Good morning, and God bless you. Turn in your Bibles to the book of 1 Thessalonians, and chapter 2. Last week we looked at verses 1 and 2, and we talked about invincible courage, where if we have this right message of the gospel, the right motive of loving people, the right method of loving people, the right motive of pleasing God, that we know that No matter what's happening to us, that until our mission is accomplished, that we are invincible. But when it's our time to die, praise the Lord, because that means He's just calling us home. And the mission of God is not over when my mission for God on earth is done. And His eternal mission for me is not done when the earthly mission is done. Amen? So if we stand for the reading of God's words, we'll read Chapter 2, verse 3 and 4, and we'll title today's message, The Losers Who Know God. It's not what you think. And yet again, it is if you know Jesus. The losers who know God. for our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel so we speak not to please man but to please God who tests our hearts prove your word today to your people and those that are your people but are not yet converted, bring them to faith. Those that are but are turned the wrong way, turn them around. Those that are running hard thereafter, help them catch a greater glimpse of you today. Those that are falling down, help them back up and know that it's not how hard we hold on to you, but that you hold on to us. That matters. Lord help us to have new eyes that we would see with your eyes what victory and what winning in the kingdom really is that this world and how we are in it does not define us but rather who you made us to be who you are making us to be and who we are going to be help us to mature in our Lord Jesus Christ for we pray this in his name amen What is winning? What is losing? What is victory? What is, you know, loss? Well, how you define those terms depends on what endeavor you're talking about. like games or sports and sometimes it's not what you see because like in the NASCAR playoffs this afternoon they're down to the final eight and somebody else that's not in the playoffs but is still racing might win the race but and somebody else might get more points and all that what they did is good for their career and all that but they're not actually moving towards the final four Right? And in the final four race, it's just one race. And it's not the person that wins that wins the overall title. It's of those last four who finishes the highest, regardless of any of the other points. And different sports do it different ways. And there are different things with different games where it looks like you may be losing, but you are actually winning. Right? And it's that way in life too. Too often people worship strength and what they think is performance and numbers and nickels and noses and things like that we talk about. In some things, winning is not a competition, it's a category. Are you a winner? You know, commercials will do that. You're a winner if you buy a car here. You're a winner if you have this. You're a winner if this or that or, you know. And we think that in high school and middle school, whoever's going out with the captain of the football team or the captain of the cheerleaders or this or that or the desirable ones and not as desirable ones and they're the winners and they're the losers and all that and they have this little thing and I play jokes with my granddaughters and I go, na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na. Because I'm trying to teach them something, that how the world and how people try to define you is not how God defines you, and not what He says is most important. So we're going to look at that, and yes, it comes from this text. So again, sometimes winning is not a competition, but a category, like being a winner at life. So let's just call this success. And when it comes, to being a Christian, maturing as a Christian, and ministering as a Christian, what the world says is success is not necessarily what God says is success. You know, I read articles all the time and they talk about, well, you know, maybe, you know, in a smaller church, or this, that, and you think, you're just not as good a communicator, and I say hogwash. The best preacher out there in the world is someone not many people know. This is God's purview. What God says. Popularity does not determine what is pleasing to God. Now there are people pleasing God that might have great popularity. My friend John MacArthur would be one of those. One of the greatest expositors of the last half century and into this century and been there at Grace Community Church since 1969. Right? There's lots of people that have big churches and they can be good and people that have small churches and they can be good and vice versa. Just because they have a small church, maybe they just are stinky. Well, I need this message today, and I need it because, you know, when things happen to you, and you think, I'm just losing, you might be winning. Sometimes you feel like you're being buried, but you're actually being planted. And sometimes God is using you. Have you considered my servant Job? to be an example for other people and a model for other people. And I know I kind of go off on this tangent or whatever, but it's not. It's in the text. It's the life of a loser which is in Christ a winner. Think about Jesus on the cross. We talked about it. We sang it. today where he's fire from his eyes and all these things yeah yeah yeah and then the next verse says well and then he is with a crown of thorns behold the king of the universe with broken hands and a bleeding side right and so we have the wrong pictures many times jesus said the first will be last and the last will should be first ladies listen to that carefully we have to submit we have to do this think think now And what the world says, even the Christian world, oh, they were this in life, so now they should be a big Christian celebrity, really. I like the ones that were somebody you don't hear from anymore, but they're still living