It is so good to be here tonight and I want to thank you for
being here. It's been 7 years.
I think that we discovered that the last time I came and it's
cooler this year, which I'm glad of.
But nonetheless, it's great to see many of you who I've not
seen in many years, some of you I have seen recently, but it's
just good to be back and good to see each one of you and meet new
folks as well. I was talking to Frankie and
talking to Terry. There's been some growth in the
congregation. And when I talked to Frankie
about what we might do during this meeting, he mentioned a
couple of things. And I said, well, I've got this
little series on Philippians. And he said that might be a good
series. Now, I have to give a little bit
of a disclaimer. I'm a little ADD.
So I prepared a bunch of PowerPoint presentations for
this series on Philippians, and I probably won't end up using
any of them, but nonetheless, we are going to use the Bible.
We are going to use the text. And so if you have your New
Testaments with us or with you rather, I would invite you to
follow along each night that we study, each time that we study,
and we're just going to go through in an expository
fashion, the Book of Philippians.
Now, of course, there's many different ways of perhaps
figuring it out or perhaps, you know, analyzing a little little
bit. But nonetheless, I want us just
to look verse by verse. In fact, one of the things I do
at home is I encourage the teachers at home to teach
expositorily. Now, some people think, well,
that's like the old chapter studies.
Well, it's similar. But in reality, I'm never very
concerned about getting through an entire chapter.
You know, back in the day when I was a child, we would grow up.
And if the chapter had 70,000 verses, you covered 70,000
verses. And maybe, you know, by the time
was over with, you were a little worn out.
But you know, in reality, my, my purpose in going through the
Scriptures verse by verse is to just dig out from them things
that are practical and also perhaps at times things that are
technical. And I think the book of
Philippians is a great book for that because Paul is writing to
a congregation that he loves very dearly.
And while this book has a lot of technical things in it, and
we'll talk about that as we go through, there are a lot of
practical things in this book that apply to all of us as
Christians. And so whether you've been in
the faith for years and years, whether you're old in the faith
or maybe you've just been baptized and maybe you're a
young person in the Lord, the book of Philippians talks to us
because it's such a practical book.
You know, just to give you a little background about the
church at Philippi, Paul establishes this congregation
and acts the 16th chapter. This is on his second missionary
journey, and he receives what some people call the Macedonian
call. He is in a vision and this
person says, come over into Macedonia and help us.
And so he and his helpers go over into Macedonia and there
they go to the city of Philippi. Now, the city of Philippi was a
very interesting city because first of all, the church that's
going to be established in Philippi was the first church on
European soil. It was in Macedonia, but it is
what we now think of as Europe. And so it's a very pivotal point
in the ministry of the Apostle Paul.
And so very interesting things happen as he goes there.
In fact, seven years ago, I looked at my old notes.
We talked about the conversion of the Philippian jailer, but
there were some things that happened before that.
Paul goes and it begins to preach in that city and he
encounters this woman who is possessed and she is a fortune
teller and she has handlers that take care of her.
And Paul, of course, rebukes that.
And eventually Paul and Silas, who is with him at the time,
find themselves in a Philippian jail.
They find themselves in a Roman prison, and of course, you
remember the story, how that at midnight, having been beaten and
having been chained to the wall, they are singing songs of praise
to God for God allowing them to go through this difficulty.
There's a great earthquake, and then, of course, the Philippian
jailer rushes out. He's going to kill himself.
But Paul preaches to him and Long story short, he's
converted. Well, there is a little nucleus
there along with Lydia, who had previously met no doubt, that
begins the church in Philippi. Now, the Philippian church
apparently wasn't a rich church, and as many congregations are of
the Lord's church, we're just common everyday people and
oftentimes there is a mixed bag of backgrounds and interests and
so on and so forth. And so Paul, he nurtures this
group and they then become one of his most ardent supporters in
preaching the gospel. In fact, he will say that at
times they were the only ones that supported him in going to
and fro back then. As it is now, it takes money for
an individual, a preacher, to go and preach the gospel to new
territory. And so Paul was always thankful
for the gifts that he would receive from Philippi and their
love for him and their prayers for him.
And so really what you have in the book of Philippians is a
little bit of a thank you letter.
Paul is writing them saying, I love you so much and I want to
encourage you just as you have encouraged me.
