A Public Scolding - 20

Well, it's hard not to feel sorry for Euodia and Syntyche. Two prominent ladies in the church at Philippi, active, hardworking, well-known, respected, but called out by name in this epistle of Paul to the church at Philippi. An unusual procedure by Paul who doesn't call people out by name very often, but apparently, well, evidently without question necessary because they were engaged in a long-standing dispute and neither was willing to resolve the issue or to just let it go.

So Paul was forced to deal with it publicly because so much was at stake. And thus we enter into chapter four of the epistle of Paul to the Philippians today, the final chapter of this book, which contains more of the personal communications and practical exhortations that we commonly find at the close of Paul's epistles. And we come to three exhortations in the first three verses that are of particular importance to the health of any spiritually alive and active local church.

Three necessities to maintain a healthy church. We see them as number one, a general exhortation in verse one, directed to the entire church to remain true to your original convictions. Number two, a pointed exhortation in verse two, directed to two individual church members to address unresolved divisions between them and the congregation. And then number three, a practical exhortation in verse three, directed to a prominent unnamed leader to assist those who are struggling. So we begin with a general exhortation in verse one. Therefore, my beloved and longed for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my beloved.

Wherever you see it, therefore, you always know to look and see what it's there for. It always points backwards into the context. And so this exhortation to stand fast, to stand firm is based upon the things that Paul has said before. We don't know exactly what he had in mind with that word, therefore.

It could have involved all of chapter three. It could even go back further into the epistle. But there's no question that it must be linked at least to the last two verses of chapter three, where Paul reminded the members of that church that our, that is believers, citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly await for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body, that it may be conformed to his glorious body, according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself.

Therefore, my beloved and longed for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, beloved. And so at least these reasons are clear for the exhortation of verse one, namely that our citizenship, our primary sphere of living is in heaven, even while we are on the earth. But we're governed from above.

We are looking to the one above. We are obeying the laws that have been given to us by God above. We are living in a different world, even while we're living in the same world into which we were born and which in which by which we are surrounded by many others who are bound to this present world. But because our citizenship is in heaven and because, as Paul reminds us here, Jesus is coming again. Jesus, who's in heaven now, is coming again. And that ushers in a whole number of things, including our standing before him to give an account. Therefore, my beloved brethren, stand fast in the Lord. Don't let your grip on the word of God slip.

Don't slide away from your original faith in the word of God and your commitment to the apostolic teaching. Therefore, and it's interesting how many different words and phrases Paul piles together to identify the ones that he's writing this exhortation to. Therefore, number one, my beloved brethren, number two, or my beloved and longed for brethren, number two, my joy and crown. And then again, closing the verse, my beloved once again. It's hard to express what Paul is trying to communicate here because it's clear that he is overflowing with love for these people.

He has a strong desire to see them again, even while he is imprisoned in Rome at this time. He considers them to be his joy and crown. His joy, this is what gave Paul joy. The lives of people like these believers in Philippi who are walking with the Lord, you know, are giving evidence that Paul's labors were fruitful and effective.

He had not run in vain. He was successful by the help and grace of God. Oh, what joy that brought to his heart and my crown, the victor's wreath, the evidence of Paul's successful believers.

Here's the proof. Here's the evidence that what he had labored for has been fruitful by the grace of God. And so these are very beloved people. He expresses that again and again, his warm personal relationship, which he feels for them, this strong pastoral encouragement, which he issues by compiling together this whole list of phrases to express his love and encouragement.

And it involves what I would consider to be wise, balanced reassurance. Remembering those scathing words, just a few verses before, in verses 18 and 19 of chapter three, many walk of whom I tell you often and tell you even now weeping, they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, whose glory is in their shame, whose mind is set on earthly things. And Paul could not go through that list without arousing in the minds of some of these members of the church at Philippi the possibility that they belong to that category rather than to another category, and that was good for them to carefully examine their hearts and his matter. But then Paul comes right back with these strong assurances, my beloved and longed for brethren, my joy and crown, my beloved. He doesn't really have any doubts about those that he's writing to in this epistle, but he recognizes that it's possible for people to be counterfeits.

