Mellish, Norman: Conformed To Christ ~ Phil 3

My wife told me that there were only going to be two verses, that's why I came up, uh, a little earlier. Uh, the book of Philippians, please, and chapter three. The book of Philippians and chapter three. I think I can- I came to Canada for the first time in about nineteen eighty or 1981, and I've been coming very frequently, uh, from that time onwards. And one of the first families I did get to know was the Tiessen family. Uh, I never like leaving home, I must confess. I love the work of God, but I hate being away from my wife and from my family. I wouldn't do it for any other master, I can assure you of that, and I just, uh, delight to be in the local assembly, uh, when I- I am at home and always have loved the local assembly. But the call of God is great, and though I never thought I was worthy or fit for it, nevertheless, here's where we are, and, uh, I say it's coming over to these parts, certainly in those days, uh, we did feel that we needed to be away for at least a- a couple of months, and to leave my wife and family for that period of time, uh, was a dreadful thing. And, uh, in those days, such was the cost of a telephone that maybe we could only speak to each other maybe two or three times a week. At home, my wife speaks to me every night. Uh, in fact, nowadays she speaks to me two or three times a day just to keep me going i- if I'm away from her. But, uh, at least we do s- we did, we did, uh, start to speak with one another every night, because when you've got nine children, you want to know how things have been and how things are going, and just to, uh, take a little interest in them. And I'm very thankful for Paul's mum and dad. They were a tremendous help to me on my first visit, very homesick, and they looked after me very, very well and showed me great care. I wasn't staying with them, but they took me to their home virtually every day, uh, just to take a little bit of interest, and we've always taken an interest in Paul and the work that he does out in, uh, in Mexico. And, uh, as far as another couple are concerned, we did have the pleasure of marrying them before they went out to Mexico. And the lady that he mentioned from Ballykeel, we've known him since he was just a wee boy, and let me tell you, we were very, very thankful to hear that he'd also an ex- an ex- an exercise to go out to Mexico. And that laddie, from the time he got saved, you would have seen him on the streets of Kilkeel every Saturday, just standing, giving out tracts. No wonder they came to give out, I don't know where Paul is, he's around, always there. Um, you're in the dark, sir, but that's all right. Um, you're giving out tracts. He's always had a love for giving out tracts. I trust that God will bless him and preserve him and his new wife when he does get married as they come out there. Now, I've not got very long, but then that suits you fine. You don't have to listen to too much at the end of the day. You've done very, very well, and we appreciate that. Uh, we've had excellent ministry, and we trust that the few thoughts now from the end of the book of Philippians might just again encourage us as we go on our way. The book of Philippians, uh, chapter two and verse twenty, please. Philippians two and verse twenty, when it says, for our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body. I like Mr. Newbury, I think it is, I think it's his translation when he tells us our body of humiliation. A child of God, there's nothing vile about your body. God created the body. There might be many vi- vile acts that we do with the body, but there's nothing vile about your body. What you do with it is a vastly different thing, but it is a body of humiliation. Sadly, because since sin came in, the body is not what it's yet going to be, as this verse teaches us, when it says of the Lord Jesus, he shall change our body of humiliation that it may be fashioned like unto his, and the thought there again is his body of glory. And thank God the day is going to dawn when we're going to have a body like unto his, a body of glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself. Now we trust that God will bless his word to us. I find, child of God, that the book of Philippians and chapter three is probably one of the highest truths that we have in our Bible practically. We have been thinking of great truths earlier in the day in connection with the position that God has brought you to and has brought me to in connection with the church, which is his body. And thank God for the fact that you are called and chosen, and you are brought into that body and linked with our Lord Jesus, links that will be eternal. Uh, we could have spoken a little, uh, uh, not only of the present blessings that we do enjoy, but of the future blessings that we're going to enjoy in a day to come. But I thought, just as we come to the end of the meeting, I would like us just to take a look particularly at these last couple of verses, and I trust that there will be a stimulus to us. Uh, the chapter itself is very simple. Uh, we notice that, uh, verses one to eight of this chapter, they deal with Paul's past. And you'll notice that as far as his past is concerned, the apostle, uh, he's counting. His past, child of God, uh, was a past that would never give him salvation. His past might have meant much as far as Judaism was concerned, but