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A reading from Paul's letter to the Philippians.
Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus to all God's holy people in Christ Jesus at Philippi,
together with the overseers and deacons, grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that what has happened to me has actually served to advance the gospel.
As a result, it has become clear throughout the whole palace garden to everyone else that I am in chains for Christ.
And because of my chains, most of the brothers and sisters have become confident in the Lord,
and dare all the more proclaim the gospel without fear.
It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill.
The latter is due so out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel.
The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains.
But what does it matter?
The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached, and because of this I rejoice.
Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, for I know that through your prayers and God's provision of the Spirit of Jesus Christ,
what has happened to me will turn out for my deliverance.
I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage,
so that now, as always, Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.
For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me.
Yet what shall I choose?
I do not know.
I am torn between the two.
I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far,
but it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body.
Convinced of this, I know that I will remain,
and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith,
so that through my being with you, again, your boasting in Christ Jesus will abound on account of me.
Whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ.
Then, whether I come and see you or only hear about you in my absence,
I will know that you stand firm in the one spirit,
striving together as one for the faith of the gospel.
This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God.
Thank you so much, Cordelia.
That was wonderful.
And Juliana, thank you so much.
Well, good morning.
We've been kind of over the past few weeks
just working our way up into this letter to the church in Philippi,
and it's a letter of friendship.
It's a letter of deep love and affection.
And I want us to be remembering who's writing this letter.
We looked a few weeks ago in Acts chapter 9,
and we saw how this man Saul of Tarsus was transformed into Paul the Apostle,
this man who had been adamantly opposed to Jesus.
He was persecuting the people of Jesus.
He had his own encounter with the resurrected Lord, with Jesus himself.
And that utterly changed and redirected his life.
He began immediately to tell people that Jesus is the Son of God,
Jesus is Israel's Messiah, and the world's true Lord.
That was around 33 A.D., just a couple of years after the crucifixion
and resurrection of Jesus.
And then I want us to remember, too, who's reading this letter.
And we looked at this a few weeks ago as well.
Acts chapter 16, God calls the Apostle Paul to go to northern Greece,
to the city in Philippi.
And we saw there were three amazing stories of transformation there
where Lydia encountered gospel truth, and she was transformed.
And that slave girl encountered gospel power, and she, too, was transformed.
And then the jailer, he encountered gospel life through Paul and Silas,
and he was transformed.
And many of their friends and their family, they all together, they repented,
they believed, they were baptized,
they became the first converts and the first members of that church
that met in the house of Lydia there in Philippi.
And that was around the year 46, 47, 48, I don't know, somewhere in there.
49 A.D., yeah, that's right.
So I just want to pause to think about this.
To marvel at the grace of God in the lives of these people.
Without the grace of God, without the power of God for salvation
and for transformation, the Apostle Paul would never be writing and sending this letter.
There would be no members in this church plant in Philippi receiving and reading this letter.
And none of us would be here today considering the contents of this letter.
But because of the power of the gospel and because of the grace of the gospel
that came to each and every one of those people and each and every one of us
from the Father, through the Son, and by the Holy Spirit,
here they are as a result of God's grace living in peace.
They're living in shalom.
That's why Paul says grace and peace to you because God's grace
has enabled them to live at peace with God and in peace with one another.
And this grace and this peace creates an amazing bond of fellowship and friendship.
In fact, I think we have a slide, if we can pull that slide up,
that just sort of illustrates a little bit of this three-way bond
where Paul is reminding them that, look, none of us is here apart from God's grace.
And none of our relationships are merely horizontal and merely social.
All of our relationships have been elevated because of the gospel.
We're united with Jesus.
We share friendship in Christ.
We're partners together now in the gospel.
There's something totally different about the relationships that we have with each other.
And then Paul goes on and he writes this letter to them.
And what does Paul want to say to his friends in this new church plant,
to Lydia and the slave girl and the jailer,
and all the people that through them heard about the grace and peace of God and Jesus Christ?
What does he want to say to the elders and the deacons and the members of this fledgling church?
