WWUTT 017 Do Everything Without Grumbling (Philippians 2:14-18)

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The Apostle Paul instructed the Philippians to do everything without grumbling or disputing, so that they might be blameless and pure children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which they shine as lights in the world.
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And this instruction to the Philippians is also the calling of every Christian when we understand the text.
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This is When We Understand The Text, and my name is Pastor Gabe. Good to be along with you here as we continue studying in the book of Philippians.
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Philippians chapter 2 is where we are primarily this week. Then coming up in the last third of this particular episode of the program,
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I'm going to be taking a question related to the Baptist Faith and Message 2000. Yeah, you know, whether or not you're aware of it, our
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When We Understand The Text ministry comes out of a Southern Baptist church. I am a Southern Baptist minister, and somebody knowing that about our statement of faith has asked a question related to something that was mentioned in the
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Baptist Faith and Message. And so I'm going to be answering that particular question, some theology infused in this as well.
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So it's not just pertaining to Baptist belief, but understanding of theology in general.
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That'll be coming up the last third of the program. Now, I want to say though, even though we're Southern Baptist, we have been receptive of all different kinds of denominational views.
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Denominations are separated on secondary issues. It is not ever going to be a separation of a primary issue if we are truly gospel -centered,
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Christ -glorifying churches. And so we as a ministry is When We Understand The Text are receptive of all different kinds of positions on various theological views.
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So I hope that by claiming to be Southern Baptist, you're not immediately going, oh, well, there's some Southern Baptist churches
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I don't like. So click, no longer listening to this broadcast. I hope that our statements of faith, the things that we believe on various issues, have been well stated through this program and also in the videos that you have watched from our
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When We Understand The Text ministry. If you have any questions, let us know as we are very open to receiving and answering those questions through our website, www .utt
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.com. That is the best way to get in touch with us. You'll find the email link there on the right side of the page.
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Hey, let's get into the text here. This is Philippians chapter 2, and we're going to read the same section that we looked at yesterday and go on because I think we really only got a couple of verses in yesterday.
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Philippians chapter 2, starting in verse 14. Do all things without grumbling or disputing that you may be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation among whom you shine as lights in the world holding fast to the word of life so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain.
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Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith,
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I am glad and rejoice with all of you. Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me.
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Our gracious heavenly Father, I pray that we rejoice in the words that we are reading today. Help this to continue to build up our joy in the
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Lord. The more we're reading of these things, the more that we continue to read these scriptures and apply them to our hearts and our minds, the more our joy is being filled in the things of Christ Jesus.
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Make us a joyful people and let us make a joyful noise unto the Lord as we declare your word and your praises in Jesus name.
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Amen. Starting where we did yesterday in Philippians 2 14 to do all things without grumbling or disputing and the thing that we keep in mind as we come to all of these texts, okay, we keep in mind the instruction that Paul had given to the
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Philippians in Philippians 2 5 to have the mind of Christ. So everything that we're reading and the verses following that is still in that context growing us more in how it is that we are supposed to have a mind that is like that of Christ Jesus.
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Now we also had that beautiful hymn of Christ in Philippians chapter 2 verses 6 through 11 displaying that full humility of Christ Jesus who though he was in the form of God did not consider equality with God a thing 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.
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He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. So this beautiful display that we see here of the humility that Christ displayed, emptying himself though he deserved to be worshiped as king and kings and Lord of lords just because he was
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God but he came obedient to the will of God and he did all things to the glory of God the
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Father. He is the ultimate example of obeying the first command to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and he is also the greatest example of obeying the second greatest commandment to love your neighbor as yourself since he emptied himself and took on the form of a servant.
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So as we have this display of Christ in his pre -existence, in his incarnation, in his sacrifice upon the cross for our sins, his rising again from the grave and his ascension into heaven in the right hand of the throne of God.
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We see this aspect of Christ, this in his ministry and so we have joy in the
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Lord. We know that we have been saved from death and we have been brought into life through the sacrifice of Christ.
