Believers are called to live lives worthy of the gospel by emulating Christ's humility and selfless service, thereby fostering unity within the church. The sermon emphasizes that true Christian conduct stems from recognizing our equal standing in Christ and prioritizing the needs of others above our own, mirroring Jesus' example of emptying himself for humanity's salvation. This unity is essential for effectively promoting the gospel to a lost world, urging believers to set aside personal differences and selfish desires. Ultimately, by adopting Christ's humble attitude, believers can work out their salvation with joy and become shining lights in a perverse generation.
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We're inviting me to be a part of the eightieth annual conference here in Atlantic, Iowa. It's a privilege to be with you, to think that it began clear back in nineteen o six and has continued every year, say for six years, up until the present day. We are certainly privileged to be able to gather as believers and look at the Word together and learn what God would have us learn from His Word this weekend. What a tremendous time where saints from all over this area of the country can gather, can fellowship together in the Spirit, and can unite around the single purpose of loving our God and desiring to learn more of Him.
The format's a little dangerous where you put two preachers back to back. Boy, I wonder, you know, what would happen if we both got up and tended to preach the same sermon? It would be kind of difficult, wouldn't it? Reminds me of two of the country's best preachers. Aachenge and Barnhouse were two preachers of the previous generation, famous nationwide. And they went on a tour down the east coast and into the south preaching in a different church every night. And they preached back to back. One night Barnhouse would go first, the next night Aachenge would go first. And strangely, Barnhouse preached the same sermon every night in each of these churches as they went around the country.
Akenge preached a different sermon every night. Well, Akenge was getting a little frustrated because he kept hearing the same sermon every night for weeks. He was a brilliant man, and so he just memorized it straight through, nearly word for word. And he thought, I'm going to get him one of these nights. So on the last night of the tour, it was Akenge's turn to go first. And he said to himself, You just wait. I'm going to preach your sermon and then we'll see what you do. So he got up there first and he preached the sermon flawlessly.
Well, he had it memorized. He'd heard it so many times and it seemed as if it was well received. And he went and sat back down on the podium and kind of looked across to see. what Barnhouse was going to do. And he was expecting this great preacher to be somewhat flustered. But not at all. He just rose to the pulpit and preached a fabulous sermon entirely different than every other one he'd preached all these weeks. Well, Locking wasn't going to say anything first. He was just waiting till after the meeting to hear what Barnhouse was going to say. And he was frustrated that Barnhouse wasn't going to bring it up. And finally he said, breaking the silence, he said, well, what did you think of my sermon tonight? Barnhouse said, well, I think they liked it a lot.
But not nearly as much as they did last year when I preached it here. It's a dangerous thing to put two preachers up back to back. And I hope that you don't get too tired sitting in your seat there very long. But we trust that as the Word of God is open, that you will enjoy your time and say that it was time well spent and the time went quite quickly. I'm in the midst of an exposition of Paul's epistle to the Philippians. And last night we opened the epistle and you're somewhat of a disadvantage if you just arrived this morning and didn't begin the exposition with us.
Last night we looked at the concept of Paul's difficulty in prison facing what seemed to be quite likely execution, martyrdom for his faith. We learned near the end of chapter one of Philippians what our attitude ought to be as we face death, that we should look back and examine our lives and determine whether or not we have lived with a proper perspective, whether that we're so focused that we could say, I'm ready to go and meet God. Why? To die is gain. And whether we really are content to make every part of our experience now To live is Christ.
Not very long ago, before the fall of the Soviet Union, when the KGB was still controlling what people thought and did, a small underground church was disrupted in an evening service when two KGB officers burst in with their AK- forty-seven rifles pointed at the Christians. They yelled for everybody to get up against the wall. To the Christians, it appeared that they were about to be gunned down for their faith. Those Russian KGB officers said, We're going to kill any of you who stand for Christ.
