To Live is Christ

Well, happy Sabbath! And thank you to the choir for that inspiring piece of music, a message in itself about our need and where we stand before God and where we stand without God. I want to again echo a warm welcome to our guests and visitors here who might be here just visiting for the memorial later today. Welcome to you, and hello to those who are joining us on our live webcast. We're sorry you can't make it here, but I see a lot of lovely smiling faces who say a big hello to you as well. You know, as we gather for Sabbath services, we cannot help but consider the memorial service. It was such a part of our congregation for so many years. And it's with this memorial in mind that I'd like to talk today about a simple yet profound insight that the Apostle Paul shared in Philippians 1. And if you could turn over there, Philippians 1 and verse 21. A very simple and yet profound statement, grammatically, maybe a little bit hard to understand, and we'll look at it in different ways to understand it. It really came to him this way as he wrote it originally. Philippians 1 verse 21. A very interesting way of describing it. He says, for me, Philippians 1 verse 21, to live is Christ, and to die is gain.

To live is Christ, and to die is gain. And I don't think there could be any more clear statement about the purpose and meaning of life than what Paul has shared right here. He literally sort of constructs this in this sort of grammatical form of to live is Christ.

It is his, it was, and it is our mission, our purpose, our goal. It was his singular determination to focus on imitating and preaching the being and message of Jesus the Messiah.

J.B. Phillips translates this passage as, for me, excuse me, for living to me means simply Christ. For living to me means simply Christ, and if I should die, I should merely gain more of him.

In the French Bible that I have, it says Christ, et m'avie. Christ is my life. To live is Christ.

As I've shared with you before, one of the most precious commodities within the 21st century that we now experience is our undivided attention.

Monotasking is the correct, long-term way to accomplish things, and yet we get so distracted with all sorts of multitasking and so forth. And if there ever was a monotasking statement, this is it. Christ is my life. That's the focus. That's the monotask that we have before us.

Paul wrote in Romans 8, verse 38, you can jot it down. I'll just quote it for you. He says, That's how God looks at us. And Paul, I think in this statement, reciprocates that back and says, Look, I want nothing to separate me from you. I want nothing to come between our relationship and what it means to be together.

And I see in this letter to the Church of Philippi, Paul responding in this way, just saying nothing should separate me from my Creator.

How do we understand this statement across the centuries to our time? How do we understand the statement in life of jobs and families and enjoying hobbies and having interests and so forth?

Are we to become an order of monks that would be barred from talking about car repairs and family vacations? How do we think about this statement and really apply it and what it means?

How do we imitate this behavior and honor our commitment to our maid and spending time with our kids and putting in an honest day's work on the job?

How do we live this? How does this really fall to us?

And just as significantly as we are here later today to honor the memory of Vern and Newby, how do we work through our emotions and our feelings for the second part of this statement that says, to die is gain.

How do we face the reality that maybe we have more years behind us than we have ahead of us? And how do we feel comfortable with that in this light?

The title of today's message is, To Live is Christ, taken from the New King James Version in Philippians 1, verse 21.

So let's stay here in Philippians and let's see if we can answer some of these questions from Paul's writing himself.

Let's continue in verse 22. Philippians 1, verse 22, he says, And so, to live means to bear fruit. So what does it mean to live is Christ? It means to bear fruit. It means to have something to show from your labor.

And he expands on this as he continues.

So living or remaining to live is Christ means that we support our brothers and their children.

And he says, in verse 22, he says, So living or remaining to live is Christ means that we support our brothers and their walk of faith, in their progress and their joy of faith.

Think about progress of faith. Now, we progress, right? We advance. We move forward. There is progress.

But I think this verse is interesting because I think Paul is being quite kind when he says progress of faith because sometimes there isn't progress of faith. Sometimes there is a regression. Sometimes we move forward and sometimes we move back. Sometimes it's two steps forward and one step back. And sometimes, you know, it's two steps back and one step forward and you feel like you're not making any progress.

That's what it meant to him to live is Christ. It meant to support his brothers and sisters in the faith as they made progress.

