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Philippians chapter 4 then and verses 1 through 9. Second to last message in this summer series that we've been in called
Deep Joy, the message of Philippians. Philippians chapter 4 and verses 1 through 9, if you've got one of our red giveaway
Bibles, you're looking at page 1042, 1042,
Philippians chapter 4 verses 1 through 9. And if one last time
I can invite you to stand with me, our reverence for God's word, Philippians chapter 4 and verses 1 through 9.
Brothers and sisters, these are God's words. So then my dearly loved and longed for brothers and sisters, my joy and crown, in this manner stand firm in the
Lord dear friends. I urge you all dear and I urge Syntyche to agree in the Lord.
Yes, and I also ask you true partner to help these women who have contended for the gospel at my side, along with Clement and the rest of my co -workers, whose names are in the book of life.
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice. Let your graciousness be known to everyone.
The Lord is near. Don't worry about anything, but in everything through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any moral excellence and if there was anything praiseworthy, dwell on these things.
Do what you have learned and received and heard from me and seen in me.
And the God of peace will be with you. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our
God will abide forever. Let me pray, ask for the Lord's help and we will get to work in God's word.
Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you that we have this privilege of worship, even with technical difficulties and even with things that are going on, you still call us out of the chaos of the world out there to come into your presence and to hear you speak to us.
And so Father, I ask that as we open up your word, that you would indeed speak to us, that in the words of the old hymn, that you would enter every trembling heart and that your gospel would comfort, it would strengthen, that your word would challenge us, it would call us higher, and that ultimately we would be the kind of people who glorify you, not just one day a week, but every day of our lives.
Father, it's our habit to pray for other local churches during this time and I especially want to take a moment to pray for some brothers and sisters across the country over in Kansas City, Missouri.
My friend Pastor Dan Michael Coggin, who today had the launch service for their church plant out there in Kansas City, Northtown Trinity Church.
Thank you for Pastor Dan and his desire to see the north side of Kansas City reached with the gospel.
Thank you for the favor that you've given their core group as they've been meeting the last few months privately and even today as they had their first public service.
Pray for the co -pastor that was installed to serve alongside Pastor Dan. I pray that as a plurality of elders, they would be able to serve that body well.
They would be able to equip that body for the work of ministry. Father, I pray for every person who has made the decision to be a part of Northtown Church.
Lord, would you give them a vision of the church that transcends their own personal need, that transcends their own personal preference, but that they would, even as we'll read in this passage, be marked by graciousness, by a reasonableness that commends the gospel of Christ to the people of Kansas City.
Father, we pray that for them and we pray that for even our own selves as we march through this portion of your Word. We ask all these things in Jesus' name and for his sake.
Amen. Please be seated. Hopefully, you grabbed a study guide when you came in.
You'll definitely need that today. On the study guide, you can see the title for this message that I've given it is,
The Pathway to Everyday Joy. The Pathway to Everyday Joy.
Well, as I said a few moments ago, we are hitting the homestretch in our exposition of Philippians.
Actually, next week will be the last message. As we've made our way through this letter,
I've made the point that each chapter has its own theme that orbits around this main idea of developing and cultivating joy.
So remember I said that in chapter one, you have joy through the single mind, the mind that is focused on the gospel alone.
And then in chapter two, we saw joy through the servant's mind, the mind that is focused not on self, but on serving others.
Chapter three dealt with joy through the spiritual mind, the mind that is focused on Christ and Christ alone.
And we saw from Paul's example, as he looked at his past, as he looked at his present and he looked at his future, that he was focused on Christ and Christ alone.
And now we come to chapter four, and as we come to chapter four, we're focusing on what you could say is joy through the secure mind, joy through the secure mind, the mind that is focused on God's provision in Christ.
And where do I get that from? Well, I think in each major section of this, there is this theme of God's ability to supply his people's needs, and that's in turn providing security for his people.
So look with me at chapter four and verse seven. So chapter four and verse seven,
Paul says, and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
Look down at verse 12 and 13, which we'll look at next week,
Paul says, I know how to make do with little and I know how to make do with a lot. In any and all circumstances,
I have learned the secret of being content. Verse 13,
I am able to do all things through him who strengthens me. And then the final section, jump down right to the end of verse 23.
He ends with his benediction. He says, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. In each section of this final chapter, there's an emphasis on something that God gives and that God supplies his children, which ought to keep their minds secure when everything else seems unstable.
And so we come to Philippians chapter four and verses one through nine, which really is the first section of this letter, of this chapter,
I should say. So chapter four, one through nine is section one, 10 right through to 13, or 14, excuse me, is section two, and 15 to the end is section three.
We're going to cover section one as its own, and two and three we will finish off with last, excuse me, next week.
On first consideration, the text in front of us might seem a little bit scatterbrained. It might seem a little bit all over the place.
You know, it seems when you read it as though it's a bunch of different commands and there's no seeming center to all of these commands.
It seems like he's here and then he's talking about this, and he's talking about this, and then he's here. But I actually do think there is a center to this passage.
I think it's an implicit one. By that I simply mean that Paul doesn't tell us what the center is, but actually
I think you can figure out what he's doing just by considering the flow of this letter. So think about where we were, last week we weren't in Philippians, so let me bring us back up to speed.
End of chapter three, we have this rousing call from the apostle for God's people to pursue spiritual excellence.
And it ends with this reality that we have a citizenship that is in heaven, verses 20 through 21.
But that whole section, it really begins all the way up in verse 12 and comes all the way down to the end of the chapter.
You can understand, put yourself in the shoes of the original audience for just a moment. They hear these words and as they hear these words, what's the temptation that they might fall prone to?
Wow, Paul, what you're saying, I hear what you're saying. This sounds great, but heavens, who can do all of this?
