Church Unity - Philippians 2

A Christian, then you have to be circumcised, meaning that if you're not circumcised, then you're not a Christian. That's how they reverse logic that. And Paul comes in blazing hot in Galatians, who has so easily bewitched you, he calls them fools. That's a heavy thing for a pastor, more so, and in this case an apostle, to say to the churches of Galatia. So we don't know if it's the Judaizers or if it's just people within the church.

I'm taking a break, perhaps indefinitely from preaching on first Timothy, but we saw in First Timothy, chapter one, that the false teachers in the church were brought up through the ranks of the church. And Paul has to tell Timothy, who is the pastor that took over after Paul left, says, hey, finish the work, deal with it, call him into order, or kick him out, which happened to Alexander and Hymenaeus in verse 17. So there's a concern that because the Gospel is also being preached for selfish ambition and conceit, as we saw in chapter one, that maybe the. Maybe people are going to fall and follow these false leaders and these teachers, and that maybe people will be swept away. So there's concern about that.

So you can see the. What might have been at one point, what seemed like a very strong and cohesive unity to. Seems to be breaking apart and falling apart. And then Paul. Paul answers this, and his answer is first to look to Jesus.

And I think what I'd like to do is have you turn your eyes to chapter one. And I want you to look at verse, apologize I didn't notate the verse.

Start in verse 12. But I want you to know, brethren, that the things which happened to me have actually turned out for the furtherance of the Gospel, so that it has become evident to the whole palace guard and to the rest that my chains are in Christ. So Paul's not defeated by this. And then he even says, if you jump down to verse 19, for I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope, and that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death. So Paul's turning back, pointing back to Christ.

In this, Paul looks to Jesus the power of the gospel. I don't think we often think of Jesus as the power of the gospel. And I think this is really important to Identify. Because the problem here and in. In Philippians, what you see here is Jesus isn't.

Or, sorry, Jesus, Paul is not rebuking the Philippines. This is really important to note. This is more of an exhortation. So it's a mix of. Of encouragement with, hey, make sure you're on the right path here.

Make sure you're not. You're not veering. Because what, what's potentially happening here. What's potentially happening is there's. There's enough doubt, there's enough concern about the state of what's happening in the church that they're almost.

They're not there yet, which is why this isn't rebuke. They're almost at the point where they're not trusting God, where they're questioning God and saying, well, come on, if God. If you started this thing, what's happening? They're almost there, but they're not there. And that's really important to notice.

So this is not a rebuke. This is not like Galatians where they've already been fooled and deceived and they actually have to be sternly corrected back in. This is encouragement to them to say, hey, don't lose heart. This is a very encouraging letter when you read it. And so Paul's encouraging them and saying, a stern encouragement, but an encouragement nonetheless.

Look to Jesus. He is the power of the Gospel. In verse six of chapter one, you see him point that out, or being confident of this very thing, that he, Jesus, who has begun a good work in you, will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Or I should say the Father. Actually, that would be the Father in that verse.

So the power of the Gospel is not bound by man. That's what we had covered when we talked about this a while ago, that the power of the gospel is the one who did the saving work. The object of the gospel is the power of the gospel, and that's Jesus Christ. And so there is no need for fear or concern because Jesus, who started this work in the church, will see it through. Jesus isn't like us.

He's not fickle. He's not all over the place. And, well, I start one thing and then I don't finish it. What God sets forth, what he ordains, he sees through to completion, for his glory and for our good. Second thing is, Paul shows that Jesus is supreme, the supreme exemplifier.

I thought of Romans 11:36, where it talks about the riches and wisdom of God being of him through him and to him. And so one of the things here that's really important to understand is the work of the gospel, whether it be in your local church, whether it be outside the local church, to the, to the watching world is started by Jesus, is carried out by Jesus through us, and is completed for Jesus.

Another thing that Paul recognizes is the unstoppable, incorruptible nature of the gospel. The gospel is powerful, man. It's sharper than any two edged sword.

