Sermon Tone Analysis

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*Intro*
I was looking this past week at famous epitaphs.
Do you know what epitaphs are?
Epitaphs are short phrases written on the tombstone to honor a deceased person.
For example, Mel Blanc, who was the voice of Porky Pig (who had the trademark line: “That’s all folks!”) and many other animated characters, was given this epitaph[1]: "That's all folks"
Here are some other epitaphs:
"A tomb now suffices him for whom the world was not enough"/ –epitaph for Alexander the Great/
"I am ready to meet my Maker.Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.”
/Winston Churchill/
“Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty I am free at last!” /Martin Luther King, Jr. /
“Here lies the body of Jonathan Blake Stepped on the gas instead of the brake.”
/Memory of an accident in a Uniontown, Pennsylvania cemetery/
/ /
I don’t know if you have ever thought about this, but what would be on your epitaph?
What will people say about you when you leave this earth?
I don’t want to sound morbid, but it would not hurt us to think about what we will leave behind when the Lord calls us home, that is, if He does not come for us first.
What kind of legacy do you want to leave?
Sure, you may not end up popular or famous according to the world or even the Christian world, but if you have been given new life by the living God, we better do something with it, something where when we are gone, people can look at it and see how we pointed it to Jesus.
Today we are going to wrap up the final verses of Colossians.
Paul is giving some final greetings and instructions.
Remember that he is in prison and several people have come alongside to be with him for various reasons.
So this list includes some he is going to send away, some who are staying and some are away and Paul greets them.
Paul mentions 10 people here and for some of them, this is all we know of them.
Did you know that Paul was not only a soul-winner, but a great friend-maker as well?
There are over 100 Christians (named and unnamed) associated with Paul in Acts and in his epistles.
In Romans, he has over 26 different friends in Romans 16 alone!
He had a great capacity for relationships.
Here, assuming Paul’s comments for each of them is true for the entirety of their lives, we are going to look at the legacies of each of them.
Nine of them are positive, one is negative.
Some of them are popular, others are no names, yet all of them have made it to the pages of Scripture.
What I want to do today is to take each of these names and give them an epitaph based on what Paul says here about them.
But more importantly, with each epitaph, I want us to evaluate our own lives and see if the same could be said of us.
The title of the message today is “The Supremacy Demonstrated: By Leaving a Legacy.”
I was thinking how similar we are to Paul’s closing here, when we come to the end of an email or letter.
Don’t we often say things like, “Say hi to your wife!” and “Don’t forget to give little Johnny a kiss from me” and “Tell Grandma I am still waiting for the cornbread to arrive” and “Tell Billy I am praying for him”?
Paul is similar as he closes, but the only difference is that getting a letter from Paul is like getting a letter from the President!
There is a respect for authority here.
Let’s start with the first name and epitaph:
 
*I.
**Tychichus** (Col.4:7-8):
Greatness is in Servanthood.*
The first person we read of is Tychichus (the “ch” is pronounced as a “k”).
His name means “fortunate” and boy were you fortunate to have a brother like him!
We do not know a whole lot about him.
He is mentioned 5x in the Bible.
The first time we hear of him is in Acts 20:4.
Paul is in Ephesus, about to wind down the third missionary journey.
Before he does that, he has one big burden to take care of.
The Jewish Christians in Jerusalem were struggling financially.
So Paul decides to go to Macedonia and get the Gentile Christians in the churches of Thessalonica, Philippi and Corinth to give financially to help out their brothers and sisters in Christ in Jerusalem.
Paul has another motive behind this as well.
He is hoping the love shown by the Gentiles in this way will help build unity between the two groups.
So one of the guys he takes with him on this journey is Tychichus.
When you read Acts you realize any trip with the Apostle Paul is an adventure.
It is a long journey and Tychichus leaves his home, church, job and friends to go with Paul.
It was not like you hopped onto a plane and you got to your destination in a couple of hours.
They had to travel by ship and by foot over several days and weeks, sometimes months.
So Tychichus stays with Paul all the way throughout Macedonia and back to Jerusalem.
What a servant!
You want me to go with you Paul? I’ll go.
Fast forward a few years and now Paul is in prison in Rome and guess who is there with him?
Tychichus!
Since the previous adventure to collect the offering, Paul had survived a plot by the Jewish leaders to murder him, trials before Felix, Festus and a harrowing voyage to Rome.
Tychichus must have remained with him the entire time.
A lot of people will be with you for a while, but a few stick with you through the long haul.
You want me to stay with you Pa ul?
I will stay.
Actually, Paul sends him to Colossae as the messenger boy.
Look at the text.
He actually carries with him the letter to the Colossians, Ephesians and the letter to Philemon.
Paul trusted him.
Now the trip from Rome to Colossae is no easy task.
Tychichus (and Onesimus would join him, see Col. 4:10) would have to first cross much of Italy on foot, then sail across the Adriatic Sea.
After traversing Greece on foot, he would sail across the Aegean Sea to the coast of Asia Minor.
After all that, he still had another 100 miles on foot to reach Colossae.
See how God preserved these letters and entrusted it with a faithful servant!
So Tychichus says, “You want me to take these letters to Colossae?
I’ll take them!” “You want me to encourage the people there, I’ll encourage them!”
 
Fast forward a few more years and Paul wanted Titus to be with him in Nicopolis to spend the winter with him.
Only problem is that Titus is a pastor in Crete and could not leave his congregation.
Guess who Paul suggests to take care of the church?
In Titus 3:12, he suggests  Artemas or Tychichus to go.
You want me to go and take care of the church?
I’ll go.
Fast forward a few more years and Paul is in prison and soon about to die.
This time, he wants to see Timothy, who is the pastor at Ephesus at the time.
Paul says in 2 Tim.
4:12 that Timothy needs to come see him and in Timothy’s place, he’s going to send someone.
Guess who? Tychichus!
He’s beginning to make a big career for himself as an interim pastor, filling in for Titus (perhaps) and now filling in for Timothy.
Tychichus is a pastor if you want him to be.
He is a messenger if you want him to be.
He is an encourager if you want him to be.
In fact, he is anything you want him to be.
Don’t need me here?
Ok, let me know where you need me.
What a legacy he left!
God did not preserve any of his sermons, or anything he ever said.
But God did preserve something about Tychichus that is precious in his sight: faithful service.
Notice what Paul calls him: “beloved brother, faithful minister and fellow servant.”
What a compliment to get from the Apostle Paul himself!  Someone has one said, “The greatest ability in the world is dependability.”
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