Our reading today will be from. First, from Philippians, chapter two, beginning in the fifth verse. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond servant and coming in the likeness of men. and being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross. Therefore, God also has highly exalted him and given him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of those in heaven and of those on earth and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you both to will and to do for his good pleasure. Do all things without complaining and disputing that you may become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in the world. holding fast the word of life, so that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain or labored in vain. Yes, and if I am being poured out as a drink offering on the sacrifice in service of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. For the same reason, you also be glad and rejoice with me." And I'm also going to read one verse from Matthew chapter 23, verse 12. And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, And he who humbles himself will be exalted. This is the word of the Lord. Heavenly Father, we come before you in the name of Jesus. Father, we thank you for all you've done for us. We ask for your blessing over this time as we study your word, as we hear your word, and as we prepare to obey your word. We thank you and we love you in the name of Jesus. Amen. You may be seated. We've been going through this series on Philippians. I talked to Pastor Seuss at the beginning of the year and he told me, find a book that you can go through in about five sermons. Well, you're not really doing a whole lot of justice to the book of Philippians by doing it in five sermons. But I'm breaking it apart into big sections. And so there's a lot of things that have to be left out. I'm finding it's rather difficult as I'm putting it together because I'm putting these big chunks together, skipping portions and running everything. But it's it's been interesting because getting the overview of the book is fascinating. And last week we discussed the humiliation of Christ. How Christ, who was in very nature God, humbled himself and became obedient and submitted himself to the will of his Father. Now, Paul, when he mentions this in the letter to the Philippians, is not just bringing up the point of Christ's humility. He's given us the command to follow and to do the same thing. And when he's given us the example to follow and be humble and to consider others better than ourselves, he points to the ultimate example of Jesus Christ. This is the command he's given us. He's telling us how to live and he's pointing out how we should live in a way that is worthy of the gospel of Christ. All right. The people in Philippians were among the in Philippi, they were the first converts of Paul after he became a Christian. He traveled over there. He led these people to the faith. He introduced them to the faith. And he had a deep passion and a love for them. And now here he is. He's in prison, possibly facing his death. And he's dealing with the people in Philippi. And he's wanting to make sure that they know how it is they are to live, that they are to live their lives worthy of the faith, worthy of the gospel. That's how they're to live their lives. They are told to consider others above themselves. And then this whole section here, 5 through 18, is an illustration of what that means. What does it mean to consider others above yourself? And I mentioned last week, I quoted C.S. Lewis, who said, It's thinking of yourself less. So it's not looking down at yourself and saying, wow, I'm a real dirtbag. It's looking at yourself. Actually, it's looking at others. When you take care of the needs of others, that is a humble person. I remember reading a story many years ago about Mother Teresa. Now, I know we might disagree with much of her doctrine and things like that, but she was, they had some, some people from the Western news channels were watching her in her ministry. And she walked over and she picked up this little boy that was probably three or four years old. And he was covered with leprosy, something we don't really deal with too much. And she picked him up. And she kissed his head and she wiped his head and she fed this little boy. And the person who was running the station, running the broadcast, looked and he said, I wouldn't do that for all the money in the world. And she turned and she looked at him and she says, and neither would I. Her concern was for the needs of others, and it didn't matter to her what it cost herself. Because she was walking in what Christ had shown her. She was walking in humility. She was considering the needs of others before her own needs. And this is what we're called to as Christians. The Christian life is a life of suffering. It's a life of humility. It's a life of obedience. It's a life of laying aside our dreams and lifting up one another. of pushing forward and helping others reach what it is that God has called them to reach. Remember, this is what Christ did. He was in very nature divine and he humbled himself and he became obedient to the point of the death on the cross. He