faithfully. I could name some, you know some. Hmm. So what the world says is success. Especially, why do they get to determine what's Christian success? Hello? Who are you trying to be friends with? What are you trying to do? What you win people with is what you win them to. And you win them with, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. Well, then they can get that anywhere. See, the visible church often makes the same mistake of measuring success in the same way the world does, in terms of strength, influence, numbers, and popularity. But what does God say? Not just what I say, not just because, well, we're a little church and all that, and I'm a little old man, and I'm all mad about it or something like that. Forget all that. What does God say? Isn't that what matters? Absolutely what matters what the Bible is trying to teach us and how does God define success? We read it this morning. Listen again to Jeremiah 9 23 and 24 Thus says the Lord let not the wise man boast in his wisdom and then say don't have it Let not the mighty man boast in his mind Let not the rich man boast in his riches, but let him who boasts boast in this that he understands and knows me God defines success as knowing Him. And of course, there's a lot of people, I know Him, I know Him, look how I'm blessed, oh boy, oh boy. Doesn't Jesus say at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, they'll come and say, didn't we do this, didn't we do this, didn't we do this? And He's gonna go, I don't know you. Of course, He does know them, but He doesn't know them in a saving fashion. Have you ever done that? You think everything is going great so God must be blessing me. I must be going the right way. And you knew right well you were not. And God was giving you mercy. And sometimes if your success grows and your anointing seems to grow and your character doesn't, that anointing will crush you. Samson, Saul, Solomon, think about it. But anyway, God defines success as knowing Him. And so the better you know God, the more successful you are in God's eyes. And God's eyes are the eyes that matter. Amen? Now the Apostle Paul also defines success as knowing God. We read also this morning Philippians 3, 4 through 10. And we'll refer again to it later. And there Paul makes it plain that he gained all this stuff before knowing Jesus and it was nothing compared to knowing Jesus. His pedigree, his passion, his performance had made him the ultimate winner in life. That's why God used Paul as an example to break him all the way down to make him in what he wanted to be. So if you think I'm this great thing and I'll do these great things for Jesus or I can't do great things for Jesus till I do these great things. Oh really? If God can get a donkey to talk. I could have said the donkeys who know God. But his pedigrees, passion, performance had made him the ultimate winner in life. But he realized that all these things were skubalon, which means trash and it means worse than that. Garbage compared to a true, intimate, growing knowledge of God. And so he was willing to lose it all. for the sake of Christ. And we saw that he actually did lose everything. He lost his reputation. He lost his position. He lost his authority. He got put down to nothing. And at first, those people that he had come to be with and be the apostle of the Gentiles, they rejected him! And then the Jews went back on him as we were talking about today and as have we been talking about in the book of First Thessalonians because they thought he was great. But the Jews that were unbelieving were saying no he's doing this to get money. He's doing this to get favors. We'll read that today. He's just wandering around making this stuff up. And Paul knew better how we supposed to deal with that. What happens to you. That's what we're talking about today. And Paul realized that if Jesus is God, and Jesus died to save me, then no sacrifice I have to make is too much for him. Wow! I don't mean that, I mean you. Jesus is God, amen? Jesus died to save me from my sins, amen? So what can he ask me to do that's too much for me to do? I just can't worship him unless, you know... Lord, I won't worship you until this is over. Until you get me out of this. That's the exact opposite. And I don't mean to beat you up with this, I mean to put wind in your sails, but when you see examples of this, it's helpful. In the loss of losing, you know, in the losing of other things, Paul gained a knowledge of God. He lost in order to win. It got harder for him to make it easier to see God. We think it's the other way around, don't we? Don't we? Hmm. As we said in our last message, Paul had an invincible courage because no matter what he might lose, he was still going to win. You can take my life, but you can't take my soul. I don't fear him that can kill the body. I fear him that can kill and destroy my soul in hell. And that's the Lord. Jesus is in hell. In case you didn't know, he's everywhere. Hell is not the absence of God. Hell is the presence of God. That's what makes it hell. And in hell, it's going to be Him frowning on you. In heaven, it's going to be Him smiling on you. All roads do lead to God. They do. Which God are you going to meet? Now, Paul had this invincible courage. And you use a title like that, and people go, oh, come on, come on. No. He was willing to die. And he lost his life. But before he even lost it, he was dying daily. He said, I die daily. To his own self-interest. No matter what he might lose, he was still going to win. Those who are willing to lose for Jesus are winners in God's eyes. And Paul was teaching the Thessalonians what it means to be a loser who knows God. Doesn't matter what other people say, man, it's what God says. And what does God say? His Word reveals that. Now look at the first part of the first verse there. For our appeal does not spring from error. Now when the Apostle Paul says, our, in this text and in this passage, and we, he's referring to himself, Silas and Timothy. Remember Paul and Silas had gone in and made many converts and they got kicked