Desiring God's Good Pleasure

If you go ahead and turn to Philippians 2, we will begin in verse 12 and read to 18.

Please stand when you have that for the reading of God's word. Philippians 2, beginning with verse 12.

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. 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.

Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith,

I am glad and rejoice with you all. Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me.

These are the words of the Lord. You may be seated. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for your word.

Thank you for this day that you set aside for us to gather and contemplate it. I pray that you would help

Pastor Josh as he preaches, that you would give him words to say, and I pray that you would be with us as we hear, that you would give us ears to hear.

And I ask that your word would not return void, but that it would accomplish its purpose, that it would change our hearts, change our lives, that it would fill us with expectation of what you have for us, and with conviction of our sin, and with assurance of the great salvation we have in Jesus Christ.

Pray that all these things would be done for your glory's sake, for the sake of your son's kingdom.

And I ask these things in his name, in Jesus' name. Amen. Please keep your

Bibles open to what was just read to you by Pastor Owens. If I asked you this morning, what is the one thing that you would be most careful not to bring to the church?

Many of us would say, well, what's happening out there in the world, Pastor? The coronavirus.

And therefore I'm taking extra precautions, therefore our pews are more empty than normal because people are taking that extra precaution on our behalf.

I would say the thing I want to be most careful about right now is to not bring that virus, should

I be in any way a carrier of it, to others. And for that we thank those who are away with us in spirit, and we thank for the extra precautions.

What is it that you would be most careful not to bring to the church? Well, there's that.

There is something though that we bring to the church against which we must give much more precaution than anything like the coronavirus, as careful as we are about that.

There is something that you need to be even more careful not to bring to the church. If the coronavirus is something against which we can take reasonable precautions, which

I believe we have, this is something against which you must not take just precaution but get rid of.

You must not bring this thing that I'm speaking of into the church. It is something that would spread faster than this virus that is going around.

It is something that is a worse contagion and worse than all of this. If we take

God's view of this thing that I'm leading towards, if we take God's view of it, if we look at the scriptural view of it, if we look at the alarm that it caused the

Apostle Paul, writing under inspiration of the Spirit of God, I think we would be alarmed as well.

And Lord willing, we'd look to our own spirit, look to our own soul carefully with our scriptures open, vulnerable before God, and ask

Him, am I carrying this? Am I bringing it to others? And then repent and be rid of this thing.

What is it I'm speaking of? Well, it's right there in the middle of the passage that Pastor Owens just read to you.

And what we have before us here is this instruction from the Apostle Paul as he continues to tell the church that they must be unified, that they must be unified in Christ Jesus.

They must have His mind. They must think like Him and think together like Him. He continues this same premise, the same thrust.

In the first two verses, in verses 12 and 13, he calls the church to continue working towards this thing which

God is working in you. And we're going to talk about that in some detail. But in verses 12 and 13, he says you must work towards this thing that God is working toward in you, working for His good pleasure as was just read to you.

I'll come back to the middle few verses in a moment, but at the end of the verses, we have a result of all this, a result of this effort that I'm going to try and explain to you this morning, which is that you become a sacrificial offering to God.

Your faith is an offering to God that is pure and acceptable to Him as a result of this effort that we're going to,

Lord willing, expound to you this morning. And I saved those middle few verses for the end of this short explanation, verses 14, 15, and 16, because there it is, this thing that you can bring into this church of which you must be far more careful than the coronavirus, which would be far more damaging to this place than anything our physical bodies could endure, because it would be a harm to our spirits, to our souls, and to the body of Christ Jesus Himself.

What am I speaking of? I'm speaking of what it says right there in verse 14, and we'll come back to it in a moment, but I want to put this before you.

I want you to know where this is going. Do all things without grumbling or disputing.

Do all things without grumbling or disputing, and these are viruses. These are things that can come into the church, do far more damage than anything you can imagine.

They caused the Apostle Paul this great alarm as he looks to this church to which he was so close, the first church in his

European conquest in Philippi, when the

Spirit told him, go to Macedonia, help those people, and so the Gospel intruded, invaded

Europe there. You read that in Acts chapter 16. This church to which the

Apostle was so close, and yet he is so alarmed at this encroaching problem, grumbling, disputing.