Well, he says to them, and we heard a little bit of this last week,
he says,
my dearly beloved friends in Christ,
my partners in the gospel.
I thank God for you constantly.
I pray for you.
I love you with the affection of Jesus Christ himself.
And you're my joy.
You're my crown.
And there's some things that God has put on my heart for you.
And I want to think about three things today.
I put it in the form of three questions,
where Paul is basically asking this church in Philippi,
how do you respond to adversity?
What are you living and dying for?
And how do you get power to live a life worthy of the gospel?
So how do you respond to adversity?
What are you living and dying for?
And how do you get power to live a life worthy of the gospel?
First of all, how do you respond to adversity?
Paul has received a report of his friends,
these brothers and sisters in Christ,
in the church in Philippi,
and he hears that they're going through significant adversity,
very difficult challenges.
And Paul says,
well, let me show you how I respond to adversity.
Let me provide you an example and provide you a model
for how I engage with my own challenges.
And hopefully you remember back,
you remember how Paul and Silas
were thrown in that prison in Philippi?
You remember that?
Just nod your head.
And then you remember what they were doing
when they were in that prison at midnight?
How they were praying to God
and they were singing hymns to God?
Well, Paul is actually in prison quite a lot.
So he's not just in that prison in Philippi.
There's another slide.
We're not sure if he's in prison now in Ephesus
on his third missionary journey
or maybe he's in Rome after his third missionary journey.
But he's sitting again in a prison cell
and he's again praying to God
and he's again singing to God at midnight.
But now this time in his new prison cell,
he's writing this letter,
which is his happiest letter.
In fact, the words rejoice and joy
occur about 13 times in this letter.
And it's clear that he wants his friends in Christ,
in Philippi,
he wants them to share in his joy.
He wants them to rejoice with him.
In fact, later on in Philippians 3.17,
Paul says,
follow my example, brothers and sisters.
You have us as a model.
And he says in Philippians 4.9,
he says,
what you've learned and received from me,
what you've heard from me and seen in me,
I want you to put that into practice.
He's saying,
look, I want to set you an example of joy.
Joy in the midst of adversity.
And here's how you see it in verse 12.
He says,
now I want you to know,
brothers and sisters,
that what has happened to me
has actually served to advance the gospel.
It's actually served to advance the gospel.
What is Paul's highest priority
and his greatest concern
in the midst of his adversity?
What is the source of his joy
in the midst of all of his many challenges?
It's the gospel.
Right?
He sees all of life
through the lens of the gospel.
He doesn't write to them and say,
I want you to know
that what has happened to me is awful.
And this prison that I'm in is terrible.
And the treatment that I'm receiving
from these Roman soldiers is miserable.
And I don't have enough food.
I don't have enough clothing.
I don't have enough shelter
to adequately meet my needs.
Paul's not focused on his comfort
or his discomfort.
He's not focused on his happiness
or his unhappiness.
He's not talking about whether or not
he's well-fed or hungry
or in plenty or in want
or in constraints
or in freedom.
What matters to Paul
is the gospel.
This message that God has come in the flesh
to die on the cross
to atone for our sins
and that he's been raised to life
to destroy death.
He cares about that message
of God's good news
and whether or not that message
is advancing
or retreating.
Is that message
progressing
or regressing?
Is that message moving forward
or is it moving backward?
Paul says,
the gospel is the thing
that gives me joy
in the midst of my adversity
and what I really care about
is to see the message
of Jesus advancing.
Now what is Paul saying here
about the sovereignty of God?
Paul is a student of Scripture
and Paul I think
would be reminding us
to go back to Genesis,
the first book of the Bible,
back to Genesis chapter 50,
back to that story
of Jacob's son Joseph.
Remember how he was thrown
into prison?
Remember how he experienced
incredible adversity
and challenges?
And what does Joseph say
about his own adversity?
He says,
you intended evil against me
but God intended it for good
to accomplish
what is now being done
the saving of many lives.
It's an amazing statement
where Joseph says
that in God's sovereignty,
God's intentions transcend
and they overrule
human intentions.
