Getting Our Spiritual Bearings (Part 1 of 2)

Most of us have used apps like Google Maps or WAV. Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg explains that the gospel is like a GPS, helping us keep our read in chapter 2, from verse 1 through to the end of verse 18. Philippians 2, beginning in verse 1. So, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being 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 every name, 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 is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or disputing, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life, so that in the day of Christ I may be proud that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all.

Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me. Thanks be to God for his Word. Well, the verses to which I should like to draw our attention are essentially verses 14 and 15 of the passage that we just followed along as I read. I invite you to turn there, and as you turn, let me turn our thoughts to God in prayer. And now, gracious Father, we pray for help to be given to the one who speaks and to each of us as we listen for that sense of humility that is characteristic of bowing beneath the authority of your Word, that there will be no clouding of the clarity that is contained in your Word, and that by your grace there may be that response of each of our lives to its truth. To this end we seek your help. In Christ's name.

Amen. Well, Paul writes this letter, as with others of his letters, from a position of imprisonment, probably in Rome. And he is writing to encourage his readers. He's writing, actually, if you like, as a good and a faithful pastor.

And from the very beginning, he identifies them along the lines of the song that we've just been singing. You will notice in the opening verse of his letter he is writing, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi. So you have this juxtaposition of being in Christ and in Philippi.

The real nature of who and what they are is on account of God's grace to them, and they are living their lives there in Philippi. Now, some of you will know that many years have elapsed since the gospel had come first to Europe in that exact location. And you can read of that for yourselves in Acts chapter 16, where we have the record of Paul and his companions going down to a place where prayers were being said.

And it was in that context that the first church in Europe was established. Now, as we read his letter to the Philippians, it becomes clear that Paul is preoccupied with the gospel. He's preoccupied with the gospel.

And when we say the gospel, we mean what the Bible means—namely, the good news of what God has done in Christ to make it possible for us to know God and to love him, what God has done in Jesus to set us free from ourselves and from sin and from the devil and from death. And Paul is writing to encourage them, because he knows that this is actually the journey on which they have begun. And so, for example, in verse 6 he says, I'm confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. And in the passage that we read in verse 12 of chapter 2, he says to them, I'm encouraging you that just as you've always obeyed, when I'm with you, so now in my absence I want you to keep on obeying.

Now, my purpose is not just to reinforce this, but let me point it out to you, and you can follow up on this on your own. Paul is clearly not ashamed of the gospel. He doesn't say this in Philippines. He says it in Romans, you will remember, at the beginning of Romans 1. I'm not ashamed of the gospel, he says. The ones to whom he writes are, according to verse 5 of chapter 1, his partners in the gospel. The reason that he's in jail is on account of his commitment to the gospel. He wants them to make sure that they live their lives in a manner that is worthy of the gospel. In fact, he wants them to stand firm in the gospel. He wants them to strive side by side in the gospel. And by the time he's getting to the end of his letter, even though he has to tweak the noses of a couple of ladies that are in disagreement with one another, he reminds them that they are actually and have been brought together by and for the gospel. All of that simply to acknowledge that Paul, once Saul of Tarsus, is a gospel man.

It'd be impossible to meet him without being made aware of the fact that he was truly amazed by God's grace in his life, that mercy had been shown to him, he who had been an opponent of Jesus and disinterested in anything to do with him had been radically changed by the gospel. And now I want us to come to these two verses in particular, verses 14 and 15. And I want to use them this morning—and I say use them, because in many ways our message is to take up this very theme and apply it particularly to ourselves on this day—I want us to see these two verses as an opportunity to get our spiritual bearings. To get our spiritual bearings. We understand what it is to get one's bearings to discover one's position or one's situation relative to one's surroundings.

That's what I'm talking about. Some of us have recollections of our fathers who, when we're saying to them, Where are we? Where are we going?

How will we get there? And we recall him saying, Just give me a moment to get my bearings. Just give me a moment to get my bearings. And so we're taking a moment this morning just to get our bearings and to consider it along three lines. On account of the fact that Paul, first of all, reminds those to whom he writes about their identity, who they are. Secondly, that he makes clear to them where they are. And thirdly, he reminds them of what it is they are supposed to be doing. Now, what I want to do is to recognize that he has written this to first-century Philippi, and here we are in twenty-first-century Cleveland, and the principles as they relate to the people of God, whether applied in the first century in Europe or in the twenty-first century in America, help us to get our bearings. So we will think of it not in terms of they but in terms of we.

