If you have your Bibles, you're in Philippians chapter 2, and I want to read a few verses, maybe a half dozen of them or so. And the last verse I want to read is verse 15. And what I'd have you do, if you will, when I come to verse 15, I'll pause at the conclusion of 14. Would you just, it's your theme, would you just read verse 15 aloud? It may seem awkward. It's certainly not liturgical, but as we come to verse 15, read it aloud with me. I'm gonna begin in verse number 10, and I'll pause at verse 14 so we can read 15 aloud together. Philippians chapter two and verse 10, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow. Of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth. It's pretty expansive, isn't it? I think that pretty much envelops all of human knowledge and existence. Verse 11, that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both the 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. May the Lord add blessing to the reading of his word. Let's pray for a moment if we may. Father, thank you for this time once again you've given us to examine and expound upon the word of God. Truly, as was aforementioned so eloquently, thou art worthy. Thou art King of kings and Lord of lords. Thou art supreme. And Lord, truly, every tongue one day will confess that thou art Lord. And it will be at that day where every knee should bow. Lord, until such day, we tarry here. Lord, lead us tonight in thy scriptures For these we ask in Christ's name, amen. I wanna speak to you tonight on this topic, what in the world do we do now? What in the world do we do now? Note our text, that you may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke in a what? Mist of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom you shine as lights of worlds. Quite interesting when you read verse 15 there, you come to the thought that This existed then, didn't exist for many, many, many, many years, and then suddenly in the last 20 years, boom, we're back again. I'm always amazed as I hear sometimes and even say this myself, I'll reflect in the past and I'll say, well, things used to be different. Well, that's true, but don't dilute yourself into thinking that somehow there was thousands of years of people that wanted to follow God and love God and then just in these last 20 months, 10 months, 10 years, you pick the timeline, that things all just became crazy place. It's not the case at all. In this particular text, the primary interpretation, note who he's writing here, he says in the midst of a crooked generation or crooked nation, in verse 15 he says that ye, who's the ye? Now I might would say it's me, but there's one problem. This wasn't the letter written to the Brandondonians. This wasn't the letter written to the Delawareans. It wasn't the letter written to the Pennsylvanians. It wasn't written to the saints in Harrisburg or the saints in Wilmington. Who's it written to? All right, so in context he said that ye, that's what he's talking about, we're gonna draw application, but the interpretation he's talking about, ye Philippians. All right, he said ye Philippians, you're to be blameless, you're to be harmless, you're to be the sons of God without rebuke, and then he's gonna reflect in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation. So by context he's talking about ye are to do these things because you are currently in a nation that is crooked and perverse. Well wait a minute, I thought that didn't happen but the last 20 years. The reality is when you get to this idea of crooked and reverse, crooked and perverse, every generation that has moved since the creation and the dawn of humanity with the creation of Adam and Eve has went through times of being crooked and perverse. And in every generation that is showcased in some form. And time will not allow us to do this, but chase the chronology of scriptures from the garden. You're just a handful of generations from Adam, and the Lord has spounded upon this. He said, as it was in the days of Noah. In the times of Noah, you have millions of people that are wicked, and the scripture records this even in the imagination of their heart. How wicked? So wicked that God poured out His wrath upon them and annihilated all of them save one man, Noah and his descendants. And so since that time the world has straightened out and now they've walked the straight and narrow, right? Oh, you know, it's just a few more years and you've got really one man. Abraham. And he's called out of Ur of the Chaldeans. I don't know how much you give yourself to history, but that's a fantastic read, the Ur of the Chaldeans. They were the ones to have these things called ziggurats. They were terraced, and from what we know in our day, they were terraced buildings, and on top of them is where they would worship the gods of the heavens. You see, man's always trying to elevate himself to the God in his heart he knows existed. That's what happened all the way back in Genesis chapter 8 when you had them at Babel building a great tower that they might ascend to the heavens. God there divided the nations by their language. And then here you've got Abraham sometime later dwelling in a city where they're building these terraced things to get to the heavens. Man innately wants to bring himself, his own justification and his own salvation and bring himself up to God. And when he finds that to be a futile expression, you know what he does? Romans chapter 1, he changes the very image of God into that of beast. When he realizes he can't bring himself up to an eternal God, he'll attempt to change who God is to bring God down. Such an apropos message that we heard earlier about seeing who Jesus Christ is as he's revealed in scriptures. That's what man seeks to do, to bring it down. Because man in his own heart is depraved. The thoughts and mind in his heart is continually evil, so what's he going to do? He's crooked and perverse. Then you move from Abraham, and you're now at Lot. Well, things weren't hunky-dory in Lot's time. And then, of course, you get down to Egypt. 