If you're willing to renounce Christ this minute, run away and we'll let you go. And a few people. fearing for their lives, took the opportunity and ran out the door and into the forest, ran for their very lives. But far and away, the majority of the people continued to stand with their backs against the wall, trembling, waiting for the bullets to begin to fly. But strangely, the officers put down their guns, took off their overcoats, and announced that they too were believers. but didn't want to reveal that fact to anyone who might turn them in.
And so it was said it was necessary for them to scare away all the pretenders so that they could have genuine fellowship with those who were truly saved. I wonder how we would respond if we were faced with possible martyrdom. Would we stand up for Christ? Would we be willing? to say, to live is Christ to die of gain? As Paul calls the Philippians to glorify Christ in their bodies, he's frustrated because he's determined that there has been a bit of friction in their midst.
He doesn't want that to happen. Paul's greatest concern is that the good news of the gospel be preached clearly. He's made that his entire life. That's why he's in prison, is because he even caused riots in certain towns as he went around boldly preaching the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He wants the gospel to go out, and he's frustrated as he's heard. The two ladies in the church, chapter four, verse two, the audience and Tiki have some sort of squabble, and the church is beginning to separate into two factions, and he wishes that they would reunite with the one cause of seeing the gospel preached, that they would rally around the unity that they have in Christ, that they would take Christ's example of His willingness to be humble and serve and hold back their own selfishness and put the other person's needs above their own and allow the gospel.
to be preached freely. Why, Paul says, in his own experience, as he watches some preaching the gospel around the streets of Rome, preaching it with false motives. The motives of envy and strife, he says, look at me, I'm not worried about the motives so much as I am concerned for the truth of the gospel being preached. And I ask you, my brothers, my close friends in the faith, put aside your differences come together center around the preaching of the gospel we see much of a summary of the epistle in Philippians chapter one verse twenty seven and I'd ask your eyes to fall on that passage first Philippians chapter one verse twenty seven at first it seems to summarize the theology of the entire book he says only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ so that whether I come and see you, in other words, whether I'm released from prison, or remain absent, meaning that I am actually martyred for the faith, I may hear that you are standing firm in one spirit with one
mind striving together for the faith of the gospel in no way alarmed by your opponents. Now, when Paul preaches to them in this letter, in this manner, as one who is in chains for the gospel, as one who has led them to the Lord, as one who is so dear to them that they have been faithful in supporting him in his missionary work for all these years, there is a tremendous tug at their heart to please Paul. And yet he says, I wish that you would conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Do you notice the way in which he has worded this particular exhortation, that our Christian conduct must be commensurate with the gospel message?
Now, what does he mean by that? The manner in which we have been saved, that each of us has been saved by grace through faith, makes it impossible for any of us to boast. We are all one in Christ, standing before Him on equal ground. There's no slave nor free man any longer, no social distinction. There's neither male nor female, no gender distinction. There is neither rich nor poor, There is no distinction ethnically Jewish or Gentile. We are all one in Christ Jesus.
And he says, because of the unity that we have in our salvation, because of the manner in which we are saved, we must walk in a worthy manner of the gospel of Jesus Christ. There's a second way in which the gospel of Jesus Christ would affect our conduct. and that is the desire to promote it. It's impossible for us to act in disunity and to adequately promote the gospel. How can we be divided among ourselves and reach the community around us for Christ? This summer, I was called to a church in Minnesota that was struggling, was splitting, There was a doctrinal controversy and some interpersonal relationship controversies, and the church had broken into two factions, and they called and asked, would I come up and act as a mediator to try to help them resolve their differences?
Each side wanted to reconcile and come back together. And as I talked with them, the reason why each side wanted to reconcile was because the town was so small. They said, This town is predominantly Catholic. It has a couple of Protestant churches, but they're so liberal, they don't even preach the gospel any longer. We are the only evangelical witness in this town. We must reconcile. Why, when we preach the gospel in this town, we are the only ones telling of salvation in Jesus Christ alone by grace through faith. We must come together.
And as I conversed with both sides, strangely, although they both had the belief that they had to reconcile to this day, they have remained separate over minor doctrinal differences and over interpersonal conflicts. Isn't it amazing that in spite of the need to remain unified in order to have a single voice in the gospel of Christ, we as human beings and our own selfishness can prevent the gospel from coming through clearly. And so he says, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. This language is similar to how you would express a person to live according to the proper citizenship.
