How to Not Waste Your Life
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Scripture Introduction:
deer fighting and lion attack
“I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord”. Philippians 4:2
The apostle Paul is concerned that his beloved church at Philippi could end up like these deer. They are a relatively healthy church. They are still giving to missions, still focused on the gospel, from all indications they aren’t caving to the Judaizers who have been spitting heresy in their region (though Paul warns here too). But the disunity bug has hit them and their starting to become infected with this virus. You’ve got two-ladies locking horns and a roaming lion seeking to devour them.
So much potential at Philippi. So many good things going for it. But the whole thing can come to a screeching halt if they forget the roaming lion and lock horns with one another. So how do you pray for such a congregation? How do you ask God to help them?
Read Text
You see the church at Philippi, just like any local church, is key to the advancement of the gospel. Not just in their own context but to the ends of the earth. The enemy is roaming about like a lion waiting to devour.
Sermon Introduction
So I’m going to let you in on the irony of my sermon prep this week. I think the text necessitates that the main point of the sermon be about being motivated by love so that we choose what is vital and don’t end up wasting our lives. The key here for our cultural moment is that we have a ton of choices. And there are so many different ways to preach this text. So I struggled with choice in a sermon about choice. But I’ll tell you why. I think this sermon is incredibly important and it’s important for two reasons.
First, is what I would call the Netflix effect. I understand that not all of you will have Netflix but maybe you’ve had a similar experience at the grocery store trying to buy cereal. On Netflix you have a choice between thousands of shows to watch. A majority of them are silly and not something which we would even consider watching. But there is plenty there and if you’ve got a couple hours and you want to watch a show you have plenty options to fill that slot. But what happens is you spend about 30 minutes scrolling through everything and then deciding on nothing. Here is why this matters—and why this happens.
Touch the pulpit from where you are. You can’t do it. Why? Because you are finite. You have a limited amount of time, and you know this. You also are limited by space. You can only do one thing at a time (even if you’re a mom and that one thing involves serious multi-tasking). Our technology has tried to convince us that we can do multiple things and be multiple places at once. But increased coffee sales would indicate otherwise. You are one person, with a finite amount of time, resources, etc. You can’t fix everything. You can’t do everything. And you know this. That’s why you stare at Netflix for 30 minutes because you know if you say yes to that documentary on underwater basket weaving you are saying no to that comedy about the sneezing pandas of Algeria.
So part of what I believe this text is doing is giving you ammo to be okay with being finite. With trusting God with your life and your being and your choices etc. And also crying out to us not to waste our lives. So it’s vitally important on an individual level.
But this text is also important on a church wide level. What I mean is that what Paul is doing in this text is connected to an underlying theme throughout this whole letter. As I mentioned earlier there is a bit of disunity going on at Philippi. We don’t know any details but it’s centered around these two ladies we read about in chapter 4. What Paul says here in his prayer is very much connected with them. We don’t know the details of their squabble but we don’t have to. We know that it is not some serious doctrinal error for one of them. Nor is this a matter of one of them living in outward sin and rebellion. Otherwise Paul’s admonishment would have been similar to what he said to the church at Corinth. What we have here are two ladies who are taking up arms on a non-essential.
Strange question for you...
If you desired to destroy a local church how would you go about doing it?
Here is how I would do it if I were you. You have to start by building relationships with everybody. Be a good friend to everyone. Then get yourself a Sunday School class or small group or something. And in this class start digging into the really tough topics. The key thing to do on step one is to begin focusing on minor things as if they are major things. Assume the gospel. Your goal here will be to get people’s eyes off the gospel and the kingdom of God and onto these “important issues”.
I would spend the first year or so building good relationships with a diverse number of people. My goal would be discovering what the church is most passionate about. During this time I will “become all things to all people” so as to destroy the whole lot. Their passions would become my passions. With such passion it shouldn’t be difficult to move into a leadership position, like teaching a Sunday school class.
Now you know that in any local church you try this out on there is going to be a few differences of opinion. You’ve got to start exploiting these differences. Lead people to view these different expressions as unfaithfulness instead of simply differences of opinion or personality. It doesn’t matter what side you take on these “important issues” so long as you can divide people on them.