10 plagues, as it were. All these plagues, wicked and perverse. You move from Vince and Moses and finally Joshua comes into the land and now they're hunky-dory, they're right there into the land, everything's gonna be just perfect, right? No, then you come to the end of the book of Judges where you find this, and every man did that which was right in his own eye. They have a civil war, it is a bloodbath that exists at the end of Judges. Then you move to the Kings, Chronicles, Samuel, et cetera. on and on what's happened. My friend, really, it's almost second hand to humanity. As a whole, they are crooked and perverse. Every generation that's passed in some way has manifested their own heart's perversion against God. And such is true of the Philippians. The Philippians, or Philippi, the city there is located off the Ignatian Highway. In fact, years before, it was really nothing, but there was a spring there, and this spring was sought after and desirous, and so Philip of Macedon, who was the father of Alexander the Great, would come, and he would build a little outpost there, right next to these warm springs that were there, and of course he'd name it after himself, hence his wife got the name Philippi. And that's all it was for many years until they found that there were gold in their heels. And then everybody packed up their bags and rags and moved to Beverly so that they could mine all of this gold that is there. And then, subsequent to the death of Julius Caesar, you have the one point in history upon which Philippi became, as it might be said, worldwide news. You have the nephew of Caesar, Augustus, Octavian. and one of the right-hand soldiers of Caesar by the name of Mark Antony, and they allied themselves together. And opposing them was a man by the name of Cassius and Brutus, and they gathered around a city called Philippi. There were over 200,000 men that engaged in a horrific battle that at fate was the empire of Rome. The winner takes it all. And in that fateful battle that would exist between those combined forces, there were over 40,000 casualties that occurred at Philippi. It held a significant role in the mind and the hearts of those veterans who had survived the Battle of Philippi. As a result, the Roman Republic now was ushered into the Roman Empire And Philippi became something of a Roman colony that was housed and populated very often by retired soldiers. As a result of being a Roman colony, being housed by so many Roman soldiers, it had autonomy from Romans as a whole. And it was distinct, almost like living in Italy itself. They had the use of Roman law, they were exempt from taxes. Roman citizenship was granted to all his residents. Latin became the official language of Rome's. All the Roman Catholics and, I'm sorry, all the Roman customs were adopted. All of the Roman religions were adopted. This is Philippi. And these group of believers that the Apostle Paul went to in Acts chapter 16, there really was only a handful of them. Do you remember? I think every believer ought to know who the founding members of the church at Philippi was. I can give you an alliterated outline on it, but the first of those was one called Lydia, and she was a seller of purple. And then you find out that there was a lady that was carried about and dwelling with all these wicked spirits. And she would go about screaming, hither and yon. And there was a great salvation that occurred in her heart. And the final group was one that was the head jailer at the Philippi jail. At midnight, you know, they sing songs of the great earthquake. And there you have the charter members of the church at Philippi. If you want alliteration, you've got a cellar, a yeller, and a jeller. That's what you've got. What an eclectic group of people. But what's outside? A former Roman colony, pressed about with all of these soldiers. The believers were desperately poor. 2 Corinthians chapter 8 mentions this. These believers are existing in a world of paganism. Get this, their society was influenced by hardened former battle soldiers. They endured persecution from the culture that was around them. They had to endure false doctrine. You find that in chapter 3 and verse 1 where he tells them to beware of dogs and evil workers and beware of the concision. You'll find in chapter 4 that because of all this hardship being pressed against them, there's this unity among them. There's doubt on how to handle this. Paul writing on this, he said, you're in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation. It's quite interesting that that phrase was actually borrowed from the Old Testament. In the 32nd chapter of Deuteronomy, the Scripture records they have corrupted themselves. Their spot is not the spot of his children. They are a perverse and crooked generation. Our Lord spoke these very words, or similar words, in the 17th chapter of Matthew, when he says, O faithless and perverse generation. In Luke chapter nine, O faithless and perverse generation. Isaiah, speaking of this coming generation in chapter 59, would write, Through inspiration their feet run to evil. In Acts chapter two, in verse 40, the apostle Peter, at that great message at Pentecost, would respond to those individuals. He said, You're an untoward generation. They're crooked. It's a medical term. The Greek word there is by which we get the medical term, scoliosis. Crooked, deviated from the standard. Perverse, it has the idea to intensify it. It's one that is strayed so far off from the path that its deviation is severely twisted and distorted. And as I said at the onset, this could apply to all history. One extent or another, all cultures and civilizations. And of course, we can even see it in our society. Yet I think of John chapter 17, the Lord in that prayer prior to his passion would pray, I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou should keep them from the evil one. Sanctify them, verse 17 of the same chapter. Sanctify them by thy truth, thy word is truth. You see, every Christian lives in a generation that is crooked, and perverse. You know I marvel a little bit sometimes. I grew up in a county that was larger. Well, and this may mean nothing to you, but it was larger than the county that I currently live in, Dauphin County. It's much larger than Dauphin County. Dauphin County has a population of just under 300,000 people. But the county that I grew up in, though geographically it was larger, it only had a total county population of about 38,000. So rule is what that is called. And that's what I grew up in. And I had the opportunity to live, I think in one sense, protected. There wasn't a lot of things in that county that exist today. It wasn't the big city. And I think of the big city, I think of crime, and I think of difficulty, and I think of drugs, and I think of murder. But you know, I some