Gracious God, our father, we thank you for the privilege of being present in this place. Lord, to sing you praises, to worship you in spirit and in truth. Thank you, Lord, for manifestation of your presence that we are not alone, but you are with us. that we realize your promise that you'll never leave us nor forsake us. Father, we thank you for this preaching moment, preaching privilege. I decrease, you increase. Less of me, more of you. Lord, as always, we ask that you send your word as you send rain and snow from heaven to water the earth, to give seed to the sower and bread to the eater. Send your word, father, that it will accomplish all that you send it to accomplish. The word will not return under your void. Father, we pray for connection, pulpit and pew. Make us one that the message of your son's coming will be received by critics and skeptics. Father, as I stand, stand in me. take control of my tongue. regulate my mind that the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart would be acceptable in thy sight. Lord, you are our strength and you are our redeemer and when you would have finished with us, lord, you'll still be god having all the honor and the Anonymous name of Jesus the Christ Christ of God we do pray and every heart say amen Come on, give God a praise He is worthy To be praised For praising him is a receipt to say to him. Thank you for the things He has done God has blessed us so that we cannot enumerate the blessings that he has bestowed upon our lives and certainly, we ought be glad that we are the recipients of God's grace and mercy. Should've, would've, could've been dead sleeping in our graves but the lord allowed our golden moments to roll on a little while longer. It's good to be alive. It's good to be active. It's good to be alert. For it is in the lord Jesus Christ we live. Move and have our being. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. 2. Beginning with verse 1. If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, If any bowels and mercies. Fulfill ye my joy that ye be like minded. Having the same love being of one accord of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory. But in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made himself for no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion. As a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. God's word for God's people. God's word is blessed. May we be blessed by being hearers and doers of his word. Look at someone and say unity in Christ. Love and humility. Look at another and say, unity in Christ. Love and humility. Come on, shout up here at me, unity in Christ. Love and humility. Amen. Amen. Amen. Paul begins chapter 2 with the word therefore and therefore requires us to look back at chapter 1 and see why he put therefore. Paul, he sets the tone for joy and unity in Christ which is the theme of Philippians. And he goes into depth in chapter 2 to help us understand what he set before us in chapter 1. That unity in Christ is not just meeting in the same place, wearing the same color, or looking the same. That is beyond the fickle frail efforts of man. because unity is not man-made, it is spirit given. So he sets before us our place in Christ and the workings of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of God brings us into a oneness in Christ. Notice Philippians chapter 2 verses 1 through 8 He says, therefore, if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion Make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit. but with humility of mind, regard one another as more important than yourself. He encourages the believers at Philippi to stand fast, to stand firm in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the purpose of the gospel. Brothers and sisters, it's not about our opinions, it's not about our emotions, it's not about our intellect, it's about the gospel of Jesus Christ. He tells us to stand fast in one spirit. one mind striving together that in Philippians chapter 2 verses 1 through 4 Paul gives ingredients for maintaining unity in the spirit. Notice the key ingredients to maintaining unity are love and humility. Love, he bases it on this love that God gives us, the unconditional love, the agape love of God. A love that looks beyond faults. A love that looks beyond imperfection. A love that can accept a person for who they are and for what they have done. A love that loves beyond boundaries. Bases it upon love and then he also bases it upon humility. The humility is resistant of pride. That pride produces a spirit of superiority. That one thing we have to watch in church is classism. that we tend to rank ourselves in different classes based upon what we have economically and educationally. Listen, without your economics and education, you just like everybody else. He says, get rid of the attitude of being superior. that humility puts self to death and regards others more highly than oneself for Jesus' sake. The only force powerful enough to motivate us to deny self is the love of Christ. Paul says in verse 1, if there be any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any powers and mercies, consolation is better rendered, exhortation, that if the presence of Christ has empowered you. The power of Christ has strengthened your heart. The spirit of Christ has stimulated your emotions. You know consolation in Christ. The consolation in Christ is union with Christ. Comfort in trials. The common bond with God and others that comes