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So therefore we have joy in Christ Jesus knowing that he has started a work in us that he will bring to completion at the day of Christ as we read really early on in the letter in Philippians chapter 1 verse 6.
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So all of these things in mind, this causes us to have joy in Christ Jesus. So therefore there is no reason for us to grumble or dispute about anything.
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We have joy in the Lord, complete joy in Christ and if we grumble and dispute about stuff, then that joy that we should be having in Christ Jesus does not actually fill us up in every aspect of our lives.
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There are still places that we feel incomplete, we feel unsatisfied and that is why we have that tendency to complain or argue or grumble and dispute about our circumstances because we don't feel that Christ has satisfied us in that area.
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Something has not gone our way, so we complain about it. It shows that the joy that we should be experiencing in Christ is actually incomplete for us and that's brothers and sisters, that's not the way that it should be.
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The joy of the Lord should fill us up in every way and in all circumstances, exuding in every single thing that we do.
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In the sermon that I preached this past Sunday, I shared, in fact, we had been preaching from Romans chapter 5.
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I think I read this last week on the broadcast, but I'm going to go ahead and read this again because it has very much to do with the context of what we're talking about.
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Romans chapter 5 verses 1 through 5. Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our
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Lord Jesus Christ. We have peace with God because we've been justified by faith, all right?
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Through him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
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Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings. Knowing that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character, and character produces hope and hope does not put us to shame.
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There's one translation that says that hope does not disappoint us, okay? Because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the
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Holy Spirit who has been given to us. We should be lacking in nothing.
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We are unsatisfied in no way. We find complete satisfaction in our
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Lord Jesus Christ. Here's a story that I want to share with you. Happened to me just this past weekend. I shared this in the sermon on Sunday too, but my wife and I attended a wedding in Manhattan, Kansas, which is just 20, 30 miles from where we live here.
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One of my wife's cousins was getting married. So we attended the wedding. My son had had a lot to drink that day, a lot of water.
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I think we even got him a slushie at some point. He also had not had a nap. So on the drive, he fell asleep and because of all the liquid that he had consumed, he wet his pants.
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They're in his car seat. And we noticed it right when we got him out. He was soaking wet from the waist down and I knew without having to be said between my wife and I what needed to happen next.
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I needed to take him to Target, which was the nearest store to where we were, get him some new pants and some new underwear.
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So I was going to have to leave the wedding and go do this. And I was grumpy. I got grumpy about it.
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I was grumping about having to take my son and get him changed and my wife could tell that I was visibly upset about this.
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And so at one point she asked me, are you okay? And I didn't beat around the bush. I said, no, I'm not. I don't want to do this.
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Now at no point did I ever take this out on my son. I just expressed to her privately.
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I don't want to leave the wedding. I don't want to have to go do this. And she said to me, do you want me to go do it? And I said, no, this is your family.
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I mean, it's my family too, but she knew most of the people that were there and people who had come long distances to come to this wedding.
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She wanted to spend time with him. So I wanted her to stay and I took Zeej, my son, to Target to get him some new pants.
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Now on the way there, between where the wedding was being held, which was outdoors, to the store, between those two locations,
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God spoke to me. Okay, now I'm not saying an audible voice came to me, but a thought was planted in my mind.
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And I know that this thought came from God. It definitely didn't come from me because I was in a bad mood and I was grumbling and complaining about my circumstances.
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A thought came into my mind that God's spirit placed there for me as if to communicate to me.
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I sent my son to this earth to die on the cross for your sins. Through Christ, you have peace with God.
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God's wrath has been satisfied and you have now become an heir through Christ Jesus of God's eternal kingdom.
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So what in the world are you complaining about? And as I'm driving and I'm having this thought,
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I'm thinking to myself, all right, and my attitude changed and I repented there before the
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Lord and realizing I had nothing to complain about because I am eternally secure in Christ Jesus, my
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Lord. I do not have to fear the wrath of God in anything.