time ago installed this little local news app on my phone. Now I'm thinking about taking it off. You know why? I was sitting over there, got an alert just before I came in. Little town, 5,000 people. Little town not far from where I live. Police just shut it down. Police activity. Cross the street from where I live in my little town. Had a hostage situation two weeks ago. Up north of us where there's nothing but like pine trees, you know. Murders. I thought rural area was supposed to be safer. Crooked and perverse. We think of the greater extent of our society. We as believers, we've attempted to calibrate our value system and have a biblical worldview that matches scriptures. When we think of marriage, we think of traditional marriage. We think of being centered around family. We think of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We think of wholesomeness. We think of a preoccupation with holiness. Yet the society around us flaunts openly their pursuits of iniquity. They attempt to destroy this. and set this apart by all of these fancy words like inclusiveness and equality. To seek to educate individuals. We live in a society that advocates by media and law every form of unholiness that could possibly be. Luteness. In fact, not only that, I think of the very fact that in our society what seems to be on the tongue of everybody's lips today politically is unlawfulness to fund the police. The worship of nature. The divisions of population. I'm about so tired of hearing of all of the hyphenated country that we grow up in. I'm going to start my own demographic grouping. The follically challenged. That's what I'm going to do. I'm a follically challenged American. Divisions. You know, on a note of that, now you want to get a group of believers together, and you want to start a church in an area that is, what's our text say, crooked and perverse? What do you do now? I mean, the rule area is everybody agrees with you on these things, or at least that's what we're told. We go preach to the rows of corn, but what do you do in a city that just so openly flaunts with its laws and its action and praises that? What do you do? You know, these are some of the very questions that I begin to consider myself when we started just outside of, you know, I'll never forget this. I went out in our little neighborhood, I didn't know anything. I learned the area that I now pastor by knocking doors. I'm not a native of that area. And I was going through this one community called Edgemont. And I mentioned to someone where I was going and they gave me this funny look. And I didn't get the joke. So here I go down Edgemont and I was with another fella and we were in between services and I said, I'm going to quick hit these roads here. You go over there and I'll meet you back on the backside. Well, I started noticing there's a police car following me and I'm getting a little unnerved. Not because I wanted to defund him, but what law am I, what is going on here? And he's following me and I'd go to one door and I could see him looking at me and I'd go to the next door and I'd go to the next door. He pulled up beside me and he said, all right, Doc, what are you doing? And I said, I'm inviting people to church. He said, no, seriously. And I said, yeah. He said, you know this African-American. He was African-American. He said, you know this African-American community. Well, I didn't. So I passed this one SUV that was there, and something was going on, but I was simple. So I knocked on the window, and they all jerked around and looked at me, and their eyes were real big. And I invited them out to church. And I went down the road, and then the police officer pulled right behind him and ticketed him for something. It was craziness. So I circled around, and then here I go down the next road, and there was another car watching me. Finally, the lady got out, and she said, what are you doing? And I said, well, I'm inviting everybody to church. She said, no, you're not. I said, yes, ma'am. Here you go. She said, oh, you are. Well, I'm so-and-so, and I reside on such a ward. I'm a local politician. And I thought that's wonderful. Well, six months later, that same township, and I didn't know this, but that particular ward leader was involved in making that local township very inclusive to any type of bathroom use. So she met me. I thought we had a positive engagement. So I wrote her a biblical letter about why our community should not do this. And she wrote me back a very unbiblical response of how I should keep my nose out of her business. What's supposed to be your response to that? You're knocking on doors. You want people to come to the saving grace of Jesus Christ. You want to see them grow in sanctification. But there's a society that was out that literally thumbs their nose against the Almighty God. It can leave you frustrated. It can leave you worn out. It can look daunting as you look back at your map back there. It can look daunting to see all the doors lit, light ahead, and you think of all the work that you've done, and sadly we begin to look at the evidence and say, well, you know, I haven't got a good return from it. What do you do when you wind up staying in a place your facilities longer than you intended on being there? What do you do when you have expectations that are failed? What in the world do we do now? These are the very scenarios that are embodied in this passage. Paul's writing to him, you're in a crooked and perverse generation. But he doesn't just leave them with a statement. He gives them some five or six pointed imperatives. Let me share them with you tonight. I think firstly, the first thing to do now in this crooked and perverse generation, number one is this, that is to exude a divine spirit. To exude a divine spirit. Look back in chapter two. I want you to note these. You'll find this phrase a couple of times, but the word mind. Now that's not simply that gray matter that exists within your cranium. When he speaks of mind, he's speaking of one of two things generally. It's an exchange of where your decision making process is, or sometimes if you will, it's the advancement or the trajectory of the decisions that you make in life. Your mindset. He's going to say in verse 2, be a like-minded. In verse 2, one mind. In verse 3, in loveliness of mind. In verse 5, he's going to say let this mind be in you. So there's the imperative, the mind of Christ. How's that embodied? It's