Sermon Tone Analysis

Lot’s of valuable things in the world:

Lamborghini in Johnson Creek- $600,000

Area Houses- 3 million

Land on the beach in Naples- 10’s of millions

If there were ten thousand, thousand millions of worlds, and as many heavens full of men and angels, Christ would not be pinched to supply all our wants, and to fill us all.

— Samuel Rutherford

The Apostle Paul said it this way:

Surpassing Value of knowing Christ!

It is something that not even Master Card can buy.

If you know Christ you have the most valuable thing imaginable!

Do you know Christ?

Paul discusses this in vv.

7-8

Pastor Jon Version:

(7) BUT everything that was gain to me, these things I have reckoned to be loss because of Christ.

How do you come to know Christ?

Salvation = Repentance + Faith

Repentance = the abandonment or repudiation of sin.

It is a based on a feeling of godly sorrow for our sin- it is sorrow that is directed toward God!

BUT everything that was gain to me, these things I have reckoned to be loss.

Paul- “I finally realized that all my life I had been trying to earn favor with God through my own good works” (5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless).

BUT everything that was gain to me, these things I have reckoned to be loss.

1 Corinthians 6:9–11 (ESV)

9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

11 And such were some of you.

My friend have you every said, along with the Apostle Paul, “Everything that was gain to me, these things I have reckoned to be loss.”

I have no righteousness, I have offended a holy God, I am a sinner.

Has the fact that you have sinned against God caused sorrow and grief in your life?

Have you every abandoned or forsaken your sin? Doesn’t mean you never sin again.

But, you say this about your sin- “I have reckoned it to be loss.”

It is worthless.

I don’t want it anymore!

Have you repented of your sin and your own righteousness?

Salvation = Repentance + Faith

Faith= the conscious decision to believe, trust, or depend on Christ alone.

You turn away from your sin in repentance and you turn toward Christ in faith.

Pastor Jon Translation:

(8) BUT, more than that, I also keep on reckoning everything to be loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.

Because of Him I have suffered the loss of all things, and I keep on reckoning them as filth so that I might gain Christ.

Have you believed?

Have you put your trust in Christ, in His work on the cross, in his death, burial, and resurrection?

Are you depending on Christ alone for the forgiveness of your sins?

This is the most important question you will ever ask of yourself?

If you have been saved, that is your have repented of your sins and have put your faith in Christ alone you have the most valuable thing in the universe.

Paul calls it this in v.8- “the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.”

What is the surpassing value that comes from knowing Christ?

What are the benefits of being a Christian?

I.

An Alien Righteousness (v. 9)

Found in Him-

Union with Christ, when we are united to Christ we share in the same position and privileges as Christ.

Not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law-

What does the average religious person think will cause God to accept them?

If my good works outweigh by bad.

If you ask the average person this question, “Do you think you are a good person?”

What will they say?

Yes

What would Paul say?- just the opposite!

I want to be found in Christ, so that I don’t have to depend on my own righteousness.

What kind of righteousness did Paul want?

Not his own- Paul wanted an alien righteousness- a righteousness outside of himself.

Whose righteousness did Paul want?

The righteousness from God!

How does someone receive this righteousness?

that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith

How can someone have fellowship with a holy God?

Hab.

1:13- Purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong!

They must have an alien righteousness, the righteousness of God Himself- through faith in Christ!

Are you depending on your own righteousness?

Or are you entrusting your soul to Christ?

Is your faith in Christ and in His righteousness given to as a gift through salvation?

Do you know Christ?

There is a surpassing value in knowing Christ!

An Alien Righteousness!

II.

A New Inclination (v.

10a)

Philippians 3:10 (ESV)

10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection,

That I may know him-

Aorist, active, infinitive- point in time, the moment of our salvation we came to know Christ in a unique way.

Here Paul says one of those unique and new ways of knowing Christ is that we came to know and to experience the power of the Christ’s resurrection at the moment of our salvation.

And we have been different ever since!

“Power of His Resurrection” c.f. Rom.

6:4

At the moment of our salvation we were united to Christ and because of that spiritual union we share in the benefits of not just his death, but also his resurrection.

How do we share in the benefits of the resurrection of Jesus right now? Paul says it is the power of the resurrection of Christ than enables us to walk in newness of life!

What does that mean?

End of v. 6 is key- being united to Christ in his death and in his resurrection means that believers are no longer enslaved to sin.

The power of sin is broken in the life of a believer.

It is broken by the power of God, the power of the gospel, the power of the resurrection!

Consider / Reckon this to be true- if you know Christ your have a new inclination!

The moment you trust Christ you participate in the power of His resurrection.

That means something new has arrived!

You become a new creation, you are born again- that means a whole reversal of the your natural tendencies.

A. A. Hodge of Princeton used to illustrate this by saying “if dice, thrown 1,000 times, always turn up sixes, you say the dice are loaded.

So with babies.

They come into the world as thick as those flakes of snow today: and they always come ‘sin up’ . . . the dice are loaded.”

You are born into this world with a corrupted sin nature that you inherited from Adam.

Because of that sin nature your natural inclination is to sin.

In fact the bible teaches that you are enslaved to sin- you are under its power.