The Power of Celebratory Encouragement

[00:00:00] Well, I'm excited this morning, um, we're gonna be starting a new series. We're gonna be looking at a series at the, at the book of Philippians, where we're gonna be kind of in through the summer and into the, in September. Into September. And, uh, and I wanna let you know, even this last couple weeks I've spent some time outlining and preparing and studying the book as a whole.

And, um, and I'm, I'm excited about it. I mean, it, this book is so, such a wonderful book. It's such an, an optimistic, hopeful book, and and I hope that you get to see that throughout our time as well. We're gonna start by diving right in, in the first 11 verses. And so if you have a Bible, I'd encourage you to open it up to Philippians chapter one.

If you don't, there's one in front of you. We invite you to use that. It's on page 980. And uh, and I'd encourage you to keep your Bible open throughout our time so you could follow along with the, the, all the points always come from the passage, so help you fall along with what we're saying. Let me start then by reading the verses that we're gonna look at this morning.

Paul and Timothy Servants of Christ Jesus, to all the [00:01:00] saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi with the overseers and deacons, grace to you in peace from God, our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for your making, uh, for, for you all, making my prayer with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.

And I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. It's right for me to feel this way about you because I hold you in my heart for your all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and the defense and confirmation of the gospel.

For God is my witness. How I'll yearn for you with all affection of Christ Jesus. And it's my prayer that your love may abound more and more with knowledge and all discernment so that you may approve what is excellent and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory [00:02:00] and praise of God.

Be God bless the reading of his word. Let me pray. Father, thank you for the privilege that we have to come together this morning. Father, thank you for the word that's here. Father, for the incredible hope that you give us through this, this passage, through this great book. Thank you for what you're continuing to teach me.

And Father, I pray now that you would use me, speak through me, and in spite of me, father, that your word, your the word of your spirit would go out. And Father, I pray for each one of us that are here, that you would help us to have hearts that are open and receptive to whatever you may have to speak to us this morning.

We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Let me start by asking, is there anyone who's ever felt like you see everything that's going wrong and you don't know how God could be in charge? Okay, if that's you, then the book of Philippians is for you. Is there anyone here who's ever felt like you've been worn down by reoccurring disappointments, and you're discouraged by the possibility of seeing how God could bring [00:03:00] what's going on in your life into a positive resolution?

If that's you, then you're gonna be encouraged by the message of Philippians. If there's anyone here who you felt like you know, things are going in wrong in life, God isn't answering the way, the prayers, the way that you expected, and you feel like you know people who are living by lies, they're winning, and the people that are seeking after God, man, they're losing.

If that's you, then you're gonna be encouraged by this passage. And by this book of Philippians. Now we're gonna dive into this and the message here is incredible, but over the first couple weeks I'm gonna spend some time in this looking kind of at as an introduction in the context of the book. Because what we've gotta realize is that this is written and Paul's addressing concerns that the believers in the Philippian Church had.

And so if we understand the context, it helps us write, understand a little bit of his message. So let's start with looking at the context. The book of Philippians was written to believers in the city of Philippi. It was a group of believers who were [00:04:00] discouraged. You could say they were running an uphill race in a downhill culture.

Uh, Paul was the founding pastor of the church. He started the church in around 52 ad uh, on a second of three missionary journeys. It's talked about in Act 16. And then he wrote this letter somewhere probably between 62 to or 60 to 62 ad. While he was in prison in Rome, awaiting trial before Caesar, before Niro, the charge against him was preaching the gospel and, uh, and, and the, the outcome of the trial was uncertain.

So when he wrote this, the church is between eight and 10 years old now. The believers were in the city of Philippi. Philippi was a, was a city that, uh, was founded in, in historically Greek area, had been founded in the fourth century by Alexander the Great. Or, or, uh, uh, Philip King, Philip, I'm sorry, the father of Alexander the Great, but then was taken over by the Roman armies around, uh, 30 bc and so over the years, Philippi had become a, a Roman city that was [00:05:00] defined by kind of rugged military town on the Roman road because what It was populated primarily by retiring Roman soldiers who had moved there and settle.

