are the plants in this passage? Now, Christians, they're fruits of righteousness is the plant.

So what this is, is that something righteous is growing mature, and now it's producing fruits of righteousness which sow more righteousness. So the idea here is that you're righteous. Do you guys know that every single one of you that's trusted Christ as your savior, you're righteous because positionally you're righteous in Christ.

Well, are you mature? Well, that depends. Are you producing fruits of righteousness? Is there something coming out of that righteousness? Is your righteousness being acted out? Is it apparent? And when we go back to Amos here, the nation of Israel, they were God's holy nation. They were God's chosen people, but they weren't producing fruits of righteousness.

They were turning into wormwood, something that's worthless, something that's useless, and they weren't being righteous at all. And so this idea of fruits of righteousness is a righteousness in your life that's already inherently there. Is it showing forth? Is it growing? Is it reproducing? Is more righteousness coming from it because you're living it out? Another passage that talks about is James 317 and 18.

We'd like to read Elizabeth. We'll let the elite read because Olivia's had quite a few already. And here in James 318, the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

There's an inward attitude. Those who make peace, they're sowing peace and is producing righteousness in their lives. In verse 17 here, it talks about that wisdom from above brings about good fruits.

And one of these good fruits, I think, is the fruit of righteousness. So the other fruit of righteousness, a verse that I thought of this morning, and sometimes I don't think God gives me a message on the way to the pulpit type idea. But Nathan read something this morning and I thought, well, that really fits with what I'm teaching today.

So if you go to First John, chapter three and have your Bible out, because we're going to use in just a second, I got a large passage that we're going to look at that I didn't put in the notes. So I may take the whole time. I said I might not.

Okay, since Nathan read the passage this morning, we'll let him read verse seven. Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous just as he is righteous.

Okay? So let's work from the back. Just as he is righteous, who's the he in this? Good, good. Jesus? God? I would accept your answer at this point.

He's righteous. God is righteous. Who else is righteous? Going back now? He who practices righteousness.

So God's righteous. We're supposed to be like God, right? And we understand that God has made us positionally righteous by the death of his son Jesus Christ. And because we are righteous, we ought to be practicing righteous.

And if we practice righteous, that means we are righteous. There's a proof in that that Christians, we ought to be living like Christians, and that shows that we are Christians. If we say we're righteous, there ought to be proof in our lives that we're living righteously, that there's the fruit of righteousness going on in our lives.

We're doing the right things, we're pleasing God. And if we don't see that, how can you go around and say, yeah, Christ saved me, I'm righteous before Him, but boy, I'm living like a sinner. I'm living like the rest of the world.

There's no proof of that. It's not to say that you haven't been saved, because I believe that salvation is by faith in Christ's, death and resurrection, the person and work of Christ. But if you're not living the right way, you can't go around saying, I'm one of God's children.

If you're not living like that, there's a fruit of righteousness that ought to be apparent in all our lives. And Paul is praying for this Philippian Church here that you may be filled with the fruits of righteousness, that your lives are just an outpouring of the righteousness that already is in you, that you're living the right way. Paul desires that for the Church.

He adds on here that these fruits of righteousness are by Jesus Christ. This doesn't just come from us. It's not just us making our daily plan and going, okay, I got to work hard.

I got to do what's righteousness? It comes from Christ. It comes from Christ working in us, and we need to allow Christ to work in us. So it's by Jesus Christ first Colossians sorry, Colossians one, five and six.

Another reader, please. Go ahead, Lynn. This is the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, which you heard before in the word of the truth of the Gospel, which has come to you as it was also in the world, and bringing forth fruit as it is also among you since the day you heard and knew the grace of God.

And so here I want to point out that phrase, what God is doing, what God's working your life? What the hope that he's laid out for you, the gospel has done for you. Is that kind of third to last line there at the end there? It's bringing forth fruit in your life. If God's working in our life, if we're allowing God to grow us, the fruit is going to be apparent.

The fruit is going to come out. It's not something that we have to go, boy, I have to work harder at producing fruits of righteousness. What we need to work harder at is being faithful and holy before God, and God's going to produce that fruit in our lives.

God's going to work that out so we trust Him with that divine result. And Paul is praying for that, that you be filled with the fruits of righteousness which are by Jesus Christ. I want that to be true of your life, that your righteousness is pouring out producing this fruit.

