Religious Resume Buster

found in human form, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above everyone. So that at the name of jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that jesus christ his Lord to the glory of God the Father. Good morning. Good morning. Morning. Good morning. Welcome. Thank you for coming. My name is Michael, one of three pastors here at so our church, it’s a joy to be a few today, repetition is key. Any marketing media admin will tell you that they have to repeat a message multiple times before their target audience. Here’s a message and it actually sinks in. And so to test that theory, we’re gonna do a little test here. So it’s uh, you gotta fill in the blank for who it is. So let’s start off. He knows a thing or two because we we know a thing or two because we’ve seen a thing or two who says this. Farmers, farmers. Yes. You guys got it. Good job way to participate. Next group 15. You also get this 15 minutes or more. Could save you 15% or more on car insurance. Geico. You guys, do you ever watch Tv back there? Geico Geico? All right. Here’s the last one. Rogers rate. Everyone gets the Rogers rate the denver bronco fans that are out there. They’re iron Rogers really heavily. Yes, Yes. All right. Let’s pray. Let’s pray God. Thank you for having fun. I thank you for being reminded of things. I thank you for a repetition. I need it. We all need it. Lord, I pray you just help us to be reminded of good things. This morning. I said you would show up and convict encourage instruct challenge. Lord, Every time your word is open or people that are discouraged or encouraged, people that are getting off the road, get back on the road, your word does not return void period. Your word with your spirit would do your work with your people this morning. The church, we just humbly present ourselves before your Lord use us Lord to here here like we should speak like we shouldn’t act and live like we should we commit this time to you in jesus name. We pray Amen. Amen Philippians three is where we find ourselves as a church. This morning. We are working through the book of Philippians. Paul wrote this letter, this personal intentional letter to a church. He helped start in the Book of Acts. And we’re picking up in Philippians three verse one, If you look with me at verse one, he reminds them of things. This whole section that we’re looking at today is a reminder of what he already wrote and or already preached to the church in philippi. So he’s using the same leadership style vision casting, reminding, encouraging. You’re supposed to say something over and over and over again until people just get sick and tired of hearing it. That’s when the message is finally signed a secret to people’s minds. So paul is reminding the church in philippi in verse one, it says this. In addition, my brothers and sisters rejoice in the Lord to write to you again about this is no trouble for me and as a safeguard for you. This is the verse that many older pastors, including myself will probably repeat as they get older and I recycle content. I already wrote. Maybe we’ll see. I haven’t preached through the whole bible yet, but I’ve noticed other men that love the Lord seem to remind people of Peter. Does it paul does it jesus does it communication as an occupation? You need to be reminding people of things over and over again. And so today we’re gonna roll through this content that these people should be familiar with. I do think uh, this passage is full of satire, humor in some shock sections in there. And so if you’re new, you came on the right sunday. It is a fun sunday to come to church. It should be a fun passage to look at. But paul is writing to church, he dearly loves, he was there at the genesis of that church, he helped found that church. He’s one of the founders of that church and they are healthy church. They’re written about in the Book of Revelations. They seem to be really a healthy church now. They’re known for their generosity. They seem to be alive and healthy christian community in the city of philippi. He calls them brothers and sisters. He loves these people, their precious to him and he’s taught them many times. And then and then uh he moves on and he points out something he’s already preached on and he points about a problem that’s soon to come see everywhere paul goes on those missionary journeys, those four or five missionary journeys he did, he would start a new gospel work. He would quickly find himself in a prison. He would get out of prison and get out of that city and move on to a new city and he start these new gospel adventures, these new gospel works and unreached, unengaged people, groups of non jewish primary audience. And then right behind him, there’s this pattern of his enemies of his ministry would come in and they would add to the Gospel. They add jewish customs and cultures to the pure, simple message of the Gospel. And we want to remind his people and envision his people about not only what the gospel is, and also warned about what is coming from the outside behind him. So that would that would take the perfect message of the Gospel and make it imperfect. He knows what’s about to come. And so we, as pastors try to remind you of things, we think we know what’s