What you're calling for sounds like more than what we're able to do. You know,
Paul, that's easy for you to say, you're the apostle, you're on this other spiritual level to all of us.
And I think what Paul is doing in these verses, verses one through nine, is basically saying, this is what spiritual excellence looks like every day.
I hope one of the things that grabbed you as you heard these commands read just a few moments ago, that one of the things
I hope grabbed you was how ordinary they are. Paul is not asking us to do anything that is super amazing.
He's not asking us to do anything that is above and beyond the pale of normalcy, as it were.
No, I think it's fair to say that what Paul is calling us to in these verses is pretty ordinary.
This is the stuff of Monday morning, if you will, Tuesday morning, pretty much any day that's not called
Sunday, actually Sunday as well. The reality is what
Paul is calling us to hear is what does it look like really to pursue joy every single day? That's why
I've titled this message, The Pathway to Ordinary Joy. Because I put it to you there, if you catch this, that this is
Paul, essentially one commentary I read had the title for this section I thought was brilliant, Shepherding a
Church's Heart. Some of you may remember a book that was written a few years ago called
Shepherding a Child's Heart, really great book, I highly recommend it by Ted Tripp, but he admits he takes his title from that book.
But that's what Paul's doing here essentially, he is shepherding the heart of this church and reminding them that the pursuit of joy, the pursuit of spiritual excellence is not something that is impossible, far from it, but it does take some work.
If you will, you could put it like this, Paul is teaching us that Christianity, and I mean when
I say Christianity, the vibrant, joyful New Testament kind, that Christianity is not lived out in a few massive crisis moments.
You know what I mean when I say crisis moments, by the way? Those kinds of big, some people call them mountaintop experiences,
I'm not saying those are bad in and of themselves, but the reality is that's not where the battle of the
Christian life is fought and won. That's not where the day to day walk of being a believer in the
Lord Jesus, that's not where that happens. Do you know where that happens? It doesn't happen in a few massive crisis moments, but it happens in a thousand steps of everyday obedience.
I believe it was the late Eugene Peterson who said that the Christian life is essentially, what was it he said?
Long obedience in the same direction or something along those lines? I think that's what
Paul's getting at here. That the pathway to everyday joy doesn't happen, isn't just walked once, it's not just an event that takes place, it's not that there is some crisis event,
I grew up in a tradition where they taught this, that there was this event called entire sanctification that happened, that when that event happened, that's when the
Christian began to finally be able to live the Christian life easily. And of course, it never actually worked, because the reality is that's not how
God has built the Christian life. The Christian life is designed to be built, or it's designed to be walked
I should say, in a thousand steps of everyday obedience.
And that should make some sense to us, because think back all the way, those of you who were here, to the very first message in this series.
Remember what I said in our very first message in the series about joy? Joy is a supernatural delight in the person, plans, pursuits, and people of God.
Please pay attention to that word supernatural. If it is that joy is something that is supernatural, it's not something that you could work up, because it's not natural.
No, you cannot create joy, but I think what Paul is teaching us that is, well, you can't create joy, but you can cultivate an environment in which joy thrives.
So then that begs the question, how can we glorify God by cultivating the kind of spiritual environment in our lives that makes joy possible?
If the Christian life is not one or two or three or five or a dozen mountaintop experiences, but it's actually lived in a thousand steps of everyday obedience, and that is how we cultivate an environment in which this supernatural thing called joy can be cultivated.
If that's the case, well, how do we do that? You know, it kind of leads to my big idea for this message.
My big idea for the message is very simple. Finding joy in the Christian life begins with deliberate decisions in our actions and our thoughts.
Very simple. Finding joy in the Christian life begins with deliberate decisions in our actions and in our thoughts.
See, the pathway to everyday joy, like I just said, is marked by a thousand steps of everyday obedience.
And I think what Paul is doing in this section is he is giving us some of those decisions that we have to make day in and day out, not just for a little bit, not just for a while, but over the course of our
Christian lives so that we can cultivate deep joy. But for the rest of our time,
I want to consider seven intentional decisions that you need to make so that you can cultivate deep joy in everyday life.
Seven decisions, which means I've got to fly through this material because we've only got so much time, and I've got seven points to my sermon today.
So let me jump straight into it. If you're going to cultivate an environment in which joy can thrive, if you're going to pursue that life of daily joy, number one, point number one, ground yourself in the love of God.
Ground yourself in the love of God. Ground yourself in the love of God.
So look with me at verse one. What does Paul say in verse one? So then, my dearly loved and longed for brothers and sisters, my joy and crown, in this manner stand firm in the
Lord, dear for hence. What's striking about this first verse of this section is just how warm Paul's words are.
I mean, look at it again, look how he describes them. He says, they are dearly loved, they are longed for, that they are his joy and crown.
I mean, think about the relationship that Paul had with these Christians. This was, Paul was their apostle, he was their teacher, he had been their discipler, and over the course of years as he had served among them and as they had gotten to know him and he knew them, that ministry had endeared these
Christians to his heart. What's beautiful about this is that Paul's love for them was a reflection, yes, a weak and imperfect one to be sure, but it's a reflection, a very real reflection of Christ's love for his people.
But what is Christ's love for his people? Christ's love for his people is a selfless, real love, it's a love that is ongoing, it's a love that is persevering, and that's why
Paul can say, in light of that, in this manner, what manner? The manner you've just heard me describe, in this manner, the love of God, in this manner stand firm in the
Lord dear for hence. As people who have received
God's grace in Christ, that love motivates us in our love for one another.
And if we're going to glorify God in everyday life by the pursuit of joy, then we have to begin by grounding ourselves in the love of God.
