Let's stand for the reading of God's Word. Philippians Chapter 2 starting with verse 19. I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon that I also may be cheered when I receive news about you. I have no one else like him who takes a genuine interest in your welfare. For everyone looks out for his own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. But I know that Timothy has proved himself because as a son with his father, he has served me in the work of the gospel. I hope, therefore, to send him as soon as I know how things will go with me. And I am confident in the Lord that I myself will come soon. But I think it is necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother, fellow worker, and fellow soldier, who is also your messenger, whom you sent to take care of my needs. For he longs for all of you, and is distressed because you heard he was ill. Indeed, he was ill, almost died. But God had mercy on him, and not on him only, but also on me, to spare me sorrow upon sorrow. Therefore, I am all the more eager to send him so that when you see him again, you may be glad and I may have less anxiety. Welcome him in the Lord with great joy and honor men like him because he also, he almost died for the work of Christ, risking his life to make up for the help you could not give me. Our text this morning will be the one that Bill read in Philippians chapter 2. We'll be looking at verses 19 through the end of the chapter. The last time you recall that we were in the book of Philippians together, we were reflecting upon Paul's statements that to live is Christ as a principle of life. And he was talking about that principle as it is reflected in the life of Jesus Christ Himself, how Christ lived, His humility, His grace, His love. His righteousness. Becoming the basis and the formation of that within us and the way that we live our lives. And in our passage here today, Paul is continuing to emphasize what the life of Christ in us looks like. And this text is really very, very simple. And the message is very, very plain, but it is one that is very, very convicting. Often that's the way that it is. The easiest text. The simplest text. are the ones that seem to penetrate us the most. Here, Paul is pointing to two lives, two people, two companions of his, Timothy and Epaphroditus, and he's pointing them out as examples of what Christ-filled living looks like. Now, notice that I said what Christ-filled living looks like. I think that's a better way of describing the Christian life than the way that we often describe the Christian life. We often talk about it as Christ-like living. The imitation of Jesus Christ. And I don't want to get too picky there. There's nothing really wrong with that. We are called to imitate Christ. We are called to imitate Paul as Paul imitates Christ, for example. And our lives ought to reflect in the way that we live the kind of life that Christ lived. But the reality biblically and the reality in terms of our lives is that the only way that's ever going to happen is if Christ is the one in us doing that work. If Christ is the one in us sanctifying us and transforming us and changing us and filling us with His own righteousness and His own goodness and His own life. And so really Christian living ought to be described, I think, as Christ-filled living, not just Christ-like living where we in our own strength try our best to conform our lives to the image of Christ. We must submit our lives to the work of Jesus Christ as He molds us and as He makes us after His own character and after His own nature. And here, what Paul is doing is highlighting Timothy and Epaphroditus as examples of what that life is going to look like when it comes into submission to the will and to the rule and to the dominion and the righteousness of Jesus Christ. First of all, Timothy. He says in verse 20, I have no one like Him who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare He says, they all seek after their own interests and not those of Jesus Christ, but you know Timothy's proven worth and how as a son with a father, he has served with me in the Gospel. Isn't that a beautiful statement that Paul makes about Timothy? Very simple, very plain, very easy to understand, but very profound and very beautiful. Paul looks upon Timothy as a father looks upon a son. Think of that. Paul, the great apostle Paul, the one who is so absolutely consumed with the values and the ethics and the truth of God's Word. Paul, whose life has been so entirely subdued and dominated by the Spirit of Christ within him, and whose affections have been taken captive by the grace and the love of Jesus Christ within him. Paul looks upon Timothy and says, he's like a son to me. And I have no one like him. who will be genuinely concerned with your welfare. I have no one like Him who will reflect the values and the life and the righteousness of Jesus Christ as Timothy does." That says a lot about the Spirit of Christ that's working in the life of Timothy, doesn't it? Paul doesn't dispense praise lightly, does he? Paul doesn't pull punches, does he? He calls things as he sees them. But for Timothy, Paul has nothing but words of affection and admiration. Why is that? Why does he have so much good to say about Timothy? It's because those same values that