[00:00:05] Thank you for listening to the Calvary Monterey Podcast. To learn more about our church, please visit calvary.com. And for additional resources from our lead pastor, Nate Holdridge, please visit nateholdridge.com. Teaching today is our lead pastor, Nate Holdridge.
[00:00:24] Chapter 2, verse 12-30 today, and I want to read the first four verses to you. Paul says,
[00:00:32] Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now not only is in my presence but much more in my absence. Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it's God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
[00:00:49] And I'll just pause there for a moment to thank Pastor Matt Kaler for teaching those two verses to us last week, really doing a deep dive on the subject of sanctification, personal spiritual growth. What does that look like? He talked about that last week.
[00:01:04] Then Paul goes on in verse 14 to say,
[00:01:06] Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish, in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world.
[00:01:24] All right. We're going to go all the way through verse 30, but I just wanted to start off with these first four verses because I wanted to read that line there where he says,
[00:01:32] To shine as lights in the world.
[00:01:36] All right. Where do I start? Where can I start this teaching?
[00:01:39] I think for today, I want to start this teaching by trying to draw your mind all the way back to a very important episode in Israel's history in the book of Exodus.
[00:01:49] You guys remember God made a call upon the people of Israel, drew them out of Egypt, brought them to a mountain called Mount Sinai where the bush had burned yet was not consumed.
[00:01:59] And God gave them the Ten Commandments there, invited them into a covenant with himself.
[00:02:04] And it was kind of like a marriage ceremony, like a proposal, if you will.
[00:02:10] And the people said, Yes and Amen, we want in.
[00:02:14] And so Moses, their leader, went back up the mountaintop to get more regulations or rules that would govern them.
[00:02:21] And as he's up there, they grow impatient in the valley below.
[00:02:27] And they begin wondering when Moses will return, if he'll ever return.
[00:02:33] And they come to Moses' brother, his older brother, Aaron.
[00:02:37] And they really demand that Aaron produce a idol for them to worship.
[00:02:45] We need a God to worship.
[00:02:46] We feel like God has left us, like he's gone from us and he took his man Moses from us.
[00:02:54] We need someone to worship.
[00:02:55] And so Aaron took a bunch of gold, put it in the fire, fashioned a golden calf from it.
[00:03:01] And the people in the valley below, right after they made this marital covenant with Yahweh,
[00:03:07] they start worshiping this golden calf.
[00:03:10] And they start doing all these abominable things that the pagan nations around them would have been doing,
[00:03:16] attached to that worship of the golden calf.
[00:03:19] And, of course, God knows about it.
[00:03:22] And he tells Moses, you know, this is what they're doing in the valley below.
[00:03:26] Moses comes down the mountain.
[00:03:27] He takes the Ten Commandments that God had just written with his finger on tablets of stone.
[00:03:31] He throws them on the ground.
[00:03:32] He grinds them into powder, casts them on water, makes them drink the water.
[00:03:39] I mean, it's a serious time.
[00:03:40] The wrath of God, it says, is burning hot against the people of Israel.
[00:03:47] And they plead with Moses.
[00:03:49] Like, we don't want this to be done.
[00:03:50] Moses begins pleading with God.
[00:03:53] I want you to have mercy on these people.
[00:03:55] And Moses goes up the mountain again to seek God's face.
[00:03:59] He says, God, I want to see you.
[00:04:01] God says, here, you can't see the full blast of my glory.
[00:04:05] You wouldn't survive that.
[00:04:06] But I'll put you in the cleft of the rock.
[00:04:08] I'll walk by.
[00:04:08] I'll cover you.
[00:04:09] And you'll see the afterglow of my glory.
[00:04:12] And as I'm passing, I'll declare to you who I am.
[00:04:16] And this is what God said.
[00:04:19] He said, the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,
[00:04:28] keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,
[00:04:33] but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation.
[00:04:44] Okay, what you have in that quotation is a bunch of people who had just violated a marriage contract with God,
[00:04:52] golden calf worshiping people in the valley below.
[00:04:54] And their big question is, what is God like?
[00:04:59] Is there a chance we could be forgiven?
[00:05:02] Is there a chance he'll extend mercy to us?
[00:05:05] Is there a chance that he could cover our sin?
[00:05:08] What is God like?
[00:05:10] Will we be consumed as a result of what we've done?
[00:05:13] Or is there the possibility for grace?
[00:05:16] What is God like?
[00:05:18] And we know that this is a major answer to that question because Exodus 34, verse 6 and 7 is the most quoted passage in the Bible by the Bible.
[00:05:30] In other words, it's like other biblical authors knowing that their audience was asking the question, what is God like?
[00:05:38] They're like, we have a real, a great answer to that question.
[00:05:42] And they would go to Exodus 34, verse 6 and 7, especially highlighting the gracious and merciful portion, the steadfast love portion of God's nature.
[00:05:55] Okay, that was a great picture of who God is.