Let's look to this Word of God and see what it has for us this morning. We'll take it in those three parts that I laid out for you, verses 12 and 13, working for God's good pleasure, verses 14 through 16, which is being rid of the grumbling and the complaining and the disputing, coming to God without that blemish upon ourselves, and then at the end, this sacrificial offering that is your faith, as we excise these things from us.

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my absence, in my presence, but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Much more in my absence.

What is the prison in Rome, so he is absent from them.

And he's saying, when I was not absent, when I was present with you, I saw your obedience. I saw you obey.

That's all in Acts chapter 16, when Paul comes into this city of Philippi, meets

Lydia at the river, where she's having the prayer meeting, and she hears the

Word of God, and she and her household are saved, where Paul exercises the demon from that girl who's filled with the

Spirit, making prophecies and predictions to the great monetary benefit of her owners. He chases that demon away and is punished soundly for it.

And later, the Philippian jailer, and he calls them my brethren, or excuse me, my beloved.

My beloved, as any pastor would to his church, as Pastor Owens and I would say to you, my beloved.

And yet, this warning, if you will, much more in my absence.

What a blessing it would be to a pastor to know that he doesn't have to stand and watch like a school teacher back in the day, way back in the day, who would smack you with a ruler on your wrist, or on your hand, or maybe on the top of your head, if you were misbehaving or not paying attention.

Now, we can't do that today, and I'm not suggesting it. You would get in a lot more trouble than you can imagine. But that's what they used to do.

And what Paul is saying is, I don't have to be there. I saw your obedience. And now that I'm not with you, you need to continue to obey.

And on what basis? How would I have you to obey if I'm not here, Pastor Owens, if he's not here? Because you don't need me as much as you need

Christ. And what he is saying is, God working you. We're going to get to that. We're going to unpack that a bit.

But this is the beginning. My beloved, this warm feeling he has for this church, this compassion, this intimacy he has with them that's unique, it seems, in all the churches that he founded.

We don't find this kind of warmth and, if you will, friendship in many of the other letters.

And yet, alarm. And perhaps that's a reason for the alarm that he has for them, that they seem to be slipping away.

He's in prison. And there's this influence coming into the church, this cause for the grumbling that we're going to get to.

We don't know exactly what it was or who it was. In chapter 3, as we continue to go through this letter to the

Philippians, we're going to come across those who he calls dogs, mutilators of the flesh.

You don't have to go there now. We'll take it apart when we get there, God willing. But we could correlate them or perhaps directly call them the

Judaizers that we find in Galatians, the ones who say you have to return to the law. And any return to anything other than Jesus Christ, any pulling away from the pure Word of God in Christ, Jesus is going to do what to you?

It's going to cause you grumbling. It's going to cause you complaining because it's just not right. And even if you can't put your finger on that thing and say, this is what's wrong with it, if it's not

Christ, it's not going to fit, not in his people. So he says, my beloved, as you've always obeyed, so now in my absence, continue to obey.

And what he says here is something that has caused terror in too many Christians as he goes on with this.

It's caused too much confusion. He says, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

There's a we get to do all things without grumbling or disputing.

What does it mean to work out your own salvation? Well, there's no working out of salvation for a

Christian all alone. All of this is in community. And these are in the plural.

So something like this, you work out your salvation in company with the brethren.

We are all in this together and you're in this on your own, in a sense. You're responsible for your salvation.

You're responsible for your growth in the Lord. You're responsible to repent of your sin. You individually are responsible as we all together grow as one in the

Lord, helping one another to do our individual responsibility. I hope that makes some sense to you because it is both at the same time.

You individually are responsible to work out your salvation with the rest of us as we grow together.

What does it mean to work out your salvation? Does that mean to get yourself saved? Well, no, by grace you've been saved through faith.

And this is not of yourselves, not of works. It is a gift of God. Being able to believe is a gift from God, from God alone, by grace alone, through Christ alone.