And as we think about it for ourselves, as we make progress or we are supporting others as they make progress.

Let's just turn a page over to chapter four and let's see a practical way of how progress is made.

Chapter four, verse two, a very specific request that Paul had, most likely of his companion, Luke, he says, I implore Eudia and I implore Sintech to be of the same mind and the Lord. And I urge you also, again, most likely, Luke, true companion, help these women who labored with me in the gospel with Clement also.

And the rest of my fellow workers whose names are written in the book of life.

The nature of this dispute was not disclosed. We don't know who these women are really other than what we have their names here.

Perhaps they were leaders within the congregation. Perhaps they were just members of the congregation. Whatever it was, he was imploring his companion in the faith to ask them to be of one mind, to ask them to be on the same page, to make progress, to move forward. And that same mind, it was described in chapter two, verse five, that mind of Christ, that humble mind that he describes, that spirit of humility, that lowliness of mind. That's progress in the faith.

Now we may not have the role of the Apostle Paul to write letters, although I encourage you to write letters, to write cards. That is a beautiful thing we can do to encourage our brethren. My wife read to me a message that she received from somebody regarding a sermon that I had given, and how encouraging that was to her. And that was very encouraging to me to hear those words. And so it is encouraging to receive a few words from time to time, either in a handwritten letter or even in a private message. But when's the last time you disagreed with your brother in the church? But joyfully went along with what they suggested anyway, and then forgot all about it because you don't keep a record of those things anyway.

That's progress. We may not write letters. That may not be how we live in Christ, but we live in Christ when we make progress when we're of the same mind, one with another. Let's go back to chapter 1, verse 15. We'll see this brought out even more because not only did Paul admonish two women in the congregation to be on the same page and to have the same mind and to recognize whatever differences they had, none of those differences was as great as having the mind of Christ in them that would bring them together in unity. So also on a larger scale in verse 15, he also mentions this in terms of how Christ is preached. He said, Some indeed preach Christ even from envy and strife, and some also from goodwill. The former preached Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my chains. But the latter out of love, knowing that I'm appointed for the defense of the gospel. And he says, What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached, and in this I rejoice, yes, and will rejoice. Paul isn't worried about who's in charge, who's got the inside track on this preaching or that preaching, who gets the credit, and certainly whether the attitude was right or not. He's not worried about that. He just rejoiced that Christ was preached. And that's progress on a group level, on a community level. I think it's clear from Paul's other writings that Paul is a champion of truth. We know that from the book of Galatians. He says how easily you return to another gospel. He's not talking about heresy here.

He's talking about truth being preached, but not necessarily from the right attitude or right approach. And that's not that he's going to tolerate the sin, but maybe he understands that in that progress, in that joy of faith, maybe those people aren't really where they're supposed to be at that moment. But eventually God will work with them and they'll get to where they need to be. And he's not going to intervene and try and short circuit that process because that's between them and their maker.

You know, when I've received visit requests in French-speaking countries where the United Church of God doesn't have any members or the ability to support people, I turn those visit requests over to another Church of God group that maybe has the ability to support that. That's how we support one another. One of our pastors in Africa had hosted a minister from another Church of God group so that the other minister would have a place to stay as he worked and visited people for the purpose of establishing a local congregation of their group. You know, that's how we support one another because that's how Christ is preached. Honestly, I haven't seen the favor returned, but I hope it will be. I hope it will be. Not because I want to receive something, but I hope that that example can spread. I don't think Paul did either. I don't think he was worried. He says the latter, out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the Gospel, but the other was supposed to add affliction to his chains. They literally were preaching Christ with the view that maybe this would somehow cause him some harm, but he wasn't worried about that. He wasn't worried about his pride.

You know, the United Church of God, from its beginning nearly 25 years ago, stated clearly that it believes it is part of the spiritual body of Christ. And we believe that we are not the only organization where God is working. Who are we to say where God is working? Who are we to say how Christ will be preached? But I know this, that we will make progress in the faith when we let go of our personal agendas. Now, notice this theme of living in Christ in Philippians 3. So now we've seen it on an individual level. We've seen it on a community level. And now let's look at it from another angle here in chapter 3, verse 7.