It's possible for people to fool others like Judas did for a long time. And so having searched their hearts in very strong language, he now comes back with the balm of love and joy to soothe their hearts once again. He's remembering these strong words in chapter three, and he's no doubt preparing them for the scolding that's coming up in verses two and three of chapter four. My beloved and longed for brethren, my joy, my crown, my beloved, including Euodia and Senegi, but I'm calling you ladies out.

I love you. I thank God for you, but I'm calling you out publicly. This epistle would have been read to the entire church, and they would have been sitting there hearing their names read out loud by the apostle Paul. Euodia and Senegi, I'm calling you out.

You need to get this matter resolved. But the general exhortation of verse one is to stand fast or stand firm in the Lord. Keep living according to the doctrine that you have learned from me, says Paul. Stand first firm and apostolic doctrine which indeed is the teaching of Jesus Christ himself. That exhortation is as much needed today as it was in Paul's day, maybe even more so in our day than in Paul's day. There are so many assaults.

There are so many deceits. There are so many seductions that are coming at the people of God in the world today that we need to be on guard or we're going to be pulled away. Stand firm. Stand firm against the hostile world. Stand firm against compromising Christianity. Stand firm against the sinful inclinations of your own heart. Therefore, my beloved, so stand fast in the Lord.

That's exhortation number one. That's an important exhortation for every church. Beacon Baptist Church, so stand fast in the Lord. Every local church that claims to be a Bible-believing church, so stand fast in the Lord because we know there are plenty of churches that have not done that.

They've drifted away. Don't let that happen here. Stand fast in the Lord, a general exhortation. But that brings us then secondly to a pointed exhortation, verse two, which is nothing less than a public scolding. I implore Euodia and I implore Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. This is an urgent situation. I implore you. I urge you. I exhort you in strong, strong terms. It's important because Paul repeats the verbs in a rather unusual manner. He would normally say, we would normally say, I implore Euodia and Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.

But in order to emphasize an important matter, this is more than just a light matter. I implore Euodia. Repeat, I implore Syntyche. It's also a reminder that both of them are equally responsible for the solution to this division. And so Paul makes it clear. This applies to you, Euodia.

This applies to you, Syntyche. It applies to both of you equally. And that shows us the urgency of the situation. And Paul identifies those who were guilty of this quarrel in the church, and it's rare for him to do that. Sometimes people ask the question, when it comes to problems within the body of Christ, is it appropriate to name names or not? And the answer is, sometimes it is, and sometimes it's not.

You'll get that clearly from scripture. Paul doesn't do this often. He does from time to time. He talks about Alexander the coppersmith has done me much wrong. And he does point out names from time to time.

Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world. There is nothing wrong. There's nothing sinful. There's nothing that is unhelpful about calling names when the situation calls for it, but obviously not every situation does. There is something unhelpful in going around identifying names and making that the main focus of your ministry and always criticizing and finding fault with everybody else specifically.

There needs to be a balance here. But Paul does call these ladies out by name. First of all, Euodia. Both of these are Gentile names, Greek names. These ladies were Gentile, pagan worshipers of false gods in the city of Philippi until the Lord began to work in their hearts and draw him unto themselves. But Euodia has a name that means a prosperous journey or maybe something more shortened to the word success. And Syntyche's name means something like lucky or fortunate. Pretty good names actually. You'd think these would be ladies you'd want to be friends with. They could be helpful to you.

Successful, fortunate, but not now, not until they get this matter resolved. They're identified by name. They're identified by reputation in verse three. Paul makes it clear he considers them valuable, hardworking members of the church. Help these women, he says in verse three, who labored with me in the gospel along with others as well. But they labored with me in the gospel. They contributed significantly to the work of the gospel in the city of Philippi.

What did they do? We don't know. Whenever you find something like this, some people are determined to read more into the language than what is found. So some will find in this the rationale for women preachers and so forth. Well, that's going way beyond what Paul says here. We don't know what these women did. Anyway they didn't do anything that Paul says elsewhere that should not be done.