I fear at times that in circles like ours, and let's be clear, I'm thankful for,
I consider myself reformed in my theology, I'm thankful for reformed theology, I believe it's what,
I believe it's the clearest expression of what the Bible teaches, but I fear that because other sections of the church, which are indeed the church, they're part of Christ's people, because other sections of the church sometimes overemphasize the love of God to the exclusion of everything else, we feel like we have to overcorrect the other way, and so we almost feel suspicious of anyone who tells you too much that God loves you.
But the reality is, God does love His children. God does love you.
How do we know that? John 3, 16, for God loved the world in this way, that He gave
His only Son. And so in a sense, we can never tire of being told the love that God has for us.
That is how we stand firm in the Lord. And if you're here today and you've not come to understand this love, can
I point to you that this is actually the heart of Christianity? Again, I thought at times the church has not always done a good job of presenting the fact that Christianity is not a bunch of do's and don'ts, that yes, there is the call to obedience, there is, and we're going to see some of that in this passage even.
But all of this is built on a firm foundation, which is not how hard we work and how much better we do.
The foundation is God's love shown for us in Christ, shown for us in the
One who came and assumed a human nature, who grappled with all of the limitations of humanity, yet was without sin, who obeyed
God's law perfectly, who went to the cross for us, who died and gave His life, paying the penalty that we deserved.
And then the Father raised Him up, demonstrating that He was truly righteous and that that penalty had been received.
For us as believers, this is what gives us stability and security, and this is where cultivating an environment where joy can thrive, this is where that begins.
It begins as you ground yourself in the love of God. So if you're going to cultivate joy in everyday life, it starts with grounding yourself in the love of God.
But if you're going to cultivate joy in everyday life, not only do you need to do that, there will be times where point number two, you need to press through conflict with the gospel.
So number two there in your study guide, press through conflict with the gospel.
Press through conflict with the gospel, verses two and three. So pick up with me in verse two,
Paul says, I urge you, Odia, and I urge Syntyche to agree in the
Lord. Yes, I also ask you, true partner, to help these women who have contended for the gospel at my side, along with Clement and the rest of the co -workers whose names are in the book of life.
Now this is not the sermon for a full take on what the Bible says about conflict, what it is, why it happens, how to avoid it, and in case you don't avoid it, how to deal with it.
I would need several sermons actually to teach that subject properly. But for now, I want to focus on just what
Paul says here in this passage. We actually don't know a whole lot about the
Odia and Syntyche, this is the only time they're mentioned in the whole Bible. Apparently there were two ladies in the church, everyone knew who they were, and they had some kind of issue that everyone knew about.
Can I pause for a moment? Can you imagine the awkwardness of hearing this read out loud if you were in the church in Philippi this
Sunday? You know, you're just reading this, you don't know what's coming.
So you've been hearing Paul kind of talk about all this stuff and it's great, it's wonderful. Imagine if you're the
Odia and Syntyche in this moment. I urge the Odia and Syntyche to agree together and look, wait, what?
But it's interesting, moving past the, just the comedy of how awkward this is, do you know that Paul doesn't say why they're fighting?
We're not told why they're fighting. Paul doesn't even get into who's right and who's wrong.
You notice that in this passage? He just says, I urge the Odia and I urge Syntyche to agree in the
Lord, which means they want to agree. But beyond that, he doesn't get into, he doesn't turn into a referee.
He's not trying to arbitrate this discussion. He's not trying to figure out who's right and who's wrong. Because let's be honest, in most interpersonal conflicts, is that really the issue?
Kofi, yes, it is. No, it's not. Yes, it is. No, it's not. Think about this.
Why do Christians fight? You ever thought about that? Why do Christians disagree?
In one sense, the individual reasons don't matter. It is what it is. Like, you know, no two people see eye to eye on everything, there will be moments where Christians don't agree.
That happens. In one sense, the reasons why they don't agree, unless actual sin has taken place, usually don't matter.
But there is a sense in which it does matter. Kofi, are you contradicting yourself? No, no, no, no, no. You see, the individual reasons might not matter, but the root of the issue stays the same.
Because often, what we fight about, if we're honest, more often than not, think about, in fact, for a moment, think about someone you've had conflict with.
I won't ask you to name the person. Just for a moment, think with me. Think about the last person you were in conflict with.
And let me ask you this, what was going on in your heart in that moment? The Bible might give you an answer to that question if you say, well,
I'm not entirely sure. You don't need to turn there, but I'd encourage you to write this down and go read it in your own time.
James chapter four. You know what the Bible says? James chapter four. What are the source of wars and fights among you?
James is writing to Christians. So in essence, he's asking, why is it that Christians are warring and fighting?
James chapter four, verse one, he says, don't they, the wars and the fights, come from your passions that are waging war within you?
He goes on and says, you desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and wage war.
You do not have because you do not ask. You see, let's be honest. What we fight over is often an indication of where our hearts are.
It's often an indication of what we place the most value on. If you can put it plainly, it's often an indication of what you want.
I remember my pastor one day asking me, I was in a moment of conflict with another Christian and I wanted to deal with it.
So I went to my pastor and I said, PT, like this, this, this, this, this, and I was honest with him and told him what
I thought was my side of the thing. And he didn't really say much, which is kind of his way in general. And finally
I got done and he said, this was before I started going about my middle name.
So he called me Douglas. Douglas is my first name. His nickname for me was Douglas. Douglas, what do you really want?
What do I really want? He said, get out of this conflict. What do you really want? I don't know.
A solution? He said, no, you don't want a solution. No, no, no. I said, go ahead. Before I say anything,
I'm going to encourage you to go home, think about it and pray about it. What do you want in this moment? I'll be honest, the question stopped me dead in my tracks, but I'm glad he asked that question because when
I went home and had time to think about it, I realized what I wanted. It's the same thing. If I'm really honest, this has been a lifelong struggle for me.