We cannot stop the gospel. The other thing that Paul addresses in chapter one, and we are still in review of this, is that the gospel, and I don't know if you've caught this in chapter one, the gospel wasn't being adulterated. We're not talking about another gospel because we already know how Paul handles that. He who preaches a different gospel is anathema, which means damned, cursed to hell specifically. So that's not what's happening here because we would see Paul correcting that.

So the problem here in the church wasn't that the gospel, the doctrine of the gospel was being adulterated or changed or altered in some, some way. It was at the motive, the heart of the people preaching the gospel was not coming from a place of reverence, of worship. So Paul addresses that and says, hey, yeah, they're preaching from wrong motive. But Christ is being preached. The gospel is still the gospel and it will do what it sets out to accomplish, which is either that will convict a soul or it'll condemn a soul.

So the message wasn't changed, just the heart behind the preacher delivering it, which is you could add a, perhaps a stern warning to those who are preaching the gospel. Make sure that your life is worthy of the, in conduct of the message that you preach. And we see that multiple times in scripture in the New Testament that you need to be consistent with the message that you preach because what does it tell the watching world, hey, you should be changed. But yeah, you know, me and my problems, yeah, I'm not dealing with that. Yeah, not a good representation of the all changing, completely powerful transformation that the gospel has in someone's life.

We want to be consistent, we want to represent Christ well. And then Christ was being preached which caused rejoicing. We saw that in verse 18. Paul rejoices. That might sound striking.

You're thinking, well these people don't really have good motives behind what they're doing. Why would you be rejoicing? Because Christ has preached.

I already mentioned the word is sharper than a two edged sword and it will not return void. That's a reference back to Isaiah 55:11 so that's all by way of review. We're going to jump into Philippians 2, 17 and we're going to talk about how that applies, how that context applies, because it does. In verse chapter one we see the connector word of therefore. So that background is important in order for us to understand where we're going moving forward.

We Before I read the passage, we're going to go ahead and pray and then we'll jump right in. Heavenly Father, we come before you thankful for the opportunity to be able to open up your word. This is not something that was always available to Christians throughout church history. And so we don't want to make light of the fact that not only do we have copies of the Bible right here in the room, we have them digitally and without probably the ability to number them.

That being said, Lord, we want to approach your Word with reverence. We want to approach your word with humility. We don't want to come to your word telling you what you should tell us, but rather have open hearts and open hands and say, Lord, what is it you want us to know and what do you want us to get from this?

Lord, help me with my focus and a lot of pressure and felt a lot of pressure from how to introduce this. And you know, Lord, I trust that you'll use that as you'll see fit, but help me to stay focused on this so that the clarity of the passage is brought to light and that your Word is put on display and not my own silliness. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. All right, Philippians 2:1:7 read along with me.

Therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the spirit, if any affection and mercy fulfill my joy by being like minded, having the same love, being of one accord of one mind, let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind. Let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but but also for the interest of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men.

We so we saw the problem that was happening in the church, the concern that the gospel and the ministry that that Christ set out to accomplish through his church was going to fail both in Philippi and the church Universal. Paul reassures them, hey, Jesus Christ the author and finisher of our faith will accomplish the work that he started. And that's going to happen through you. And it's going to even happen amidst people who don't have the right motives. And it's going to continue to grow because nothing can stop the Lord Jesus.

What he sets out to accomplish, he will see through. So then we get into chapter two and we start delving into unity. Now why do you think that that's being talked about? Why do you think there's even a need for mention of unity amongst the body of Christ? Do you see the division that's in chapter one?

There's already division of a separation between the people preaching the gospel for false motive and the people preaching it for right motive. Now I wasn't there in that time. I'm not going to sit here and say who was right on whether or not that person was actually saved or not. That's not my place to make that judgment call what scripture tells us is there. There was people preaching.

There were people preaching for wrong motive. That's clear. Were they Christians or not? I don't know. But the point of the matter is there is division.

There's now a faction happening. You say, why is then why is that important? When we represent Christ, we need to be unified in how we do that.

