Well, I invite you to turn in your Bibles tonight to the book of Philippians, chapter 2. That's found on page 1165. We conclude chapter 2 tonight. There's four chapters in this book as we're working our way through it, typically in the mornings. And tonight we come to verses, we started to look at verses 17 and 18. We'll be looking at verses 17 through 30 tonight, and typically in the night we're working through now studying the Ten Commandments, but we're having this reflection tonight, and we'll return to this next Sunday morning also. So this is Philippians chapter 2, beginning at verse 17. Even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I'm glad and will rejoice with you all. Likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me. I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon. so that I too may be cheered by news of you. For I have no one like him who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare. For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. But you know Timothy's proven worth, how as a son with a father, he served with me in the gospel. I hope, therefore, to send him just as soon as I see how it will go with me. And I trust in the Lord that shortly I myself will come also. I have thought it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother and fellow worker and fellow soldier, and your messenger and minister to my need. For he has been longing for you all and has been distressed because you heard that he was ill. Indeed, he was ill, near to death. But God had mercy on him, and not only on him, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. I am more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again and that I may be less anxious. So receive him in the Lord with all joy and honor such men, for he nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete what was lacking in your service to me. There we'll end the reading of God's Word. What we have before us tonight is Paul showing us real examples of what we all want in Christianity today because we've seen so much hypocrisy. What we all want is authentic, real, true, sincere Christianity. This is something that people are crying out for and want to see, and tonight this is what is essentially being shown to us how God wants us, as we've been studying in the book of Philippians to conduct ourselves as citizens of heaven and with a goal of where we're headed and what our purpose is on this earth. But he wants to particularly focus in tonight on a few examples for you so that you would think about what it looks like in the body of Christ to have the mind of Jesus, to be a servant, which has been the goal of this book. We, of course, came to that great pinnacle in chapter 2 at the beginning of looking at the mind of Jesus and all that he did to save us from our sins and what he became for us, emptying himself, becoming in the form of a slave, giving his life so that we might live. And that is what's being recreated in the body of Christ. That's what this is all teaching us and showing us. And so remember he was addressing a real problem in Philippi. It was a selfish mindset, wasn't it? A selfish mindset had occurred in the church. This happens. Church ebbs and flows, and it faces trials and tests, just like we've considered. And at times, there can be a lot of fighting, and there can be a lot of discord, and a lot of separation, and arguing, and complaining, and disputing. And that's exactly what began to happen in Philippi. Like I said, we've never seen that, have we? This is what we've seen in the church a lot in the course of our time under the sun. And he's helping them through this. He's motivating them through this. He's basically helping them into how to behave in the midst of a wicked and crooked and perverse generation. This is how the world behaves every day. This is what we see every day and we see it right now in our society in full measure, don't we? It's just tear into everyone. It's dog eat dog and everyone's pushing an agenda and everyone has their side and everyone's fighting. Well, this is the point that in the body of Christ, this is not to be so among us. And so he does something really special here tonight in chapter two. He showcases the lives of a few servants among them that they can look at and think about and consider. And I love this because he doesn't just showcase pastors. See, I think we often think that about the pastors are the ones doing the real work. And certainly he showcases a pastor tonight and how important that work is. But he doesn't want us to think that it's the pastors who are doing all that. He wants us to realize that all of us, each of us, plays an important role in that and that each of us is called to have the very same mind of Jesus. And he's going to show us what that looks like in the body. See, I think it would be easy to read this the wrong way. He draws a connection, Paul himself, between his sufferings. Remember, he's in prison when he's writing this letter. He's about to die for the gospel. We might say, there's the super pastor doing the big stuff out there. And Paul essentially stops and he says, listen, we are in a gospel partnership and fellowship. And what that means is the common sufferings in the body of Christ, the things that we experience together in the body, the difficulties, the hardships as a family, the same kind of servanthood is what we're called to. And that's what he's helping us tonight with. No matter what your calling is in this life, each of you plays an important part as we together have gospel fellowship and share in the same ministry, even of somebody like the great Apostle Paul. And that's what I want you to take from this tonight. No matter who we are, we are to have the mind of Jesus. That's the heart of this. We are called to the same sacrificial mind. And we are called to shine his lights as the Lord is working out his salvation in us. Remember, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For it's God who works within you to will and to do for his good pleasure. God is that intimately involved in the things that we are doing. And so that's what we're looking at briefly here tonight. The calling that he gives, the examples, and then the encouragement for each of us to have that same mind. So let's begin with this call tonight. What you'll notice here in verse 17, it's implicit, not so explicit, but I pulled it out and I think you can see it. Verse 17, even if I am to be poured out as a drink offering, upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. We started to