I want to start with a passage here.
This is from 2 Corinthians 10, 3-5.
And this is not our focal passage, by the way.
We'll get to that.
I want to start.
It says,
For although we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh,
since the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh,
but are powerful through God for the demolition of strongholds.
We demolish arguments and every proud thing that's raised up against the knowledge of God.
And we take every thought captive to obey Christ.
So a few, well, it's been four weeks ago, something like that, four or five weeks ago,
Philippians 2, 3 really impacted my life.
God just gave me a whole new sense of understanding of different concepts.
A lot I want to share with you today.
But, so, I was not on the preaching schedule,
but I asked Seth, and he graciously allowed me, to speak on this particular passage.
So, I'm very, very interested in that.
So, where we are is in Philippians 2, verses 111.
What I will do today is there are some things I'm intentionally doing differently.
And it's sort of a long story, but it is according to this passage.
And it goes back a lot of years in my own life and things like that.
Part of what I want to do differently and think differently is in this very work of speaking to you right now.
There are just specific things that God needs to be glorified.
In all that we do, in all that we say, in how we operate,
He is to be glorified.
And not ourselves.
And that is part of the crux of Philippians 2, verse 3 and 4, which we'll read.
So, first let's read that whole passage, and then I will come back to my notes.
But let's get an idea of what we're studying.
I put most of these verses in my notes.
Okay.
Chapter 2, starting with verse 1.
So, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation or partnership in the Spirit,
any affection and sympathy, complete my joy, Paul says, by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
Verse 3.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.
But in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,
who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, nothing to be grasped,
but emptied himself.
By taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form,
he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.
Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
As I study through this, this passage, it just gets deeper and deeper and deeper.
There is no end, I do believe, to the concepts that are in this passage.
What I want to do is a mix of different things.
Number one, I want to walk through this scripture and exegete it just a little bit, okay?
I'm going to use my experience, what God has done in my life, as illustrations.
And I'm going to also press you a little bit in the same vein.
So one of the things is, are you familiar with this passage?
Who's read this passage?
Who's read this?
Yes.
Who's read this probably 5,000 times, right?
Me too.
I've read it a lot.
But you know what?
It's when we open our hearts and our minds and we sit down and hear from the Spirit.
And then, boom, he teaches.
And opens up something brand new that you never even knew was there, right?
I spent 53 years hiding from some of this.
So, the first thing, verse 1, he says, so.
Well, so is kind of a therefore statement, right?
So, he's looking back.
He's looking backwards.
So let's look backwards.
Let's go back to Philippians 1, 27 through 28.
This is, since Philippians 1, 27 through 28 exists, then blah, blah, blah, right?
That's what this so is there for.
So, Philippians 1, 27.
There is a way to walk here, a manner worthy of the gospel.
So, this passage really starts out, he throws it back to what he had talked about.
He talked back to this way, how we walk in unity.
And so, that's the ground that we go into chapter 2, is the same concept of unity and our character, our part of unity, how we approach that together.
And then he says the second word of verse 1.
And so, if, I promise we'll go faster as time goes here, but if is the second word.
If here, basically, is since.
So, if you look at the rest of that verse 1.
So, since there is encouragement in Christ, since there's comfort from love.
So, it's a given, in other words.
These things exist.
There's an encouragement in Christ, a comfort from love, a participation in the Spirit, and affection and sympathy.
So, there, verse 1 and 2, we have a parenthetical almost here.
So, it starts with, so, and then you can skip down, complete my joy by agreeing, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
Paul is, so first, we please God.
And he gives us these things.
That's encouragement in Christ.
It's not something we manufacture.
Not something we come up with.
It's comfort.
First Corinthians, I'm comforted as he has comforted me.
This is from God.
Same thing, participation in the Spirit, partnership in the Spirit, and mercy comes from God.
So, all of these attributes, all of these things are from him.
Not something that comes from within, that we somehow build up.
So, so, complete my joy.
So, we are obedient to God.
Paul is saying, that pleases me.
That pleases me as one that has oversight, one that has looked out for you, one that wants to see the Lord grow you in all ways.