And I'm sure that's
what's on Paul's mind
in the midst
of his own imprisonment.
And I'm sure Paul
is also thinking about
Jesus himself.
He's thinking about
the worst thing
that ever happened
in human history, right?
When human beings
crucified the son of God.
God and how God
and his sovereignty
turned that worst thing
into the best thing.
That God took an act
of human rebellion
and he turned it
into an act of divine grace.
And God took death
and he turned it
into life.
You meant it for evil
against me
but God meant it
for good.
And the Apostle Paul,
I think here in his prison cell,
is applying the story
of Joseph
and the story of Jesus
and the whole story
of the Bible
to his own life.
Right?
He says,
I want you to know
what's happened to me
has actually served
to advance the gospel.
See, here's Paul
as the main architect
of the greatest movement,
the greatest faith,
the greatest religion
in the history of the world.
His intellectual gifts,
his leadership gifts
are such that he could go
into any major metropolitan,
sophisticated city
in the Greco-Roman world
and he could publicly
debate people
and after a while
there would be
so many converts
in his wake
that he could leave
a new church there
and he did that
all over the Mediterranean world.
But here is Paul now
and he's facing
a terrible trial
in the midst of,
right in the very middle
of his career.
He's only had a few years
to plant churches
and now here he is,
he's chained
to Roman soldiers
night and day,
right, he can't sleep
or go to the bathroom
in privacy.
He's in a demeaning,
demoralizing,
dehumanizing situation.
For a traveling apostle
to be put in prisons
like a concert pianist
having his hands
tied behind his back,
right,
and he's not only
in prison,
he's facing
possible execution,
he's in danger
of his life
being snuffed out
within days
or within weeks.
It's the greatest defeat
he's ever experienced
and conventional wisdom
would tell Paul
and would tell us
that if you take
the greatest spokesman
for the gospel,
the greatest church planter
who ever lived
and you take him
out of the game,
he would be
massively discouraged
and the Christian movement
would come
to a screeching halt.
But I think Paul would say,
yeah, but you're forgetting
about our sovereign God.
Right?
Remember the God
who turned
Joseph's terrible situation
into salvation
for Israel
and food for the whole world.
Remember the God
who turned
Jesus' crucifixion
into salvation
and took the dead corpse
of Jesus
and turned it
into a resurrected body
and hoped for the whole world.
That same God,
Paul says,
that same God
can take everything
that looks wrong
in my life,
prison,
chains,
everything that looks
like a major difficulty
and a major defeat
and he can turn it
into an opportunity
for the gospel.
Do you all believe that?
That he can take
horrible, horrible things
and he can turn them
into good
so that the gospel
is actually advancing.
And what he says
in verse 13,
he says,
as a result,
it has become clear
throughout the whole palace guard
and to everyone else
that I am in chains
for Christ.
And because of my chains,
now most of the brothers
and sisters in this city
have become confident
in the Lord
and they dare all the more
to proclaim the gospel
without fear.
You see,
Paul never planned
a mission to the palace guard.
He never planned
to have a mission
to this force
of elite soldiers.
But now,
he has a captive audience
all day,
every day
for the gospel.
He's sharing the gospel
with army rangers
and navy seals
all day,
every day.
Six times a day.
They come in
on four hour rotations,
one chained on his right
and one chained
on his left.
And one by one,
they're getting converted
and transformed
by the gospel.
And then when the Christians
in this city
hear that these hardened
Roman soldiers
are having their hearts
softened
to Jesus,
the Christians
in that city,
they start to grow
in their own confidence
in the Lord,
that the Lord is here,
the Lord is present,
the Lord is powerfully
at work.
And they start
to overcome
their own fears
and they begin
to find fresh courage
to invite their friends
and neighbors
and coworkers
to listen to them
around their tables
and to ask them,
what do you believe?
You know?
What do you think
about life and death
and what's the meaning
of everything?
And they begin
to share with them
the good news
about Jesus.
What's amazing
is if you turn
to the end of this letter
in Philippians chapter 4
verse 22,
Paul says that
all of God's people
here send you greetings
especially those
who belong
to Caesar's household.