Now, the city of Philippi was an interesting city because it was
a Roman city. It was named after Philip the
2nd, and the Roman city was, shall we say, an emulation of
the city of Rome. There were imperial cities
scattered throughout the Roman Empire, and these cities,
Philippi being one of them, sought to be just like Rome.
Now, of course, Rome was the capital.
In fact, you've heard the expression all roads lead to
Rome. And of course, Rome was where
the emperor was. Rome was where the bigwigs were.
Rome was where the pontificate, you know, the status was.
Well, that's what Philippi was on a smaller scale.
And of course the people in Philippi considered themselves
ultra Roman citizens. And that of course will make
Paul's later words when he says, well, your citizenship is in
heaven. That makes that even more
poignant. And of course, in the city like
Philippi, as in Rome, you had the emperor who was believed to
be God. He was believed to be deity.
Now as Rome conquered the ancient world, they didn't
always seem to care about the local gods and goddesses.
Not until someone said, well these are exclusive.
As long as you were willing to take a pinch of incense or some
money or offer some sacrifice to the emperor as a God, they were
quite happy to leave you alone. Well, of course, Jesus was Lord
to the Christians. There is one Lord Paul told the
Ephesians in Ephesians 4. And so they here at Philippi
would not offer that incense. They would not OfferUp the honor
to the emperor as the emperor wanted.
And so they often were set aside to be persecuted.
Now, we don't know a lot about that in Philippi, but we do know
that they were in a city that no doubt was very difficult to live
a Christian life. You know, we are in a world
today where it is difficult to live a Christian life.
It is not easy. In fact, sin and all kinds of
idolatry, maybe not the kind they had, is all around us.
We are being tempted by all kinds of things, from sexuality
to immorality to, you know, greed.
And that is exactly what the Philippians had to go through as
well. And they were, of course,
hanging on. They were trying to be the best
Christians that they could be. So Paul encourages them.
In fact, not only that, but as we'll notice as we go through
our study, he sees them as partners with him in spreading
the gospel. You know, sometimes again, we
think, well, the world's too bad.
The world is so wicked, we will never get converts to Christ.
Paul didn't see it that way. In fact, the darker the night,
the greater the light shone, the greater Jesus could come forth
and help these people out of sin and darkness.
And while indeed our world is getting dark, while indeed our
culture is changing, we are arguably, or perhaps not even
arguably anymore a non Christian society.
There is room for the gospel. I love the song that we just
sang and I love the theme of some of the other songs that we
sang. You know, we are here tonight
because of the gospel. Now, what is the gospel?
I don't want to get off on a rabbit trail too far.
That's easy for me to do. By the way, I guess I'm a little
ADD and I learned this week on a podcast that I can't help it,
that that's the way we are in our brains.
But nonetheless, that's not my excuse anyway.
But nonetheless, what is the gospel?
Well, I think the gospel is a very broad actually a concept.
You know, when Jesus came and John the Baptist came, the
gospel was at that moment, repent, for the Kingdom is at
hand. King Jesus is breaking forth
into the scene. And of course, as Jesus
established or began to establish his Kingdom and his
church, of course the gospel became more about other things
as well. Death, burial, resurrection of
Jesus, coronation, ascension, you know all that.
And so the gospel is a broad spectrum, but at the core, the
gospel is about our relationship with God.
It's about how that man was estranged, how that we were
separated from God, and yet God sent his Son.
John 316 God so loved us, He loved the world that he sent his
only begotten Son. And that's really what the book
of Philippians is all about. It's about this encouragement to
remain faithful in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Now, of course, the letter that Paul writes is an interesting
letter because along with Colossians and Ephesians and
perhaps one or two others, it's known as a prison epistle.
You see, Paul had it rough. He would go and preach and at
times he would end up in prison, such as he had at Philippi.
But it's believed that this letter that we're going to be
looking at this week was written by Paul, probably from Rome.
Now, some people believe Ephesus, but more than likely it
was from Rome. Paul probably in his first Roman
imprisonment. And scholars believe that at the
end of the book of Acts, he's in prison.
But then he's let go and he goes on to preach again.
He is re incarcerated and beheaded.
But probably Paul is in a a Roman prison, perhaps under
house arrest, perhaps whatever. But he is writing these letters
back to Colossae and to Ephesus and to Philippi, encouraging
them in the faith. In fact, when you read Ephesians
and Colossians and Philippians, you're going to find a lot of
similarities because they're all written about the same time,
maybe about 62 or so AD they're all written while Paul is in
prison. Many times he will repeat
himself and, you know, talk about the same themes like any
of us would when we write letters.