So, these are important keys.
This encouragement, comfort, participation, and affection and sympathy is like, what did I have?
Compassionate hearts.
Like having compassionate hearts.
Compassionate hearts.
So, therefore, walk in a manner worthy of the gospel.
These qualities, they unify us.
They unify us as a church.
They unify us as individuals and then as family.
We've been talking about family.
Josh preached on that last week.
How do we get family?
He gave us all different points.
Here is just another way of talking about that same thing.
How does family come about?
Encouragement in Christ and comforted by God.
Partnership in the spirit.
This is how the church should interact.
This is fruit that we will see.
So, I'm going to speak in terms of, when it comes to an illustration of myself, I'm going to speak in terms of a fortress.
Because this is how I first pictured it.
And so, I pictured a, almost like a hut or a fortress.
I'll use the word fortress.
Something very strong and secure that nothing gets in.
And only certain things can get out.
Only the certain things that I allow out get out.
Okay?
Do you have that picture in your mind?
So, how I constructed this fortress.
How I constructed this was over years of having different thoughts about myself.
Having different, the input that came in from outside of myself.
Starting from childhood.
It sort of put me in the spot where I said, I don't care what happens outside of me.
I need to control or fortress what comes in and what comes out.
I need to control what happens here.
Because I don't trust anything outside of me.
I don't trust what I can't manage in some way on my own.
So, once this was constructed, these particular, look at these qualities again.
Encouragement, comfort, participation, affection, and sympathy.
The fruit of us as a family.
How can a person live in a fortress and be able to effectively receive those things?
Or effectively share those things?
You can't.
It doesn't work that way.
Those principles are so important in how we work together that any way that you may hinder it can't be.
You cannot stop this and expect to have unity, which is what he's focusing on.
You can't stop encouraging.
You can't stop receiving encouragement.
You can't stop having mercy for one another and only letting in so much.
Because that will hinder and stop unity and family and closeness.
Well, that's what I construct.
Some of those things were fear of rejection.
Being looked at a certain way.
Well, I don't want to be looked at a certain way.
I don't want to be looked at.
I don't want to be looked down on.
I don't want to feel like people are going to leave me or reject me if I say something.
If I try to encourage, if I try to give a word and it falls flat, forget it.
Then I'm not going to do it again.
I'm not going to try that anymore.
I'm going to close that up.
I'm going to shut down unity.
I'm going to shut down family.
Does that make sense?
That's what I did.
And it took a lot of years.
And it was a lot that parted across the line that made that happen.
Started when I was young.
And there were different events that happened in my life.
And that's when I started to build.
As time went, then expectations are laid on.
So as a young person and in high school and things like that, I said, I'm going to separate off.
After that, then it ends the church.
And maybe you guys were a part of church other than Bellicose at some time.
And they put all kinds of expectations on you.
They expect you to look a certain way, be a certain way, speak a certain way.
And those things aren't spoken necessarily.
But it's part of the act.
It's part of how the whole thing looks.
And you go to church on Sunday.
And you look like everybody else.
You behave like everybody else.
And then you leave.
And there's no unity.
And there's no family.
And no one looks out from their fortress.
Because no one really wants you to look into their fortress.
It's two-way thing.
Second thing.
The fruit of unity.
How will it look to be a person who is in the family and unified?
What will that look like?
Verse 3.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.
But in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Do nothing from selfish ambition.
This is holding back.
Selfish ambition is holding back.
It's stealing God's glory.
And I'm going to tell you this can happen from the loudest of us to the quietest of us.
And we have a good mix of all.
Right?
Yeah.
If we don't look at what we're doing on how we're thinking, we will be selfish, selfishly ambition.
We will be conceited.
We will be in that fortress that I'm describing.
Glory-stealing.
Glory-stealing selfish ambition.
Let me tell you a couple areas this could be.
Number one, compare yourself to others.
That is an enemy of contentment.
When I look at somebody else and I say, how come I'm not like them?
How come I don't have what they have?
How come, you know, I need to look like this?
I need to be as good as that.