coming, it’s just us, we’re not paul, we’re not the Apostle, we didn’t write the bible, so you’ve got limited leadership skills up here leading the charge, but we we try to do this to we try to remind you of things that we’re working on and things that we think are coming. And so I’m going to test the effectiveness of what we’ve done. So here’s some phrases you might have heard before. The first one is our churches like big three values, gospel blank and generosity. Any anyone want to shout out the middle value. Our staff got said anyone community good are the next one. We’re playing off that community groups are the blank blank of Solar Church, not staff everyone else. What? What is that? You’ve heard that phrase a lot from Shane Ben and I what? Backbone? Yes. Is that a new man? A new man got that anyway, backbone to go in the back Yes. Committee groups of the heartbeat, the lifeblood, the backbone. That the one thing we try to do and then the third thing is your blank flows out of your theology. You all know my bad english that I’ve talked to, you pretend made up words someday we’ll make the dictionary church. And then jesus said this, you reap what you so amen. Alright. So we try to do this to remind people of who we are and we constantly try to remind you of the pastoral team of threats and opposition that’s coming at the church. And so paul knows what’s coming. He’s the founder of this church and he is giving his church a timely heads up about what is coming. Maybe paul knows he’s at the end of his life, he’s martyred two years after writing this letter, you might be knowing he’s coming to the end of things for his life, but he cares and dearly loved this church and he wants to war in this church. In these words, he has to this church to hold onto the gospel and be reminded of threats that attack the pure, simple message of the Gospel is very applicable to our lives today. Living in America Lincoln Nebraska in the year 2021. Um, people, we have a prone to take the Gospel for granted. We have a prone to dilute the Gospel as just people all over this globe. This is a pattern that christians have to hold. Two paul reminds him and he warns them in this passage to keep a laser focus on the Gospel. And so what is the Gospel? The Gospel? We boiled down into a track here. It’s a Gospel presentation. They’re all over the place. Um, if you have grabbed on these workbooks, stick in your backpack, stick in your pocket. This is the Gospel. This is what I, because I became a christian bringing through one of these little workbooks and our team, our branding team made it look all cool and added our content on the back of this. And so this is, explains the Gospel in a concise, culturally relevant way to understand what the gospel is and what the gospel is not. So what is the Gospel? Well take that workbook with you and wrap your mind around that. But we as a church, we tried as pastors, we try to have the Gospel be the key central theme of our messages. We try to end on the Gospel or point things to the Gospel of jesus christ throughout the entire bible. From genesis to jesus to revelations. This scarlet thread is what scholars say, this story of God’s redemptive plan, God’s rescue plan for all of mankind. Is there from genesis to revelations? Your entire bible is about jesus and God’s plan of saving mankind. So all of scripture points to the Gospel and it’s our attempt to show you and model for you what that looks like and where you can see jesus and where you can see God’s redemptive rescue plan for the world, for all nations, not just this american nation, but for all nations, we as a church, we try to live in light and empower the Gospel. We are attempting to so the Gospel into our city. We have community groups that attempt to have Gospel initiatives at their community groups in the neighborhoods around the city. We are united like Shane share last week. We are united people. That the one thing we have in common as people is the unifying work with the Gospel message of jesus christ. The Gospel is our first value of our church that we have. We get stuff done because of the Gospel we share because of the Gospel. We we are envisioned to act and to live because of the Gospel. You and I have all given generously to advance the Gospel. The Gospel moves us as people and we think the Gospel is moving people. We are changed people because of the Gospel. Your time, your talent and your treasures, you mobilize because of them motivated by the Gospel. You see worth and how you spend your time as people. Um, I think this is a value. Your understanding of what the Gospel is. His grows with time as you grow older. I became a christian when I was almost 10 year old little boy and now I’m 36. So my understanding of the Gospel and what all happened when I became a believer just grows an appreciation grows in value and worth As I grow older and you like me, you didn’t get the whole thing wrapped up the first time you heard it, You probably have to hear it multiple times and realize I didn’t realize that happened when I became a christian. I didn’t realize that transpired as I got accepted me into his family. And as you grow the rest of your life, you want to find yourself in a bible preaching gospel believing church. That makes