Are you able to believe? So Paul does not mean get yourself saved by working and making yourself worthy to God.

No one is worthy. By nature, children of wrath. You cannot make yourself worthy. Only Christ Jesus can.

So let's eliminate that idea. If you've come in with this idea that what the apostle Paul means, or if you've heard it for the first time when

I read it to you, where it says, work out your salvation with fear and triumph, you say, okay, this is what

I have to do. I'll follow the Ten Commandments. I'll obey all the rules. I'll memorize more scripture. I'll do, do, do.

No, that is not what the apostle Paul would be telling us.

So it's not to get saved, nor is it when Christ returns, he's going to look upon you and say, well, let's see how many merits you got during this life.

Let's see if I want to call you to myself. It's not that either. The Christian, the one whose faith is in Jesus Christ, the one who's repented of his sin, is one who has been saved.

You are saved now. The one who will be saved when Christ Jesus returns, he will call you to himself and are being saved.

You're being saved by taking on the worldview, the biblical view, the words of Jesus, the word of God, which

Christ is, and infusing that into all that you do, living a life worthy of the gospel by which you've been called.

That's chapter 1 verse 27 of this very letter that we're in. This is what it means to work out your salvation, the ramifications, the implications, the worldview that the gospel gave you.

The scripture from Genesis chapter 1 verse 1 to Revelation 22 verse 21, from beginning to end, that is the word of God.

In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God, and the word became flesh.

The apostle John goes on in the opening to his gospel. Jesus Christ, the living word of God.

Jesus Christ, the very word of God. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.

Work out your salvation, meaning follow his ways. Learn of Jesus Christ.

Say the things that he said as you see them in the gospel. Respond to things the way he did as you read them in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and John.

Understand the implications of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice for your sins, his death, his burial, his resurrection, as you read it in the letters.

Romans, and first and second Corinthians, and Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and so forth.

This is what it means to work out your salvation. Not to get saved, and not to keep yourself saved, not to make sure that you're good enough when

Jesus returns that he will actually call you to yourself. You are saved by faith, by faith alone.

You will be saved because God's promises are sure, and Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. That is not what it means.

You're not earning anything. Working out your salvation is to live out the implications of the gospel, to live a life worthy of the calling by which you have been called.

So let us put away and put aside any idea that we're going to do anything to make ourselves worthy of anything

God has done in, and through, and for Jesus Christ for you. It's fear and trembling

I wanted to get to pretty quickly. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.

Well, what does fear and trembling mean? Now, have you heard this term before? In church, we often hear fear and trembling, but because you're in Jesus Christ, you shouldn't be scared of God.

So what this means is awe and reverence. I want to tell you this morning, do not so dilute what the

Apostle Paul is saying. What does he mean by fear and trembling? Fear and trembling.

This is what he means. Awe and reverence are proper. We should come into God with a feeling of awe that we can come to the into the very presence of the

God of the universe, the God who called in all things into existence. That should be awe -inspiring.

So that's proper, to have awe of God. And reverence, of course we should revere

God, of course we should reverence God. But what does the

Apostle Paul mean by fear and trembling? He means, brethren, fear and trembling.

I want us to think about Israel. Think about Israel, because there are many allusions in this letter, and I think especially in this passage before us, back to Old Testament Israel.

Old Testament Israel at one point was fearful and trembling before God. Now you don't have to turn there.

Let me just explain to you quickly, because I don't want this message to go on too long, and it will go on too long if I get you back there, because I'll never be able to pull out of it.

So let me just summarize for you quickly. In Exodus chapter 19, Israel is at the foot of Sinai, and they're seeing the manifestation of God as God is meeting with Moses and giving him the law, and they see the cloud, and knowing that that's

God's presence, and they can see the lightning, they can hear the thunder, and they tremble to touch the mountain, because if so much as an animal touches the mountain while God is there, it has to be stoned.

And any person who comes near the mountain is going to die. They're fearing, and they're trembling as they're filled with awe and reverence, yes, but they're fearful and trembling as they are so near God.

And you who are in Christ Jesus, how near to God are you by faith in Christ Jesus?

