Partner for the Gospel

Find Joy in Prayer

Paul begins by telling the Philippians how thankful he is for them: “I thank my God in all my remembrance of you.” Every time Paul thinks of the Philippians, he’s thankful for them. He’s blessed by them. The memory of them brings him gratitude and thankfulness.

He goes on further to say that in every prayer he offers on their behalf, he prays with joy. It’s a joy to pray for the Philippians!

Paul was one of the most powerful men in the Gospel, and he spent time in prayer, because he knew that God was the One to affect change...

I want you to pause for a moment and think about that verse:

I make my prayer with joy… Christian, this brings up an important question. Do you make time to approach God with joy? Are there people in your life, things in your life, that give you joy? Do you remember to thank God for them?

Too often we get stuck in prayer request mode. It’s like in Sunday school, you know. Now listen, prayer requests are a good thing, right? It’s good to pray for the needs around us. But sometimes. SOMETIMES, Christians… Prayer request time can become something different, can’t it? Tell me if you’ve seen this before in prayer request time: “Uh, yeah… I would like to pray for my uh… Aunt. And really, it’s not so much praying for her, but you see she’s got this pet weasel, and it’s got the gastroenteritis, and uh, I just want to ask for prayer for the weasel.” So you pray for Aunt Muggy’s suffering weasel, and that’s about how you pray for the day.

In this rut, prayers become less about glorifying, thanking, and celebrating God, and more about what we need from God. “God, I want this,” “God, I want that,” but when do we simply come to the Father’s presence and say, “Thank you, Lord?”

See Paul found joy in speaking with God because he knew that he had an audience with the Creator of the Universe. Don’t let that fall flat on you, believer. He has created all your eye can see, and He invites you into His presence.

As a matter of fact, I’m going to have us do that now. We’re going to press pause on the sermon, and we’re going to spend a few minutes praying to the Lord, individually, but all together.

Take a moment and think about who you’re thankful for in your life. Thank God for them, and thank Him with joy. Think about the joy that these people bring in your lives.

Think specifically about your Sunday School class. If you don’t have a Sunday School class, man, you’ve got to get in one! And then think about the Christians closest to you. Or maybe those Christians who have really contributed to your spiritual growth.

Let’s pray. --- 2 minutes

Amen.

You know, we have a prayer ministry for this express purpose. To engage our church in prayer for one another. It’s one of the things that has the opportunity to unite us. Send in your requests and pray for these requests that come through. If you’re not on the prayer chain yet, write that on the connection card there in the seat pocket in front of you.

Paul goes on to describe the reason for which he’s so joyful in prayer…

Partner in the Gospel

It’s because they “partner” with him in the Gospel. And he says it’s been going on since the first day until now. As we look at last week, that first day was when he, Paul, founded the church by preaching the Gospel and watching people come to faith in Christ.

This partnership is where I want to spend most of our time together this morning, because it sits here at the beginning as an indicator of the theme and flow of the rest of the book.

So what is a partner? Simply put, it’s anyone who goes side-by-side in any kind of venture with someone. It could be a business venture, in which you have a business partner… A co-worker is a partner, or in class you have partners in a group project. You say, “Okay Hackler, we get it, why are you telling us this??” Because I want you to see how accessible the Bible really is. When he calls the Philippians partners in the Gospel, he really means partners… Co-laborers. People to help shoulder the burden of the work of the ministry that Paul is engaged in.

The people helped Paul in his Gospel mission in three primary ways: They proclaimed the Gospel, they suffered for the Gospel, and they gave so that the Gospel mission could continue through Paul.

Engage in the Gospel Mission

And so they chose to engage in the mission. They engaged in two ways, personally. The first way in which they engaged in the mission was by joining Paul in their proclamation of the Gospel. They proclaimed Christ in their gatherings by their preaching of Jesus. They proclaimed Him by their missional efforts in the city. They proclaimed Him by their radically different lifestyles.

They also engaged in the mission through their common suffering with Paul. As we will see later in Philippians, their struggle in their town against the same crowd that brought great difficulty on Paul was likely heavy. They were opposed in their efforts to make Christ known. They lost and sacrificed for Jesus.

Support the Gospel Mission

As a part of this sacrifice, the Philippians partnered with Paul in the Gospel by providing for his needs. As Paul was under house arrest, he would still need supply to make it through his sentence. The thing about prisons and arrests in ancient Rome was that you still depended upon your family or your own wealth to supply for your needs. It was a tough reality. Paul, having no family aside from the Church, truly relied on these churches to supply for him while he was under house arrest.