It was a Roman colony, so they had Roman rights. It was a very secular city, not friendly at all to, to new religious ideas. In fact, if you think about it, I mean here it is in kind of the northeast corner of what is now Greece, and it's not only that, but it's a long way away from Jerusalem, which is way over here.

I mean, these were people that were not influenced by Jewish, uh, scripture, by Jewish thinking. In fact, we know in most cities that Paul went to was he started a a church. He tried to reach the people. He would start by going to the Jewish synagogue, but when he went to Philippi, there weren't enough Jews there to start a synagogue.

You need 12. There weren't that many. And so the few that were there were meeting at the Riverside Outdoors. And so here's the setting. It's this relatively new church in a 400 year old colony, a colony that was [00:06:00] defined by secularism and more relativism that was not friendly to new ideas. And as there were church that had a lot to be discouraged about, they're trying to build this church in a very hostile city and culture.

Paul, their leader, had been arrested and now had been in prison for two years. The prayers for Paul's freedom hadn't been answered, and it seemed that not only was Paul Chain, but even his message of the gospel was changed. They were afraid that instead of being released to preach the gospel, Paul could be executed.

And if the opposition from the outside wasn't enough. There were all kinds of problems within the church. Some had left the church and started other churches for selfish reasons, more about themselves than about the gospel. Other false teachers were coming in and trying to take people out of the church, and even within the church, there was all kinds of divisions so that there were leaders that were so divided, they weren't even talking to each other.

So if you could sum up the context of the bur the, the, the book. Now Paul's writing this to a group of people that he [00:07:00] knew that were discouraged and that were confused. In fact, the context is that the people in Philipp PA had sent a monetary gift to Paul to kind of help him cover some of his needs and imprisonment.

And then as he, Paul spent time with the guy that was the messenger, he was able to tell from what he heard, that this church was discouraged and tired and, and defeated. And they were worried about Paul with his imprisonment. Um, you know, and all the problems that he faced. They were sure that he had to be depressed, he had to be discouraged.

I mean, he's in prison. It's carried on for a couple years, and he's here living in, in prison and living in poverty. He's lonely. It could end an execution. Now that's the setting. It's a pretty dark setting. But the amazing thing is, the theme of the book is joy. In fact, the word joy or rejoice occurs 14 times in the short book, more than any other book.

In the New Testament, you see the Philippi, Philipp believers were overwhelmed by what was over, what was [00:08:00] facing them, all the power, all the problems that they had. But Paul writes this work book letter of encouragement that reveals that he's overwhelmed by the confidence that God is in charge. God has a purpose.

And what we're gonna see, the primary message of this letter is that we need to see God's life from God's perspective. And when we do, when we see how God sees things, it, it gives us an optimism and a joy. See why? Because if we really understand that God is in charge of everything, that he loves us, that he's involved, and that he has a good purpose, it gives us a reason for an optimistic perspective.

Yes, there can be clouds out there, but. Does the clouds have silver lining? Well, if we know who the one who holds the clouds, we can believe it. Is the cup half empty or half full? Well, if we know the one who holds the spigot for of living water, it's always half full. There's reason for hope. But what we're gonna see is that it's not just even optimism.

God calls us to something that's [00:09:00] deeper and richer than the simplistic optimism that we often think of. So how do we see things? How do we interpret life from this God perspective? And right off the bat, Paul dives into that He, he begins by giving us a prayer of encouragement through celebration. Now, when I say that, he begins with words of encouragement.

I need to point out. It's not the kind of encouragement that we often think of when we think about the idea of, Hey, let me offer some words of encouragement. That's often a pretty shallow idea. You know, you think about it, you know, what is the encouragement? It's like, oh, things will get better. You know, just believe in yourself.