had every right to rule. Except the proper path to the throne was the path of humility. And last week we discussed the way that the devil tempted Christ in the wilderness. When he came to Him in the wilderness, he didn't tempt Him with a lot of the things that you and I might be tempted with. He tempted Him with taking His rightful authority, but not waiting on the Father to do it. To do it on His own time, rather than waiting on the Father's time. Have the angels minister to you. Now, no, that's not what his time was. He was there for service. And what Satan was trying to do was trying to get him to step out from under the authority of his father, to be out on his own. It is through the path of humility and obedience that Christ walked, and it was because of that that he was given the name that is above every other name. This is what the text tells us. It says, therefore, God has given him a name that is above every other name. Paul's perfect illustration of how we are to walk of Christ Jesus. He's been encouraging the Philippians to be humble, to be submissive to the Father and to the Lord. And he appeals to this supreme example of Christ's humility. And then he points out that as Christ has humbled himself, he then is exalted. I was going through, as we were singing through our order of worship today, we read through Revelation, chapter five. And we're called to this path of service and obedience. But in Revelation, chapter five, we hear the saints and they're singing, You have made us kings and priests. before our God. You have made us kings and priests before our God. Christ's death has done that to us, but what is our path to kingship and priesthood? What does the king do? What does the priest do? He serves his fellow man. Our path is a path of service. If we are walking and we've forgotten that we're to serve one another, before everything else, then we're missing what Christ has shown us. At the name of Jesus, every knee should bow of those in heaven and of those on earth and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. This is a very familiar verse. We've heard it many times. That at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. But then it says, therefore, the next word is therefore, therefore, because of Christ's exaltation, therefore, my beloved. So he's addressing them, they're people he loved, my beloved, as you have always obeyed. So he's also recognizing that these people, these Philippians, these are a people who have walked in Christ, they've obeyed, they've walked in Christ, as you have obeyed. Not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence." And we've gone through this quite a bit. He's deeply concerned for the Philippians how they are going to react to his imprisonment. This is also part of Paul's humility. He's imprisoned and his concern is for his brothers at Philippi. Not as in my presence, but now much more in my absence. Work out your own salvation with fear, and trembling. This is one of those verses that I don't know how to say it. It kind of trips me up. Work out your salvation in fear and trembling. We know that it is God who has saved us. It is God who has called us. It is God who has redeemed us. He's done everything for us. And yet here in Philippians 2, we're told to work out our salvation, our own salvation in fear and trembling. What does this mean? Remember, these people at Philippians, they were already believers. They were the people that Paul had led to Christ when he began his ministry. And he says, work out your salvation in fear and trembling. So I looked up this word work out, and the word means to work out the implications of what it is that Christ has done in your life. Work it out. And it's a thorough working. I don't know about some of you, but some of you here have actually done gold mining. Me, not so much. It'd be fun, I think. But when you have a claim and you find out that the claim is rich, let's find out you strike a rich ore, a rich vein of gold. Do you just take a little bit of it and leave and leave the rest for others? No, you work it out. You get in there and you work it out until that place is empty. You try to get every last bit of it out of it. You work it out. You get in there and dig it out. I remember I used, now this is more my ballpark, fishing. When they're really biting and they say, hey, you ready to go? No. They're really biting. We're gonna nail as many fish as we can today. I remember I was fishing with my sister once when I was a kid and we found, I don't remember what the limit was per se, but we didn't really care. We came home and I remember we walked in the house and my mom said, what is that smell? We had fish everywhere. We had found this fishing hole, and seriously, you didn't even need bait. You dropped in a hook, you caught a fish. It was like, wow. And we had, between the two of us, and we were like 12 and 10. We had like 60 fish. And they made us clean them all. But we worked it out. We saw these fish were biting. And when we left, they weren't biting anymore. There's this little teeny pond that we found. The water had flowed over and everything else had vacated this little teeny pool. We caught a lot of fish that day. And you couldn't