constrain Paul's life had come to classify this beloved student, this beloved companion, this beloved disciple of his, Timothy. Timothy was someone that we could classify as an unselfish helper. Those are the two words. Unselfish and helper. that you could use to describe Timothy. Charles Spurgeon once said that it takes more grace than I can tell to play the second fiddle well. Do you know what he means by that? It takes more grace than I can tell to play the second fiddle well. He means that it requires a lot of grace to be content to be in the second spot and not be envious of the first spot. And that was the grace that was evidenced in the life of Timothy. He was content to be a servant of Paul. He was content to be a helper of Paul. He was content to be relatively unknown and have no name for himself. Well, Paul was well known. And in fact, famous. Timothy didn't need any of that. It requires a lot of strength from the Spirit of Christ to devote one's life as a servant to another person. As a servant to their aspirations. As a servant to their goals and plans. and purposes while resigning all of your own. But that's exactly what Timothy did. He served Paul humbly. And he served Paul helplessly and without any envy or pretense or aspirations for his own status or fame. You remember that there were those, on the other hand, who were jealous of Paul's status as an apostle, right? You remember back in chapter 1, he talked about them. When he was in prison, they took advantage of his position, of his imprisonment. to try to go out and make a name for themselves by preaching the Gospel, to try to compete with his reputation. And so he said they were preaching the Gospel out of envy and out of improper motives. Timothy wasn't that kind of a person at all. Timothy cared little for himself and he cared much for Paul. He did not seek his own interests. And notice in verse 21, The contrast that Paul mentions there between someone who seeks his own interests and someone who does not, they are called the person who seeks the interests of Christ, Paul says. You see, that's the kind of guy Timothy was. That's the kind of person he was. He was not only self-abasing, but he was Christ-exalting. He wasn't self-centered, but he wasn't man-centered either. He wasn't just Paul's little groupie. He wasn't just Paul's little yes-man. Anything you say, Master, I will do. He wasn't focused on pleasing Paul. He was focused on serving Paul as a way to please and honor and glorify His Lord Jesus Christ. He was a selfless servant because, and this is the important point of the passage, because the ultimate selfless servant, Jesus Christ, was dwelling in him. And the ultimate selfless servant Jesus Christ was molding Timothy like the potter molds the clay and transforming Timothy by the renewing of his mind. Christ was in charge of Timothy's life, not Timothy in other words. The heart and the mind and the spirit and the attitude of Jesus Christ have come to define the heart and the mind and the spirit and the attitude of Timothy. And so as a shepherd, He pities the flock. He sympathizes with the needs of others. He throws Himself into their needs and into caring for their needs because He's caring for them as Christ would care for them because it's Christ in and through Him, not the flesh of Timothy simply conforming itself to some image. And that reminded me as I was thinking upon that and studying through this passage of really the beautiful statement that Paul makes in 2 Corinthians 12 and verse 14. He says to the Corinthian church there, he says, here for the third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be a burden, for I seek not what is yours, but you. Isn't that a wonderful thing to say? Do you hear what he's saying? He's saying I'm not coming because I want to get something from you. I'm not just making my rounds to the churches hoping that they're going to give and support me and feed me and shelter me. and edify Me. I'm coming to you because I want you. He loves them, not what they give Him. And so He's willing to give of His time and His energy, His giftedness, His life, in order to come to them because He loves them and He wants to serve them. That's selflessness. Now think for a second. Take a pause and look at your life. And look at your heart and ask yourself, if that really is the same attitude that is within you. How often do you treat people the way that you do simply because you love them versus because you want them to do something in return for you? Husbands, how often do you bring your wives beautiful bouquets of flowers just because you want to bless them? Or how often do you bring them the beautiful bouquets of flowers because you're hoping that they'll cook you a nice meal or that they'll treat you well? A lot of times we give in order to get, don't we? Paul wasn't that kind of a guy. I'm not coming because I'm hoping to get what is yours. I'm coming because I want you. I'm coming because I love you. You see, so often, I think that we are guilty of selfishness without even really realizing it. We make friends because of what they can do for us. Because of what they can give us either in material stuff or in meeting our felt needs. But a true friend A friend who loves and who serves without regard to self doesn't seek