All those things are comparisons.
I need to be as pretty as that or as good of a mother.
These things also weigh in sometimes, don't they?
2 Corinthians 10, 12.
Comparing ourselves or not being content steals God's glory because he has given you to be you.
He has given you what you need and the grace you need to be here in this family now.
And if you think he must be something else, that is an ambition, right?
That is your ambition, my ambition, which is selfish.
That's the selfish ambition.
Desiring something that I need to be what I think I should be, not what God needs to be.
Second thing, approval of man.
Praise, acceptance, approval.
God had this from other people.
Approval of man.
It's insidious.
John 12, 42 through 43.
Nevertheless, even among the rulers, many believed in him.
But because of the Pharisees.
So people around the synagogue, people hearing Jesus, they were believing.
But because of the Pharisees, they did not confess him.
Lest they should be put out of the synagogue.
For they love the praise of men more than the praise of God.
This particular one is big for me.
It's very, like I said, it just gets into the fabric of my life, personally.
What kept me in the fortress.
What put me in there and wouldn't let anything in is a fear of man.
A fear of looking dumb.
A fear of saying the wrong thing.
A fear of rejection.
If I were to interject in some way and it didn't make any sense, man, did I look dumb.
Well, I can't look dumb.
At least that's what, you know, that's what the fortress people say.
Which is really just me, you know, in the fortress.
I can't look dumb.
So, I'm afraid.
And I don't give the word I should have gave.
I don't say the thing I should have said.
Going back to those verses.
I don't extend the mercy or compassion I should have extended.
Because I question myself.
Myself.
Why do I question myself?
Because am I doing the right thing or the wrong thing?
I'm afraid that I might be doing the wrong thing.
That's fear of man.
That's a selfish ambition.
Pride.
Pride is the third one.
Pride of self and pride of wanting to be great.
Luke 4.11.
Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled.
And he who humbles himself will be exalted.
I want to run through this idea real quick.
And hopefully I can express it in a way that you follow.
If you can't, it's because I'm not saying it right.
So, I'm going to be very careful.
Okay.
So, run with me.
This is the thought.
In life, we want to be great.
In general.
There's a very...
And listen to me.
I'm talking about two different sides here.
I'm talking about a flesh side.
A world side of us.
And there's a spiritual side of us.
Right?
I'm going to speak right now in this world side of us.
The world...
We want to be great.
And so, in our minds, even from young, we'll try to make good decisions.
We'll try to excel in something.
We'll try to do whatever in our minds to be great.
But the problem is, we can't.
And so, when we're not and we fall short, there's frustration.
There's frustration that I can't be as good as what I want to be.
I can't be as great as what I think I should be.
You hear all this selfish ambition.
This is how the world thinks.
This is what happens.
This is how we can think.
I want to be great.
I fall short.
I'm frustrated.
When I get to that point, what do I do?
I can say, you know what?
Forget it.
I'm not going to try again.
I'm going to back up.
I'm not going to worry about it.
I just will never be what I think I can be or should be.
Better is better.
Maybe I fall into a place where I strive all the harder to be great.
To be what I think I should be.
This idea in my mind.
That's what I want to be.
So, I'm going to strive all the harder to be that.
Maybe going back to the contentment issue.
Susie is that.
I can be that.
I should be that.
And then I tell myself, then I strive all the harder in my own striving, in my own work, to get to that point.
Well, these frustrations, this cycle, this hamster wheel is pride.
Because it's selfish ambition.
It comes down to the fact that you aren't trusting God for what he has for you.
You're trying to construct yourself.
Whatever that should in your life.
Whatever that high level thing is that you're chasing after is a selfish ambition.
And it's pride to either try to attain it or attain it.
And then look at yourself on that pinnacle.
Or not attain it.
And back up from life and say, I just can't do it.
That's pride to think that you ever could have.
To think that you can jump that hop.
To think that you can make that happen.
That is pride.
You see?
It's when we talk about from a lot of what I did.
A lot of my construction, my fortress, all these things.
It was inside.
The things that I was thinking.
The things that I said to myself.