And so you can expect when you read those letters or those
prison epistles to find a lot of overlap.
But yet there's also differences.
You know, Ephesus or the Ephesian letter speaks of Christ
and the church. It speaks of the grand scheme of
redemption. It speaks of how Jews and
Gentiles are brought together in the church.
The book of Colossians speaks of the headship of Jesus Christ,
and the book of Philippians speaks of the membership.
That's us. Now, of course, the book of
Philippi or Philippians wasn't written to us directly, but it
was written for us. You see, the New Testament comes
down to us today, and it teaches us how we need to live.
It teaches us how we need to serve God and how we need to
please God as well. Now Paul is in prison, so he's
got a problem. He's in prison, but yet he's
writing. He longs to see them.
He is praying that he'll be released, and he begins to talk
to them about how he even believes that through their
prayers and through their power and through their piety, he's
going to be able to accomplish that.
You know, that's wonderful because if you look at yourself
in the mirror, as we all do, what do we see?
We see mere mortals. We see people who at times, as
we prayed, in our prayer, make many mistakes.
We see ourselves who are at times so far away from God.
We see ourselves who don't really know where to go from
here because we don't have all wisdom and knowledge, you see,
But we're human. And these people here at
Philippi, we're human. And yet Paul has enough
confidence in them to say, listen, you are partnering with
me in the gospel. You know, I know that if you're
a preacher or teacher leader, if you're just a member, you covet
the prayers and you covet the help of those of your brothers
and sisters. You know, when I go overseas or
when Frankie goes overseas or when someone travels, you know,
they covet the prayers of those who are thinking about you.
And you know, a preacher would much rather have a member or a
leader would much rather have the members who are dedicated at
home to the Lord than $1,000,000 in their bank guarantee you,
because that just gives him a strength of purpose and knowing
that they are standing behind him.
Well, that's Philippi as we look at this letter.
Now, when we begin, Paul writes, and I hope we don't get too
tedious in looking at details. You know, one of the problems
with preachers is they'll start looking at a passage and they'll
begin to analyze it. And pretty soon they're off in
left field. And that is especially dangerous
if that preacher has been maybe writing commentaries or
something, because then you get off into all kinds of things.
But we want to stay with the text fairly quickly, move
through it. We won't get very far tonight,
maybe into chapter 1. But let's just see what Paul has
to say to this Philippian church.
First of all, he says Paul and Timothy bond servants of Jesus
Christ. Now Timothy is the helper of
Paul. He's the young protege.
He's the one that Paul trains. Paul calls him his son in the
faith. Paul is the agent apostle and
they have been travelling. Paul takes Timothy with him.
He is learning the rope, so to speak.
But Paul says that he is a bondservant of Jesus Christ.
In the Greek, the idea is Doulos or one who has been slaved to
Christ, one who has given up his own rights to be a servant of
Jesus Christ. You know, in reality, when we go
down into the waters of baptism, we are pledging to give our
lives to Christ. We are pledging to give up our
will to the will of God. You know, Jesus has always been
a person and A and a Savior who wanted will our wills to conform
to him. His will conformed to the Father
in the garden. He would say things like Father,
let this cup of suffering pass from me, but nevertheless, not
my will, but thine will be done. Paul had given himself hook,
line, seeker, whatever analogy you want to use to God, so much
so that he could say, listen, I would rather die now and go be
with the Lord, but it's helpful for me to stay and to help you.
Now that is truly an altruistic statement Paul makes, but it's
not one of despair. Paul wants to go be with the
Lord because he knows that's better.
And then he says this. He says to all of the Saints in
Christ Jesus who are in Philippi with the bishops and deacons.
Let me camp out that on that just a little bit.
He says to all the Saints. Now you notice Paul doesn't say
to all the church members. Now you could have said that
these folks at Philippi were members of the Lord's church,
but he says no to all of the Saints.
Now why did he say that? Well, first of all, I think he's
telling them, listen, you hold a very high esteem position in the
Lord's body. You know, if you're a member of
the Lord's church, if you've been baptized for the ministry
of sins, you're certainly part of the Kingdom, you're part of
the Lord's church, but you're a St.
Now, you know, when you compare what the world today, even the
religious world, thinks of as a St. versus what the scriptures
talk about as being a St. you'll see two very distinct, different
pictures. Now, in the religious world, a
St. first of all, is someone who is usually dead, someone who has
gone on. Maybe they have been beatified,
maybe they have been elevated, but some organization has said
this individual has been such a stellar person that we're going
to knight him, so to speak, as a St.