Christ is unified in purpose and in heart and in spirit with his Father. What did Jesus say? I have not come to do my own will, but that of my Father. So if we're going to be Christians, little Christ, which was the derogatory term coined for us, if we're going to be little Christ, we need to exemplify Christ. We need to live like Christ would, which is to say, Lord, not my will, but yours.

So unity is really important.

By application because I'm going to apply as we go even in our church. That's important, is it not? How can we faithfully serve one another? How can we faithfully love one another and help each other grow deeper in our walks? If we're struggling to love one another, if we're struggling to see others interests as we're going to see here in the passage as more important than our own, how are we going to actually do life together as Christians grow in the grace and knowledge of truth?

If we're sitting here having bickering arguments and debates, if we're sitting here elevating our ministry over the ministry of the other people in the church, that happens. And if it's okay for me to even say it, it happens here.

That's why I wanted to bring awareness to that is I kind of felt we need. We need to kind of be shocked into this because we can approach this passage. Go. Yeah. Amen, man.

Unity. Hey, let's go. Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. See you next week.

Oh, by the way, I didn't really care for how you guys didn't empty the trash can in that one office the other day.

Hmm. That's a small thing, by the way. I know of bigger things. I won't go there. We don't need to.

You get the point. How are you esteeming your brother and sister as more important than yourself? Hold that thought. We're gonna get there. But do you see the purpose of unity?

Do you see the importance of it? That if you don't have that, your roots are only going to go so deep? And when the storms of life hit our church, just like they were hitting the church at Philippi, they hit hard. One of their leaders is gone. That guts you.

Imagine.

Not great with examples off. You create your own example. Somehow we lose our pastor. However that is. That's in your head.

You decide that for yourself. What would that do to us? That would rock us, because that's somebody that God has raised up over us to lead us, to shepherd us, and we've come to love him and be ministered by him and grow under him. That rocks a church. That changes the dynamics of a church significantly.

Same for Philippians. For the Philippian church. So unity is really important. And if we're going to love the Lord, we're going to love his bride the way he says to. So let's look at that.

So we're going to talk about understanding Christ's ministry towards us. That's going to be the first point. The second point we're going to look at is Christ's ministry lived in us. And the third is Christ's ministry lived through us. And we'll go quickly through this as much as possible.

So, all right. Understanding Christ's ministry towards us. For ministry to flow from us, there must be Christ's ministry dwelling in us. I repeat that again. For ministry to flow from us, Christ's ministry must be dwelling in us.

How then do we take these ways in which Paul emphasizes Christ's ministry to us and then minister them to others in the church? Well, we first will look at what ministry looks like. There's a few components here. There's three components specifically, I want us to draw our attention to. Ministry as listed in this passage.

Specifically is conditional. It is real, and it is necessary. Allow me to show you verse 1. Therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if there is any comfort of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, any affection and mercy, then the call to action, fulfill my joy.

So there's conditionals there. What do those conditionals mean? It means, number one, that there must be a relationship with Christ. You cannot love and serve the brothers and sisters in your church if you do not have a right relationship with the Lord. Impossible.

How can you expect people. We say this oftentimes about the washing world. How can we expect the world to act like Christians when the Lord's never transformed their heart? They're dead in their trespasses and sins. They've been given over to their affections.

Well, that's true for people in the church, because, hate to break it to you, there's people that enter the church that are not Christians for various different reasons. We won't go into that today, but there's many different reasons why that happens. But make no mistake, for the ministry to actually happen, you must first have the most foundational part dealt with, that you have had your sins forgiven and you've placed your faith and trust in Jesus Christ and you've been transformed by the power of the Gospel. And then that leads to the second aspect, which is a continual, fully surrendered devotion and submission to Christ. And that means not just as your Savior.

There's arguments in theological circles of that Jesus can be your Savior but not be your Lord. That's false. Jesus is the master that bought you out of the slave market where the devil owned you. You were bought with a price. That's language we don't like.

That's language that in our culture is very uncomfortable to the idea that Jesus bought me and he owns me. Yes, like Romans says, you are a slave. Either a slave of sin or. Or you're a slave of righteousness. You might ask yourself the question, well, aren't I free in Christ?