have got us to leave because we were excited. Work it out. Find out everything there is that God has for us. Work it out means to do the very last bit. We've been given access to the glorious Kingdom of Christ, and we must maximize the gift that has been given us, and the way it is done is by continually working out that gift. In Matthew 25, Jesus tells a parable about three men who are given different talents. One is given five, one is given two, and one is given one. The one who is given five does not sit back and say, hey, look what I have. No, he works it. And what does he do with those five? He turns it into ten. And the one who is given two doesn't sit back and say, hey, I've got my two talents. I'm content with this. And he turns the two into four. And their reward, the one who turns the five talents into ten, is given ten cities. The one who turns the two into four is given four cities. And then you have the guy who's given one talent. And I want you to notice this. All three of them were given the talents they have. They didn't go out and earn these talents. They belong to someone else. They belong to the Master. Everything we've been given, we've been given as a gift from God. And this is something we have to remember. But we've been given it not to keep it like it is. Adam was placed into a garden and he was told to tend it. He was placed into the world and he was told to keep it. He was told to take dominion over it. It wasn't to stay the way it was when he was put there. He had work to do. Likewise, we have the same thing. We have been given much by God. Everything we have, we've been given by grace and we've been given the command to work it. Work out your salvation with fear and trembling. The challenge is twofold. We're to make our Christian life all it can be. You know, it's not the army, you know, be all you can be. No, that's not. But what we're to do is there are things that Christians do. And I always like to point this out because it's amazing how many times people miss this. Theron is fond of saying, if everyone in our city became a Christian, would we notice a difference? And, you know, you'd have to say, hopefully you would say, yes, there would be a difference. Because they would run things differently. All right? If, okay, and this is fun, I always like this one. If you met a Christian and he was coming back from his weekly adultery, Would you say there's a problem there? He's not living a Christian life, right? And you would say, wow, not very Christian. And then what we do is we look at our country and people say, oh, we're a Christian nation. And I'm like, what does that mean exactly? What is a Christian nation? Well, we, you know, last year we didn't abort 1.5 million. We only aborted 1.3. I think the gospel is really working itself out. No, that's not the marks of a Christian nation. There are certain marks that Christians bear. And if we are a people who are walking according to Christ, we're going to see what that is. Paul told the people in Philippians, if you guys are walking worthy of faith, I'll know it. I'll know it because of what you're doing. I'll hear the report of it. When they were preaching the gospel in Acts, the people who made idols went out of business. The idol makers were going out of business because no one was making idols. So we can a good way to measure the growth of Christianity in a society, in a culture, amongst the people is to see how well sin triumphs. In those. Institutions, whatever they may be. The part of this verse that I find very intriguing is we're told to work out our salvation with fear. trembling. And I tried to picture what that is, fear and trembling, and I kept comparing that with another scripture in the Bible where it says, be anxious for nothing, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. And I was running those two against each other, be anxious for nothing, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. Now, they're both the word of God. And so I had to think about, what does it mean to work out your salvation with fear and trembling? And I got to thinking about what anxiety is versus fear and trembling. One of the things we should always keep in mind is that it is God who is in control. If God's in control, anxiety really shouldn't be too much of a problem, right? And yet, we are to fear God But we're not to fear other things. The Lord said He would never leave us or forsake us. I often think we don't believe that. I think that's one of those things where we love to quote that Scripture when someone else is really going through it. But when we're going through it, we ignore that Scripture. We don't believe it. We, anxiety. I can remember, I remember an incident when I was a boy. We lived in Carlin, Nevada. I know you know where that is. My dad used to take me out deer hunting with him. I was too young to hunt. I was too young to hold the gun. I was, I was pretty young, but I felt big. I felt important. Why? Because I was with my dad and we would hunt. He would hunt. I would follow him and make noise. But I was excited just to be there with dad. And I remember one of the things I would do is I would, I couldn't keep up with him because he had these big