Sermon Tone Analysis

Scripture Introduction:

So I had been a children’s and youth pastor for only a couple of months.

I was serving at a Methodist church—I’ve never been a Methodist but a professor in college suggested it as a good experience for me.

So I dove right in and began doing ministry.

One of our first big events was a progressive service.

Now you need to know that the only two churches I’d been to in my life at this point were Baptist churches and a Christian church that my grandma went to.

On this one night I’d be exposed to a Methodist church, a Lutheran church, an Episcopalian church, and what was completely foreign to me—a Catholic church.

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In each of these churches I didn’t know much of what to do.

And when you’re in a new church what do you do?

If you’re a guest here this morning for the first time you can answer that question well.

There are things that churches do that are different from what you’re used to and strange to you.

Your only hope to not look like a complete goon is to look around you and just do what everybody else is doing.

But what is really not cool is when you get to the Catholic church and have to sit in the front row.

I didn’t have anybody to look at.

(Which is why visitors and guests like to sit in the back and it’s a sign of hospitality not to fill those seats up).

I was a youth pastor and didn’t know when I was supposed to sit or when I was supposed to stand.

It was incredibly embarrassing.

I could have really used an example—a model—somebody to look at.

The Philippians have just been charged by Paul to be shining lights.

To be like Christ in self-giving love for one another.

But they could also use living—touch with your hands—see with your own eyes—hands and feet of Jesus type examples.

And that is what we have in our text this morning with Timothy and Epaphroditus.

Listen, to the type of example that these two men are.

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I think if you were living in the first century you might have been a bit surprised to see Epaphroditus on this list as an example to follow.

Let me give you a bit of a backstory here.

The church at Philippi absolutely loved Paul and they were concerned about his well-being.

So they decided to send one of their own, a guy named Epaphroditus, in order to give Paul some money but more than anything to serve his needs while he was on house arrest.

He was given as a gift to Paul.

But something happened.

Epaphroditus got sick.

He got very sick.

There was no way that he could minister to Paul’s needs.

In fact he needed ministry himself.

You could almost say that he was becoming more of a burden than a help.

And he was missing his people in Philippi.

It was much better for him to go back home.

So what does Paul do?

If he sends him back it could do a couple things.

First, it could be insulting.

As if Paul was saying, “this gift isn’t good enough, take it back.”

Kind of like what you feel like if you get a sweater for Christmas from your sweet Aunt Gertrude but the thing is hideous…you feel kind of bad sending it back.

You certainly wouldn’t give it back to her and say, “hey can you take this ugly thing back to the store for me and get me something better?”

But we’re also talking here about a human being and not a sweater.

Epaphroditus would have been hand-delivering this letter to the church at Philippi.

It would have been a failed mission for him.

If these words weren’t in this letter then the church would be incredibly disappointed in Epaphroditus.

So Paul is also commending him.

Here is what we want to catch.

The vision the Philippians had for Epaphroditus was that he would for a long time minister to the needs of Paul until he was either executed or released from prison.

But he got sick and couldn’t complete the job—he couldn’t even come close to completing the job.

Here is our question tonight.

Was he successful in his ministry?

You see that is an absolutely important question for us as well.

It’s a bit easier when we’re talking about things like sports.

You define success when you win.

You can’t bat .180 on the year and say you had a successful season.

Unless you did so blindfolded or something.

At church camp this week our cabin was successful as we took home the golden tray once again.

We got the most points.

That’s an easy success.

It’s easier with businesses.

Many jobs are measurable.

You have a bottom line that you are shooting for.

Did you meet the goal?

If so, success.

If not then you can’t say you succeeded.

But what does this look like when we start talking ministry.

Lots of pastors or churches try to define this by budgets, buildings, and bottoms.

But there are many self-proclaimed churches with massive budgets, million dollar buildings, that packs the house but they will not hear from Jesus, “well done good and faithful servant” because they’ve long ago abandoned preaching the gospel.

How do you define success in your Sunday school class?

At our block parties?

What about parenting?

Marriage?

Friendships?

What about counseling a friend?

The worst fear for us as counselors is that we’ll “lose somebody”.

You’ll have someone very depressed, you’ll try to help or get help.

And they end up taking their life.

You feel like a failure.

But how do you measure success in counseling?

Is it only if they are “helped” or “cured” or whatever word you want to use?

What about sharing the gospel?

Are you only successful if somebody comes to Christ?

We learn from our text this morning that the measure of success is really self-giving Christ-centered faithfulness.

But what does that even look like?

We know that faithfulness doesn’t just mean “response to our preaching or efforts at discipleship”.

If it was then we’d have to say that even Jesus wasn’t all that successful.

I mean when he was crucified his following wouldn’t even have broken that magical 200 person barrier.

But I don’t think it’s quite right to say that we don’t care at all about response.

I don’t think that reflects the heart of the New Testament either.

There is something to be said for 📷, “Do you see a man skillful in his work?

He will stand before kings; he will not stand before obscure men”.