Just hope. You know, kinda like if you believe things are gonna get better, believing that's gonna make everything better, right? Is that your experience? But that's often what people have. It's the little platitudes that really don't make a difference. And our kids were young. Uh, one of our, the, the set of movies that we really enjoyed were the night of the museum movies.

And one of the things that I really liked about 'em is that they actually made fun of some of the simple, [00:10:00] simplistic, shallow platitudes that we often throw off in our, in our popular culture. And in the second movie, there's one scene that makes fun of the shallow, simplistic idea of encouragement. Now, if you haven't ever seen it, the setting is this.

There's this magic tablet that makes all the exhibits in the museum come at, come to life at night. And then the second movie is set in the Smithsonian where there's this evil Egyptian mummy who's come to life and he's trying to take the power of the tablet to take over the museum. And at the end there's this battle scene where the good guys try to stop the bad guys.

And one of the good guys is General George Custard, again, his, his, um, exhibit has come to life and the whole movie, he's been bragging about his bravery in battle. But now that battle has started, he's hiding and the main character comes and finds him in. Offers encouragement. That's the scene. What's going on?

Hiding. Hiding. Whatcha doing? Come on. We need you a failure. Hey, we are not. [00:11:00] Did you foolishly lead 208 Americans to their deaths at the battle of Little Big Horn? No. No. Not good. Not good at all. It's not good. Sure. I talk a good game. The truth of the matter is, I don't deserve these stars. I will always be famous for my biggest failure.

Hey, the past is the past, okay? Right now, this moment, this night, this is what you're gonna be remembered for. This is your last stand.

They need a leader. Yeah, they need a leader. Yeah. [00:12:00] One Visas leader. Huh? You do. Let's do this. Alright, here, let's go.

Yeah, I love that. You know, when we look at that, it's that all encouragement is, you know, just put the past behind you. You know, you can believe in yourself, be the leader. The problem is your bad general. Believing in yourself doesn't make you a good one. You go out there and you still get wiped out as soon as you walk in the battlefield.

I mean, it's encouragement is not just follow your dreams. I mean, if I have a dream, I have a dream of being a professional athlete. I have a dream of dunking on LeBron James. Does my dream gonna make that happen? No. And and people will say, well, we need to encourage you. Follow your dreams. Yeah. If you get me to believe in myself and try to follow that dreams, it's gonna lead to a life of frustration and disappointment.

'cause I'm never gonna do that. Now in his prayer and in this whole chapter, Paul teaches us what real encouragement is, something far deeper and far more meaningful. So he's not just telling them, you know [00:13:00] what, believe what it is, you know, but he's actually giving them a model of, this is not only how I'm gonna pray for you, but this is how you need to pray for each other.

This is how we keep from being buried by the discouragements of life. And, and so what does he do in this encouragement? He starts not the way that we might expect. Because again, even when we think of encouragement, it's not believe in yourself or, or it might be. Boy, if things are hard, we might say, well, I know that's difficult, what God's gonna get you through and he's gonna bring, you know, God's gonna, that's not what Paul does.

Look what he's, how he begins. Verse three. I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always, in every prayer of mine for you, for with all making all, um, my prayer with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. So he doesn't start by focusing on the problems. But instead he prays focusing on reasons.

He has to be thankful, the joy he feels for them. He starts with an attitude of thankfulness Now, now that's surprising enough itself, but then we go [00:14:00] even a step further and we say, okay, let's look at the thankfulness that he offers. What does he thank God for? In fact, let's start by saying what he doesn't thank God for.

In fact, it's not only Paul. If you study all of the New Testament prayers. What we're gonna find is they didn't thank God for the things that we might expect. I mean, what? We often thank God for our stuff and our things and they never said, God, I thank you for the new chariot. You know, God, I thank you that my child got into that good Roman school that was, uh, that we're hoping you know, God, I thank you that my savings account for ath Athens Bank is doing well then never thank God for their blessings or even for their health.

