Discernment In The Midst of The Mess

Abounding & Empowering Love

12.8.24 [Philippians 1:3-11] River of Life (2nd Sunday of Advent)

Mercy, peace, and love are yours in abundance. Amen.

Imagine the owner of the company you work at gives you a late-night call saying there's an important client he urgently wants you to meet face-to-face. You need to leave right away. You like your job, so you make arrangements. You book a flight and a rental car, and then it hits you—you cannot remember the client’s name or address. But, you figure, you can call your boss in the morning and work out the details after you land.

When you land, you reach out to your boss and even his boss, but nobody knows anything about this important client. Not only that but when you arrive you find out your company has no offices in that town. There’s no one familiar with the lay of the land to help you get your feet under you either. And still, no one knows anything about this very important client. So you begin to poke around.

But as you poke around, someone notices you’re not from around town. They think you’re up to something. They begin to follow you. They see your work polo and they begin to shout about you everywhere you go. Finally, you had enough. You snap. A little bit. You say something gruff just to get her off your back and suddenly the whole city is on your case. And in a small town that doesn’t take too kindly to strangers, that’s enough to get you roughed up a little bit, tossed in the back of a squad car, and a long night in the clink. When morning comes, they realize they didn’t have a good reason to arrest you, so they let you go and tell you not to come back to town. Would you ever want to go back there again?

Not in a million years, right? But that’s pretty much what happened to Paul when he visited Philippi. God told him in a dream he was to go to Macedonia and help a man. While Paul was looking for that man he had a run-in with a demon-possessed slave girl, got arrested, beaten with rods, and thrown in prison. In prison, he met the man who needed the Gospel, and the next day he was told to leave town. Doesn’t seem like the kind of place Paul would want to ever see again, does it?

But listen to Paul talk about the people there. (Php. 1:3-4) I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy. (Php. 1:8) God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus.

After everything that happened, Paul still wanted to be back in Philippi! Now, perhaps, some cynical folks will point out that he mentions that he is in chains—he’s incarcerated because of his work preaching the Gospel—and so being in Philippi had to be better than his current circumstances. Just a few verses after our text, Paul says that his chains have actually served to advance the Gospel. Everyone in the palace guard knows that he is not a bad man, but a bold man. Someone who is in chains for Christ.

So Paul’s longing isn’t about getting out of jail. It’s about being with the Philippians. Paul longs to enjoy the Gospel partnership they share face-to-face. Paul longs to bask in God’s love together and then abound in demonstrating that love for God and neighbor. Paul longs to teach them and deepen their insights into the marvels of God’s mercy. Paul wants to see them mature in their faith.

It’s more than just nostalgia. Going through hard times like that has a way of bringing a group together like nothing else. People who have served in the military shoulder to shoulder may not see each other for months—even years—but if a squad mate needs something they respond. Loyalty is forged when you see how people respond under stress and duress. Their character is revealed.

Do you have people like that in your life? People that are in it to win it, spiritually speaking? Do you have people who are fighting the good fight alongside you? Do you have trusted spiritual friends that have your back and the backbone to tell you when you’ve gone astray? Do you have people who are encouraging you to abound in love? Do you have people who challenge your knowledge and insight? Do you have someone who comes to you seeking help in discerning what is best, so that they might be pure and blameless?

In so many other areas of life, we see the benefit of surrounding ourselves with people who guide us, who know things we don’t know and who see things in a way we cannot. We know there is value in being around people who will challenge and encourage us.

Think back to the Olympics this summer. You remember the French swimmer, Leon Marchand, who won four golds. If you watched the Olympics or just the local news, you likely heard that he came here to train. Why? Because ASU had the coach who taught Michael Phelps. Because ASU had a program that had a track record of getting the most out of its swimmers. Swimming is among the most individually focused sports. You don’t need teammates like football, volleyball, baseball, and basketball. Can’t you just get in the pool and swim? Shouldn’t that be enough?