I wanted respect in that moment. I felt disrespected and I wanted that person to respect me.
So I went back to my pastor, hey, PT, I gave your question some thought. I want respect. Okay.
Why do you think this person disrespected you? Well, exit. Eventually he said, okay, brother, have you considered that that person maybe doesn't view what they did as disrespectful, but it is.
He goes, no, you think it is. And because you want respect, that is coloring the way you're viewing this.
At the end of the day, conflict happens because something somewhere in our hearts, even if, think about this, even if we're in the right, remember what the
Bible says about peacemakers? I believe it was Lord Jesus Matthew five somewhere. I think that was it. I think he said, blessed are the peacemakers.
The reality is conflict happens because we want something more than we want peace.
Well, again, Paul doesn't tell us what they're arguing about. So it's kind of hard for us to ask what they particularly wanted. But I raise all of that simply to say that conflict more often than not shows what's going on in our hearts more than anything else.
Well, if that's the case, well, how do we press through conflict? Not like the world deals with conflict.
But as Christians deal with conflict, how do we do that? Well, two thoughts. Letter A there under point two.
First of all, remember the leveling power of the gospel. Remember the leveling power of the gospel.
So looking at verse two, look what he says. I urge you, Odiah, and I urge Syntyche to agree in the
Lord. Now, there's a way to read this that kind of sounds like what my folks would do after like my siblings and I would get into a fight where they would just kind of say, you be quiet, you be quiet, now get along.
That's not what Paul is doing here. Paul isn't just saying, now, now, ladies, sit down, shut up and get along.
That's not what he says. That's not what he means here. Very clearly, that horse had long left the stable. They were disagreeing and they were disagreeing enough that everyone knew about it.
What Paul says, again, look at verse two. He says, I urge you, Odiah, and I urge
Syntyche to agree in the Lord. I might need to pause there, though, because that's not what he says. The CSB translates the word agree, but actually you've seen this phrase before.
It's not a word, it's a phrase. In fact, this one I want you to see for yourself. It should be just over the page in your
Bible. Look at chapter two and verse two. So we were in chapter two a few weeks ago.
Remember, he had those four gospel indicatives that should drive humility. Encouragement in Christ, consolation of love, fellowship with the
Spirit, affection and mercy. Remember those four? Remember what his command was at the end of that Philippians 2 -2?
He says, if any of that is true, then make my joy complete by thinking the same way.
That's the exact phrase in chapter four, verse two. In fact, those of you who have access to it, if you look up the
Legacy Standard Bible, that new translation, new update of the NASB and the Legacy Standard Bible, they pick up on that and they translate the phrase the same way.
So chapter four, verse two in the LSB says, I urge you, Odiah, and I urge Syntyche to think the same way in the
Lord. Essentially, Paul is throwing a throwback to what he said originally.
Those realities that I talked about? Yeah, I need you to go back and revisit those.
His point is not what we often tell people in conflict. Well, maybe you just need to compromise, meet each other halfway.
That's not what Paul says here. Paul's answer to conflict is, no, you don't need to meet halfway. You need to meet at the foot of the cross.
Think about this. How is it that warring Christians can think the same way? Clearly on the natural level they are, that's why they're fighting.
The answer to conflict isn't compromise. Compromise might work for a season, but the whole point of compromise is no one's getting 100 % of what they want, so no one actually wins.
And in conflict, one or both parties wants to win. Let's be honest. No one has gone into a fight wanting to lose.
No, you need something that transcends and trumps that innate human desire in all of us to win.
And that is exactly what the gospel does. As we remember the good news of Christ's obedience for us, of Christ's death for us, of Christ's resurrection for us, our shared need of that work and our shared need for the grace that flows from that every single day.
My contention is this, that as we reflect on that, the ground somewhat levels in front of us and we recognize that whatever we are fighting about pales into relative insignificance.
Let's be honest in our heart parts. Half the things we fight about are not that, they're just not that deep.
But it's easier said than done, ain't it? Paul can say, think the same way in the Lord. Think back upon the gospel.
Remember the leveling power of the gospel. Paul can say all that. But isn't it often the case that at times we need some help in doing that?
That sometimes the internal motivation is not all that strong. It should be. That's the ideal.
Guys who've been in my preaching group, remember what I taught you guys about the real, the ideal and the optimal?
There's the ideal of a Christian life, what it should be. The real, what is actually happening. The optimal, what we hope will happen.
And the reality is that we don't always live in the ideal. We live in the real world, don't we? And in the real world, sometimes the internal motivation to remember the gospel isn't always that high in the moment of conflict.
You're thinking about something else entirely. And so not only do you need to remember the leveling power of the gospel, let it be, you need to remind each other of the gospel practically.
You need to remind each other of the gospel practically. So look at verse three. So yes,
Jodie and Syntyche, you need, that's your responsibility. You need to think the same way in the Lord.
You need to go back to the gospel. But verse three, he says, yes, I also ask you true partner to help these women.
We don't know who the true partner is. Um, commentators go all kinds of fun places with it.
We just don't know. Whoever they are, Paul says, listen, whoever this person is, you need to help these ladies in this pursuit of the gospel.
And the reality is, just as it was true for Euodia and Syntyche, it's going to be true for us sometimes.
There will be moments where, yes, individually, we need to remember the leveling power of the gospel.
But there are times where we also need help. And we need the body of God's people to remind one another of the gospel.
I know it's become popular in recent years to use this language of preaching the gospel to yourself. And that's all well and good, and I'm all for it.
But guess what? There also needs to be a part where we preach the gospel to each other. Yes, we don't know who the true partner was in this passage, but we do know what his mission was.
Help them. As one commentator puts it, no Christian, we might say, is at liberty to stand aloof from the needs of another
Christian. We never get to say, well, that's not my problem, or I've got other things going on.