[00:05:58] But of course, if you're a student of the Bible and a student of the New Testament and a student of Philippians,
[00:06:02] especially Philippians 2, verse 5 through 11, which we studied a couple of weeks ago,
[00:06:07] you know that there is an even more paramount or a better expression of who God is found in the Bible,
[00:06:14] and his name is Jesus.
[00:06:16] When Jesus came, he demonstrated what it means that God is gracious and merciful and slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness,
[00:06:26] who will not by any means just clear the guilty.
[00:06:29] He deals with sin, but his steadfast love is for thousands of generations.
[00:06:35] He showed us what that looks like more granularly when he came and lived and died on the cross and rose from the grave.
[00:06:44] All right, so Exodus 34, that's who God is.
[00:06:47] You move to the New Testament, who is God, what he is like.
[00:06:51] Hebrews 12, verse 2, that Jesus came, says that Jesus came and he was the express image of the glory of God.
[00:06:58] He just shows us exactly what God is like, exactly who God is.
[00:07:03] He unpacks the Exodus 34, verse 6 and 7 concept of God.
[00:07:08] Why am I saying all this?
[00:07:12] Because there's God declaring himself.
[00:07:16] There's Jesus, the Son of God, shining even more brightly, declaring Yahweh.
[00:07:23] And now at the center of this next little section of Philippians that we're looking into,
[00:07:29] we learn that God declared himself, Jesus declared God,
[00:07:34] and we also should shine as lights, he says, in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation.
[00:07:43] In other words, it's like Paul is saying, this is to me what an advancing gospel community looks like.
[00:07:49] There's God, he declares who he is.
[00:07:51] He sends his Son, he declares who God is.
[00:07:55] And now all those people who have believed in his Son,
[00:07:59] they then take who God is, who the Son is,
[00:08:02] and communicate that to the world in which they live.
[00:08:05] They also shine or illuminate the nature of God to the world in which they live.
[00:08:12] Maybe you've been tripped up before by looking into the Gospels and seeing Jesus say,
[00:08:17] I am the light of the world.
[00:08:19] He said that in the Gospel of John.
[00:08:21] And then in Matthew 5, he looks at his disciples and he says,
[00:08:24] you are the light of the world.
[00:08:26] Which is it, Jesus?
[00:08:28] Who is the light of the world?
[00:08:30] Well, what he's saying is, I'm the light of the world.
[00:08:33] And as you believe in me, I'm pouring through you so that you could be the light of the world.
[00:08:40] It means that Jesus' life and death and resurrection
[00:08:42] shine the light of God's nature and plans.
[00:08:46] And as recipients of his Gospel, we are to continue his shining work.
[00:08:51] So I've called this teaching today,
[00:08:53] An Advancing Gospel Community Breaks Into Darkness.
[00:08:57] And I want to think about four ways that we do so,
[00:08:59] according to the passage that Paul gave to us.
[00:09:02] And the first way is this.
[00:09:03] We already read verse 12 to 15 together.
[00:09:06] But the first way is this.
[00:09:07] Number one, we participate in salvation.
[00:09:10] We participate in salvation.
[00:09:17] The phrase that I'm lifting this exhortation from is found there in verse 12,
[00:09:21] where Paul says, to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
[00:09:25] You ever read that and kind of freaked out a little bit?
[00:09:27] You know, a lot of people get all weird about Paul saying that.
[00:09:30] You know, and the reason is real simple.
[00:09:32] You know, Paul was the guy who, more than most,
[00:09:36] championed that salvation is by grace through faith.
[00:09:42] Right?
[00:09:43] He's all about that.
[00:09:43] Romans is about that.
[00:09:45] Galatians is about that.
[00:09:47] Ephesians is about that.
[00:09:49] Colossians is about that.
[00:09:50] He's always championing that salvation is by grace through faith.
[00:09:55] So then he comes along and he's like,
[00:09:56] hey, and also work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
[00:10:00] And some of us have like little panic attacks.
[00:10:01] We're like, oh no, Paul forgot justification by faith.
[00:10:06] He had a like doctrinal brain fart right here as he's writing the Bible.
[00:10:09] Not allowed to do that, Paul.
[00:10:11] No, that's not what happened to Paul.
[00:10:13] Now, the phrasing is strong.
[00:10:15] You might wonder, like, why isn't it translated like Pastor Matt said last week?
[00:10:20] Like, live out your salvation with fear and trembling.
[00:10:23] Why isn't it translated that way?
[00:10:25] We're interpreting it that way.
[00:10:26] We're saying that's what he means.
[00:10:28] And that is what he means.
[00:10:29] But why isn't it translated that way?
[00:10:31] It's not translated that way because it would be wrong to translate it that way.
[00:10:35] The word work out is a word that means produce, make it, do it.
[00:10:45] It's not a word that means live out,
[00:10:47] though that is the implication of what Paul is addressing.
[00:10:50] Paul is saying, look, if you've been saved, if God has saved you,
[00:10:55] I mean, the idea that you could save yourself is just like an oxymoron.