And when he speaks of coming to observe them, it's as if he's speaking as a military general coming to review the troops. And he says, when I come and see you, may I see that you are Standing firm as good soldiers in one spirit, with one mind, with one soul, with one psyche, together unified around the truth that you want to strive for the single purpose of promoting the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what unifies us. It's the desire to preach Christ. if we were preaching what color carpet to put in our assembly buildings we would be divided if we were to preach what temperature to place the thermostat in our assembly buildings we would be divided if we were to preach what kind of clothing to wear to the assembly meetings we would be divided if we were to preach what songbook to sing from as we come together we would be divided if we were to preach the manner in which we would worship God at these meetings.
We would be divided. But if we come together to preach the person of Jesus Christ and the gospel of how we are saved by grace through faith alone, we will strive together with one mind, with one soul, with one psyche for the cause of preaching Jesus Christ. And that's what Paul calls the Philippians to do. Now, when he comes and asks them to do this, He in a sense brings them to their shame because He reminds them of the person of Christ and what lengths He went to in order to save them. How He was willing to humble Himself and give of Himself to meet their needs.
How His desire was not to think of Himself, but to think of what our needs were at the time. And as He begins in chapter two, He says, If there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation in love, if there is any fellowship in the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose to preach Christ clearly. Now, in the Greek language, it has the possibility of asking a question in which the answer is obviously assumed.
And that's exactly how it's worded here. Yes, there is encouragement that comes to us in Christ. And how can we be divided when Christ is so encouraging to us? Each of us has Christ's encouragement. Is there any consolation in Christ's love? Yes, there is. Each of us has been infused with God's love. and in His love we can share stories and illustrations of how loving God has been to each of us on an individual basis. Similarly, there is fellowship in the Spirit. Each of us has been baptized with the same Spirit. Each of us reaches our God praying through the same Spirit.
Yes, there is unity in the Spirit. Yes, there is affection and compassion, and so Paul is a prisoner. cries out to them he says, Make my joy complete. Now how can we do that, brothers and sisters? Come from all over Iowa and Nebraska. We can make Paul's joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, intent in spirit, united in one spirit, intent on one purpose. Last night we were talking about how married couples seem to grow together through the years.
Why, after you've been married many years, it just seems as if you can read each other's thoughts. Why, my host and hostess last night were saying they can be in silence for quite a while, and one of them can give just one sentence out of an entire paragraph, the rest of which has remained unstated. And the spouse can immediately pick up the entire context about anything having been said and understand the complete conversation. Isn't that amazing how we grow together as the years pass? Why, it seems to me that older married couples even begin to look like each other as they get older. I don't know, staring at each other's face so often they just must melt into the same look.
Got this theory. It's true that way also with owners and their pets. It just seems like the longer someone has a particular dog or cat, the more they look like their pet. I'm not sure exactly how that works. It just seems that way. How when you spend quality time together and grow together, you begin to think alike. Isn't it wonderful that in Jesus Christ, as we have the mind of Christ, we are united in our thought processes? that we think the same thoughts because we are thinking Christ's thoughts. As we walk the way Jesus would have walked, as we keep in step with the Spirit, that our minds are saying, yes, this is exactly how we must accomplish it because this is how Jesus would have walked.
This is how the Spirit is leading us. We are united by being of the same mind. Similarly, We maintain the same love. We love the same person. We love the same person. Why I can travel around the country and meet new people that I have never seen before in my life. As we begin to compare notes, we find out we know the same person. We start laughing about good old Bob, and we say, yes, now any friend of Bob's is a friend of mine, and we start comparing stories, telling stories about what Bob is like, and we laugh. We don't even know each other, but we both know Bob, and consequently, we suddenly have an affinity together.
far more than just knowing Bob. We know our Savior Jesus Christ and have been baptized with His Spirit and are unified together in the person of Christ and consequently we have the same love for Jesus Christ and are filled with the same love that He gives us and we are unified by loving the same things. Have you noticed how quickly you can have fellowship with a believer because of the same love for the person of Jesus Christ? Similarly, we are united in spirit because we have the same Holy Spirit and we are intent on one purpose, that purpose of seeing Christ promoted to a lost and dying world.
