Philippians - The Mindset That Lasts

We're into week three of our series in Philippians, and we've called this series Living for what Lasts. If you missed any of the last couple of weeks, you can catch up online. But we've seen over the last few weeks that as he starts this letter, Paul has encouraged the Church of Philippi by reminding them of their deep partnership in the Gospel. This letter is a letter, this book is a letter. And so Paul writes to people that he knows, that he loves, that he cares for deeply.

This is a place where Paul had spent time ministering to, a place of people that he had personally led to know Christ. And so then we have him now in Rome. We've heard over the last few weeks that he's there under house arrest. And Paul writes this letter to them and is overflowing with gratefulness, with gratitude for their faithfulness. We've seen in the last couple of weeks that the Church of Philippi has sent Paul a financial gift.

They've got together their resources and they've sent them to him as an encouragement to him. And he is overflowing with gratefulness for their generosity. And so out of that comes this letter. But we see that Paul doesn't just encourage them, he doesn't just thank them, he actually does more than that. And Pastor James led us through last week as Paul urges them to live lives that are worthy of the Gospel.

And he starts by encouraging them that the focus of their life, sorry, focus of his life and his priority above everything else has been to live for Christ. We've seen that he says that for me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. That actually the most important thing I can do in my life is to live for Christ. And he wants them to know that their partnership, the way that they've been so generous to him in the Gospel, has enabled the work of ministry that he's engaging in, even under house arrest. And so we've reached the last four verses of chapter one, so you can turn there if you have your Bibles.

In a few moments, the words will come up on the screen. But I want to remind you of something important. It's a really simple thing. It's not particularly profound, but I want to remind you of the fact that this is a letter. And by the very nature of a letter, while we're breaking it into parts for a six week series, just so that our services don't go for, you know, six or seven hours, it's an important reminder for us that the Philippians received this as one message.

This was one Message. It's one letter. The things that we see, the chapters and the verses and the little headings that are in our text, they came much later. And so, as Epaphrodites returns from Rome with this scroll in his hand, the church would have gathered together, the believers would have got together, and. And there would have been a great sense of excitement because the great apostle Paul, their brother in Christ, the one that they loved dearly, has written them a letter.

And they didn't read it in. You know, this week we're gonna look at these seven verses and come back next week and we'll read the rest. They would have sat there together and they would have read in its entirety. They would have been eager to hear every single word. And so as we break this up, like we break it up into chunks so that we can work through it, they wouldn't have done that.

And so we need to make sure that when we come to it, that we don't treat each section or each idea as a standalone thought, but rather that we see each idea and thought as this kind of collective, as Paul builds from one idea to the next as he writes across the course of this letter. And so that's why today we're actually in verses that straddle the end of chapter one and the start of chapter two. Because it's one section, it's actually beneficial for us, I believe, to look at this as kind of one section of the letter. And so we're going to open God's Word and we're going to start in chapter one, verse 27. And as we do that, would you join me as we pray our God?

We pray that as we come to your word today, that it would help us to know you better, that we would see in this the image of Jesus Christ. And that would compel in our hearts and our minds and our lives a desire to become more and more like you. And so we pray this in Jesus name, Amen. And so verse 27 says this. Above all, you must live as citizens of heaven, conducting yourselves in a manner worthy of the good news about Christ.

Then whether I come and see you again, or I only hear about you, I will know that you are standing together with one spirit and one purpose, fighting together for the faith, which is the good news. Don't be intimidated in any way by your enemies. This will be a sign to them that they are going to be destroyed, but you are going to be saved, even by God himself. For you have been given not only the privilege of trusting in Christ, but also the privilege of suffering for him. We are in this struggle together.

You have seen my struggle in the past, and you know that I am still in the midst of it. As we opened the start of this letter together in week one, we saw that a key idea in the letter revolves around the citizenship. Citizenship. Now, being born in Australia and never kind of moving to another country. I think as I was reflecting on over the last couple of weeks, I think I take my citizenship for granted.

It's always just been the reality of my life. All the things that citizenship unlocks is just all that I've known to be the way that life is. But I'm really mindful that for many in this church, even some in this last week, that journey of citizenship has been a journey of waiting and of praying, and for many of you still on that journey. And so while our citizenship to Australia or various countries comes with it all kinds of benefits and various things, Paul actually says, above all, you must live not as citizens of Australia or as citizens of another country, but you must live as citizens of. Of heaven.