Do you know
what that means?
That means
that the good news
of the Lord Jesus
because of Paul's chains
and because of his
imprisonment,
the good news
of the Lord Jesus
is advancing
all the way
into Lord Caesar's
household,
into the very
upper echelons
of the Roman Empire.
that the message
of God's kingdom
is advancing
into the heart
of Rome's kingdom.
And people are hearing
this message
that Jesus is actually
the new emperor
and he's taken
the throne of this world
to be the king.
He's the one
who's going to bring
grace to this world
and peace
to this world.
He's the one
to whom every knee
is going to bow
and every tongue
is going to confess
that he in fact
is the Lord.
None of this
was part of the plan.
No one
formed a committee
for how to reach
these elite soldiers.
No one created
a playbook
for how to reach
the upper echelons
of the empire.
But this was God's
sovereign plan.
That both inside
the prison
and outside
in the city,
the gospel
would be advancing
and Paul says
this is the reason
I have joy.
This is the reason
you too
should be rejoicing.
So friends,
my question for you
is,
is this how you
interpret your life
and your circumstances?
Is this how you
interpret your adversities
and your challenges?
Paul's setting for us
a Christian example
for how to do that.
Do you have
a strong belief
and a robust confidence
in the way
that God works out
His purposes
through your hardships?
Do you believe
that God can use
the worst things
that happen to you?
Imprisonment,
unemployment,
sickness,
injury,
cancer,
challenges with your kids,
the loss of a loved one?
For Paul,
most likely,
and we do know
that he ends up
experiencing martyrdom
in just a few years?
Do you believe
that any of these
can be God's
sovereign means
for advancing
the good news
of Jesus Christ?
How is God
arranging
and orchestrating
your current circumstances
so that the gospel
might be advanced?
how is God
using adversity
to grow you
and your confidence
in the Lord
and give you
a more fearless
courage
that you might
take that message
of Jesus forward
among those
who do not yet
currently believe it?
Paul says
that's the thing
that any healthy church,
any living church
ought to be concerned
about
in the midst
of their adversities.
Okay,
so that's question
number one.
How do you respond
to adversity?
Are you with me?
Second question is
what are you living
and dying for?
He wants this church
in Philippi
to think about
the question
what are you living
for and dying for?
Paul's heart
for them
is that they would
learn the secret
of the Christian life,
the secret
of Christian ministry,
and that they would
come to imitate
his overriding ambition,
that they would come
to follow
the example
of what makes
him tick,
the model
of what motivates
him.
And Paul's arguing
that everybody's
living for something.
And so he wants
them to think about
what are you living
for and what
are you dying
for?
If you had to
fill in the blank
of this sentence,
to me,
to live
is blank,
blank,
and for me
to die
is blank.
How do you
fill in those
blanks?
Now,
Paul says,
for me,
in verse 21,
he says,
for me to live
is Christ,
and to die
is gain
because I get
Christ.
Now,
after Paul
was beaten
in Philippi,
after he was
thrown in prison,
after he was
asked to leave
that city,
do you know
what Paul did?
Did he just
give up?
No,
Paul went on
to the next
city,
and then he
went on
to the next
city,
which was
Athens,
and he went
to the birthplace
of Greek
philosophy,
the birthplace
of Greek
art and
literature
and science
and democracy,
and we're
told that he
began to
debate there
the Epicurean
and Stoic
philosophers
about their
many gods
and their
many different
approaches
to life
and death.
And you
can imagine
him engaging
with the
different life
systems and
thought systems
there in
Athens,
and like
Socrates,
like Plato,
like Aristotle,
Paul comes
in and he
asks questions
and he says,
well,
what's your
definition of
life?
What's the
thing that
makes life
life for
you?
What's your
bottom line?
What's your
most important
thing that if
you say,
if I have
this,
then I'm
really living,
then I'm
truly alive.
No matter
what you take
away from
me,
I'm really
alive.
And Paul
begins to
engage in
the different
alternative
philosophies of
life and death
there in Athens.