What does Jesus say? I and my Father will make our home in him. And in the same vein, he says that the

Spirit of God will likewise dwell within you. He's going to say, my beloved,

God is in you. He's not up on the mountain. There's not thunder and lightning.

Christ has quenched God's loud thunder. We sang that hymn. Let us love and sing and wonder.

How much more should you fear and tremble in the presence of God when he's in you?

What is the fearful and trembling attitude about? Is it because God might cast you away?

No, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, yesterday, today, and forever. And he says, none can come to the

Father but through me. And he also says, and any who come to me, I will by no means cast out, and no one can cast you out of the

Father's hand. If you are saved, you are saved indeed. What is the fear and trembling about then?

The fear and the trembling is directly related to, with fear and trembling, for it is

God who works in you. And there's that indwelling presence of God that I just spoke of. For it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

We'll take that apart. We'll unpack that a little bit in a moment. But the idea is this. Fear and tremble at the very thought that God, the

God of the universe, in company with his Son and his Spirit, a way that we'll never really quite understand.

I'm not even going to try and explain. But he is there. He literally is there. He's in you.

Fear and tremble to not be accomplishing what God himself in you would have accomplished.

Fear and tremble that. Don't turn it into simple awe and reverence. We want to keep those.

We don't want to cast those aside. But this is more intense. This is more difficult.

It is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. What do you will?

What do you want? That's what the word will means. It's a verb. To will, to desire, to go after, to think it's good to have.

Everyone has different things that we aspire towards, different financial goals, different physical goals.

Then we work hard for those. You're going to work for that which you think is good. And that's what the

Apostle Paul is saying here. To will, to desire, to want to have, to will and to work for his good pleasure.

It's God working in you. It's the same word God works in you so that you can work for his good pleasure.

The same word. It's the effort towards accomplishing a particular goal. And what is

God working in you? His good pleasure. Now again, Genesis 1 to Revelation 22 -21, that's

God's good pleasure. What is God's good pleasure for you? That you should be like Christ. That you're predestined destiny.

Romans 8 -28, having been predestined to be conformed to the image of his son Jesus Christ. What is

God's good pleasure? That you should put aside immorality. That you should leave behind the old and useless ways.

That you should follow Christ in his ways. That you should know his word. You should gather with God's people.

You should pray. Those sorts of things. That's God's good pleasure. That's what he's working in you.

But God is working in you to make you will it. Paul says to the

Corinthians, the natural person does not, naturally can we say, desire the things of God.

It's not in you to want these things of God. Not in and of yourself. It's God working in you that makes you want them at all.

I ask you, do you will and work for God's good pleasure?

Do you even want what pleases God? Well, that's what he's working in the

Christian. It's God working in you to make you want those things. And we freely confess that if God doesn't make me want them,

I won't want them. Do you want them? Ask yourself in the privacy and the security of your own mind and spirit.

Do I will for myself the things of God? The things that please God? There's only a couple of answers we can give.

Because if you don't will, if you don't want, if you're not working for what pleases God, and God is in you, well then we'd have to say that you defeated

God and his purposes for you. That's almost saying, that is literally saying, I would argue, that you're more powerful than God.

That God is working something in you. The God who said, let there be, and day after day there was, and he accomplished his will, and on the seventh day he looked, he saw it was done, and so he rested from his creating, and saw that it was very good.

That God accomplishing something in you. First Corinthians 5a, saying that God who called light out of darkness has shown his light into you.

He's working something in you. Is he? Do you will? Do you desire?

Do you work for the things of God? The things that please God? Or have you defeated

God? Well that would be impossible, because our God finishes what he starts. Because otherwise it would be

Genesis 1 .1, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was formless and void. In other words, the earth could not accomplish the purposes for which he created it, and the

Spirit of God was hovering over the over the face of the deep. And he said, but I can't get it done.

Let's go take a rest and try again later. It'd be absurd. It would be ridiculous. And so it would be for one of us to say, but God is in me.

I believe in Jesus Christ, therefore I have his Spirit within, but it's just not getting done in me.