All the things that we tend to thank God for in our prayers these days didn't make their top 10 list. And I think one of the problems that we've gotta look at is it possible that we're thanking God for the wrong things, and that in the process we somehow miss the full extent of God's blessing. Why?

Because the New Testament writers realized that the [00:15:00] direction and focus of their Thanksgiving was indicative of their values and their priorities. And not only that, but it also would shape the way that we think. So what did Paul focus his Thanksgiving on? What does he teach us to thank God for? Look again in verse three.

I thank God and all my remembrance for you. He was thankful for the people in the church. Now, think about this. When we pray for each other, how much time do we spend praying? And Thanksgiving for each other. Thanking God for the other person's strengths and the other person's, uh, abilities and, and who they are.

How much time do we focus on the things that bring joy? And this is important because the more that we spend time, it's reflecting the heart of God. That's how God sees us when we celebrate each other and celebrate each other's strengths and successes. We're seeing each other through God's eyes. So practice glory, what does it look like?

Let's go again in verses three through, uh, three through five, I thank my God and all my [00:16:00] remembrance of you always in every prayer of mine for you, always in a prayer of joy because of your partnership and the gospel. From the first day until now, he's teaching us that our thankfulness is expressed through joyful celebration.

Again, let me ask you a question that I've had to ask myself this week. As you think of other people, how much time do you spend focusing on the things that bring joy? You see, I'm not saying that we should ignore the problems, but the question is, where is our mind centered? Do we spend more time thinking about the other person's weaknesses, about the things that frustrate us, or more time thinking about their strengths and about the victories that bring joy?

For most of us, it's natural for us to focus on the weaknesses. It's natural to focus on the, the frustrations, especially within marriage and family. Why do they bother me so much? You know, we, we, we focus on that, but what we need to realize is that Paul doesn't focus there. And it wasn't because there weren't problems.

I mean, again, if we look at [00:17:00] the whole context of the, the book, there were all kinds of problems. But Paul doesn't say, you know, God just, you know, bless their heart, help 'em grow up. You know, that's not what he says. In fact, let me jump ahead because when we read this, we don't see the context right in the beginning.

But if you look at the whole book, I'll jump ahead and tell you some of the things we're gonna see. There were all kinds of problems in this church. There were divisions and fights within the church. Uh, there were people that were, you know, going out and planting other churches for wrong reasons, for selfish reasons.

And, you know, you had people that, that had pride. There was a huge pride problem that people were about expecting to be served at the expense of others. There were fights amongst leaders that were so bad, they weren't talking to each other. There were a lot of problems. And on top of that, the people were discouraged.

They would've repressed. It was, again, a kind of beat down and, and instead of focusing on the problems and the weaknesses, Paul chooses to focus his heart and mind on strengths and success that brought joy. I mean, he could have said, now I'm praying for you and I, I'm just praying [00:18:00] that you finally get it.

He could have started and say, how many times do I have to remind you guys of this? But instead he says, I'm choosing to be thankful so that in all my prayers for you, I pray with joy, my friends. This is really something that not only Paul is, is modeling, but he's teaching us because it's important. And again, his, his, this prayer wasn't based on an ignorance of problems, but it was any choice to focus on and celebrate the things that were good, the places where God was working.

Now I wanna tell you, I can tell you in my own experience how significant this is. I've been a pastor for over 35 years. We've been at four different churches, and, and again, I've learned by experience. We had one church where a couple of the primary leaders of the church, they, they had the spiritual gift of criticism and discouragement.

And, uh, and you may say, I haven't heard of that spiritual gift. Well, I hadn't heard of it either, but they, they really worked hard in developing it. They, you know, they, they, they thrived and they, and they [00:19:00] would look at, you know, there was people and they would look at, you know, what can I criticize? If something went well, what, what went wrong?

And, and over time their attitude of, of, of negativity had had, uh, spread and become part of the church culture. And it weighed the whole church down. It was hard to overcome. Yeah. And, and I would contrast that I think I, I appreciate our church and the spirit of encouragement that we've seen here, and Sandy and I have been the beneficiaries of that.