You are free in Christ. You're free from the bond of sin and death, but you are a slave to Jesus Christ. We are not our own, so it's conditional. In order for ministry and unity to happen in the church, we must have a right relationship with the Lord. Secondly, it's real.

This might seem a little obvious to say, but it's important to notate that ministry is true to God's character as God carries it out. So this ministry isn't some intangible thing that we're striving for. God Himself does this ministry. He does it to us. So it is real.

And secondly, it must also be true of his people. If we are transformed and then conformed into the likeness of Christ, then we will reflect him. That's our job as image bearers, is to reflect Christ. So this ministry that we're about to look at here in the first few verses is true of God, therefore it must be true of us. And thirdly, it's necessary.

Obedience to Christ requires an act of obedience to the ministry God has called us into. We don't get to just walk into ministry in God's church and do it however we want. And I think oftentimes in our modern American independent. I'm even going to dog myself here, entrepreneurial way of thinking. We think that we can walk into the church of God and just say, God, this is how it's going to be done.

And that might sound like something that you would expect a Fundamental Baptist preacher to say, but, folks, it's true. I've had a lot of conversations with people from different backgrounds in the faith, by the way, some even within our own circles. And we walk into the church and we start laying down our demands instead of first asking God, what is it from your word that you've instructed us? This is your church. You built it.

You gave us the instruction manual long before I was born. What does your word teach us? What does your word say?

What should I be drawing out of this?

That isn't to say that there aren't like, obviously you can get in the discussion. Well, should you have a pulpit, you know, there's nuances into the discussion. But the main. The main point that I'm asking or the main thing that I'm driving towards is where are we starting? Are we starting with our own thoughts on our own head, or are we starting with the word of God?

And the ministry isn't just to a lost and dying world, but also to one another who are alive in Christ. I think oftentimes we think of ministry as we should and more so should as discipleship. And that is very much true. I'm not taking away from that at all. That emphasis needs to remain where it's at, but it also means to one another.

And I think sometimes we either try to. We do the teeter totter. You remember that on the playground at school, where it's one's up and the other's down and you go back and forth, and that's how we try to live our Christianity. It's like, well, discipleship and evangelism. But I don't really care about My brother, like, forget him.

He'll get over it. Oh, really? Is that how Jesus talks? Is that how he handles that? Or then we go the other way?

No. We need to care so much about our church. Forget the dying world. They'll figure it out. The Lord will deal with that.

Hmm. Maybe instead of us trying to create ultimatums, we should let the Lord instruct us on how to think about that. So it's conditional, it's real, and it's necessary. That's what this ministry is. And what does it look like from Christ to us?

Well, first of all, in verse one, we see the consolation in Christ. This word means to comfort, to exhort. It's a little bit of a mix of both. We see that in chapter one, but we also see it. I was thinking of another passage in Hebrews 4, 14, 16, where Jesus is our sympathetic high priest.

So in the pain and the suffering that the Philippian Church is going through, where they're realizing, oh, my goodness, I don't know what's happening. Lord, what are you doing? Jesus is sympathetic and compassionate. He consoles them.

Secondly, there's a comfort of love, that love exists from Jesus to us. Jesus isn't just saying, you get over it. You'll be fine. Don't you know, I'm sovereign, I'm in control. What are you even worrying about?

Jesus cares. You see that in verses six through eight of chapter one, where it says being confident of this very thing, that he who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Just as it is right for me to think this of you all. That's a really interesting phrase, something that deserves some attention. Because I have you in my heart, inasmuch as both in my chains, in the defense and confirmation of the Gospel, you are all partakers with me of grace.

The emphasis that I'm looking at there is the fact of Paul is saying that this is what is in his heart, this affection he has for his church. And that affection comes from the Lord. The Lord's affection is coming through Paul to the church. And that's really important to see the fellowship of the Spirit. The word.