embodied in the fact of Jesus Christ's suffering and his death and burial on the cross of Christ. But I would have you note that mind clearly articulated that divine spirit in verse 8. He said being found in fashion as a man, what did he do? It's a mindset of humility. You see, humility is what allows any believer to be like-minded. I don't know about you, but sometimes my dog doesn't even agree with me. It's a terrible thing sometimes. What do you do when you come to a local, if a local assembly is ever gonna be successful, someone has to embody a spirit of humility. You won't find it in the world. That's why it's a grief to my heart when they tell me that we gotta run the church like a business. I'm going to tell you what folks, if I'm going to please Christ, I better not be doing it like a business. Now I'm not talking about transparency and honest and order, that's not what I'm talking about. But our purpose here isn't to please the consumer. What's the purpose of a New Testament church? I'm here to please the Savior. And I'm to have a mindset that exudes the divine spirit of humility. Humility is embodied in sacrifice. Note verse four. Look not every man on his own thing. Oh, isn't that so hard? I thought the world told us to live the American dream. To get all we can, can all we can get, and then sit on our proverbial can. That's what the world teaches us. The world teaches us to keep pushing forward in the rat race of life. But what's embodied here? Look, not every man on his own thing, but every man on the things of others. And by the way, the Philippian church desperately needed that, as I mentioned at the onset in the introduction. They're surrounded with persecution. 2 Corinthians chapter 8 talks about these same Macedonian believers under great distress giving out of their poverty. Interesting note, they're at this time likely the only church in Europe. Not the only church in town, the only church on the county, because they're in Macedonia. They're gonna have to embody a divine spirit of humility that will bring about that essence of sacrifice. Humility's embodied not only in our sacrifice, but humility's embodied in our submission. I would note verse number seven, speaking of Christ, and I think of Hebrews chapter one, who's made a little lower than the angels. He's the diadem of glory. He's the king of kings. He's the lord of lords. He was born king as we heard earlier. But what did he do? He took upon a robe of flesh. He tabernacled John chapter 1 among us. He came unto his own. His own received him not. My friend, one of the attitudes that must be embraced is this of humility. A crooked and perverse generation, what do we do now? We embody, we exude the divine spirit of humility. For submission, for sacrifice. Now let me just give you this singular fault here. Verse number nine, and we didn't read this at the onset, but I would note this. Humility is what allows us to succeed. Know what he did there? God has highly exalted him. You know, sometimes in the process of our Christian life, when I think of succeeding, I think of enduring. You know, that's the one thing every child of God can do. You may not have the resources, you may not have the gifts to be able to preach or to teach, or maybe you don't have the talent to sing, but every child of God can pray, and every child of God is expected to endure, to have patience. All of those are the fruit of the Spirit. There's wonderful things when you look at chapter three I get down to verse number 13. This is that process of sanctification, but note this. Paul's speaking of this. He says, Brethren, chapter 3 and verse 13, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do. You know what he's speaking about. He's speaking about becoming like Christ. And that's gonna require endurance in his Christian life. Endurance is a wonderful thing. There are any number of things that pressing onward in your Christian life, if you will, I can say this, not quitting, not throwing in the towel, not surrendering to the causes, and just assuming that because we live in a perverse and wicked nation, in a generation that seemingly doesn't care about God, that then is the time for us, through humility, to endure for Jesus Christ. Endurance. Endurance glorifies God. Endurance verifies our regenerated state. Endurance adorns the truth. Endurance grants assurance. Endurance has a sense of preserving us from the human weakness which is often exposed with the tragedies of life. Endurance protects the name of Christ from reproach. Oh, the number of Christians that used to do something for God. The number of Christians that saw the wickedness of this life, and like Lot, chose rather the fruitful plains of Sodom, rather than to abide in the presence of God. And folks, while I knew a guy that used to be a Sunday school teacher, I knew a guy that used to be a deacon, what happened somewhere along the line, they forgot the goal of the Christian life. The singular thing that every child of God ought to treasure, and that is to endure for Him. It takes humility. It produces endurance, joyfulness, and usefulness in our Christian life. What do we do now? Well, friend, I would think the first of those is this, we exude the divine spirit of humility. Notice, second thing, if I might, draw your attention to verse number 13. Really back that up to verse number 12. He says, wherefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, look at this phrase, two words, work out. Work out your own salvation with fear driven now. He didn't say work to have salvation. That's not what he said. He says work out your salvation. This really is the theme of a continual fulfillment. Your salvation is not by works, but because you're saved. Sanctification should be a preoccupation with your mind. To become more and more like the Savior. But when I see this idea of sanctification, of working out, I think about the elements of sanctification that will be entailed in the very next chapter as well. I think about obedience. I think about holiness. A preoccupation with holiness. It seems to be a weird thing in this world. As crazy as everything is in this world, it amazes me yet that this world actually thinks that the craziest thing in life is Bible-believing Christians. That they're the weird ones. I had just the other day, I think it was around Memorial Day, we were outside and we were having a little bit of a fire pit and I was putting some hot dogs on