what they can get from others. They simply seek to be a blessing to others regardless of the cost to themselves. Isn't that the definition of love? Meeting the actual, not just the felt needs, but the actual needs of other people regardless of the cost to yourself. That's the definition of love. Jesus exemplified that of course. Paul modeled that as Christ was transforming him. And he's saying that Timothy also modeled that. It's the difference between what the New Testament calls a shepherd who devotes his life to protecting and caring for the sheep at whatever cost to himself. The difference between that and what the New Testament calls a hireling. A hireling is someone who simply tends to the sheep for what he can get out of it, for the wage that he gets. And as soon as the danger outweighs the wage, he's gone. but not a shepherd. A shepherd is there to care for the sheep no matter what the danger, to protect the flock no matter what the cost, because the shepherd is more concerned with the sheep than with the shepherd. That was the life and the mindset and the attitude of Jesus Christ and of Paul and of Timothy. And it ought to be, as Christ is forming Himself in us, the attitude of all Christians. That's convicting, isn't it? Relationships with others. Are we shepherds or are we only hirelings who are willing to do what we do in order to get something? And as soon as we don't get what we want or as soon as something else is more attractive, we're done. Are we shepherds or are we hirelings? The difference is simply this. If your life is being defined by Christ's Spirit within you, then you are a shepherd. And if you're not a shepherd, if you are a hireling, then your life is not being defined by Christ's Spirit within you. It is being defined by your flesh, which is constantly waging war against Christ's Spirit. Timothy exemplifies what it looks like to be filled with the Spirit of Jesus Christ. And then Paul speaks of Epaphroditus as a second example of Christ-filled living. Look at verse 25. He says, I thought it was necessary to send you Epaphroditus, my brother and my fellow worker, fellow soldier, and your messenger and minister to my need, for he has been longing for you all and has been distressed because you heard that he was ill. Indeed, he was ill, near to death, but God had mercy on him and not only on him, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. I am the more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again and that I may be the less anxious. So receive Him in the Lord with all joy and honor such men, for He nearly died for the work of Christ. Risking His life to complete what was lacking in Your service to Me." The one word that classifies what Paul is saying about Epaphroditus is the word sacrificial. Sacrificial. He was an elder in the church of Philippi, Epaphroditus was, the church to whom this letter is being written. He was probably the preaching elder, the teaching pastor there, probably the leader of the congregation there. And he left his post in Philippi in order to travel to Rome because he heard that Paul was in prison in Rome. And there with his heart of compassion sitting in Philippi, Epaphroditus pictured Paul sitting chained to an imperial guard alone, not surrounded by his beloved brethren, not surrounded by Christians, languishing, suffering, And Epaphroditus' heart was moved to go and to minister to Paul while he was there, to meet Paul's needs, to minister to his bodily needs even. The Spirit of Christ was being manifested in Epaphroditus' life in that he was committed to those who were suffering. He was committed to ministering to them. How about us? Are we seeking to minister to the poor and the sick and the prisoners? seeking to minister to the suffering ones? Do they elicit compassion within our hearts? If they don't, it's because our flesh is what's driving our hearts. If they do, it's because Christ is what's driving our hearts. Remember that Jesus says that to the degree that we minister to the needs of those who suffer, we are ministering to Him. And that was the heart of Epaphroditus. And his commitment to that ministry was a sacrificial commitment. He was willing to give anything in order to meet the needs of others, in order to minister to the Apostle Paul. He toiled. He worked until he was exhausted, until he was seriously ill, near to death it says. And verse 30 says, he nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete that which was lacking in your service to me. How's that for a chastisement of the Philippians? Epaphroditus almost died making up for your laziness in the ministry, for your lack of compassion, for your lack of care, for your lack of love and service and work. Epaphroditus was willing to kill himself to fill up that which you neglected. Oh, that's convicting. How about us? Epaphroditus went beyond his own physical strength. He literally willingly risked his own life, it says. The Greek word for risk refers to a little game that teenage children would play where they would take their hand and spread out their fingers. Maybe some of you have done this in school. I remember doing this in junior high. You spread out your fingers, and then you set your fingers on your desk or a piece of wood, and you let somebody take a knife and drop it from a