It doesn't work, folks. It doesn't work. Is God working in you for his good pleasure?

Do you want the things of God? If you say no, this scripture is a hard one.

I would have you leave this place knowing that if God is not working in you, if you do not desire his good pleasure, if you're not working for those things that would please him,

I would argue God is not working in you, and you need to confess your sin and repent and come to the

Lord Jesus Christ for forgiveness. You need to become a Christian, because if you're a

Christian, God is working in you to will and to work for his good pleasure, and you want his good pleasure.

It's a hard verse. These are hard teachings. The Apostle Paul speaks to the

Philippians, my beloved. Sometimes it's hard to tell people you love so much, the people you're warmly attached to, the hard things.

Here's something hard, my beloved. If you don't desire what God desires, if you don't desire his good pleasure, if you are not working actively in your life to conform yourself to Jesus Christ, which is

God's good pleasure, ask yourself if you even have his Spirit. Ask yourself, do you really believe in Jesus Christ?

Because if you do, the promise of Jesus Christ himself is you have his

Spirit, and if you have his Spirit, it is God who works in you. If God is working in you, there's something we need to leave behind, isn't there?

Not just the entire way of life. Paul zeroes in on a particular virus invading the church there in Philippi, which can invade any church, the grumbling and the disputing.

Some of your Bibles say grumbling and questioning. There's other translations, but it means basically the same thing.

We need to look at this. If God is working in you, if you want his good pleasure, here's something that is not his good pleasure, and if God is working in you, you are getting rid of this, or have, praise

God, gotten rid of it. Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent children of God.

Let's stop for just a second. Blameless and innocent speaks of temple sacrifices, the unblemished lamb that you must bring to God.

Jesus Christ as an unblemished lamb, the only fully unblemished ever, without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as light 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.

What is grumbling? I want us to think about grumbling here. It comes from a

Greek word, and I think it's, and I shudder to say this because I always get the word wrong, onomopoeia, did

I pronounce that right? A word that sounds like its definition. In Greek it's gangousmos, sort of a g -o -g -g -u -s -m -o -s if you will, gangousmos.

It sounds like what it is because it starts down low, it's this discontent that you have in your own spirit.

It's just you, you're not letting it out, and it's this gangousmous, this rumble, this r -r -r -r -r -r -r -r -r, and it becomes a grumble, grumble, grumble, then becomes a complaint.

It's grumbling against God ultimately. Do all things without grumbling or disputing.

Grumbling is taken so seriously in the scriptures. And again, let me take you quickly through, just This is an exodus, a fast trip through exodus after their redemption from Egypt.

And then we'll talk about a couple of specific things with grumbling, because I want you to see, as I said at the beginning,

God's view of this. I want us to see it through His eyes. In Exodus 15, we have this song of Moses, and later

Miriam and the ladies of Israel join in this song as a song of glory to God, of thanks to God, because what had just happened, the

Red Sea had just closed in on the pursuing Egyptians. And these Egyptians who you now see, you shall not see again.

And so on the safe side of the Red Sea, they sing this wonderful song of praise to God and thanking

Him for what He did to the Egyptian pursuers, that great army of the day, in rescuing

His people. Isn't that a glorious moment? Half of Exodus 15 is that song.

And what happens in the second half of Exodus 15? What do they do?

Grumble and complain. They grumble and they say, did you bring us here just to starve us to death, to watch our livestock and our children die?

They grumble and they complain. What happens in Exodus chapter 16? They're hungry from eating, they grumble and complain.

What happens in chapter 17 of Exodus? More grumbling, more complaining. How quickly we forget the joy that we have in the

Lord when He first opened our eyes to Jesus Christ. It's like Israel's fear and trembling.

You know, when they feared and trembled at the foot of Sinai, and I spoke about this moment,

I know it's something I forgot to say, so I'm picking it up again. I'm sorry to get a little out of order. Stay with me, please.

They let their fear and trembling slip to what I was saying before, into just awe and reverence.