and we had some friends over and there was little doggies running around in our backyard and some neighborhood children came over. And I'm sitting there trying to light wet wood, you know. I'm too cheap to buy the dry stuff. I just use whatever's in the yard. And I'm sitting there. A little neighborhood girl came up next to me. She leans over and she said, can I ask you a question? I said, sure. She said, how are you able to have this fire pit? Our landlord won't let us have one. You own this house? I said, well, me and the bank, yeah, we own this house. She said, that's why you can have dogs over here? I said, well, yeah, I guess that's why. I never thought about it. Yeah, I guess that's why. And she remarked something to me. She said, you must be the luckiest guy in the world. And I said, because I'm having a fire. She said, no. You live with your wife. And your children listen to you. And I thought, your children listen to you. And y'all love each other. And all your children are like normal, I think that might have been the word she used, normal brother and sister together. And she started expounding upon this and I thought, don't know me, you know what? Her life has so been embedded that she looks at biblical truths as being odd. So crooked is the world that she lives in. It's a process of sanctification. Obedience. Holiness. Look at that last phrase in verse number 12. We exude a divine spirit. We endure a divine sanctification. Look in verse 12. Look at this phrase. You work out your salvation. Note these words, fear and trembling. Fear and trembling. That amazes me. This to me expresses a little bit of worship. We have a worshipful life. When we worship, We are to declare the attributes and the activity of God. To worship the worship that God enjoys isn't us speaking about all that we've seen and do and all that we hope and dance around it. That's not biblical. Biblical worship exudes the characteristics of God. Biblical worship pronounces the activities of God, what He's done, how He's provided. It builds upon the very character of God. And my friend, when we see the character and the person and the work and the ability of Jesus Christ, called Moses to lay prostrate before Him. When we see the power and the working of the Almighty God, it puts us in a place of true submission to Him. We exude a divine spirit. Number 2 in verse 12, we endure divine sanctification. I'm going to skip down towards the close of these and I'm going to circle back to one for chronological order, but let me give you a fourth one. We'll come back to number three. I think number four, we engage in a divine salvation. Listen to the words, blameless, harmless, without rebuke. The last of verse number 15, shine as lights. in the world. Blameless, a life not criticized by sin or evil. In 1st Timothy chapter 5, commanded that ye may be blameless. In 1st Timothy chapter 6 and verse 4, that the pastor was to be unrebukable. In 1st Thessalonians 5 and verse 23, the prayer for Paul for the Thessalonian believers that their whole body, soul, and spirit be preserved blameless. In 2 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 8, that they would be blameless. In 2 Corinthians or 2 Peter chapter 3 and verse 14, without spot and blameless. Listen, as you think of the word blameless, we come to the point that what God would really have us be in this life is living a life so sanctified by the salvation that we were living on this life like we were already in His presence. without fault. That's the cause of the Christian life. He says blameless, harmless. There's a wonderful word. That word harmless is used over in Romans chapter 16 and verse 17 and Paul put it this way, that you would be simple concerning evil. The same idea. Innocent. A life that is pure, unmixed, unadulterated with sin. The idea of a high quality metal that needs no alloy. You know, I was talking to someone the other day and they were telling me about gold bullion. They were telling me that the Canadian gold maple leaf, one bullion, it's like 32 troy ounces or something like that, 99.99 gold. So I asked a very obvious question, I thought. Why that close? Why not 100%? You know what I was informed? Well, if it didn't have some type of alloy in there, it'd just about be useless, easily damaged. But my friend, the calling of the Christian life here, the engaging in our divine salvation to move to this place in life that God's goal for us is that we be innocent. without any alloy, pure. I think of 1 John chapter 3. Beloved, what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. We know not what we shall be, but when we see Him, we'll be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Now pay close attention, Jesus. And every man that hath that hope in him, what does he do? Purifieth himself, even as he is pure. What does he do? He lives in a crooked and perverse generation with the same aptitude and desire that he one day will possess in totality. That's what we do. We engage in a divine salvation. And then he brings about this, we shine as lights. Oh, what a wonderful analogy. In Ephesians chapter 5, the aerobic chapter of the Bible, you know, because we're told to walk, walk, walk, walk, walk. Seven times we're commanded to walk, I think, in Ephesians chapter 5. But we're commanded to walk as lights. I think of the gospel that we have in 2 Corinthians chapter 4. It's called a glorious gospel of light. And in verse 6, that God had commanded the light to shine out of darkness and has shined into our hearts to give the knowledge of the light, of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. In Daniel chapter 12, while I'm getting ahead of myself, Daniel relates in the closing portion of his great prophecy. He says, and they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament. The fact is, our responsibility is to engage in the matter of divine salvation that we have. To live now like we were in the very presence of the Almighty God. To be a transcendent light upon this world. No, we have no new gospel. We have no methods, new methods or new means. We do not have that. We have the Word of God. And we allow this Word of God to work in our life that we be in these days blameless and harmless. Note verse 16. Here's another imperative. Holding forth. The word there has the idea of echoing. Holding forth the word of life. That is to embrace divine scriptures. Holding forth, to give heed, to pay attention, to hold