Partners in the Gospel
First B Jackson
2026-07-05

Automatically transcribed. Where this and the recording disagree, the recording is the record.

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So, verse three through 11 and it's really cool to think about like over the mountain in Idaho, we've been we went through Galatians. There's a very different introduction to Galatians. It's like, he's astonished at how they've betrayed the gospel, right? And they've walked away and they've listened to false teachers but here, the church in Philippi is crushing it and he is so joyful and he is so thankful to God for them and so it's just it's really sweet to be in this letter and I was thinking through you know, where does if Paul was alive today, where would first be, what would a letter from Paul to first be be like? And you can answer that for yourselves.

But I'll tell you this, when we came here for the first time last year in February, that one encounter with the Lord in this body is the reason we're here. So it's an amazing church that we get to be in today. We'd love to know what that letter would look like. But notice there's there's two parts to this to this paragraph. The first is this joyfully thanking God for this church, the church in Philippi and then and then he doesn't stop there like you've read thank you letters when we write thank you letters.

It's like, thank you so much for blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. Blah, Y'all are great. And now I'm praying for your perfection and that you strive and do these things. And so it's even if we're the healthiest church in the state, we we don't sit back and relax like there's a a striving that that happens. So, that's kind of where we're at today.

Those two halves. The first is we'll reread verse three through four is this or or three through six is the thankfulness for the partnership that this church has been for Paul and then a prayer for perfection at the end. So, verse three through four, I give thanks to my God for every remembrance of you, always praying with joy for all of you in my every prayer. He's happy and he's in prison and he's joyful in prison thanking God for this church. How cool?

How amazing is that? And we have to think. He's and he's thankful for all the people and we know at the end of this letter, there's a couple troublemakers. But he's thankful for them too and we have to think back on the Macedonian call that Paul had in Acts 16. So, in Acts 16, Paul is trying to go to these different places and the Lord shutting doors and then boom, he ends up in Philippi, a prominent city in Macedonia and he encounters Lydia and she's praying there and he shares the gospel and she's the first believer.

She is the first believer in Europe which is so wild and then he goes and and there's the slave girl that's following them around and telling the future. She's made her owners a bunch of money and he like exercises the spirit out of her and then the owners are mad because she can't make the money anymore. That gets him put in prison after he's beat up a lot by rods, right? And he's in prison and and he and Silas are are singing praise to God in prison. They're joyful.

They're not thinking about themselves first. They're thinking about the gospels already advancing in this town and God causes an earthquake, right? And the the jail cells open, their shackles are are broken free, and the jailer is about to kill himself and Paul's like, hey, wait, we're all here. We're still here. All is good.

He shares the gospel. That dude becomes a follower of Christ and his whole family and there's a quick little picture of how this church starts. From the first day they became a church, they were inviting the mission team into their home and sharing with them and and defending and confirming the gospel. So neat and he's I I was thinking kind of laughing about this a little bit too when he's writing this. He's thankful for all of them and he says, in all the memories, like all of his remembrance, that includes getting beaten and maybe by that jailer, right?

Like, it's not that much of a stretch to think that a person in this church could have beaten him at one point. But those memories of hardship, I know that a lot of us have difficult memories back in Auburn and Crew. We bonded closely maybe because we were dumb and we signed up for a lot of punishment but there are some hard days of suffering. We were in Alabama. It does get cold and we were rowing in February.

The water doesn't freeze usually. So, we're rowing in the in the dark and ice is forming on the oars as we're rowing and it was miserable but we often joke if we are on the phone talking and we joke about, man, remember when we were suffering in this way? Like, and there's like a bonding that happens. Man, this church is is is suffering in so many different ways together. Not just Paul but but the church body too and Paul's here in prison thanking God for the fact that this church is so healthy and strong.

Joy despite imprisonment. There, one of the commentaries is this cheesy acrostic, okay? J O Y, joy and it's it's the priority in our minds of what we are focused on, what's in, what are we looking to for our joy and it's Jesus, others, and you. And that's how that he can be joyful in that situation, right? If the while was on top, how could he be joyful about being in prison?

He, yeah, these other things are happening but he's you see what I'm saying but if Jesus first, Jesus is moving in all of the earth at this time and and in others in this church of Philippi, he's moving and advancing and he's fired up about it. He says in verse five, I have joy because of your partnership in the gospel from day one until now. The Greek word is Koinonia. Definitely didn't say that, right? Maybe I did.

I don't know. Yeah. John's giving me a smile. Koinonia, it's there's more than just partnership like there's like friendship and mission together, like a co laboring aspect of this partnership. And if you think about what he's already been through with this church, it makes sense.

Like he's he's friends with these people like he's suffered with and for these people and there they still decide, they decide to support him and his missionary team. They're his spiritual brothers and sisters. They have the same spirit dwelling in them, right? They pray for each other. The partnership is a repeated theme not just in our text today.