his past would never have brought him, uh, to the Lord Jesus Christ, and it would never have counted him righteous. And he tells us, as far as his past is concerned, uh, great though that past might have been in the eyes of men, he would tell us that these things, uh, what things were gains to me, he says in verse seven, those I counted loss for Christ. And what I'm very glad about is that the apostle, he goes on still to tell us here in verse eight, yea, doubtless I count all things for loss, for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. Child of God, what he did in the past, he's still doing in the present. And I tell you, it's a blessed thing for you and me, as we look back on what we were before we were saved, uh, just to thank God that, uh, we came to a knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Those things are of no value, whatever you were in the past, they should all be gone. The Apostle Paul has put them down in the depths of the sea here. The thought is that he has literally jettisoned them and cast them overboard. One writer I noticed some time ago, he he said, and a sign was put up, no fishing. You don't go to try and get them back and to reestablish what you were before you were saved. What you were before you were saved, child of God, has all been dealt with, and it should be finished with. And I'm very glad that the Apostle Paul here, when he looks at his past, he says, I count all things but loss, and he's prepared, uh, to see them as jettisoned, child of God. And again, he- he counts them in verse eight just as dung. What might have been great as far as the eyes of man was concerned, Paul realizes they're of no value as far as eternity is concerned, and he's not only prepared to count them but loss and jettison them into the sea, but he looks at them as being awful, a- a- a- an awesome smell that might have arisen to his nostrils. My wife's got a good smell, let me tell you. And when we're in the car often enough, and we might be passing a field, she'll suddenly start to hold her nose, and she'll start, I can't smell a thing. In fact, I don't mind a farmyard smell. But child of God, I tell you, don't ever seek to find any value or any good in those things that marked you before you were saved. They couldn't save you. They'll never bless you o- on your spiritual experience here. There's only one thing that'll bless you, and there's only one thing that'll maintain you. And Paul brings that before us in verses nine down to verse sixteen. I- if verses one to eight has to do with his past and his counting, in verses nine uh, to sixteen we have Paul's present. And in the present child of God, he's pressing. He tells me very clearly in verse fourteen, I press toward the mark, toward the, toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ. What is that high calling, child of God? Well, that high calling is seen in verses nine to eleven particularly, when the apostle would turn round and tell us that all I want to do is to be found in him, not having my own righteousness. I thought I'd got that in the past, but I've got rid of that now. I- I- I don't want to have my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Jesus Christ, the righteousness which is of God, uh, by faith. And all he wanted was to see a life that was moving for the honor and glory of God as he moved in the righteousness that God had imparted the day that he got saved. But then you'll notice in verse ten, there are things that Paul wants to know. He says, I want to know him. I want to know him. And all that Paul wanted was to get to know the person of the Lord Jesus. Here's his present. Whatever the past might have meant, child of God, was nothing to him now. He just wants to get to know the lovely person of God's beloved Son. I tell you, what an ambition, what a desire, that Christ might be everything to us, for that's all that Paul wants here. I notice, please, that he begins with a man on the throne. That's how he came to be associated with the Lord. For the Apostle Paul didn't know the Lord Jesus, of course, uh, when he was in the flesh. He only got to know the Christ of God when the Lord Jesus was on the throne, and so he says, that I might know him. But I also want to know, uh, the power that put the Lord Jesus there. Here's the book of Ephesians that we were talking about this morning. When God wants you to know something of the power that put the Lord Jesus upon the throne, called here the power of his resurrection. And the book of Ephesians chapter one, Paul is praying, and he's praying that the saints of God would know something of the exceeding greatness of his power to us, what that believe. Child of God, there's immense power for you today, if you'll only draw on it. And what is that power? Why, it's the power that took my blessed Lord out of the tomb. It's the power that raised the Lord Jesus, but it didn't leave him here upon the earth, did it? It's a power that took him far higher than rockets have ever gone, or satellites out into space. That's as far as man can go. Here's a power that took my blessed Lord through the realm of satanic powers and caused that blessed man to be made higher than all principalities, powers, might, and dominion, and set him at his own right hand, says God, you think of that power. But that's the power that's at your disposal. I better get my watch out because I haven't long. But