your appreciation and love for the gospel grow Amen, Amen! So paul reminds this church throughout this whole passage to hold on to the True Gospel and keep a laser focus on it as enemies of the Gospel come in, let me jump into verse two, It says this, Watch out for the dogs! Watch out for the evil workers! Watch out! Watch out for those who mutilate the flesh. This is not this is not paul using soft words for soft theology of a soft culture. There’s a preaching proverbs that hard words make soft hearts and the congregation and soft words when you’re preaching, make hard hearts, paul is not dancing around. He’s going right out the problem and teeing off on a threat to the gospel message of jesus, christ, the gospel that he preached, paul goes straight out and try to cut its throat, throwing the rest of this today’s passage, this is not like this is not like paul speaking, you know, secret camera off the cuff. Soundbite pulling him, you know from some friend that was recording paul speaking, hanging out when he doesn’t know what I mean. Paul systematically knew what he was writing in a prison cell, thinking of these people, knowing what happens with the other churches. He started he carefully picked all these words that we’re looking at. He put the word dog. If I were to call you or your significant other a dog, that would be offensive, you would maybe punch me in the lobby. That’s offensive today and that was offensive in that day calling people dogs is a cultural lightning rod stance. But there’s a there’s a very divisive topic burning through the new testament church. We’re gonna look at that today. I mean divisive topics ripping through Christianity. I mean we’ve never experienced that before. Have we sound familiar? Yes, it should sound familiar. We’ve seen a thing or two the last year or two, so paul is teeing off on the topic of the judaize ear’s Judah users. What’s that? Well, well I’m gonna go out on a limb here. I don’t know all of you, but all of us in this room are not, none of us in this room are jewish if you are introduced yourself to me in the lobby, but none of us are jewish. And so the original new testament church, when jesus went to heaven, the disciples were given the great commandment. They kind of had the great, you know, kicked it in Jerusalem, reaching out in Jerusalem, they didn’t go anywhere, he said, go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptizing them. The name of the father, the son, the holy spirit, teaching them to do everything I have commanded you and lo I will be if you always even to the end of this age. And the disciples heard that commandment, the great commission from jesus and they went right back home to Jerusalem and they were building this mega church in Jerusalem. And then persecution comes from the romans and the persecution hit the early church and they scattered all over. But before that persecution hit and during and after that persecution hit, when the church was scattered, paul was going out and reaching out to unreached, unengaged people groups known as non jews. The bible, he calls them gentiles. There’s a jew and there’s a gentile, there’s a jew and non jew, a jew and gentile. We are all non jews. And so in the early culture of this day and age, Judah users, people who have the culture and customs of Judaism came and they added the jewish belief systems and the jewish culture to the early church. And initially the early church was women and slaves and jewish people made up the predominant, you know, demographics of the early church. But then as paul’s missionary journeys throughout europe continued, the gospel advanced to unreached, unengaged people groups. This church in philippi was full of non jews. They didn’t know much about Judaism, they weren’t jews, they were non, they were non jews, they were gentiles, jean paul came in and share the Gospel. They responded, they’re healthy church, they were generous church. They were loving church. They make it in the bible as a good prototypical church to model after it was telling the rejoice, He’s warning them of the Gospel and he says Judaism’s are coming. They’re going to add jewish cultures and customs, two Jewish traditions to the gospel message. He’s basically answering the question, how jewish do you have to be to be a real christian? The early church was monotheistic. Ethnic, ethnically really looked a lot alike, is predominantly jewish because it was in the capital city of Jerusalem and made sense. But as the church expanded, they were not designed to export the jewish custom of principles. They are designed to export the Gospel. The Gospel is resilient. It’s able to go into any demographic. If you’re rich, poor educated or not, if you’re famous or you’re an obscure nobody, the gospels for you, whatever ethnic group, you find yourselves all over this globe, God’s Gospel is resilient and it goes from generation to generation from demographic to demographic. And however we divide people. God’s Gospel unites people to himself through the Gospel message of jesus christ. And that’s why you find the Gospel not just in the Middle East, that’s why you find the church, the christian church, not just in Jerusalem, Sahara, desert Israel area. You find it around the globe. It’s a global enterprise