It's twice in our text today but it's through through Philippians. So, you'll you'll hear more about the partnership and some of of our brothers and sisters in Christ, obviously not in this room but choose not to be surrounding themselves with partner, gospel partners and and not choosing to be part of the body of Christ but we we must see the importance of that partnership not just between us and our missions team but but within each other, our that we really get to know each other and that we're really on mission for the same vision. About ten years ago, after four months of of being in South Sudan, I came home and I was having like reverse culture shock. Ray's probably in reverse culture shock right now. He just flew back from Spain last night and he's here.

But reverse culture shock, like I needed to get out and I had a friend who's a tree arborist and I called him up and like, hey, do you need help? I've run a saw for a summer. He's like, yeah, come on. Excuse me and so, I get there and after a while, like I get to know the crew and we have Bluetooth, helmets. We can talk to each other and I we got comfortable working together.

We knew, hey, this guy's on the skid steer. This guy's up in the tree, tied off. This guy's cutting. This person is running the chipper. So we're all there are about four or five of us usually.

We went up to this lady's house and she there's a huge white oak. It had to have been this big around and it had big branches that were hanging over her house. And she's thinking there's no way that this is going to be able to be removed safely without hurting somebody and it's going to take forever and we're like, don't worry. We got you and so, we get to work. We fire up the machines.

Everybody's doing their thing and she didn't know like we were able to talk with our Bluetooth headsets. So, we weren't like shouting, hey, Billy. Like, you can let the rope out and and so we had we're cutting the limb and we had like a zipline that went over to the chipper and we're getting all of that taken care of. The skid steer was loading big logs up on the trailer. We're just moving quickly and efficiently.

We've done this many times. And at the end, we got everything cleaned up, invited her to come outside and we're like, hey, everything looked good. And she's like, man, like, how did y'all do that so fast? And I never even saw y'all talk to each other. Like, if it seemed like you just read your mind, each other's minds.

And we're like, well, we've got these headsets, you know. And but we are all working in these different tasks. Right. And we had one common vision. Get the tree safely out.

Right. This is where we're headed. Some of us are on a saw. Some of us are on the skid steer. Some of us are on the shipping machine, which is the worst.

But you know, we all had our giftings in our spot, right? We must share that common vision of prioritizing the gospel in our conversations, in our prayers, in our families, marriages, sharing each other's burdens together, right? If you have, if you go and have coffee with somebody that's not a believer, maybe you evangelize that person, that's awesome but other than that, it's just a coffee meeting, right? It's just, we're just having coffee but if your brother or sister in Christ and you have coffee, like, there's a lot more going on than just having coffee. The same spirit in a that's in us is in each other.

We are praying for one another. We're encouraging one another. We're sharing one another's burdens. We're communing with God, the eternal, omnipotent, powerful God. Like at it's all of a sudden, it's like, who cares about the coffee?

Like, we're having a really great thing right here and I think we we forget about that sometimes and we just we just have coffee but our church is doing that in the different these different aspects of figuring out where we fit in like children's ministry. Man, do not complain about no children's ministry today. Those people need a break, right? So, take the break but children's ministry, there's an engine room downstairs. They're dedicating themselves to praying for this right here every Sunday.

The greeting team, their hospitable, good looking folks out there that are greeting you, coming in the room and small group leaders, right? They're taking time to clean their house, get it ready, prepare food, have you come, preach the gospel, pray with one another, like, there's so many different things. Awana, like, we could go on and on, right? Everybody's plugging in and serving with a common goal, right? Be knowing Jesus and making him known to other people.

That how can we be more like Jesus? And this church in Philippi really got this. In second Corinthians eight, Paul is writing a letter to the Corinthian church and he's using this church as an example, right? He's like, well, I'll just read it and but before I read it, think about this. How did these words go together that I'm about to read?

How do these words fit? Okay, it's really wild. We want you to know brothers and sisters about the grace of God that was given to the churches of Macedonia. One of them is Philippi. During a severe trial brought about by affliction.

Their abundant joy. Let me slow down. During a severe trial brought about by affliction, their abundant joy, and their extreme poverty overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. How? I can testify that according to their ability and even beyond their ability of their own accord, they begged us earnestly for the privilege of sharing in the ministry to the saints.

There's no excuse for them. They're like getting attacked and they're like, we're gonna keep on pressing on. They have a common vision of how Jesus is. Later in verse nine, that this chapter eight second Corinthians, for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though he was rich, for your sake, he became poor So that by his poverty, you might become rich. So, that's the model that this church understands and adopts for themselves and that's why Paul is so joyful and thankful and excited about having these type of gospel partners.