He says, Now, what things is he talking about were lost that he would have considered gain? Well, all the things described earlier in chapter in verse 5. Let's read it in verse 5.

He says, Paul had quite a resume. Paul had a lot to brag about. Paul had done things and accomplished things in his life, which were quite remarkable. These were his credentials. He was a man of letters. He was trained, classically trained. This was a time when many people didn't even know how to read, and he was classically trained. He was a man of righteous conduct, as he described. He could identify his ethnic lineage. Some people say, oh, I'm related to so-and-so. I'm related to the Queen of England, or I'm related to this person or that person.

He had lineage back to the tribe of Benjamin. His resume was impeccable. How did he consider his credentials when it came to live his Christ? He considered them lost. Nothing. Worthless. Of no value. Of no meaning. Now, some of us here have professional credentials.

Some of you here are teachers. You have a credential to teach in the state of California. Without that credential, you cannot teach. I'm a certified public accountant. I am licensed to practice that in the state of Washington and by reciprocal arrangements in all 50 states. Some of you might be nurses. You can't just walk into a hospital and start helping people.

You have a credential. Those credentials say something about your competence in that area. What I find interesting is that I've noticed about pretty much everybody, whether we have an actual credential or not, we carry these other created credentials with us.

It's kind of who we are. It's our self-image. It's how we define ourselves. And that's kind of the credential that we carry with us. There's sort of mental, emotional, physical attributes about ourselves that give us some sense of who we are. And they might be physical competencies. We might have a musical talent. They might be some life experience that we've had. Perhaps we've cared for somebody who is not well for a long time. And we sort of have a great deal of empathy and ability to manage those difficult circumstances.

Perhaps we've served locally here in the congregation in some capacity for many years. And that's something that we know how to do. Whatever it is, what I've noticed sometimes is that when somebody gets into our wheelhouse, they sort of start walking on our credential. Don't you know who I am? I have a credential in this. I know how to take care of this. And when we're not respected for our credential, we're not respected for what we have to offer, we can get our feathers ruffled.

And Paul certainly could have gotten his feathers ruffled. He was a Pharisee. He was righteous. He was this. He was that. And he said, no, I'm not going to worry about the fact that they're preaching Christ to try to sort of add to my affliction. That doesn't bother me. I mean, who was more qualified than Paul to preach the gospel? He was an amazingly qualified individual. He didn't get his feathers ruffled. And he says in verse 7, But what things were gained to me, these I have counted lost for Christ. See, no credential that we might carry around with us can compare to the credential that is Christ and what He gives us, what He provides to us.

We take all those other things and we throw them away. At least we should. That's what the example of Paul is here. And so we get to then verse 8, It really doesn't matter, right, if somebody disrespects our credential.

Hey, don't you know I know how to do this? Don't you know I'm good at this? Don't you know I've had a lot of years? You know, all these things come out in time. Paul said he counted all those things lost. To live as Christ means letting go of our created credentials. And they might be real credentials. In this case, you know, Paul was a Pharisee, you know? Maybe you're a nurse and nobody asked you to help.

Maybe you're a teacher and nobody asked your expertise and how you're going to teach a subject. Maybe you're an accountant and, you know, they're like they got other people to do it. Those things eventually come out and those things do get worked out. But in the meantime, we can have our feathers ruffled.

We can feel a little bit hurt. Nobody asked us. Nobody asked us to help. You know, I thought I could help in this way and nobody respects or understands me. And when we do, when we let go of those credentials and we count all loss for Jesus Christ, we just get a little bit closer to God and we get a lot closer to being a better neighbor.

We get a lot closer to being a kinder and gentler person with our brethren, whether here in the church, in our families, because all those personal agendas have gone out the door. We have nothing to prove. There's no, no chip there, right? Sometimes we've got that chip on our shoulder, right? Oh, you know, nobody... nah, it's gone. What does it say? My burden is easy, my yoke is easy, my burden is light. We don't have to worry about our personal agendas or, you know, being the smartest person in the room or being the dumbest person in the room, right?