And I wanna say from personal experience, it's a whole lot easier serving in a place that, that celebrates and encourages. It's more joyful than in a place that criticizes and tears down. But yet as I've looked at this, I realize, okay, but God's calling us to do more. God's calling me to do more. How do I do this more?

How do we as a church continue to grow that we should be defined as a place of celebration and encouragement where we're celebrating each other for what God is doing in each other's lives. Now, for some of us, this is not natural, and I think it's not natural because, well, I don't celebrate other people [00:20:00] 'cause people don't celebrate me.

And, and so we haven't had that modeled, but here's what I want you to see is in what God is teaching here. What Paul is teaching us is that this isn't something that we do after someone has done for us. It's something that we're called to do unconditionally. And when we start celebrating others, it will be part of the culture.

And in time we're gonna find that it will wrap around and others will affirm us as well. Is I'm gonna give you some homework today and I'll come back and I'll, and, and repeat this at the very end. But I want you to, to actually do this today, I want you to, to, before you leave, ideally go find somebody and, and encourage them.

It might be a friend. Hey man, how you doing? I wanna encourage you. Thank you for doing this. I see this again in your life. It might be someone that's serving today's. If you have kids who's serving in your, you know, taking care of your kids in Sunday school, your kids in nursery. Encourage them, you know, build them up.

It, it might be the greeters at the door, the people making coffee, the people serving in the tech team. It might be people that are behind the scenes [00:21:00] that, you know, doing things here throughout the week. And you, nobody ever notices. It's never appreciated. Here's what I'd encourage you. What's, what if we all did that today?

What if we all said, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna encourage a couple people before I get out of here. We're all gonna feel a little better walking out. What if it's not just one Sunday? What if we did that every Sunday? What if we every Sunday say, well, I wanna come in and I don't wanna encourage two or three people before I leave.

I wanna tell you this will be a different place. This will be a place of encouragement, a place that, you know, in spite of everything that's happening, it's like, man, I feel encouraged and doing what we're doing, and that's what God is calling us to do. Now we say, well, how can I do that? Well, let's look at what he says about how and why understanding the foundation of this confidence and this encouragement.

Paul states it in verse six. He says, I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to com completion at the day of Jesus Christ. Now when you understand the context of everything that's being said, this is amazing. [00:22:00] Because again, Paul's suffering in prison. He's got an uncertain fade.

He's, he's, he's got people attacking him and his work. He's writing to a group and flip flipping believers who he knows who are going through difficulty. And yet he says, I have confidence. I have confidence in my future. I have confidence in your future. I am sure of this. And, and why is he sure not because things will get better, because I will make it through.

His confidence is in God. I am sure of this, that he who began a good work, that it's God's work. Paul is confident in God, and God who began the work will bring it to completion in spite of all the opposition he's facing. You know, in spite of all the problems within the Philippian church, he's saying, I'm not confident in you guys.

I'm not confident in me. I'm confident in God. Now you think about how this is so different than the way that we often encourage each other. Because often it's, it's not about you. It's often about, well, you know, things are really hard. You know, I'm confident that you can bounce back. [00:23:00] You can make it, you know, I, I know, you know, you, you can do it.

And we're often encouraging people about who they are, but that's not the tone of Paul at all. You know, he's not saying, I, I know you can make it. He's saying, no, I got no God can do it. I know that God is at work in your life. But sometimes we say, but you know, how can God work? You know, you don't understand my failures, you don't understand my scars.

You don't understand, well, why is it that God works? We need to remember that his work is a work of grace. Look, again, I am sure of this, that he who began a good work will bring it to completion. He's saying, when God began a good work, it means that he not only started, but he's the origin of the work.

That he planned to redeem and restore and repair and to use you before the foundation of the world that he chose to use you based not on anything that you've done, but based on grace. It's not that we do something that's good and that somehow we move towards God, and God says, [00:24:00] okay, now I can use you.