forth. Paul writing to Timothy in 1 Timothy chapter 4 says, take heed unto thyself and to the doctrine continue in them for in doing thou shalt both save thyself and those that hear thee. Pay attention to them. Your lights in the world are to be centered around the word of God. I am amazed today at what Christians hold forth. We hold forth with psychology. Can I tell you something? Every child that's ever been born has mom and daddy issues. They do. I don't understand how exploring your past is going to make you a better child. So you got mom and dad issues? Yes. I'm a geriatric millennial. I wouldn't know what to do if I couldn't blame something on my mom and dad. And they're baby boomers. And you know what? If they couldn't blame their mom and dads, who are they going to blame for their life? Nah. It doesn't need more psychology. I know what we need. We need a deeper probing of ourselves. To understand what is in the root of our heart, I think of the Proverbs, only a fool seeketh to discover himself. I know what we need. We need more entertainment in life. Entertainment is much like a drug in our society. It erases from us time. You know, I read something the other day. Said the average individual that lives today, get this, listen closely, will spend a hundred days of their life searching what to watch on TV. It didn't say that they'd spend a hundred days watching TV. They would spend a third of a year of their life surfing to find something to watch. The drug of the entertainment industry. And by the way, it's more and more and more and more each year. Why? So we don't have to think about our life. But note here the scripture, the imperative. What do we do now? Well, we exude a divine spirit. We enjoy, if you will, I think the word I used there was endure divine sanctification. We engage in a divine salvation. We move down to these very words in verse number 16 and we embrace the divine scriptures. They're the only thing that really has life-giving power in this world. And when I think about the Word of God, I think about the great men and women, the brilliant men and women that gave their life to scratching the surface of the Word of God. I can think of no other topic that has covered from stern to stern, library after library after library of top topics. I think of the individuals that look at the Word of God and say it's some book in the past, and yet I find of all the great individuals, believing or otherwise, that lived in the time past, that gave themselves to the study and the understanding of the Word of God because they saw it as valuable, there's hope and truth in the Word of God. And if anything we're to do, we're to embrace in the divinely given scriptures. They are called the word of life. I think of John chapter 6 and verse 68. To whom, Peter, wilt thou also leave me? Peter responds in verse 68, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. 7 in verse 17. It's on the last day of the Feast of the Tabernacle and the Jews by tradition had this water libation. And what they would do is they'd go out to the Pool of Siloam that was fed by the Spring Gihon and they would take a chalice if you will and they would dip in the water seven times and they would bring it into the temple and they would pour it something like a drink offering upon the altar and it would run down over thence and all of this while they're commemorating and singing the, I think it was the halal, the 118th psalm and they would march around the altar in this great process and they would make a big pharaoh and a big spectacle on the eighth day and in John chapter 17 the scripture starts out and that was the feast of the tabernacle and he says right before verse 17 on the last day of the feast At the crux, I kind of like to think it's right at the midst of where they're pouring that great water upon the altar, the Lord Jesus stood. He said, I am the water of life. He that cometh with me, cometh to me by faith, from his birth will flow forth living water. He'll never thirst again. It's the water of life. That's the life-giving principle of the truths of the Word of God. Ephesians calls it the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. It is the source by which sanctification is had. It's the source by which a young man can know a direction that will please God, the 119th Psalm. The Word of God, it's true, it's preserved, it's eternal. It never fades. What should we do now? What in the world? We embrace the divinely given and preserved Word of God. Note a fifth thing, if you will, in verse 18. And really, you could even back it up to verse 17. He says, yea, if I be offered, that word there, spendo, is a Greek word, and it directly references a drink offering. In Numbers chapter 15, you'll find about these, but they'd have a burnt offering. And it's very detailed in the 15th chapter of Numbers. If the high priest, when he's offering a burnt offering, I believe it was a third of a hen or a half a hen. No, it was a quarter of a hen if it was a lamb, a third of a hen if it was a ram, and a half a hen if it was a bull. And he would put the burnt offering up. It's going to be roasted with fire. And he was to take so much of that liquid and he was to pour it out. You know what happens when you pour water on a burning substance? What happens? Smoke. And that was a sweet incense to God. That's what Paul is capturing, not only here in verse 17, but also in 2 Timothy chapter four, where that great phrase is used, I have kept the faith, I have finished my course, I am ready to be offered, both of them the same words, same illustration. It was that water libation, that drink offering that was given. He said, if I be offered upon the sacrifice and the service of your faith, what do I do? I joy and rejoice with you all. And verse number 18, for the same cause also do you joy and rejoice with me. That's a marvelous thing here. We're told that Philippians is a prison epistle. Nearest recollection that I can have, I think he's in his fourth year of prison. You can get a little parallel in 2 Timothy chapter 4. He's by himself. He's isolated. If tradition has it right, he's in Mamertine prison. That's where they held all the high crimes individuals. All the traitors of Rome were there and they put this sickly preacher in there. He's surrounded by knaves and cutthroats and blackers. I joy and rejoice. I joy and rejoice. I joy and rejoice. In chapter one, he's even going to talk about that now