All right? So first of all, he reminds us who we are. And of course, there's no surprise to this. You see there in verse 15, he refers to them as the children of God. He says, You're the children of God. In verse 12 of chapter 1, he refers to them as his brothers and sisters.

What a strange thing to say! They're clearly not his physical brothers and sisters. No, it's because of their relationship.

They have one Father. And when he refers to them in that way as children of God, he's not talking about it by way of creation, in the sense that we're all the evidence of God's handiwork, but rather that he's talking about it in relationship to redemption. So, for example, if you think about the beginning of the church and the conversion of Lydia, who was a worshiper of God, when you read in that passage, it says that the Spirit of God worked in her heart to pay attention to what Paul had to say.

He goes down to the place of prayer, and in that context of God-fearing people, he begins to speak to them. And the Spirit of God worked in her heart in such a way that she paid attention. It's a good reminder, isn't it? Some of you are listening to me now, but you may not be paying attention. I cannot command your attention. I can't hardly command my own attention. The fact of the matter is, it is the Spirit of God at work in the heart and mind of a person that even grants the ability to pay attention.

So when somebody says, Are you paying attention? Well, Lydia paid attention. And as she paid attention, she realized that for her to be converted involved two things. Number one, credence. There was something that had to be believed—namely, who Jesus is and what Jesus had done. And secondly, commitment—and that is, commitment to the one who made the promises. Now, when we think in these terms, as we consider the notion—I was thinking this morning as I was driving here, as I just said the phrase children of God in my mind, and, you know, I have the problem with this, but I was thinking again of Woodstock, and I could hear Joni Mitchell saying, I came upon a child of God.

He was walking along the road. And I said to myself, Yes, but you were talking about a child of God by way of creation. We're all children of God. He made us. But may I ask you this morning, has he adopted you into his family? Do you believe in Jesus? Well, that's the credence part. Have you committed your life to Jesus?

You see, this is what's involved. It's not belief in a power greater than ourselves. This is what makes the Christian distinct from every other religious notion in the world. We're not talking here about, Do you believe in God? No. We're not talking about, Do you believe in a power that is within ourselves or beyond ourselves?

No. We're actually talking—and we're not talking, incidentally, about deciding to become spiritual. No, we're actually talking about receiving Jesus.

We're talking about resting in Jesus as the one and the only one who is able to set us the right way up. So, number one, who are we? We're the children of God.

Number two, who are we? We are citizens of heaven. You say, Well, that's not in our verses.

No, but it is in the passage, the wider passage, verse 20. Our citizenship is in heaven, and from we awaited a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Philippians understood what it was to be living away from their real location, because Philippi was a Roman colony. And so, the people lived in Philippi, but when they thought in terms of authority, they looked to Rome and they looked to Caesar. And they understood that. They were, in one sense, aliens from their true location.

They were established as an outpost of this kingdom. And so it is that he is writing to them, and he's reminding them that their primary allegiance is to Christ and his kingdom. Their primary allegiance is to Christ and his kingdom.

This, of course, is very, very important. And when we think of ourselves this morning, rejoicing as we do in the particular celebrations that are ours, we realize that we are a fairly diverse congregation. There are people here whose roots are in New Zealand, people from Africa, people from the Ukraine, from Russia, people from all over the world that are present, and very kindly and very graciously joined us in the singing of our anthem. But it's not actually their anthem. So what is it that unites us? Not a shared anthem, but the same Father. For our citizenship is a citizenship that is established as a result of his divine intervention in our lives.

And that is true across the whole world, in any language and in any place. And so, when we think in terms of all that we have for which to be thankful as a nation—and surely we do—we realize as well that our ultimate allegiance is to God himself. Once we were dead, now we've been made alive. Once we were lost, now we've been found. Once we were helpless, now we are made new.

Once we were without hope, and now we've been born again to a living hope. I once was lost in darkest night and thought I knew the way. That's what some of you would want to tell me. That's what some of you have told me. I used to come there and listen.

I hadn't a clue what was going on at all. And then, somehow or another, the Word of God became alive to me. I came to Jesus as I was, weary and worn and sad, and I found in him a resting place, and he has made me glad. So we're the people of God, called by his name. We are citizens of heaven. Secondly, where are we? Who are we?

The children of God, citizens of heaven. And where are we? Well, where were they? Well, geographically, they were in a very nice spot.

Some of us have been to Philippi, and it's jolly nice all around that region. That's where they were physically. But spiritually, notice where he says they live.

