Fireside Feb
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Josh thanks so much for leading us tonight. I know for my own heart to gather in the middle of the week and worhsip the Lord together is good.
If I haven’t got a chance to meet you yet my name is Steven and I’m the campus pastor here at the DT campus. If you are visting wellcome
over the next 4 firesides we are going to be looking at the book of Phillipians together.
my hope is our love for Christ will grow during these times together.
When I first came to Faith in Christ Philippians became one of favorite books of the Bible. It has been a constent source of strength and encouragement for me
and maybe for you also. Some of the verse that impacted me the most over the years are found in this letter.
Here are some of them
sound bites than any other section of Scripture of similar length—certainly it has done that for me. Here are some of my favorites:
• “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” (1:21)
• “I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.” (1:23)
• “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ.” (1:27)
• “Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also the interests of others.” (2:3, 4)
• “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” (2:5–10)
• “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (2:12, 13)
• “… that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ.” (3:8, 9)
• “But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” (3:13, 14)
• “But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.” (3:20)
• “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice.” (4:4)
• “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (4:6, 7)
• “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable …” (4:8)
• “I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content.” (4:11)
• “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” (4:13)
You can sense as Paul writes this letter to the early church there is this great love he has for the people he is writing
He knew them
if you are new to church you might not be familiar with all of this. but here it is
Paul was on his way to kill new Christians a few years after Jesus rose from the dead.
ON his way to kill them Jesus saved him and radically changed his lfie
know his lifes mission was to lead people to Christ and establish local churches
The church he is writing to is in the region of Philipi
The city was no more then 10,000 people and Alexander the greats father
Philip of Macedonia named it for himself
When Paul arrived in Philpi he meet a young businsess owner named Lydia she came to faith in Christ and they estiblished a church in her home
Know writing from a jail cell Paul once shares the hope of the gospel and the Love of Christ with this church which was so dear to his heart.
If nothing else tonight thtat’s really encouraging. To know that in what most of us would consider a really difficult moment in anyones life the Lord is using him to see the gospel advanced.
He says so much in chapter 1
I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel, so that it has become known throughout the whole imperial guard and to all the rest that my imprisonment is for Christ. And most of the brothers, having become confident in the Lord by my imprisonment, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.
Amazing. Knowning the church might be discouraged abou this improsiment. Paul adds prospective. He is actually expierence and living out the verse he would write to the roman church
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.
and I would just pause and ponder that for a moment.
what most would consider a horrible moment (I know I would)
Paul reconginzed God wasn’t abesent. He wasn’t distant. It wasn’t without purpose
Know even in Jail the gospel was advaincing.
even while paul was in chains the gospel was unchained
and as you pause to ponder that truth would you also just pause and think about something that might be really difficult right now in your life?
Something you wish was differt? Something you feel improsined by
and would you hear Pauls words again
I want you to know, brothers, that what has happened to me has really served to advance the gospel,
My heart needs to be reminded of that.
I feel like I have a lot of prison moments
in other words there have been times in my life when everyone looking from the outside would say what’s happening must be painful.
It must be confusioning
It must be discourgaing
and while a lot of those things are true
each of those prison moments have purpose
becasue pain without purpose seems creul
but we have a God in having who loves us enought that none of our moments, none of our pain is wasted.
that if we allow him those moments can actaully serve as ways for others to come to faith in Christ.
KENNY STORY? DAD?
Eyes?
Job?
and I could imagine in a room like this there are some of you who are in real pain. Maybe it’s too hard to even speak to it.
it might even feel like whatever you are walking through is like a prison. I hope Pauls words help tonight
The question I ask when I read these words is how can you look at your life and process your pain to the point where you understand it’s purpose and it’s ability to advance the gospel
I think the verses and prayers paul says right before this is helpful.
For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus. And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.
Paul says he is yearning something amsazing would happen for the people at this church
and his yearning is with the affection of Jesus
He is pointing the early church to the source of his strenght because he knows it would serve as the source of his strenght
it’s why he says my prayer is that your love may abound more and more
how is that even possible? It’s possible when we realize just how much Jesus loves us.
John reminds us in 1st john our love is birthed out of his love for us
his affection for us. One of the most beutiful pictures in scripture of the affection of Christ is found in John chapter 9
As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. We must work the works of him who sent me while it is day; night is coming, when no one can work. As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” Having said these things, he spit on the ground and made mud with the saliva. Then he anointed the man’s eyes with the mud and said to him, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam” (which means Sent). So he went and washed and came back seeing.
The neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar were saying, “Is this not the man who used to sit and beg?” Some said, “It is he.” Others said, “No, but he is like him.” He kept saying, “I am the man.” So they said to him, “Then how were your eyes opened?” He answered, “The man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, ‘Go to Siloam and wash.’ So I went and washed and received my sight.” They said to him, “Where is he?” He said, “I do not know.”
Let’s look at the picture and the affetion of Jesus
Encounter with Jesus
John 9 walk through it
And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,
“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.