With my new Sunday school class I will begin by digging into the really tough topics. We will lead our class through seeing what the Bible says about them. During this time I will focus on minor things as if they are major things. The gospel will be assumed. My goal will be to get people’s eyes off of the gospel and the kingdom of God and onto these “important issues”.
Just as in any church there will be natural differences of opinion within the body of Christ. I will devote my energy to exploiting these differences. In time I will lead people to view these different expressions as unfaithfulness instead of simply differences of opinion or personality.
Just as in any church there will be natural differences of opinion within the body of Christ. I will devote my energy to exploiting these differences. In time I will lead people to view these different expressions as unfaithfulness instead of simply differences of opinion or personality.
If you are successful people will begin falling into certain camps. At this point you have to take the super spiritual position and lament all the disunity in the church. At this point you take peoples eyes of Christ and start focusing on the problems at hand. You can even start prayer meetings and asking God to help with all the disunity, preach on disunity, work through creating unity. But through the whole thing you have to keep people’s eyes away from the character of God. You can’t allow people to view these trials as opportunities for growth. You have to make this a battle of good between evil.
And at this point you have one more thing to do and you’ll blow everything up. Donate a large amount of money anonymously and designate it. The only stipulation is that the money has to be used to advance the ministry of the church and it has to be used within the next two years. Because of all the “disunity” in the church every suggestion for using the money will be met with suspicion. Whenever people disagree on how to spend the money (as they likely will) they will be accused of “furthering disunity”. The church should split into several groups.
Because of all the “disunity” in the church every suggestion for using the money will be met with suspicion. Whenever people disagree on how to spend the money (as they likely will) they will be accused of “furthering disunity”. The church should split into several groups.
Hopefully, each faction will think themselves the godly ones. This means that anyone that opposes them are the ungodly ones. The decision has to be made on where to spend the money, and one group has to win this decision. But, regardless of the decision one group will consider it ungodly. Who wants to stay in an ungodly church anyways?
Paul doesn’t try to solve disunity by focusing on unity. He turns their eyes to Jesus. He doesn’t focus on the issue at hand between these two ladies but instead prays for them and gives them a much bigger vision than their petty squabbles. Paul tells them what he is praying for them for a reason. Do you ever wonder why he does this? Why not just say, “I’ve been praying for you”? No, he gets specific and says here is what I’m praying for you. You know what happens when somebody says this to you, don’t you. One, it tells you that they’ve actually been praying for you. Two, it gives you a laser-like focus. You start looking for the work of God in these areas. And it also causes you to learn. If somebody tells me they are praying for my patience I begin to wonder if there is something specific there that I need to look at. So Paul, in his prayer is also teaching. It’s real prayer. He’s not preach-praying. But his prayer for them helps us to see what he sees as vitally important for them. And if we want to be about advancing the gospel we’ll see that these are essential for us as well.
Paul lets them know the content of his prayer. Do you ever wonder why he does this? Why not just say, “I’ve been praying for you”? No, he gets specific and says here is what I’m praying for you. You know what happens when somebody says this to you, don’t you. One, it tells you that they’ve actually been praying for you. Two, it gives you a laser-like focus. You start looking for the work of God in these areas. And it also causes you to learn. If somebody tells me they are praying for my patience I begin to wonder if there is something specific there that I need to look at. So Paul, in his prayer is also teaching. It’s real prayer. He’s not preach-praying. But his prayer for them helps us to see what he sees as vitally important for them. And if we want to be about advancing the gospel we’ll see that these are essential for us as well.
Here is what Paul is doing in this passage.
Think of it this way. Imagine we gave everyone $10 as you entered into the building this morning and told you that you needed to use this to spread the gospel. Some folks might come up with some really creative ideas about how to spend their $10. But quickly you will realize that you are really limited with $10. Remember what I said earlier about being finite? Now some of you might come up with a really great plan and say, “Hey, if we pool all of our resources together we can probably accomplish even more.” But what happens when you pool your $10 with ten other people? It’s not that you now have $100 it’s that you have 1/10th of a piece of $100. But you’ve got skin in the game so it means you now care about how 9 other people spend their $10. And what if your ideas---morally indifferent ideas—differ? I don’t think this is how we ought to spend that $100!