huge stripes. And we were in this area out the Ruby Mountains. I don't know if we were there. We're out there and we're hunting and dad is walking and he's taking these big steps. And I'm watching his footprints in the ground. And I'm going like this, trying to stay with him, you know, because I can't do it. And I'm following his footprints. And I'm not really watching him. I'm watching his footsteps. And I came around this corner. We were like in this canyon. I came around this corner and the dirt was gone and there was like shale on the ground. And so his footprints were gone. And I looked up. This is very vivid to me because I remember this fear. I looked up and he was gone. And have you guys ever panicked? You know the panic feeling? Theron was talking to me the other day. He said he remembers looking around once and his daughter was missing and she shouldn't have been there in that instant. Where is she? You know, this panic. That's exactly what I felt at that moment because I was alone. I was afraid. There were no more footprints. I was out in the middle of the wilderness. I was going to die. And I was only six or seven. And my dad remembers this pretty vividly, too, because he was standing two feet from me, behind me. And he said, I was standing there, and I just went, dad, dad, dad! Because it was one of those instantaneous moments of absolute fear. And he said, son? I don't know if you've been there, but he was right there the whole time. He was right there the whole time. And I was alone. But I wasn't. Sometimes I think that's where we are in our Christian walk. We think we're out there alone. And he's right there. He's right there with us. It tells us to work out this salvation in fear and trembling. And then it says, for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure. So in spite of the times you feel alone, the times you feel afraid, know that God is there. Know that He's there. There's no need to be anxious, if you will. This week, the last three days have been days of anxiousness for me over something really stupid. Some of you might not think it's stupid, but seriously, yesterday, I'm supposed to be finishing up the final touches on my message. I've been working on it. And all I can think about is, where is my Kindle? Seriously, if you see it, let me know. I still don't know. Okay? I set it down somewhere. It's gone. And yesterday I'm sitting there putting this message together and I'm trying to read the Bible. Where's your Kindle, Mike? Where's your Kindle? And I'm just like... Okay? This anxiety that drives us, you know, this is not the thing we're supposed to be anxious for. All right? But when it comes to obedience to God and doing his will, do that with fear and trembling. The responsibility that is laid before us is awesome. It's massive. Revelation five says he's made us kings and priests before him. The way we do that is through service and we become kings and priests by serving in a proper way. And we're not only serving Christ, we're serving one another. He is our companion. He is with us working out our salvation. It is God who is working in us. He works to will. And what this means is He reveals His will to us and coax us into adopting His will as our own. Have you guys ever come to a point in your life where your will and God's will conflict? Seriously, none of you? Wow, you guys should be up here. His will is here. Your will is here. And they conflict. And it's funny the way we try to rationalize why our will should win. No, seriously, God, I do know what I'm doing here. I got this handled. When His will and our will conflict, we need to submit our will to His will. Because in doing that, that is the way in which He raises us up to do. He does not only teach us His will, but He also gives us the energy and the empowerment to do it. It's one thing to know the will of God. How many of you have ever known the will of God and you've looked at it and you want to do it, but you just say, I can't? I don't have the ability. He works his will into us to will it and to do it. He gives us what we need to accomplish what he has placed before us. God doesn't just save us and leave us to sort out his will. He moves us. He moves in our lives and brings us to the point where we can do what he's called us to do. Now, because of this, He gives us a series of commands. And so how can we measure if we're walking the way God has told us to? Well, this is where it gets exciting. So listen, and you guys, I had to go through this all week as I was putting this together, so I'm marking marks against myself. Do all things without complaining and disputing. Okay. Do you guys know that's a command? Do all things without complaining We're to do all things without complaining and disputing. Anyone here like to complain? We're to do all things without complaining and disputing. Now, disputing here, it's interesting. Last week we talked about striving. This disputing is, the word there is a, in the Greek, the word is, interesting word, It means hesitation and doubt. This refers to doubting God's promise and hesitating at His commands. In 1 Timothy 2.8, it's translated doubting. Doubting what God has said. Thus causing us to dispute. And the dispute