height and hope that it lands between your fingers and not on them. It's a risk. It's a gamble that you're taking. It's a stupid thing to do. Don't do it, children. But it was a game that would be played by these children. And Paul is using that word to speak of the gamble, the risk that Epaphroditus took. He exposed himself willingly and knowingly and openly and deliberately to danger in order to minister to the life of the Apostle Paul. Why? Why would he do that? Why would you play this stupid little game? Well, the game you would play because you're stupid. Epaphroditus wasn't stupid. Epaphroditus realized and recognized because the Spirit of Christ was transforming him that Paul's needs were greater than his own. For Epaphroditus, Paul's life was more important than his own life. Ministering to Paul's needs was a greater priority than taking heed of his own needs and serving himself. And so that's what he did. He went out on a limb He risked everything for the sake of ministering to a friend in need. He knew that it would cost him. He knew that it could very well cost him his life. But that was okay. Because you remember Jesus' words in John 15, 13, that greater love has no man than he lay down his life for a friend. Epaphroditus had that love because Christ was the one defining his life and transforming his heart. He wasn't concerned with his own comfort or well-being or his own needs. Look at verse 26 and how other-centered he was. When they heard in Philippi that Epaphroditus was ill, it says that it made them anxious. And when Epaphroditus heard of their anxiety, it distressed him. He was bothered by the fact that they were worrying about him. He was more concerned with the fact that he had caused them anxiety than with his own illness. You see? He had no inclination to revel in the fact that they were feeling sorry for him. He didn't want to advertise it and say, oh, woe is me, poor me, look at me, feel bad for me. He wanted to keep it a secret because when they found out about it, it made them suffer and he didn't want them to suffer because his heart was more for them than for himself. He would rather that they never knew so that they would not have to be distressed. He wasn't concerned with his own life. He was singularly concerned with the lives and the needs of others and devoted to meeting those needs. Why? Again, because his life was not his own. It wasn't Epaphroditus who lived, but Christ who lived in him. His life was one that was lived by faith in the Son of God. He had been crucified with Christ. He was being defined by the Spirit of Christ and not his own flesh. So here's the point. It's very simple. This is not a hard passage. And this is not a hard message for us to understand, but it is probably the hardest message for us to live. The point is that these qualities of selfless, sacrificial love at any cost, service and ministry to others, those are the essential qualities of the Christian life and of Christian character because they were the qualities evidenced in the character and the person of Jesus Christ. They are the hallmarks of Christ-filled living because they are the virtues and the values by which Christ always and without fail lived every moment of His life. Now a lot of people examine their lives and they think that they're good Christians because of what they don't do. See? I don't commit adultery. I don't get drunk. I don't take drugs. And they have this whole list of things that they don't do, thinking that the things that they don't do qualify them to be very, very, very spiritual, because they avoid the big sins. And sometimes they even create lists of other sins that aren't in the Bible and they avoid those too, thinking that that makes them even more righteous. But see, if you don't have these characteristics in you, selflessness, the willingness to love and to meet other people's needs, whatever the cost to you. Not just the cost to you physically, but the cost to you emotionally. I'm going to love somebody that's difficult for me to love because they are more important than I am. And even though I'm not getting anything out of it, it's more important for me to give to them than to only give to people that I can get from. You see, those are the essential characteristics of the Christian life because those were the things that drove and motivated Jesus Christ. And without them, we can't say that we have Christ-filled lives. Because rather than manifesting the righteousness of Christ by faith, we're only being self-righteous by avoiding the things that are convenient to our own image. Paul's burden in this chapter of Philippians is to proclaim to Christians that since there is this war raging within us between flesh and the Spirit of Christ, we have to recognize that war. We have to acknowledge that that's going on on a daily basis. And not only do we have to recognize it, we have to fight it. And the way that we fight it is by not feeding our flesh, but sowing to Christ's spirits. That's what we have to do. And what Paul wants to see happening is he wants to see our flesh dying. He wants for Christians to be suffocating the flesh and starving the flesh to death, cutting off its supply lines, cutting off its life source, strangling the life out of it literally. How do you do that? He also wants