You live, he says, in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. So physically, there they are geographically, and yet their intersection with the culture in which they live is the fact that they are now demonstrably different, by grace, through faith, from their surrounding environment. There is a contrast. They are not blended in with it.

They are distinct from it. And it is their very distinction from it that provides them with an opportunity to speak about the fact that their ultimate allegiance is not Caesar in Rome, but it is Christ and his kingdom. And what is true of Philippi in the first century is to be true of us in Cleveland in the twenty-first century. We, like them, live in a crooked and twisted generation. We live in a warped and a diseased world. You see, that description here in our text, crooked and twisted, is not peculiar to time and place. It's not as if once they got through with that in the first century and they moved on into the second and the third and the fourth and so on, and as the unfolding drama of history took place, people were becoming better and better and better, and eventually, of course, when we finally got to the twenty-first century, it was beautiful!

It was perfect! And we read this, and we said, What does it possibly mean? Crooked and twisted and diseased and broken.

Well, you see, it's not peculiar to Philippi in the first century. It is representative of our world after Genesis chapter 3. It is representative of the fact that we live in a world that is fallen, and as a result of it being fallen, things are flawed. And it is the flawed nature of it, the curved, crooked nature of it, which is in opposition to the amazing plan and purpose of God from the very beginning—a God who creates absolute perfection, who provides everything that is necessary to enjoy the world that he has made, to enjoy the relationships that will be manifested in that world. And then, all of a sudden, everything takes a downward turn. Now, I'd like to take that which you say I shouldn't have.

I have a sneaking suspicion that you are keeping that from me, because that's really the key to it all. The same thing that is said even today. Our world is desperately ill. Our world is diseased. Our world is searching for a cure. A cure that is only found in the gospel. Do you believe this?

Listen. "'You were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked,' writes Paul in Ephesians 2, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work, in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind. And we were, by nature, children of wrath like the rest of mankind, alienated from the God who made us, on two fronts, by our own rebellion and by his settled reaction to sin.

Therefore, unless there is the opportunity of reconciliation, we remain in a dreadful state." Well, you say, well, that's not the whole story, is it? Doesn't the psalmist say that we are fearfully and wonderfully made?

Yes! And we are. Look around. Look at your neighbor. Fearfully made.

Wonderfully made. There is the evidence of it. But the psalmist also is honest enough to say, I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Now, you see, that's a big help when you're thinking about raising your children.

Because if we have a biblical view of the doctrine of creation and a biblical view of the fall, then we realize that what we're dealing with is not simply a bunch of little angels but angelic-looking little creatures who will defy you as quick as look at you, who will explain to you when they're going to bed and why they know that bedtime is on their clock and has nothing to do with you, that why they need the car keys, that why it is a stupid idea, that why, that why, that why. What is that? Did they go to school for this? No! What's the problem? Crooked! Crooked! Warped! It's not a straight line. Now, you see, what the Bible actually does is then make clear—and this is what Paul is doing—he's reminding these people as they live in Philippi, listen, you must remember the fact that you live in a crooked and perverse generation, that you live in an environment that you have been actually removed from spiritually, and yet you live in that.

You go to work in that every single day, and so do we. Our world is searching for answers, searching for a cure that's only found in the Gospel. You're listening to Alistair Begg on Truth for Life. If you'd like to find out more about the Gospel, you can take a few minutes and watch a couple of free videos we have on our website.

Just visit the Learn More page at truthforlife.org slash learn more, and you can download these videos. It's an easy and convenient way for you to share the Gospel with others. Alistair often reminds us that the main things are the plain things, and the plain things are the main things. But it's easy for us to get distracted and to head off on a rabbit trail when we're studying the Bible on our own. So how do we read the Bible in a way that keeps us focused on the main things? Well, the book Read This First, a simple guide to getting the most from the Bible, offers tips and examples for how we can hone in on the essentials when we're studying God's Word. Request your copy of Read This First when you give a donation online at truthforlife.org slash donate. The book Read This First is perfect for sharing with a friend who is new to Bible reading. It's also a great book to give to new members in your church. If you'd like to purchase extra copies, you'll find them in our online store where they're available at our cost. Visit truthforlife.org slash store. I'm Bob Lapeen. We hope you enjoy your weekend and are able to worship with your local church. Monday we'll hear the conclusion of today's message, and we'll learn how to wake up, step up, and speak up so that we don't get caught in darkness. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life where the Learning is for Living.