out because the religious people of that area were saying look if they keep talking about a king other than Caesar they're going to take our free status away from Rome is going to come and crush us. And so they made him pledge money. One Jason a friend of theirs and said if he comes back in you're losing your house you're losing your life. So what did Paul do? He sent Timothy, who had not been there, to check on him. And Timothy said, as we saw in verse one, chapter one, wow, we don't have to do anything. These people, God has gotten a hold of these people. They're getting persecuted and all that, but they're still following Jesus. The power of the Holy Spirit is evident. They've turned from their idols, turned to the living God. It was a trade route. They're telling everybody on the way, you got to have some Jesus. So he was happy. So why is he talking about defending his, why does he say our appeal doesn't do this? They already knew this. Because you need to know what to do when people are at you. You can pray for mercy upon them. Pray for grace so that they can learn. Realize that when you see something in somebody else, it's because you got it in front of yourself. Jesus said, before you go... He didn't say don't do it. Before you go and take that stick out of your own eye, or out of somebody else's eye, take that log out of your own. That's why you see it. You know, a quarter can block out the sun. You got that right? So Paul is saying, look, this is going to happen to you. It happened to me. It keeps happening to me. It happened to John the Baptist. It happened to our Lord Jesus. You're not going to be any different because Jesus said so. Now when he says us, he means, you know, this group. But I'll shorten it down to Paul. Paul had apparently been accused of teaching falsehood and heresy. This would be this passive idea of error when it says, does not spring from error. Planos, planies, there's words there where we get the English word for planet. They said he was like, you know, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. He's just sailing off into anywhere and just making this stuff up. They would be like, okay, if I had my eyes closed, and I didn't know this room, and I'm wandering around, I hit a chair here, I fall down here and all that, that's the air he's talking about. Now if my eyes were open, but you, but it was, And I knew the area, but you didn't, and I started pushing you into chairs and all that. That's the other side. This is spring from attempt to deceive. So there's this other thing of just walking around. You got no Old Testament. You got nothing. Don't you have people doing that now? They call themselves prophets, and they're saying things that aren't in the Bible. They're wandering around like aimless stars. But it sounds so exciting. It's exciting to know that they're wrong. Yeah. Everything Paul did was anchored in the Old Testament. The revelation he was getting, he always put back in the Old Testament. They were accusing him of not because, you know, they didn't have a printing press, not everybody had the Bible, and people were ignorant of the biblical truth, and it shouldn't be that way today, but... Oh, they're such a man of God. No, they're not. Oh, there's so many names, but you ought to know what they are and who they are. Not to beat them up, but to avoid them. But Paul had been accused of falsehood and heresy. And again that's a passive idea of error. As in roaming around with no guide. The unbelieving Jews were saying Paul was wandering from the truth of what we call the Old Testament. Of course it wasn't true of Paul. He always showed how the Old Testament connected with and confirmed the truths he was teaching. Romans 4 when he's talking about faith and works. Or Galatians 4 remember he used Hagar and Sarah and their children Isaac and Ishmael and showing Right? From the Old Testament. The sovereignty of God and the plan of God and works versus faith. And works coming from faith or thinking that works give you faith. Maybe you should check those out. Paul wasn't setting sail into the soil of his own imagination and making his doctrine up. His New Testament doctrine was anchored in the Old Testament revelation. Now, tragically, many people today seem to think that spontaneous means spiritual. I mean, you can be spontaneous. I'm praying, and I'm praying for somebody this morning, and they said something, and some illustration came to my head, and all that, and, you know, I get it. People get excited because the guy's running around, and he's doing all this. I'm trying to teach you something, whether you go to this church or not. Too many people are ignorant of biblical truth so they love what sounds new and exciting even when you can't find it in the Bible. Or they use Bible verses and passages to twist them to say what they don't mean. Or even when one biblical truth is emphasized in a way that invalidates another biblical truth. That's one to watch for. That's not the truth. That's error. And that wasn't Paul. Amen. That's what he's trying to say. Now they already knew that. But he was saying, how are you going to do this when it comes to you? Don't let ad hominem attacks and straw men and all these logical fallacies say, what is it that you say? There's a guy out there running for president now and all the youngins are excited about him and they ought not to be. And he said something, you know, everybody on this stage but me is bought and paid for. And I would have said, that's right, I'm bought and paid for. Bought with the precious blood of Christ who paid for my sins and you're saying you're not? And when you mention God, you're talking about an amorphous God. My God has a name, his name is Jesus. You gotta be careful, just because you do this, get that thing out of here. But he's young like us, so what? He's short like me, he's Jewish like me, you know. It's what they're saying, it doesn't matter what you bring to the table if you can't put it on the plate. And it doesn't matter what's on the plate if you can't put it in your mouth. So Paul was