And I think he
probably said
something like
this,
for you
Epicureans,
to live is
pleasure.
Right?
To live is
to have fun.
Yeah,
I've got a
good job and
I work hard and
I make a lot
of money,
but really I'm
living for
recreation.
I'm living to
play hard on
the weekends.
I'm living to
pursue my
hobbies and
experiences,
to get good
food and to
do more travel.
for me to
live is to
be happy.
And he
says,
for you
Stoics,
for you to
live is to
be strong.
For you to
live is to
be in control.
It's to be a
good and an
upright moral
person.
To have
courage and to
have grit and
resilience in the
face of all the
hard facts of life,
to just brace your
shoulders and have a
stiff upper lip and
to have an iron
will and to
refuse to be
defeated.
These are the
dominant definitions
here in Athens of
what it means to be
truly alive.
And I think you
can probably look
around and see in
the Bay Area these
definitions, these
ancient definitions
are still very much
the things that
people are living
their lives by here
in the Bay Area.
Or other people may
say, you know,
for me to live is my
work and my career.
For me to live is
romance and sex.
For me to live is my
family and my
precious children.
For me to live is my
money and my stock
portfolio and my
401k.
For me to live is to
be kind and to try to
leave the world a
better place.
For me to live is to
invest myself in
politics and power.
But what does Paul,
the greatest theologian,
say?
He says, you know,
why do I exist?
Why am I on planet
earth?
What is the meaning
and the purpose of
my life?
What gets me up in
the morning?
He says, for me to
live is Christ.
And for me to die is
gain because I get
Christ.
And everything else
is secondary.
Everything else is
subsidiary to that.
Paul would say this
is the only definition
of life.
The one bottom line
that most important
thing that will stand
up to all the
tragedies of life that
every single one of
us are going to face.
Even our own death.
That when you lose
all of your loves and
when you lose your
very life, you
yourself, if you have
this definition of
life, you yourself
will not collapse.
Do you realize how
radical this is, what
Paul is saying?
He said, look at it
again, verse 21.
For me to live is
Christ and to die is
gain.
And if I am to go on
living in this body,
this will mean fruitful
labor for me.
Yet what shall I
choose?
I do not know.
I'm torn between the
two.
I desire to depart and
be with Christ, which is
better by far.
But it is more
necessary for you that I
remain in the body.
Convinced of this, I know
that I will remain and I
will continue with all of
you for your progress and
joy in the faith so that
through my being with you,
again, your boasting in
Jesus Christ will abound
on account of me.
Paul's awaiting the
verdict from the
imperial tribunal.
He's awaiting this
decision whether or not
he's going to live or
whether or not he's going
to be beheaded.
And Paul says, you know
what?
I'm good either way.
Why?
Because if God's plan for
me is to live, then I get
to be a laborer in God's
vineyard.
And I get to go out and
sow seeds of the message
of Jesus and I get to reap
a harvest of gospel fruit
and I get to make disciples
and I get to help those
disciples make progress and
joy in their faith.
And I get to help people
more and more come to learn
what it means to boast and
nothing else but Jesus
Christ.
But if God's plan for me is
to be executed and to lose
my head, well to die is
gain because I've trusted
in Christ and the passion
and the goal of my life
since the day that Christ
Jesus apprehended me and
took hold of me is to see
Christ, not by faith but
by sight.
To die means to depart and
to be immediately, directly
and consciously with Jesus,
to be finally and fully
in his presence.
And this is the secret of
Paul's life.
It's the secret of the
Christian life.
And here's the logic.
Paul says because of the
empty tomb, because of the
resurrection of Jesus on
Easter Sunday in the past,
and because of that coming
resurrection of all who died
trusting in Jesus that's
coming in the future,
death is no longer a loss,
it's gain.
Death leads to victory.
Death leads to triumph.
Death leads to being with
Christ as you await your
resurrection body that will
enable you to live in the new
world that God is going to put
right and remake completely.
And so Paul says because of that
past resurrection of Jesus and
that future resurrection of the
dead, he says I have confidence,
I have assurance that no matter
what happens to me in the
tribunal of Lord Caesar, I know
where I stand in the tribunal of
Lord Christ.