Since we have the same enemy, Satan, we are united because we have the same goal of defeating Satan by the power of Jesus Christ, by preaching that Christ died for our sins and was resurrected to give us life. Consequently, Paul brings this theology to home and gives them some specific admonitions as to how they ought to live. He says in verse three, Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind, let each of you regard one another as more important than himself.
That's extremely difficult for us as human beings to do because we are built with a warp towards selfishness. From our father Adam, when he fell in the garden, to this day each of us is built with an inward selfishness. We're warped. Why, just last Sunday morning as we were getting ready to go to the morning meeting, my children had time to play. And my daughter and my youngest son were playing with a stuffed animal quite calmly and quietly and well-behaved in my daughter's room.
But it turned out that the particular stuffed animal in which they were playing belonged to my middle son. He didn't even know they were playing with it. He was happily playing with his own toys. But what happened the moment that he found out that they were playing with a toy that belonged to him personally? While I was off in another part of the room, but I heard the sparks flying. I came up and found out that the only problem was they were playing with a toy that belonged to him. They weren't harming it, and he didn't need it, but it was his toy, and they were playing with it, and that was enough to cause disunity in the home.
What is it about us? that such lovely children, and I don't think you could find any more lovely children than my three, would fight over such stupid things. I don't know. There's got to be something warped within us. Why, when I put all three of them across the back seat and try to drive any distance, it's amazing how quickly they can find disunity among themselves. Have you ever practiced that experiment, take your kids, put them across the back seat and find out how long they can get along together? They don't get along more than a few miles. And I'm sure that if you're like me, there have been times where you've turned around partially. You want to keep your eye on the road a little bit.
and told them, if that happens one more time, I am going to stop this car no matter where I am on this interstate, I am going to pull you out of this car and I don't care how many people see, I'm going to turn you over my knee in front of the entire interstate to see. It's because we're built with a warp of selfishness. We want what we want and we want it now. So we've got to adjust when we come to Christ. And we've got to let Christ fill us and control us so that we will be changed and can get along together and can have that singular mindset to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And so he says, Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind, let each of you regard one another as more important than himself. That means I must defer to you. I must prefer you in honor and love. I must prefer the color of carpeting that you prefer. I must prefer the placements of the windows in the building of the church where you want them to be. I must prefer your temperature at the thermostat.
I must prefer the kinds of clothing that you prefer to wear. I must prefer to see you worship God the way you prefer to worship God. I must put you first. And if I do, there will not be a disagreement. In fact, it'll be coming back to me. You'll be preferring me. And we'll be stumbling all over ourselves saying, no, no, you choose. No, no, you choose. And we'll find it is easy to get along with each other. This summer, I got a telephone call in the midst of a Bible study from a former student of mine who was heading toward an ugly divorce. And I turned the prayer part of the meeting over to...
the rest of the group and I went upstairs and I spent two hours on the phone talking to this young man as his wife was leaving him and filing for divorce. As he explained the problems that they were experiencing, I was so sad to hear that the kind of problems that they were having were the normal, everyday, average kind of problems that all of us as married couples have faced as we have adjusted to each other. Why the silly old things like which way the toilet paper roll comes off the roll, top or bottom? Why I could even tell them that sixty percent of the people in America have it come off the top and forty percent off the bottom unless you have a cat and then you do turn it a certain way.
Why, who squeezes the toothpaste tube from the bottom or the top? There are so many silly little things. Division of labor in the home, what belongs to the husband and what belongs to the wife. And unfortunately, they had allowed all these things to pile up to the point where they could no longer live with each other. How sad! How defeating! Look back and see how quickly we might divide if we lived in a selfish manner. How many things we could disagree about. And yet Paul says the solution is to have the mind of Christ.