Word in the Greek on this is partnership, contribution, communion, and distribution. You see this used in multiple different ways in different passages. For sake of time, I'm not going to go ahead and go through the list of the passages like I had planned to, but I wanted to show you how they're used in different ways throughout the Old and New Testament. But the idea here is now you might. You Might find that surprising, by the way, when you hear, oh, partnership and contribution.

Wait a minute, isn't this all the. Isn't the gospel the full work of Jesus Christ? Like I'm not contributing to that. That's not what we're talking about. We're not talking about the gospel here itself.

We're talking about the actual ministry towards one another, that we are vessels for noble purposes. We are ambassadors for Jesus Christ. This is the language that Paul uses quite a bit throughout the New Testament. In addition to that, he's the potter and we're the clay. So there is an idea of the idea that there's, yes, God's sovereignty, but also man's responsibility.

And that's what's being emphasized here in this idea of that fellowship with the Spirit, that the Lord is working in us and through us. And then affection and mercy, which is simply pity and sympathy. We saw that in verses 23 to 24. For I am hard pressed between the two, having a desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better. Nevertheless, to remain in the flesh is more needful for you.

So that's Paul's tug of war. I want to go be with the Lord. It's much better that way than to be here on this earth. But I need to be here for you, to spur you on and to encourage you. And again, I understand that that's Paul, but that you see the heart of the Lord in Paul.

Like Paul says, imitate me as I imitate Christ. So what we're seeing here, what does ministry look like, at least in this context here, with what's happening in the Philippian Church, that there's comfort, that the body of Christ is comforting one another, that there's genuine love for one another, that we care about each other, that there's fellowship and we're working together to accomplish the purposes that God would use us for in ministry, both towards each other within the walls of the church, but also outside of the walls of the church, to the lost and dying world and finally to have pity and sympathy, to actually care about people.

That's what Christ did for us.

So then Christ's ministry lived in and through us. Jesus ministry was lived in us. And that's what we're called to. So verse two, fulfill my joy by being like minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. That's the command is to fulfill Paul's joy, which I think you all understand by now, that if we're fulfilling Paul's joy, we're fulfilling the joy of The Lord, How do we do that?

How do you fulfill the joy? Yeah, that's great to say. Okay, great. I'm going to fulfill your joy. Paul.

Cool, Wonderful. Or the Philippian church should be saying that for us by application we'd be saying, great Lord, we're going to fulfill your joy. How? Being like minded. Unity.

What does that mean? It means to entertain, have a sentiment or opinion, disposed interest oneself set affection for same love which is agape love, affection or benevolence, being of one accord, co spirited, similar in sentiment, one mind. Same as the beginning of the list, by the way. So how are we seeking to understand the ministry God has given our brothers and sisters in Christ?

Unity is actually entertaining the ministry that God has given somebody else. It is having sentiment towards the ministry that God has given someone else. It is being disposed to want to help and to come alongside that person in ministry and help them succeed in that ministry. It's setting affection for the ministry that God has called others to. So when you have factions in the church, when you have division in the church, how are you in that moment thinking of other people's ministries?

Or are you really thinking about your own? And maybe yours isn't even a ministry. Maybe yours is just your own opinion that you need to lay at the foot of the cross. God didn't. I don't know if you've noticed this, but in scripture God didn't call us to have a book of opinions.

He called us to die, to self, to esteem. As we're going to see here in a minute, others higher than ourselves is more important than ourselves. So if unity is having our affection and having our posture, if you will, if you were to, if you were to visualize this and for those who are going to hear this on audio, you're not going to be able to see this, but imagine I'm facing my body one direction, maybe away from my brother in Christ. I've got my affections for my own things. I'm busy doing my own thing here.

I'm doing this, I'm doing that, flying here, having coffee there, whatever this, that, whatever that. But my posture is away from my brother. The idea of unity is that I'm going to turn and have a disposition and a posture towards my brother. How can I help? How can I?

What's going on in your life? What is the Lord calling you to? How can I come alongside and encourage and stir you up for good works? So how are we seeking to understand the ministry God has given your brother and sister in Christ before You can even think about unity and helping them and coming alongside them. You must first understand the ministry God's called them to.