And of course, a lot of different groups have different
rigmaroles they go through to get that job done.
But now in the New Testament, if you're a St. you're a living
person. You are a living sacrifice, as
Paul talks about in Romans 12/1 through 4.
You are someone who is serving God in a holy way.
It's about holiness. Now, the idea of being a St. is
the idea of being sanctified. We use that term sometimes, and
in the Bible they used it a lot. In fact, when you go back to the
Old Testament, you find that often times things were
sanctified that just simply meant they were set apart for a
special service. For example, in the Tabernacle,
in the temple of the Old Testament, you have various
instruments, you had tables, you had, you know, cups and platters
and different things. And in and of themselves those
items were just common, everyday, ordinary items.
But when they had been sprinkled with the blood, when they had
been set apart for holy service, they became extremely important
and they became special. They became sanctified.
They became set aside for a very special purpose in the service
of God. When you were baptized, When I
was baptized, we were set aside. We were sanctified, we were set
apart to serve God. And God looks at us not just as
average Joes, although he loves average Joes, but he looks at
those of us who have espoused his Son Jesus and really married
the Lord, if you will, as being sanctified.
Now when we think of being sanctified, we also think of
purity, and that is also a part of it.
You know, in those Old Testament dishes and things that they had,
they would have washings and have ceremonies to, to cleanse
them. Well, of course we have that
obligation today in our lives to live holy lives, to live clean
lives, to live, if we can, as sinless as possible.
But a St. is not perfect. Sanctification is not quite the
same as perfection. You know, anything that is
human, anything that touches humanity is going to be
imperfect to some degree, but it can still be set apart for the
Lord. And maybe some of you have come
into the Lord. Maybe your past is, you know,
dark, or maybe it's scarred with all kinds of sins and problems,
and maybe you're still struggling to overcome some of
those sins. Now that's OK.
It's not OK that we have sin, but it's OK that we struggle
against those. I would much rather have someone
come to me and say I am struggling with this sin, help
me overcome this sin, tell me what the scriptures say about
the sin, then just ignore it and live with it and never address
it. You see, sanctification is not a
one time deal. It's not where we go down into
the waters of baptism. We come up perfect and we stay
perfect all of our lives. No, we still live in a fallen
world and we still deal with a fallen fleshly nature.
And so then we have to constantly work on being
sanctified. So Paul calls them Saints.
He doesn't call them perfect people.
He says Saints now very quickly take a little hiatus here and
look at the next little statement, he says to the
bishops and deacons who are in Philippi.
You know, apparently, by this time, the Church of Philippi had
matured. Now, just recently, Brother
Frankie came over and helped us at 85th and Euclid in Kansas
City to ordain elders and or, or, or bishops, or shall we say,
you know, the names of, of the shepherds, if you will, of those
of that congregation. And of course that congregation
has been there for years. And finally we have our first
elders or our first bishops, if you will.
It's all the same same job. It's just different words in the
Greek. But nonetheless, Frankie came
and helped us do that. Well, here there are bishops and
deacons, servants of the Church at Philippi.
So apparently the Church at Philippi, though it had started
with perhaps Lydia and the Philippian jailer, had by this
time grown to have real solid leadership.
And by the way, you know, solid leadership is very important.
Now, a congregation can exist quite scripturally without
elders per SE, but it has to have leadership.
In fact, in Acts chapter 13, I think it is you there have
apostles and teachers and prophets.
You don't have elders mentioned, but they're a strong
congregation that is sending out preachers to preach the Word.
So a congregation without elders can certainly do the Lord's
work, but we strive for that greater level of leadership
maturity. And sometimes it takes many
years, especially in a transient society like we live in.
But Philippi had the pleasure of enjoying that.
You know, I entitled the, the study initially was, oh, what
grace? And of course, when you think
about grace, you think about God's unmerited favor, and
that's certainly part of it. But I also think Philippi was a
Church of graciousness, partly because of their leadership.
They had people who were setting the example, no doubt for them.
And then he says in verse 2, grace to you and peace from our
from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is a very common greedy in Paul's epistles.
In fact, I think all but Galatians, you'll find this
common grace and peace wish and of course grace God's a merit of
favor, peace coming from a proper relationship with God.