look at that last time. That was taken from the Levitical priesthood, who they would take an animal sacrifice. And in that animal sacrifice, they would lay that sacrifice, like what we considered today, on the altar, but on top of the sacrifice was a libation. It was a drink offering. And the drink offering would be poured on the hot altar, and a great puff of steam would go up, and everyone would see this amazing moment of this libation being poured out on the altar. When you did this, it was so hot, it created that kind of effect. The libation would disappear in a puff of steam. Now what Paul is doing is grabbing that. Something that was familiar to them. And Paul is saying, that's what my life's like. That's how I think of my life. That I would, my life is like that libation on top of the sacrifice. I am being poured out on the sacrifice and service of your faith. That's how I want you to think. Our lives are poured out like Jesus's was. On the sacrifice and service of, well, go through the line. your husband or wife, your children, and particularly here tonight, those in the body of Christ. He's given us an arena for this, hasn't he? Paul is writing this from prison, you'll remember. And he knows there's this strong possibility that he will be martyred and eventually would be beheaded. And in fact, we know that would happen under Nero, at least according to history. And all he's really saying here is, all that really matters to me is your faith. I want to advance and help you in your faith. You see how this kind of combats the individualistic mindset that we all have. I mean, you really can't be a Christian disconnected from the church. You just can't be. You're what God made it for you to be a member of a body fitting you together. Anyone who sits on the outside and says they're a Christian and totally avoids the church is not a biblical Christian. I mean, we have to say that. He made you to be part of a body. And that's what we're looking like. How does that work? And what does that mean? And I think these are the kind of things that we have to help people with. And this is how Paul first is, is helping them with perspective. First thing, he has to be in the mind in how you think. If I am killed doing the work of Jesus, let's take the worst possible scenario, which was Paul. If I'm killed doing the work of Jesus, if my blood is poured out, it would just be like that puff of steam. It would be for you. That's why I give my life to this service. Anything that I've achieved in the Christian life is nothing compared to the fact that I have been used by God to bring and help people into his kingdom. To be saved from the wrath to come. The judgment to come. So Paul is having us think about this. The implicit call here is, this is your call too. To have the mind of Jesus. You're free. Jesus has forgiven you. He's loved you. And now that mind is being recreated in you. we have to think about how we pour ourselves out on the sacrifice and service of each other's faith. Not just on ourself, to serve ourselves. And so this is what now comes to this, what kind of seems like an obscure section in the book. And what Paul essentially does here is grab a few examples for them to help them with perspective on this and encourage them in this. Notice I'm verse 19. But I hope in the Lord to send Timothy to you soon so that I too may be cheered by news of you, for I have no one like him who will be, notice this, genuinely concerned for your welfare. For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. Notice he says, but you have known Timothy's proven worth. How as a son with a father, he has served with me in the gospel. Therefore, I hope therefore to send him just as soon as I see how it will go with me and I trust in the Lord that shortly I myself will come also. The first example that he raises, the first thing that he raises is to have them think about the work of the ministry and to have them think about what's going on in the sending of somebody like Timothy to them to be a blessing. Timothy here is important. We're challenged to ask this about the interests of others. I hope to send Timothy to you shortly. For what reason? So that you'd be encouraged, built up, strengthened. Paul heard about all the troubles in Philippi. That's why he's writing this book. It's terribly hurting him. There you see the heart of a pastor. Remember what he said in 1 Corinthians 11? I have all these daily things I go through. Three times I was beaten with rods, once shipwrecked, stoned. I mean, he goes right down the line. He says, you know what my greatest burden is? It's the church. To see the devil get in and to see the church go sideways and to see the divisions and to see the pain, that rips me up. There's a grief when the church, by servants, by servants. There should be a grief when the church is in turmoil, a pain when the church is in turmoil. And so here's, here's one of the solutions God has done. He says, well, this is what God has done, and I, through this ministry, I'm going to send Timothy to you, so because there is nobody who I trust like this who will sincerely care for you. Now, Timothy was a young pastor at this point who had been set apart to pastor some of the most important churches and travel and pastor for times in Asia Minor. And I find it fascinating what he says about Timothy here. He's saying, there's no one else of like soul who I can count on who will carry on all the same concerns of my heart for the church. He will, verse 20, genuinely or sincerely care for your souls. Paul says, I'm going to send him so that I know about it too, and that's going to greatly bless me. You see the body working together here. It's going to greatly bless me when I know that you're cared for. Talk about the mind of a servant. You see it? You can apply this in many ways. He separates out the character of Timothy. And remember, he already made a comment back in chapter 1. Some are in the ministry because of envy and strife. In other words, they're those in the ministry that only really are serving themselves. And they're not in the interest of Jesus. They're not in the interest of souls. They're not in the interest of people being helped and saved. And Paul warned against this. He called them deceitful workers. People who think that godliness is just a means of gain. And he says in 21, he accents that by saying, listen, all in general seek their own and not the interests of Jesus Christ. That's the bent of human nature. It is wired in us to first and foremost be about us. We seek our own. And this is a