This is what happens in churches. And it’s probably what is happening to Eudoia and Synthyce. Good people who desire a good thing but they’ve made a minor thing into the main thing and so they’re in danger of getting swallowed up by a lion.
So this passage speaks to both things—your individual lives and choices and saying “Don’t waste your life” and it’s also saying to us together as a church body “don’t get distracted and waste your lives corporately but be about the main thing for the sake of the gospel.” I want to show you from this text how that comes about.
First, where am I getting that this passage is about the “don’t waste your life” stuff. Look at verse 11. This text actually works backwards. The ultimate goal is in verse 11—God being praised and glorified through the Philippians. But how does that take place? It happens when the Philippians are pure and blameless or “sincere” and “without offense”. Two interesting words that are rare in the NT.
The word he uses for pure or sincere is one which means “without wax, without mixture”. The English word sincere comes from the world of pottery. Fine pottery was quite expensive and it would often crack when you put it in the kiln. Cracked pottery ought to be thrown away—but dishonest pottery salesmen would fill the cracks with a hard pearly wax that would blend in with the color of the pottery. You couldn’t tell unless you held it up to the sun. By holding the pottery up to the light you could tell if it had cracks in it. If a vase passed that test it was known as “sun-judged” or in Latin “sine cera” which is where we get our word sincere. So when Paul speaks of being pure he means being authentic.
Here is what Paul is doing in this passage. Look at the last part of verse 11. That is his ultimate goal. He wants God to be praised and glorified through these Philippians. That’s why we do missions. As it has been said missions exists because worship doesn’t. We share Jesus with people because we want to see others passionately worship Jesus. But Paul also draws the Philippians (and our) minds to that great day when Christ returns and we are standing before him. He uses some interesting words here in verse 10. Words that are rare in the NT which are translated here as “pure” and “blameless” or “sincere” and “without offense”.
Here is what Paul is doing in this passage. Look at the last part of verse 11. That is his ultimate goal. He wants God to be praised and glorified through these Philippians. That’s why we do missions. As it has been said missions exists because worship doesn’t. We share Jesus with people because we want to see others passionately worship Jesus. But Paul also draws the Philippians (and our) minds to that great day when Christ returns and we are standing before him. He uses some interesting words here in verse 10. Words that are rare in the NT which are translated here as “pure” and “blameless” or “sincere” and “without offense”.
The word he uses for pure or sincere is one which means “without wax, without mixture”. The English word sincere comes from the world of pottery. Fine pottery was quite expensive and it would often crack when you put it in the kiln. Cracked pottery ought to be thrown away—but dishonest pottery salesmen would fill the cracks with a hard pearly wax that would blend in with the color of the pottery. You couldn’t tell unless you held it up to the sun. By holding the pottery up to the light you could tell if it had cracks in it. If a vase passed that test it was known as “sun-judged” or in Latin “sine cera” which is where we get our word sincere. So when Paul speaks of being pure he means being authentic.
The word for blameless isn’t the typical word that Paul uses which is translated as blameless. This word means to be without offense. It means that people can’t throw accusations upon you and they stick. It’s akin to being above reproach. It means not being ashamed. It’s a bit like the parable of the talents. Jesus told the story of a man who gave a different number of talents to three different guys. The first two use them and multiply them and when the owner comes back they have something to show for it. But the third guy says, “I knew you were a cruel dude, so I buried it. Here it is”. Jesus said that this third guy was wicked. So Paul’s picture here is that we’re standing before God and we are filled with the fruit of righteousness. It is evident that we’ve been changed by Jesus. Our lives bear witness and we aren’t ashamed.
His goal for them is that they’ll have authentic and well-spent lives. That’s the goal. Not ashamed. Not filled with regret. But lives that please God. So how does that happen?