But then you notice what he says in verse three.
He says, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you.
From the very moment these folks have been baptized and the
church had been established, I have no doubt that Paul thought
of them almost daily. Here was a church that he had a
very close relationship with. They were close to his heart.
He thought about them. He prayed for them.
He always remember them when he went to the Lord in prayer.
You know, that is so touching really, because sometimes we'll
be in an assembly maybe and we're busy and we leave and we
don't think about our brothers and sisters maybe all week.
Or maybe we don't think about people that maybe we should have
thought about because they had special needs.
You know, Paul must have just labored in prayer.
In fact, over in First Corinthians, the Second
Corinthians Chapter 11, he talks about all the things that he
went through and then he says and the care of the churches I
deal with on a daily basis. And you got to know that Paul
was praying over and over. He says, I remember you always,
verse 4 in every prayer of mine, making requests for you all with
joy. He is thankful for them.
He is thankful for that relationship.
He is thankful for their dedication, not just to him as a
person, but to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Why? Because it is only the gospel
that can save an individual. I can't save you.
No one else can save you, but Jesus can.
The gospel can, His blood can. And Paul understood that.
But notice what he says. He says, I pray for you, making
request with joy for you, for your fellowship in the gospel
from the first day until now. Now this is interesting to me
because we know from other passages that Philippi wasn't
necessarily a rich church. And obviously when it first
began, it wasn't big, but from that great inception, I suppose
when the Philippian jailer came out of the water, there was
already this what can we do for the Lord attitude.
You know, that's hard to maintain, that's hard to keep up
because we get discouraged. I tell you, you go be with the
work, you know, that maybe gone on for 50-60 years and you'll
see it decline. I mean, just give you a personal
example. The congregation where I am now
is fairly small, smaller than you all are here.
And, you know, at one point we were sitting out chairs and, you
know, the community was really behind us.
And and then gradually people moved and passed away and all.
And it is hard to keep that fire going.
It's hard to keep that zeal going.
And I think Paul saw in Philippi a group of people who were
constantly saying, Paul, what can we do to help you out?
This idea of fellowship is the Greek word Koinonia.
It's used of Paul extending the right hand of fellowship to
other men and women. It is also used of the Lord's
Supper. It is used of the collection.
In other words, it's a joint participation.
And so Paul viewed the Church of Philippi as his partners.
He wasn't in competition with them.
He wasn't trying to convert people so he could say, hey,
look what I did. No, the glory obviously
ultimately went to the Lord, but it was shared among every single
believer in the Church of Philippi.
Paul says, listen, that fellowship in the gospel from
the first day to now, you know, whenever this congregation
supports a preacher or supports one of their own to go to the
Philippines or whatever, you are in fellowship in more ways than
one with that individual. You are helping him, you are
sending him, you are helping spread the news.
You see, no one person could ever do it.
Even Jesus chose me to help him. And so when we have
congregations behind us as preachers or leaders who we know
that while we're not perfect, they have our back, it gives us
confidence, it helps us, it encourages us.
And we are so glad that despite both of our imperfections, they
are there for us. And then Paul goes on to verse
6. And he says, being confident of
this very thing, that he who has begun a good work in you will
complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.
Now this day of Jesus Christ has been variously interpreted,
interpreted, probably the second coming, probably the end of
time. But nonetheless, he's saying the
Lord is going to continue to work in you.
The Lord is not done with you yet.
You know, that's a beautiful thought because sometimes
literally I get up in the mirror, I, I mean, I, I mean
this literally. And I think you are a worthless
something. I don't know what, you're just
worthless and you don't feel very good today and you don't
have a lot to offer the Lord. And then I think, no, the Lord
is not done with me yet. You know, we use that phrase.
He's a work in progress. Well, I guarantee you every one
of us is a work in progress and some are moving a little faster
than others. Some of us are a little bit
remedial, but nonetheless, the Lord is still using US.
You know, I love it when I see especially older folks because
I'm kind of one of them now. You know, I was out in
Kennewick, WA a couple years ago and I just came back just
really, really thrilled because you have seniors converting
seniors out there. You know, one of the couples out
there had met some other seniors at the mailbox and they began to
walk together and talk together. And then right after I left out
there, they were baptized. And I thought, man, this is
seniors converting seniors. You know, you never are too old
to be in fellowship with the job or the the work of the church.