Sometimes, you know, I'm the dumbest person in this room. I feel terrible. Or I'm the smartest person in this room. Why don't people listen to me? Both ways can be a problem. And we don't have to worry about any of those things. When we think about what Paul said, indeed, I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish that I may gain Christ.

When we get this, that's when we begin to listen to advice. That's when we begin to take steps to change because all those agendas and credentials and things that define who we are, they don't really matter anymore. What matters is understanding where God wants us to be, where Jesus Christ wants us to be. And in this case for Paul, Paul was in prison. He was awaiting trial. He was in Rome. He was wondering what was next, what was going to be next for him.

And so we get then to verse 9, and he says that he might be found in him. Not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith. So it's not his righteousness. It's not his credential. It's not his background. It's Christ's righteousness. It's the faith that comes through Jesus Christ.

And this is why legalism is so destructive to a church because once you start getting into legalism, then you start getting into situations where I've been here 30 years and I've been this and I've been that and this is my rank and this is my role. And you start defining yourself that way. It's not a contest to see who can work hard enough or do enough to measure up and so forth.

And if I just only do these five things, I'm going to make it into... That's not how we think about it because that's all about us. And that's a lot of pressure. That's an enormous amount of pressure. And some people just walk around thinking, I'm not going to make it in the kingdom. I'm not going to make it.

Well, you know, yes, if you're sinning, if you are not following God's law, if you're not allowing God's grace to cover you, if you're not allowing Jesus Christ's sacrifice to be there for you, then yes, maybe that is going to be a problem. But it's not because you didn't do this, that, or the other thing. That's what we do. We keep God's law because that's how God wants to be loved. That's his love language.

When we accept Christ's sacrifice and we put our hand to the plow, we don't look back and we repent of our past behavior and we're baptized and we receive God's Holy Spirit, Christ's blood washes us clean and allows us to be reconciled to him and to be ultimately in his kingdom. And then we walk in a manner, becoming of that sacrifice, which means we leave our credentials behind and we carry only one thing forward. And that's what we see in verse 10.

There's a lot in here, so let's just unpack this for a moment. That we may know Christ. That's the first thing he says. That we may know him.

Do we forgive as Christ forgave? Or do we remain angry towards those who have hurt us intentionally or not? Do we have compassion on those who've hurt us as Christ had compassion on those who hurt him? Do we walk an extra mile for someone who will spitefully use us and persecute us? Do we love one another as a sign of being his disciples?

Can we be spotted in a grocery store or in a public place for being a Christian because of the way we're acting? Because of what we're saying? Because of how we're treating our fellow family members or people around us? Do we show tender mercy towards others? That's what it means to know him. Because we know him and that's how we want to be. I want to be like that person. Maybe when you were a kid there was somebody who you really looked up to, some sort of sports figure, or maybe some actor, or some public figure. You looked up, man, wow, he's just so good at that. I just want to be like that. That's what we do. We look to Christ like, oh, if we could just forgive, if we could just love, if we could just have mercy, if we could just have ourselves just sort of, you know, add a peace that surpasses understanding. That's what it means to know Christ. And then he says the power of his resurrection, the power of his resurrection. You know, when we confront death, as I know, Verna Newby confronted death just a few months ago, then we can know the power of his resurrection. You know, Verna called me to say goodbye. She had come to a point in her life where she realized that she didn't have to just keep fighting every day. She didn't have to keep doing that. It's not like she gave up. She had had a long road. She came to a point in her life where she realized the race had been run. What had been accomplished had been accomplished. Yes, she would have loved to have stayed around longer and seen her grandchildren grow up. She didn't want to not have that, but she realized the time had come. The time had come and she could look death in the face and say, I've run the race. I know the power of his resurrection. That is a very powerful place to be.

We're not fearing death. When Paul says to gain, to gain him, death is gain. What does that mean? It doesn't mean suicide. It doesn't mean giving up. It actually means, hey, I'm okay with that. I'm comfortable with the fact that I don't have much longer left. And as long as I'm here, I'm going to keep producing fruit. As long as I'm here, I'm going to keep being what God wants me to be. Do we fear death? Do we fear not getting everything out of life that we wanted to get?

