- Stand - We will not be moved (Phil 1:27)
- Strive - We will not quit (Phil 1:28)
- Suffer - We will not be afraid. (Phil 1:28-30)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:00-00:25
We're gonna be picking up in verse 27. Last week where we left off, the Apostle Paul says, "To live is," what? "Christ, and to die is gain." So he was saying, "You know, I would actually prefer to die, and, you know, I'm actually chained to a guard.
00:25-00:33
I would prefer to die and be with Christ, but it's more necessary that I stay for you.
00:36-00:48
So today we're going to pick up in verse 27, and before we get to the text, I wanna just to kinda show you what Paul's thinking here, why he's writing some of the things that he's writing.
00:49-00:51
I know some of you know my dog.
00:51-00:52
Let's get that picture.
00:52-00:53
This is Gordy.
00:54-00:55
(dog whining)
00:57-00:58
He's really, oh there he is.
00:58-00:59
That's Gordy.
01:01-01:04
Actual size, actually.
01:06-01:13
But, something that I've learned is that I'm really lame at training dogs.
01:14-01:16
Now, he's a boxer.
01:18-01:22
How many of you have had boxers or had to deal with boxers?
01:22-01:22
Okay, a lot of hands.
01:23-01:24
How many of you have boxers right now?
01:24-01:25
I know some of you do.
01:25-01:26
OK.
01:27-01:27
All right.
01:29-01:31
So you'll back me up on this.
01:33-01:42
Boxers are like coiled springs electrically charged on steroids, right?
01:42-01:53
Like they are constantly just-- growing up, we had an English bulldog, and that thing was basically a watermelon with legs, only it wasn't quite as active as a watermelon.
01:55-02:03
So I went from having this English bulldog that was lazy, and you actually had to carry the thing and put it in bed.
02:03-02:05
I mean, it was this lazy bulldog.
02:05-02:12
And then, you know, to having these boxers, and these things are just like constantly on the go.
02:12-02:16
Well, I've tried to train them.
02:17-02:30
I had one before this one who had passed away, and we got this one a few years ago, But actually a man from our church, Mark Bloomingdale, was teaching me some things about training.
02:30-02:33
He's not a dog trainer. I'm gonna get that out.
02:34-02:40
But he was telling me some things that I was doing wrong in training the dog.
02:42-02:46
And he explained to me that dogs are actually pack animals, right?
02:46-02:49
Like wolves. And in every pack you have what?
02:50-02:57
You have the leader of the pack, which was also a really cool song back in the day.
02:57-03:23
Remember that song? But you have the pack leader, and unless that dog identifies you as the pack leader, there's going to be some tension on over who is the actual pack leader. So Mark had told me that I need to assert myself and work with the dog in such a way that he knows I'm the leader of the pack and he is not.
03:26-03:45
Well here's the problem. We've been working with Gordy, but the problem that we've discovered is that through all of this process of establishing the pack leader, we found out in our home that I am not the pack leader.
03:47-03:50
And actually, Erin is the pack leader.
03:51-03:58
Okay, my wife Erin is the pack leader in our wolf pack.
04:00-04:03
And here's how we know this.
04:05-04:22
When Erin goes somewhere, if she has to go to the store or whatever, and I'm staying at home working on things, as soon as the door shuts, Gordy does things that he would never do when she's in the house.
04:24-04:25
And it's hilarious.
04:25-04:32
The door will shut and immediately I'll hear the click of his toenails on the hardwood floor.
04:32-04:34
I'll hear click, click, click, click, click.
04:36-04:38
He jumps on the bed.
04:39-04:42
What are the chances that dog would jump on the bed when Aaron's home?
04:43-04:48
He knows that she would turn him inside out if he jumped on the bed.
04:48-04:50
As soon as she's gone, he's on the bed.
04:50-04:53
The other day, she went somewhere and I was at home working.
04:54-04:54
Where is the dog?
04:55-04:56
I went out to look for him.
04:56-04:57
He was on the couch.
04:58-04:59
That dog has never been on the couch.
