Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Doing something hard creates confidence.

When you were starting your company, you were at the bank signing the business loan, and your hands were all sweaty and your voice was a little shaky because you were really scared to death.

You weren’t certain that things were going to turn out okay.

But, they did, and now you look back on that day when you were so nervous and so uncertain as a source of confidence for you to take the next uncertain step in your life.

And, the opposite is true, too.

Avoiding something hard creates doubt.

It’s amazing how naturally it comes to us to cower down instead of step up, isn’t it?

The biggest regrets in our lives are usually the result of our unwillingness to do what is hard in the beginning.

We give in to the temptation to live like everyone else, because it’s easiest, and then we pay the price.

We avoid marriage or children or career opportunities because they are terrifying, and the longer we live under the rule of fear the more our cowardice erodes our confidence.

So, doing something hard has the effect of teaching us that we can and avoiding something hard has the effect of teaching us that we won’t.

And, those realities begin to define our future decisions and our future joy.

And, it’s this cause and effect that stands behind the Christian life.

Why is it that God doesn’t make our lives easier when we commit to him?

Why is it that, in fact, our lives become more difficult and more treacherous when we begin to follow after Christ?

It’s the design of God to increase your joy in him.

That is, hard lives have the effect of increasing our confidence in the gospel and decreasing our reliance upon ourselves.

Hard lives repeatedly call us to bank our livelihood on the sufficiency of Jesus, increasing our confidence in God as He comes through time and again in ways that we couldn’t foretell.

So, we’re going to see this morning that we are called to live a life worthy of Jesus and that by living that hard life our joy and confidence in Christ will increase.

hard lives serve to increase confidence in the gospel decrease confidence in ourselves.

God’s Word

Read

Live as Citizens of Heaven

v. 27 “Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ” Verse 27 is a penetrating verse, isn’t it?

“Let you manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

And, if you’re like me, you immediately think “Not in a million lifetimes could I be worthy of the gospel of Christ.”

In fact, that is the gospel, isn’t it?

The gospel is quite literally that you are unworthy of God, but God loved you and came to you in your unworthiness so that you might be saved to an inheritance that you are unworthy of.

The gospel demands our belief in our own unworthiness of God’s kindness so that we might receive it based on his kindness alone and not our worthiness.

So, it’s strange when Paul tells us to live worthy of the gospel of Christ because it almost seems counterintuitive to the gospel itself.

But, the instruction is not to live worthy so that you may receive the gospel.

It’s not make yourself worthy of God so that God will love you.

Rather, it’s live worthy because you have already received the gospel.

You have been received into the household of God so now live one who is worthy of your new last name.

Your living didn’t give you that name.

Your Father’s love did.

But, having received it, now live like you understand its worth and its value and its honor.

The word translated as ‘manner of life’ is actually the word that we get the word ‘politics’ from.

It means to live our faithfully your civic duties as a good citizen.

So, Paul is saying to the proud, nationalistic Roman colony at Philippi: “As you proud as you are of being Roman, you are citizens of a greater Kingdom.

Your Lord, your Master, your King is not Augustus.

Your Lord is so mighty that mountains tremble before him, so holy angels are traumatized by his presence, so sovereign that the oceans obey his command, and yet you are his chosen people.

Live worthy of his name.

Live as faithful citizens of heaven even though you reside in Philippi.

Live so that your King looks good.

Belief and Behavior

There’s a relationship here betwen belief and behavior that’s important for us to see.

There seems to be two different camps within Christianity that are equally lethal to the joy of Christians.

There are some who focus only on belief.

That is, it doesn’t matter how you live or what you do so long as you believe that Jesus was raised from the dead.

But, James says that this is no better than how the demons believe about Jesus.

It’s a joyless, powerless, glory-less, salvation-less perversion of the true gospel.

There’s another camp that are only concerned about your behavior.

There’s no concern with your abiding in Christ but rather your performing for Christ.

So long as you watch the right kinds of movies and avoid the wrong kinds of drinks and attend the proper number of church services then God is pleased with you.

And, this is a joyless, powerless, glory-less, salvation-less perversion of the true gospel.

But, what we see here is that the true gospel calls for attention to both and in the right order.

The gospel begins with belief as the cause and behavior as the effect.

Because I believe the gospel with all of my heart, I will now live out the gospel with all of my life.

I am a child of God so I will live like a child of God.

Belief is the cause and behavior is the effect, and they work in concert with one another so that your ‘manner of life (is) worthy of the gospel of Christ.’

APPLICATION: Living “worthy” of Christ begins with the belief that Christ is “worthy” of all of your life.

It is to recognize Jesus as the only prize worth having and so live with a tunnel-visioned pursuit of that prize as a result.

So, how do I know what I believe about Jesus?

How do I know if I find my joy in Christ alone?

I look at my life.

Is my life a living monument to the glory of Christ?

My life is the effect of my belief.

And, faulty behavior reveals faulty beliefs.

Right now, is there anything that you could be offered that you would be willing to lessen your devotion to Christ for?

If the right man said the right things to you, would you be willing to compromise what Jesus says about sex and lust?

If the right job opportunity came along, would you be willing to compromise what Jesus says about priorities and family and church commitment?

If the right trip presented itself, would you be willing to compromise what Jesus says about money?

It’s because in the recesses of your heart, despite what you might say and despite what you wish your character was like, you believe that whatever it is that your willing to lessen your devotion to Christ for is a greater source of joy and a greater prize to receive than Christ himself.

Lock your eyes on the prize of Christ alone!

Believe on Christ for joy.

Believe on Christ for peace.

And then, let that belief shape your budget and schedule and priorities and marriage and career and Netflix account.

See the worthiness of Jesus so that you might live as one worthy of the gospel!

Stand in God’s “Spirit”, not your “Strength.”

v. 27 “standing firm in one Spirit” And, what we’re given are specific instructions to live worthy of the gospel of Christ (headline beneath ‘living worthy statement’) If you’ll notice the descriptions that he gives, you’ll notice that each of these make clear that this isn’t for the faint of heart.

‘Stand firm’ implies that you’ll want to waver.

‘Strive side by side’ implies that it would be easy to back down in isolation.

‘Don’t be frightened’ implies that there will be attempts at intimidation used to stifle you.

They all speak to how difficult life is in this world for the Christian.

And, these examples are meant to build one upon the other so that we can understand the glory that stands behind our hardness of life as we follow Christ.

The difficulties that you experience in your life are not without purpose and not without gain.

In fact, they are both an effect and a cause as we’ll see.

So, how are we to live worthily of Christ?

Stand in God’s “Spirit”, not your “strength.”

Paul tells the Philippians twice to ‘stand firm.’

Once here, and once in chapter 4:1 when he says, “Stand firm thus in the Lord.”

And, I want you to notice that in both cases their standing firm is linked to being in God.

“IN one Spirit.”

“IN the Lord.”

That is, your ability to stand firm in the battle is because God is strong and God is willing and God is with you.

Last year, GK was helping me move something heavy at our house.

And, you could tell that her performance was exceeding her own expectations, and she said, “Dad, let go.

I’ve got it.”