Now I can accept you. No, God chose us based on not what we deserve, but grace that we did not deserve. In fact, when did he love us? I love what Romans five eight says, but God showed his love towards us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Why we were sinners, why were we rejecting him?

You see, the whole message of the gospel isn't, you know, if you're good, God may accept you. If you're good, God may use you. No, it said God loved us. Why we were bad. Why we we rejecting him, that he sent his son to die for us while we were sinners. And he calls us not to earn his love, but to admit that we can't earn his love.

To admit our need. Ask him to forgive us and, and to, to ask for the forgiveness that he offers us through Jesus Christ and his death on the cross for our sins. That's the gospel. That's the invitation that God gives to each one of us that are here today. But if we understand that, we then realize that our whole relationship with God is based on grace, not performance.

And that's [00:25:00] every aspect of our relationship, including how he uses us. You see, if God uses us based on our performance. And well, I did this so now God can use me. Well then by definition, if it's something that I did, then it's something that I can undo. Then I, if I mess up well then I'm not real able to abuse of God, or, or it's something that other people can undo terrible circumstances or, or people that are opposing.

God can mess up God's work. God's plan can be thwarted. In fact, I'm sure there are people here today and you look at how you failed in the past and you feel like, man, God could never use me. You look at your scars that you have. God could never use me. And and, and you feel like, man, he started this work, but man, it's been shipwrecked.

My friends, I wanna say this with all love and compassion. Don't be so proud and so arrogant. Because what you are saying, if you're saying that, is that you are the primary part of the equation. You're saying because of who I [00:26:00] am, because of what had happened to me, God can't use me. You see, you're saying that your failure is greater than God's grace, and the fact is God's grace is greater than your past, is greater than your failure.

It's greater than your weakness. The issue is issue is not what you can do. It's what God can do. And that's why I can say with Paul, which we need to affirm, you know, I'm I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work will bring it to completion. We can be sure of that. There's something else about the promise that it's not only that God is is doing it, it's a work of grace, but it's a good work.

We have to trust in his goodness. And at times I'll talk to someone, they'll say, well, I don't really want to fully surrender to Christ if I do. So he'll probably send me to a mission field and he'll have me in bugs or something like that. And, and uh, you know, it's like I, I'm sure it's gonna be bad and I hear that kind of idea variations all the time.

And here's what I want you to realize. No, God is good and his plan for your life is consistent with his [00:27:00] loving and generous and good nature as your father. And if you fully surrender to him and in your life, it will be a good path. Now, that doesn't mean that he's gonna give you everything that you want because his good plan is often different than what we think is good.

And it's also important to say that while his plan is good, it doesn't mean that it's always gonna be easy or it's gonna be trouble free. 'cause God doesn't promise consistent prosperity and health. See, but while God's work and our life isn't always easy or it isn't always enjoyable, we can have confidence that it's always good that God is in control and nothing happens outside of that.

And so there may be times like the Philippians where it didn't, didn't make sense, it didn't feel good, didn't seem good, but that we can know that God is in control and he is accomplishing that good purpose. That's a promise that Paul makes in Romans, and we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good.

It's not all things are good, but all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his [00:28:00] purpose. Lastly, we need to see that we need to root our confidence in God's sovereignty. That is God's work that he has begun, he's originated. That is a good work, but it's one that he will bring to completion.

And, and you know, look what it says. And I'm sure of this, I'm, I'm sorry, I'm going, I skipped there. Lastly, um, I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. Now, here's a question we're gonna be looking at in the next couple weeks. Is God an optimist or a pessimist?

If we have faith in him, what should we be? You see, often we can look at our situation in life or even our church, our world, and, and it's easy to get discouraged. I. However, this is in large part due the fact that we don't really understand and believe God is at work in this situation. So here's the problem.