Now, that word citizen would have landed with real weight on the church at Philippi, and it would have landed with real weight on them because they were citizens of Rome. It was a big deal in that city. Remember, we saw in week one that it's a colony, and it's not a colony in the negative sense that we might think of it. Being a colony of Rome was a really significant privilege, and being a citizen of Rome was a huge deal. It was.

It brought with it all kinds of wonderful protections and tax breaks. But Paul says to them, there actually needs to be a greater allegiance in your life because your first identity is not Roman. It's not even Philippian. It is heavenly. You are citizens of another kingdom, and I want you to live like it.

And so Paul gives us a picture, and he lists what citizenship looks like. He says the reality of heavenly citizenship means that you are standing together as believers with one spirit, that you are striving side by side for the sake of the gospel, that you needn't be intimidated by those who oppose you, that you should even embrace suffering as a gift because it unites you with Christ. If we actually think about those things for a minute, those are radically different to the world around us. And Paul says to them, hey, your life should not be marked by self interest, but instead by shared purpose. You shouldn't be motivated by comfort.

You should be motivated by courage. Your decision shouldn't be made on how you can avoid suffering, but instead by recognizing even Suffering can be a gift when it draws you closer to Jesus. And so then we turn over to chapter two, or I shouldn't say turn over, I should just say, like, scroll up. We scroll a little bit and we get to chapter two and we see Paul continue the same thought. There's no break in his logic.

He's just described what a gospel shaped life looks like. And now in these first 11 verses of chapter two, he gets really practical. He writes this. Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ, A comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit?

Are your hearts tender and compassionate? Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose. Don't be selfish, don't try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourself. Don't look out only for your own interest, but take an interest in others too.

Paul starts with these four rhetorical questions. He doesn't need answers here because he has seen the fruit of, of the believers in Philippi. He's seen their faith. He knows the reality of their experiences in Christ. And so he says, since you've received encouragement from Christ, comfort from his love, fellowship with the Spirit, and now your hearts are tender and compassionate, then a certain response to that should follow.

Now, I wonder if you notice that these things that he says, these realities of a heavenly citizenship, that they're the same ideas here in verses 3 and 5 as the same ideas that we just had. He says, be united. Be people who live in humility. Count others as more significant than yourself. Be invested in the lives of others.

You see, Paul says them again, and I reckon one of the reasons he says them again is because those things, if we really, really look at them and think about them and apply them in our lives, are really hard to live out. And Paul acknowledges that. He acknowledges that this type of gospel community that is marked by these traits is actually radically countercultural.

Now, I find it incredible that it's countercultural in Philippi, as Paul writes, but it's also countercultural here because we are surrounded by a world that says, put yourself first. You are the most important person. You do. You protect your freedom at all costs. Chase your happiness, speak your truth.

We live in a me centric world. And that's why this section that comes after this is so powerful, because Paul doesn't just give instructions. He just doesn't say, hey, be heavenly citizens and live in this way. He. He says there's a reason why that it is possible to live a radically different Life, because he directs to a model for this life.

He directs them to Jesus. Now, if you happen to have a hard copy of the Bible there with you today, it's possible that the text that follows this is formatted slightly different. And it's formatted differently because it's a hymn Paul shares with them, a song. And I reckon the Philippians probably knew Paul as a bit of a singer. I don't think we think about that much, do we?

I mean, I wonder if he had a good singing voice. But this is the singing apostle. This is the apostle who in their very own jail there in Philippi, in the dead of night, having been beaten, he's there with Silas. And what does he do? He sings.

He sings, and God does an amazing work. And so the singing apostle gives them another song to sing. Now, I don't know the tune. Paul didn't give us that. He just gave us the words.

So probably fortunate for all of us, I'm not going to try and sing it this morning. But we have here a song, and some people suggest that this would have been one of the main songs sung together by the early church. Starts like this. In verse 5, you must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. It's a very, very simple start to the hymn, but it is profound.