You know, again, the Lord is still working in US and I
believe that now sometimes He works on us as far as our
character and our personage, because, you know, we got a lot
of rough edges sometimes. You know, my wife tells me, she
says, well, you know, your tongue is is your curse because
maybe you can speak, but then man, it's sharp.
And that's true. I thought my mind was sharp, but
apparently it's my tongue. But nonetheless, you know, she
cautions me about that. Well, I don't just tell her,
well, I'm a work in progress that that doesn't float with
her. But nonetheless, we are, we are
a work in progress. And so don't ever become
discouraged and think because I failed before, I can't succeed.
Don't ever think that because everyone fails, everyone sins,
everyone has problems. And yet God is not finished with
us. And Paul very, very, very
poignantly says that God is going to complete the work that
he has started in US. You know, the beautiful thing
about God is his Providence. I don't know what God has in my
life or in store for my life. I don't know.
I don't know if I'll make it home after this meeting.
I don't know if I'll go to Africa and be killed by, you
know, a lion. I don't know.
But, you know, God knows. But God uses us.
And So what do we do? We place our faith in the
Providence of God and say, God use me.
And I can guarantee you that it when you make yourself
available, God will use you. And it may not be in the way you
want to be used. It may be in something that you
think I'm a little too good for that.
No, you're not too good for that.
If that's where God puts you, then that's what's going to
happen. Now I don't know how all that
happens sometimes, but haven't you had circumstances where you
thought, man, somebody ought to do something about, oh, wait,
maybe it's me that ought to do something about this.
You see, God is using US and he will use us if we make ourselves
open to him. So then he says in verse 7, just
as it is, right, And we'll start summing up here, just as it is
right for me to think this of you all, in other words, this,
this exuberance, this happiness, this joy I feel for you.
It's, it's, it's justified, He says, just as it is, right,
Because I have you in my heart. You see, Paul, and he does this
by the way, with Philemon when he's writing about Onasemus, he
says Onasemus is my heart. That's runaway slaves, remember.
But Paul, he, he had such a dear love for his fellow Christians,
and I think others too, otherwise he wouldn't have
preached the gospel. But he had such a dear love for
his Christian brothers and sisters that they were living in
his heart That that that's incredible.
Because you see, I tend to categorize and compartmentalize
my heart. The good Christians, the guys I
like, the people I like, they're going to live here, the others
over here. No, Paul says, I love you.
You're in my heart. And he says in as much as both
in my chains. In other words, it is
imprisonment. And in the defense and
confirmation of the Gospels, you all are, are partakers with me
of grace going to stop there. But what's Paul saying?
He says, he says, listen, you all are in my heart.
You are with me. Whether I'm going through
prison, whether I'm being, you know, baptizing someone, whether
things are going well or going bad, you are in, you are with
me. We are partners.
We are, we're together now, you know, when a congregation feels
that way about each other. And that's one of the reasons
why we have activities we do together and we worship together
and we, you know, keep tabs on each other.
It's not to be, you know, intrusive.
It's because we love one another.
Or when a preacher, you know, goes, like I said, overseas and
he knows his congregation is praying for him.
It, it, it's, it's something that cannot be described because
you know that others servants of the Lord with as many flaws as
you have, and yet Saints are remembering you and
participating with you in the work of grace.
And so Paul will use that then to go on and encourage them that
their love and their knowledge and their wisdom will abound
more and more to the greater glory of the Lord.
So that's part of the 1st chapter.
Paul will get into some other things that we'll notice
tomorrow night. But nonetheless, as we go
through this book, just just follow the follow the train of
thought. Paul is so thankful and he's so
encouraging to them, although he will point out some things they
need to hear later on. And that's the way it is.
The gospel is the most precious thing that God has entrusted to
us. His preciousness is our life
itself. And Paul will talk about that
when he says, listen, you know, there's nothing more important
than serving Christ. Well, you're here tonight and
you're not a Christian. There's some very simple steps
that place us into the body of Christ, obeying the gospel,
hearing the word of God first of all, and align that to to
resonate in our hearts. It's called faith.
We believe it, and then we change our mind.
We turn from our previous life, we repent of our sins, and then
we're willing to confess Jesus as the Son of God.
We're willing to confess his lordship, if you will.
And then, of course, we are baptized.
We have our his blood washing away our sins in the waters of
baptism. It's quite simple, but yet it's
so incredibly profound. So not if we can assist you in
that or anything else in your spiritual walk, we'd be happy to
do that. I'll be standing, obviously.