to see us feeding and sowing to the other combatant in there, the Spirit of Jesus Christ. How do we do that? It's everything that we've learned from this chapter in the past. We do that by plugging into that supernatural power source that God has ordained to create new life within us and cause us to be transformed by the renewing of our minds. And what is that power source? It is God's Word. It's not just informational. It's transformational. It's living. It's active. It's able to crush the flesh. and it's able to cause the life of Christ to be built within us. We fight that battle by treasuring God's Word within our hearts and meditating upon it day and night and making it our constant source of spiritual food. Listen to me, if you're not doing that, then you're losing the battle. The only thing on this earth, the only thing in your house, the only thing on your bookshelf The only thing in the universe that is effective for crushing your flesh and causing the life of Christ to flourish within you is the Word of God. It's the only thing. You can't get it from Dr. Phil. You can't. Maybe you watch that show and maybe he has some good things to say and it's not sin and it's not wrong, but you cannot substitute God's Word for anything else. The only way to see the life of Christ flourish is to be constantly saturating yourself with the Word of God. It has to be your constant spiritual food. And the more that you do that, the more that the Spirit of Christ is at work to crush your flesh and to mold you like clay in the potter's hands. And here's the thing. Here's the way that you know whether or not that's happening. You simply look at your life and you pray the prayer of David in Psalm 139. Take a look at my heart, God. Examine it. Let me see if there be any wicked way in me. And then lead me in the everlasting way. Evaluate your life. Evaluate your heart. And ask yourself, is what I see the result of my flesh or the result of Christ's Spirit working within me? Which is it? If it's Christ's Spirit, then more and more your life is going to come to reflect that same self-abasing, self-sacrificing, other-serving, humble, loving attitude that Christ lived by. It's that attitude, remember, that prompted Him to leave the glory of Heaven in order to come down to this wicked, sin-cursed, sin-filled, debauched earth to take on human flesh, to surround Himself by wicked and sinful people, to be despised and forsaken and mocked and blasphemed and beaten and scourged and crucified. Nothing motivated Christ to do that except for His lack of concern for Himself and His consuming concern with the glory of God and His love for you. And if Christ is the One forming your heart, then that will become the way that you live your life. Nothing is too great to sacrifice for the sake of another. Greater love has no man than if he lay down his life, let alone his time, let alone his money, let alone his emotional comfort level for a friend. If that's the same attitude which is yours in Jesus Christ, then you will begin to look like Jesus Christ. And if that attitude is not what is defining the disposition of your heart and mind and the direction and the values of your life, then the only other option is that it is your flesh prevailing and not the Spirit of God. Period. And the only way that the flesh, which Paul says is crucified in the Christian, it should be dying. And the only way that it prevails is if we're feeding it. If we're doing CPR on it. If we're continuing to sustain its life even though it's supposed to be dying. If we're catering to it rather than starving it and suffocating and strangling it. And the only way that we do that is if we are neglecting to sow to the Spirit of Christ by not storing up His Word constantly in our hearts. Not meditating on it day and night. Instead, allowing the influences of this worldly age to fill our minds and captivate our hearts and lives. That's how you sustain the flesh. That's how you feed it. That's how you sow to it. Again, the only thing that crushes it and strangles the life out of it is God's Word that is sharper than any two-edged sword. And if you neglect it, and if you choose instead to fill your mind and your heart with anything else, even if it's not explicitly immoral, even if it's not explicitly evil, if it's anything other than God's Word, it cannot feed and sow to the Spirit of Christ. It will feed and sow your flesh. and your pride and your arrogance and your self-sufficiency and your self-reliance and self-righteousness. And that's going to cause you not to have this mind of Christ manifested in your life. Rather than being humble, you will be proud. Rather than being self-abasing and sacrificial and consumed with the needs of others, you will be self-absorbed. You will find that when you spend time with people, You're more concerned with yourself than them and what they can do for you than what you can do for them. So again, you need to look at your life, and I do. We all do. We have to examine our hearts. We have to ask ourselves, what do we value? It's as simple as that. Do you value God's Word? Can you say with David in all honesty that God's Word is more desirable to you than gold or silver, than the most precious things in this world. Can you say that? Is it of incomparable worth to you? The