saying, I'll put my money where my mouth is. Look at the Old Testament. Because Jesus did the same thing. He goes, it's John 539. And he said, search the scriptures, because that's where you think you have eternal life. And they're pointing to me. And when he rose again, and the two on the road to Emmaus in Luke chapter 24 said, we thought that you were going to redeem Israel and make all this happen. And he goes, haven't you read the scriptures? And he showed them what everything that pointed to him was, how the whole Old Testament points to Jesus. Maybe they just didn't have it all put together like that. But Jesus puts it all together for us. Amen. He is the embodiment. He is the Logos. The Word of God. In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God. And the Word was God. Nothing that was made wasn't made with him. Did he make himself? He's self-existent. He is God But they were saying you're going away from this revelation. You're just doing whatever you want to do He's like that's not me and you guys know it and then he says our appeal look at the third phrase there because he says our appeal does not spring from air impurity or any attempt to deceive and Because you look at the wandering around, the passive area, and then the attempting to deceive, leading with guile. And then what the motive is, is what they put in the middle there. The impurity. I'll explain this. He says, our appeal does not spring from any attempt to deceive. That would be actually guiding others with guile. It would be like using bait to snare people into your scheme. I mention the 70s a lot because I grew up in the 70s. And one of the things that they used to do was called flirty fishing. And they would get the cute girls to ask the boys to go to church. And it worked like crazy. But this one girl can't be seeing 17 guys. I don't think. But you get my point? And if we win them with gimmicks and things like that and all that and just, it's a fresh, it's a fresh word. I want the old word. I want God to take what seems like stale old bread and to put new life on it. You know, because it's the same God that breathed it out that breathes it in. Tozer said something like that. The same God that breathed that out breathed on us now that we might understand it once again. So Paul's opponents would have said he's using his message to manipulate people into doing what he wanted. And they were saying that Paul wanted was to satisfy his own sinful passion. So either they were saying, you've got this error, you know, you're just wandering around the dark and making stuff up. And he's like, no, no, no, no. That's not me and you know it. Then they're saying, you know, you know what you're doing, but you're using this to get what you want. You're steering people in the wrong direction because you have an agenda. Now, what was that agenda? He says, our appeal does not spring from impurity. See, he's mentioning this. They know that. The Thessalonians were good with him. But he said, this is the kind of thing that you're going to have to deal with. Impurity. This is talking about perversion and uncleanness, like sexual immorality and greed. This is what the pagan priests were doing. When you read about temple prostitutes and you read background to Corinthians and the temple of Athena and all that, it wasn't regular people going there and paying for the girls. It was the guys leading the thing, saying, you want to be closer to God, hang out with us. And then making them their harem. And so they were saying is, and you think you know God, and you were a religious leader, Paul, you're worse than the pagans and their priests. They knew better than that. Paul didn't go there and start hanging out with all the chicks. Right? No. That's what the pagan priests were doing. So since Paul was a Jew and a former religious leader, he was being, again, accused of being worse than the pagans and their priests. And the Apostle Peter said, that's right. Not that what Paul's doing, but that's exactly what false teachers do. He describes in the same way as those who use Christianity as a pretense for perversion and greed. Are you on the lookout for it today? Send me 1995 and I will tell you how to, oh. Selling Jesus. I mean the worker is worthy of his hire. You know you want to help support me if I'm gonna read the Bible and talk to you guys all day every day. Okay. But if I start flying planes out of here. And I put international, and I start wearing orange and checkered. You know what I'm saying. Come on. But it's more subtle than that. But listen to what Peter says. In 2 Peter 2.2, many will follow their sensuality. Verse 3, and in their greed they will exploit you with false words. You're never going to, if you just have enough faith, you'll never have to suffer. That's the exact opposite, I haven't even really gotten there yet, of what we're teaching today. If you can just do this, I can tell you, your days of being in debt are over! I don't know how much do you owe. Verse 10, 2 Peter 2, those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion. Verse 14, they have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. Verse 14 again, they have hearts trained in greed. Verse 15, they love gain from wrongdoing. Verse 18, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh. Verse 19, they themselves are slaves of corruption. But in verse 5 of 1 Thessalonians 2, Paul says this wasn't him. For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed. God is witness. Paul wasn't wandering off God's path. He wasn't attempting to deceive people. He wasn't trying to satisfy his sinful passions. Of course, if him just saying that, but they knew, he keeps saying, you know, you know, you saw, God is witness. Because a lot of people say, and I mean, you know, Jesus is Lord, and I'm not trying to do it for the money. Well, you know, what's his name? The president said, I'm not a crook. And all of us that are my age and older know exactly who we're talking about. And remember how he resigned the next day. Again, Paul wasn't wandering off God's path. He wasn't