from the Holy Spirit. Have you ever felt down inside? Have you ever felt distressed and dejected? And the tender love of Christ has entered in and encouraged you When you were at your lowest, the love of Christ picked you up, turned your life around, and planted your feet on solid ground. Am I preaching to some real people? that have had some real problems in their life. You have had some situations in your life. You didn't know how you were going to make it through, but you called on the Lord and his spirit of love came in and lift you up out of the muck and the mired clay. You have experienced consolation in Christ. Notice Paul says if we are going to be unified and united in Christ, the first thing is there must be a Christian experience. I like him because he talks about unity in Christ is possible because of the reality of four things we experience as Christians. notice the four things and notice uh christian experience that that that paul uses if and each if refers to an entitlement that every believer in christ received at the point of salvation if any encouragement if any consolation of love if any fellowship of the spirit if any affection and compassion notice the if clause are translations of first class conditions in greek which means they are they assume truth for the sake of argument that paul says that it is true that every christian has been encouraged, has been comforted, has fellowship with the Spirit, has affection and compassion. He reveals these conditions that every Christian has in Christ. What does it mean to be encouraged? That encouragement, paraklesis, being a compound word meaning one called along to help, encourage, admonish, and exhort. That Jesus speaks of paraklesis as a name of the Holy Spirit. In John chapter fourteen, verse sixteen, that the paraclases means exhortation at other times, encouragement that Paul, he uses paraclases as encouragement. Have been encouraged. I've been encouraged and you have been encouraged. The last time I checked the record, when we are encouraged, when we experience the comfort of the Lord in our affliction, it qualifies us to administer comfort and encouragement to others. What Jesus Christ has done in your life at your most down and lowest moment is what He wants to do through you when others find themselves down and low. Listen, as a Christian you have no business kicking people. when they're down. You have no business rejoicing over people's downfall. You you have no business criticizing and and talking them down and talking about them. Uh you ought to be an encourager. Look at your neighbor and say encourage. Don't discourage. That that that we have that that conflict can can can come to all of us. And and trial can come to all of us. Suffering of afflictions know our address and can come to all of us and and when they come, they can be the cause of depression, despair, and discouragement, downness, and despair can cause you to fall out, fall out of church, fall out with Christ, fall out with brothers and sisters. But Paul, he reveals to us that our experience qualifies us to minister comfort. that you need the body of Christ. And you may not think so. And you may be one of those super superlative saints that say, I don't need nobody but Jesus. But Jesus has placed people in your path and people in your life. And when you're down you need people the most. He deals with Christian experience, encouragement in Christ that that God has qualified people to encourage you. But then he he has qualified people to give you consolation of love in Christ. The word consolation is used of comforting someone in grief. that when relationships are strained, there is grief, a sense of loss, but leaning on the love of Christ is comforting. Think about it. Christ loves us when we are rebellious. Christ loves us when we are disobedient. He loves us when we disregard and disobey His Word. That's consoling that I got somebody in my life that don't treat me like fickle frail friends. You know how some people say, you know, I'm with you as long as you write. but you mess around and get wrong. People will treat you like you got leprosy. They'll get up and walk out of your life, but we got somebody that'll love us through it all, that'll console us through it all, that'll embrace us through it all, that won't throw us away because we have strayed. that he loves and comes after us as the good shepherd went after the lost sheep you can't get away from God isn't that something that's consoling that you can't get away from God once you belong to him you can't get away from him Even when you decide to take the wrong path and you decide to disobey, you are still in his hand and you can't get away from God. You can't get away from his love. His love is so high you can't go above it. It's so wide you can't go around it. It's so far reaching you can't outrun it. It's so deep you can't go beneath it. You can't get away! that God holds you when others walk out of your life. We console. And here it is. He wants us to be a conduit because while we experience in the love of God, he wants us to share it. Look at your neighbor and say, I love you. Look at another neighbor and say, I love you. Look up here at me and as I say, I love you. Now y'all tell me y'all love me. That what we receive from Christ, he wants us to share it. That we have consolation. of love in Christ. We encourage, we encourage in Christ. We have consolation of love but then we have fellowship of the Spirit. That the Holy