And I'm praying that Jesus Christ would work in you to do that. Does that make sense? Moving along here. Good.

Okay, the last one here, number five, a glorifying purpose. A glorifying purpose. The end of verse eleven there, it says that this is to the glory and to the praise of God.

So two phrases in here, the glory of God and the praise of God. So we start with glory. And I'm going to kind of explain maybe what the difference in them might be.

But let's look at a couple of verses that might help us here. Glory two, Thessalonians 111 and twelve. Ted, go ahead.

Therefore we also pray always for you that our God of this calling fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of our faith with power. That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you and you in Him according to Jesus Christ. So verse twelve there, he's saying, I'm praying for you guys.

And this is another one of those prayer passages that Paul has for the churches. Verse twelve, that the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you and that you in Him. And so the idea is that our lives pour forth God's glory.

It shows God's glory to people around us, that people see Jesus Christ in us, that they see who he is and a right reflection of who he is, that he is glorious, that he is worthy of worship and worthy of praise because of the way we are living our lives ought to reflect that. Another passage here one, Corinthians 1031. Whether you eat or drink or whatever you need, and this is in a passage that talks about the church.

It's right before the communion passage. So it's talking about the Church in relation to eating together and different things like that. And I think the point here though is that whatever you do, whether you eat or you drink, because that's what he's talking about in context.

But whatever you do, everything you do, you have to do it to glorify God. Your life ought to reflect that. Your life ought to if you say, what's my first goal in life? My first goal in life is to glorify God.

Whatever I do, I'm going to glorify God in it. That means when I'm dealing with disciplining my kids, I'm glorifying God. If that means we talked about cars having problems.

When I have a car problem and I don't know what to do and I'm trying to fix it myself, maybe, or trying to figure out how to get rides around when we don't have enough cars to do it, I'm glorifying God. When I'm talking to my neighbor, I'm glorifying god. When I'm at work, I'm glorifying god.

That's my goal in life. Whatever we do, we glorify God. We're going to come back to Ephesians One in just a second, but also that he wants us to be to the glory and to the praise of God.

So let's look at first. Peter one, six through seven. First, we like to read that.

Olivia, go ahead. In this, you greatly rejoice. Now for a little while, you have been grieved by various trials.

That the genuineness of your faith being much more precious than perishing, though it is tested by fire. Maybe some praise, honor and glory at the and again, the context of First Peter One here is in trials when you're going through hard times, but the result ought to be and he gives three things in this passage to praise, to honor, and to bring glory to God. And so there's that idea of praise.

Again, it brings praise to God that draws people to worship God for who he is and how he deserves. Let's turn to Ephesians one. So I told you to keep your Bibles out.

Ephesians One, we're going to read verses three through 14. I want you to as we're reading through this, look at how often praise and glory come into this passage. So need a strong reader for this one.

Nathan, you want to go ahead. Okay. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as he chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without blame before him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of his grace by which he made us accepted in the blood in Him we have redemption through his blood and forgiveness of sins grace which he made to abound toward us in all wisdom and prudence having made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed himself, that in the dispensation of the fullness of the times he might gather together in one all things in Christ both which are in heaven and which are on earth.

In Him. In Him also we have obtained an inheritance being predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of his will. That we who first trusted in Christ should be to the praise of his glory.

In Him you also trusted after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession to the praise of his glory. Now, I counted at least three times where the phrase to the praise of his glory occurs in that passage. I don't know if I missed any or if you counted more than me, but verse six, it talks about everything that Christ has done for us.

He's blessed us with every spiritual blessing. He chose us in him. He's predestined us to adoption as sons.

And the whole purpose of Him doing all this for us is to the praise of his glory. That's what God wants. He wants us to show forth a reason for people to say, wow, look what God has done.

Isn't God good? We can praise Him for all this stuff. Then you go down to verse twelve. That verse eleven says, in Him we have obtained an inheritance being predestined according to purpose of Him who works in all things according to the counsel of his.

Well, I got these underlined, so I kind of type Bible. It's hard to read sometimes that we should be who first trust in Christ should be the praise of his glory. Again, those who trust in Christ, the purpose of all this that's happened, all the salvation, is that we praise God, that we give a reason for people to say, I want to worship God because of what he's done.

Verse 14 talks about verse 13 and 14 talk about the Holy Spirit coming on us. Well, what's the Holy Spirit's goal? He's the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession. Again, to the praise of his glory.