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I don't have to feel unsatisfied in any way because my eternally at my eternity has been taken care of.
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I know where I'm headed. Hope has been filled in my heart for the things of the future. Therefore in the present,
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I have no reason to grumble and complain about any circumstance, anything and everything that I go through should roll up into praise to God.
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Even my son wetting his pants. Yes, even in that I should be able to praise
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God because I have an opportunity to spend a moment with my son and show him grace, even though he did something like wet his pants and I can show him love and affection and show him attention that he needs to get him cleaned up because God showed me attention to get me cleaned up.
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That was what I experienced on Saturday and we actually did end up having a fun time.
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We went to Target. I was I was very joyful with my son because God had reshaped my mind and my heart while on that drive and we got to Target and and you know, we we had fun.
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We laughed as a father and son. I let him pick out the spider -man underwear that he wanted. I let him get the shorts that he wanted.
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We got everything taken care of and were able to get back to the wedding just in time to hear the
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I do's and to see the couple presented before the congregation as man and wife.
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It still became a great experience and I was able to roll up into praise to God having that experience with my son.
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There was nothing for me to complain about. In fact, when I got back to the wedding, I even said to my wife and this was after the wedding was over and people are just kind of mingling but I said to her that I was sorry for my attitude and I asked her to forgive me.
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I repented to my wife because of the grumpy attitude that I had and she did and I got a kiss on the cheek for it too.
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So that's something that I learned this past weekend. This is something that God continues to work in me folks.
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I can I can fall into those bad attitudes just as easily as anybody else and complain and grumble about my circumstances, but I'm reminded of something that CS Lewis said when he said that we need to stop looking at interruptions in life as interruptions.
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It's all life. It's all part of life. And so everything that we think that would interrupt us from accomplishing what we want to do is really just our selfish nature coming out when we complain about these interruptions.
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It's because while I had this thing that I wanted to do and now I can't do it because of this that that's our selfish nature coming out there.
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And that is one of the things that we need to submit to God and ask him to repair in us ask him to sanctify and continue to grow us in the knowledge of and and to shape our mind to be more like Christ Jesus.
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Do you know Romans 12 1 and 2 present yourselves as a living sacrifices unto the
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Lord? This is your spiritual act of worship do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by renewing your mind and then you will see
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God's good pleasing and perfect will this act of renewing our mind is a daily submission every day needing to have our minds transformed and changed to be more like Christ.
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No one causes you to be in a bad mood. You do that. You are the one that thinks evil thoughts.
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No one makes you do that. And you might be saying, yeah, but you don't know my friend Bernie. I mean that guy is crazy.
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He makes me think evil thoughts all the time. No, he doesn't he does not make you think evil thoughts you can take those thoughts captive and make them obey
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Christ as it says as the Apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians all of us have that responsibility to do that submit yourself to Christ Jesus and let him shape your mind to be more like Christ.
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So Paul says and instructs the Philippians as all Christians are to be instructed in this do all things without grumbling or disputing we show ourselves to be completely satisfied in Christ Jesus that you may be blameless and innocent.
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No one can bring any accusation against us because they see that our attitude displays the joy of the
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Lord because we are children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation among whom you shine as lights in the world.
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Now, if I might tangent a little bit here, if I might if I might go off on a tangent a little bit, there's a possibility that what
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Paul is saying here about shining as lights in the world or your translation might say shining as stars in the universe.
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There's a possibility that he is alluding to something that is being said in Daniel chapter 12.
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Now, this is this is prophetic what Daniel is explaining here in Daniel 12.
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So let me let me tell you, okay, I'm going to read this from Daniel 12. He says this at that time shall arise
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Michael the great prince who has charge of your people and there shall be a time of trouble such as never been since there was a nation till that time.
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But at that time your people shall be delivered everyone whose name shall be found written in the book and the book of life as we understand it in the book of Revelation verse 2 and many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt and those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above and those who turn many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever the angel goes on to say to Daniel, but you
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Daniel shut up the words and seal the book until the time of the end many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall increase.