But if you want to develop, even in swimming, you need to train alongside people who do things you don’t, who know things you don’t know, who will challenge & encourage you. They do all that for a gold medal.

Do you take as much initiative and put in as much effort for the crown of righteousness? Nowhere in the Bible are God’s people called to be rugged, self-sufficient individuals. The few cases where we see people doing that—Moses & Elijah—it doesn’t take long before they’re at their wit's end. God calls us to partner.

We know that. We call that partnering, church. But even as we call a church our church, there are ways that we take spiritual shortcuts.

It’s easy for us to settle. To think we’ve got a pretty good grip on what the Word of God has to say and leave it at that. To live like all God wants is an hour of your time, a handful of your bucks, say a few prayers and post a Bible passage on your social media. To settle for watching worship online because it’s more convenient.

It’s easy for us to coast.To seek out and follow the path of least resistance. To avoid any kind of healthy spiritual confrontation and instead surround yourself with people who think like you think, know what you know, and live like you live. To only serve in ways that are convenient, comfortable, and make us feel charmed. To find friends who fall into the same kinds of temptations that we do, more or less, so we know they won’t say much when we do.

God has not called us to fight the good fight on our own. Nor has he called us to a life of comfort and convenience. He has begun an important work in you. A hard work, but a good work. And he will see to it that it accomplishes his will.

As we began, I asked you to imagine going on a no-good, very bad business trip. The details were sketchy. The support was non-existent. The work was hard and the job was thankless. And the people treated you with suspicion and hostility. Who would want to go there and do that work?

Your Savior. As bad as things were for Paul and his associates in Philippi, they were far worse for Jesus. Jesus came to earth and sinners were his business, his very important client.

But sinners kept saying they didn’t need him. That things weren’t so bad. That their great problems were other people. The people of Israel were happy when Jesus did a miracle, but they were disgruntled whenever he talked about their slavery to sin, how they were spiritually ignorant, blind, and dead. They insisted that they were children of Abraham. They’d never been slaves. They insisted that they knew what the Law of Moses said better than Jesus did. They argued that they could see just fine. They swore that they couldn’t be spiritually dead, not when they had the Law and the Temple. If Jesus wanted to do anything for them, he could go on healing the sick or he could set them free from Rome.

Eventually, their insistence turned into foolish obstinance. When Jesus wasn’t the king they thought they needed, they traded him out for a convicted murderer, Barabbas. Instead of listening to his cries to repent and believe, they cried for his crucifixion. They refused to believe that he was the promised Messiah. Yet, Jesus died for their sins. And ours. He rose to life to prove that he was who he said he was and that he had the power he claimed over sin, death, & the devil.

The same God who began the work of salvation as a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and crossed the finished line in gruesome fashion, has begun his good work in you. And he will see it through.

God the Holy Spirit has called you with his Gospel. He has enlightened you with his gifts. As he did with the Apostle Paul, he has transformed the hurdles of your heart and mind and gifts and personality into traits that advance the Gospel.

God transforms stubbornness into steadfastness. Argumentativeness into zeal for the truth of his Word. God renews intellects. God retrains tongues to pray to God, praise God, and give thanks to God. Hard working hands are no longer only for self-reliance, but for self-sacrifice.

God does all this in all his people, but he doesn’t do it magically. He does it methodically. God grows you spiritually the same way he grows the rest of his creation. Organically.

He sets his children alongside one another and invites them to dig their roots into the riches of his Word & Sacraments. Then and there the Holy Spirit conforms us to the image of Christ. To think like Jesus. To talk like and about Jesus accurately and wholeheartedly. To act like Jesus more and more. And as you’re growing up in grace and knowledge he places his beloved people alongside you. Some of them need you to bear their burdens. To listen to their spiritual struggles and assure them that Christ died even for that sin. Others are there to provide knowledge and insight you don’t have. And then, there are times, when that flips. Why? Because God is working in you.