all I want to tell you is I remember a dear sister saying to me many, many years ago, found in a compromising position, a- and I might say to my dear brother, uh, Tayson today, just tell the saints of God they needn't fail as far as life is concerned, morally or in any other way, child of God. There's a mighty power at your disposal to live for God, and all Paul wanted to was to know something of the man that's exalted to the throne, and he wanted to know something of the power that put that blessed man there. But says Paul, I also want to, uh, uh, I want to know something of the fellowship of his sufferings. He's moving from the throne to resurrection, onto the cross, as he says, to be conformable unto his death. What's he want to do? Can I suggest to you, he wants to be completely finished with self, this side of resurrection. He wants to so enter into the good of all that Christ is and all that Christ has done. He wants to be like Christ this side of resurrection. And that's why he goes on to say in the next verse, if by any means I might attain to the out resurrection, not to the resurrection. He knew, of course, uh, that if he died, uh, he would be amongst those saints that would be brought out of the tomb, but he's not living, uh, looking here at this moment of time for the coming of the Lord. He is living at this moment of time, child of God, that he might live a resurrected life this side of heaven, where sin was dealt with, where failure didn't come in, where Christ was everything. I tell you, that was his present. The highest truth, I believe, as far as practical living is concerned, here is seen in the book of Philippians. Now, Paul realized he'd not attained it, he tells us that. He realized he wasn't already perfect. There's no sinless perfection this side of heaven. But though child of God, perhaps and perchance, he had not yet reached the goal that was before him. He says, I'm pressing on to it. You know that word literally means I'm persecuting it. I- it's exactly the same word as you have a little earlier in the chapter, in verse six when it says concerning zeal, persecuting the church. What he was doing, he he was seeking to chase after the Christians, to bring them down, and to bring them to imprisonment. Ah, says Paul, I've got something far greater than that now. There's a goal before me. Conformity to Christ in all the fullness of his blessed person. It'll mean there's got to be a finishing of self. It'll mean again that I've got to know the power of his resurrection. I've got to have an out resurrection. I've got to live this side of heaven, as I'm going to live in a future day. I tell you, what a blessed thing, child of God. No, I've not attained it. The Lord laid his hand upon me to this end, but I've not yet fully grasped it, but I'm pressing on to it. And this is the desire of my heart, says the Apostle Paul. This is the prize of the high calling. I wonder if we've got zeal like Paul's, child of God. I wonder if we really long to be like the blessed man that saved us, and long to be conformed to his image as we ought to be even this side of heaven. I tell you, a blessed thing to be like God's beloved son. But when you come to the end of the chapter, and I'm looking at verses twenty and twenty one particularly, i- i- it's not Paul's past, i- it's not Paul's present, it's Paul's future. I- if in the past I count, and he's laying aside everything this world could give to him. I- if in the present, he's pressing on toward the mark. Nothing's going to deter him. He- he's going to seek to attain, uh, to sinless perfection here, even though he knows it cannot be reached as such. But when it comes to verses twenty to twenty one, says the apostle I Luke, you see there's a man coming, and when that man comes, he's going to do for me what I'm going- desiring to do now. And in these lovely verses, verses twenty to twenty one, four simple things are brought before us. First of all, he he brings before us in verse twenty uh our habitation. He he turns around and says, for our conversation. Now these theologians that we've been, uh, hearing from today, and that have been telling us they're not theologians, they'll tell you that the word there is really our politics. That's the idea behind it. He said, for our politics is in heaven. Now, why does Paul use that expression? Well, child of God, he's writing to the saints at Philippi. And Philippi was a little colony of Rome. And the whole of its, the structure of its life, and the habits of that na- of that people, and all that they did was based on what went on in Rome. And they were a little colony of Rome. Ah, says Paul, you're a colony of heaven. That's where your politics are. If their politics were all found in Rome, your politics are in heaven. You're not an earthly people now, child of God. You don't follow the politics of this world. You follow the politics of heaven. So that's our habitation. We're citizens of heaven today, and thank God here in Vancouver there are those that are citizens of heaven, and a blessed citizenship it is too, let me tell you. But look, there's not only the habitation, there's an expectation. For you see, the city of, of Philippi, it, it so ordered its life that it was living in the expectation that at any time the emperor might come. He would go to visit these colonies, and that city didn't want to be taken in surprise when the emperor