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Now, if that is what Paul is actually referencing back to something that was given to Daniel that might really change something about your eschatology.
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I'm not going to try to guide that thought in any way. I'm just going to tell you that as you continue to study
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Philippians and if maybe you are in a study right now where you're studying aspects of eschatology meaning the study of end times.
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Maybe you're doing a study on the millennial the millennial reign of Christ and you're not yet decided whether you are a pre -millennial is an
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Amel in it on a millennial list or a post -millennial list that description that that Paul gives there in Philippians chapter 2 verse 4 verse 15 and as it pertains to what
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Daniel saw in Daniel chapter 12 that might change your millennial understanding a little bit. I just want to guide you in that study.
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That's all I'm all I'm pushing toward there. I won't go into talking about eschatology any further than that at least here in this broadcast.
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Okay, so as we shine as lights in the world holding out the word of life or holding fast to the word of life is another way that that is translated in verse 16 so that in the day of Christ again might have some eschatological implications there in the day of Christ.
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I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. In other words, the
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Philippians Declaration of their faith was not just a private ordeal. It was something that needed to be displayed as they preach the gospel to others and Paul said,
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I want to know that my delivering the gospel to you was not in vain. It wasn't just me preaching to myself.
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It was for your joy and you were transformed and you became like Christ taking on the mind of Christ as we partnered in this gospel ministry together.
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He goes on in verse 17 to say, even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith.
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In other words, Paul saying for the benefit of your faith, I have given all of myself and even if I I must die because of my declaration of the gospel,
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I am glad for that and I rejoice with you all. I am more than willing to pour out more of myself for you and the growth of your faith.
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Likewise, Paul says in verse 18, you also should be glad and rejoice with me. We should be fulfilled in Christ in all things in all things.
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There is nothing that we are lacking if we are in Christ Jesus, let us rejoice and be glad in these things.
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Our God continued to guide us in what it is that we have read today.
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Help us to have a mind that is submissive to Christ. Help us to have a mind that is like that of Christ that doesn't grumble or dispute about our circumstances, but we feel ourselves to be satisfied in all things because it is the joy of the
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Lord that is our strength and we pray and ask for your spirit upon us in Jesus name.
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Amen. Jesus said to love the
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Lord with all your heart soul and mind and love your neighbor as yourself. Now, there are some who have taken that command to mean that you're supposed to love yourself.
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In fact, they'll say you can't love others unless you love yourself. The best way to understand this command is to look at the context by which it is originally given in Leviticus 19.
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You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
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I am the Lord a few verses later when a stranger sojourns with you in your land. You shall not do him wrong.
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You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you and you shall love him as yourself for you or strangers in the land of Egypt.
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I am the Lord your God. God says to his children just as I have loved you as my own so you love others as if they were your own as if they were yourself the apostle
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Paul wrote do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
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If you think that in order to do that, you first have to love yourself. Well, that would be selfish, wouldn't it?
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If you don't love yourself, it is impossible for you to love anyone else. It's just not possible. You know why?
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Because you can't give away what you don't have. Well, if you don't have it, then how can you give it to yourself?
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Your worth is not in how you love yourself. It's in Christ who demonstrated his love on the cross dying in our place for our sins.
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If you love God, you will love others not with the selfish love of you, but the selfless love of Jesus when we understand the text.
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Our question today comes from Derek in Indiana, and he says, dear what first?
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Thank you for what you do. I haven't been this excited about a podcast in some time. Well, thank you,
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Derek. And is great compliment. I saw that your church holds to the Baptist faith and message.
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I was wondering what your thoughts are concerning a specific sentence in section 3 on man.
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Here is the quote. Therefore, as soon as man is capable of moral action. They become transgressors and are under condemnation unquote.
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Appreciate your time and thank you for your tireless efforts to promote sound biblical theology and proper exegesis.
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Keep it up. Thank you, Derek. Okay. So to give a little bit of background into where Derek's question is coming from.