attempting to deceive people. He wasn't trying to satisfy sinful passion. He was committed to God's truth, and his motive was to please God, as you can see there in verse 4. That's why he was approved by God. I mean, imagine someone coming in and saying, I have been approved by God. I am an apostle. Oh. Even the kids get that, they know, like, oh, give me a break. Exactly. Give me a break. But here is the Holy Spirit helping him to pen these words. We have been approved. It means Paul, Silas, and Timothy have been approved by God. That's a big statement. I mean if Shaquille O'Neal came in here now and said I'm seven foot two and three hundred sixty pounds you wouldn't go well you big braggart you're just this. It's just the facts. Right. Someone come in and do it. He says the proof is in the pudding. We have been approved by God. Paul, Silas, and Timothy were not self appointed ministers. They were not teaching error. And Paul wasn't simply making this stuff up as he went along and calling it the anointing. Or being led by the Spirit. Oh my. Just because someone says that doesn't mean that's happening. What are they saying about the truth? Not going from this verse over here and over here. How about staying down in one passage and bringing it out instead of reading in? We've got some work to do to learn, don't we? Who's tired of getting fooled? Now wouldn't it be terrible if I'm fooling you and I'm the one saying that? Does that get me off the hook? No. Test all things. Hold that which is good. If it can't stand scrutiny, it can't stand. That's in this book 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 by the way. So Paul, Silas, and Timothy were not self-appointed ministers. They weren't teaching error. Paul wasn't making this stuff up and calling it the anointing or being led by the Spirit. He wasn't using the gospel as a pretext for money and he was not using whatever it took to get the people to do what he wanted and justifying that in the name of God. By the way it's going to get even more exciting here in a little bit if you just hold on. Will you hold on amen? Somebody? They weren't justifying falsehood and doing what they want in the name of God. Rather, Paul, Silas, and Timothy had been tested by God, and proven by God, and so sealed with God's approval. Now how do we know that that's true? What was going on where he could say that? Was it because he was popular? Well, he had some popularity, but Jesus had popularity until he said, eat of my flesh, drink of my blood, you have no life in you in John chapter 6. Then what happened? It says, many of his disciples walked away. And it says 5,000 that he fed there, but that'd be about 15,000 men, women, and children. And almost all of them walked away. Almost all of them, because he says to the disciples, are you also going away? Think about what that was like. Who looked like a loser then? Jesus. You had all these people and you lost them all. What a backdoor revival that was, pastor. Come on. We have more revivals in this church than any church I've ever been in. Some are my own fault. Some are my fault because it's God's fault. Amen. Paul's many trials as a minister of the gospel demonstrated his genuineness as a guardian of the gospel. Ah, that's what it was. It wasn't his popularity. It was the fact that he was persecuted. Not just that he was persecuted, but that he persevered even though. Not staying stubbornly with a false message, but staying with the message they knew that was God. He didn't change! His bold action, despite what happened to him in Philippi, that was verse 2, that was last week, even though we were shamefully treated at Philippi. He doesn't mean by the Philippian converts, he meant by the people, the Jews and others that put him in jail. Remember he prayed in the jail, Acts chapter 16? And he was going to pray and praise God no matter if he got let out or not. He just happened to get let out. And he didn't change his message. He didn't change his method. He didn't change his motive. He stayed with it. So his bold action, he said, I'm going to do the same thing. I'm just doing what I did in Philippi and what I got to do everywhere. Remember we read Acts chapter 20. I know this, that everywhere I go, there's going to be trouble waiting because the Holy Spirit has told me that. And you see the proof of that. And he said that's the proof of his approval. Now some people are just getting, you know, I mean, they went off and stole money and did this, that, and the other thing. Well, they're getting disapproved for the right reasons. That's not persecution. That's consequences. Despite what happened in Philippi, he had bold action, and that was an example of his tested and proven steadfastness. Now, I'm starting to get to the point about losing, because he would look like a loser. He got kicked out of town, again. Put into prison, again. Lots of people coming after him saying, don't listen to this guy, again. Don't we look and we try to find out how many hits there are on YouTube and that's the one that we should listen to? Or we see the one that seems all secret and ooh, that's the one we listen to? That's the same thing. That's the error. First time you see something like that, ask them what church they go to. Well, they... You can't lead if you can't follow. God's not trying to create leaders. or a leader. He's trying to create followers. Jesus said, lead me. No. He said, follow me. And Paul said, follow me as I follow Christ. And he's saying, look, this is what happened to me. Look how I'm processing this. This is what you need to do. And it's about being willing to lose for Jesus. Not doing it. You ain't got to be beaten, burdened, bare and broke. The person that has the least amount of money is the most spiritual? No. Just like the person that's in the greatest shape is not the most spiritual? No. We need people on every facet, every plane of life, because there's people that we're witnessing to that will hear that, because they haven't learned yet to hear it everywhere. So sometimes God allows people to be incredibly successful