05:02-05:11
The thing is, when the pack leader's there, Gordy knows what he's allowed to do and what he's not allowed to do.
05:12-05:19
When Aaron's not there, Gordy's like, I'll just do whatever I want.
05:20-05:21
Who's gonna stop me?
05:21-05:22
What's his name?
05:26-05:28
Well, why are you sharing this?
05:28-05:29
Well, here's why.
05:29-05:35
Look at verse 27, because this idea is really what Paul is talking about here.
05:37-05:54
He says, "Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ," here it is, "so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit." And then he goes on, we're going to get to that.
05:55-05:57
But see, this was the Apostle Paul's concern.
05:58-06:01
My concern is that you're walking with Christ.
06:03-06:04
Whether I'm there or not.
06:06-06:09
You're not allowed on the couch, Gordy, whether I'm there or not.
06:10-06:20
And Paul's saying, "Church of Philippi, you need to be conducting yourselves in a godly way whether I'm there or not." That's what I want to hear.
06:22-06:26
You remember in elementary school, when the teacher would leave the room?
06:27-06:30
I don't know how it was at your school, but I'll tell you how it was at our school.
06:31-06:57
When the teacher would leave the room, it would turn into absolute chaos. Kids would be dancing on desks and throwing things and doing all kinds of crazy things. Then you'd have the one kid like posting lookout to see when the teacher was coming back, so that when the teacher walked in her room, every kid was sitting in the chair perfectly quiet. And it's the whole idea of, listen, this isn't just putting on a show like, "Oh, Paul's coming to town. We better act real spiritual.
06:59-08:01
Paul's coming to town. We better show him that, you know, he didn't waste his time with it. Let's put on a good face for Paul. Paul, because it doesn't matter if I'm there or not." So let's look at the text here. We're gonna break it down. The first word, every word's important by the way. Every word's important. The first word in verse 27 is "only." Now you need to circle that word in your Bible because this is emphatic in the Greek. This is a very important word. What he's saying is this is the bottom line. With everything I'm telling you, listen, this is it. This is what I need to tell you. That's what he's saying by starting with the He says, "Only let your manner of life..." Now this is an interesting word in the Greek.
08:01-08:04
I'm not here to give you a Greek lesson, but when it's important, it's important.
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And it helps us. If you miss this, you're gonna miss the rest of the sermon.
08:09-08:16
But the Greek word for manner of life is "polis." It's actually the word for city.
08:22-09:47
So when he's talking about, he goes, "Listen, let your polis, your manner of life..." What he's saying is you need to be a good citizen. What does a good citizen do? A good citizen does what is for the good of others. A good citizen reflects the values of the state. And the reason Paul would use this word is Philippi was part of Rome. And Roman citizens were very proud of that. Okay, Roman citizens would have had Roman names, Roman clothes, they would have prayed to Roman deities, they would have sworn to the Roman Emperor. You know, to be a part of Rome was a big deal. And they were very proud of that. Sort of like being from Pittsburgh and you travel, you know, make you pack my penguins jersey, right? Make sure you pack my Stiller shirt." You know, it's that sense of, "I'm proud of where I'm from." But in the Roman culture it was even more than that, if you can believe that. Actually, in Acts chapter 16, talking about Philippi, it says, verses 20 and 21, "When they had brought them to the magistrates, they said, "These men are Jews and they are disturbing our city.
09:47-10:14
They're disturbing Philippi. What are they doing that's so bad?" Well, listen to this, "They advocate customs that are not lawful for us as Romans to accept or practice." What they're saying is, "They're not acting like Romans and that's a problem. That'd be like somebody visiting you here from out of town and they don't know the customs.
10:15-11:00
They put the coleslaw beside the sandwich, not on the sandwich, and you're like, "That's not how we do it here." They show up wearing their Ravens jersey. You're like, "Seriously, are you trying to get beat up?" But that's what on here. It's that's not how we do it as Roman citizens. So I think you're starting to see Paul's point. Actually in Philippians 3 20 Paul says, "But our citizenship is in heaven and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ." You You are a citizen of heaven.