that he's in prison, some individuals are preaching simply to add affliction to his bondage. He said, but I do rejoice and I joy. What is to be the attitude of the saints of God in a crooked and perverse generation? That is this, they esteem the presence of Christ. They joy in Him. I think of Nehemiah rebuilding the wall surrounding Jerusalem. He says in Nehemiah chapter 8 that the joy of the Lord is our strength. Joy is not happiness. A child of God can have everything going wrong in life and express the joy of the Lord because the joy of the Lord is indicative because of the presence of Jesus Christ. Only the child of God can truly know the joy of God. There's a great humility of the divine spirit. There's the great outworking of the divinely engaged salvation. There's the great rejoicing that is here in verse number 18. The esteeming of the presence of Christ. The embrace of divine scriptures. But let me take you back to really the whole point of the matter. One thing you better not do. You see, there is one thing that is mentioned in this text that will undermine your spirit that you're supposed to exude. It will undermine your sanctification that you're to pursue. It will undermine the divinely held scriptures that you're to hold forth. It will undermine the divine spirit, if you will, the joy that you're supposed to have. One thing. Look in verse 14. Do all things with what? Without murmurings and disputings. Fail to enjoy your divine status. You know, I think about that word murmurings, and I think they call it an automatopoeia. Where the embodiment of the word sounds like what you're trying to say. Kind of like the hiss of a snake. That's what the word murmuring is. It's kind of like gong-gong-gong-gong. That's what it is. Murmuring. What is the one thing you shouldn't do in a crooked and perverse generation? Murmur. I've never seen a murmuring child of God express the joy of the Lord. I've never seen a murmuring child of God really seek divine sanctification. I've never really seen a murmuring child of God hold forth the word of God. I've never seen any of these occur because it won't. You want to know something that better not abide? Murmuring and disputing. That word disputing is simply put as arguing. Romans chapter 14 and talking to the assembly there, he says, Receive not a brother unto doubtful disputes. Arguing! Doubtful? What's he arguing about? Anything you can argue about. Boy, churches are full of that business. We like to argue. In 2 Corinthians, Paul is going to speak, this is a beautiful picture where Paul's gonna speak about the Corinthian church, and he talks about the word contentions. The word specifically uses a compound Greek word, it's philoneko. Phila means love. Neko, I don't see anybody with them on, but you ever seen those clothing that has a little check mark? You know what I'm talking, what do we call, you're not supposed to like them politically. They're very inclusive and woke today and there's a big boycott. Do you know what I'm talking, it's not Adidas or Puma, it's, well Nike means victory. That's why they chose that. And it's in the scriptures and Paul said about this, he said some of you, you have this contention about you. Philonico, loveth victory. Some people just argue Simply because that's what they enjoy. I promise you, it's damaging to your testimony. I promise you that it's damaging to your assembly. You know, I no doubt, I think as a pastor, pastor a little bit and served as an assistant pastor, folks come in and I look at our church. We've had a couple folks get saved in the last six, seven, eight weeks. I'm very excited about it and we've got some upcoming closes. You know what they think about the church? It's the most wonderful thing that's ever existed. But I know something. Let them get growed a little bit. Let them get some church experience. And guess what? Doesn't it always happen, us mature Christians? Come in through the door, and boy, we came to church the first couple times and preacher preached, and he may have preached his worst message, and you went away, wow, wasn't it good to hear the preaching of the word of God? Couple months, couple years, Roast preachers for dinner. Murmurings and disputing. Nothing will sap your joy quite like murmuring and arguing. I'm not talking about standing for the truth. No, I'm not talking about contending for the truth. I'm talking about feeling like your way is the only right way and if it ain't your way, it ain't the way. Contentions. I think that's one of the great hurdles. Now I don't know to whom I speak. Your preacher has not debriefed me with his membership package yet. But I'll tell you something I've learned by experience. Church folks gathered around the preaching of the Word of God. And at one point or time, we now created these expectations of what the church going future needs to be. I'm speaking very specifically of this assembly. You say, well, this is what the missions program's got to look like. Here comes one for you. This is the kind of building we got to get. This is the kind of service we got to have. And what happens? All that murmuring and disputing. And all of a sudden, the worst problem that we have is not the crooked and perverse generation that we live in, but it's the preacher. My soul It's the deacon. It's the Sunday school teacher. Did you see how Brother So-and-so swept the floor? Doesn't he know anything? But there was a time when we just loved that somebody was sweeping the floor. Of all the things that he commands to do in the Scriptures. The one he tags in before he actually gets to the point. Because might I say this? Murmuring and disputing is a characteristic of a perverse and crooked generation. It's what they do. It's why they invented Twitter. It's why they have Facebook. So that everybody can know their foolishness. get someone in their pajamas in their mother's basement arguing about how they would have won the football game or how they would have done this or how they would have done that and somehow giving their opinion and it doesn't even have to be qualified anymore. Murmurings and disputings. Go on a little limb here and I'll tell you something. It's toxic to a local assembly. What's the will of God, 1 Thessalonians 5? Give thanks for this is the will of God for you in Christ. That's the will of God, this is the opposite. You know the first time we find murmuring, it's in Exodus chapter, I think it's Exodus chapter five, it's Moses. You find throughout the book of Exodus murmurings. It's interesting the picture that you get in 1 Corinthians chapter 10. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10, Look over there if you will we've stayed in Philippians, but look over in first first Corinthians chapter 2 chapter 11 is the teachings on the element of the communion The Lord's table look at chapter 10 He says in verse 4 and did all drink the same spiritual drink for they drank of that spiritual rock which followed them and that rock was Christ Note verse 5 but with many of them God was not well pleased and For they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now, these things were our what? The reason the Lord put all that in there, why? Because it's indicative of humanity. He said, I know what you're gonna do. He said, I know your hearts. Murmuring. These are examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they lusted. And I would submit to you, God gave them manna, And they wanted garlics and onions. I don't know why it's nasty. That's what they said, wanted melons. Where's the quail? Just always got this manna. Notice in verse six. Neither be ye, Corinthian church, by application us, neither be ye idolaters. Well, I thought Christians don't have idols. We know Jesus Christ is our savior, how could we have idols? Remember the last verse of 1 John chapter 5? Little children, keep yourselves from... He said, neither be ye idolaters of some of them. And as written, the people sat down to eat, drink, and rose up to play. Neither let us commit fornication. Oh my, why is it in almost every church epistle there's a passage just like verse 8? 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, for this is the will of God that you abstain from fornication. Over and over and over. Why? Because it's innately human. In fact, it is the actions of a crooked and perverse generation. Promiscuity lewdness wickedness all of this that is present It's a hallmark and earmark and identifying quality of what it means to be crooked and perverse note verse number nine Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted and were strode of serfs verse 10 neither what? Murmur gee Some of them also murmured and what were they I? Would submit to you that failing to engage in the divine status, allowing ourselves just to be full of ourselves. You know, I remember when I first went into the ministry, there was this fella, and things would go awry in his life. And he'd lose his temper, he'd say something he ought not, whatever the case would be, and this is what he'd always say. He'd say, but I'm Irish. That was his answer to everything. And then I'd meet other Christians and they were this way, I'm Italian. I'm such and such. That's not a justification. I started making up stuff, you know? Because I'm a southerner, I can do this or I can do, do you think God really cares about this? You see, the fact is, murmuring and disputing, embody the life of one that is not pursuing sanctification in their life. Now there's an obvious many things here that is missing in my imagination. Imagine if we'd have started out the message about some of those that were missing. Philippian church, what are you to do if you're blameless and harmless? And you live in a crooked and perverse nation, what are you supposed to do? I guess hoard provisions. But it's not in the text. Be preppers. Go out and buy 50 million rounds of ammunition. Build your bunkers. Invest in all-terrain vehicles for the coming invasion. Storm the White House. Do you see any of that present? You know what's not even present? Be politically active. Listen, I'm all for stewardshiping the liberties we have. I'm just noting that it's not in the text. I'm not preaching against it, I'm expounding on the text, and it's not there. And today, so often, those are the human beings by which we're going to seek to deal with a crooked and perverse nation. May I tell you this? If I can tie this back into the first message, the verses we started reading at the name of Jesus. You know, one of the failures of Israel in the Old Testament, even into the Gospels, was that they could fail to ascertain that the kingdom of God was not of this earth. They couldn't get that. If Jesus Christ would have come and came as the Messiah that their traditions held to, they would have installed him as king. But he didn't come like that. Because he had a divine plan and his divine plan was the redemption of humanity. And they didn't want a redeemer. They wanted a deliverer and king. Hence is why they crucified him. My friends, the kingdom of God's not of this world. It amazes me that Philippi is a place of ruins today. There's no such thing as the Roman Empire. 200,000 men once waged a battle in Philippi and it had no impact on our lives today. There's always been a crooked and perverse nation. Do you realize if God tarries his coming, he'll still be the king of kings even if there's no United States of America. You say, well I don't want that. Well I'm with you, I'm just telling you what's not in the text. We give ourselves to so much worry and so much difficult and so much anxiety and none of that's in the scriptures. How do you deal with it? By recognizing that God's kingdom has nothing to do with the United States of America. Do you realize God is king regardless? And my friend, no election is going to change his status. No PAC, political action committee, is going to change that status. That there's not one human individual that can delay the kingdom of God. It stands starkly eternal and divine. And you and I have a great responsibility I think of the chorus. Be like Jesus, this my song. In the heart and in the home. Be like Jesus all day long. Little Sunday school song. You realize that has so much truth packed in it. That's God's calling for my life. What do we do now? I'm to exude the divine spirit. I'm to embrace the divinely given scriptures. I'm to take and enjoy the divinely given status that I have now. My friends, that's how we deal with a crooked and reverse generation. Take a moment before we close, look around. I don't know each of you, but I can tell you this, if you're a professing child of God tonight, if you're a saint of God, you're in the presence of people that you will spend eternity with. And what the world really needs is that believers would hold forth the world of scriptures while it is yet day. For the night cometh when no man will work.