Hey, isn't that awesome? What? Oh, that cloud up there, yeah, that's an awesome God, isn't it? We should revere

Him. Yeah, let's revere Him. How are we going to revere Him, having lost our fear and trembling, no longer afraid of this

God who's appearing? Well, let's make a God. Hey, Aaron, what do you say we toss in all those earrings and all this jewelry that we stole from Egypt, or we plundered

Egypt with, not stole, God gave it to them? And out comes this calf. And so also, with the grumbling, how quickly we devolve into it.

So they're saved, and they immediately fall back into these old ways, this grumble, complain.

Let us see God's view of it. Now you can turn to Numbers chapter 12. This is very important.

Numbers chapter 12. And again, we have to go through it very quickly. Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the

Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman. And they said, has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses?

Has He not spoken through us also? And the Lord heard it. Let's just stop for a second.

We're not going to take this apart, this one statement I'm going to make right now, because we'll never come back to it, but it was perfectly fine for Moses to marry a

Cushite. There's no racial barriers in the Gospel. The issue is only was she a believer in Yahweh, not what stock she came from.

But setting that aside for a moment, and going very quickly through this, the Lord says, you three come out,

Moses, Aaron, Miriam. So Moses, the one they're complaining about, and Aaron and Miriam, the two grumblers.

And He sets them aside. Then He says, Moses, you get out of the way. And He deals with Miriam and Aaron.

Let's see how God looks at the grumbling. Paul says, do all things without grumbling and complaining.

God working in you to will and to do for His good pleasure. This is definitely not His good pleasure, this grumbling.

Look at verse 10, please. And when the cloud removed from over the tent, behold,

Miriam was leprous like snow. If you read in the book of Leviticus, you will see that more detail is given to analyzing and curing and dealing with leprosy than almost anything else in that whole book.

Leprosy was the most feared disease in the ancient Near East, and still to this day, incurable.

My idea of leprosy, and I think the Scripture would bear this out, otherwise I wouldn't say it. My idea is that leprosy is the most clear example of the sheer ugliness of sin.

By one man came sin, and death through sin, says the apostle Paul. Sin is so ugly that it can only be best personified, sort of a living parable of how awful it really is that leprosy is its sign, its picture.

And here Miriam, the grumbler, is given leprosy. That's how

God sees it. Now what was the problem here? Saying really

Moses is not the one through whom God spoke. That God is not really working through Moses.

It was against the leadership there. Despite all the miracles, despite the redemption from Egypt.

Turn over to chapter 14 of that same book. Verse 2,

And all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said, Would that we had died in the land of Egypt.

Let's stop there. Grumbling again. But let's see how God sees the grumbling. What is God's view of it?

What must be our view of it if we have the mind of Christ? Look at verse 9. Only do not rebel against the

Lord, and do not fear the people of the land, for they are bread for us. Do not rebel against the

Lord. What is grumbling? How does God see it? It's rebellion against Him.

It's saying that God has not worked. God has not done enough. It's saying I'm just dissatisfied.

This is gangousmos, this rumble coming up from within. This gangousmos, gangousmos, gangousmos.

It becomes this rumble, rumble, rumble, rumble. This stirring of the spirit has got to come out somehow.

We need to quench it. You need to be able to stop it. What they're saying is

God hadn't worked through Moses. It was against the leadership. Moses had been directly named by God as the leader of Israel.

In a special way that is not really replicable, Moses was their leader. And this applies to the

New Testament church, to your leaders, to myself, and to Pastor Owens. And it applies in almost a direct way.

If God raised up Moses by direct revelation, which He did, how are pastors raised up?

According to God's word in the scripture. I don't raise myself up. And God didn't speak to me directly as He did to Moses to raise me up.

But the scripture which God gave us says here's how the church does it. A man is qualified and a church raises him up.

A church votes. A church has him serve at their indulgence. But once there and according to God's word, it's

God's man. And this is why there's extra protections for grumbling against leaders. I don't mean to set myself or Pastor Owens apart.

But 1 Timothy chapter 5 addresses this. And it gives us some extra protection here against the grumbling.

What does it say? It says that we're worthy of double honor. That doesn't mean we're better than anybody else.