that are telling the right message, but that's not the telltale sign. It was not popularity that demonstrated God's approval of him. It was suffering, persecution, and then his continued perseverance that demonstrated God's approval of him. 2 Corinthians 10, 18, where it's not the one who commends himself who's approved, but the one whom the Lord commends. And we say, well, how does he do it? What happened to Paul, who wrote those very verses there? Hebrews 5, 4, and no one takes his honor for himself. Of course, they do, but it doesn't mean, in reality, they can. No one takes his honor for himself, but only when called by God, just as Aaron was. Now, the Christian minister is not a priest like Aaron, but all ministers, all Christians, should be God-called people, and not people who simply push themselves into the ministry, or think they've got something to say. Well, you might. But take a number. Now look at the next phrase. 2. We have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel. Entrusted with the gospel. Paul knew his role. 1 Timothy 1 11. In accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I've been entrusted. Titus 1 3. And at the proper time manifested in his word through the preaching with which I have been entrusted by the command of God our Savior. Paul's method, if you read verse 7 through 9 there, and verse 11 and 12 in 1 Thessalonians 2, and we're going to get to those in the coming weeks, Paul's method was to love people. Love is love. Water is water. Go drink out of the toilet. It's just a piece of paper. Give me all your money. You're doing the right thing, sister. speaking the truth, living the truth, and not using the truth for his own ends. His method came from his message and his motive. He knows that God gave him the mission to spread the message of the gospel, so his motive was to please God. We're almost done. Do you see that? The phrase is right there, but now we're getting to the point. So we speak, not to please man, but to please God. Paul's method was to love people, but listen, loving them didn't mean he simply gave the people what they wanted. He gave them what God wanted. He didn't love them by redefining terms, compromising truth, and the name of pastoral care and going along to getting along Paul's mission wasn't pragmatic his motive wasn't to achieve popularity his mission was spreading and living the gospel and his motive was pleasing God Galatians 1 10 For am I now seeking the approval of man or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, hear that, if I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ. Did you notice that Paul said, and I emphasize, if I were still trying to please man. You see, you have to learn to be purposeful. God pleaser. It is an automatic and not everybody's an automatic people pleaser. But we've got to learn not to be obstinate and stubborn and mean and all that. I'm pleasing God, not men. Take it up with God. Oh, Paul wasn't like that. He said I was like a nursing mother. I was like a little baby. I was like a doting father. We'll see that in the coming verses in the coming weeks. But you've got to learn to discern what's the voice of God through other people helping you figure out what's really going on being corrected being confirmed and what's just confusion and condemnation. And that takes knowing God. And sometimes you have to let go of your own wisdom to do that. Sometimes you have to let go of your prestige and your you know your. Sometimes you got to lose to win. It's not automatic. Paul loved people by telling the truth. living the truth and trying to keep people and help people mature and endure in the truth. And Paul knew that God knew, tested, proved, molded and matured Paul's heart. And here we are. It says, God who tests our hearts. He could just say that, right? God tested my heart. Yeah, I know I have a clean conscience. I know you're sitting there bloody on the floor and I have a baseball bat in my hand, but I didn't do it or I did it, but God wanted me to do it. He wanted me to fleece you out of all your money. Right? He wanted me to do this. He wanted me to divorce my wife and marry another. Oh boy. You know, sometimes you're not mad at me. You're mad because God's turning up the heat, man. Look in the mirror. Have God look in your heart. Have Him expose what you are and help you change what you are. God who tests our hearts. Are you ready? Listen to this statement. This is how the call of God is discerned. God examines a person's motives and exposes those motives. He examines them and then exposes them to the person so the person will see their own heart. Psalm 19, 12 through 14, when I say every day, I don't mean every day, but it's around my mind all the time. Lord, who can know his errors? Cleanse me from secret faults. Keep me back from presumptuous sin. Then I'll be innocent of a great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and the thoughts of my heart be acceptable in your sight. You're my Lord, you're my Redeemer. And what's he testing? Think about what's happening to Paul, what did happen to Paul, and what he's saying to the Thessalonians. Because he just said, I was spitefully treated at Philippi, I got kicked out, and then I went to you and I got kicked out again. Am I going to discern while I'm not doing it the right way? Or do I know that I'm doing the right way? Not just because bad things happen, but because the conviction of God rested upon me still. So let me go back just a little bit. This is how the call of God is discerned. Anybody listening? God examines a person's motives and exposes those motives to that person. So the person will see their own heart to see if you will allow failure, persecution, slander. And trouble and really to show you how willing you are to lose whatever it takes for his sake. You say, oh, Lord, make me something, make me something. He's going to break you something, break you something. If you don't remember anything else, remember this. Failure is often the price of pleasing God. Failure. I've just got things I've gotta do. So does