He says in verse four, do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but for also the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus. And so he gives us the example of our Savior and how humble he was and how willing he was to meet our needs at his own expense. And in fact, as he explains this, we find the deepest central passage on the incarnation of Jesus Christ found anywhere in Scripture. He brings it up merely for illustrative purposes to say, act like Jesus would have acted.
that we learn the depths of the incarnation of God becoming man as we listen to what he said. Have this attitude in yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus, who although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant and being made in the likeness of men. And having been found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. If we have the attitude in which Jesus is willing to humble himself and give to meet our needs without any thought of return, then we will be unified in preaching the gospel of Christ.
He says that Jesus existed in the form of God. When the second person of the Trinity was in heaven prior to his coming to earth, it was obvious that he was God. Why, just to look at him, you'd immediately notice the glory of God. The angels worshipped the second person of the Trinity in heaven. But he did not regard this obvious equality, this outward manifestation of his deity, as a treasure that had to be grasped and held tightly and retained.
But he was willing to empty himself and take the form of a bond servant. He was willing to pour himself out and make it look as if he were a human. our God took on himself complete humanity so that his external manifestation did not look like a God but looks like a human being because he genuinely was completely human. He did not exchange his deity to become a man giving up his deity but he added to his deity humanity, so that he is both one hundred percent God and one hundred percent man at the same time.
Some theologians, as they look at this concept of emptying himself, wonder if he resigned his deity to become a man. We know that not to be true. He is our God. Some thought that he gave up some of his attributes, whether all of them are just the omnis. They thought that there was some way in which he relinquished his attributes. Again, none of us can give up any part of ourselves and remain human. Neither can our God relinquish what it is to be God and remain God. Yes, he still possessed all of his attributes. Now, did he give up?
the unrestricted use of His attributes, we do know as He lived on the earth, that He only did the Father's will, and the miracles that He performed were in tune with the Father's will. And we know that He submitted to the Father so that He would do nothing that the Father did not have planned for Him. We do know for certain that his obvious external manifestation or his appearance of God was veiled. His glory that was so obvious in heaven was held back so that when we behold that little baby in the manger, we see a human baby.
As he grows up the son of a carpenter and Joseph, we see a normal human being. As he comes to minister publicly, again we see a full functioning normal human being except for our sin nature that we have inherited from Adam. He doesn't have to be sinful as we are because Adam was not sinful prior to the fall. Jesus Christ can be completely sinless and completely human at the same time. He stripped himself of the insignia of majesty. He emptied himself of the outward manifestation of his deity for the use of his own benefit.
As the King James says here, he made himself of no reputation coming as a man. He emptied himself, taking the form of a bondservant, being made in the likeness of men, and being found in appearance of a man. He humbled himself. by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Why was he willing to do this for us? Because we needed him to do this for us. There was no way that we could save ourselves. We needed him to rescue us. We needed a savior. And he was willing to humble himself and die in our place.
If Christ was willing to do that, why are we unwilling to prefer one another in honor? We must learn to have the same attitude that Jesus had, to be filled with the same love that Jesus gives us, that agape love that is willing to sacrifice ourselves, to give to meet the other person's needs with no thought of how we will be benefited. just to give and give and give. As I teach my children from the Scripture, I read them stories from the Bible and then apply them to their lives. One of the more famous stories in our family is the story of Abraham and Lot as they're looking out across the land and deciding who will get to choose first the best land.
As you recall from that story, Abraham told Lot, you choose, and Lot selfishly chose what he considered to be the best. But we also know that Abraham did not lose out because God blessed him in the land that Abraham took. But we have taught our children to prefer each other in honor and let the other person choose first. Consequently, they're reminded often, year after year, don't be a lot. Be an Abraham. And that's code language for us to remind us of the story of allowing other people to go first. Well, that works fine until you try to cut up the cake. We have a tradition in our house where the birthday boy or girl gets to cut his own cake, regardless of how old they are.