test is easy. How much time does God's Word command in your life? Conviction. That's hard. How much energy do you devote to mastering the message of God's Word compared to the amount of time that you devote to other things in your life? Now, there isn't a set amount of time. It's not that you'll be more and more righteous and more and more pious by the minute and by the hour, and you can log it and you can count it up. We don't want to be self-righteous. We don't want to be legalistic. It's a simple matter of value. If you spend four hours a day watching TV and no time in God's Word, then you value TV more than God's Word. It's as simple as that. Or whatever it is. Do you find that God's Word and time in God's Word is a burden for you? or a hardship for you, all that means is that you don't love it. Because we don't have a hard time doing the things that we love, do we? Jesus says, My burden is easy. He says, My load is light. And if the Spirit of Christ is what is defining our values, then the Word of Christ will be easy. It will be light for us to dwell upon and to spend time in. If His Spirit is conquering our flesh, then we are going to love what Christ loves. Period. Look at our lives. We have to examine our hearts. We have to say, what are we consumed with? Is it the needs of others? Or is it the needs of self? Which one is dominant? When somebody does you wrong, when they disappoint you, when they injure you, or even if they persecute you, what's your response? Is your response to fight for your rights or to demand some kind of recompense from them or to rake them over the coals until you feel that they've suffered enough for the sins that they've committed against you? We do that so easily, don't we? We do it so easily. Or is it to turn the other cheek? What's your perspective of persecution when it happens to you? Or when people wrong you? Is it that of Christ or is it that of Paul? You know what their perspective was? They saw persecution as an opportunity to manifest the glory of God by displaying the grace and the patience and the love and the forgiveness of Jesus Christ to others. Is that your perspective? When somebody does you wrong, do you see it as an opportunity to say, I am going to show you the glory of God by displaying to you the love and forgiveness and patience of Jesus Christ? Or do you say, ah, now it's my chance to get back at you? It's hard. It's real easy, isn't it, to appear loving and patient and kind and peaceable and self-controlled so long as others are being that way towards us. But that's not the deal. The clincher is whether or not we are that way when everybody around us is not being that way towards us. Jesus' standard is devastating to our flesh. Turn over to the book of Luke. The Gospel of Luke in chapter 6. Just for a moment. To see Jesus' standards here. Look at verse 32 of Luke chapter 6. Jesus says, if you love those who love you, what benefit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what benefit is that? For even sinners do the same. And if you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that? Even sinners lend to sinners in order to get back the same amount. You see? So what if you think that you're loving? So what if you think that you're a loving person to the people who love you? That doesn't qualify you to be anything more than a pagan, Jesus says. It is not an evidence of the Spirit of Christ being manifested in and through you. And He goes on to say, but love your enemies and do good and lend expecting nothing in return and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High. Here's the most important part. For He, the Most High God, He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil. Therefore, be merciful even as your Father is merciful." I think that's some of the hardest stuff in all of Scripture. Is that you? Is that me? Is that our lives? Are we that kind of a church? Are we kind to the ungrateful? Are we kind to the evil? Or do we turn our backs on them? Do we only offer kindness and love if we deem that they have given it to us in sufficient measure first? Remember what love is according to 1 Corinthians 13. It's patient. It's kind. It doesn't boast. It's humble. Love doesn't envy. Why not? Love doesn't envy. When somebody else gets something that you wanted, love doesn't envy. Why doesn't love envy? Because love is concerned with the other person more than self. And so when someone else gets something, a loving person doesn't say, hey, I wanted that. Why didn't I get that? The loving person, more concerned with the other than for self, says, I'm happy for them because my greatest concern is that they have good things, not that I have good things. Are you that kind of a person? Love doesn't envy. It doesn't insist on its own way. It's flexible, in other words. It concedes to others. It is more concerned that others have what they need than it is with itself. It's not irritable. It's not resentful because those two attitudes come from self-absorption. When I'm concerned mostly with me and secondly with others, and then others don't do what I want, they irritate me. They bother me. They vex me. Love isn't irritable. Love isn't resentful because it's concerned more with others than self. It rejoices in the truth. It's not evil. It bears all