God. You gonna resist Him? And be happy on your way to hell? Failure is often the price of pleasing God. Think about it. In their lifetime, and even today, People have said that John the Baptist, Jesus, and the Apostle Paul were failures. Christianity is a means of identity, but is not a means of self-esteem. Yes, obedience to God can and will bring blessings. Hallelujah! But Christianity is not a means to success in the way the world defines it. And some in the visible church define it. Yes, there are true godly ministers who are popular, influential, and successful. And there are true godly ministers who aren't. popular, influential, and successful. And there's other ministers who are popular, influential, and successful, but who aren't godly in their motives. Now keep listening. Anybody still listening? God testing and proving you. You're thinking, where does this come from the text? I just told you. Verse 2, and then everything he's talking about, and why is he talking to the Thessalonians when they already love him, and he's already talked about chapter 1, how he don't even need to talk to them anymore. They're awesome! Because he's saying, look what's happening to me, and look how I still brought this to you, and this is how you're going to do it too. And this is how you're going to know that God's doing it through and with you. Okay? Are we set there? I want this stuff anchored in text, not just going to go from verse, verse, verse. Ooh, he proved it with, they had a lot of verses, and he used a lot of verses, so what? Satan uses a lot of verses. My grandkids are going to go, you were loud. And I'll say, blame the people, they're not listening. I'm just kidding. I don't always get laughs. But I've got to watch my own heart too. And you've got to know, God's testing your heart. Again, to see if you're going to allow failure, persecution, slander and trouble. Really, to show you how willing you are to lose whatever it takes for his sake. Failure is the price of pleasing God. Again, Christianity is not a means of self-esteem. God testing and proving you and approving you is not about God figuring it out. He's testing you as if He don't know. He's not trying to figure out what you really are all about. He's trying to show you what you're really all about. And then molding you and maturing you into what He wants you to be. 2 Corinthians 4, a jar of clay. What's up with a jar of clay? They're broken. They're vulnerable. You never say, when you pour something out of the jar of clay, go, ooh, look how nice the jar of clay is. You're like, what, look at the milk. I mean, if we go to Texas Roadhouse or Longhorn or somewhere else that's paying me money to say it, no, I'm just kidding. And we said, wow, look at that plate. No, you say, look at that porterhouse, baby, right? Look at that steak. Look at that red coming out of it as I, I'm getting hungry. God's trying to make you. But you've got to remember what it's really all about. Jesus. So Him testing and proving and approving you is not about Him figuring out what you're all about, but showing you what you're really all about. And then molding and maturing you to a jar of clay that's willing to be broken and vulnerable. Willing to help and willing to keep being molded and matured. That demonstrates the power and worth of Jesus in and through your life. When things are bad and when things are good. In losing and in winning. A model of what it means to be molded, maturing, and enduring. Are you willing to lose in order to know God and please God? That's the only way you're going to win in God's eyes. And those are the eyes that truly matter. Paul knew that even church people fail to see what the issue really is. What godly success really is. 2 Corinthians 5, 12, one of my life verses. We are not commending ourselves to you again, but giving you cause to boast about us, an example, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what's in the heart. Paul's mentor was a man named Gamaliel. In Acts chapter 5, The apostles were just going crazy. This is before Paul actually became a Christian. And he said some of the worst advice that you'll ever hear. And everybody uses it today as if it's good. Just because it's in the Bible doesn't mean that God is saying that it's truth. Read the book of Ecclesiastes very carefully. Right? Sometimes it's what God's saying, sometimes he's trying to show you what the enemy's going to say. And he said, well, if we try to stop these Christians, it doesn't matter, because if they're not doing good, they'll get stopped anyway. But if they're doing good, you can't stop it. Wrong. There's 1.2 million Muslims in the world. And they are not of the truth. They have some truth. Right? There's all kinds of religions out there that seem to be getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller. The Reformed churches usually aren't the large churches. But I have news for you. The sovereignty of God, suffering as a means of sanctification, and the full and complete sufficiency of the Scriptures are what this thing is all about. I can get excited, but I want to get excited about the right things, man. And Paul says, don't worry about these people that are looking at the outside and going, see, look, Paul is in jail all the time. Paul is little. Paul doesn't seem well. Paul, you know, he's just, come on, follow us. We've got Cadillacs. And then they say, and give us one too. Sow that seed, brother. I'm not saying don't give money. If you win the lottery, don't play the lottery. But if you win the lottery, give us some. We've got some property to buy over here. But you get my point. He said, I'm trying to give you an example so that you would be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. God who tests our bank account. God who tests our love life. God who tests our how we feel. God who tests our health. God who tests our wealth. God who tests our number of hits, you know, YouTube influencer status and all that. No, God who tests our hearts. And how does He do it? He takes stuff away and see if you will still worship Him