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I'm a pastor to Southern Baptist Church. I mentioned that and in our confessions of faith, we adhere to the
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Baptist faith and message 2000. Now, I'll be honest and tell you that I do not fully agree with everything in the
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BFM. All of the essentials. Yes, but there are some things that I don't agree with.
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For example, the section on church governance. A church is not governed by a pastor and deacons.
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The deaconship is not a legislative body. It's plurality eldership that should be overseeing the spiritual needs of the church.
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Okay, so that's just one example of something that I might disagree with. Our church has its own mission statement, but it's basically a summary of the things written in the
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BFM. Roman numeral three is the section on man and it says through the interpreter,
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I'm sorry through the temptation of Satan man transgress the command of God and fell from his original innocence whereby his posterity inherit a nature and an environment inclined toward sin.
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Therefore, as soon as they are capable of moral action, they meaning all of Adam's offspring, they become transgressors and are under Condemnation, and I'm actually all right with that statement.
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The crew that helped to fashion the Baptist faith and message 2000 was an eclectic group chaired by Adrian Rogers, but also included
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Dr. Al Muller, the president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Those two figures are quite a contrast when it comes to soteriology
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Muller is a Calvinist. Whereas Rogers had an almost outright hatred for Calvinism.
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Now, I've used Rogers sermon on Romans 9 as the quintessential example of the finagling one tries to do with that text in order to avoid admitting to the clear confession of God's sovereign election that Paul wrote about there in Romans 9 in Rogers letter to the convention about the
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BFM update. He said that God's foreknowledge of events does not necessarily mean that he predetermined them again.
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That's just in Rogers letter that that's not in the BFM itself, but Lamentations 337 just as one example says that nothing happens that the
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Lord is not commanded to happen. So there honestly, it's ridiculous for anyone to claim that God is not predetermined events.
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Adrian Rogers had a fine ministry in his lifetime, but his prejudice against anything remotely Calvinistic is very apparent.
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And when I read that statement on man, I understand why Rogers was satisfied with it, but I can also appreciate it through a more reformed lens.
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The word transgression in Scripture is not quite as all -inclusive as sin.
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Take, for example, Romans 415, where Paul writes for the law brings wrath, but where there is no law, there is no transgression, though Paul had previously argued that sin still exists where there is no law in Romans 212 here in Romans 415.
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He makes a distinction between transgression and sin to transgress is to break a revealed command.
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This made the sin that the of the Jews all the more serious than the Gentiles because they knew the law and broke it.
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Anyway, the BFM states that when a person is capable of moral action, in other words, they know the commands of God, but will inevitably break them as we all do.
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They at that point become transgressors. This does not mean that before transgression, they were without sin.
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It rather affirms the sin nature that they were born under, which is stated in the previous sentence in that section on man, and I'm Satisfied with the context.
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So that's why we as a church are followers of the
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BFM 2000. I'm not follower followers of scripture works followers of the Bible, but we agree with the
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Baptist faith and message 2000 as a mission statement for our church. If you have any questions about some of the doctrines that we believe as a ministry, when we understand the text, when you go to our
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Website www .utt .com just click on the church button there and it'll take you to our website where you can find out about our doctrines and some other things that we believe in teach or just watch what videos because you'll get a pretty good idea of where we sit on a number of different different theological issues just by watching those videos.
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Let me close this in prayer here. God. I thank you again for this time that we have to be able to read your word and learn and understand these things and I pray that these words continue to be living and active inside us constantly changing us renewing our minds and submitting our thoughts to be like that of Christ and we pray this in Jesus name.
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Amen. You've been listening to when we understand the text of Pastor Gabriel Hughes. We featured dozens of videos covering a wide range of biblical topics viewed by thousands around the world each day.
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These videos are free for anyone to use for ministry purposes in your church youth group Bible study or to share on social media.
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You can find a complete list of videos and topics on our website. Wwut .com.
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Thank you for listening tomorrow. We'll continue in Philippians rejoicing together in God's truth when we understand the text.