Encouragment from Paul

The book of Philippians is about finding joy in all situations by having the mind of Christ. Paul encourages rejoicing in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, despite any circumstances. He reminds the church at Philippi that their fellowship is centered around the Gospel. Paul emphasizes that salvation leads to spiritual maturity and being conformed to the image of Christ. Our joy should not be dependent on worldly circumstances. Paul exemplifies how to maintain joy even in difficult situations, such as being a prisoner in Rome. He sees his imprisonment as an opportunity to preach the Gospel and spread it to even more people. Paul's message is to have the mind of Christ and live a life of joy by being focused on the Gospel. We started in Philippians a couple of weeks ago. Of course, the book of Philippians is about joy. The book of Philippians is about having the mind of Christ. Sometimes when we're in our lives and we're living our life, sometimes joy is hard to come by. But if we have the mind of Christ, no matter what the situation, no matter what the circumstance is, we can find and have joy. And today, I want us to look at an encouragement from Paul. And I hope that you, I've been encouraged all week studying this, and so I pray this morning that it will also encourage you. But I want us to look at verse 18 this morning, because then it will give us the conclusion before we get to how we got there. But Paul said, "...What then, notwithstanding every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached. And I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice." Are we rejoicing in the Gospel of Jesus Christ? That's our question. Paul said, I am rejoicing and I will continue to rejoice in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. You go back up in verse 5 and you remember that Paul started this conversation about the furtherance of the Gospel. You remember that Paul is now in prison. He is in Rome. He has been put to death because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The church at Philippi has held him. They have been close in relationship with Paul. And all of a sudden, now what's happening? He is in prison for preaching the very Gospel that God called him to. But he reminds them, he says, remember, we have had this fellowship in the Gospel. That's what it's all about. Church work is about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And then here's why it was so important to Paul. He said in verse 6, "...Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ." And so Paul says not only is there salvation, but there's also spiritual maturity. And he says what God started in you was salvation. When God came into your life as salvation, guess what? He is going to lead you into maturity. He is going to conform you into the image of Jesus Christ. We saw that when we went through the book of Ephesians. When he wrote to the church at Ephesus. Our goal and our purpose is to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. And so spiritual maturity is measured by our joy. In other words, if we are spiritually mature, we're going to have more joy in our life because circumstances and situations are not going to affect us. Because our joy is not in this world. Our joy is where? In Jesus Christ. And so he sets the thermostat. He sets the potential of the joy that is in our life. And you know, unfortunately, a lot of us today are going through life, and we look at life, and rather than having joy, we react to situations, right? We react to everything that happens. That's why we get up on Monday morning and what typically happens. Not what we expected to happen, right? And so we allow the circumstances. We start off Monday morning when the alarm clock goes off, and we just react. Well, I overslept this morning, so now I've got to speed up and try to get to work. And our whole week just gets shut down over one little situation. And it becomes a cycle of action and reaction into our life all week long. But yet, Paul wrote in Galatians that the fruit of the Spirit is love. And the second one that he mentions there is joy. Joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, neatness, temperance against such there is no law. He also tells us in chapter 4, verse 4, he says rejoice in the Lord always. And again, I say rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord always. How many of you get up every Monday morning and rejoice in the Lord? But how many of you when you go to bed Monday night are still rejoicing in the Lord? Paul commands us here in chapter 4 to rejoice always. And he's going to write this letter to the church at Philippi, and that's where we're going. That's what he's showing us is how do I live a life of joy? Well, in order to have a life of joy, I've got to have the mind of Christ. I've got to think like Christ and act like Christ. That's what Paul did. Paul tells us in Philippians, he said, nevertheless, not I live, but Christ lives in me and through me. He tells us also in Psalms 51, you remember David after he committed adultery with Bathsheba? And Nathan comes and confronts him, and he writes this in Psalms 51. And in verse 12, after dealing with the guilt of sin, after dealing with the consequences of sin, he finally comes to God and he finally confesses his sins. And down in verse 12, he makes an odd statement. He says, restore unto me the joy