with the same. Does it bring you closer that pain that you're going through? The Apostle Paul defines success as knowing God. And he said that what it takes to know God is to fail. to lose in order to win. Remember what we read this morning in Philippians 3, 4 through 10. There Paul was discussing his pedigree, his passion, his performance, before he knew Christ, and he lost them all. Now it's not as if these things don't matter in your life at all, or that you have to lose them all. It's that they are subservient to what's most important, which is a true, intimate, growing knowledge of God. the losing of other things Paul gained a knowledge of God listen to Paul here writing from a jail cell in Philippians 4 12 through 13 he just talked about losing everything and now he's in jail why would God God's not gonna allow that to happen when you're a man of God well let's see who's the greatest man of God in the New Testament not just besides Jesus and up until John the Baptist people Paul said I mean Jesus said John the Baptist grace man who ever lived It's Paul, maybe John, whatever. They were all martyrs. Philippians 4, 12-13, now in light of what we've been talking about, these verses that you know, hear them now. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. You heard me say it this way. Everybody says, God is good all the time, all the time, God is good. Yeah, it's easy to say when things are going good that God is good, but when things are going bad, that's when you need to say God is good, because that's what we're counting on. I don't want my leg to fall off. I don't want to lose children or grandchildren. I don't want everybody to run away. But when things bad happen, I've already got that thing figured out. I could have gravel and ashes in my mouth, and crying in my face, but I'm still going to praise God with these lips. And if my lips don't work, because they cut them off, I'm in my heart. God's the one that... People say all the time, God knows my heart. You just have your heart. Has He revealed your heart to you? The Word of God says, you know, the Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, and discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart. All right. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abase. I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, in any and every circumstance, any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things. The word means endure. You can do this. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Bringing it home now. Anybody ready to land this plane? It isn't that you have to be beaten, burned, bare, and broke. But would you be willing to? Are you willing to let God search your heart and show it to you? That's it. Are you willing for God to search your heart and show it to you? Let me put it a little sharper. What sin are you willing to lose? Are you willing to let God mold you by losing some of the things that you want in order to be and do what you think he has called you to be and do? Here's one. Are you willing to let your dream die for the dream of God? Here's Abraham. He's old, old, old, old. And God says, you're going to have the child of promise and through him the Messiah will come and all the nations of the earth will be blessed. And he didn't wait long enough and he had one son through another woman. And God said, no, no, no, that's not the one. Here's the one. And that child wasn't some little child. He was a man. When God said, now take him that I promised you, the dream I gave you, that I promise is going to be there, you go kill him. Bring him up on that mountain. By the way, same mountain that Jesus was crucified on. And said, and here he is just about to do it. Both of them had to have a lot of faith. You know how he felt? Because it says so in Hebrews 11, 17 through 19, I believe the verses are. He figured God must be raising him from the dead. God must be raising him from the dead. I don't know, but I know God. I don't know why this is, but I know God. Again, are you willing to let your dream die for the dream of God? Are you willing to lose? And will you worship God when you do? Because that's the measure of your maturity. And that is the test of whether or not you can be made ready for mature and enduring ministry. Any man that sets his hand to the plow and turns back has not been made ready. Not just that they aren't ready, God hasn't made them ready. It's the truth. All who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. That doesn't mean you get one little ankle sprain and go, I'm hit! It means that sometimes it's going to be so obvious and you're like, and then God's like, and? Are you willing to lose and will you worship God when you do? Because that's the measure. That's the measure of your maturity and the test of whether or not you can be made ready for mature and enduring ministry. Paul, Silas, and Timothy were ready, willing, and able. They had nothing to prove because God had proved them. God had proved himself to them and had proved them as vessels for God. And the people in Thessalonica, not the Christians, But everywhere Paul was going, he went Philippi, Berea, Thessalonica, you know, Corinth, all throughout Greece and everywhere he went, they said, that guy's a loser. Paul, Silas, and Timothy, they're a bunch of losers, leading losers. Hallelujah, they were the losers who knew God. Heavenly Father. I don't even suppose for a second that I've lost as much as Paul and had to deal with as much as he did. But you have brought me to places in my life where I am learning that oftentimes what I would think is losing is actually winning. And then until my mission is done, I can have courage because you will fully accomplish your plans and your purposes for me. Psalm 138, eight. The Lord will perform his purpose for me. Give what you command. After commanding what you want us to do, Lord. Give us that patience, that peace. That perspective. and prudence the timing of all this as we process the pressures and the pleasures and problems of our lives this we pray in Jesus name amen