things. It's tolerant of wrongdoing, in other words. It's quick to forgive, in other words. It's patient, looking for opportunities to extend grace. It says that love believes all things and hopes all things. I think those are some of the hardest ones. I think those are the areas in which we fail the most sometimes. When Paul says that love believes all things and love hopes all things, here's what he means. He means that if you love someone, then your first instinct and reaction to the things that they do is not to assume that they've done something wrong. Not to assume guilt or wrongdoing, but first to assume the best, to give them the benefit of the doubt. Not just as a matter of principle, but as an inclination of the heart. If your heart loves them and they do something that you don't understand why they did it, your first instinct is not to assume that they had it in for you or that they were sinning against you, but to extend the grace of the benefit of the doubt and say, until I have evidence and proof that they did something wrong, I'm not going to believe that they did something wrong. Love assumes the best until the worst is proven. In other words, it is slow to assume guilt or to assign poor motives. Is that you? Is that me? Is that us? Or when somebody does something that you don't like, is your first reaction to assume that they must be sinning against you? They must have been selfish towards you. Love doesn't do that. because it's consumed with the needs of others and it's focused on the situations of others, and so it doesn't jump to conclusions. And in the absence of evidence, it doesn't make those gratuitous assumptions. Look at your heart. Examine your life. Can you take that passage, that 1 Corinthians 13 passage, and wherever the word love appears, can you substitute your name for it? I am patient. I am kind. I am humble. I am not envious. I don't insist on my own way. I bear all things. I believe all things. I hope all things. Are you that kind of a person? We need the Spirit of Christ to be forming our hearts and our minds. Do you have the humble, self-abasing mind and attitude of Christ? It's the simple question Paul leaves us with. Are you willing to suffer the loss of all things for the sake of another? Is the principle that you live your life by the principle that greater love has no man than if he's willing to lay down his life for a friend? In other words, that there's nothing that is too great for you to sacrifice for another even if they never sacrifice a thing for you? Even if you never get a return on your investment with them, are you a person who's known for loving them? Or is your definition of love and relationship and friendship centered around what you get from other people? when you're with them? Or are their needs the primary thing in your mind? Are their needs your greatest interest and the things that you want to talk about the most? Or do you spend all your time talking about yourself and what you're going through? I think all of us know people like that, right? And it's hard to be around them. You go and you sit down with them and they never ask how you're doing. They never want to know about your day. All they want to do is tell you what they're going through. That's hard. It's difficult. They're not giving, but are you loving them? And if you're that kind of a person, the Spirit of Christ needs to change you. You say, well, that's a high bar to clear. This is an impossible standard to meet. And you're right. You're right because we're weak. We're self-absorbed. We're needy. We're arrogant. We're unloving people. And it's only when the Spirit of Christ dominates our hearts, our sinful, prideful flesh, that we can begin to be transformed. And that only happens when we suffocate the flesh and sow to the Spirit by feasting on God's Word day and night. Listen, there are limitless applications to all of this, aren't there? If Christ's Spirit is dominating us and if our flesh is suffocating and being crushed, then we begin to look like Christ and Paul and Timothy and Epaphroditus. That selfless, sacrificial, loving spirit will blossom within our hearts. We will become consumed with the needs of other people and consumed with serving them as Christ does. What about your time? How does that Luke 6 principle factor in to how you give your time to people? And to whom you give your time? Are the only people worthy of your time deemed you worthy of their time? Are you only willing to be there and to plunge yourself into their world to give yourself to the meeting of their needs if they first give something to you? Well, what good is that, Jesus says? Even the sinners do that. Did Jesus do that? Or didn't He eat His meals with tax gatherers? Didn't He reach out and touch the lives of people that everyone else called unclean? and disassociated from and wouldn't give the time of day to. Didn't He love those that everyone else called unlovely? He did. And is that a description of your life? Do you deliberately reach out and touch those that are difficult to reach out to and intentionally befriend people who are difficult to befriend? It's because you look at the relationship first in terms of what it does for you and then in terms of what you're willing to do for them. And that's your flesh, not Christ's