with global branches around the globe because the Gospel, jesus christ unifies us. You see in South America and north America asia africa, europe Antarctica. Maybe if there’s people there, you see him in those small islands in the pacific you see it everywhere because the Gospel is for the whole world, not just for a people group and the cultures and customs, with the first demographic that got saved and became believers in jesus christ. We’re trying to add their preferences, their their privilege, their opinions and how things go to the new message of the Gospel. We do this in our day, cultures and customs. We want to add to the gospel. We have always we’ve always done it that way, mike. We’ve always had that way. That’s not how my old church did it. I mean, you fought this or said this to me. Maybe you have preferences. You have partiality in your life of things that you’re familiar with and your customers that you want to bring into the new Gospel work. You see happening in front of you. We do this as people, whatever group is more established and have the Gospel message first. They tend to, you know, spoken or unspoken, expand on the simple message of the gospel paul goes on his way to prove that in this passage that he is more religious than these religious jews. He’s more of a jew than them. He’s the jewish of jews, say that five times less he’s the jewish of jews. Fall comes face to face with his religious resume and you completely busted unless the title of my sermon, me being cute religious resume buster. That’s what we see in these following few verses here We read his religious resume, picking up in verse three, he’s talking really about how jewish they are and how much they added the gospel. He comes along and says, listen, I’m more jewish and these people, let me prove it to you, verse three, for we are the circumcision, the ones who worship by the spirit of God, boast in christ, jesus and do not put confidence in the flesh. Although I have reason for confidence in the flesh. If anyone else thinks he has grounds for confidence in the flesh, I have more. He goes in his his resume, his religious resume. I was circumcised on the eighth day of the nation of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin, A hebrew born of Hebrews regarding the law. A pharisee regarding zeal, persecuting the church regarding the righteousness. That is in the law blameless. You see, paul was a gangster with his, with his life’s work, his pedigree, his religious pedigree, he was just he was a thug living, thug, jewish living is what he rolled with his work, his life worth his lifelong pursuit. He considers a loss compared that of knowing christ. So think about this. If you’re in Philly pioneer, these people, let’s let’s I don’t have a democrat, I don’t have a graphic to show you, but let’s pretend this is a big square building. This is the temple, that’s the square. All right. And so let’s start on the outside of the temple out here. People hang out and then they want to come into the temple to worship God, worship yahweh. If you’re a jew, you can come in. If you’re not a jew, you have to stay outside in the court, outside. You come to this next room, which is about a third of the temple and that’s the place where the women’s day and then you can go. Only men can go in a little deeper into the jewish temple. Into this other area where men can stay in worship and experience the sights and smells and sounds of what transpires in a jewish temple. And then you go in a little farther and that’s where just the paid professional Pharisees religious leaders can go. And then there’s the holy of Holies place where once a year there’s a lottery of prestigious jews get selected by the casting of lots were like I like paul would have could have should have gotten his name randomly selected. He could have gone in there and done the sacrificial sacrifice one time of year in the holy of Holies where God’s presence is where God’s power is where you have to be holy and pure perfect jew. And they would tie her up around the guy’s leg with bells around his his get up and guard his castle. So as he went in there, if they heard it was quiet and he got struck him dead, they would drag his body out with the rope. So super selective separated from other people. Paid professionals, Men, women non jews. So the people that paul is writing to, they don’t even they’ve never been inside the temple and these people that are jewish are coming and saying yeah, yeah, there’s this thing called the temple. There’s this thing called Jerusalem. We’ve got a really big church there, you’re really small church. Let me tell you how else you gotta be, all share that basic stuff. He’s an evangelist. I’m gonna tell you what else we’re doing in Jerusalem and what else you need to do. You gotta circumcise. So if you don’t know what circumcision is, ask your parents, if you’re older, you can still call your mom and dad, asked them about that. But but think about this means to the people in philippi, they’re not jewish. It means God’s relationship of God seems out of range. Friendship of God seems out of range. A connection of God seems out of range, forgiveness from God, seems out of range because I got to be circumcised. I wasn’t circumcised on the eighth