Welcome to another program with Truths to Live By, a ministry of Harriman Baptist Tabernacle located at 1420 Old Roan Street in Harriman, Tennessee. You're now listening to Evangelist Brother Cam Clark. Thank you for joining us again for another broadcast. I'm Evangelist Cam Clark. In light of what Christ said in Matthew chapter number four, in verse number four, that man should not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. I would like to encourage you to follow along as we study through God's eternal word. Thank you for joining us once again on Truth to Live By. It is a wonderful day to be saved by God's grace. I'm thankful that God so loved the world and that so wonderfully he loved me that he gave his only begotten son and that one day I believed on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and I passed from death unto life and I found this life to be the most joyous and peaceful life. Though it's hard at times and though there's trials, this life is the greatest life that one could live. But today we'll be in the book of Philippians, Philippians chapter number two, Philippians chapter number two, and we will continue our study in these verses. I wanna read our verses for today and then try quickly to give us some background or a summary of what we looked at last week and then jump into our thought. The Bible says in chapter two, verse 13, for it is God which worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure, Do all things without murmurings and disputings, that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God. without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life, that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither labored in vain. Yea, and if I be offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all. for the same cause also do ye joy and rejoice with me. But I trust in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus shortly unto you, that I also may be of good comfort when I know your state. And so last week we looked at verses 13 through 15 and we discussed discontentment and the fruit that follows it. We looked at verse 14 at murmuring and complaining and how it proves that you and I are discontented with what God is allowing and doing in our lives. As long as this dissatisfaction or discontentment reigns supreme in our hearts, we will never be blameless, harmless, nor will we be unrebukable in this present world. And with great sorrow, we will not be the light of the world that we are called to be. And because we are failing to be the lights of the world, we are not pleasing our Father in heaven. Recall how verse number 13 says, for it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. And so God is pleased when we live according to his word, and it ought to be the desire of every heart that is listening to the sound of my voice, to please the God of heaven. And it is pleasing, obviously, to God to be blameless, harmless, and unrebukable in His sight. And then we find in verse number 16, we did not cover it this past week, but I want to quickly gaze upon this verse. We find that it is pleasing to hold forth the Word of Life. Let me say that word, hold forth, it means to have or to hold upon, to apply, observe, attend to, or to hold towards. This here is much deeper than just a quick glance reveals. This is a hearkening and heeding to truth. which produces a holding and heralding of it. So we first hear the truth, we heed or obey to the truth, and this produces a holding or a keeping of that truth, which then results in us declaring and making that truth known. And so it is pleasing to God for us to be hearers and doers of the word, and then for us to make it known to the world. And so that word, that phrase, holding forth has great depth that we must be willing to search out and apply in our lives. Which brings me now to our next thought, what I want to try to focus on today. Remember, we've been focusing in chapter two on the leadership of the Christian. And so far, we've looked at our primary example, that being Jesus Christ. We're going to begin looking at another example which we have spoken of much throughout this book so far, that being the Apostle Paul. Recall that Paul the Apostle is in a jail cell for the faith, and he's enduring great affliction for the gospel's sake. We see some of that affliction in chapter 1, verses 12 through 20. He is suffering for the cause of Christ. And just as in chapter 1, we find here in the verses we've read Paul's heart for the local church at Philippi and how exemplary this is for our lives. And so as we've read in verses 13 through 16, we see that these attributes please the Father. These attributes of being blameless and unreprovable, these things please our God. But we find that these attributes also pleased Paul the Apostle. Paul was pleased with this church living holy and godly. He was pleased with them being unrebukable. He was pleased with them being blameless. He was pleased with them being contented and not murmuring and complaining. That brought pleasure to the heart of Paul. We know that Paul's life was wrapped up in seeing the perfection and sanctification of the saints. He was not focused on himself, rather he was focused on others. How easy would it have been for him, a man suffering and in pain in a dark and damp jail cell, how easy would have it been to be focused on himself. But Paul was focused on the sanctification of others. So he says, holding forth the word of life