It says that you must come with an accusation with two or three witnesses. You must be extra careful. Why is that? Because like Moses, a leader raised up, one doing public ministry of the word, is extra vulnerable.

Not extra holy. Not extra sanctified. Not extra unable to be approached with error because we're all going to make errors including

Pastor Owens and myself. Just extra careful. Because we've been raised up in accordance with God's word.

There's a great protection against grumbling. And there's a great protection for you that you just can't come in here and start throwing around accusations.

In any case, Jesus Christ does give us the way to handle these things, does he not? He says, go to your brother and show him his fault, just the two of you.

We have plenty of faults. The only point here is that God gives extra protection to those who are in public ministry because we're extra vulnerable to accusations that everyone else isn't in that same way vulnerable to.

It's grumbling. It's complaining that it's this infection that can come into the church. I want to just give you one more example.

If you look at John chapter 6. Verse 41.

I want you to notice this. So the Jews grumbled about him, about Jesus Christ because he said,

I am the bread that came down from heaven. What had just happened is he had just fed the 5 ,000 people.

He had just miraculously multiplied the bread and the fish, the few loaves and the few fish, and fed all those people.

And he had this whole teaching that he's given them, that he's the bread of life that came down from heaven. He says,

I am that bread of life. And they grumbled about him, the Jews, Israel. Grumbled about him.

Same as back in Numbers. The same as back in Exodus. Israel grumbling about Jesus Christ.

And what does it mean to grumble about him? What did it mean to grumble about Moses? What does it mean to grumble about your pastor?

What does it mean to grumble about your pastor saying God is not speaking through this one? For Moses, directly. For Jesus Christ as the word of God.

For your pastors as credible, valid, accurate purveyors of that word that we have before us.

What they're saying is God is not working through him. They're judging him by human standards.

That's verse 41. The Jews grumbled about him. And many left him. Let's go quickly through this.

Many left him. Many disciples said we can no longer walk with this man. We're not going to eat his flesh. We're not going to drink his blood.

We don't understand this. It's too much. And, more importantly, this is not God working through him.

It can't be. So they left him. After verse 66.

After this, many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, Can we put a prayer in there?

The Israel of God. Those who were going to preach the word after Jesus Christ ascension back to the father.

After his death and burial and resurrection. He said to the twelve, Do you want to go away as well?

Simon Peter answered him. Answered on behalf of all of them. Lord, to whom shall we go?

You have the words of eternal life. And we have believed and come to know that you are the Holy One of God.

There's the answer. What's the answer to our grumbling? How do we get rid of it?

It's Jesus Christ. It's looking to him. It's knowing that he is the one who has founded the church.

It is he is the one who has given us this word. And as that word is being proclaimed to you. As accurately and as clearly as we can.

No cause for grumbling. Grumbling is just that thing that wells up from within. And ultimately goes to others.

And it affects the church in this way that alarmed the apostle Paul. In this church that he calls my beloved.

And he's saying, but you have to stop the grumbling and complaining. You must fear and tremble to not stop it.

Because this is how God sees it. Do you have a complaint?

There's a difference between complaints and suggestions. There's a difference between grumbling.

And going to someone and asking him and showing him his error. There's a difference between talking to others.

And saying, didn't pastor mess up here? Wasn't that hymn this wrong way? Why do we have to sing the amens?

Why don't we sing the amens? And going to someone and saying, say, why don't we do this? Do you see?

Jesus says, go to your brother, just the two of you. Very quickly. I've had to really work on this.

I've really been challenged on this. The idea of going to your brother, just the two of you. Does it have to be the big thing? Does it have to be the terrible sin for which you will ultimately be thrown out of the church?

And if it's not one of those, then we're not going to address it. No, it's part of the normal course of events.

Going to your brother. And that's the great prevention that Christ gives us. That will stop the grumbling. Because you have an avenue.

You have a word of God that shows you what your standards are. You have the mind of Christ. Philippians 2, 5.

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus. So there's no need for grumbling.

There's no need for complaining. There's no need for rumors. That virus that's going to spread faster than anything, the alcohol wipes can get rid of.