He says to them, if you want to live a dynamically different life, you need a dynamically different mindset. And here he tells them what mindset to have. He says, have the same attitude as Christ. Now, I find that personally quite challenging because we often pray, hey, Jesus, make me more like you. Make me more like you, Transform me more into your likeness.

But I wonder how often we actually understand what that would look like, what the reality of being more like Christ would actually mean. And Paul, he gives us a picture. He doesn't just tell us what the attitude should look like and expect us to guess what that looks like. He says, look at Jesus. And in verse six, though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to.

Now, here we have a foundational sentence about what we believe. It's a really important theological statement from Paul because there were people across the church, the early church, there are people across the church today who doubt the divinity of Christ. And today people will tell you the same thing. They'll say, hey, look, Jesus was a good guy. He was wise, he was a great prophet.

He taught some really cool things. But Paul says, nah, not good enough. He was God. He was equal with the Father. He was sharing in God's glory from the beginning of time.

And Paul says that Jesus didn't hold on to that. In verse seven, he says instead he gave up his divine privileges. He took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself and obedience to God and died a criminal's death on a cross. We have some more key theology here.

He says that Jesus didn't stop being God. Jesus didn't stop being God. But even though he remained fully divine, he didn't cling to his status or hold on to his divine privileges or his rights. Instead, he willingly laid aside the privileges of divinity and submitted himself fully to the Father's will. Now, this is the mystery and the majesty of this moment.

Jesus fully God took on the very nature of a servant, and not just in appearance, but in reality. Because the Greek word that Paul gives us here is jewelos. I wonder if you remember, because we mentioned that Greek word a couple of weeks ago at the start of this series, Paul writes that letters from him and Timothy slaves to Christ. And it's the same word. It's jewelos.

It means one who is literally a slave, who is owned by another, who has no personal rights, who is completely subject to their master's will. And Paul gives us this parallel here because I think what he's modeling to the Philippians, what he's calling them to do, he's saying, hey, live this way, but I'm not just telling you to live that way. I have modeled this in my own life. If it is enough for the Son of Man to become a Doulos, a slave, then it is the only mindset worth imitating. And I, Paul the great apostle, have imitated Christ in these same way.

I have given up my own rights, my own privileges. I've put all that aside in the hope of serving Jesus.

And he says this to them. And it would have been radical, because Jesus didn't use his power to climb higher, he used it to stoop lower. The King of all became the lowest of the low. He entered into the human life. He got hungry, he was rejected.

He was misunderstood. He was abused. He served rather than demanded to be served. And Paul says he even humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal's death on a cross. You see, Jesus didn't just humble himself to become human.

He humbled himself as a human. He obeyed the Father all the way to the most agonizing and humiliating form of execution, that there was death on a cross. And then Paul points to the result of this, in verse nine, he says, therefore God elevated him to the place of highest honor and gave him the name above all other names, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. So Paul says that because Jesus went to the lowest place, that God raised him up to the highest. And now he is exalted, lifted up.

He's given the name that is above every other name, that one day everyone in heaven and on earth and under the earth will bow before him. What an incredible reversal that is that Paul speaks about. And Paul draws here from the words of Isaiah 45, as God declares that every knee will bow before him again. Paul is pointing to. To the undeniable divinity of Christ.

He's saying, there can be no doubt in your minds, the church at Philippi, that Jesus, who was crucified as a criminal, is now declared Lord of all, and not just in heaven, but over every realm. Heaven and the earth and under the earth.

And that is where his song ends. Paul is saying, this is Jesus the servant King. That's a pretty good song. Maybe we should get some talented people to put music to it, because what a declaration it is of what we believe about Jesus. And so, at the end of this section that we've looked at this morning, I have two questions for you, two questions that I want you to ponder this week.

They're up on the screen there. But Paul invites us in this section to consider these two things. Firstly, am I living as a citizen of heaven? Now, I only briefly want to touch on this because we've already kind of covered it, but I reckon we've heard that phrase before. Citizen of heaven.

We've heard that phrase and we've thought, yeah, that's me. Like, I know I've heard that phrase and I've thought, yeah, I'm a citizen of heaven. I know the reality of what is waiting for me on the other side of this life. We know that that's our true citizenship. But Paul, he doesn't just stop at us knowing it.