It's in order to praise God. It's all about God. Really? Everything that we are, everything we do as Christians is first and foremost about giving praise to God.

Now, MacArthur wrote something I think was very helpful for me to describe glory and praise. I'm going to read that. I have it in your notes there.

His glory, god's glory is the sum of all his perfection and the honor for being who he is and doing what he has done. God's glory doesn't diminish. This is about who he is, all that he is, all that he's done, that's his glory.

Then he goes on to say, and his praise is the affirmation of that glory by those who recognize it. So God is glorious and praise is saying, yes, we understand. We know who God is.

We know what he's done. And yes, he is exactly who he says he is. That's praising God.

And then we do that, of course, by our lives, by saying, we know who God is. We know what God has done. We know what God's commanded, and I'm going to serve Him because of how glorious he is.

And that's praise in our lives. So does that make sense? That kind of helped me. That MacArthur definition, because sometimes we think of those things kind of the same thing, but I think there's a little bit distinction between them.

Okay, let's go to the takeaways. My first takeaway point is kind of to rephrase something I've said in the past that maybe was a little confusing, and I want to fix it a little bit. So Paul's prayer focuses on spiritual issues and the growth of the church.

While passages like James Five and Third John show that prayer for our physical needs is important, Paul shows that our spiritual needs are primary. So what I want to say is that it's not wrong when we pray for each other's physical type needs, when we have sicknesses, when we have cars break down, when we have hardships between people, that's not a wrong thing to pray about. So I'm not trying to say that.

In fact, I think as a church and as many churches, we're very good at that. Those things impact us. Those things are a concern to us.

So we spend time praying about them. I think that's very good. What I think we fail to do often is to sit and pray for each other's spiritual needs.

I want you to take a look to the people to the right and to the left of you. Okay? Right and to the left. If you have a wall to one side of you, look behind you or something.

I don't know. I want to ask you this. When's the last time you prayed that they would be to the glory and praise of God the Father and of Jesus Christ for that person? Have you ever prayed that that's what Paul's praying? He's praying that the church in Philippians would be to the glory and praise of God.

Do we pray that about each other? I'll stand up here and admit that I don't do that. I do at times pray. I want the church to walk with God.

I want them to do what's right. But do we pray like this for our spiritual needs? We all have these needs. Do we pray that we would be approving the things that are excellent for each other? I pray that Lynn would be approving the things that are excellent.

Do we pray like that? Do we pray that we would be sincere and without offense in our faith? Do we pray that our love would abound more and more for each other? Sometimes we do pray that. So that one's probably a little bit of the easier one. Do we pray that we would think on excellent things, that we approve those excellent things, these types of prayers.

And you can look at some of the other prayers that Paul has. Every single prayer that Paul talks about, this is what I pray for. You every single thing in there is a spiritual thing.

And I'm not saying that Paul didn't pray for people's health. I believe he did. And he talks about Epaphroditus was sick unto death and their prayers helped to heal him.

So I'm not saying Paul doesn't say we shouldn't do that. So I'm not trying to downplay that. I'm trying to upPlay that.

Hey, let's focus on praying for spiritual things for each other too. Let's make that a habit. Not just generally, because that's generally how I pray.

I pray for the church. Parents, pray for your children. Do you want your children to be to the praise and glory of God? I hope so.

So pray for that children, pray for your parents. Your parents need that prayer too. And I'm looking over here because most of my children are over here.

Why aren't we praying this way? Well, I think we have a kind of limited view of prayer, not an incorrect view, but we don't see that there's so much more we can be praying for. So that's why I'm encouraging we do a good job praying for people's temporal, physical needs. But may we need to be better for praying for the spiritual needs of people.

And that would be my encouragement. So that's my first point. Secondly, our lives should reflect sincerity and blamelessness that comes from a love that comes from God and right thinking that is founded on God's word.

We should be displaying a Christian model in our action, reputations, attitudes, everything we do, everything that we are, we ought to be reflecting the right things. And so if Paul's praying this for the church, what I'm saying is that these are things that are important in our lives that we should be doing. Paul wouldn't be praying like I'm praying for you, that you do this, but I really don't care that you do it.

No, he's praying because he cares. He thinks that this is important and this is the right thing. Then my final point here, as our goal should be to glorify and praise God, not only in our speech, but in our lives.