So we can't take an unclear passage and use that to cancel out a clear passage. But whatever they did was very significant. It was very important. It was very helpful.

It was very strategic. It was very fruitful and useful to the establishment of the church in Philippi. Paul was very grateful for what they had done. They had a wonderful reputation as gospel workers in that church. And he identifies them not only by name and by reputation, but by also relationship because they were not only closely associated with Paul himself, but closely involved with other faithful church members. One who is named Clement, we know nothing more about him, and others he does not name. They labored with me in the gospel with Clement also, and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the Book of Life. They were very active, involved, and important to the work of the Lord in Philippi.

But something has come along to damage the continuation of that valuable work. There is an unfortunate disagreement. I implore Euodia and I implore Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord.

It's an unfortunate disagreement because of their prominence. It's likely, though not certain, that they were part of that original group of ladies who met with Lydia at the Riverside when Paul came to Philippi looking for a synagogue, which he did not find, but finding instead a small gathering of women who were worshiping Jehovah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the Old Testament scriptures down by the Riverside in Philippi. And that's where Paul began his gospel ministry. That's where Lydia's heart was opened by the Holy Spirit of God that she attended to those things which were spoken by Paul. That's where the beginning of that church all started.

And there were many women, we don't know how many, involved, and it's certainly not unlikely that two others besides Lydia were Euodia and Syntyche. We can't prove that, but we can tell that they were longtime prominent members of the church. They weren't new converts. They weren't new members.

They'd been there for quite a while, possibly from the very beginning. They were probably pillars of the church. They were probably founders of the church.

They were probably what we call today charter members of the church. And those likelihoods make their quarrel all the more problematic. This is an unfortunate disagreement because of their prominence. And it's an unfortunate disagreement because of the nature of the disagreement.

And you say, what is that? What was the problem? What were they quarreling about? And you search the passage carefully to find the answer and you really don't find it, but what do you find?

Well, you find certain things that are not said that lead us to understand something about the nature of this problem. There is no doctrinal departure indicated. If the nature of the problem were doctrinal and one of the ladies had departed from sound doctrine and the other lady was trying to correct her and they were quarreling about it, then it is inevitable that the apostle Paul would have stepped in and said, now, this teaching is an error.

This other teaching is correct. He did that frequently. He would have been compelled to do that if that were the situation, but it clearly is not. There's no doctrinal departure that's indicated. And furthermore, Paul's silence and his clear unwillingness to take sides in the dispute, he doesn't say, I've heard people describe this and I've waited carefully and I want to tell you who's right and who's wrong.

He doesn't do that. Makes it evident that there probably is no clear violation of scripture of any kind, not only of doctrine, but even of practice. You can't find a biblical violation in what Euodia contended for as opposed to what Syntyche contended for. There's no clear violation of scripture. It is therefore by process of elimination, apparently a mere difference of opinion over something that really doesn't matter very much. It's not doctrinal.

It's not biblical. It's a difference of opinion over something that is indifferent. This is what we probably would call in our day a personality difference.

That sort of covers a multitude of things, doesn't it? That's the nature of their quarrel. Well, it's just a personality difference. I could say some other things about that, but we'll go on. But that's, in our day, that's probably what this would be called.

Euodia and Syntyche are not able to get along because of their difference of personalities. In other words, in this issue, whatever it was, both could probably claim to be right and could not be corrected in that opinion. But both are clearly wrong in the way they handled the situation. It's not necessarily the issue itself that is clearly right or wrong.

It's one of those things that could be either way. But it was clearly wrong in the way it was not handled correctly, and it was going on and on and on and on without resolution, without putting it aside, continuing to disturb the peace of the church. I suppose in some ways similar to the difference of opinion between Paul and Barnabas concerning John Mark.

Who was right? Barnabas said he's repented. He's ready to go again. He's ready to recommit himself to the work of Christ. We'll take him along on the second journey. Paul said, oh, no, not enough time has passed.