And yeah, the young ones cut it kind of funny, but it's still a wonderful tradition. Well, you should see them cut cake for each other when there's very few pieces left. There's a tendency to want to cut one piece too big and the other piece is too small. And so again, we have a rule. that the person who cuts gets to cut however he wants and what other shape he wants, but he doesn't get to choose first. He can cut him in unequal sizes if he wishes, but he doesn't get to choose the first piece. And consequently, you should see how accurately cut each of those pieces are to make sure he gets as much as he possibly can.
just human nature. We must learn to prefer each other in honor. Some of us wonder, are we going to be trampled over if we give to each other first? Look at the example of Christ. In verses nine and ten and eleven, we learned that Jesus Christ's humbling of himself led to his exaltation. Verse nine, therefore also God highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name which is above every name, that now he has the highest title and office and rank and dignity in the universe.
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth that not just humanity but the angelic realm and the demonic realm every living creature will bow the knee before Jesus Christ this one who was humiliated beyond what normal humans would be expected to endure has now become king of the universe and every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father do you want to be exalted it shouldn't be our motive but God resists the proud God will humble those who are proud, and God will exalt the humble and the lowly.
In the kingdom of heaven, the last shall be first. So as Paul applies this to the Philippians, he says, Live out now what I have taught you. Be changed. He says, so then, my beloved, verse twelve, just as you've always obeyed, not in my presence only, but now much more in my absence. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. continue to live out your salvation, honoring and respecting your God, knowing that you have been saved by grace through faith alone. For it is God who is at work in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.
God is living in you, giving you both the desire and the ability to please him. Therefore, according to verse fourteen, you must do all things without grumbling. or disputing. Grumbling isn't allowed. My wife likes to speak in abbreviations. She picked that up as a teenager going through school and she uses it even now. She has an abbreviation for me every once in a while. It's called D-R-A. And she says, honey, you've got a D-R-A. That means a dirty, rotten attitude. In other words, my heart isn't where it ought to be. It's a nice little euphemism.
It helps. Not to have it come all the way out and say your attitude stinks. It's easier just to say, honey, you've got a DRA. But we must learn not to grumble or dispute because it is God who works within us. Because God is giving us both the ability and the desire to accomplish His purpose in our lives. May we then live what we have seen in this passage today. May we be of one spirit, one mind, as we seek to promote the person of Jesus Christ and his salvation. And according to verse fifteen then, may we prove ourselves to be blameless and innocent.
Children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among who you appear as lights in the world. holding fast the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may have caused to glory, because I did not run in vain, nor toil in vain. Heavenly Father, I would ask that we might be of one mind, one's purpose, one's soul. Father, there are brethren from all over this area of the country from all over Iowa and from Nebraska and perhaps from elsewhere. We would pray that we would come together not to compare small differences but to unite around the singular person that we all love, the person Jesus Christ.
May we unite around the desire to promote Jesus Christ and to preach the gospel to a lost and dying world. May we be willing to humble ourselves to have the attitude that Jesus Christ had, that we care only to promote Him. Have the attitude that Jesus had where He was willing to humble Himself and meet our needs at His own expense. We pray these things in the name of Jesus Christ. It's for His glory. Amen. Thank you, Ken.
We will be eating the noon-hour meal, eating dinner very soon. But first, I have just a couple of announcements. As I'm sure you all have noticed, there are quite a few books back there for sale. Pat Bennett has those for sale, and he will be selling them between meetings. And so go ahead and browse and... I'm sure Pat would be pleased to sell you something. We also have some videos that are going to be for sale, and Vernet Martin, could you stand up there, Vernet? Some of you over there can't see Vernet there, but anyway, he is videotaping these messages, and he will have videos for sale, and you can go back there and speak with Vernet, and he'll show you.
something to sign and say that you're interested in getting some videos. So, please be aware of that and audio tapes will be available as well. Oh, there we go. Sign-up sheet up here for audio tapes. Very good. Okay, so dinner is going to be served back there. As many of you know, we'll just line up over there and form two lines and you'll go through and get your dinner and