God's glory is paramount. It's the most important thing. It's the best thing that we can do, is to bring God the glory that he deserves, to help people to see God and to worship Him for who he is.

We are to be to the praise of his glory. So those are my three encouragements, my three takeaways this morning. Any thoughts, questions, concerns, comments? Yes.

I love that kind of prayer. It's not just the shallow. Pray for this thing, pray for that person's spiritual well being.

So much so that they would abound. Yeah, it is. And I think if we were praying even just a little bit more like that as a church for each other, not only does that we're praying that so and so would be this way, but it affects us too, because we realize we have to be more like that.

And it encourages us to be encouraging and come alongside people and help them to meet I want to call them goals. It's probably a bad word for it, but these goals that Paul puts out in his prayer that you would be abounding, that you would be thinking excellently, that you would have integrity, that you would bring it forth one, that you have that divine result in your life and that you be the praise and glory of God. If we're praying for people like that, we're going to be concerned about are they getting there? Are they walking the way they should? I'm, I'm going to come alongside them and say, I want to encourage you, I want to help you because I'm in the same boat as you.

I need the encouragement too. And so I think it's super helpful for each other. So great point.

Thank you. Anyone else? This morning, dory moved her hand. Does that mean you want to say something? I think it's really true that when we pray for somebody or some person I remember when Kevin, pastor Kevin came to my home and he was going to pray.

I asked him if he would pray. I mean, he was going to pray for Jim, but I asked him if he would pray that in all of this God would accomplish that it affects it's like tons of things you can pray that relate to the physical needs. Yes, they can.

I agree totally with that. One of the people I'm not trying to make any of my daughters cry or anything like that, but we know Andy Stearns, we know what his wife is going know. If God were gracious and want to be miraculous and completely heal her and whatever, that would be great.

But what's the spiritual need there know, we pray God may this may be the know, when sue passed away, I wasn't expecting her to get slammed into by a vehicle on the way to church on Wednesday night. But that's what God allowed. So what do I do about that? Well, I can pray for my response.

I can pray for my kids response. I can pray that the gospel would go out. And one of the things that I was so thankful for is at her memorial service that I thought the gospel was very clear.

I thought the testimony was very clear. And there were a lot of people there that I know did not know Christ as Savior. And I'm not saying they got saved, but they heard the gospel and the seeds planted and so those are things are there hard things that go with you? I didn't sleep for several months.

After this happened, I asked for people to pray that I could get some sleep because that's a physical need I have. But I also have a need to respond correctly in my situation to give God the glory, to give God praise and to give God honor. And that's something that I'm still trying to learn at times and still could use prayer for that.

I have the right attitudes, that I do the right things, I make the right decisions, that I do better at the task I know I need to be doing, that I'm not doing as well as I should because God wants me to. So there's spiritual needs involved with every physical need that we have. And even just a right response, even just that we show Christ to that.

If you're in the hospital for a reason, you got a nursing staff and a set of doctors that they have to be there with you. So you have the chance to show God's glory to them. You have a chance to share the gospel with them.

God's put you in that situation for that there's. Yes, I want my whatever to be healed, but I also want to do what glorifies and honors God. And so those should go together.

Very good point. I love that Ted passed away. Hospital staff is there and said, hold on a second, I want to pray real quick.

They're not going to say no, and so they at least hear the prayer whether they believe it or not. So just take those opportunities. Perfect.

Thank you. Yes. When you're praying about spiritual people, you're not thinking, and it's not just, hey, how are you? Good, thanks.

Bye. Yeah, but you're actually going to have a really deep conversation, and that's what Paul desires for the churches. That's what God desires for us, too, is to have that kind of a deep relationship.

Yes, we are joint ears with Christ, brothers and sisters in Christ, sons of the living God. We're family. We ought to be close to each other.

We ought to have the deep relationships with each other. It's hard sometimes. We don't like to let people in.

But again, if we're praying about the spiritual needs of each other, that's going to open up those doors and bring that closeness, bring that companionship. So you're absolutely right. That's very good.

Thank you. Okay, let's go ahead and close in prayer. Ted, will you close us? We just thank you so much for Your Word and that available for us to read.

Lord, many times we know that time to do that. It help us this week to be in Your Word. You'd help us to live like you would like us to in this world.

It's so easy to be distracted by people, be like them, to help us to be steadfast and glorious in this body.