We can't be sure that he is ready to go. And the contention between them was so sharp that they divided and Paul, Barnabas took John Mark and Paul took Silas and they went their separate ways. And as we look at that from some distance to say, well, now after several years have passed, who was right and who was wrong?

What can we say? Paul may have been right initially, maybe not enough time had passed, but Barnabas was correct in his evaluation. John Mark was potentially useful for the cause of Christ. His initial defection was only a stumble, not a fall. He was ready to be restored.

He was ready to go on. And Paul was not ready to recognize that. Now who was right and who was wrong?

Really, initially it seems like Paul was probably right, but in the passing of time, it seems that Barnabas no doubt was right. It was a difference of opinion that there is no biblical way to put your finger down and say, here's the clear answer to the problem. That's the kind of dispute that was going on in the church at Philippi between Euodia and Syntyche. This problem was difficult to resolve. The women evidently couldn't see their way to resolution. Paul evidently couldn't pronounce a principle judgment as to what was correct and what was not.

He wasn't reluctant to do that when that was possible. Remember the situation in Corinth? They were dallying about dealing with a man who was living with his stepmother immorally. And Paul said, from a distance, I've already judged this matter. I've condemned this man. It's not right.

Now you get busy and get him out. He made a judgment, clear judgment, because there was a clear issue of right and wrong, no question about it. But in this case, he doesn't do that. So I think we must conclude that no such thing existed. Paul couldn't pronounce a principle judgment in favor of either Euodia and Syntyche, but this quarrel needed resolution for the sake of Christ and for the sake of the church. So since they hadn't resolved it now with the passing of weeks and months, Paul did something very unusual. He called them out publicly from the pulpit in the public reading of this letter. They were sitting there, and I can imagine when they heard this read, their faces were red. He called them out publicly.

Why? Were they guilty of fornication like the man of 1 Corinthians 5? Nope. Was one of them embezzling money from the church treasury?

No. So what was so serious that it caused Paul to call them out publicly? They were quarreling and refusing to resolve their quarrel, which is far more serious than we usually consider it to be.

Clearly it is. Look at the evidence here in Philippians chapter 4. I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if a pastor did something like this today, called out the names of two people who had an unresolved dispute of the church and called out their names from the pulpit publicly and said, you, wouldn't have to be ladies, could be men, you too, get this matter resolved.

It's gone on long enough. What would be the reaction of the church? What would be the reaction of most Christians? What would be your reaction to that? Why? How dare him do something like that? That's entirely overboard.

That's entirely uncalled for. Well, tell that to the apostle Paul because he didn't get the memo. Which brings us then to the third exhortation in verse three, a practical exhortation.

What have we had? Number one, a general exhortation in verse one directed to the entire church, an exhortation to remain true to your original convictions. Number two, a point of exhortation directed to two individual church members telling them to address their unresolved differences. And number three, a practical exhortation in verse three directed to a prominent leader to tell him to assist these ladies in their inability to resolve their dispute and by extension to assist those who are struggling in the church to get their house in order. A practical exhortation verse three. And I urge you also, true companion, whoever that is, I urge you also, true companion, help these women who labored with me in the gospel with Clement Alson with the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the book of life. A practical exhortation directed to an unnamed partner in my Bible called true companion. Another version says loyal yoke fellow, somebody obviously who partnered with Paul in the work of the gospel.

True companion, loyal yoke fellow. He's not named. Some have tried to propose that he actually is named, that this term translated true companion or loyal yoke fellow in Greek comes out something like Zizgis and that that was his name. But if so, he's the only person that can be found anywhere in hundreds of years of Greek literature with that name.

I don't think that's very likely. That's not who it is. That's not his name.

He's not Zizgis. He is a loyal yoke fellow, a true companion, an unnamed ministry partner. But the way he's described as a yoke fellow almost makes it sound like he's a member of Paul's missionary team. He's one of those who traveled and ministered with the apostle Paul. And if that's correct, and we can't be sure that it is, but if that's correct, the most likely person would be Dr. Luke. We can place him in Philippi at this time. We'd have difficulty placing Timothy or Titus or anyone else there at this time. Was it Dr. Luke?