of thy salvation. David didn't lose his salvation because he committed adultery. He was still God, but what did he lose? He lost that joy of serving God. He lost that joy of that relationship that he had with Him. And so he says, man, restore that joy unto me. And it seems like we have a lot of Christians today that are saved, amen? But they don't have any joy. We've lost our joy. We've allowed circumstances and situations and acting and reacting to rob us of this joy. Matter of fact, Jesus Christ said in John 16, verse 33, He said, these things have I spoken unto you, that in Me you might have peace. In the world you shall have tribulation. But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world. Jesus warned us that we can expect trouble in this world. Not everything is going to go smooth. Not everything is going to be the way that you want it to happen. It's not going to be according to your agenda that is there. But Paul, all of a sudden, becomes this tremendous example of how that we can allow the circumstances in our life to come into our life, but not affect our joy. Not ruin our joy or steal our joy. Now remember, Paul is a prisoner in Rome. And he tells us in verse 12 where we're going to begin in this passage today, he says, but I would you should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the futherance of the gospel. In other words, he says, I want you to understand. Remember last week, he just prayed for them. And he prayed that their love would abound more and more. That they would be able to approve the more excellent things. Not just good things in our life, but the excellent things in order that we might produce the fruit of righteousness. The fruit of Jesus Christ. And he said, guess what? When you look at Paul's life, Paul was not an example of what truth looks like, right? None of us want to love God, so we obey God. So we preach the gospel. We share with people, right? And then all of a sudden, we make the good decisions. We witness the people. We share the gospel. And it lands us up in prison. That's not what we expect when we share the gospel, is it? But Paul says, listen, I want you to understand, what has happened to me has actually become a blessing. It's not a bad thing. And notice he tells us that we should have joy despite apparel. In other words, when problems and stuff come into our life, we should still have joy as Christians. He tells us there in verse 12, he says that it happened unto me, have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel. He says in verse 13, so that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace and in all other places. And as many of the brethren in the Lord waxing confident by my bonds are much more bold to speak the Word without fear. Now the assumption would be, when you looked at Paul being in prison, you would assume that Paul is now incarcerated and all of a sudden, Paul should be writing, woe is me, right? I am in jail. I have been in prison for preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's what I hear as a pastor a lot of times, right? People say, man, I tried to live for Jesus at work this week, but this happened and that happened, right? And all of these negative things and all of this negative happening, but look what Paul said. He said, I'm not saying woe is me. I'm not saying this turned out bad, but rather, it turned out better than I thought. You see, peril did not end the ministry of the gospel. One reason is because the gospel doesn't depend upon us. It depends upon Jesus Christ. And so Paul said, man, what did he get arrested for? He got arrested for preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, right? But he said, guess what? That did not end the gospel of Jesus Christ. That didn't stop me from preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. He said, as a matter of fact, I have now been able to preach the gospel in the palace. Them guards that they put over him, guess what? That answered back to Nero and stuff were beginning to what? Be saved. They were beginning to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. He said, everywhere around Rome is the gospel starting to be heard because I am imprisoned in Rome. See, Paul couldn't just jump up and run and go to Rome preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. They would have killed him on the spot. But what did he do? He got arrested and brought to Rome. And while he was there awaiting his trial, he continued to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so peril actually expended the ministry of the gospel. It actually made it better. And so when Paul, if you remember back in the book of Romans, when Paul wrote the Romans after he had been there with them, he said, as much as is in me, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also. I may be in prison, but guess what? That doesn't stop me from proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. He said, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God and the salvation to everyone that believe it, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. He told us in 1 Corinthians 9 and verse 16, he said, for though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to glory of, for necessity is laid upon me. Woe is unto me if I preach not the gospel of Jesus Christ. Folks, we need to be gospel oriented. We need to understand when Jesus Christ said... Do you remember