Ultimately we know that this comes from God. First, that’s evident in the fact that Paul prays for them first and foremost. Secondly, we see this in the text as he says, “filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ”. Notice that he doesn’t say “from” Jesus. This isn’t imputed righteousness. This is actual God-pleasing lives which flows out of our changed status and our changed hearts. The gospel really does change you. If it doesn’t—then we have to question whether you’ve really had an encounter with Jesus. You go out on I-49 and stand in front of a semi, it’s gonna change you. I can’t believe that we can say we have an encounter with the living God but it didn’t really do much. No he produces actual fruit and righteousness in our lives. But how? How do we end up living well-spent lives?
Well it happens by you approving what is vital and essential. Verse 10 is where you picture your Netflix library. Or better yet picture yourself with a stamp that says “essential” while a million choices start rolling through your life. You put the stamp of approval on what really matters and you don’t get distracted with stuff that doesn’t matter. But how does that happen? It happens when our love abounds more and more. And when it’s the type of love that is filled with knowledge and depth of insight. It’s a grounded love. I’d sum up Paul’s prayer this way: What does he pray for? “A growing love, grounded in truth, which focuses on the vital will give you an authentic well-spent life”.
T/S
What does it mean to “approve what is excellent”?
The word that Paul uses for approve is one that was often used to describe the testing of precious metals. You’d put a coin through the fire and whatever is impure is stripped off and what is left is pure. If something passes through the fire then it’s “approved” it’s an actually valuable coin. So the picture that Paul has here is of giving something your stamp of approval. And we do this many times every single day. Our day is filled with choices. When you pick one Netflix show over another you are “approving” what you deem to be excellent.
The word “excellent’ means that which is worth more. In Jesus says that we are of “more value than” the sparrows. Same word. So when something gets your approval you are saying this thing is of more value than this other thing. But what really is the most valuable?
I want you to see why this matters. This is the heart of what Paul is saying. You’ve only got one stamp. This isn’t trying to decide between sharing Jesus or burning your neighbor’s house down. This is trying to decide between good things. You are putting your stamp on the thing that is the absolute best and most valuable. When you put your stamp on this thing in this moment that means you are saying “no” to a whole host of other things. And so this is the heart of Paul’s prayer. He is saying that his prayer for them is that they’ll always pick the thing that really is the most valuable. But how do you determine that?
When you put your stamp on this thing
This is the heart of Paul’s prayer.
The most valuable thing is that which gives me the most money.
Look what he is doing in this prayer. I pray that your love would grow more and more. And that it’s the type of love that is a grounded in truth love. And I pray that this happens so that you’ll learn to approve what is vital…that love will referee and you’ll know what to give your lives for. And when that happens I know that you’ll be standing before Christ pure and blameless…you’ll be authentic and have a well spent-life that increasingly looked like Jesus. And this will glorify God. That’s my hope for you Philippi.
The most valuable thing is that which gives me the most pleasure.
Can you see what that would do to Eudoia and Synthche? Through the work of the Spirit they’d look at their petty squabbles and compare them to eternity. And they’d drop them and start focusing again on what matters. And so that’s what we want to ask today. We are a distracted people who are often in danger of wasting our lives. We need this prayer as well.
The most valuable thing is that which gives me the most comfort.
What does he pray for? I’d sum it up this way, “A growing love, grounded in truth, which focuses on the vital will give you an authentic well-spent life”.
The most valuable thing is that which gives me the most power.
The most valuable thing is that which feels right.
That’s in part what we see for today. Distracted. In danger of living lives which aren’t pure and blameless. So Paul prays for them. What does he pray? I’d sum it up this way, “A growing love, grounded in truth, which focuses on the vital will give you an authentic well-spent life”.
The most valuable thing is that which keeps people from yelling at me. What makes them happy.
The most valuable thing is that which glorifies God, please God, increases my joy in God—or your joy in God, or makes me more like Christ.
This is where both our misery, our anxieties, and our fights come from. This is what says: What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions[a] are at war within you?[b] 2 You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.