Possibly. But whoever it was, it was a prominent leader, well respected by the church, who presumably would be allowed to enter into the situation. And Paul says, please get busy and help these women. They aren't getting it done by themselves. We need a third party to help them.

We need third party mediation. That, of course, assumes that the women will sit down and talk with this person. What if they won't?

Well, that becomes another matter. If they are requested to do that by the church leaders and refuse to do that, that becomes another issue that needs to be dealt with. We don't have the option of not cooperating in this way. So they are going to be invited, and if they are reluctant, instructed to sit down with a third party mediator and each tell their side of the story and hash things out and let this mediator, this well respected leader, listen to what they have to say and then to help them bring it to a God honoring resolution.

Help these women. Help them resolve their disagreement because this needs to be resolved. Help them to remove this substantial hindrance to the work of the Lord, this hindrance to the effective labors of Clement. Euodia and Syntyche labored with me and with Clement, and now they're not able to do that, and it's hindering the work of Clement. Help these ladies who formerly worked with a lot of other people in the church, Clement and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the book of life. But now a lot of this work has ground to a halt.

It's only dragging along instead of sailing along because of this dispute that's going on between the women. So help these women because their dispute is adversely affecting the whole church. Now let's make some applications from the passage. Number one, we learn here to beware of subtle deceits that can turn us aside from foundational Christianity.

Verse one, therefore my beloved and longed for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord. How do you decide when something new comes along? How do you decide whether that's a good thing or a bad thing for the health of Christianity? I'll tell you how most Christians decide.

They don't do it like this, but it turns out looking something like this. A lot of people say this is a good thing, so I guess I will too. That's the way the wind's blowing. But if we're going to be true to Christ, we can't take our cue from the general prevailing opinion. We must be grounded in the word of God. We must keep evaluating everything by God's word. And don't you wish you could do this once and say I've done that, now I can go on to other things? But you can't because new things keep coming along all the time. And just about the time you've got something sorted out over here, you're going to be blindsided back here by something else, and you're going to have to evaluate something else all over again from the word of God.

And about the time you've got this one pretty well settled in your mind, you're going to get hit from something by this side. And that's the way it is, and that's the way it's going to go all throughout your Christian life. I'm amazed at some of the Christian leaders and some of the strong Christian institutions that I thought had really gotten firmly settled on the word of God. They fought courageous battles, they won the war, and now they're losing the battle because something entirely new has come from a different direction, and they haven't recognized this as a threat to Bible truth, and they're being swept along.

Three or four decades ago, those who had come to a reformed understanding of salvation who were very rare in those days, really in the minority, began to see encouragement. There are more and more people that are embracing these truths that are in the word of God. It's actually becoming not the majority opinion, but a very sizable minority opinion. It's even becoming popular in some quarters. Uh-oh, be suspicious of that word popular. We do a better job sorting things out biblically when we're not popular and do not succumb to the desire to be popular, because when we succumb to the desire to be popular, to be well thought of, to be accepted, that's when we're blindsided by things that are contrary to the word of God, but somehow we don't see that, and we believe that they are acceptable because they seem to make our position more acceptable to others. And isn't that a good thing?

Probably not. Beware of subtle deceits to turn you aside. Another lesson I see is to understand the balance between encouragement and rebuke. I re-pointed that out to you earlier. Paul really scathed this congregation in chapter three, verses 18 and 19, not so much the members of the church, but they may have been.

It's people that call themselves Christians who clearly think they are, and yet they're not. And that was a searching, searching passage. But notice how quickly Paul follows that with abundance of warm words of encouragement. We need to learn that balance. We need both. We need to be searched, but we need to be comforted and encouraged. We need to learn to be wise and godly, kind and courageous. It's not an easy balance. Some people tend toward one, some people tend toward the other. Some people always want to be smiling and encouraging to the extent that they aren't willing to ever confront anything that's wrong.