[00:11:00] And salvation requires someone else saving you, right?
[00:11:05] So Paul knows that.
[00:11:06] He understands that.
[00:11:07] But he's looking at these Philippian people, people that he watched, many of them get saved.
[00:11:12] And he says, you need to take that salvation that has been given to you,
[00:11:17] and you need to live in that salvation.
[00:11:22] One illustration that's been helpful to me to understand this concept comes from the Old Testament conquest passages.
[00:11:30] You know, God had for years promised to the people of Israel that they would be given a land.
[00:11:36] And he told them where that land was.
[00:11:38] He had Abraham look at it, walk through it, all that kind of stuff.
[00:11:41] He promised this land to them.
[00:11:43] And for many years, they did not possess it until the time came.
[00:11:46] Book of Exodus, wandering through the wilderness.
[00:11:48] Book of Joshua, the time came.
[00:11:50] The land was promised.
[00:11:51] It was, in God's sight, theirs.
[00:11:54] But they needed to go into the land, and they needed to take it for themselves.
[00:11:58] He said, wherever you put your foot, that is yours.
[00:12:01] So it was like it was their land, but they actually had to go in and possess that land that was already theirs.
[00:12:08] And to me, that's what the sanctification process is like.
[00:12:11] You are a new creation in Christ Jesus if you believed in him.
[00:12:16] You have received a new nature from him if you believed and trusted in him.
[00:12:21] But now we're living this little life where we are unpacking that salvation that he has already given to us.
[00:12:29] We are being transformed into the image of Christ because we are new creatures within already.
[00:12:35] But there's this big flesh and old nature that's in the way.
[00:12:38] And so as we're walking with him, we become more like him slowly and progressively.
[00:12:44] It's who we already are in his sight.
[00:12:46] We're already possessors of the promised land in his sight.
[00:12:51] But there's the steady process of just walking into it.
[00:12:54] And I think the thing that I want to say today is like this is pretty exciting because we won't get to do this for eternity.
[00:13:02] You know, I'm really glad that we won't get to do this in eternity.
[00:13:05] I'm looking forward to being glorified and just like, all right, the battle with sin is over with.
[00:13:10] But right now, this little slot between the time that you believed in Jesus and the time that you go home to meet with him,
[00:13:16] it is the only opportunity you will have for billions and billions and billions and billions of years
[00:13:22] to just walk with him and watch a slow transformation occur where you creep into further Christ-likeness.
[00:13:31] So it's like a really cool opportunity that we have.
[00:13:34] So sanctification is a really big deal.
[00:13:35] And Paul is looking at this group of Philippians and he's saying, you guys need to get after it
[00:13:41] because it's something that you do with God and for God.
[00:13:45] That's why he said in verse 13, it's God who works in you.
[00:13:49] That's you're doing it with God and you're doing it for God for his good pleasure.
[00:13:54] I love that from Paul.
[00:13:55] It's like he's saying, you ever heard someone say something like, you know,
[00:14:00] God has done his part and now the rest is up to us.
[00:14:03] Like, that's not what Paul is saying.
[00:14:06] But have you ever heard someone else maybe say something like, you just got to let go and let God?
[00:14:12] Ever heard that?
[00:14:13] Paul is saying neither of those things.
[00:14:16] He's not in either of those camps.
[00:14:18] He's right down the middle saying, God will synergistically work with you as you work out your salvation for him.
[00:14:28] In other words, the power of God is going to meet you in this process.
[00:14:31] There's an illustration from the life of Jesus that I think illustrates this really well from Mark's gospel and also Luke's gospel,
[00:14:38] where Jesus was in the synagogue in Capernaum on the Sabbath day.
[00:14:42] And the religious leaders were already getting bothered with the way that Jesus treated the Sabbath because he did it.
[00:14:47] He's like, I made the Sabbath and I know what I made the Sabbath for.
[00:14:50] And it's not all the silly things that you guys are doing with it.
[00:14:52] And so Jesus like often violated their interpretation of what the Sabbath requirements mandated.
[00:14:58] And one of the things Jesus did that they really didn't like, it's like, I don't know how you don't like this,
[00:15:02] but they really didn't like that Jesus would heal people on the Sabbath.
[00:15:05] They're like, they just were really down on it.
[00:15:08] They're like, you know, there's one thing we don't like, it's healings.
[00:15:10] And so they were against that on the Sabbath day.
[00:15:14] And so one day Jesus is in the synagogue on the Sabbath.
[00:15:17] It's like a big gathering.
[00:15:18] They're going to read the Bible together.
[00:15:19] Someone's going to bust out the scroll.
[00:15:20] Jesus will probably give a Bible study.
[00:15:23] I wish I'd have been there.
[00:15:24] You know, it's just like this amazing holy moment.
[00:15:27] And these guys plant, these religious leaders actually plant a man who's visibly injured.
[00:15:33] He's got a deformity of his hand.
[00:15:36] It's clear.