Alright. So, this far, we're three verses in. We've got fifteen minutes left in the service and we've got communion. So, we're just recap. There's joy in recognizing who the church in Philippi is.

They're united. They're partners with one another, friends on mission, and their partners with their mission team, Paul, and other people that they've sent out and they have a common vision that they are united under after the example of Christ and they have worked hard and they've suffered alongside one another, tightening their bond as this band of brothers and sisters who are just sold out for Jesus. So then, back in our text in Philippians, Paul says in verse six, I am sure of this I am confident that he who started a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. The work has begun in Philippi and Paul is encouraging him saying, I am confident. I know for certain by faith and by his own experience, I know this to be true.

That God will carry on the work that he started in you. How many of you are like DIY junkies? Me and Ray. Don't... Oh, there's a few more.

Okay. How many unfinished projects are just there in your house? There's a few, Ray. I mean, if you're a DIY person, there's gonna be a few. Until you've gotta sell the thing and then it's all buttoned up all of a sudden.

But we are not an unfinished forgotten project for God. He promises for certain, he will finish. Not just the work of salvation. Boom. Complete.

Done. Saved. But the sanctification process, this ongoing process in our life. He won't just leave you there. He he promises to finish it at at the day of Christ when Jesus comes back.

It's going to be done. Man, we can take joy in that but I've got a little illustration for you guys. Ray probably wondered what these are doing up here. Part of my workout that I normally do is I like to do farmer's carries with double 70 kettlebells. It's so fun.

But they're really heavy. Like how I could not preach the rest of the sermon like this. No way, right? Like I can't, my grip is stronger, but it's not that strong. Like I couldn't hold these for very long.

Maybe 150 meters. And I'm just saying that so Richard Largie's impressed. But they're they're heavy. Man, I didn't warm up for that either. But good news for us that we are our continuance in the faith is not only dependent on our grip strength.

Right? Our good shepherd promises that he will keep us in his grip. He says, nothing will snatch us out of his hands. So good. Ray says that all the time.

So good. But the assurance of salvation does not lead to laziness, does it? It drives us on to let him do more in us and work in us. And then, okay, verse seven and eight, he has a little bit of a digression. Typical Pauline fashion.

We'll read it. Indeed, it is right for me to think this way about all of you because I have you in my heart and you are all partners with me in grace both in my imprisonment and in in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness. How deeply I miss all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. He says, it's right for me to have this mindset about you.

And he's talking about he's overflowing with the affection of Christ towards the work that's happening in the in the church. He has that deep bond with the church from the from all the different things that he's been through with them. And he's excited about the partnership. He mentions it again, right? Partners of grace.

Even though so in that time, if you're put in prison, doesn't matter why, like, it's kind of, it kind of hurts your relationship a little bit. Like, it's not a great thing to be put in prison but they defended the gospel. They they were probably questioned. You're following a guy that's put in prison for what you're saying and they're like, this is what's true. Jesus crucified is our savior.

They defend and they confirm the gospel. Right? So cool. The band of brothers and sisters does not need to sit back and relax. They press on.

Last week, Carolyn Werseniak invited my family to come to Compass. No, I was going get emotional talking about it. And man, such an awesome work going on. They have this little cute little conference room in the side, and they had decorated it for her birthday that they didn't know. They didn't think she'd make it.

She has. Praise God. She's right here. But these are likely her last days. Does she just sit back on the beach sipping pina coladas?

No. No, she doesn't. She's working to share the gospel with these women in crisis. I'll try not to cry when I pray for the event this week, but goodness, that's so good. Like, that's so encouraging to have a saint that lives out this example like there there's a movie I forgot what it was but the guy's like, I'm going to go out with my boots on and then he crashes an airplane into a hanger.

What movie is that? Okay, great. But he goes out with his boots on like he doesn't just stop. He just keeps going and Paul calls us to do that in the power of Christ. Like, there's no other explanation for our sister in Christ who's able to do this.

Okay, the prayer for perfection in nine to eleven is where we're at now. And this is the part that has worked on me the most this week. It's trying to wrap my mind around this prayer that he prays. He says, and I pray this, that your love will keep on growing in knowledge and every kind of discernment. So that you may approve the things that are superior and maybe pure and blameless in the day of Christ.

Filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God. The ESV says that Lauren read is abounding in love more and more. It says, more and more like the church has love. Like, we know that, right? Clearly, they have the some of this somewhat figured out but he still prays that that they continue to increase in that love more and more but then he couples it and this is where this is where it's like, okay, what are we actually saying?

Love with knowledge and all discernment. It's both the head and the heart together, right? What if you only had one? So, I kind of wanted to flesh it out. If you only had the knowledge and discernment piece or if you only had the love peace or if you're able to have both.