Don't you know I've got problems too? Yes, you do. And guess what? Sometimes you need to put those aside and help somebody else. And no, we don't.
This is not a calling to become a busybody and a gossip and insert yourself in situations. How many of you have heard my definition of gossip before?
If you haven't heard it, this is Kofi's copyrighted definition of gossip. Gossip is talking about something where you are neither part of the problem or part of the solution.
You're not part of the problem. You're not part of the solution, which means you really don't need to be talking about this. This is not what
Paul is calling us to here, but it is the reality of when we know that there are challenges among believers, when we can see it, we should do something about it.
And of course, Paul would do this. It's very clear he knew these ladies. In fact, he calls them co -workers in gospel ministry.
Oh, I wish I had time to unpack that Pandora's box. What does it mean that they were co -workers in ministry?
But for now, Paul says they were co -workers. In fact, he lists them with other co -workers in the ministry.
These were believers. In fact, do you see what he says about them? End of verse three. He says, along with Clemens and the rest of my co -workers, whose names are in the book of life, these are indeed
Christians. And yet Christians have their moments where they need to be reminded of the gospel and they need to be reminded of the gospel in the place of conflict.
And sometimes we would do well before we raise our fists, fellow believers, as it were, we would do well to, before we do that, to raise our eyes back in the direction of the cross.
So how do we cultivate an environment of joy in everyday life? Well, we ground ourselves in the love of God.
We press through conflicts with the gospel. I've got to keep running. Thirdly, number three, maintain joy in the
Lord. Maintain joy in the Lord. Verse four, we won't be here long because it's pretty straightforward.
He calls us to maintain joy in the Lord. So verse four, Philippians 4 .4,
rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice.
Yes, joy is something that we cannot develop ourselves. Remember, it's a supernatural delight in the person, plans, people, and purposes of God.
It's supernatural. We can't do anything to develop joy. But even though joy is a fruit of the
Spirit, it's a fruit of God's work in us, we do have a role to play in the pursuit of joy.
But we actually have to live that out. That's what this term rejoice means, to exercise joy.
And again, remember who's writing this. Paul is writing this from less than pleasant circumstances to a church that is very clearly worried about him.
We'll see that next week. If anybody, think about this. If anybody could get a pass on not being joyful, we could issue one to Paul.
We could say to Paul, hey, Paul, I understand. You know what? I get why you're not feeling great right now. I do, for real, for real.
And yet here is Paul issuing a call to demonstrate joy in the
Lord. Well, let's get practical for a moment. It's very easy. You know, this can become one of those churchy terms.
You know, rejoice in the Lord, which we basically translate as be happy, which I'm going to argue are not the same thing.
But how do we demonstrate joy in the Lord? How do we rejoice in the Lord? Well, when you start to run through the
Bible, you start to realize that there are a multitude of ways this happens. It happens by meditating on the
Word of God. So if you take a note, Psalm 119 verses 1, 1, 1, verse 111.
The psalmist says, I have your decrees as a heritage forever. Indeed, they are the joy of my heart.
How about prayer? Paul links prayer and rejoicing in 1 Thessalonians 5, 16 and 17.
Right next to each other, he says, rejoice always and pray constantly. How about meditating on the love of God?
Psalm 90 verse 14, satisfy us in the morning with your faithful love so that we may shout with joy and be glad all our days.
How about remembering the providence of God? Psalm 126 verse 3, the
Lord had done great things for us. We are joyful. All of these things that we can do practically to maintain and to demonstrate joy in the
Lord. Yes, it's not always going to look like, you know, being happy, laughing and smiling all the time.
That is true. And I think sometimes we in the church can do a very bad job of assuming everyone should be happy all the time.
But there is a sense in which even if we are not externally happy, we can still have true, deep joy, true, deep delight in what
God, in who God is and what God is doing. As we meditate on his word, as we seek him in prayer, as we think upon his love for us, as we remember his providence.
And can I know just one more thing before I move on? Because again, I need to keep moving. Paul gives this command to a church, not to an individual.
That tells me that rejoicing in the Lord is a community project. One of my relatively new favorite books,
How People Change by Paul Tripp, he talks about change is a community project. Well, rejoicing, I'm going to argue, just like change is a community project.
We are going to need to help each other in rejoicing in the Lord. Think about this. Think about this. There will be moments where you need to be encouraged to rejoice in the
Lord. And there'll be moments where you need to encourage others to rejoice in the
Lord. But all of that requires all of us. I have so much more
I'd like to say, but time is gaining on me and we do need to keep moving. If you're going to cultivate joy, you need to ground yourself in the love of God.
Press through conflicts with the gospel. Maintain joy in the Lord. Number four, learn to let go of your preferences.
Learn to let go of your preferences. Verse five. So look at verse five. Let your graciousness be known to everyone.
The Lord is near. The word for graciousness actually is very hard to pin down. Different translations go different ways with it.
ESV says reasonableness. NAS says gentle spirit. The NIV says gentleness. The King James Version says moderation.
And they're all actually kind of circling the same general definition. The idea here is not insisting.
This is how one dictionary puts it. Not insisting on every right of the letter of the law.
Not insisting on every right of the letter of the law.
And I think that makes some sense given the context of what we're reading. We know that at least two ladies in this congregation were on less than civil terms.
And there may have been more. Could it be? I mean, think about this. Excuse me.
Does it make sense that maybe the issue was something of preference that had gotten out of hand?
I mean, let's be honest. How many, how many of you have seen that happen in church life? Two people can't agree on something that the
Bible doesn't ask for. It's a matter of preference. But because they can't agree on this matter of preference and it keeps escalating and escalating and escalating before you know it,
I've seen it happen. Church splits over a matter of preference. Not something that God clearly says in His Word.