[00:15:37] It's obvious.
[00:15:37] And they're like, they put him there right in front of Jesus.
[00:15:40] They're like, we're going to bait Jesus.
[00:15:41] He's going to break the Sabbath.
[00:15:43] And so Jesus, I love Jesus.
[00:15:46] He just toys with them in this episode.
[00:15:48] And so he makes the man stand up in front of everybody.
[00:15:51] And he looks at the man and he says, stretch out your hand.
[00:15:55] And the man stretches out his hand.
[00:15:58] Jesus doesn't touch him.
[00:15:59] Jesus doesn't say anything else.
[00:16:01] Jesus isn't like, I heal you.
[00:16:02] You know, nothing.
[00:16:03] He's just like, hey, you over there.
[00:16:06] Why don't you stretch out your hand?
[00:16:07] And the guy does it and he's healed.
[00:16:10] And I just imagine Jesus kind of like looking at the religious leaders like, what?
[00:16:13] You know, how can you pin that on me?
[00:16:15] I just told him to stretch out his hand, you know.
[00:16:20] But that story is a great illustration to me of what the sanctification process often looks like in our lives.
[00:16:27] It's like the Lord is saying, here are things that I want you to be.
[00:16:29] Here's things I want you to do.
[00:16:31] And as you try, I will synergistically, my power work with you to strengthen you.
[00:16:40] That man could have said, I can't do it.
[00:16:42] That's, I've never been able to do it.
[00:16:44] That's not who I am.
[00:16:46] But instead, he realized, like, I'm in the presence of Christ.
[00:16:52] He's asking this of my life.
[00:16:54] I think there was an element of trust there.
[00:16:57] Like, God's power is ultimately going to meet me in this process.
[00:17:01] All right?
[00:17:01] So those are a couple of ways that I think about the sanctification process.
[00:17:06] But as he's talking about this, you know, some of us, like, when we think about sanctification, we think about all these, like, big, gnarly sins.
[00:17:16] And then Paul, he's super quick to just go, yeah, and also do all things without grumbling or disputing.
[00:17:23] Just in case, like, you showed up at church and you're like, oh, sanctification, I got that on lock.
[00:17:28] Paul's like, I'm going to go after the thing that everybody does.
[00:17:32] And he's actually lifting a phrase from the Greek version of the Old Testament that alludes to what the people of Israel were like when they wandered in the wilderness.
[00:17:42] Grumbling, complaining, complaining about Moses, complaining about God, complaining about their situation.
[00:17:50] And here's what Paul is saying.
[00:17:52] And he's like, the sanctification work of God is so strong and so powerful that he's not here to just rescue you from these surface level things.
[00:18:05] He's here to go all the way down to the wood rot within that causes you to grumble and complain and be bitter.
[00:18:15] He can deal with even that.
[00:18:19] Man, that's powerful from Paul the apostle.
[00:18:22] He's showing us how far this goes.
[00:18:26] Now, before I move on to the next verses, I just want to point out, I think that Paul, when he says that,
[00:18:33] work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,
[00:18:36] I think he's probably thinking about the church collectively a lot more than we are.
[00:18:40] Like, I read that verse and immediately I'm thinking about myself.
[00:18:43] Time to do some inventory.
[00:18:45] Am I growing?
[00:18:47] Am I taking this seriously?
[00:18:49] What are some areas of my life that I've just kind of let lapse and I've not been serious about the Lord with?
[00:18:54] And I start doing the personal inventory.
[00:18:57] But Paul, the whole letter of Philippians, it's communal.
[00:19:02] He's like, I want you all to be of one mind and one heart and one spirit.
[00:19:07] And I think as he's looking out at the Philippian church and he's like, you guys are the answer there in Philippi.
[00:19:15] You have the life saving message of the gospel.
[00:19:20] You're what the Philippians need more than anything else.
[00:19:24] But if you don't collectively work out the salvation that's been given to you, you're going to come to a grinding halt.
[00:19:34] And so I think he's thinking of a communal thing.
[00:19:37] And this is just true.
[00:19:40] If you think of like a band, you know, playing music, doing their thing, you need to have the different instruments playing the same song.
[00:19:49] You know, you ever have a moment you're listening to live music and like one of the musicians just like they forgot or they just messed up.
[00:19:56] And it's just like, well, that's a, you're doing something different.
[00:19:59] It stands out.
[00:20:01] And this is what happens when in the body of Christ, we're growing together, we're pursuing Jesus.
[00:20:06] And then maybe someone, and this unfortunately happens a lot even with people who are prominent in the church.
[00:20:12] And they begin to say something, they might not say it with their words, but with their lives, they're saying, I am no longer going to pursue my sanctification.
[00:20:20] I'm going to do my own thing.
[00:20:23] It's a discordant note.
[00:20:26] It's like an awkward moment.
[00:20:29] And it keeps us from playing the beautiful music that we're meant to play.
[00:20:34] And so Paul's looking at the Philippian church and he's saying, there is a city out there that needs you so badly.