11:04-11:08
And a citizen of heaven reflects the values of heaven.
11:10-11:13
So look back at your text here, 127.
11:13-11:29
He says, "Only let your manner of life, let your citizenship be worthy." Now don't get tripped up on that.
11:29-11:34
You know, some people could read this and say, wow, I need to try harder to be a Christian.
11:35-11:39
That's what the Christian life is about, is just trying to be a better boy or trying to be a better girl.
11:40-11:46
And you know, maybe I, this word worthy could also be translated appropriately.
11:49-11:55
I mean, not like translated appropriately, translated, air quotes, appropriately.
11:58-12:18
So don't miss this. He's saying, "Act how is appropriate for a citizen of heaven." You're like, "Well, what does that mean?" Think about it this way. How do people in heaven act?
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If you were to take a field trip to heaven today and come back and and do a report on how people were acting in heaven.
12:27-12:28
What would you report?
12:34-12:37
Live as a citizen of heaven, even while you're on the earth.
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Here's what that means.
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People say about you, you know what?
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She seems like she really cares about people.
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Well, that's appropriate because she's a citizen of heaven.
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You know, that guy, he's really honest.
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That guy's really honest.
12:56-12:57
Well, you know what?
12:57-12:58
That only makes sense.
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Why?
12:59-13:01
Because that's how citizens of heaven act.
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They're honest.
13:03-13:05
Well, that guy's really trustworthy.
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You know, if he says he's gonna do something, he does it, and you can always trust him.
13:09-13:09
Well, that makes sense.
13:10-13:12
That's how citizens of heaven act.
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You know, she's really forgiving.
13:19-13:22
She's had to deal with a lot of stuff in her life, and she has been so forgiving.
13:23-13:28
Well, that makes sense because that's how citizens of heaven act.
13:29-13:30
That's exactly what Paul's saying here.
13:30-13:33
You know, you people are so proud of your Roman citizenship.
13:34-13:47
You're citizens of heaven, actually, in the rest of the phrase, he goes, "Let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Jesus Christ." He says, "Your citizenship is with the gospel." That's the citizenship you need to be focused on.
13:53-13:58
Basically, it's a life consistent with what you preach.
13:59-14:01
It's practicing what you proclaim.
14:04-14:21
And you're like, "Oh yeah, here comes another one of these sermons." This is so important, Christians, because we, I think, sometimes more than any other people on the earth, we miss the forest for the trees here.
14:22-14:24
And we become the biggest hypocrites on the planet.
14:28-16:24
I was talking to another harvest pastor this week, just getting caught up, and, "Hey, going on in your church and what's going on in my kind of thing and he told me there was a man in his church who was really bent out of shape over the elephant room thing. Remember the elephant room? This guy was so bent out of shape over the elephant room and he would not let it go. He was just constantly like, "I can't believe they would talk to TD Jakes!" He just would not let it go and this pastor friend of mine was like, "Dude, seriously, the elephant room was like when when did that happen like seriously it's time to move on I understand your concern I don't agree with your concern it's time to move on but this guy still you know putting stuff on the internet and still you know getting people ripped I can't believe the elephant room I gotta you know it's wrong just this guy had built this whole platform this whole soapbox this anybody that stands still for more than three seconds is going to hear about my displeasure concerning the elephant room. Well then this man's wife put on Facebook, this Mr. Anti-Elephant Room guy, his wife put on Facebook, "What do you call a man that cheats on his wife?" "Answer, my husband." We are so guilty of that. We get running around and our feathers are ruffled and our britches are in a bunch because of some stupid little campaign and we're missing the obvious thing. Like I'm glad that kind of stuff doesn't happen here, really.
16:25-16:43
We're all concerned about, you know, we got this election coming up and we concerned. But with all the campaigning you're doing for one political party or another, how much energy and attention are you putting into your marriage?
16:44-16:55
How much energy and attention are you putting in to raising your kids? How much energy and attention are you putting into reaching out to that lost person that you work with?