day. Had to be circumcised and uncircumcised when your eight year old it’s just wild. And there’s a lot to that eighth day circumcision. Why? On the eighth day. But we’re gonna keep moving. But we we played this game in America. If paul were to write an instagram post, having a little fun. All right, we’re gonna paul wrote an instagram post, it would read this. I have the hardest hard part. I wear the skinniest jeans, I wear the flannel ist flannel, I has drink the spiciest pumpkin spice, lost latte, I have a hipster sombrero stressed, blessed, coffee, obsessed, hashtag beard life, hashtag hydro flask, water bottle. This is too true for some of you. I know I have a hard part is getting jeans and I have plans. I mean I’m making fun of myself up here, but we we think, you know, there’s there’s christians and then the main demographic, there’s the american christian church is what we kind of lift up and our music and our youtube in our view of their, the cool church there, the they’re the ethnicity, cool church, the church was established church and they set the tone for whatever all other churches need to look like. Now, these aren’t just external, superficial things that you can add or subtract to paul’s life to indicators of wealth or status or or influence you have or don’t have this list paul role. So is a very jewish list, a very culturally specific list to a very specific ethnicity With a very religious deep history, a very proud nation with very rich customs. These aren’t things that happened by accident in Paul’s life. This was systematic decisions his young Jewish parents made thinking of young baby Paul when he was known as all of what they wanted him to do out on the 8th day. They had circumcision parties for babies. Back then, we’ve read about jesus circumcision party and john the baptist circumcision party like circumcision party, it’s like a diaper shower, but a little bit different. Alright, circumcision parties and all that stuff. Think about this. Think about hebrew couples, they lived that they love this. This is the thing they cherished. Anyone here been circumcised by a rabbi. Don’t raise your hand. All right. I mean, you can’t like make these things happen, but circumcised on the eighth day national pride. He’s an Israelite, prestigious ethnic, you know, ethnically influential family. He’s from a specific tribe, the Benjamin tribe, which is thought highly of the jewish nation. Some of the other tribes not thought highly up in the jewish nation. He calls himself here, uh, the Hebrew of Hebrews, that’s like a phrase, I’m a man’s man or your marty and Matthew are man’s man. You know, a man’s man, you’ve heard that phrase right? He’s your hebrew of hebrews. He’s a prototypical hebrew. The ideal hebrew of hebrews in the hebrew nation, paul claimed that he did everything right in his life, his cultures and his customs, private and public. He did all these things right In his life as a matter of devotion, verse six, he says, regarding the righteousness. That is in the law blameless. There’s 618 commandments in your Old Testament Bible, 618 commandments in the Bible. The Old Testament Bible. The first five books of the bible are composed of 125,839 words. The Torah, the first five books of the bible moses wrote, Paul memorized those five books of the bible. He says I obeyed all of it. We hardly know it, much less obey at all. Paul says I know it all and I did it all right. He memorized the first five books of the bible. So what is, what is Paul saying? Let’s look at Verse seven. But everything that was a gang gang to me. I have considered to be a loss because of christ more. More than that. I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing christ, jesus, my Lord, because of him. I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them as dung so that I may gain christ and be found in him not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through the faith in christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. So what is paul saying in light of the gospel? This should make you sit up and perk up. This is the main thing. He’s trying to drive point on this this section. We look at this morning, he’s saying in this section, those who trust in christ are the true people of God. Those who trust in christ are circumcised, that circumcised of the heart. Those who trust in christ belong to the right tribe, christ tribe, the real tribe that will last forever. He says the word dung in here. In the christian standard bible, your bible might say waste, might say other words he says. This means dog feces, my kids, we have a swear word, they’re not allowed to say and stupid, you’re swear word that starts with an S might not be stupid. It’s a tame scoreboard. Just draw the line there to help our kids speak nice to each other. I consider it my whole life dog. Yes. Do you get what I’m saying? S have to spell out for you age. It’s a complicated word, but dog feces dog waste. I consider my whole life’s work dog waste. He climbed this jewish ladder. It was a prominent, prestigious ju pharisee affairs. His elite pharisee from childhood through his, the adolescent teen years age of 13, memorized the 10 five books of the bible, the first one and then he’s he’s in this, this prestigious school