You put your stamp on a thing and your elbow was motivated out of these messed up desires…and you end up getting pot committed (that’s when you are so invested that you can’t really back out) and rather than backing out and cutting your loses and realize you stamped the wrong thing we try to change the thing we stamped into the most valuable. NO this relationship MUST be the most valuable. This idea I had MUST win the day! And so we fight and quarrel because our passions are at war within us. Can you see Eudoia and Synthyce? Eudoia: I’ve put my stamp on THIS idea…on this ministry…on this way of winning the world for Jesus. Synthyce: But I’ve put my stamp here! This is the way we need to go! E: No! This is the way! On and on…lion coming up over the hill.
So how can we break this cycle? How do we approve what is vital?
Notice the text. See the “so that”? It means that what you see in verse 10 comes from what happens in verse 9. Abounding love. Love is the referee. It moves the stamp. When love moves the stamp you can rest assured that it is always going to approve that which is most valuable. True love always picks the most vital.
But love for whom? Notice that Paul doesn’t mention who the object of the love is? Is this love for God? Love from God? Love for people? They are all connected. My love for God flows out of my love from God. And my love for others flows out of my love for God. I can’t have one without the other. And so when he says that their love may abound more and more he just means love—agape love.
C.S. Lewis in The Four Loves distinguishes eros, a kind of romantic love where the lovers are hungry for each other, and philos, friendship love where two people are linked arm in arm, shoulder to shoulder, with a common vision and a common goal and a delight and a partnership pulling together toward the goal, and storge, affection that one might have for an old sweater or slippers, an old dog that you just can’t let go of, and agape, divine love characterized by sacrifice in the pursuit of another person’s good.
It’s agape love here that Paul mentions. So this isn’t just some warm and mushy feeling. This is why we can’t just say, “Well I’m motivated by love—whatever that means—so whatever I do is going to be correct”. We know this is on the right path because of the manner of love that Paul speaks of. It’s with knowledge and discernment. It’s a grounded love. It is a love which is informed by our relationship with God. It’s a discerning love. What does that mean? It means the ability to know what really matters. Discernment isn’t just sniffing out what’s true—it’s being able to sniff out hope. Discernment is the ability to find a rose in a field of land-mines more so than the guy who can find a land-mine in a field of roses.
The Bible commentator Warren Weirsbe died last week. And I like the way he said this: “truth without love is brutality, and love without truth is hypocrisy”. So the type of love that is necessary is a love which flows out of our relationship with Christ. It’s like if your wife sends you into the store to get ice cream and she doesn’t tell you what kind. If you don’t know her very well you may very well come out with a flavor that you like, or just the one that felt right, or the cheapest one, or some other factor. But if you know your wife and she says go get some ice cream you know which kind she means. So also if you know Jesus then approving the excellent means picking what Jesus does.
That means that ultimately this is the work of God. It’s a process. And it’s one that is covered with grace. The last thing I want is for you to be crippled by fear and to stall out on decision making out of fear that you are going to shipwreck everything. That’s not what Paul’s prayer is meant to do. This is all in the context of a loving relationship with our sovereign King. He is working on our hearts and the more it changes the more we’ll approve the vital. As one commentator put it:
The first thing that we notice from Paul’s prayer is that he prays that their love might abound more and more. His prayer is that their love might be “abounding more and more”. The first question I want to ask is, “Love for whom?” Is my love supposed to be abounding more and more for people? Is my love supposed to be abounding more and more for God? Or is it a combination of both? I believe that Paul leaves the object of this love vague for a reason. It is what the entire Bible teaches. You cannot say you love God and not love people. And at the same time you cannot truly love people unless you have a deep love for God. It is as if Scripture is teaching that the two are intimately eternally linked. You love God—you love people. You love people—if you truly love them—then that is because you love God.
When God gives you a heart that loves others wisely, setting you free from grasping selfishness and grieving self-pity, what is really important begins to come into focus. With practice you develop a taste for the things that count, things that last. You learn to make choices that align your priorities with God’s wise purpose for you, and to exhibit Jesus’ wise love toward others.