It was inside.
You wouldn't know it.
You wouldn't know it to talk to me.
A lot of what we do is inside our heads.
The fourth thing is lack of love.
Love sacrifices for another.
It sacrifices.
Just quickly look back at our verse.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.
But in humility count others more significant than yourself.
Sacrifice.
Lack of love.
Galatians 5.
Fruit of the flesh is selfish ambition.
That's one of many listed there.
I'm all about me.
I'm all about what I'm going to do.
I'm all about what I think I should do.
I'm all about what I tell myself I should be.
Blah, blah, blah.
On and on.
But the fruit of the spirit is love.
Among others.
Fruit of the spirit is love.
So how about conceit?
How about conceit?
Thinking more of ourselves than what we should.
Is basically conceit, right?
How do we stack up?
What does the Bible say about conceit?
It's pretty clear.
Let me give you just a couple of verses.
Number one, Romans 9.20.
On the contrary, who are you, human being, to talk back to God?
Will what is formed say to the one who formed it?
Why did you make me like this?
God made us.
He formed us.
And we're going to look back at it and try to be conceited about that somehow?
We're going to look back and try to hold ourselves higher than somebody else somehow?
Is that even a thing?
Who are you?
Oh, man.
Job 38.2-4.
Who is this who obscures my counsel with ignorant words?
God says.
Get ready to answer me like a man.
When I question you, you will inform me.
Where were you when I established the earth?
Tell me if you have understanding.
I don't.
So I had a fortress protected as well.
I constructed it.
And then I protected it.
I looked out for it.
I made sure that anyone lobbing bombs of trying to get through for me to be vulnerable or open beyond what...
I picture, you know, I'm sitting in there.
I'm sending out the messages that the fortress will allow.
I will give you so much.
But I won't give you all of it.
I won't let you in to see what's really happening.
I was talking to Clayton and he said,
you ought to knock some doors and put some windows in that thing.
Probably should.
I'm thinking more along the lines of obliterating it.
But that was what wasn't happening.
I sent out those cryptic messages.
I gave you.
You can understand.
It's sort of like redaction, you know.
I'll let you know so much because there's a ton of it that's all blacked out there that I'm not.
That's the messages that will go out of the fortress.
As a fortress protected.
Too often, my thoughts, they were self-righteous.
I want to be the smartest guy in the room, you know.
Like, it's nice to be looked at that way, isn't it?
How conceited.
Putting myself first and high.
Again, how conceited is that?
These are realizations that really landed on me.
As I took a look at this situation and what I'd been hiding from and what I'd been protecting myself from,
which we'll get to ultimately, is freedom of Christ is what I was protecting myself from.
There is no unity in a protected fortress.
If each of us closed ourselves off and only gave redacted messages to one another, there's no unity in that.
There's no family in that.
We can't do that.
I'm giving you this from my experience.
And I think this is what I want to talk about.
I can't remember.
One of the things that I did here, I've never done this before in my life.
I always have outlines.
You know, Roman number one, two, three, A, B, C.
And they are legit Harvard outlines, if you're familiar with those.
That's how I always do my notes.
This is a bunch of bullet points and verses.
I've never done this.
So anyway, I think this is where I want to talk about this.
Anyway, January 29th.
You know that Stacey and I have been having conflict and things like that.
It was a difficult time and difficult things that both of us were bringing to the table and just trying to work through.
And January 29th, we sat there.
We sit on the, most of us, I think, have been to our house.
There's like an L couch there inside the door.
And she sits in the corner.
And I sit on the other side.
That's where we drink coffee and talk and stuff in the morning.
Anyway, this Wednesday morning, I said, we're getting, moving past an argument time.
And I said, hey, what do you see in me?
And I shut up.
And I listened.
And she told me.
She gave me a lot of stuff.
A lot of great stuff.
One of those things that she gave was a piece of paper.
And this was an article written.
And it had all kinds of, this writer, I have no idea who they are, but they were reading my man.
They knew me.
Because it was all about me.
It was all about how I behaved.
It was all about my fortress.