How much time do you spend thinking about all the problems in life? All the problems in the world contrasted with the time, amount of time that you spend thinking about all the good things that [00:29:00] God is doing, all the places that you see God working. See, the challenge here is faith. It's a faith that's not able to look at another person and say, I, I have faith in you that you can do it or you can grow, or that I can fix it.

It's, it's faith in God's ability to accomplish his purpose. And Paul had an incredible faith in God that when applied towards other people, gave him great hope. Even an expectation that he said, I can look at you and I can believe that even though you're struggling, I believe and I'm confident that he will begin a good work, will bring it to completion.

So if, if I could sum up, I think what Paul is saying here in this verse, it's this idea of saying, I'm thankful for who you are and for what you're doing. You, you bring me great joy because I see how God is working in your life and I'm confident that as much good as I see in you that God has even planned greater things in your future.

And I look forward to seeing what that's gonna look like in your life. See, God is calling us to focus on the good and the praiseworthy things and, and to see [00:30:00] where God is working in our lives. And, um, but we've gotta apply this, you know, to the way we view ourselves, the way we view our other people, the way we view our situations.

It's not believe in yourself and you could do this. No. It's believing what God can do. And even some of us may say, well, I don't really have much to work with, and you don't understand, you know, God. Okay, let me ask you this. God created the universe. What did he have to work with? Nothing. And he took nothing and he made the universe, he made everything.

So if you say, I have nothing to work with, God's really good at working with little, with nothing. You know, God can no matter where you are at, do you believe what God can do? But how do we get there? Well, that's where he calls us again, to come and to and to do a work of prayer, to pray to God and and to seek confidence in God and his plan.

Again, look at verse nine. He says, this is my prayer that your love may a bound more and more with knowledge and discernment. Now, when you read that, that you may have more [00:31:00] knowledge and discernment, what is it that we need knowledge and discernment about? That's a good question, right? Just don't read that there.

What are we supposed to have knowledge and discernment about? Well, again, those are part of our church. You know that the first rule of interpreting the Bible is scripture, interpret scripture. Rule one A is context is king. So this is a really easy one. He just told us in verse six, he who began a good work and you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

And now he's saying, here's the challenge. You need to fight a battle for your heart and mind to believe those things. That's the biblical truth. And what he's doing is he's now speaking to a group of discouraged and confused people and he said, okay, I've affirmed this foundation of truth, that God has a plan, he's begun a work, he's gonna bring it to completion.

And then he comes back and he says, now I'm gonna pray that you believe it. I'm gonna pray that you really understand it, that you can apply it to your life because it's a battle He, he wouldn't have to tell us to do this. If it was natural, if I could read the verse and say, oh, I understand that, [00:32:00] man. I totally believe it.

No, this is hard for us to apply. It's the same idea that Paul talks about in Romans 12 when he says, do not be conformed to this world. That's the natural state, to be conformed to the world, but be transformed by the renewing of our mind. That we need to let God come and say, God give me truth. That I am transformed, that my thinking is different.

See, it's not only how we just pray for each other and our ourselves. It's how we pray for our world. It's everything. And when we see this, it changes our thinking. And how do you pray for people that are going through a difficult time? Think about that. If you have somebody come up, man, I've got this, I've got this difficult, you know what, what, what I think natural for me, I think natural for many of us, you know, we're gonna come and say, well, I, I pray that God give you the strength to endure it.

I pray that God would get you through. Uh, maybe God, pray that God removes the circumstances. Look how Paul teaches us to pray here. That's not what he does. Look what he says. Verse nine. It is my prayer that your love may abound more and [00:33:00] more with knowledge and discernment, that you may approve what is excellent and be so pure and blameless for the day of Christ filled with the fruit of righteousness.

It comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God. He doesn't say, pray that you would, hang on, pray that God would remove the circumstances. You know what he says? Pray that you would advance. Pray that you would abound. He's not saying G, G God. I mean, I pray that you take these things away.

He's saying, God, give me the vision to be able to move forward and to see places where you are working. Because the more that I'm aware of that, the more I'm going to be able to endure the things that are difficult. God's been teaching me this in my own life, you know? You know, if I look at it and I say my natural tendency has been over the years.