He was likely chained to a Roman guard, and could have guests, but still stuck at home. Could not go out and labor for his daily bread. So he relied upon the good graces of the church, and the church lavishly supplied him all his needs. These were financial gifts they were giving Paul. We see all of this expanded upon in greater detail in chapter 4, and I’ll tackle it more in depth when we get there, but for now, I want you to know that I came across a statistic the other day that was very staggering.

You’ve heard before of tithes, right? A tithe is a tenth of what someone brought in for the year, and that’s what the Jews would bring to the storehouse of the temple to make sure that the work of the Temple could proceed. This is the Jewish understanding of financial religious duty. In the New Testament, what happens?

Well, tithes are Old Testament, right? So we don’t have to practice it anymore?

I mean, yeah, that’s right. But a thoroughly biblical understanding of finances says, “Okay, God… You own ALL of it! What would you like me to set aside for me and my family?” And then, just as the Philippians did, “What is a gift that I can give to support the work of the Gospel that is going forth?”

I think a tithe is a great place to start in that. You should know that our family practices tithing and giving over and above the tithe. I don’t say it to brag, I say it to qualify what I’m about to say next…

Among average churchgoers in the USA, the percentage of income given during the Great Depression was 3.3%. Now. Do you think people had more disposable income during the Great Depression or less? Probably less, right? Today, the average churchgoer gives 2.5% of income to the local church. Crazy, right?

Some have taken the concept of tithing and said, “Well, it’s not just about money, right, so can’t I substitute my tithe with time?” Listen, to ask this is to completely miss the point. It’s not about a percentage, it’s about the fact that God owns all of it, and we are to be obedient in giving all of ourselves to the Gospel mission. That doesn’t mean quitting your job, it means taking Christ to your job. It doesn’t mean giving 100% of your assets to charity, it means living as if your assets are merely borrowed from God, and we allow the Lord to do with them as He pleases. It means your home is a ministry headquarters in your neighborhood.

Know the Gospel Mission

In order to cooperate or partner in the Gospel mission, one must first know the Gospel. If you’ve never understood what Christians mean by the word, Gospel, or perhaps even as a Christian if you’ve never fully grasped the Gospel of Jesus, then let me invite you to understand the fullness of the Gospel as best I can:

Back when the world and humanity were created, there was a period of time when God and people lived in harmony. Along the way, humanity betrayed God by wanting to become like God themselves, and that set a series of events into motion that brought sin’s curse to the world. Every wrong thing, every act of evil, every disease, war and famine that has ever plagued our earth is a result of this act. It’s called sin, and it has forever tainted God’s good creation.

God, being perfect, will judge sin and those who commit sin at the final judgment of creation. He does this to achieve justice so that what is leftover at the joining of His Kingdom and our universe is no longer tainted by sin and will be perfect forever.

Because of His perfect love, God set His own series of events into motion that eventually brought us His Son, Jesus Christ, to the earth in human flesh. During His time on earth, Jesus had a lot to say about a “kingdom,” and how He had come down to earth to establish that Kingdom. By living a life completely free of sin, and then taking on the punishment for all sin, He paid for the sin you and I commit by dying a brutal death on a cross. And then, on the third day of being dead, He conquered the grave by coming back to life, securing victory over death. If we trust in Him, He adopts us into His family, we are no longer guilty for our sin, and we can join God in His mission to show the world His love and salvation. He rescues us from our sin, calls us to a new way of life, and enables us to do all of this through the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Triune God.

The King, “Jesus” will be returning at the end of time to reestablish His kingdom once and for all. At this time He will raise the dead, and those who have trusted Him will live for eternity in Heaven, and those who have rebelled against Him will be turned over to judgment for their sin. You will either be found in Christ or outside of Him.

The Good News is that the Way to Christ has been opened for everyone if they will submit to Him as Lord and Savior. This is the news that Paul sought to make known to the ends of the earth. This was the Gospel mission that the Philippians joined with Paul in.

Conclusion

And that’s the Gospel message you are invited to believe today. Christ died for you. Will you receive Him as savior and Lord? To refuse this is to go into judgment with no account for your sin, and you will pay the price. But the free gift is the invitation to surrender it all to God and become a part of His family, free of sin, and given new life.