[00:20:41] So agree together to work on your sanctification together.
[00:20:46] Keep on growing in Jesus.
[00:20:49] Because if you stop, then what's going to happen is the grumbling and the disputing and the complaining and the infighting and the bickering.
[00:20:56] And the lack of love for each other.
[00:20:57] And pretty soon you become a community that no one in Philippi is going to listen to.
[00:21:03] So I think this is a really important exhortation that Paul is giving to us in the body of Christ.
[00:21:11] Okay, so the first one I want to say is just that, number one, how do we shine as lights in the world, participate in salvation?
[00:21:18] Number two, verse 16 to 18.
[00:21:21] I think a second thing is to by holding the word of life.
[00:21:25] How do we break into darkness by holding the word of life?
[00:21:28] Let's see that exhortation.
[00:21:29] Verse 16, he says,
[00:21:31] Holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
[00:21:40] Even if I'm to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith,
[00:21:45] I am glad and rejoice with you all.
[00:21:49] Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me.
[00:21:59] I'm not going to lie right now, this was totally closed.
[00:22:01] I took a whole sip and it wasn't open.
[00:22:05] And I thought about it, I'm like, do I just pretend that I took a sip right there?
[00:22:10] And then I felt like that would be dishonest in front of all of you.
[00:22:14] So now this is a real sip.
[00:22:23] Okay, back to the Bible.
[00:22:26] Another way we break into darkness is, look at verse 16.
[00:22:29] I like this exhortation, holding fast to the word of life.
[00:22:32] Okay, a couple questions about that.
[00:22:34] First of all, what's the word of life?
[00:22:37] You might think that what all that means is the Bible.
[00:22:41] And of course, you could think of the Bible as the word of life.
[00:22:45] But in the context of Philippians, it appears that it's a portion of the Bible that's the word of life.
[00:22:51] It's the gospel message.
[00:22:52] He just talked about the emptying of Jesus coming to die for us, rising from the dead, all of that.
[00:22:57] So that appears to be what Paul is clued in on, hold fast to that life-giving message.
[00:23:07] What does it mean, though, to hold fast to the word of life as a congregation or as a people?
[00:23:13] The words that Paul used for hold fast could mean one of two things.
[00:23:18] It could mean grip onto, like hold it tightly, or hold it out.
[00:23:25] And in the context of Philippians, I think that Paul is saying both things.
[00:23:34] That as Christians, as a community of believers, man, we got to hold on tight to the gospel.
[00:23:42] You know, we got to preach that message to ourselves.
[00:23:44] We got to remind each other of that glorious message of the gospel.
[00:23:50] It has to be front and center in our minds.
[00:23:52] We've got to appreciate it, marinate in it.
[00:23:54] We've got to see it as the source of hope for a lost and broken world.
[00:24:00] That's got to be present within our hearts.
[00:24:04] However, we also need to hold it out to the community in which we are part of.
[00:24:10] If we don't hold it close, we won't hold it out, but we eventually need to, as well, hold it out.
[00:24:18] This reminds me of a story in the book of 2 Kings.
[00:24:22] There was a time where in Israel's history, because of long-term decay and brokenness and sin and all of that,
[00:24:31] things were going really badly in Israel, especially in the north.
[00:24:35] They had kind of a two-capital situation.
[00:24:37] There had been a civil divorce in Israel, north and south kingdoms.
[00:24:41] And in the north, their capital city was Samaria.
[00:24:45] And because of their widespread disobedience, the Syrian armies had come against them there in that region
[00:24:53] and encamped against their city.
[00:24:56] And because they encamped against them, no food was coming in or out,
[00:24:59] so it was like a famine inside the city walls.
[00:25:02] And people were starting to panic.
[00:25:03] They're getting to the end of their resources, and they don't know what to do.
[00:25:10] And Elisha the prophet comes along, and he sees the despair, and he hears them beginning to cry out to God.
[00:25:16] And so he says, within 24 hours, there's going to be plentiful food and drink inside the walls of Samaria.
[00:25:24] And there are some who scoff, don't believe.
[00:25:27] But what the Bible says is that there were these four lepers who were begging at the gates of the city,
[00:25:33] and they started having a conversation with each other.
[00:25:36] They said, you know, in the city, there's no food.
[00:25:40] If we go in, we're going to die.
[00:25:42] If we wait here, we're going to die.
[00:25:46] Why don't we go out to the Syrian camp right out there, and let's just see if they give us food.
[00:25:52] What's the worst that happens?
[00:25:53] They kill us.
[00:25:54] We're going to die in the city.
[00:25:55] We're going to die here at the gate.
[00:25:56] We just die out there with them.
[00:25:58] But what they didn't know is that the night before, in the middle of the night, God made the Syrian army hear the sound of an invading force.
[00:26:09] I just love God.
[00:26:10] He's so creative.
[00:26:11] You know, it's just like they hear the sound of hooves and soldiers and yelling and threats.
