UNSHAKABLE FAITH

ANNOUNCEMENTS:

Kids Ministry in September

The health unit is asking us to not hold a separate kids ministry program. But we’re committed to still ministering to children really well.

Two changes - one, messages will be adapted a bit and two, we will be doing a kids ministry video chat. We’re still nailing down the exact date and time for that video chat, stay tuned on facebook.

Plus for any parents who are bringing their kids to service with us, we want to provide you with a little ‘Worship Kit’ package to help your kid learn more and remember more from the services. We’ll put some materials and resources to help your child take notes or creatively process what they’re hearing, along with a little fidget toy to help with the wiggles, and they get a cute little bag to also bring along anything else you need to bring

If you want to sign your kids up for either the worship kits or the kids ministry video chat, visit parklandchurch.ca/kidsmin

Prayer Meeting & Bible Study Small Group

We are going to be moving the prayer meeting BACK into the church. It will be wednesdays at 9am as always. If you aren’t comfortable coming back into the building for prayer, we will still be doing it through video chat as well.

Bible study small group runs every thursday, from 7pm to 8pm

If you are coming, masks are mandatory throughout the time we’re present.

KIDS:

Today, I’m talking to the adults about the best way to be able to live for Jesus. So, I have a question for you to think about: have you ever been unsure of something? Have you ever had a time where you’re like, ‘uh oh, I don’t know what to do here?’

For me, that’s happened a few times when I got lost. I remember driving around with my grandma once, and i thought we were lost. She knew where she was the entire time, I figured out later she was just having some fun with me. But it was really stressful!

Sometimes, we ask the question, ‘God, what do you want me to do?’ and we don’t feel sure about the answer. We feel lost. We don’t feel like we know what to do. And if you don’t know what to do, how do you know you’re doing the right thing?

So I want you to listen today, and as I’m talking, I want you to think of something. I want you to think of somebody else. Maybe it’s somebody in your family, maybe it’s a friend. Maybe it’s somebody you like, maybe it’s not. But think of somebody else other than you right now. Tell somebody else their name, or write it down.

Today, we’re going to talk about a way Paul says we can learn to follow God. And it all starts with this idea - somebody else. So remember your somebody else, and if you hear me say something you can do, i want you to try and think - how could i do THAT for the person i’m thinking about?

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Today, we’re on part 2 of unshakable faith.

Last week, we talked about how it’s our convictions and our confidence in Christ that sees us through hard times, and how Paul wrapped it all up in this one phrase - to live is christ and to die is gain.

To Live is Christ

Paul uses a bunch of comparisons between us and Christ throughout philippians

Philippians 1:27

Philippians 1:27 NIV

Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel

Now, I want to draw attention to something here. Paul doesn’t say, ‘Conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of Christ’. That’s how we’ve always understood it.

Paul is saying, ‘conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the GOSPEL of Christ’. in fact, this word Gospel, literally just means ‘good news’. We have given the word a massive spiritual connotation, but I think we can grasp what Paul is seeking to say here by a simple word substitution. ‘Conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the good news of Christ’.

There’s a difference here I want to highlight.

Paul doesn’t say, ‘Jesus is the standard of holiness and morality, you need to live to prove that you’re good enough to be with him’.

Paul’s point is, ‘What Jesus did, his death on the cross, his resurrection, the way he fulfilled God’s wrath paid the price of our punishment - make sure your life is one that is a worthy proclamation of that good news’. AKA, to live is Christ to paul wasn’t a calling to a self-imposed moral standard - it was a reminder that Jesus already paved the way, He already paid the price, and we needed to do anything we could possibly do to show others about that.

We could live the most moral, ‘holy’ lives, but if our attitude, our relationships, our lifestyle, if it drives people away from the gospel of christ - if it’s focused only on benefitting ourselves - we are not living a life worthy of the gospel.

To paul, life being for Christ means having such a life that God looks at you, and he doesnt’ say, ‘ya, that person is a good enough person to be welcome into my kingdom’ because, spoiler alert, none of us are. Life being for Christ means that God looks at our lives and says, ‘That is a life that is worthy of showing other people my love, mercy and grace’.

It’s not self serving, it’s not even self considering. Life for Christ doesn’t ask the question, ‘ok, how do I get the most of what I need’. It asks the question ‘ok, how do I show the world the most of what IT needs’.

And this isn’t even a stretch in the text. This is how Paul ends off chapter 1, on this idea of our lives being an outwardly-focused testimony of God’s goodness. And let me read Paul’s concept of what victory in this area looks like (READ FROM: ‘I will know that you stand firm…’):

Philippians 1:27-28

Philippians 1:27–28 NIV

Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence, I will know that you stand firm in the one Spirit, striving together as one for the faith of the gospel without being frightened in any way by those who oppose you. This is a sign to them that they will be destroyed, but that you will be saved—and that by God.

Listen to those qualities. No fear. Being saved from destruction. That implies, no fear in the face of destruction.

KIDS:

OK, so, kids. I want to talk to YOU about what it looks like for YOU to live for God’s good news.

The good news is (get it- good news) is that it’s easy to do whatever age you’re at. Being the kind of person that shows God’s good news to other people doesn’t mean you have to have to go to bible college like me, or that you’re older or wiser than other people. It just means saying this to yourself:

I know God loves me. I want to love other people so they know God loves them.

So we’re going to watch a video, and I want you to think about the person I told you to think about before. As you’re watching it - ask yourself. How can I do things to make this person feel loved more?