How often do. Let me ask you the question. Let me make this a little more personal because I am preaching. I am very open to admit that I struggle with the application part, so I'm working on that. So let me ask you, by application, directly you in your seat, pick three people in the room.

If you need to turn around and look and see who's in the room, that's fine. Pick three people in the room and tell me, or tell yourself, what are their ministries that God has called them to? Can you clearly identify them? Be like, that's it, that's it, and that's it. If you can't do that, you are not having a posture of unity towards your brother and sister in Christ.

We are a body of Christ made up of multiple different members. If you don't know, if you do not know what the other member of the body is doing, how can you say you have unity? You must first understand it. How are we seeking to help fuel that ministry? So if you don't understand the ministry clearly, you can't fuel it, or if you do, you might feel it with the wrong thing, get an explosion.

And that's oftentimes what happens when there's disagreement in the church. Somebody thinks, well, this is what's most important, and this is the ministry that needs to happen. And this is the thing that needs to be agreed upon. And this is the opinion that we should have. Here, let me pour my fuel all over this.

And next thing you know, you have a catastrophic explosion in the church.

And the question to summarize that point would be, what are we willing to lay down for the sake of the furtherance of someone else's ministry? We don't think about that. I think oftentimes when we think of ministry, we think of the Lord's called me to this. So therefore, you must do this, this, this, and this for me so I can accomplish the ministry God's called me to. You understand that the first thing about personal ministry within the church is that you first seek out what God's doing in other people's lives and you seek to help them.

And then as everybody's doing that, we're all filling each other's cups.

There's a contrast here, by the way, in verse three, let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit. Now that's an interesting statement. Why would that be said? What was happening from the preachers that were Preaching the gospel with wrong motives. They were doing it for selfish ambition to puff themselves up.

They were doing it out of conceit. They wanted to make a name for themselves. And thirdly, I forgot to mention this earlier, they wanted to spite Paul. And so true humility and true unity looks like modesty towards one another. So we're not engulfed in selfish ambition which creates factions or conceit, which is just glorifying ourselves, but lowliness of mind, which is humiliation of mind.

It's often connected with long suffering. Again, for sake of time, I won't show you all the passages where they're connected, but it's really, it was really interesting to see and think of others as higher, more important than themselves. We're going to see that in just a minute. And then like mindedness, look not only to your own interest, but also the interests of others. Let's look at, let's jump down to verse five there, or excuse me, verse four.

Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also the interests of others. Actually, excuse me, I do want you to look at verse five. We'll come back to verse four shortly. Here, let this. Oh, hold on, sorry, I am still in verse 3.

Apologize, but in loneliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. I've. I've talked about this so much. If you've had conversations with me personally, I probably said this at some point to you. What does the passage teach?

Does it teach let each esteem others interest as equal to your own?

It does not. So what does it say? If you go around saying well, God gave me this ministry and God gave you this ministry and so therefore you should just deal with it. You're being unbiblical, you're not honoring the Lord. That's not the attitude that Christ has.

We'll see that in verse five. That's where I was thinking is let this mind be in you, which is also in Christ Jesus. Jesus. And we're going to get to this in a minute. Set aside glory to come redeem us and save us.

And as the example that he set. Likewise, we are to set aside our ministry, not discard it. I'm going to get to that in a minute. Set it aside for the sake of helping to helping others, edify them in their ministry, there's like mindedness. And this is where verse four came in.

Look not only to your own interest, but also to the interests of others. Let each of you look out not only for his own interest, but also for the interests of others. Oftentimes you expect a preacher to come up and say, see, your interests don't matter at all. You're a lowly worm and you don't matter. You should go care about everybody else and just get rid of your own ideas.

That is not what the passage teaches. What does the passage say? Let each of you not. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests. So there's a positive command there.

You are to look out for your own interests. What are those interests? The ministry that unifies the body of Christ, the ministry that. That displays the Gospel, the ministry that accomplishes what God has called us to do in his church and outside of his church. That's the ministry.