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How much energy and attention are you putting into your integrity. We're not as unlike this guy as we think. That's why Paul says, "You're a citizen of heaven. Act like it. Act like it." They're not going behind people's backs in heaven. They don't act like that.
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There's not hatred and bitterness in heaven. They don't act like that. And you don't act like that either. They're not lying to each other in heaven. There are no secret sins in heaven. They don't act like that. You're a citizen of heaven.
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Act But when did being immersed in a culture of social programs and politics and inner church quarreling, when did all this stuff replace the gospel?
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Citizen of heaven, you're a citizen of heaven, let's act like it.
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Like, okay, well, can you be more specific?
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Actually, yeah, let's continue in the text.
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things today. Three things.
18:26-22:03
Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit. So the first word on your outline is "stand." we will not be moved. Stand firm. Actually, this is a military term. It refers to a soldier on his post. A soldier on his post meaning this is where I'm taking my stand and the only thing that's removing me from this position is somebody killing me. That's what that word means. I'm taking my stand. So Paul tells the church be an appropriate citizen, walk worthy. How? First of all, stand firm. He says in one spirit. Now he's not talking about the Holy Spirit here. Certainly the Holy Spirit is behind the writing of this and Holy Spirit is who empowers the church. We get all that, but he's probably not talking about the Holy Spirit here. Actually, in your Bible the word "spirit" is probably written with a small "s" as it is in mine. Literally what it just means is "attitude." Stay on your post and everybody keep the same attitude. Now when we get to chapter 2, We're going to be talking a lot about unity. So this is sort of a down payment that Paul's giving us. But Paul's saying, "Here's the report that I want to hear, that you're not abandoning your post. That's what I want to hear. I want to hear that you guys took your post, you're standing on your post, and you're not abandoning your post. When I was in Bible college, I had longer hair and I was on the soccer team and I was informed that if I did not get my hair cut, I was going to be thrown off the soccer team. And my response was, "Oh, we don't need to fight about it, I'll just quit." And I did. Like, I don't want it to be like a big issue, so I'll just quit. This "so easy to quit" attitude, we're all just too quick to quit. You know, whether it's our television provider, our cell phone carrier, our marriage, we've learned to program ourselves to say we don't really need to stick to anything. If I don't like something, I'll just quit. If I don't agree with something, I'll just quit. Paul here says, I want to hear that you're standing firm, that you're not moving, that you're not bailing. And again, he's talking about unity in the church. It's protecting... what's unity in the church?
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Well, we're gonna see this as we go through Philippians, but one of the things, it's protecting relationships. It's saying, you know, sometimes it's worth but to have the hard conversations.
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And I've lived in this area most of my life and I've shared this with you before.
22:19-22:26
Is this like a, this culture thing or is this sort of like permeating the United States or I don't know.
22:28-22:37
But what I'm finding more and more, at least in this area, it's easier to avoid people for years than to have one hard conversation with people.
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Isn't that true?
22:42-22:45
You know, instead of sitting down saying, "Sam, you know what?
22:45-22:47
That offended me when you said that, man.
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That really bothered me and I think you're out of line to say that.
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We need to talk about it." Instead of having that conversation, I'll do whatever I can to avoid Sam for the next five years.
22:58-23:03
So maybe then if I run into him, we'll just act like nothing happened, right?
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Isn't that what we do?
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Now, seriously, is that like here?
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Is that-- Did they do that out in Philadelphia?
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Okay, so maybe it's a Pennsylvania thing.
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All right.
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They do that in Ohio?
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Oh gosh, it's spreading.
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That bothers me.
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Sit down and have the conversation.
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I'm blocking you from my friends list on Facebook, which a lot of people did after last week's sermon.
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You realize that whole beginning was just a joke.
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Protect relationships.
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Don't be afraid to have hard conversations.
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Unity's worth it.
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Okay, can we, you know, if this whole thing is spreading, can we be like the start of, let's start something new.