It was all about the protection, the hiding, the things that I would say to keep the fortress intact.
So nobody would mess with it.
And so that day was really huge.
I took what she said.
I took that paper.
And I started studying the scriptures that were in that paper.
And I said, this has to change.
I've got to turn this over to the Lord because I'm way off here.
I'm way off.
I'm hidden away somewhere.
Nothing's coming through.
There's no fruit.
The way the fruit should exist in a unified situation.
In the church.
In my family.
In our marriage.
So I was protecting.
I was protecting that fortress.
Verse 3, he says,
Consider others as more significant than yourselves.
Inhumility is how that's done.
But I just want to think for a second about considering one another as more significant than ourselves.
And what that looks like.
Paying attention to others' interests as much or more than your own.
In all of our relationships.
And how we interact here.
How often are we considering others' interests as more important than our own?
How often do we talk to another and consider that person?
Regardless of their place in life.
Regardless of who they are or what.
How often do we consider them as more significant than ourselves?
As we're talking to them.
As we look another person in the eye.
Are we giving them time?
I think one of...
Did Josh say last week?
Like the time.
Eight minutes.
Did he say that?
Yeah.
Like the conversation.
We give eight minutes to somebody.
And if you can sit.
You know, he's talking about looking and listening to them.
There's a study that if you give someone eight minutes and you listen to them.
Like post eight minutes.
They, in their minds, have this sense that you don't care.
That you've listened.
How many of us want to be listened to?
How does one listen to another?
And why?
Because I consider you more significant than myself.
So I'm going to show.
I'm going to take the time.
I'm going to carve it out.
I'm going to forget about the clock.
And I'm going to take time with you.
And be present with you.
I think about it in terms of the brothers.
Do we consider ourselves more significant than the other?
I think of it, of course, in our family.
With parents, siblings, kids, things like that.
Your spouse.
Is your spouse more significant than you?
Do you think of them that way?
Right after this point in Philippians, Jesus, I'm sorry, Paul, as he's writing, this verse four.
This verse four.
Let each of you look not only to his own interest, but also to the interest of others.
He, in this same chapter, and I don't want to walk on anybody else.
I don't know who's after me.
I'm not going to get too much.
I'll let them flesh it out.
But Paul gives four examples of that verse, one after another.
Boom, boom, boom, boom.
First was Jesus.
We'll talk about that.
Second is Paul himself.
Third is Timothy.
And then fourth is Epaphroditus.
So Paul in Philippians 2, 17 says,
Being poured out like a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I'm glad.
He's concerned about them.
He's being poured out.
He's going to die.
And he's glad because he considers them and their matreus as higher than his own.
Second on Timothy, chapter two, verse 19 and 21 through 21.
He is genuinely concerned for their welfare.
He's sending Timothy to the Philippians because Timothy is concerned for those Philippians.
Everyone else, he says, has sought their own interests.
All the other ones are seeking their own interests.
Timothy is willing to travel, which wasn't an easy thing back then,
to go through whatever might be trouble since then, personally, physically,
to go back to these Philippians because he cares about,
because he cares about their interests above his own.
Third one, Epaphroditus, is chapter two, verse 25 through 26.
Epaphroditus, Paul talks about him being ill,
and ill even to the point of death.
But what is Epaphroditus concerned about?
He's distressed because the Philippians were worried.
He's thinking about them, not his own health in that haven.
He's concerned about them and their thoughts about him.
So I built the fortress.
I protected the fortress.
And then the fortress was attacked.
And that was on that date, January 29th.
When that set in motion for me,
a lot through this chapter,
a lot through other verses,
and all kinds of studies
that I have done there on my couch
as Chuck very approvingly looked over my shoulder.
And it has grown.
It has grown.
The Lord has allowed me to see things
that I've not seen before.
Understood things that I have no doubt spoken of,
taught on, whatever.
But never listen.
I encourage you today to listen.
Hear these verses.
Hear what God says.
Hear what is happening in this.
Hear what could be happening in your own heart.
Are you building some sort of fortress?
Are you hiding away from something?
Are we hiding away from each other?