[00:26:16] But they get up in the middle of the night.
[00:26:18] They think they don't have a moment to spare, and they flee for their lives.
[00:26:23] They leave all their stores of food and supplies and clothing and drink behind.
[00:26:29] And so these lepers, they cruise out there, and they find that the whole encampment is empty.
[00:26:35] And so, you know, they're doing what we would do.
[00:26:38] They'd start eating and drinking, and they're finding garments and gold and silver, and they're like, yo, we're rich.
[00:26:44] And then they get to this point where they look at each other, and this is what they say.
[00:26:50] They say, we are not doing what is right.
[00:26:54] This is a day of good news.
[00:26:56] If we are silent and wait until the morning light, punishment will overtake us.
[00:27:01] Now, therefore, come, let us go and tell the king's household.
[00:27:08] What did these leprous beggars need to do?
[00:27:12] They needed to hold out the word of life to their community.
[00:27:17] That's what they needed to do.
[00:27:18] They're like, we have the solution.
[00:27:21] We have the answer.
[00:27:23] And they needed to communicate it to others.
[00:27:26] They had no right to hoard it to themselves.
[00:27:29] And we, as believers, we have to do the same.
[00:27:31] We have to have the glorious gospel message that we feasted on, then shared with the world in which we live.
[00:27:39] We have to be willing to do this.
[00:27:41] I want to read to you a quote from J.I. Packer.
[00:27:45] He was a major figure in the church in the last century.
[00:27:50] And in 2013, while he was in his 80s, he wrote a book.
[00:27:55] It might have been his last book called Weakness is the Way.
[00:27:58] And it was written to the modern church.
[00:28:01] And he said, Christians should see themselves as sharing the church's calling to make Christ known with a discipling purpose as far and as wide as we can.
[00:28:11] We are called to trust, love, honor, worship, and serve Christ and to practice neighbor love in all its forms of which evangelism is one.
[00:28:21] The church everywhere is called to be a missional community as well as a doxological one.
[00:28:27] So we're about reaching people as well as about the message.
[00:28:31] And all Christians are called to pull their weight in both aspects of its ongoing life.
[00:28:39] So something for us to meditate on there from J.I. Packer.
[00:28:43] But the concept here is just being really simple.
[00:28:47] We need to be a people who are holding fast to the word of life.
[00:28:53] All right.
[00:28:53] Thirdly, we need to pursue Jesus's interests.
[00:28:58] Let's read verse 19 to 24 together.
[00:29:02] Paul said,
[00:29:03] I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon so that I too may be cheered by news of you.
[00:29:09] For I have no one like him who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare.
[00:29:14] For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ.
[00:29:20] But you know Timothy's proven worth.
[00:29:23] How is a son with a father?
[00:29:24] He served me in the gospel.
[00:29:26] I hope, therefore, to send him just as soon as I see how it will go with me.
[00:29:32] And I trust in the Lord that shortly I myself will come also.
[00:29:39] Okay.
[00:29:39] Here at this point, what Paul does is he turns his attention to a couple of just like housekeeping kind of things.
[00:29:46] He talks about Timothy.
[00:29:47] And in a second, we'll read about him talking about a guy named Epaphroditus.
[00:29:49] Epaphroditus.
[00:29:51] And Timothy was a co-worker of Paul's.
[00:29:54] Timothy was there when Paul started the church in Philippi.
[00:29:59] He was younger than Paul.
[00:30:02] And Paul believed in Timothy a lot.
[00:30:04] And so he thought of Timothy as his spiritual son.
[00:30:07] He called him a son a lot, including in this passage.
[00:30:11] Timothy gets two New Testament letters written to him, 1 and 2 Timothy.
[00:30:17] And even though he was young, and even though in other passages we learned that he battled some kind of physical sickness,
[00:30:25] and even though he also struggled with fear or anxiety, God used his life mightily.
[00:30:32] He became one of the pastors of the church in Ephesus and was one of Paul's most trusted ministry companions and missionaries.
[00:30:42] And here, what Paul tells the Philippians is that he hopes to send Timothy to them sometime soon,
[00:30:48] probably so that Timothy can bring news back to Rome where Paul is in prison about how the Philippian church is doing.
[00:30:56] This would be like a little bit of an accountability check for Paul.
[00:31:00] The Philippians get this letter from Paul.
[00:31:03] He tells them over and over again, be unified, act like Jesus, knock it off, you know, kind of stuff.
[00:31:07] And then also as they're reading the letter, he's like, and I'm going to send Timothy.
[00:31:11] He'll be there pretty soon.
[00:31:12] And they'd be thinking to themselves like, okay, we got a due date.
[00:31:17] Before Timothy gets here, we better start liking each other again.
[00:31:19] You know, it's kind of like the thing that Paul is doing when he says this.
[00:31:24] But there's this one little phrase that I wanted you to see.
[00:31:29] He said that I have no one like him, everyone else seeking their own interests.