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Let's start a new thing where if we have an issue with someone, we're going to lovingly go to the person to talk about, well, you know, that's not really new.
23:59-24:01
Jesus actually told us to do that.
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But here's something new.
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Let's be people that actually do it.
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How about that?
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So protecting relationships, standing firm.
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What else does that mean?
24:12-24:19
Jot this down, "standing on the truth of God's word." We're going to see that also, especially when we get to Philippians chapter three.
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There is a danger of false teachers.
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And Paul says you need to stand firm.
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Stand firm and not moving from sound doctrine.
24:42-24:46
Now, it's easy, it's easy to evaluate sermons here.
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Because at Harvest Bible Chapel, what we do is we go through a book at a time, we take a chunk at a time.
24:54-24:55
That's what we do.
24:55-26:28
Last year, if you were with us, we went through Colossians and we started at Colossians at the very first verse and we ended at the very last verse. That's what we're doing this year with Philippians. We start at the first verse, we're going to end with the last verse. Why do we do that? Because if I just preached about what I felt like preaching about, I'm not going to give you the whole counsel of God. I'm probably only going to lean in certain areas and only give you certain things and you're gonna get a very unbalanced diet. We believe that God wrote this book, so in preaching it, we're going to go through and cover all of the issues that God covers in his word, and we're going to do them in the order that he covers them. Not random topics, not "let me tell you some things that I was thinking about this week." Let's go through God's word a verse at a time. So here's how you evaluate sermons. Go home, take the passage that we looked at together, and ask yourself, "Is this what the passage says?" That's how you evaluate a sermon. You know, sometimes people evaluate sermons based on, "I don't like the personality of the preacher," or "I didn't like his illustration," or whatever. That's not how you evaluate a sermon. You Now, is this what the text says?
26:28-26:42
You should be able, after the sermon, to go through these verses and say, "Oh, I see why Jeff said that, because that's just what it says here." Honestly, that's my evaluation every week.
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Every Sunday afternoon, I go back to say, "Did I just say what the text says?" That's the only thing that the church can be unified on.
26:58-27:05
We have an objective source of truth that becomes our rallying point.
27:07-27:08
So first of all, stand.
27:08-27:10
We will not be moved.
27:11-27:12
We will not be moved.
27:12-27:19
Secondly, to live a worthy life, to be an appropriate citizen, so to speak, right down the word strive.
27:19-27:20
We will not quit.
27:24-27:28
He says, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit.
27:29-27:37
Look at the next phrase in verse twenty seven, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.
27:40-27:45
So first we had this military term of standing, not abandoning the post, striving.
27:45-27:47
Here's actually an athletic term.
27:49-27:50
That literally means sweating.
27:51-27:53
We're going to sweat it out together.
27:53-28:00
So working together, side by side-- all right, help me with the illustration here.
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When you think of athletics and you think of athletes that are lined up side by side, sweating together, working towards a common purpose, what do you think of?
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No, not tennis.
28:15-28:16
Football, right?
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She said football.
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Football, right?
28:21-28:24
Common goal, laying it all out.
28:27-28:29
And there is power in unity.
28:29-28:39
But understand this, when we talk about unity, as we'll be doing a lot, because that's what comes up in Philippians, understand it's not unity for unity's sake.
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Like, hey, let's just all try to get along, why?
28:44-28:45
Just for the sake of getting along?
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The end game, what is it?
28:51-28:53
Striving side by side for what?
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He says, for the faith of the gospel.
29:00-29:02
But here's the thing, church, what disrupts unity?
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Almost all the time, what disrupts unity in a church is something subtle.
29:14-29:19
When there's disunity in the church, when there are people upset and there's discord.
29:24-29:33
Many times what I've seen personally and in talking with other pastors, you know, you kind of look back and say, what exactly is the problem?
29:35-29:42
You see, a lot of times it's not blatant, gross, obvious sin because that's easy.
29:45-29:50
You know, so-and-so, you know, is in sin and we're, you know, we're dealing with it in a biblical way.