But something that I think should happen. Well, I don't think it should happen. Could that be what was going on here?
I think so. I genuinely do. And if you understand it that way,
I think Paul is saying to these believers, don't be identified by your insistence on your own rights.
Be identified by the willingness to let go of those preferences. Let me say that again.
Don't be identified by your insistence on your own rights. Be identified by the willingness to let go of those preferences.
The reason I think that Paul is saying that in this passage, it makes the most sense to me because this is consistent with what
Paul says in a number of places. If there was a word for the 21st century church,
I think there are many personally. But if there were a word for the 21st century church, could it be this one?
Think about it. How often have Christians been identified by a lack of being reasonable?
How often have Christians been known for being dogmatic about matters that the
Bible is either silent on or at least gives us room for discussion?
How often have churches split and or outright killed themselves? Not literally, but they killed the church because the members of the body stood their grounds on matters that are open to debate.
Remember that glorious year called 2020? I saw that happening in our own congregation at the time.
Eddie, you'll remember this. Preach the sermon series, four parts, Romans 14 and 15 called
God's black and white on gray areas. If you go to our website or you go to our church app or our
YouTube page, all of those sermons are there. I preached that series because I saw people in our own congregation were starting to fight each other.
This was kind of the tail end of the lockdowns. We were back meeting together again, but now the big conversation in the air was a vaccine is coming.
And do you take the vaccine? Do you not take the vaccine? You've got my personal opinion. I really don't care, but people really cared.
And so I took it upon myself. I was supposed to start a series on the personal work of the
Holy Spirit. I preempted that series and said, no, this is more important. And so I preached a four -part series.
Now, I'm not delusional enough to think that my preaching solves all the world's problems. So I knew that, you know, people are going to have to wrestle with this material, grapple with it, come to their own conclusions.
That's fine. But I'll never forget, I preached this sermon series. It was one of my favorites, actually.
I plan on preaching it again one day. The end of week one.
Yeah, I just started the series. Get a phone call from a member of the church asking if we can meet on Zoom.
Okay, so we have this meeting on Zoom about this sermon
I've just preached. And I was accused of being harsh and unloving that, quote,
I just don't understand American culture. We are very, very, very big on our rights.
And I didn't say anything at the time because I've learned that my mouth can really get me in trouble when I get going. I have that terrible mix of being both
English, in terms of where I grew up culturally, and being Ghanaian by blood. That's a bad combination.
We have no chill on either side when we get going. So I've just learned sometimes
I just need to not say anything. But I did say one thing. I think
I said at the time, it's like, you know, you know, you just don't understand the culture here. Like, people vigorously debate things.
I mean, I said, I understand. I said, it's precisely because I understand the culture that I'm preaching this. Christians can be characterized, even non -Christians,
I think sometimes they overdo it. But sometimes there's some truth to it. Christians are often identified by a rigid insistence on matters of preference.
But I read Paul and Paul is essentially saying to us, genuine joy and that kind of rigid insistence on matters of preference cannot coexist.
We cannot say that we are people characterized by the joy of the Lord, and yet we are fighting about matters that are matters of preference.
You don't need to tell me about reading to you. This is how James puts this. James chapter three, verse 17 and 18.
James says, the wisdom that comes from above is first pure. Now we like that part. Yeah, we want pure wisdom.
We want, we want to be right. Okay, I agree. We should want to be right. But James doesn't stop there.
He says, the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, compliant, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without pretense.
Verse 18, and the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who cultivate peace.
The reality is that part of pursuing joy in everyday life is not everything has to become a battleground.
We should be marked by reasonableness. And why should we want to be reasonable?
Well, look at the motivation he gives us. End of that verse. Let your graciousness be known to everyone.
The Lord is near. Because we have the presence of Christ as he draws near to us as his people.
He is near to bless us and to encourage us in this. We don't do this absent of the presence of God.
We do this in the presence of God. Again, so much more
I could say. I encourage you to go back and listen to that sermon series, God's Black and White on Gray Areas. I get into more detail than I can here.
For now, how am I doing for time? I've got 10 minutes. Okay, let's see how we can do here. If we're going to cultivate an environment where joy can thrive, we have to ground ourselves in the love of God, press through conflict with the gospel, maintain joy in the
Lord, let go of your preferences. Number five, put problems in perspective through prayer.
Put problems in perspective through prayer. Philippians 4, 6, and 7 might be up there with 4 .13
as the most well -known passage in this letter. Don't be anxious for anything.
But in everything through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your request to God and the peace of God, which is a positive understanding, will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
You could preach whole sermon series on these verses. We don't have that kind of time. So I'm going to limit myself to,
I think, three questions that will help us get the most out of these verses. First things first, letter
A there. We need to ask the question, what does Paul mean by the CSB says worry? Some of your Bibles will say anxious, same idea.
What does Paul mean by worry in this passage? I ask that because there can be a tendency where we, for us, where we read our
Bibles with a very flat definition of things. So the word means this, so it must always mean this.
Never mind, that's not how we generally use words. And actually, that's not how
Paul's using this word here. Because the reality, the word that's translated anxious or worry here isn't always negative.
Sometimes it's a good thing. In fact, you've seen this. If you've been following this series in Philippians, you didn't know it, but it's the same word that's used in chapter 2, verse 20, where Paul says about Timothy that,
I have no one else like my new who will genuinely care for your interest. The word care is the exact same word.
Paul will use that word in 1 Corinthians chapter 12 to describe the care that the body of Christ, the members of the body should have for itself or themselves,
I should say. In fact, in 2 Corinthians 11, 28,
Paul talks about the ministry that God had given him and the challenges that came with it. And listen to this.
This is how the ESV renders this. And apart from other things, all the other things he's talked about, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of this.