taught by this prestigious Mordecai guy, this famous Pharisee guy, He is the prototype goats pharisee who’s gonna run the whole jewish faith and then God saves him because there’s an entire life’s pursuit dog waste, dog faces dog waste. My friend, I was at a friend’s house last week and he invited us over and we were hanging on his back yard and we don’t have a dog at my house. I’m allergic to cats, I don’t know why that has to do everything. We don’t have a dog. My my but my friend had a big dogs, big dogs and big dogs have big piles of poop in their backyard and me and my friend are talking his back porch, my four kids are running around and he’s inside talking to his wife and me and my friend are talking and I look over and I see my kids and they like took it in me, they’ve gathered around a pile of dog poop probably this big. And I see one of my kids going like this, they’re just, they’re just captivated, they don’t know what it is and my kids gonna stick his finger into it and I’m like, hey what are you doing? Go over there, the lawns big get away from that like that, like what is it? Get away from it, paul says, I consider my whole life a big steaming pile of dog poop compared to that of the value that surpassing value and worth annoying crisis. It’s a big statement, shocking statement that would have got the attention of his, his readers. He’s vulgar on purpose, he delivery wrote this as a way to get their attention and again, it’s not as a sound bite some, you know, hit piece on him. Supreme recorded him. This is not that he wrote this out carefully systematically in a prison jail to this church because he knows what’s coming, he’s trying to shock them out of being lulled into this performance based Christianity. We have to look a certain way. Talk a certain way, act a certain way, read a certain thing and act and just get formed into this main demographic mold versus the new demographic mold. This is not an accident. Paul looks at his life, thinking about his accomplishments, he climbed the religious ranks, his past life, his prestigious, powerful, influential life, a token success story. A jewish document would have been made about paul’s life. At the end of his life, he was gonna solve his pre jesus life, but his whole life jewish documentary. From rags to rags to pharisee garb regs. The riches would have been his documentary. You could have watched it on Youtube. I mean, the Pharisee Pharisees considers those years that time, that energy, that pursuit a complete and total waste compared to the worth of knowing, jesus christ paul needed someone else’s righteousness in order to go to heaven to be perfect. I’ll do that. Only perfect people go to heaven. Only people that are justified in the eyes of God go to heaven. There is no one righteous. No not one is what Paul writes in the Book of romans. There’s no one righteous Paul seen a thing or two and he knows a thing or two. He knows his bible bear, that any of us, men and women, there is no one righteous. No not one. You’re not righteous. I’m not righteous, Paul is not righteous. No one is good enough to go to heaven. Only perfect people go to heaven. And you said this on the sermon on the mountain Matthew 567 Verse Chapter seven at the end of summer, the amount he says you must be perfect because you’re how many father is perfect! There is no one perfect, There is no one righteous, This is the only source of righteousness. So look at this, if you jump ahead to verse 10, Paul is like a broken record. Let’s read verse 10. He says this here in the book of Philippians, he says that elsewhere in Galatians and this is the main theme of his letter, she writes to his church is because he’s warning them about leaving Gospel and chasing a pursuit-based workspace. Christianity says. It’s my goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering and being confirmed conformed to his death, assuming that I will somehow reach the resurrection from among the dead. Paul never got bored with knowing jesus. He was a lifelong pursuit of him, is knowing jesus, Walking of jesus, having an intimate relationship with jesus christ and paul seemed to be lights out for knowing jesus, paul seemed to be an all in kind of guy who was all in on pursuing his fantasy life, his legalistic life, his religious life, his workspace life and then he flipped and something changed his mind when he got saved on the Damascus road and then he was all in for jesus when jesus called the do of being a light to the gentiles and going on all these missionary journeys. No one like paul has ever hit Christianity Since then, paul is the reason a you have a new testament and be the known world in europe at that time was arranged. Paul was a thug when it came to missionary trips. You can read about his amazing missionary exports but put all in Paula’s all and everything but many of you, you’re all in, I’m all in, we’re just all in on stupid stuff. We’re not all in on the Gospel and the mission and all in on christian community were all in on dumb pursuits. That will be lacking at the end of our life. We’re all in our hobbies, our career, our house, our wealth, our possessions, our health, our pleasures. We’re all in on the wrong things. And paul was all in on knowing christ and making his