Spirit. What about your service to Christ's church? What is your participation in the ministry of the Gospel according to whatever giftedness the Lord has given you by His grace and providence? Do you say, well, I'm too busy or I'm too tired? Or I'm too afraid? I'm too self-conscious. It's all a matter of what matters to you. What you value. You have time in your life for a lot of things. Every single one of you, I know it. Every single one of us has time for a lot of things in our lives. And if ministering to others and ministering in the church doesn't factor in, then all that means is that those other things are more important to you than that ministry. That's what it means. What about your money? That's a hard one. It's an unpopular one. Proverbs 3 gives us the essential biblical principle on money and how we ought to use it for the Lord. It says in verse 9, Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all of your produce. The firstfruits are exactly that. They are the first and they are the best of everything that you own and possess. In terms of a crop, you went out to harvest the crop and the first and the best proceeds, produce, that which you gleaned from the crop, the first and the best were given to God as an expression that He deserves the first and the best. And then anything left over was for you to sell and make money on and for you to live on. Is that how we live our lives? It means that in order to honor the Lord with our money and our possessions, giving cannot be an afterthought. It has to be the first priority. We can't have the attitude, well, first I'll pay my bills and buy what I need and then I'm going to see how I'm doing and whether or not I can afford to give to God and how much. That dishonors God because He's the one who gave it to you in the first place. In fact, it's really not your money at all, is it? Everything that you have belongs ultimately to God because He is the Creator and the Owner and the Sovereign Majesty of this universe. He's just giving you stewardship over it. And a humble, sacrificial, selfless, Christ-exalting person is going to steward that money in such a way that honors the Lord who gave him that money. It means we'll make the service of Christ in His church the first priority for our time, for our energy, for our love, for our money. Now again, I always hate to bring money up because in this congregation, burned that reality, I think, into many of your lives. This is really an unusually generous and gracious church. Many churches have to live by the statistic that says that 20% of the people support 90% of the giving. Have you heard that? I don't think it's like that here, praise the Lord. Here, people are very generous. Here, people are very convicted that they need to honor the Lord with their wealth and their possessions. But there may be some of you who need to be convicted by God's Word that your first inclination with your money is towards yourself, and then towards Christ. And that needs to change. Maybe some of you need to be convicted that in your relationships, you're serving you and not others. And really, right, in reality, all of us need to acknowledge that our flesh is still waging war against Christ's Spirit. That none of us give with pure motives. That none of us love with pure Christ-filled hearts. We need to acknowledge our weakness and pray that God would reveal to us all of the ways in which we're sinful and in need of His transforming grace. And so this morning, know above all else, if this has been convicting for you, and it has been for me all week, know above all else that whoever you are and wherever you are, and whatever the condition of your heart in these areas is, Christ's grace is sufficient for you. And in fact, His power is perfected in your and my weakness. Do you believe that? Let's turn to Him in prayer and ask for Him to continue to grow us in His grace. Father, even though Your Word is sometimes hard for us because it rubs against our flesh, and it exposes our weakness, and it exposes our sinfulness, it exposes how far short of Your glory we fall, Father, even though that's true, we thank You for Your Word. We praise You that it is a spotlight that illuminates every recess of our hearts. And we praise You, Father, that as it does that, it doesn't leave us to our own strength, to our own means, but that it reminds us and shines into us at the same time the very grace and goodness and patience and power of Jesus Christ who would come in and transform us and clean us and sanctify us and purify us. So, Father, we place ourselves as Your children at Your mercy this morning and ask for You to do that. To make our sin known and then make Your grace known that by the power of the Gospel and Jesus Christ within us, we may be changed and transformed. That we may become more selfless. That we may become more loving. Father, that we may be known as a people for whom No sacrifice is too great in the meeting of needs of others. Father, we ask that You would turn our hearts in this direction. For Your glory and by Your grace, we pray in Jesus' name, Amen. Let's stand together and sing one of the greatest hymns that speaks to this truth that has been written. Number 585 in your hymnal. Take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to You, to Thee.