Right?
No matter what happens to me in the
courts of Rome, I know where I
stand in the court of God.
God, I'm going to be delivered,
I'm going to be justified by
grace.
And therefore, I can say for me to
live as Christ and to die is
absolute gain.
Friends, can you imagine what kind
of revival, what kind of spiritual
awakening would happen here in the
Bay Area if ordinary everyday
Christians just embrace this one
focus and the singular passion?
It's very easy to say it with our
lips, but it's actually in our
priorities very difficult to live
it out because we can say for me
to live as Christ plus work plus
leisure plus wealth accumulation
plus relationships.
And how easy it is for that plus
factor, for that secondary thing to
become our primary passion.
But notice what Paul does here with
his personal preferences.
He says, you know, I'm going to take
my personal preference, which is to
depart and to be with Christ, which
is way better for me individually, and
I'm going to submit my personal
preference and desire to something
greater than myself, which is the
corporate and collective needs of
Christ's church and Christ's mission.
And what if more Christians in the
Bay Area were to reorder our
preferences, reorder our desires,
reorder our loves in such a way that
we're not living for self-gratification,
but we're living for the fruitful labor
of advancing and progressing in the
gospel.
Paul is in fact showing us and
embodying to us a life that's not
looking to our own interests, but
looking out to the interests of
others.
He's giving us a model.
He's giving us an example of valuing
others above our own personal
preferences.
Against his own personal desires, he
puts the needs of the gospel and the
needs of other people first.
To depart and to be with Christ, that's
emphatically better, Paul says.
That is by far the best.
There is no question about that for me,
Paul says, but it's more necessary for
you that I remain and that I live.
And it's more necessary for your
progress and your joy in the faith so
that your boasting in Jesus will abound
more and more.
And that's why I want to live.
To live is to go on laboring for Christ
and the praise of Christ.
And to die is to go on living that much
more in union with the resurrected
Christ.
And because Christ is a singular focus
and the singular passion of my life,
whether I'm released or whether I'm
executed, whether I live or whether I die,
Paul says, I win.
I win because I get more of Christ.
Christ.
What would happen to your marriage if you
live like that?
Or what would happen to your children and
your family?
What would happen to our church?
What would happen to your workplace?
What would happen to our communities if all
of us filled in the blank and we said, for me,
to live is Christ and to die is gain because
it's more of Christ?
Christ, that's my definition.
That's my bottom line.
That's what I'm living for.
That's what I'm dying for.
All right.
I'm out of time.
But hopefully you now know, how do I respond
to adversity?
By seeing all of my life through the lens
of the gospel and drawing all my joy from
the gospel itself.
What am I living for and what am I dying
for?
I'm dying for nothing other than Christ.
And I'm living for nothing other than
Christ.
And finally, how do you get the power to
live this way?
Well, Paul says it very simply in verse
19.
He says, I know that through your prayers
and through God's provision of the spirit
of Christ, what has happened to me will
turn out for my deliverance.
I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no
way be ashamed but will have sufficient courage
so that now, as always, Christ will be exalted in my
body whether by life or by death.
Paul says, the thing that I need you to pray for me
and the thing that I'm praying for you is that we would
all, no matter what our circumstances,
no matter what we're going through, we would exalt
Christ, we would glorify Christ, we would magnify Christ.
And the only way we're going to have the power to do that
is if God, our Heavenly Father, fills us with the spirit of
His Son, Jesus, so that we live with that same power of
Jesus and that same courage of Jesus and that same life of
Jesus.
And so, friends, I want us to think about what do we pray
for each other?
What should I be praying for you?
What should you be praying for me?
What should we be praying for each other?
Oh, Father, fill us with the spirit of Your Son, Jesus,
that we might live for Jesus and die for Jesus,
that no matter what we're doing, we might seek to exalt Christ
and glorify Christ and magnify Christ.
Without Your Spirit, we cannot do that.
But with Your Spirit, we can do all things.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
Amen.