Again, if you've got an ESV or you've got a smart app on your phone, pull it up and look at it. There is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.
If we have a flat definition that says that all worry, all concern, all anxiety is bad, you can't deal with passages like this.
Sometimes, and we have to, again, there's some discernment that has to take place. Sometimes concern, even anxiety, isn't always a bad thing.
The question is, what are you worrying about? And more than that, and this is what
I think Paul's actually getting at, if you come back to Philippians 4, how are you demonstrating this concern?
See, there's a kind of concern, a kind of interest, if you will, that becomes sinful worry, that becomes sinful anxiety because it's demonstrating faithlessness.
It's not coming from faith in God, it's coming from a lack of faith in God and it can become all -consuming.
Well, all you're doing is worrying and Paul says that is the kind of worry and anxiety you need to avoid.
It's the kind of worry that Jesus says you should avoid in Matthew chapter 6. Don't worry about what you're going to eat, what you're going to wear or what you're going to drink.
He says don't worry about these things. He says the Gentiles, those who don't know God, worry about these things. Is it wrong to be concerned about your basic needs?
No, it is when it becomes all -consuming. That's why Jesus says at the end of that section, seek the kingdom of God and its righteousness and everything else will be added to you.
So what does Paul mean by worry here? He's talking about the kind of concern that shows faithlessness and becomes all -consuming.
But then that leads us to a second question. Let it be, not only do we need to ask what does Paul mean by worry, but we also need to ask how do we handle the temptation to worry?
How do we handle the temptation to worry? Well, he tells us don't worry about anything.
Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
In a word, we handle the temptation to worry through prayer. We don't respond to the temptation to worry by trying to solve problems in our own power alone.
No, we start by appealing to God's power in prayer. Those of you who've been in prayer meetings with me, you know how much
I love the Bunyan quote. We can do more than pray after we've prayed, but we cannot do more than pray before we've prayed.
In other words, pray first, then do something. But pray first. Paul uses three words for prayer in this section, all of which carry this idea of asking or desiring something.
You're worried and concerned about something. The way in which you handle that is to take those worries and concerns and to go before the
Lord and to ask him about those things. Think of it this way, the way to deal with worry is not to approach
God with a list of complaints, but with faithful expectancy grounded in God's love for his children.
Let me say that again. The way to deal with worry is not to approach God with a list of complaints, but with faithful expectancy grounded in God's love for his children.
In essence, it's the difference between, think about this, praying from a legal perspective and praying from a gospel perspective.
Let me flesh that out some. If you're praying from a legal perspective, you view God as a judge and you're going to him to prove your case.
Think about it. Most judges you go before, are they actually, let me be careful, we have a judge in the room.
So let me not be offensive or say something out of pocket because I don't know much about the hard work that judges do. But for the most part, you go before a judge, you have someone who represents you and you prove your case before that judge.
Why? The judge is not there to take into, well, I guess Paul can correct me later on. But for the most part, the evidence is what you consider.
You're not supposed to take partiality on the person who's involved and all the rest of that. But that's very different from how a father deals with their children, ain't it?
I have a son, he's three. Gareth can come up to me and ask me for things as best he can with his limited vocabulary.
And my first response before I go, he knows he can ask me because I'm either going to say yes and give it to him which is what happens most of the time.
Or no, Gareth, which he may or may not understand. But in that moment, does he come?
I hope this never happens. Does he come to me with fear that he has to kind of prove why he needs this?
No, I'm his dad. So like it happens every Thursday when
I get to spend the day with him. He comes up to me and he says, mix. Because my son is addicted to pub mix.
He doesn't say, excuse me. He doesn't sit there and say, dad, hungry, pub.
He doesn't even have to say all that, he just has to say mix. And he knows for the most part, I'm his dad.
I'm gonna walk over to the pantry, I'm gonna grab a plate or a bowl, put some pub mix in there and give it to him.
One views God as somebody who isn't willing to listen and basically needs to be cajoled. But that's not what
Paul says here. Not that he says you do this with thanksgiving, why? Because you know he's a father.
And if we are asking according to his will, he hears us. And so we handle the temptation to worry with prayer from a gospel perspective, a perspective that says that God is indeed our father.
He loves us and he desires what is best for us. Even when he says no to what we ask, he's doing so because he loves us.
That leads to a third question, which is, well, what happens when we pray? What happens when we pray?
Paul says, I love the way he puts this, verse 7. And the peace of God, as you do this, the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.
The term for God here is a military term. It was to form a protective barricade around something. Paul says that as you pray, you may not get the answer immediately.
But what does happen is this, that God in his wonderful providence and his love for his children, he puts up a protective barricade around your mind so that your mind is not overcome by the situation that you find yourself in.
Think about this, human peace is linked to what makes sense to us, but God's peace is able to function at a level which supersedes what we are able to understand.
If you think of it this way, prayer is God's means of protecting the sanity of his children.
That's one of the reasons I believe that corporate prayer is so critical. I know I harp on this a lot, but the people of God praying together, according to Paul, as they do that, they partake of this protective barricade that God forms around the hearts and minds of his people.
Yes, we can and should talk to each other, but at some point we need to stop just talking to each other and get on our knees and talk to the
Lord. I believe it's the old song that says, just a little talk with Jesus makes it... None of us know that song?
Thank you, just a little talk with Jesus makes it right. And that's what needs to happen if we're going to cultivate an environment where joy can thrive.
God and ourselves in the love of God, we press through conflicts with the gospel, maintain joy in the Lord, learn to let go of our preferences, put problems in perspective through prayer.
Number six, number six, get a grip on your thought life. Get a grip on your thought life.
Verse eight, get a grip on your thought life. The reality is the battlefield of the mind is where spiritual victory is either won or lost.