Spirit indwells every believer and draws us into fellowship with God and with every believer in Christ. That the moment you believe in Christ The Holy Spirit positioned you in the body. He made you a part of something greater than you and greater than what you could ever be on your own. He made you to be a part of the body. Useful. to the body. Or if I had time, I'd talk about 1 Corinthians chapter 12 and how you may be just an ear. And you may not think much of yourself as being an ear, but without you, we can't hear. Or if I had time, I would talk about how you might just be the eye. And you may think you're not important because you are the eye. But if we didn't have you as the eye, we couldn't see. Oh, you may think you just a pinky toe and you are not important, but cut it off and see how it causes you to be imbalanced. You may not think much of yourself and how important you are to the body of Christ, but you are important. And when you got saved, when you put faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, he put you in the body. We used to sing some years ago, I need you. You need me. We all apart. of God's body. Pray with me. And we go on and on and sing of the importance of one another. Look at your neighbor and say, I need you. I need you. I need you in my life. I need you in my worship experience. I need you. That's hard for some of you to say because you feel you don't need no one. He says fellowship of the spirit. That this thing is spiritual. That our coming together on Sundays and Tuesdays and Wednesdays and Saturdays and whenever we meet as a body or important times of fellowship. When the pandemic hit, I heard preachers and people say, well, this is the new norm. While we were quarantined and in our homes watching from afar, they said, well, this is a new way. Well, there are no new ways because you can't have church without fellowship. I knew God would put the pandemic to rest, COVID-19 to rest, and he would bring us back together to worship and praise and to fellowship because you can't have church without fellowship. You don't know how messed up your life would be if you stayed away from this place. You don't know how messed up your week would become and your week would be if you mess around and didn't make it to church on Sunday mornings. Listen, God has a way of equipping you in fellowship by way of his spirit to handle everything that's going to come your way within any given week. You don't know how crippled and lame you'll be. physically and spiritually. If you didn't get a chance to come into fellowship, you don't know how foul your mouth would be. If God didn't confront you in fellowship, y'all looking at me funny, you know you got a cussing habit. Since you're quiet, let me go on there with you. Since you want to leave me out here by myself, as if I'm preaching the ghosts and warlocks. Come on in the house. Come on in the house. We need fellowship. Because we are interdependent. And God made it so that we come into the house of God and worship and praise his name. together. Oh, there's synergy. There's energy. Yes, sir. You ever notice in worship, a person over here to my right can start hollering and praising and the next thing you know, a little spark has come over here and about two or three people get happy and start praising god in this aisle set of pews and because this one and these three caught on fire and the wind is still blowing it starts sweeping all over the sanctuary and a person way over here to my left is happy and shouting and praising god because their synergy in fellowship Look at your neighbor and say, I need you. I need you to show up on Sunday. I hope somebody's watching that's not here and they understand the importance that they will find themselves in the sanctuary next Sunday. We need them here. Let me leave you. I won't be able to finish this. I just got to cut it off. He deals with encouragement or Christian experience by way of encouragement and consolation and fellowship, but there's a fourth if. He talks about affection and compassion in Christ. That the word affection is translated bowels. bowels. Affection puts the emotional element of God's love into action because it's not enough just to talk about it. See, if I say to you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, and there's no action That's not love at all. Oh, I'm trying to help us now. Because what affection does is is put to emotional, the emotional element of God's love into action. If you say you love me, show me. Show me. Look at somebody and say, show me. Don't just tell me, show me. I need to see your love in action. I need to be embraced sometime. I need you to speak a word of encouragement. I need you to pick me up by what you say and how you look. I need to see a smile on your face when I'm down and out and I feel like I'm not going to make it. Show me. You have talked enough. Show me. Show me what love makes you do. Do I have a witness? Because love has to have action. Y'all don't mind if I cut across the field and finish this next Sunday, do you? I said love has to have action. That if you love someone, It causes you to become sacrificial. If you love someone, you'll put some stuff on the line. For the Lord Jesus said, greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ain't he all right? He loved us enough to to set aside his his robe in glory. He loved us enough to to come down through 42 generations. He loved us enough to open our eyes when we were blind. He