29:50-29:53
That'd be an easy thing to sort of put your finger on.
29:53-30:01
But when there's disunity in the church, somehow it manages to creep in.
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It manages to creep in and manifest itself through criticism, through blaming, through accusing, through bitterness.
30:19-30:21
Now, Steelers play at one today.
30:22-30:24
Now, are they wearing those throwback uniforms today?
30:25-30:27
Is that today they're wearing those things?
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Have you seen these things?
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All right, all in favor of the throwback uniforms.
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Anybody?
30:37-30:38
A couple of you.
30:38-30:41
Darren, you like those things.
30:47-31:13
Wow, I am shocked. I saw a picture this week, it was Ben and Kiesel, like, standing on a field wearing these things, and I thought they lost a bet. Well, one o'clock, the Steelers start. Imagine that James Harrison doesn't care for the throwback uniforms.
31:17-31:39
They're like, "You're wearing them." He's like, "All right." And he only goes at it sort of half-hearted today. Could you imagine? I'm only going at it half-hearted today. And somebody says, well that that's like Taylor's gimmick, don't take that.
31:41-33:25
Or Big Ben doesn't like Mike Tomlin's coaching. So he's like, you know what, if this is how it's gonna be, I'm just gonna do my own thing. You know, Ben in the shotgun formation and they snap him the ball and he punts it. It's like first and ten. Like what are you guys doing? Well why isn't that going to happen? Why aren't you going to see Harrison playing half-hearted? Why aren't you going to see Ben punting on first and ten? Because they don't care. It's not going to happen because they're striving side by side for a common purpose. There's the legendary Herb Brooks that says the name on the front of the jersey is more important than the name on the back. He was talking about hockey, but I'd like to share that with you, talking about the church. So let me ask you, what's more important? What's more important to you, unity or being right? Unity or my preferences, unity or my opinions. Don't sweat over the differences. You need to sweat over the commitment to unity. And in order to do that you need to see the big picture. That's why Paul says, "Striving side by side for what? For the faith of the gospel, the faith of the gospel.
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You have to get that big picture.
33:28-33:32
Why are we doing what we're doing here for the faith of the gospel?
33:37-33:40
So stand, strive and finally.
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Let's talk about suffering.
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Verses 28 through 30.
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He says, "And not frightened in anything by your opponents.
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This is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation and that from God.
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For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ, you should not only believe in him, but also suffer for his sake, engage in the same conflict that you saw I had, and now hear that I still have." So lastly on your outline, write down, "Suffer. We will not be afraid." Living as a citizen of heaven, let me ask you, how many people in heaven right now do you think are wrestling with fear?
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How many?
34:39-34:41
How many people in heaven are wrestling with fear?
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Hold up the universal sign for how many?
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Zero.
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Why?
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Because God's right here.
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What do I have to be afraid of?
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But God's right here too.
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We don't see him as they do in heaven, but that doesn't mean his presence isn't here.
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Do you know the Bible says, "Fear not"?
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how many times? I know some people, the Bible says 365 times fear not, one for every day of the year. That's not true. That was in that movie, wasn't it? Like Facing the Giants or something, don't they say that? I've gotten emails that say that. That's not true. It's actually somewhere around a hundred times. Your Fear not. Fear not.
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That's what Paul says here.
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Not frightened in anything by your opponents.
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Now what's his statement all about?
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He says, "This is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation, and that from God." Well, Tertullian, the church historian, was converted because he watched a slave girl face death with courage.
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That's the kind of thing he's talking about here.
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Seeing the suffering of God's people and those inflicting the suffering, there's a sense of I am wrong.
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She is right.
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I realize now that I'm on the wrong side of this.
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Now, when we talk about suffering here, we're not speaking of suffering in general, like for example, sickness.
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I'm still getting over this flu, this fever that I've had all week, you can probably tell.
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But this isn't suffering for the sake of Christ.
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I'm not talking about, "Well, I've been having financial problem." That's suffering for the sake of Christ. No, that's called life.
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We're all going to suffer in those areas.