that I may rejoice in the day of Christ that I have not run in vain neither labored in vain. Paul was a man who would rejoice in the Philippians' professed subjection of the Word of God. And so what Paul is declaring in few words to these believers, obey these truths so that in the end at the judgment seat of Christ, all my work and labor will not have been in vain. If you do not work out your salvation and be blameless, harmless, unrebukable, then I have bestowed all my efforts upon a people who have received the grace of God in vain. And how painful it is to hear of stories of men of God who have labored for years in churches, preached the truth to them only for their congregation to go astray upon their departure. How sorrowful that must be. Paul did not want to experience that. And so we've mentioned in the past how these believers are moved by Paul's commands because of all that he had done for them. And this command here, this revelation here, would once again spur on the believers to obey. For they did not want Paul's work to be in vain. And so we come to verse number 17, which is where I'll give our title. He says, yea, and if I be offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I joy and rejoice with you all. This is a verse that we all must ponder and meditate on, and it would be great for us to memorize, but I would entitle our thought today simply exemplary sacrifice. Here we find a great common attribute of all the examples of men we find in this chapter. And that is the attribute of sacrifice for others. We looked at Jesus first, our greatest example, how he was willing to be offered. We find here Paul being willing to be offered for the church. We'll find in a moment Timothy he cared for others more than he cared for himself. We find Epaphroditus in the end of this chapter and his love for the brethren. And so that is a common attribute of those living the Christ-centered life. And so in verse 17, Paul here is is revealing that he is willing to be poured out like wine for the furtherance of the faith of God's people. And it's a great type and revelation of the drink offering in the Old Testament, which we do not have time to dive into. But just in thought, wine or water, when poured out, will always travel as low as it possibly can. And so Paul is revealing that he was willing to offer himself to God. He was willing to go as low as he possibly could for the furtherance of God's people. And so very clearly, if you and I are to live the Christ-centered life, we must live humble. We must live sacrificially. It is a life of service and labor for others. And very clearly, the Christ-centered life is not the easiest life to live. As Paul said, it was an offering of himself, and it will be an offering of yourself to the church. We need some believers who are willing to offer themselves for the sacrifice and service of the church. God has put you into a local church and given you a people to serve and live for. And let me ask you, are you offering yourself for that church? Are you going as low and as humble as you can so that the sacrifice and service of that church might be in its fullest? Are you giving yourself for the body of Christ that they may be who they are supposed to be. Notice Paul says, our joy and rejoice with you all. This sacrifice brought joy to the heart of Paul. Can I say the reason so many of us are miserable Christians, the reason that you have no joy and peace in your life today is because you and I, we are failing to serve others and we are serving ourselves. If we will give ourselves to the church and to the world, God will grant joy by the Holy Ghost. But as long as we continue to give ourselves to our own passions and lust, we will continue without joy and gladness of heart. And how we need joy in a day of great darkness. Depression and anxiety is rampant in America. And what the world needs to see is a joyous group of believers. living in victory and in peace. This will be done by sacrificing for others. And so a good question to ask yourself today, how can I give myself for others today? How can I get as low today as I can to exalt someone else? else. I've not made it as far as I thought that I would, but I do want to exhort you today. Give yourself for the local church. Get as low as you possibly can. You want joy in your life. You want peace in your life. You want to have rest in your soul. Please, my dear brother, please, my dear sister, Humble yourself. Offer yourself to God and serve other people. You don't have to be the greatest known preacher in the country to serve God. You do not have to win the most souls to Christ. But if you will simply offer yourself and pour yourself out for the local church and for sinners and for the world, you can be known by God and you will be honored and rewarded in heaven. And so may God give us people who live sacrificial life for others that our joy might be full. That concludes another broadcast of Truths to Live By, a ministry of Harriman Baptist Tabernacle located at 1420 Old Roan Street in Harriman, Tennessee. You can also find us on the web at www.hbtchurch.com. This program has been a blessing. We would love to hear from you. Please send all correspondence to P.O. Box 575, Harriman, Tennessee, 37748 or by email to info at hbtchurch.com. We thank you for listening today, and until next time, we leave you with the words of the Apostle Paul, who said in Romans 15, 13, Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost. you