name known on the Gospel, on expanding the Gospel on a healthy churches. Paul was all in on what jesus was all in on paul is saying here that the life ladder he built of jewish legalistic workspace. Man Works was built on a wall over there of how to get to God. Men are down here and God’s up there and there’s this ladder of your life’s works and your accomplishments and your achievements. And he’s climbing the ladder and he was high up on the ladder higher than any of his other jewish period of the time. Remember that list of his religious resume and paul’s way up there, like we have a ladder in the basement that’s massive. It scares me because I don’t like heights, but we have a lot of that can get you to the roof almost, it’s still be shaky. But paul was up there in that huge, massive ladder. He says, this is completely dog waste this dog feces. He gets off the ladder and moves the massive ladder and leans over there. Where crisis on the trusting in the work of jesus christ, he’s like I’m going to pursue that, pursue the work of God’s changing and working in me, pursuing the gospel, how Jesus came and came down the ladder and picked me up and carried me up the ladder to heaven. That’s the gospel. You can’t get to heaven on your own. God knows that. So he sent jesus christ to come and get you, throw on his shoulders, fireman style and haul you out his burning world that we’re in. That’s the gospel message of Rescue up. Think of the nation of Israel, 2.6 million people in the nation in Egypt and moses is God’s ambassador go leader Rescue off and pull them out of there and they come to a terrible situation where they’re stuck with the Israel. The Egyptian army behind them and the Red Sea in front of them and God parts the Red Sea and they walked through on dry land and then God protects them to the 40 days of willingness lead them to the promised land. All that’s a dramatic, amazing rescue off of God’s saving 2.6 million million hebrews out of the nation of Egypt. There was about four million Egyptians and 2.6 million that were hebrews. That was a big deal huge rescue up and you see God’s rescue redemptive plan occurring over and over and over again throughout your bible. You can’t save yourself, paul could not save himself. Only jesus christ can save you. You have to trust in the work of jesus christ. On your work. God justifies people that are perfect and you can’t be perfect, No one is perfect. You have to move your ladder from this wall to that wall. Do you see Jesus and all of this? Let’s look at verse 10 again, I’m playing with it a little bit just to make it obvious to you. But my goal is to know Jesus and the power of Jesus and the resurrection and fellowship of Jesus is suffering, being confirmed to jesus death. His goal of his life as jesus, his power is found in jesus. The fellowship he has is in Jesus is suffering, he has his cousin jesus, and the death he’s being formed into is because of jesus death. So what’s the sunny school answer to all questions that are being asked to your kids upstairs, jesus right, this is a very jesus centered, painfully christ centered, Jesus centered on his living on the books, he wrote All he needs is jesus. All I need is jesus and all you need is hey man, good job, Alright, let’s look at this, J I packer, he says this once you became aware that the main business that you are here for is knowing God. Most of life’s problems fall into place of their own accord. The main thing you have here is the pursuit of God. That’s from his book, Knowing God, he wrote, also pursuing God. Now his toes are, I’m sorry, everything in life, everything in your life you have flows out of when your priorities are focused on knowing jesus and growing closer to jesus, knowing God. So why is this in the bible? Why is this in the Bible? Why are we spending 33 minutes looking at this passage? Why is this in the Bible? Why are you talking about it? Mike? Well, as listening to me and Z podcast this last week and they said we are so bad at following things. If we are not first shown how to do them. As people, we needed to be modeled for us, we need to be laid out for us. I think paul is a great example of keeping the gospel central and premier in your mind and in your life, and pursuing and knowing a relationship with jesus christ, I broke out an acronym that is terrible, you won’t remember it and I won’t either, but there’s an accurate of what, how do you know God? R P p R like I’m done, I know you don’t let me still go through it. Read, pray participate in reach like that’s too much mike, I know all right, so engaged with God, engage with God’s people and engage with God’s mission. That’s how we know God, that’s we pursue God, paul, engage with him and jesus, he after his conversion spent three years alone with jesus and learning from God and studying the Torah and studying the bible and he came back and went to the christian disciples and Peter and others and talk to what he’s learning how he understands the gospel, Is that correct? Peter you’re of jesus, I spent time with jesus, there’s a unique season for paul when the apostles, he was in the community, went out from that christian community, came back to the christian community and gave reports. It was under the authority of a christian