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This is a specific kind of suffering.
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You see, at the end of verse 29, it's suffering for His sake.
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It's suffering that's a direct result of making your stand with Jesus Christ.
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It's the suffering that results for that.
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I'm just going to stop here and say, honestly, I have no idea how to preach on these persecution passages here in America.
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I mean, I've preached a lot of sermons over the last 15 years, and you get to these passages about persecution, about suffering for the gospel of Christ, about, you know, standing up and, you know, sharing the gospel and facing backlash because people hate Christ, people hate the gospel.
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I don't know how to preach that in America, I just don't, I'll be honest with you.
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We are so clueless, all of us.
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So there again this week, I was looking at this, Oh, here we have one of these persecution passages.
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What do I...
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And I was thinking about this moment, I'm like, what do I even say?
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Do I really think that there are people sitting in this auditorium that are enduring anything that resembles persecution?
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So much of scripture teaches that citizens of heaven will be mistreated by those of this world.
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And I think we're doing such a good job of being undercover that the world can't spot us.
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So I don't know what to tell you about persecution.
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other than to say, "If you really act appropriately as a citizen of heaven while living on this earth, that is going to bother the people of this earth to the point that you will be persecuted." And when that happens, when that happens, here's a word for you.
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Verse twenty nine says, for it has been granted to you that word granted is the same word where we get the word grace.
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We think suffering is bad, persecution is bad.
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Actually, persecution is a gracious gift of Christ.
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So when you suffer because of your commitment to Christ, throughout eternity, you're going to look back at that as a grace.
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Acts, chapter five, verse forty one, when the early disciples were persecuted, they didn't run home and lock the door and say, this church thing isn't working.
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Do you remember what they did? Back handsprings all the way down the avenue saying, "We were considered worthy to suffer for Christ." And here's all I can tell you about that.
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You'll know what that's like when it happens.
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But if your faith hasn't ever brought some level of suffering, that's a problem.
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How can you not expect suffering for faith?
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We're redeemed people but still living in a cursed world.
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When you stand as a citizen of heaven and you start saying things like, "You know what? Maybe some other people at work are taking some shortcuts.
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I'm not going to do it." And suddenly you're the odd man out.
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You're going to start to know.
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When you begin to say, "You know, I'm not going to watch my family and friends make decisions that are going to destroy their lives.
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I'm going to speak up and say something to them." And your family and friends hate you because you had the gall to speak up and say, "You know, I think you're making a bad decision "because this is what the Bible says." And now all of a sudden, you're the odd man out, you're going to start to know.
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"I'm going to reflect the values of heaven.
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"I'm going to live worthy no matter what the cost is." As a citizen of heaven, We need to see ourselves as tourists on the earth.
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You know that?
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So here's a good citizenship statement.
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If it's easy, it isn't right.
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And if it's right, it isn't easy.
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So would you bow your heads with me?
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And this is a call for all of us, as I've already said this morning.
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The last thing we wanna do here is play games with this.
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If you truly consider yourself, if I truly consider myself as a citizen of heaven, how can that not affect our conduct?
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So the word to all of us, myself included, our manner of life must be worthy of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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Are we living appropriately as citizens of heaven?
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Are we standing firm?
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Have you made the commitment to say, I'm not going to be moved?
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Strive together.
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Have you made that commitment?
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I'm not a church goer.
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When I show up, it's to work.
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It's to strive side by side.
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It's to work together for the sake of the gospel.
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And to suffer victoriously.
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Not afraid.
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People that are in heaven aren't afraid.
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Why should I be afraid?
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The worst thing that anybody could do to me is actually the best thing anybody could do to me?
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What, kill me and send me straight to heaven?
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I will not fear when living as a citizen of heaven offends people, not because I'm obnoxious, not because I'm trying to be some self-righteous Bible-thumper, but simply for being someone who represents Jesus Christ, someone who simply wishes to represent the values of Heaven while I'm here on the earth.
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That's a worthy life.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Philippians 1:27-30
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.