[00:31:34] But he says in verse 21, Timothy sought the interests of Jesus Christ.
[00:31:43] What I want to say here is what you have in Timothy is you have a man who is emulating what Paul is shooting for.
[00:31:49] He's like, there's God declaring who he is.
[00:31:52] The ultimate revelation of who God is is found in Jesus.
[00:31:55] Timothy believed in Jesus and he is showing us how to shine brightly in a dark world.
[00:32:04] And the way that he's doing it, according to Paul, is he's saying Timothy is more concerned about Jesus's interests than anything else.
[00:32:14] He's into Jesus's mission and purpose and all of that.
[00:32:19] That's what he's focused upon.
[00:32:23] And because of that, Timothy emptied himself for other people, including the Philippians.
[00:32:29] And he was imitating Jesus who emptied himself out for us.
[00:32:35] This is just what I want to say here.
[00:32:37] I think the more that our wills and priorities are aligned with King Jesus's interests, the more we will shine as lights in the darkness.
[00:32:50] This is really the aim of sanctification, isn't it?
[00:32:53] Is to become more like the one that we worship.
[00:32:56] More like God's son.
[00:32:59] The more we think like Jesus and act like Jesus, valuing what he values and having a similar passion level to the things that he is passionate about, the better our light shines.
[00:33:11] So what are Jesus's interests?
[00:33:14] That's the big question.
[00:33:16] Like what are Jesus's interests?
[00:33:18] People will import all kinds of things.
[00:33:19] Jesus is about this.
[00:33:21] Jesus is about that.
[00:33:22] From the passage, what are Jesus's interests?
[00:33:25] Well, you could say two things.
[00:33:27] Timothy cared a lot for the Philippian believers.
[00:33:31] He's like, I want to make disciples there.
[00:33:33] I want to teach them.
[00:33:34] I want to spiritually encourage them.
[00:33:36] So apparently one of Jesus's interests is the spiritual well-being of God's people.
[00:33:42] And then the whole book of Philippians is about being spiritually healthy so that we can be an advancing gospel community.
[00:33:50] That tells us that Jesus's interest is the world that he came to die for.
[00:33:56] All right, so what does Jesus care about?
[00:33:58] He cares about the spiritual health of his people because he cares about reaching, seeking, and saving that which is lost.
[00:34:07] Luke 19 verse 10.
[00:34:09] So with an answer like that, I think we have to ask ourselves, how can we also then seek the interests of Christ?
[00:34:17] If Jesus is interested in the spiritual health of the church, and if Jesus is interested in reaching the lost, how can my life be geared more in that direction?
[00:34:27] All right, I want to close though with one last exhortation.
[00:34:31] To say it like this, we can also shine as lights into the darkness by celebrating when others shine.
[00:34:38] Let's read verse 25 to 30 to conclude our time together.
[00:34:42] He says,
[00:35:32] All right, here in our closing little passage for the day, Paul talks about this guy named Epaphroditus.
[00:35:38] If you're expecting a little one to be born sometime soon, I would encourage you, give Epaphroditus a shot.
[00:35:45] You know, I've been pastoring this church for a long time and no one's gone for it yet, so pray about it.
[00:35:52] But we don't know a lot about Epaphroditus.
[00:35:57] He's mentioned here, he's mentioned later in this letter.
[00:36:00] But what we do know from this little paragraph is that Paul thought really highly of this man.
[00:36:07] Apparently, he was Paul's co-worker there in Rome.
[00:36:10] Look at the phrases that Paul uses to describe him.
[00:36:13] He says, he's my brother.
[00:36:14] He's my fellow worker.
[00:36:16] He's my fellow soldier.
[00:36:18] We're going to war together.
[00:36:19] So he felt like he's my co-worker.
[00:36:23] But they were also the Philippians' ambassador.
[00:36:26] Paul said in verse 25 that he was their messenger and minister to Paul's need.
[00:36:34] And later, when we end our study of Philippians, Philippians chapter 4, we're going to see that Epaphroditus was the one who came from Philippi to greet Paul, to minister to Paul.
[00:36:44] And he brought a financial gift from the Philippian church and gave it to Paul.
[00:36:48] So he was kind of like the emissary of the Philippian church to Paul.
[00:36:56] And apparently, while he was there in Rome, he got really sick.
[00:37:01] And I remember being a little kid, you know, and we'd like go to visit Mexico and they'd be like, don't drink the water.
[00:37:06] I thought you just would like explode or something like that.
[00:37:08] I think Epaphroditus drank the water in Rome.
[00:37:11] All right, he got sick.
[00:37:12] He's like in a new place.
[00:37:13] His body can't deal with it.
[00:37:15] He's not accustomed to it.
[00:37:16] He gets sick.
[00:37:18] But he doesn't leave.
[00:37:20] Paul says he got near death and God had mercy on him.
[00:37:27] But even after God had mercy on him, Paul became eager.
[00:37:30] He's like, I really want to send Epaphroditus back home to Philippi because this is not a good environment for him to be in.