community and the whole wild paul’s life was on mission because on mission of knowing God and community. On mission, that’s how you pursue God, men and women, that’s why we preach the bible at sewer, you’re gonna learn something in your life and you’re going to master something, master, fancy football team, become a master fisherman, you’re gonna be a master at something, a master Youtube commentator, you’re gonna master you mean game, you’re going to master something in your life. Are hoping goals that we will be a church that masters these 611,000 words of this ancient text that is all about knowing God and making him. No, that’s what Shane been and I preached through, is that we know this bible, the rest of your life. If you’re here or somewhere else, find yourself in a bible centered gospel preaching church. The main theme of your life is be all in on jesus conclusion. So it’s doing is always more powerful than simply hearing. We want to be doers, not just hearers, there’s a clear call to action in Philippians three. I would label us. There’s four groups, group number zero. You need jesus, read this gospel book, grab one stick in your pocket, sneak out of here, read it privately. And if you know someone you think has a good connection of God asked them what they think about it, learn about God. Reading this is what made me a christian when I was a 10 year old little boy. This Gospel message is powerful. The word of God is alive and active. It can change and will change your life. Read the bible, Read the Gospel Message. Uh huh. I have a dear woman I live with whose father is not a believer. She asked if the grandkids could read a passage of Mark to the grandpa and they’re sending marco Polo’s of grandkids, reading the bible to grandpa, get the bible in your life. Matthew Mark luke john any of the words or actions of jesus christ. See for yourself. You’re smart enough to figure it out, see for yourself and expose yourself to the gospel and expose yourself to the words and actions of jesus christ. Don’t let the word of God change you. That’s group number zero. Group number one. You’re neglecting your bible. My screen is frozen, You’re you’re neglecting your bible. You lost it. That’s okay. We found it. Your bible that is lost is around the corner and the literature resource library thing. So grab a bible. If you don’t have a bible, you want a different bible. You want a new bible. I change my bible every six months. You can grab a bible from us as long as you promise to read it. We have them free for now. So you can have a bible on us. Just Read It. Group # 3 2. You’re missing from community. You’ve abandoned your brothers and sisters, the military, have a term uh, call this uh, missing in action. M I a missing in action. If you’re new to this church or you had a big break Because of the pandemic. That’s great. We love to get you connected. We have 10 community groups right now in this city. There’s a bunch of them that could and should probably multiply in the coming months. All community groups are firing enough to full tail boogie in august right now they’re just having parties. So this is a fun time to go, but in august there, rolling back to weekly meetings, weekly gatherings of about 14 people in them. So we’d love to get you connected. Talk to me Shane. Ben, Any staff, anyone that looks like they’ve been on the stage, someone that knows it’s been here for a little while. They know community groups, they know where they are. We’ll have a table set up in future weeks to make it even simpler photos and where and when. Right now it’s kind of the organic model of getting people connected, which is in this new this way, but get connected on august, they’re all going full tilt boogie. Start dating a community date around final community, That’s a good fit for you. We’re not possessive. Skit connected somewhere. There’s a lot of good ones in group number three, you’re apathetic, you like me, grab, grab your, grab your track, everyone grab a track, it’s hot, it’s hot up here, get a track, we’re done, grab a track, we’re ending. This is the gospel message. If you’re like me, you can be a coward when it comes to the gospel. So my challenge for you, apathetic people like me is to take your gospel tracts, stick it in your pocket and give it to someone before you go home today, not in this building, stop at a gas station, stop at the grocery store and just say, hey, you get one of these and handed out and smile and then run away. Don’t be apathetic about what paul gave his life for and what jesus gave his life for and what they call us to live our lives for the gospel of jesus christ. It’s a winsome, it’s a winsome track. Take one and give one away. Amen. Hey man. And then let’s pray God thank you for today. Thank you for the Gospel and how it changes lives. It changes our lives if we let it, Lord, thank you for your word that is alive and active and able to demolish strongholds in our life, to demolish beliefs and worldviews that are not helpful as we grow and develop and become the men and women. You’ve called us to be acid. Just really make the live the word of God come alive in our lives almost to live it out. That’s where the real power is. We pray this in jesus name. Amen. Amen. Thank you mike. Uh huh.