here, the terms of this is we argue with God. So stop complaining. Stop disputing. Now, complaining is one of those ones that always cracks me up. You guys all know people that like to complain, right? Maybe you're one of them, I don't know. Well, some people, they really get excited when they can complain about something. They're in their element. But here's some of the ways I've heard complaints. And children do this more than adults, but I've heard adults do it too. But this is one of my favorites. Everything's doing something, and what they do is they come up to you and they tell you, I'm bored. And what they're wanting you to do, they're bored, they're telling you, hey, take care of it. Right? Is that what they're doing? I'm bored. Give me something to do. Now, usually that's children, sometimes adults. They're wanting you to take care of them. Alright? Now, what are they not doing when they're doing that? I'm bored. They're not considering others above themselves. Because if you're bored, you're wanting something done to entertain you. Right? Generally. You're looking for a way to be entertained. I was talking to someone just yesterday, a friend of mine. Some of you know him. And I was talking to him and he's trying to get certain people, certain people he knows and cares for need to be in church. And they know they need to be in church, but they don't go. You guys ever meet someone like that? They know they should be there, but they always make excuses, always come up with reasons as to why not. And one of the things they said was, you know, there's really nothing there for me. Anyone ever heard someone say that? So what are they doing? Let's analyze it. What they're doing is they're going to church primarily for themselves. Did you guys know one of the great reasons you should go to church is because you minister to the needs of others? I cannot tell you the times that different individuals in this congregation have came up to me on a Sunday and told me just the right thing. Right? And I appreciate that. And they may not know it. They may not know, but what are they doing? They're ministering to the body of Christ. They're serving by coming up and encouraging me. You're serving. You're considering me above yourself. I know sometimes you probably don't want to come up and talk to me. I can't blame you, I guess. But we consider others above ourselves. The greatest example of this I can think of, I used my grandpa as an example last week about the time when he put me in my place because I was out of line. But I remember when I was about 15 or 16 years old, my grandpa, my actual, My blood grandfather passed away, my grandma remarried, and I really got along with the guy she remarried, Grandpa Ken. In fact, he's probably the person in my family I look the most like. Shelly can laugh because she knows this. He's short, has a big beard, kind of chubby. And everyone else in my family, believe it or not, is tall. I don't know what happened. But grampy, short, big gray beard. And at the time I was 15, I didn't have a big gray beard. I had a little beard, but we still got along and they always gave me a bad time. So I was always going up to him and we were having fun with each other. One particular Sunday, I went up to him before church and I was giving him, I was wanting to ask him a question. And he didn't have time for me. Okay? I don't remember exactly what he said, but whatever he said, it was really apparent he didn't have time to talk to me. And then he walked off. And instantly, I got hurt. You guys ever have someone do just something real small, and all of a sudden you're hurt and you're ready to lash out at everyone? Now, I'm not saying this was a good thing, but I got my feelings hurt, and then someone else came up and said something to me, and I lashed out at them. You see the reaction there, okay? He didn't treat me the way I thought he should treat me. I lashed out at him. And Dad said something to me later, and I said, well, Grampy's just being bleh. And I don't remember what I said. It probably wasn't very nice. And I said, Grandpa, he's just being this way. And my dad jumped all over me. And he said, How can you be so selfish? He said, You don't know what he's going through this morning. And he just turned around and went to talk to someone else. And you got all hurt. And you've been behaving like a regular heathen because of that. And what he meant by a regular heathen is all I was concerned about was myself. What was going on? And I didn't know at the time. Grampy had to preach that day, and his mind was not with me. He was getting ready for the message, and so he ignored me, and I took it as, well, he's just being a jerk. And so I felt that gave me the right to treat everyone bad. Listen, people. In dealing with one another, there are going to be times When people in this congregation are going to rub you the wrong way, you have a choice. Do you consider them above you or do you get hurt and allow relationships to be fractured? Do you allow division to come in because you got your feelings hurt? We are to consider others above ourselves. That's what he tells us there. Consider others above yourself. Don't complain. This is a