Which we have available and we'll talk about at the end. There's no need for it. Because we have a word of God that sets the standard.

We're all sinners together. We need each other. All in our various functions.

And Jesus Christ gives you the way. Here's the standard. That's your scripture. And here's the way to bring forth your concerns, which is not grumbling.

Here's the way to bring forth your questions, which is not disputing and looking for a fight. Here's the way to humbly approach with fear and trembling because of God who is in you.

That's what this is about here. How they got this way, we don't know. Perhaps we'll be able to sort it out as we continue going through this book.

Holding fast to the word of life. Holding on to Jesus the way Jesus didn't hold on to his prerogatives in heaven.

Holding fast to Jesus Christ who is the word of life. And that's what we've been saying. And we need to finish.

I've gone longer than I'd hoped this morning. Verse 17,

Your faith is a sacrificial offering. This is Romans 12.

Therefore, present yourselves as a living sacrifice, which is your spiritual duty.

Your reasonable duty, as the Dutch Reformed used to say. Your life is a living sacrifice to God.

Your life is an acceptable sacrifice to God. In Romans 12 too, that's what he says. Holy and acceptable to God.

In chapter 3 of this letter to the Philippians, we're going to come to this language again. Being holy and acceptable to God.

Your faith, your life, your manner of life, which is worthy of the gospel. Your not grumbling life.

As we come together and together grow in the Lord Jesus Christ. As God works in us. It's a sacrifice to God.

Paul's drink offering. Many opinions on what that means. But it really takes us back to Numbers chapter 6 and the drink offerings.

Which as I understand, just means it's all poured out. There's none that's left for you. It's all given to God. And Paul has given himself to God.

He's in prison. He expects to be executed. He wants him to obey even when he's gone. Even if he comes to them again while he's in prison.

Continue to obey. He's a drink offering being poured out upon the sacrificial offering of your faith.

Your faith is that offering. Jesus Christ is the one who makes your offering worthwhile.

Without blemish is our ethical, our world view manners. As we live in this world.

And this is what it means to grow more and more in the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's Jesus Christ who makes this offering good to God.

Acceptable to God. Holy and acceptable to God. The words pile up. Paul being poured out on the offering of our faith.

And he says rejoice. He says rejoice in this. Rejoice that you have a faith that is acceptable to God.

Rejoice that you are a sacrifice. That your life is a living sacrifice to God. The psalmist says.

The Lord is God. And he has made his light to shine upon us. Bind the festal sacrifice with cords up to the horns of the altar.

The image of the sacrificial animal coming into the temple. To be sacrificed for their sin.

And here your faith. Purified and made right. By the Lord Jesus Christ.

By faith in him. Made acceptable to God. So the apostle

Paul. With some alarm tells the church. To look to themselves.

Be sure it is God who is working in you. To will and to work for his good pleasure. Be sure yourself.

That you want God's good pleasure. That this is your desire. That this is where you are going. This is where God is bringing you.

Because that is the sign that God is in you. And if not. If you look at the scripture. If you kind of shrug your shoulders.

Or pick and choose from amongst it. Which you will obey. Which one works for you. That is not

God working in you. Beware. Beware and do not leave this place without considering very carefully.

That you need to repent. And you need to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. And ask him for faith to believe and repent.

And seek his forgiveness. You are a sacrificial offering to God.

Your faith is an offering to God that is acceptable to him. We become without blemish as we follow the word of God.

Live in a manner worthy of this gospel. And know that it is

God working in you. As you will and work for his good pleasure. I hope you have understood what fear and trembling is this day.

How insidious grumbling can be. And how easily it wells up from within. And see

God's view of it. And let us be a church that evermore together. Would work to will and to work for God's good pleasure.

And what he is working in us individually and all together. As we grow into the image of Christ Jesus our

Lord. Amen. Heavenly Father we thank you for the day that you have given us once again. We pray that you would continue to watch over and protect us.

Give us grace Father to continue to meet as it would be your will. And Lord to hear from the spirit of God as we look to the word of God.