He calls us to live it. And that's why we've called this series Living for what Lasts, because this question is at the heart of it. Am I living? Not do I know? But am I living as a citizen of heaven?

Is the way that I spend my time? Are the things that I prioritise? Is what I do with my finances, how I treat other people, the way I respond when I'm under pressure, are those things marked more by heaven or by here? You see, Paul doesn't say, live one foot here and one foot there. He says, live here, completely shaped by that reality.

Live now, shaped by a knowledge that your main, your first, your only allegiance is to Christ, and that should shape every single part of your life. And so then the second question for us is, am I living with the mindset of Christ? Now, I've said it before, and I'll say it again, because I don't want us to miss it, but what Paul says would have landed with enormous weight on the believers at Philippi. Like, it's easy for us sometimes, I think, to miss the context of how radical and profound this would be, because we've heard oftentimes these verses before. We believe these things to be true.

But in Philippi, they were so proud of their status as a Roman colony that the biggest religion in Philippi, this has been shown by archaeological digs. The biggest religion there was emperor worship. And I don't just mean that in theory, like, they thought the emperor was cool or in the way that they lived. It actually was a religion. They had statues, they had temples dedicated to the worship of Caesar.

They saw Caesar as divine. And because of this, everything that he was, everything that he represented, they wanted to be. And so they worshiped a status. They worshiped wealth, they worshiped dominance. They saw that crushing your opponents, rising to the highest rank in society, having people serve you, that those were all great virtues, that they were the sign of greatness, and they should be prized.

So I want you to imagine that into that context. Paul says, let this mind be in you, the mindset of Christ. And then he describes someone who humbled himself. He describes Jesus who refused to hold on to the privileges of his divine status. He talks about a savior who submitted himself to the worst of all deaths, the one that was reserved for the least in society.

And he says, let this mindset be in you. You see, we talk about humility now, and we think that's a very noble virtue. We should be humble. In fact, if you went around and told people that you were driven by your ego, that you were proud that you were, you know, full of yourself, people would. They wouldn't like you very much.

But instead, back then, those things were virtuous, to be powerful, to be sure of your power, to have people serve you.

But Paul says, hey, let's flip it. Let's instead aspire to humility. And so he writes to them and he says, hey, our king is not like Caesar, he goes down, not up. He takes on the role of a slave, not a ruler. He lays down his rights.

He doesn't defend them. And I wonder if we find that confronting today. Because while we know that humility is a virtue, I wonder how often we actually live it. I wonder how often, even in Christian circles that when we're criticized or misunderstood or challenged, our first response is to get defensive. It's to demand, to explain ourselves.

It's to push back or it's to lash out. I even see that publicly. Lots of Christians become indignant. They say, how dare. You know, in the press, you'll say, how dare they say that about us?

Or my favorite, what's happening to our Christian society? It's like we've got this growing sense of outrage, like we deserve to be treated better. The world isn't recognizing the place that we deserve to hold. Now, I'm not saying that we shouldn't stand for truth. I think there are absolutely times when boldness is needed.

But I think we need to be really clear about how we stand. Because when Paul says, have the same mindset as Christ, he's calling us into a way of life that looks nothing like this world. He's calling us into a way that isn't loud. It's not grasping to power. It's not fighting for what we think we deserve.

It's surrendering. It's obedient, it's humble. It's an attitude that says, I don't need to win the argument. I need to reflect Christ. And it's a mindset that enables us to live for what lasts.

And so I'd encourage you today Church to ponder this week those two things. Am I living as a citizen of heaven? And am I living with the mindset of Christ? Let's pray as we ask God to help us with that. Our God, we come to you now challenged by your word.

Lord, it's one thing to know these concepts and to know these truths. It's another thing to live it. And so, Lord, would you help me? Would you help us, each one of us, to actually live in a way that reflects the mindset of Christ? Make us less indignant, make us less defensive.

Help us not to cling to our rights, but instead to serve.

Lord, shape us more and more each day into the likeness of Jesus so that we would be a light in our family, in our workplace, in this community, in this city, that we might show a radically different type of living. We might be a people who strive to live for what lasts. And so we pray that you would help us to do this. In Jesus name, amen.