I want to close by telling you the story of the Bible in regards to approving what is excellent. God created man and woman and placed them in a Garden. And he gave them a choice. Don’t eat of the fruit of this one particular tree. Now that seems a bit odd and a bit weird that the whole future of humanity would hinge upon fruit-picking. But there is much more at stake. They had lots of trees they could eat from. Lots of excellent trees. But only one that wasn’t. It’s like take a multiple choice test where a, b, c, d, through z is all correct except one letter. Just pick one of them and you’ll pass. They pick the one wrong one. Not out of stupidity but out of rebellion. Rather than approving what is excellent..putting their stamp on God’s choice they decided to place it on their choice. And since that moment on our choice has become far more complex. Our hearts became all messed up. So now we choose that which we shouldn’t. We love what we should hate and hate what we should love. And when we get some things right we get the order wrong. We get it right and love our kids but we love our kids for their own sake and not for the glory of God. We make idols of them. We say that they are what is vital and then we put all the weight of our identities upon them and it crushes them. Something other than love is controlling our elbows and we’re picking the wrong stuff—all the time. And apart from grace this will end in a wasted life.
But thankfully Jesus has and is redeeming this. He is fixing our elbows. Or better yet he is fixing our hearts. He is teaching us love. And love is changing everything. It’s causing us to once again begin approving what is excellent—picking the vital. He is restoring our value systems. And he is doing this by causing our love to abound more and more and to give us knowledge of himself so that we can say, “I want to pick what Jesus would pick, and I know what that is.”
So when we have lots of choices with what to do with our lives you can see redemption at work when we start thinking and caring about what Jesus would have us do and when we find ourselves actually doing it. We don’t have time but an interesting place to look would be (particularly verse 18) and see how Paul uses this word. There he speaks of the Jewish people who—because of the Law do know what would please God. And they hold others to that standard but they don’t actually do it themselves. They know God doesn’t want them to steal..but rather than actually living out approving what is excellent they steal themselves. The Spirit is doing such a work on our hearts that we are learning daily the heart of God and He is motivating in us to actually want to do what pleases God. You want to know how to make good choices—dig into God’s Word and pursue wisdom. Not hiding in bushes and discovering the mysterious will of God. No, it’s relationship. Knowing God. And you can do that principally through His Word and also through His people.
But also when you come to make decisions as a church body. Approving what is excellent. What really matters. For Euodia and Synthyche the issue is not as much about the issue but about their relationship to one another. Love isn’t controlling the stamp. Let love referee.
So the picture is that you’re standing before G
When Paul sets as his goal here that they would be blameless he means not like one of these brothers. But that our reputation is one where people cannot rightly throw accusations and have things stick. The other word, “pure” or “sincere” is another rare word that means “without wax”. It comes from the world of pottery. In ancient times the finest pottery was thin. It had a clear color, and it brought a high price. Fine pottery was very fragile both before and after firing. And this pottery would often crack in the oven. Cracked pottery should have been thrown away. But dishonest pottery salesmen would fill in the cracks with a hard pearly wax that would blend in with the color of the pottery. This made the cracks practically undetectable on the shelf, especially when the piece was painted or glazed. This wax ruse however was immediately uncovered if the pottery was held up to bright light, especially sunlight, for the cracks would show up as darker lines. It was said that the artificial element was detected by “sun-testing.” Such a vase was known as "sun-judged". It is notable that the honest pottery dealers would mark their product with the words "sine cera" which means “without wax”. Our English "sincere" comes from the Latin words "sine cera"!
In ancient times the finest pottery was thin. It had a clear color, and it brought a high price. Fine pottery was very fragile both before and after firing. And this pottery would often crack in the oven. Cracked pottery should have been thrown away. But dishonest pottery salesmen would fill in the cracks with a hard pearly wax that would blend in with the color of the pottery. This made the cracks practically undetectable on the shelf, especially when the piece was painted or glazed. This wax ruse however was immediately uncovered if the pottery was held up to bright light, especially sunlight, for the cracks would show up as darker lines. It was said that the artificial element was detected by “sun-testing.” Such a vase was known as "sun-judged". It is notable that the honest pottery dealers would mark their product with the words "sine cera" which means “without wax”. Our English "sincere" comes from the Latin words "sine cera"!