loved us enough to put bread on our tables and clothes on our backs and shoes on our feet. He loved us enough to raise us up to come to come down and and go to a hill called Calvary. Shake your neighbor's hand and say, love is what love does. And if you say you love me, you ought to show me your love. Because Jesus said, I love you and he showed us his That's love. He let him rivet his feet. That's love. He let him put a crown of thorns on his head. That's love. He let him lift him high. And drop him low. That's love. Shake your neighbor's hand. He died loving us. He was buried loving us. He was raised loving us. Ain't he alright? And say, shake your neighbor's hand and said, neighbor, I know he loves me because the Bible tells me so. I He was buried for me. But early Sunday morning, he got up for me. To love me eternally. Yeah. And he said, if you can believe that that's love, if you can believe that he came and died for your sins, then give your life to Jesus Christ. The doors of the church is open. The doors of the church is open. That's love. He died for us. That's love. He gave his life for us to have a right to the tree of life. That's love. He gave his life for us to fellowship and love one another. The doors of the church is open. If you want to give your life to Jesus Christ, to be your personal savior, You ought to come. You ought to come. Come on. Come on. Give your life to Jesus. Give your life to Jesus. Give your life to Jesus Christ. Come on. Come on. Come on. Then you might be in a backslid. You might be in a backslid and want to rededicate your life to Christ. We're asking you to come. He'll forgive you. The Bible says he's married to the backslider. You ought to come. And then, if you want a church home, a pastor who will teach you, who will lead you, who will guide you, who will love you, who will protect you, who will shepherd you. New Bethlehem wants you. You can make this your church, y'all. Today, you ought to come. You ought to come. You ought to come. Come on. Come on, don't wait. Don't wait for tomorrow. put off of tomorrow what you can do right now. You ought to come. Come on. Come on. Door is open. Door is open. Door is open. Come on. Come on. You are important to me. Door is open. I need you to survive. Door is open. It's open. Amen. It's open. I need you. You need me. Come on. Come on. Come on. Hallelujah. We have Jada Mason, a candidate for Bachelor. Hallelujah! Man, you know the Bible said, if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart, and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead. The Bible says, thou shalt be saved. Y'all believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God? You believe that Jesus Christ came and died for your sins. You believe that he didn't stay dead, but on the third day morning he rose from the dead with all power. Are you giving your life to Jesus Christ to be your personal savior? Yes. Well look, hallelujah, you saved. You saved. So I want you to repeat after me. I believe that Jesus Christ came and died for my sins. But he didn't stay dead. On the third day morning, We'll be here next Sunday morning. We'll be baptized. We'll baptize you all next Sunday. Accountability party. These people that we're calling out to be by your side, you heard the message today. They're going to strengthen you. They're going to encourage you. You can call them. Amen? Amen. This is Reverend Master. This is Reverend Moody. So, can y'all be here at 9-20 next Sunday morning? We have our new members class taught by Sister Cruz. So, if y'all can be here next Sunday morning, our new members class, there's four classes, then you'll be selected into the full-on membership of the Bethlehem Baptist Church. Come on, let us stand and sing that with Brother Eric. Come on, make one more round with me. We're all a part of God's life. Stand with me. Agree with me. Agree with me. We're all a part of God's life. It is His will that everything I got this note doing church from Sister Daniels. She says, please pray for my brother's family. His grandson was killed in a car accident this past week. And his son is in the hospital. We pray for you and your family. Brother Perry asked for prayer for his father. It's good to see brother Acoff. He's usually in the choir and he has gone through an extensive surgery and he has a surgery to come and we pray for brother Acoff. We pray for mother Van. She had a surgery on last Sister Alicia Williams text me while we made the appeal and asked for prayer. She's been sick on and off. Let us remember brother Cedric. I can't remember Cedric's last name. What is it? Stevens. Amen. Amen. We pray for brother Stevens. Let's see. Sister McGee. Uh she had to leave doing service. Sister Erskine. Listen, just call out names. You can do it Come on, call him out. Come on, call him out. You pray for me. I love you. I need you to survive. I want to hug you with words from my mouth. I love you. I need you to survive. I pray for you. You pray for me. Pray for Mother Evans. Bertha McLean, Sister Wiley, lost a sister, but she's here in worship with us. Lewis and Johnson's family. Pray for Mother Ford. What I want you to do is bow. Pray believing. Pray trusting. God is able to do exceeding. A bundle above all we could ever ask or think. God, thank you for hearing our prayers. answering our prayers. Now may your grace and mercy, may the communing of the Holy Spirit, rest, rule, and abide with us now, henceforth and forever. And every heart say amen.