He gave the parable of the sower? What was the sower to do? The sower was not responsible for the ground, was he? He was just to sow the seed. And He said, some of it's going to land in bad places and people are not going to receive, but guess what? The more seeds you throw, the better the opportunity for those that are going to receive the message. And so He didn't tell us, it's not our responsibility to prepare the ground. It's our job just to spread the seed. And somehow or another, Satan has allowed fear, and Satan has come upon us and are keeping us from sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. But Paul was convinced that it was the gospel that had the power of salvation. It's not a ministry. Guess what? Our vacation Bible school cannot save not one single person. So what do we have to do in Bible school? We have to present Jesus Christ because He is the One that saves. Our sermons, our worship service is not going to save a single person. The lineup of the songs that we sing is not going to save a single person. The only thing that saves is Jesus Christ, that He died for our sins, was buried, and rose again. And so, man, we need to get gospel focused. Everything we need to do needs to be centered around the preaching of the gospel. Notice he says in verse 5, for your fellowship in the gospel from the first day till now. The church at Philippi did not disassociate themselves with Paul when he got arrested. No, they actually sent him money. They actually reached out to help him. They sent him Epaphroditus to help him while he was in prison. Go back to Acts and read what all happened there. And so, man, they didn't shy away from the gospel because of the arrest of Paul. No, they fellowshiped in the gospel. They continued to preach and to share the gospel. And so Paul said in verse 7, he said, even as it is meek for me to think this of you all, because I have you in my heart in as much as my bonds, and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel, you all are partakers of my grace. In other words, he said, man, you have defended and confirmed the gospel. You didn't run out on me. You didn't quit on me. No, you confirmed it. You defended me. You defended the gospel. Why? Because the gospel is a message of grace. And it's given to us grace. It's not what we do. It's what God has done for us. And so he tells us then in verse 12 that comes down to our text this morning, he said, it is falling out rather unto the futherance of the gospel. The futherance. It didn't stop the gospel. It helped the gospel to be reached by more and more people. He says in verse 27, only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ. That whether I come and see you or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs that you stand fast in one spirit with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel. He refers to it over and over and over again. The gospel is to be heard. The gospel is to be preached. The gospel is at the heart of our ministry. The gospel is at the heart of everything that we do. The gospel should be our passion. It should be what drives us. It should be going before us. It should be going with us. Everything we do and live in this world should be about the gospel. The gospel is still being advanced today. Listen to me. And here's the encouraging part. Opposition will never stop the gospel. It doesn't matter how bad our government gets. It doesn't matter how many laws they make, what they try to do. Guess what? The gospel is still powerful. And I hope and pray that until the day that I die, I continue, whether in prison, whether in church, whether in prison, no matter where I'm at, that I'm found to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. Because it's the power to change lives. It's the power to get us there. In 2 Timothy 2, verse 9, Paul said to Timothy, the last letter that he wrote, the last letter before he was killed, he said, Wherein I suffer trouble, as an evil doer, even unto bonds, but what? The Word of God is not bound. Let me tell you something. They can take prayer out of church, but they can't take the prayer out of school. But young people, they can't take the gospel out of your mouth. They can tell you you can't pray, but guess what? You can still talk about Jesus Christ. You can still share your life. But that's not bound. There's no rule. There's nothing that can stop you from sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. And Paul's joy rests in Jesus Christ. You remember, Jesus Christ was killed as a common criminal, right? He was put between a thief and a murderer there. They tried to shut him up, but at his very death, what happened? At his very death, the thief on the cross beside him repented, right? And said, I accept you today. Remember me when you come into your kingdom. And when he said, it is finished, when he cried, it is finished, what did he mean? All of sin was taken care of. Death had now been destroyed. Death has been removed. The sting of death, which is sin, has been taken away. And there was a guard that was standing there that had just spit in his face, that had just slapped him, that had just mocked him, that all of a sudden said, truly, this is the Son of God. Truly, this is the Son of God. See, it's about the Gospel. And Paul's joy is realized that the Gospel cannot be silenced. It can't be locked up. It can't be bound. No matter what the circumstances