command. Complaining is not the mark of someone who is serving others. Complaining is the mark of someone... Hey, I know sometimes we're wronged. Was Christ wronged? Did He complain? Did he grumble? No, he didn't. And that's who our example, that's who we're to be. Verse 15 says that you may become blameless and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights in the world, that you may become blameless and harmless. Blameless means no one can point a finger at you. Romans 16, 19, Paul writes, I want you to be wise in what is good and simple concerning evil. We should be focusing on what is the good, on what God's will is for us. Not focusing on the evils that are done to us and the evils that are around us. We need to be lifting one another up. Wise in what is good. That type of life, the life that considers others above themselves, that serves Christ, will stand in stark contrast to the standard of the world. And notice what the standard of the world is. I like the word there. Perverse generation, a crooked and perverse generation. In Acts 2, verse 40, when When Peter is preaching after the Holy Spirit has fallen at Pentecost, he says, and with many words he exhorted them, saying, save yourself from this untoward, or some translations say, or this perverse generation. Save yourself from this perverse generation. You're not saving yourself from the perverse generation when you're behaving the same way they do, when you're walking in the same way they do. We're walking according to a different standard. And it says, if we do this, we will shine as lights in the world. I was reading an illustration about C.S. Lewis this week, and he was he was sitting at his desk and he noticed a small ray of light that was shining down on his desk. A small ray of light. And he was staring at it, and he was marveling, and he was watching the dust kind of circle through this ray of light. And he was looking through it, this little light, and it captivated him. He was in this one room, and this one ray of light captivated him. And then as he turned and he got a different angle at the light, this one ray of light was coming from the sun, and it was coming through a crack in the door. It was just a little bit of light. But when it shone into this room, it got every bit of attention in the room because it was so bright. It drew people to it. If we are living the life that Christ has called us to do, it says that we will shine out. We will shine out as lights in a dark place. When I was about, we went to, I mentioned Carlin, Nevada earlier. How many of you have ever been to Ely, Nevada? Wow, that place is a pit. We went there when I was a kid and outside of Ely, Nevada, there's a place called the Lehman Caves. And I remember we went into these caves and The way these caves were found, the guy was walking along and he stepped in a hole in the ground and fell into the cave and whoa, discovery! And somehow he got out. I mean, he didn't have light or anything. While we were exploring these caves, they went down in there. It's been a long time since I went there. But one of the things they did, and any of you guys who have ever been in a cave know what I'm talking about. They do this in a lot of these cave journeys. You're in the middle of the cave, and the guy says, OK, we're going to show you what it was like when Mr. Lehman discovered this cave the first time. And they shut off the light. And it was dark. We're not talking mildly dark. It was as black as could be. You couldn't see anything. It was terrifying to, again, this is one of those situations. Dad was standing there next to me, the lights went off and it was dead quiet. And I yelled out, turn on the lights. Because I was terrified. OK, but notice, and when they turn on the light, the only light in that whole large cavern was the light that the guy had on his hat. And when he turned it on, everything changed. One light in a dark place is amazing. And we're called to be this light. And the way we are that light is by serving one another. As Christ served, it says, He has been given a name that is above every other name. That in the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow on heaven, on earth, and under the earth. That in the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. We're called to emulate Him. And as we emulate Him in service, then what is said in Revelation chapter 5 also becomes true. We are made kings and priests before Him to serve in the kingdom of Christ. As we do this, we're going to see the light continue to grow and the darkness will begin to fade. Christ has called us to a task that is huge. but we cannot shirk from it. We must do what we're called to do. As He was exalted and He was crowned with many crowns, we're going to close and we're going to be singing, Crown Him with Many Crowns. But let us pray in closing and then we're going to sing that. Heavenly Father, we come before You in the name of Jesus. Father, You have given us the command to walk in the way that you walked, to work out our salvation in fear and trembling. And Lord, right now, we ask that you would be with us and guide us and direct us and help us as we do this. We love you and we thank you in the name of Jesus. Amen.