came, and everything was ordered and done in the light of a coming emperor. Oh, says the apostle, the Lord's coming. And if Col- if Philippi is looking for the emperor, he says, we're looking for the savior, the Lord Jesus. My wife shouts at me when I say the same things, you know. But I love to tell a story of a dear boy in Manchester many years ago, uh, giving a little exposition of this chapter or of these verses here, uh, just to the young folks, you know, and he turned round and said, it doesn't say waiting for the Lord Jesus, it says looking for him. He said, you can be waiting for a bus, but looking in a shop window. And child of God, you can be taken up with everything other than Christ. Is he coming? Do we live on the tiptoe of expectancy that he's coming? I tell you, I wouldn't like to be found in some condition or position, or even state of heart that wasn't consistent with meeting the Christ of God in the air. Oh, that we might live for the glory of that blessed man and Luke, in anticipation of the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. But, says the apostle, if we have a habitation, an expectation, when that expectation is fulfilled, there's going to be a transformation. And what he couldn't do, he says he's going to change this, our vile body, this body of humiliation, that which kept him from attaining what he really wanted, this side of heaven, thank God, is going to come. For the Lord is going to change our bodies. And here's where the failure is, isn't it? But for eternity, child of God, there's going to be a vast change, and we're going to have a body like his, body of glory. I'd love to spend time, but I'm going to close. But you just anticipate the day when your body is going to be checked. Oh, says Paul, what I can't do, he can do. But what's it going to take? Well, the last verse tells us that this conforming to the image of our Lord Jesus, the confirmation, he says, according to the working whereby he is able. There's another able for you. He's able, and thank God he's able. We began, began with it this afternoon, didn't we? We'll end with it tonight. He is able, and thank God he's able to do what we can't do. But child of God, it's that ability that's going to be needed. The ability to be able to subdue all things is that that's going to be needed to subdue me and make me what I ought to be. A young lady I took her wedding to in the United States on one occasion, she said to me, she said, whatever you do, please tell the Christians we're not perfect, but the Lord hasn't finished with us yet. Well, child of God, the day is dawn, will dawn when you are going to be perfect. But oh, to have this seal, to have this desire this side of heaven. Don't let anything stop you, will you? You want to be like Christ. Make this the object of your life. Press on toward it, child of God. We know we may not reach it this side of heaven, but the Lord's soon coming, and when he comes, thank God, the mighty power of God will make the transformation and we'll have a body like under his body of glory. Shall we pray? Our God, we just commit and commend, uh, this day to thee. We're thankful for the many saints that have gathered. We're thankful for the ministry that has been brought before us, and we're thankful again for the encouragements that we've heard. We do pray that thou remember all that has been done today, and pray that we might all be able to carry something home that will be a help and an encouragement to us. We're thankful that we've learned of the ability of God, and what a blessed thing that we have a God of great power, and we're thankful that that power is to us all that believe, and we do pray that we might be able to appreciate the movements of God toward us and his care for us. We're thankful again that we have heard, we have heard today of saints of God that oftentimes are hurt, and oftentimes they do feel the pressure of the way and the opposition that comes sometimes very unjustly. We would ask of thee that there might be an appreciation, again, of the movements of God, and pray that we might move in a way that will cause us to, in these circumstances, just to know the gracious hand of God in all that we do. And we ask again that thou remember all that has been brought before us in every way, and we pray again that the ministry might prove to be a help and an encouragement i- in the things of the Lord. Do bless the work in Mexico and other parts, and we ask again that thou just encourage thy children. We're thankful to know that precious souls are saved when people hear the gospel. We see our own day, and we see the total indifference that marks many, uh, they're not prepared to come under the sound of the gospel. We ask of thee, Lord, that thou overrule in these things, and pray that we might see a movement yet wrought of the Spirit of God, uh, that will see just a simple, clear preaching of the gospel, leading sinners to the Lord Jesus Christ. We do just commit all that has gone on in the day to thee, and pray thy blessing upon it. Remember thy children, give us a good night's rest, bring us up tomorrow in the will of God, that we might be able to glorify thee. And we pray again that this conference might continue to prove to be a help amongst the saints of God. We leave all in thy hand as we commend ourselves to thee in the precious name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.