[00:37:37] And so he's nervous about him.
[00:37:39] He wants to send him back.
[00:37:40] And so he did.
[00:37:41] And Paul prepared the way for Epaphroditus.
[00:37:44] You know, he's like putting in the Bible.
[00:37:47] You got to remember, these guys are going to get this letter from Paul.
[00:37:49] They're going to have a big church gathering the next Sunday.
[00:37:51] They're going to read this letter out loud.
[00:37:53] He puts in it this little Epaphroditus clause.
[00:37:57] And it's like, hey, I know you guys sent Epaphroditus to me to be part of the gift.
[00:38:05] Like he brought the financial gift, which is great because I have to pay my own way here in this Roman prison.
[00:38:11] However, he remained.
[00:38:13] He's out there doing errands for me.
[00:38:15] He's a companion to me.
[00:38:17] He's spending time with me.
[00:38:18] He was part of your gift.
[00:38:20] But I need you to know I had to send him back.
[00:38:23] He didn't wimp out.
[00:38:26] But I had to send him back because he became incredibly sick.
[00:38:29] And I was so anxious that I just had to get him back to you.
[00:38:32] And so then Paul says, and I want you to honor him.
[00:38:38] But don't just honor him.
[00:38:39] He says in verse 29, honor such men.
[00:38:42] In other words, honor people like that.
[00:38:46] And I think what I want to say as we wrap up today is that an advancing gospel community breaks into darkness by celebrating the right people,
[00:38:55] by celebrating when others are shining like Epaphroditus was shining.
[00:39:00] When people like Epaphroditus become our heroes, we stand a better chance of shining in like manner.
[00:39:10] You know, Paul wanted Epaphroditus to receive the welcome of a military hero coming back from the battlefield.
[00:39:18] That's what he's saying.
[00:39:19] He's like, he's a fellow soldier.
[00:39:20] You need to honor this guy.
[00:39:21] He was out there on the front lines doing Jesus work.
[00:39:24] And I want you to celebrate people like that in your congregation.
[00:39:30] And you can imagine the effect of this being read in the Philippian church.
[00:39:35] There's Epaphroditus, you know, maybe still like recovering from his sickness a little bit.
[00:39:40] He's like getting some of his home cooked meals.
[00:39:43] And he's just like a little weak over there in the corner.
[00:39:45] And they're reading this letter and the people start coming up to him like Epaphroditus.
[00:39:49] Dude, you did what we didn't do.
[00:39:53] You risked your life.
[00:39:56] It took the apostolic word to make you leave your post.
[00:40:02] Bro, thank you for what you did.
[00:40:05] Thank you for your dedication.
[00:40:08] Thank you for your sacrifice.
[00:40:10] And as that praise and thanks for Epaphroditus was rising in the Philippian church,
[00:40:16] guess what else was rising?
[00:40:18] Their value system.
[00:40:20] They were beginning to see, oh, these are the people that we emulate.
[00:40:25] These are the people who are our heroes.
[00:40:28] The Jesus people who are broadcasting the life of Jesus in the way in which they live.
[00:40:36] All right.
[00:40:37] So what does this whole passage that we just read say to us today?
[00:40:41] Well, here's what I think it says.
[00:40:42] I think that people today in some way, shape or form are still asking.
[00:40:47] Many of you in this room are still asking the same question that our golden calf worshipers down in the valley below Mount Sinai in Exodus chapter 34 were asking.
[00:41:00] What is God like?
[00:41:02] What is God like?
[00:41:03] What is God like?
[00:41:04] You know, the Bible teaches that there's a general revelation that's given to all of humanity.
[00:41:07] That as people look into nature and as they feel the pangs of conscience, they can't know everything there is to know about God from that.
[00:41:18] But it's there from God, the Bible teaches, to create a questioning.
[00:41:25] What is God like?
[00:41:28] God declares himself, I'm slow to anger, gracious and merciful, abounding in loving kindness, steadfast love for thousands, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquities of the fathers to the third and fourth generation.
[00:41:41] In other words, I deal with sin to the third and fourth generation, but my steadfast love goes to thousands of generations.
[00:41:49] Like this is the main part of who I am.
[00:41:53] He communicates that.
[00:41:55] Then Jesus comes along and puts flesh onto that.
[00:41:59] That's who God is.
[00:42:01] Then we come along and believe in him and we are to shine with who he is to the world in which we live.
[00:42:11] So we better participate in our salvation.
[00:42:14] We better hold tightly to the word of life and share it with the world around us.
[00:42:18] We better prioritize Christ's interests and honor others who do the same because we get a chance to represent our Lord to a lost and broken and hurting world.
[00:42:36] Thank you for listening.
[00:42:38] If you would like more teachings and information about Calvary Monterey, please visit calvary.com.
[00:42:43] You can also find books, teachings through the Bible and articles from our lead pastor at nateholdridge.com.
[00:42:51] Thanks again for tuning in.
[00:42:52] We'll see you next week.