SHOW VIDEO - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLYzxRxwigw

And here’s the truth - I said earlier, sometimes it’s hard to know what God wants us to do. But it shouldn’t be - because he’s already told us a lot of things he wants us to do! So, if you are never sure about what God wants you to do, just say this:

God wants me to love someone else

And just in case there’s any doubt. Paul in chapter 2 draws attention to the self-focused faith. He challenges people:

Philippians 2:1-4

Philippians 2:1–4 NIV

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

We know that a life in Christ benefits us greatly. There’s no denying that. Living for Christ changes us in every possible way.

But we can be tempted, in living for the gospel, to draw attention to trying to maximize what WE get out of it. To make it about, how God benefits ME.

And paul is saying here, if you have received ANY kind of benefit from Christ, if you’ve had any kind of experience at all - don’t focusing on yourself. Focus on others. Don’t fight and claw to meet your own interests and needs - fight to meet the interests and needs of others.

And paul makes this second comparison to life like Jesus here:

Philippians 2:5-8

Philippians 2:5–8 NIV

In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!

Jesus, the one person on earth who deserved to actually have things focused on him, lived the most outwardly-focused, servant life that has ever come before him - and Paul wants us to understand just how much Jesus was victorious.

Philippians 2:9-11

Philippians 2:9–11 NIV

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

This is one of Paul’s key points in understanding a faith that is like Christ. That paradox that it can be so relentlessly concerned with reaching others, living with humility and sacrifice - that to the world, that sounds like a key way to lose. But to God, that sounds like victory.

And again, Paul draws our attention back to what we can expect out of it.

Philippians 2:14-16

Philippians 2:14–16 NIV

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain.

Philippians 3:10-11

Philippians 3:10–11 NIV

I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

This is the ultimate ‘to live is Christ’, for Paul. That paul can say, ‘my life is like Christ’s life’. And this goes beyond a moral or holiness perspective (But it is certainly that!). To paul, it wasn’t just, ‘to live like christ is to hold the standards for myself that Jesus did.’ That’s great, but it’s a lot simpler, and a lot deeper than that.

Paul says, if Christ suffered, I WANT to suffer. If Christ died for others, I want to die for others. And he was convinced that walking like Christ in this life led to him walking like Christ in the next - knowing the power of the resurrection from the dead.

But how many times have we thought that suffering was a strike AGAINST our faith? Maybe we have a backwards concept of what grows us and benefits us. Paul said, REJOICE in suffering because God can use it to produce fruit in our lives. To Jesus, success was to go out and teach other people about the kingdom of God - to seek the lost. To us, success is seeking the greatest experience for ouselves. Is that what Jesus did?

Jesus suffered in his path to communicate the good news to the lost - we aim to suffer the least. Jesus sought to feed, we seek to eat. Jesus proclaimed that he finished his work when he gave everything for others - we say it isn’t finished until we’ve received.

Is this what Jesus did?

And I don’t mean to criticize with this point. I meant to draw our attention to something that we may have missed, because I want to see great things for everyone. We see the whole point of everything to be WITH Christ, so that we can receive from him - Paul taught, the whole point was to be LIKE Christ so that others could receive from US.

And Paul makes this connection later, to where this thought process leads:

Philippians 3:20-21

Philippians 3:20–21 NIV

But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

This is the high bar. We recognize that this perspective doesn’t prosper us in the ways we want - that by taking this road, we’re placing our home somewhere else. Our comfort somewhere else.

But listen to the victory here. The power that enables Christ to rule the entire universe will come, it will transform everything about us that is weak and temporary and broken and we will stand in glory - in HIS glory. Every hard time, every failure, every weakness that stands inside of us - everything that we try so hard to reject and get past - Christ will one day clear it all away in a flash. One day, we will be in perfect glory.

Paul is pointing us to a deep, deep reality. That if we walk like christ did, how christ did - we’ll wind up like Christ did, where Christ did. By seeking not to serve ourselves or prosper ourselves, we will succeed in every possible measure. Every conceivable way that we are in want now, God will fulfill us in perfection for eternity. By sacrificing our lives, we will gain them back in power and perfection and glory.

So I want to lead you through a cole’s notes version of Paul’s thought process of what it means to live like Christ:

Step 1 - Show everyone else the gospel, no matter what. And God will create in you a fearlessness even in the face of destruction.

Step 2 - Serve everyone else and their interests, no matter what. And God will pour his power into you so that you can become blameless and pure, shining like stars among the people around you.

+Step 3 - Do whatever you can to be like Jesus - serve others. Wash their feet. Sacrifice for others. DIE for others. And power that Jesus Himself uses to run the entire universe will take you and mold you into something perfect and glorious.

Fearlessness, purity, perfection, and glory. And the recommendations Paul gives to every single one of those circumstances is MISSING two key things. It’s missing any mention of your current circumstances. And it’s missing any concept of entrance criteria. Every single one of these things - live worthy of the gospel, serve others without ceasing, and give yourself for others like Jesus did - can be done absolutely anywhere, at any time, to anyone, by anybody. Paul lived these realities out locked in jail. The most powerful way of seeking God could be done by anyone whenever we felt like doing it.

And here’s the real truth. The real power of what Paul is teaching here. Paul says, to live is Christ. And that means, the flip side of that is also true - Christ IS life.

And that’s the beauty of the backwards kingdom here. We can’t meet our own needs until we’re so laser focused on reaching others and meeting their needs. We can’t bring Christ in until we’re dead set on giving Him away to others. We can’t save our lives until we’re willing to give them away.

TIME OF PRAYER AND MUSIC