you are going through, right now, the Word of God will continue to prove true, effective, and eternal. The Gospel is all we have in Christianity today. Paul is reminding the Philippians that every attempt that has been made to stop the message of Jesus Christ only furthers it. That's joy. That's joy. You know how many times the Gospel has been trying to stop since the time of Jesus Christ? But yet, you and I still sit here. They tried to shut it out of China. They tried to make it out of Russia. But guess what? Go read Voice of the Martyrs. Go look and find out. Guess what? There are people today that are being saved in China. There's churches in Russia. Jesus Christ. His Gospel cannot be stopped. It cannot be deterred. So notice the Gospel progresses outside of the church. He says, now that I'm locked up in prison, he said, look, in my bonds are manifest now. The Gospel is manifest. It is revealed. It is made present in all the palace and in all other places. Well, what does this say to us today? Because obviously, none of us are in jail, right? And it's easy for us to jump on that bandwagon and say, well, if I was in jail, I would preach Jesus Christ, right? It's easy to say that because that's what the context tells here. But what about, are you complaining because you're chained to a desk? If I wasn't locked down to this desk, I could share the Gospel more. Or maybe this morning, you were chained to a place on an assembly line. Or maybe, young person, you're chained to this classroom. Or you're chained to a car as you move around from place to place meeting people in all of these sales positions and everything. Wherever you are, look at it as a point to share the Gospel. It's not a burden. It's not a peril. It's an opportunity. In other words, what Paul is saying, and he's telling the Philippians, listen, I am in prison, but the Gospel is not bound. Wherever you live, whatever you're doing, make the Gospel prominent. Live and preach the Gospel. Maybe it's a hard place. But probably not as hard as what Paul had, right? But Paul still preached the Gospel. Maybe it's a difficult place. That's all the more opportunity to demonstrate the reality of a transformed life. And so not only as the Gospel progresses outside the church, but look what happens in the church. Look at what they said to those in Philippi in verse 14. Not only is the Gospel being preached in the palace and every other place, but then he says, and many of the brethren, those that have already been saved, those of you that are in Philippi, in the Lord, are doing what? Are waxing confident because of my bonds. And are much more bold to speak the Word without fear. When you step up and share the Gospel, guess what? It encourages others to share the Gospel. And when peril and problems come and your job is taking its toll and its effect on you, listen, the progress of the Gospel in your life should always be committed to, and guess what? It will encourage others. It will help others to preach and to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ. You know, we have in our world today what I call joy suckers. In other words, they suck all of the joy when they know the Word of God. When people know what the Word of God is. When they have experienced the power of the Word of God. When they are experiencing the blessings of growth, but yet they're not willing to share the Gospel. They're a joy sucker. And Paul says, I don't want to be that. Paul says, I want you to understand that even in my bonds, guess what? The Gospel's being spread in the palaces. The Gospel's being spread in other places. And you're getting more confident because of that. Therefore, because joy happens even in peril, we also need to understand that joy happens despite people. You know, we shouldn't allow people to affect the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Look at what Paul says. He says the people were emboldened in verse 14. They were much more bold to speak the Word without fear. And I want us to make sure you understand that. Because Paul being in prison, because Paul is still preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ, much more people were getting involved in talking about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But then look at what the next verse says. He says, some indeed preach Christ, and I underline that, preach Christ, because I want you to understand that. Some indeed preach Christ, even of envy and strife, and some also of goodwill. The one preached Christ of contention, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my bonds. What then? Notwithstanding every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached. And Paul says, I therein do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice. When we think about the joy despite of people, he first of all mentions people of envy. Notice he says there that some indeed preach Christ, even of envy and strife. What does it mean to envy? Jealousy? Jealousy? You know how many preachers and how many church members talk about Christ and they're emboldened to preach Christ, but it's out of jealousy of someone else's success? Right? We don't get too real happy when other people are having more success than us. And so this envy, they're preaching not because of the power of Jesus Christ, but they were preaching out of jealousy. They were wanting the same results that someone else was wanting. They were wanting