When things are really difficult, you know, I'm gonna come to God and I'm gonna say, God, okay, here's the problem. And I spend time explaining to him what happened so that I inform him just in case he doesn't know. And then I tell him why it's bad and I ask him to fix it. I don't know. Does anybody else pray that way?

It's like, [00:34:00] and, and, and one day I'm praying that way and I'm, I'm, I'm, God just kind of hit me over the head. It's like I'm telling, okay, here's where it ask. It's like, so do you think, I don't know this. Well, okay, God, here's where it's bad. And I felt God saying, so. Do you think that I was sovereign when I let that happen?

Because deep down I'm almost thinking, God, you kind of fell asleep and here, let me tell you what you don't know so you can change it. And suddenly I realized, okay, God, if you're sovereign, when that happened, maybe you allowed it for good purpose. And so here what God's teaching me to pray, God's teaching me to pray.

God, help me to see what you want me to learn through this. God, help me to see what you want to redeem. God, you've allowed this difficulty for some reason. Help me to see the good that's here. Help me to learn the lesson, to redeem it and then change the circumstance. I wanna learn quick 'cause I wanna get out of the, I wanna get outta the fire.

But the fact is I, you God's teaching us actually run towards some of this. Why? Because we believe and have confidence in his faith and his and his sovereignty [00:35:00] is goodness. And so he's calling us to not seek to escape, and we're gonna see this in, you know, in coming weeks. It's an optimism that isn't denying the difficulty, but it's actually embracing and letting God redeem.

And so that we're so overwhelmed by the good things that God is doing, that it gives us the ability to persevere through the difficult See at the end of the day that God is calling us to pray for the fruit of his good work. Again, verse nine, it is my prayer that your love may have bound more and more with knowledge and discernment.

For ourselves, for each other. How do we love each other in this way? What is he calling us to? And when we do that, we're filled with the fruit of righteousness. It comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God. Lemme just close with this idea. There's a lot that we get into, but if in this context immediately, you know, one of the ways that God calls us to love each other, to encourage each other, it's a very practical thing.

Hey, we all get worn down. [00:36:00] We all are going through difficulty. He's calling us to love each other through encouragement and through celebration and even those that are failing. And man, we're struggling here. And instead of just, Hey, you can do it, but it's, Hey, here's what God's working in your life to speak God's truth into our life and to celebrate the the place where God is working.

And the more that we do that, see, it's not only gonna encourage other people, it's gonna change our perspective. And you know what happens if we do that as a church man, it's gonna change our culture. But what if, again, I gave you homework and I want you to, before you leave, find a couple people, encourage them and praise them, thank them in some way, but make that, try to make that something that you remember to do.

'cause what would happen if on every Sunday that we had people that say, okay, I'm gonna walk into church before I walk out. I'm gonna try to praise three people. I'm gonna encourage three people. And so at first it's like, I'm just saying this, but if that changes the culture and suddenly we have three people coming to us [00:37:00] every Sunday, Hey, I appreciate this about you.

I'm heard just, I mean, what would happen? What would happen to a new visit? Hey, we're glad to here. I mean, suddenly the culture is different. And you know what? No matter what weight of cloud you came in with, no matter what difficulty, it doesn't make it go away. But you know what? We start suddenly start to see a different perspective, and there's an hope and there's an optimism.

There's even a. Joy that transcends the circumstances. Let's try to work on that together. It's something that's, it takes effort for all of us. It is not natural, but let's try to embrace it and I look forward to seeing what God does in my life. I. And your life, and even in the life of our church culture as we try to live this truth out.

If you have a question about the Message Community Church or Jesus Christ, send us a text to 3 3 0. 432 42. You can learn more [00:38:00] about our events and community groups at CCP Life slash Connect There you can also send in a prayer request. We would love to pray for you. Have a blessed Lord's Day, and we'll see you on Sunday.