That's the interest. So you are to look out to that, but also for the interests of others. And we know how to do that because of the previous verse, where the previous verse says that you are to esteem their interest as higher than your own. The word higher is really important to look at, really important because the connotation or the. The way it's used is striking.

It's. There's three elements of this word. It means to think of, to count. And then there's an element of superiority. What do I mean by that again?

For sake of time won't go through all the verses. You can do this if you have a strong concordance. You can see all the verses, all of them, where it's all used. And the word is used the same way in all of these. Or excuse me, the same word is used in all three of these different formats.

In all these verses, it first means that you're thinking of somebody else to think higher, to esteem others better than themselves or think higher than himself. You are thinking of others. You're thinking of something outside of you. You're counting that cost as well. Of what does that look like?

There are verses that talked to the counting element. And then finally there's an element of even superiority. So there are verses that talked about. Well, in fact, actually, let's go ahead and go there. I think that would just be most helpful.

So to esteem. You would see. Well, for example.

Okay, here we go.

So, for example, the superiority aspect. Acts 14:12. And they call Barnabas, Jupiter and Paul Mercurius because he was the chief speaker. Chief speaker is the word higher that you see in verse 3, Acts 26:2 speaks of the thinking of. I think myself happy King Agrippa.

When Paul's talking to. To Agrippa.

We're going to see later and next week, Philippians 2:6, who being in the form of God. Thought it not robbery to be equal? God, same word. Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my lord. That's Philippians 3, 8, 1st Thessalonians 5, 13.

And to esteem them very highly all the same word here.

The point that I'm making here with this is the idea that truly seeing someone as esteeming them as higher than yourself requires that you see them as more important than yourself. That's the point of the text and I'm struggling to convey that today. But that is the point that you need to walk away with, that your brother should be seen as someone is more important than yourself. You're to think of their interests that way, you're to count their costs that way, and you're to see them as a superior. Because the way that's used in other texts is in titles such as governor or like I said, chief speaker.

And Jesus did that for us too. He, in a sense, He. He put our needs above his own, did he not? Jesus didn't have to die for our sins, but he chose to. He stepped away from.

From heaven and came down to earth, took on the form of man, humbled himself, as the Bible says, to be able to redeem us. And finally Jesus ministry lived through us, ministry out of us must give something to someone else's ministry that requires humility. I think oftentimes we think of humility as something that is just internal. While I was humble and you know, but no, humility is something that actually affects other people. Humility is something, is an act of worship to God and cooperation with his people.

You're putting yourself in a position where others can be elevated. Usually that's we're talking about God, but that's also true towards one another. It requires care and concern. One is thinking about another's ministry and one is doing alongside another person's ministry. So all that to be said, so what?

We had our speaker last week and he said at the lunch, he said, one thing I always try to do in my, in my messages is have a so what? And so I thought, you know what, I should probably learn from that because I struggle with my so what's and my messages. So maybe, if anything, this might be the better part of the message. So what? We want to be like Christ.

We want fidelity to the glory of the Gospel. And the way in which we do that is to have the same mind in Christ, which is what we see in verse 5. Let this mind be in you. What is this mind? What is that?

It's having unity, having love and comfort and fellowship with the spirit, of having affection and mercy for one another. It's esteeming others. Interest is more important than your own. The ministry. God's called your brother or sister too.

In the church, you come alongside and you do what you can to help encourage them. You do what you can to help them with their ministry. So it thrives and so so that people come to know Christ because of it. And as you're doing that for them, they'll be doing the same for you.

And as you're looking out for all the ministries in the church, that's how you'll have this mind which is also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of men.

Christ is unified with the Father. He has the same mind, same purpose.

And if we're going to say that we're followers of Christ, then our purpose should also align with his. And lastly, there's a little bit of a paradox. In a sense, it's a paradox of God becoming like man, as then we are then called to be more like Christ. That's kind of an interesting point to look at. Is God humbling himself to be to come in the form of man so he can save us and redeem us?

Because he doesn't have to do that. He's coming from glory. But then we're also humbling ourselves to become more like Christ. God's interest for himself is worship. It's being exalted above all creation.