the same effects that was there. And what this jealousy was doing was causing strife. Strife is a word of friction. There was this contention, this conflict that was going on. But guess what? The key to it all is they were still preaching Christ even though they were jealous, but they were causing these problems. And the problem with jealousy is that it pits us against someone else. It makes them on the same team. I was visiting with somebody Friday night and they were sharing with me and they were opening up their heart to me Friday night. And they used to be a member of the church that I grew up in and they moved to another church and they still have a lot of friends and family members in this other church. And they're members of this church. Both of them are scriptural churches. Both of them preach Jesus Christ. But sometimes his son wants to go on Wednesday nights over to the other church that he used to be a member at because of their youth group and because of the things that they're doing on Wednesday night because of his friends. And he allowed it. And so he's got some people in his church that says, guess what? They shouldn't be going to church over there with that other church, right? They shouldn't be attending there. And then another church says, well, aren't you a member over there? You shouldn't be there. But listen, what is the deal? Both of them are preaching Christ. And for a 16-year-old boy, he is just tickled pink that he at least wants to go to church, right? And so there's some battles that we have to fight. But what happened? We've got two churches, both of them, scriptural churches, both of them preaching Jesus Christ, but instead of lifting up Jesus Christ, what are they doing? They're fighting and bickering among each other, which is the best, which is the one that we should be at or what we shouldn't be at. Paul doesn't give us the details here. We don't know what they were preaching or what they were doing. He just says it was because of jealousy. It wasn't because of doctrine. It wasn't because they were preaching bad things about Jesus Christ because they were preaching Jesus Christ. But he said the problem was arising because of jealousy. And so whatever the accusation was, we can sure let our minds wander. And man, I've read commentators. I've read all kinds of things of people that are adding things to the Scripture. We don't know what exactly they were saying about Paul. We don't know how they were using the Gospel to bring Paul down. But we know that because of what Paul said, it was to discredit Paul. You know, I hear preachers all the time because their church is growing. They must be preaching something unscriptural. They must be doing something wrong, right? We all know situations where the Gospel is being preached, but guess what? We're jealous. And so we have to accuse them of something. We don't know if that's what was going on, but that's the idea. That's what's happening in our society today. And they were using the fact that Paul was in prison as their very ammunition. Guess what? If Paul was really for God, then why in the world is he in prison, right? How many times have we said, well, if that church was really living for God, they wouldn't be closing their doors this week, right? They wouldn't be shutting down. You know, if that church was a good church, they wouldn't have a problem finding a pastor, right? We make all of these things, and it's over jealousy. And all it does is do what? Cause strife and friction. But notice that Paul's joy, despite the people, was also an encouragement. He said there's those that are preaching Jesus Christ for envy, but then there's also those that are preaching Jesus Christ as an encouragement. Look, he said some indeed preach Christ, even of envy and strife, and some also of goodwill, of encouragement. But what are both groups doing? Both groups are preaching Jesus Christ. Goodwill is satisfied with Paul's life. There's some people that are preaching Jesus Christ and they say, you know what? Paul is in prison for preaching this same Gospel. And they're encouraging Paul rather than looking down upon Paul. They identified. They understood. They sympathized with Paul. That's of goodwill. These people encouraged Paul. They were a blessing and they were a source of joy. And so Paul now explains this. How can both groups preach Christ, but one preach for envy and the other preach for encouragement? And he gives us the explanation in verse 16. He says, "...the one preach Christ of contention, not sincerely supposing to..." What? "...add to the affliction of my bonds." The goal of these envious, jealous people, they wanted to add pain to Paul's life by hostility and strife. They wanted to make things more difficult for the apostle Paul. And he gives a motivation of selfishness there. Contention. This word has to do with self-promoting work. A driving ambition that elevates himself at all costs, not really caring how it achieves greatness or who it steps on in the process. Notice their attitude. Supposing to what? Add affliction to my life. As if prison is not bad enough, right? They wanted more harm to come to Paul. The goal was to hurt. How many times do we see today churches that get excited when churches and pastors are hurting them? And we just help spread that gossip along. We just help spread that attitude along. They were not concerned with the church. They wasn't concerned.