Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Well, good morning FBC!

If you have a copy of God’s Word, go ahead and turn with me to Philippians chapter one...Philippians chapter one.

Over the past month we’ve been walking through this letter to church of Philippi, verse by verse, chapter by chapter really trying our best to understand Paul’s heart as he penned this from his home there in Rome.

And if you remember, of course Paul was on house arrest waiting for the emperor’s decision on his punishment for sharing the gospel.

I mean, Paul had really created a ruckus everywhere he went.

He was turning the world upside down with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Even an evil spirit at one point said in Acts 19, “Jesus I know…Paul I know…right?”

Listen, Paul was making an impact in the kingdom of God and there were those that just didn’t like that.

And so, because of that, Paul was placed on house arrest, chained to a Roman soldier every hour of every day.

And this letter…it was basically an update on his current situation but also an encouragement to these Philippian believers.

Paul wrote this letter to help them understand what it is they were called to.

They were called to something that went beyond themselves.

They were called to a higher purpose.

And in his imprisonment, Paul knew that as well.

It wasn’t about him.

It was all about Christ.

The heart of this letter…and we’ve seen this to be true especially throughout the first chapter…the heart of this letter’s the gospel…and the thing he’s constantly reminding these Philippians of is the idea of unity.

They’re all unified around Christ and the work He did to bridge the gap between them and God.

And listen, if Jesus can bridge that gap between us and God, He can certainly bridge any gap that exists between us.

The gospel, as Paul keeps reminding us, it’s what unifies us together as believers.

It’s our priority as a believer…That’s what we talked about last week.

When we’re growing in our relationship with Christ…when we’re becoming more and more holy, it’ll push us towards that end…the gospel…and the glory of Christ.

And listen, the purpose the gospel gives us, as we’ll see today…the purpose is the same for every single person that comes to know Jesus.

The purpose it gives us in this earthly life is to wanna magnify Him above all else…and it’s to long for Him.

It’s a longing to wanna be with Him.

That’s what we’re gonna see as we approach these verses this morning.

And so, if you’re there with me in chapter 1…let’s all stand together as we read verses 18 through 26.

Paul writes, “18 What then?

Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed, and in that I rejoice.

Yes, and I will rejoice, 19 for I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance, 20 as it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death.

21 For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

22 If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me.

Yet which I shall choose I cannot tell.

23 I am hard pressed between the two.

My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better.

24 But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.

25 Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith, 26 so that in me you may have ample cause to glory in Christ Jesus, because of my coming to you again.”

Listen, imagine for a second that myself and all the other deacons…all of your spiritual leadership…imagine we all went on a mission trip.

But listen, we never came back.

You didn’t hear from us…you didn’t get any kind of update on our whereabouts.

You have no idea where we’re at…And then all of sudden, maybe a month later…we send you an email.

You’d probably wanna open that, right?

Listen, that’s kind of what happened here in a way.

The Philippians were concerned for Paul.

They had no idea what was going on…how he was doing.

They didn’t know his status.

And yet, in his return letter, he didn’t say, “Hey guys, please contact the Roman officials and your political leaders…please work the system to get me out of here.”

No…instead, Paul spends these verses comforting these Philippians.

You remember last week?

He essentially said, “Don’t worry about me…my suffering…my affliction…it was all meant to advance the gospel.”

He said, “The whole palace guard’s hearing the gospel…others are boldly preaching Jesus…Listen, I’m good!

Christ is proclaimed and for that I rejoice.”

That was his message to them, right?

And now, as we continue is that response…Paul says, “You have no need to be worried…you don’t need to feel ashamed.”

He says, “Christ’ll be exalt in my life and in my death.”

He says, “That’s the purpose of my existence…that’s the purpose of my calling…that’s the purpose of the gospel in our lives.”

He’s comforting his friends before we see his exhortations and encouragement in the last few verses of chapter one which we’ll look at next.

Listen, Paul’s point in our text today?

It’s that our purpose as believers…it’s to magnify Christ in everything…life….death….whatever it is.

And then in the last part of the passage we see this longing we should have to be with Christ.

We should long to wanna be with Him.

Even in this life, we should long to be with Him now.

That’s Paul’s point here.

And listen, you might be sitting there thinking, “Yea, but that was just Paul’s desire…that doesn’t mean it has to be my desire.”

Well, at the end of this letter Paul writes, “Do what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me.”

Meaning, as Christians, it behooves us to look at the words and example of Paul and follow them…because what he writes was inspired by the Spirit of God.

And so, let’s examine these first couple of verses together.

1.) We were delivered to magnify Christ (vv.

18b-21)

You know I’ve mentioned this multiple times before but unfortunately, our English translations, they just don’t always capture the full essence of what the author was trying to get across to his original audience…and here in these verses, there’s one of those instances that are really on full display.

Verse 21, it’s one of the most quoted verses in all of the New Testament…Paul writes, “21 For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.”

And guys, the reason I start with that this morning is because it’s really the summary of this entire section.

Paul’s telling us all about a life that’s worth living and all about a death worth dying.

The question he raises is, “What do you live for?”

But again the problem that we see here is that our English translations, they just don’t really capture the full beauty of this verse.

There’s no verb in the Greek manuscript here.

And what happens is we just kind of supply it with the word “is.”

But listen, there’s other verbs out there that could do a better job of describing this idea that Paul’s trying to get across about purpose and meaning.

Living for Paul…it literally means Christ.

Living depends on Christ.

Living honors Christ…it magnifies His name.

In the Greek…it literally reads, “to zēn - Christos.”

Or if you were to directly translate that, living - Christ.

Which of course that doesn’t really make any sense in the English translation.

Paul also writes, “dying - gain.”

There isn’t an “is” in the Greek text.

It doesn’t actually read, “living ‘is’ Christ and dying ‘is’ gain.”

Listen, the point I’m tying to get across to you is that this is a very important verse here…I mean we really get to see Paul’s own heartbeat in the rhythm of these words.

The living and dying are directly correlated with one another…and here’s the application I want you to see because you can’t understand the rest of this message if you don’t understand Paul’s heart.

The application, it all starts with that little phrase at the beginning of the verse.

Paul says, “For me,” right?

Paul was saying that he would live for Christ.

That was his statement there.

That was his purpose in life and in death.

It was all for Christ…and everyone has to fill in that same blank on a personal level.

I mean just think about that for a second…How would you fill in that blank?

How would you complete that sentence that Paul wrote here, “For me, living is…..blank?”

What is it?

For some, it’s filled in with all these cheap substitutes that this world offers…money or sexual pleasure…maybe it’s power or beauty….entertainment….whatever it is.