That just doesn't seem beyond their ability. You better ask God to give you the courage to do it when it needs to be done. But other people are really good at confronting and calling out, but not so good at encouraging and strengthening. And the balance, and the apostle Paul is clear to see, we need to do both. May God help us to do that.

Number three, we need to understand the seriousness of feuds among Christians. It's so common. It's so expected that we've almost come to the place where we just say, well, that's life. That's the way it is. You can't do anything about it.

Just ignore it and go on. But Paul didn't. He certainly doesn't encourage us to. When feuds go on for an extended time among Christians and don't seem to come to any resolution, that division in the body of Christ forfeits the full blessing of God. That division in the body of Christ hinders the work of the church.

That division in the body of Christ spreads to others because eventually others know about it, hear about it, and they begin to take sides. I side with Euodia. I believe she's right.

I side with Syntyche. I believe she's right. And pretty soon you've got whole groups of people who are at loggerheads with one another because of this personal dispute between these two individuals. And when that happens, it eventually leads to serious divisions in the church, and it must be resolved for the sake of Christ. Don't ignore these things. Take them seriously and deal with them as God instructs us to. Which brings me to application number four, which is the need for mutual assistance in our Christian walk. These ladies aren't getting it done themselves. They need help.

So help them. Come on, some of you other members of the body of Christ, get involved here. Don't ignore it. Don't walk around it.

Lend a helping hand. Mutual assistance in the body of Christ is one of the prime reasons for the assembling of the saints. Did you know that? Let me read that well-known passage in Hebrews chapter 10, beginning at verse 23. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for he who promises faithful. That sounds like verse one of Philippians four. Stand firm, stand fast in the Lord, beloved. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering. Well, how do you do that? Verse 24. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works.

Well, how do we do that? Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the manner of some, shame on you, you some, but exhorting one another. And so much the more as you see the day approaching. You see, there are some things about the assembly of the saints designed by God that cannot be substituted by video, by live stream, by distance. How wonderful those things are when there truly is a serious problem that keeps it, makes it impossible for you to attend how blessed we are in our day to have those kinds of tools available that our forefathers didn't have. A way to stay somewhat connected, but no way to be as involved as the scripture indicates. No way for us to be able to come alongside others and encourage and help and strengthen them, which requires personal presence, personal interaction, personal attendance and involvement.

There is no substitute for personal involvement. And then my final application is, don't expect to find the perfect church. Now, I know you know that theoretically, but I often, I see what so often happens. I think I found the right church until something develops, maybe a quarrel between Euodia and Syntyche. Well, if that's what's going on in this church, then I'll just go find me another one.

Oh, slow down. Isn't it strange how people will apply a much higher standard to the church as a whole than they'll apply to themselves? When you're as perfect as you ought to be, then you can expect the church to be as perfect as it ought to be. But it's clear that even in the first century, this is one of the best churches.

Philippi is truly one of the best churches that Paul established and that Paul writes to. But it wasn't perfect. It wasn't without problems. They had a quarrel that had been going on for a long time. There's some important lessons to be learned by staying and working through these things. God uses that in our lives. Someone has rightfully said that one of the greatest tools of sanctification in the lives of believers is marriage.

When you have to learn how to live together and work out all these things, when your lovey-dovey think you've got the perfect mate, the perfect marriage, and everything's going to be perfect until it isn't. So then what? Bail out?

No. Work through these things, and in the process, you're going to grow. God's going to teach you some things about yourself.

And you're going to grow in the process. It's a sanctifying tool. And it's similar many times with churches. What should you do? Find the best word-centered healthy church you can. And then what? Get plugged in. Don't sit around and gawk and take what benefits you can without getting involved.

Get plugged in. Serve. Build relationships in the church. Learn to address and resolve differences biblically. Grow together.

Make things better. And that's the way that we ought to relate to the local church. And if we all do, what a blessing that will be. Shall we bow in prayer? Father, help us to take your word seriously. Help us to examine our own hearts honestly. Help us to direct our actions and attitudes biblically, all to the honor and glory of our Savior, in whose name we pray, amen.