I want us to kind of wake up for those of you who dozed off and think through this with me, okay? The knowledge and if you only have the knowledge and discernment and and not the love, it looks prideful. It looks legalistic, puffed up. It's it's cold like the Pharisees, right? The fair, did the Pharisees have a ton of love?

No. They had a lot of knowledge and they thought they had good discernment but they didn't and they were not of the spirit. They were self righteous in their actions and maybe they had good intentions but they were self delusional. Paul list out in first Corinthians 13, all these different things but if you don't have love, nothing. It's nothing.

But if you only have love, that's not good either. You're blind. You're approving anything, approving anything. You're directionless, shallow, like there's no accountability. What are you holding yourself accountable to that you just love more?

You're lost, you're, and then, you know, kind of on the other side of just lovey, lovey, lovey is like, if you don't know who Jesus is, maybe you love and expect something back or maybe you love out of an obligation or maybe it's out of partiality like, oh man, that dude just pulled up in a jet like I need to get to know him. You know, man, he's like, no, like, you're, that's partiality and weird and like leave the guy alone, right? And they also can have good intentions but they're susceptible to what culture says is right and wrong, right? And and so, it that's a dangerous place to be is to only have the love component but if you have both, Christ like, deep relationship with your heart, soul, mind, strength. There's spiritual component.

We use the word to understand how to best love our brother and sister. Think about if you went to the doctor, you had some pain, you went to the doctor, and the doctor's like, a really great, nice, not great, but nice doctor. And he finds on a scan a tumor he knows for sure is cancerous in you. But he's like, oh, I don't want to hurt Vans Day. I'll just get, hey, just take some aspirin.

You'll be fine. Oh, thanks, man. I feel great now, you know, but I'm dying. Like, tell me the bad news. Or like if I have something in my teeth, and I'm just smiling, and you're like, honey, he has something in his teeth.

But I don't want to make him feel weird about it. Like, tell me about the thing in my teeth, because then I'm going to go to a 100 other people with the same thing in my teeth. Right? It gets worse. Like we we we can tell them also think about this.

Like Jesus warns against finding the speck in your brother's eye with a board in your own. Don't do that either. Like we want to have love. Also with our knowledge, discernment. So, so if we have a brother or sister who has given into some foothold, whatever it is.

Let's I'm going to use an example from back home. It's not in this room. A little foothold like, I'm on, you know, I'm in, I'm eating dinner with you but I'm I'm just always on my phone and I'm like, hang on stuff on here. Whatever. Like, it doesn't seem like a big deal, but it seems like there's an addiction issue with with the phone.

And I'm like, get benefit of the doubt, whatever. He's fine. Don't say anything. That becomes worse in this person's life, and that foothold grows, and that addiction continues on in a nasty, nasty way that turns into predatorial behavior on young people. What if I said something?

When we don't, we're actually loving ourselves more because because we're more worried about our perception of ourselves to that person or our friendship that it might hurt our friendship. But even if it's just a small foothold or just something in your teeth, just love your brother and sister in Christ. And towards the unbeliever, there's this kind of a different category. They're not holding themselves to a standard that we are, right? We can love our unbelieving not brothers and sisters, our friends, and do it in a way that's not approving of the whatever the sin struggles are in their life, right?

We can love them in a way where they know they're loved by us but we don't approve of X, Y, and Z because not because we're smart people but because we live under this, right? Okay. I'm going to try and finish this thing. He's got three reasons of why we love this way or why we love with this with knowledge and discernment and it's so that we can have wisdom so that we can have righteousness, and so that we can glorify God and I'm going to fly through this so we can get to communion. The wisdom component, you can so that you can approve what is excellent or that you can approve things that are superior and that you may be pure and blameless.

There's an inner and an outer component. Pure and blameless. Is he is he telling us? Is Paul saying, hey, you gotta get cleaned up so that you're perfect, looking great for the day that Jesus comes back? Uh-uh.

No, that's not what he's saying. He's saying that we that the goal is to be like Jesus, to have the the same a changed mind, a reformed mind so that we can continue on this journey of being more and more like him all the way until Christ returns, right? The righteousness that he's talking about is is given to us. The fruit that comes from our life is from Jesus. And it's all for the glory and praise of God.

There's more there, but we're gonna wrap up. If I ask you to be an usher this morning for communion, please come forward. We're gonna pass out both the bread and the cup at the same time. Again, okay? If you are a follower of Jesus, we welcome you to the table.

We welcome you into our church to share a meal together. If you are not a follower of Christ, we ask you let this be just for followers of Christ. We're going to pass the elements, hold them in your hand, and wait and we'll all take it together at the end. Alright, they're figuring it out. Alright.

Lord, thank you so much for today. Thank you for your word. I pray that you change us, convict us, show us how we can love with knowledge and discernment more. In Jesus name, amen.