Secondly, God humbled himself, took on the form of a servant. By the way, he's king. He doesn't have to. He's the sovereign. But he served us in such a way that put our best interest of redemption in front of Him.

Now, again, that was the purpose and the ordination of God. God planned that God, this is not something that God's just doing out of pity. This was part of his sovereign decree and sovereign plan that he would redeem a people, that he would always have a people for himself.

And that's actually my next point. Jesus did not abandon his interest. See the comparison here. Jesus didn't set aside all of his glory and say, well, I'm no longer God, so I can come down and save man. That's heresy.

He still maintained his purpose. He's still God on the throne. Make no mistake of that. He is still the sovereign.

Likewise, we are not being told to abandon the ministry that God's called us to those interests. But Jesus did exemplify stepping off of the throne, receiving all that worship in that setting which he still is receiving as God the Father, but as God the Son, the Son of man, stepping down to service so that we would likewise serve others with the same heart so we could actually be able to serve God. So likewise, we with the ministry we're given should know its rightful place where we can do the ministry God's called us to, but also seek out our brother and sister's ministry, help them in their ministry so that they can glorify God as well and the call to action My question I've got four questions for you today as we close. Where does your ministry align with this passage? And what I mean by that is, how are you doing with this?

Are you so let me just say it. Are you so self focused and self centered that all that matters is, well, this is what God's called me to do and you know, me, me, me. And you know, man, I wish someone would help me with my ministry again. There's nothing wrong with having attention and a focus on the ministry God's called you to. But how are you thinking about serving your brother and sister in Christ?

How are you thinking about coming alongside them to embolden them their ministry? So where does your ministry align in this passage? Secondly, how's your heart doing with the motives of your ministry? Are you doing it for selfish reasons? Well, I've got my ministry, you know, and let's just be real.

No one's ever going to say this out loud, but are we doing it to make ourselves look good? Are we doing it because we want to get something? I think of young men, for example, want leadership in the church. That's just a real thing. Are you preaching?

Are you discipling people so you get a name for yourself? I can tell you the answer right now is you should probably stop doing that. I mean, doing the ministry until you get your heart right.

How's your heart doing with motives in your ministry? What would Jesus expect you to change to give him unadulterated worship? When serving your church family, you understand that if you're not serving one another with love and with compassion and with care and edifying others is more important than yourself. You're actually destroying the church that God has given us. I'm speaking to myself too.

If all I'm doing is seeking my own interest and seeking my own good, I'm destroying the church that God built here. We're approaching 25 years this year. It'd be a really Sad thing if 25 was the last number. It doesn't have to be.

And how quickly will you shore up your ministry to God's people and sanctify your worship to God? We can sit here and say, oh, that's great. Yeah, I should probably align. Okay, yeah, maybe I need to check my heart, my motives. Maybe you're doing great on that, by the way.

Maybe you're doing fine. But if you're not and you want your worship to be pleasing, a pleasing sacrifice to the Lord, how quickly are you going to change? It's one thing to know that you need to change. It's a totally separate thing to actually put the work in. So how quickly are you going to be obedient to the Lord in that?

I appreciate you guys allowing me to preach today. Go ahead and pray and dismiss Heavenly Father. You know my heart and everything that was weighing on my heart and floating around in my head. And although I don't feel like this was a very good delivery of your. Of your word, what we know is that your word does not return void.

And if there's clarity brought here, you'll magnify that in each person's life as it needs to be magnified. I trust that you would help in that. I trust that we would understand, Lord, that you have given us a ministry individually, that we're called to whatever that looks like in the body of Christ, but you've also given everyone else a ministry, too. And your heart for us is to care about that other person's ministry, to set our own interests aside. And not that we're neglecting the ministry, but that we're edifying one another and we're spurring one another on to the finish line.

We're running the race. It's like encouraging one another as we're running side by side to the finish line. Help us do that well. Help us finish the race strong. May you be honored and glorified in that.

And then from that, may we be satisfied. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.