I believe Verna was led to understand that her journey in life had come to a point where her race was complete and she could let go and she could fall into God's loving arms.

That's where Paul says he wants to be. That's what he's describing in this letter. That's what it means to live is Christ. Christ is my life. It's that peace. It's that comfort to fall into God's harms when the time comes. And then he says, the fellowship of his sufferings. The fellowship of his sufferings. Now, many sufferings we endure, we bring on ourselves, unfortunately. Our bad decisions, our pride, all these types of things. A lot of times we bring sufferings on ourselves through our misguided judgment. That's not what Paul is talking about here. What Paul is talking about here is a fellowship of suffering that Christ endured, that he endured, and that all those who follow Christ will inevitably endure. Paul is speaking here of standing up and being counted for what he believed in, for what he believed, for the truth. Not as a religious fanatic, but as a sane, rational individual who counted the cost and who was grounded in what this book says. Paul, as he wrote in the book of Philippians, as I said, he was in prison in Rome. He was awaiting his outcome. Was he going to be tried? Was he going to remain in prison indefinitely and die there? Was he going to be let go? Was he going to be sentenced? What was going to happen to him? Would he live or would he die? What kind of punishment would he suffer? He didn't know. We are to live in, but not of, this world. And that means we better be hardworking. We better be taking care of our families. We're having skills that allow us to support the church and our communities with our hands, with our wallets, or with our creativity, whatever it might be. But it also means that sometimes we're going to be ridiculed. We're going to be put down for what we believe. And we don't have to hide from it. We don't have to worry about it.

What I found is, interestingly, true professionals, whether they're atheists or Buddhists, true professionals, if you're working with true professionals, they're not going to ridicule you. There's a certain standard of, okay, I mean, I'd agree with this man. There used to be a line that would line up in front of my office on a Friday afternoon, because they knew I was going to leave. They wanted to talk to me before I left. Some guys would say, you're going to turn into a pumpkin soon, I better talk to you. They kind of joke with me about that. They're not there to ridicule me. They're there to recognize that this was something that was important to me, and they respect that, and they can move on. But you know, there's not a lot of those people out there, unfortunately. Unfortunately, there's those true professionals we don't always work with 100% of the time. We work with people who are not truly courteous in that way, and they're going to mock you. They're going to put you down for your beliefs. They're going to make fun of you. And sometimes there could be suffering. When we swim against the current, when we stand up for what we believe, yeah, we're going to be, from time to time, suffer, just as Jesus Christ suffered. But when this is done, this is what we end with in verse 11. He says, If by any means, after understanding, knowing Him, the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His suffering, being conformed to His death, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead, from the resurrection from the dead, this is His goal. This is the prize. You know, Paul in one breath says that he seeks righteousness through Christ, which is from God by faith. And then almost in the next breath, he says he wants to attain it. Because it is something to be attained. It's something to strive for. There should be no doubt that the resurrection is to be attained. We have to stand fast. We have to stand firm. We have to resist the adversary. We have to run the race that is set before us. And sometimes we're tired. Sometimes we don't want to keep running. We don't want to come back to church. We don't want to pick up the phone and call somebody and ask for help. We don't want to listen to advice. We don't want to do what we know we have to do because it's exhausting. And we don't know why it's exhausting. And we can't see beyond that. But we just put one foot in front of the other. And we just keep moving.

We just keep moving because we want to attain to it. Because we know that's what we have to do. Living by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Casting aside every weight of our credential.

The weight of our expectations of life. The weight of learning patterns of thinking. And of our own demandingness. We cast aside all of that.

And we bring every thought into captivity. To live is Christ. To live is Christ. And to die is gain.

Let's live to serve our brothers and sisters in the church as we each progress and progress in the faith. Let's live to serve our family members. Let's live to show and express agape love one towards another.

Let us learn to have joy no matter the trial. No matter the hardship. Let us each run the race to win. To win that we may obtain the resurrection from the dead.