I, again, I wish I had more time. That's why I just put these six points in the study guide for you.
Pull this six particular things that we should be thinking about, that we should, again, look at the end of verse eight.
He says that we have to dwell on these things, literally camp here on these things.
What is true? Does what we think correspond to reality from God's perspective? Is it honorable?
Does it line up with that which is dignified, decent, serious? Is it just?
Does my thinking conform to God's righteous standard in Christ? Is it pure? Does my thinking stay clear of polluting influences?
Is it lovely? Does it exalt that which promotes love for God and love for others?
Is it commendable? Does my thinking elevate that which builds up others, that which
I can commend to others? Again, I wish I had more time, but I will say this.
As I was preparing this on Friday, I got convicted. Because let's be honest, my thinking isn't, let me be honest with you, my thinking isn't always in line with this.
I easily get mad. I easily get frustrated. My love for God is not always as evident in ways that build up other people.
And I had to take a long hard look at my own self and say, if I'm not doing this, where do
I need to take some inventory in my own life? We live in an age with both a 24 -hour news cycle and a perpetual stream of entertainment.
We are by far the most kind of informed and definitely the most over -entertained generation in the history of history.
And with all of that, you can, what, it's got to a point, I think I've mentioned to some of you before,
I don't watch the news anymore because it just makes me angry. You look at the incompetence of those who are called to lead us.
You look at the evil that happens in the world and you just can't help but get angry at it. So I just said, you know what,
I don't need to expose myself to that. You know what, no. But whether it's the rage machine that exists in the modern media or the ability to just shut your brain off in front of what my dad used to call the idiot box, 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
I think in a culture where we have both of those options, what Paul says here in Philippians 4, 8 becomes really, really, really, really appropriate, doesn't it?
Again, more I wish I could say about this. You guys have been great. I'm almost done.
One more. Ground yourself in the love of God. Press through conflicts with the gospel.
Maintain joy in the Lord. Learn to let go of your preferences. Put problems in perspective through prayer.
Get a grip on your thought life. And finally, number seven. Commit to pursuing lifelong discipleship.
Commit to pursuing lifelong discipleship. So again, look at verse nine.
What does Paul say? Do what you have learned and received and heard from me and seen in me and the
God of peace will be with you. Again, I wish I had more time. This is actually one of my favorite verses in the
New Testament. For now, let me just kind of give you the 30 ,000 foot view. Lord willing, in the future, we'll come back to this verse in more detail.
Paul lists four actions. You see them there in the text? Learned, received, heard, seen. You can actually pair those together.
Two and two. And those two pairs basically form how the
New Testament understands discipleship and disciple making to work. So the first two, learning and receiving.
That pair basically communicates to us that discipleship begins with learning the truth.
That verb for learning is actually where we get the word disciple from. It's actually also where we get the word math from, if you ever wondered.
Learning refers to the action of the student, the one who is being taught. Received refers to the fact that there is something that you are getting from a teacher.
That discipleship begins with the learning of the truth. It begins with taking in the word of God.
But it's not just learning the truth. Yes, there is a learning and a receiving, but it's also the second half of this pair.
Yes, discipleship is learning the truth, but discipleship is also modeling the truth.
So you see that second pair, hearing and seeing? Not only does truth need to be taught to you, you need to hear someone in their own words and through their own experiences, actually communicating what this looks like.
And then you see it, you're able to see a pattern of life and to see, okay, this is what they're saying and this is how what they're saying is walking itself out in their lives.
And so Paul says, you were discipled by me. You learned and you received and you heard and you saw some things in me.
And he simply says, those things, do them. I think
I said this a few weeks ago. I think I said that the Christian life is both taught and caught. We devote our lives to learning the truth and then we devote our lives to practicing that truth as we see others practice it over the course of a lifetime.
And again, the church can kind of go one of two ways with this. Either we make discipleship all theological or we make discipleship all relational.
There can be imbalance that happens, but Paul beautifully puts those together and says, yes, there is a body of truth you need to know and you need to learn.
And guess what, as you learn that, you're going to learn that from people who are living in line with that.
I won't dwell here because I've taught on this theme more than enough times and time is gaining on me. Let me land the plane.
You see all seven of those decisions? All seven of those, when you think about them, on the surface, they don't seem like much.
I hope they don't, but that's the point. Again, think back to how we started the message, that the
Christian life is not a few mountaintop experiences, but it's a thousand steps of everyday obedience, grounded in the gospel, grounded in the love of God for us.
These are decisions that we have to make just every single day. There's just no way around it. We can't say, okay,
I made that decision once upon a time. I'm good, I'm going to move on. No, we daily have to say, you know what?
I am re -enrolling in the school of Christ as it were. We're called to do that every single day.
The question simply becomes, and I leave you with this question. Will we do so? Will we do so?
Our Father, we thank you that you have designed the Christian life in such a way that the way in which we grow is not through a handful of experiences here and there, but that growth is the journey of a thousand steps.
Father, I don't know where each of your people who've gathered here today are. Lord, only you know hearts.
You know where people are and they walk with you. And Father, I thank you for those whose lives are characterized by this, who in simple obedience every single day to the light that they have are walking with you and are growing as they walk with you.
And I pray for those who, again, I don't know the hearts of your people. Maybe they've stagnated somewhere in their walk.
Maybe somewhere along the way, they stopped making some of these decisions.
And there's so many other more we could add. But Lord, ultimately, you're a father.
You love your children and you work in us through your spirit to make us more like you.
And so Father, I would ask that as many as are here who know you would be characterized by living in this kind of way.
And Father, if there's anyone here who doesn't know you, who doesn't know the Lord Jesus, I pray that you would use the word they've heard to wake them up, to bring about spiritual life where there is spiritual death, to make the unable and the unwilling, able and willing to come to you.