Which would be horrible.
It would be horrible.
Are you hiding away from your family?
From your spouse?
Are you hiding away from your wife or your husband?
Which is probably the worst thing.
So I want to look at Jesus' example of humility to us.
Because that's the first one that Paul gives in this.
And I want to let it settle in on us.
Let this example really settle.
All right?
Verse 5 in Philippians 2.
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,
who, though he was in the form of God,
did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
but emptied himself.
By taking the form of a servant,
being born in the likeness of man,
and being found in human form,
he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.
Death on a cross.
That's our example.
This power, this mind of humility,
this way of thinking.
Look at verse 5.
Have this mind, this mind of humility,
this mind that is open,
that is ready to give and receive in a humble way.
Have this mind, which is yours in Christ.
You've already got it.
Yeah.
You've already got it.
So if you are not acting in this way,
you're fighting it.
It's only two things.
You're either going to walk in it,
or you're going to fight against it,
because it's already yours.
So you have to actively choose not to be obedient,
not to listen,
not to walk in the light.
And that's work.
I'm telling you,
that's work.
It's work to construct a fortress.
It's work to hide away.
It's work to avoid everything that you should be obedient in.
And that's hard work.
And it takes a toll.
It's not freedom.
Yeah.
It's not freedom.
This humility that's already yours in Christ
is the freedom that he gives.
When you can come out of whatever you have constructed,
I'm telling you what I did.
Maybe it's similar.
Maybe it's different.
However you want to picture it.
Maybe you have a nice tiki hut or a beach or I don't know.
Whatever you do.
But I'm telling you that there is freedom outside of what we build for ourselves.
There's freedom outside of the disobedient.
Outside of all the pride, of all the selfish ambition, the conceit.
All these things that he wants to rely on.
When that's gone, there's freedom.
Freedom in Christ.
So let's take this apart.
In verse 6, this is Jesus' example.
We're going to take it apart and apply it.
First thing is he was in the form of God.
John 17, 5 says Jesus was saying,
Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you
before the world existed.
So there's an idea of the form of God that he had glorified with the Father before the world existed.
Okay, we get this picture, right?
That's where he was.
Then he says,
He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.
In other words, at this time, that wasn't his purpose.
At this time, it was to come and flesh.
But emptied himself.
That's what he chose.
Fully God and fully man.
Jesus was fully God and then fully man.
John 1, 14.
The word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory.
Glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.
This is a good quote I found Piper wrote on the idea of emptying himself.
He said,
So there was a divine glory in the incarnate Christ for those who had eyes to see.
But the fullness of divine glory, I think, would have incinerated sinners and blinded everyone.
And this is what he emptied himself of.
Maybe the best way to say it is that whatever stood between the fullness of the divine glory before the incarnation and the suffering and shame and degradation and death on the cross,
whatever stood between there, that had to be laid aside so he could do it.
There's a lot that we don't get there.
There's a lot that is of God in there.
But whatever stood between, that's what he emptied himself to be both fully man and fully God.
And to do what he did on the cross.
Then he says he was, going back to our verse,
he emptied himself by taking the form of a servant.
The form of a servant.
Mark 10, 42 through 45.
And Jesus called them to him and said to them,
You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them,
and their great ones exercise authority over them.
But it shall not be so among you.
But whoever would be great among you,
be great.
That idea of being great, remember, the selfish ambition.
But whoever would be great among you must be your servant.
And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.
For even the son of man came not to be served, but to serve.
And to give his life as a ransom for many.
The form of a servant.
So, I just want to pause right here for a second.
And we're seeing, okay, we're seeing the glory of Jesus.
Then the servanthood of Jesus.
We see the span that he, from one to the other, emptied himself.
One to the other, okay?
Again, this is our example.
Now, where is there space for a fortress?
Where is there space for a conceit?
Where is there space for a selfish ambition?
None.
We were talking on the way in.
If it weren't for grace that he gives us,
the shame of this difference between myself and Christ
is off to charters.
But it's grace.
It's grace.
But you see the difference between us and him already.
We see this, don't we?
Obedient.
And this is where the verbal rubber meets the road.
Obedient to the point of death.
John 18, 4.
Then Jesus, knowing everything that was about to happen to him,
knowing everything that was about to happen to him,
went out and said to them,
Who is it you're seeking?
In the garden, when they came to get him,
he knew he was about to go to the cross.
He knew he was about to be separated from the Father.
He knew the agony that was just hours away.
Knowing everything that was about to happen to him,
went out and said to them,
Who is it you're seeking?
The sound.
I want to go, if you would, turn with me to Psalm chapter 22.
Psalm chapter 22.
I want to read a few different verses.
This is, we brought up maybe a week or two ago.
Prophetic.
Jesus speaking.
What he saw.
It's an amazing chapter.
Amazing chapter.
But he's, here he's, I want to keep in mind,
he knows what's about to happen to him.
Yet he was still obedient.
Acquaint that to us real quick.
Right?
When you have those decisions to make.
When you can either hide away, or you can open up.
When you can be vulnerable, or you can choose to do something else.
When you can encourage, or you don't.
When you have those decisions.
We have them constantly.
He, his example, was obedient when he knew what was about to happen.
What do you think is the benefit?
Whatever fear, whatever pride, whatever's on the other side of choosing to be obedient,
is irrelevant.
Because, probably not dead.
But even if it was.
He takes us away.
That obedience.
Verse one.
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning?
Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer.
By night, but I find no rest.
He went obediently to that.
Verse six.
But I am a worm and not a man.
Scorned by mankind and despised by the people.
All who see me mock me.
They make mouths of me.
They wag their heads.
He trusts in the Lord.
Let him deliver him.
Let him rescue him.
For he delights in him.
Very sarcastic.
As they stood around the cross.
Yet you who are.
Yet you are he who took me from the womb.
You made me trust you at my mother's breast.
On you as I cast from my birth.
And from my mother's womb, you have been my God.
Be not far from me.
For trouble is near and there is none to help.
Many bulls encompass me.
Strong bulls of passion surround me.
They open wide their mouths of me like a ravenous and roaring lion.
I am poured out like water.
And all my bones are out of joint.
My heart is like wax.
It is melted within my breast.
My strength is dried up like a potsherd.
My tongue sticks to my jaws.
You lay me in the dust of death.
For dogs encompass me.
A company of evildoers encircles me.
They pierce my hands and feet.
I can count all my bones.
They stare and gloat over me.
They divide my garments among them.
And for my clothing, they cast lots.
Then verses 27 through 28.
All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord.
And all the families of the nation shall worship before you.
For kingship belongs to the Lord.
And he rules over the nations.
Now, I have a fortress destroyed.
I've equated this.
Probably, you know, a few guys have heard this.
But I equate it to being through the wardrobe in Narnia.
It's like, it's a different place.
There's a different thought.
Now, I'm not looking at the inside of cinder blocks and something closed in.
Now, there's freedom.
I'm learning to live in that.
I'm learning to grow in that.
Part of the reason, the reason, I can even hope to do that, is because of what I just read.
Because of the work he did on the cross.
For me, that obedience, that example, for me, allows me to now follow the kingship that belongs to the Lord.
The one that rules over the nations.
There's nothing in between us.
There is no wall or ceiling or something I can't get out of, something I've made for myself.
It's just me and him.
An exalted savior.
Here.
Oh, man.
The last part of our...
I lost my page.
Oh, there.
Okay, that's not very much.
The last part of these verses.
Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name above all names.
So that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth.
Every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
He has been highly exalted.
The name above every name.
This is the glory that our lives give to him.
Leaving selfish ambition.
Leaving conceit.
Leaving the area that he specifically, Paul specifically points out, is against unity.
That's against family.
The thing that will trip us up.
Leaving that is glorifying to God.
Making those obedient decisions, just like Jesus did.
Knowing what was going to happen.
We make those obedient decisions, knowing that it is glorifying to God.
Not worrying about self.
There is no self to worry about.
It's all him.
It's all his.
He was born and heard this Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck Eck