big problem in ministry, says Paul. And so Paul is saying, listen, it's very rare when God does, and God has been faithful in doing this all over the place, but to find this kind of commitment of someone in the life of the church who genuinely and truly cares for the needs of others. Timothy was of that kind. We expose false pastors all the time, and pastors take it on the head all the time, even good ones. But it is important to stand back and look at good examples among us. Timothy, coming to them, would bring forth a servant who would labor in every way to show concern about the church and to give himself to the ministry of the word so that these kind of problems and fires would be put out. He would put his life on the line and travel to these places and churches and stay to help struggling churches, brothers and sisters, who were facing internal problems, number one, and then facing, which remember what we've said is the thesis here. The internal problems were driven by the pressure of a persecution in the culture coming at the church. So much cultural stuff and attack on Christians was happening. And it was affecting how the people were becoming. This is a big moment for us, beloved, in the church in America right now. This is exactly what's happened in America. All the external pressure, all the fear, all the division. Our holiday's over, by the way, as Christians in America. What has that done in the church? It's caused a lot of panic, turmoil, fear. And what Paul is saying here is, this is one of the great examples to show you how God works. He sends you pastors. You know, think of the long line of pastors in this church. Think of all the way back to Joe May's father, Reverend Rorta, to Reverend Hauerzile, Reverend Kaminga, Reverend Voss, Reverend Donovan. Now, tonight I just prayed and he's sending you another that will minister to your needs, Reverend Contreras. That's a huge encouragement it should be to you. It's God's work. And sincere pastors bring the mind of Jesus to bear down on the congregation. Because they care about that. To encourage you. To help you. You know, I think this is meant to say to people who are constantly asking, what do I do? How do I live out my faith? What am I supposed to do now? What is a true Christian? And everyone is saying to me right now, we've got to fight. We've got to fight. I hear this all the time. You want to know how to fight? It's with a whole different set of weapons. We are to look at these examples and see what we are to be in the body of Christ. You know, turn over to chapter 4 for a minute. You'll see it. It's building to this. I think this is kind of the crucial reason the whole book was written. If you look at verse 2, here's the heart of it. You don't just name people in the New Testament unless something big is going on. Paul names two saints. He names a lot of people in the Scripture who are wolves, by the way. We get all mad at that today, but the Scripture does it frequently. But notice here, I entreat Iodia and I entreat Syntyche to agree in the Lord. There it is. A rift had happened and there was a big fight and there were women who had separated out and factions had happened in the church and all this was building to this. And so what is his solution? Yes, I ask you also, true companion. So that's a name of someone he's pulling out. Help these women who have labored side by side with me in the gospel together with Clement and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are in the book of life. Rejoice in the Lord. See, there he grabs it and he says, this is what pastors were sent to do. And now this is your responsibility in the body of Christ. Help one another. Help one another. So this is an important, have we seen problems? of people loving one another? Or do we engage in the gossip? Have we seen rifts and divisions? Have we had conflict? You've got a great purpose. Okay, pastor, that's the pastors. That's the pastors. You're holding up the pastors with the responsibility. We're just laymen. Well, don't say that too quickly. Now we're going to meet a guy named Epaphroditus. And this is a good layman. Notice what is said in verse 25 about Epaphroditus. Yet I considered it necessary to send you Epaphroditus, my brother, fellow worker. This is verse 25. And fellow soldier. Amazing he calls him that. And your messenger and minister to my need. Now listen. For he's been longing for you all and has been distressed. because you heard that he was ill. Indeed, he was ill, near to death. But God had mercy on him, not only on him, but me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. Receive him, notice what he says there. I am more eager to send him, therefore, that you may rejoice at seeing him again, and that I may be less anxious. So receive him in the Lord with all joy and honor such men for he nearly died for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete what was lacking in your service to me. Okay. Who was Epaphroditus? Paul has a lot of things to say about this guy. Gets a lot of good things said about him. He's a brother in the Lord. He's a fellow worker. He's a fellow soldier. And notice here, the Philippians messenger to minister to Paul. So here's what happened. Epaphroditus was a very given member in the life of the congregation. Somebody who you knew in the life of the congregation that was a servant. And so they knew that this would be the guy that would be willing to put his life on the line and go to Paul and take the Philippian gift to Paul because Paul's in prison and they didn't feed people in prison. So on behalf of the congregation, they said, Epaphroditus, servant, are you willing to go? Of course I'm willing to go. Later in chapter four, Paul will say, there was no church when I was in prison and I'm suffering. No church so far who has shared with me concerning giving and receiving, but you only. I mean, this church was really a good church. You see why he's so burdened, but the devil got in and is dividing the thing. Only the church in Philippi, 800 miles, came, 800 miles, came to meet Paul's need. They didn't have airplanes. In cultures, prisoners didn't get food. It wasn't like our prison system where we pay tax dollars to pay for the prisoners' care. They would die there. And they didn't care if they died. Food and necessity was absolute, absolute necessity was needed to survive in prison. So Epaphroditus says, I'll do it. I'll travel 800 miles and I'm going to bring Paul food and relief from your love as a church for him. Paul was so overwhelmed by that. That's chapter four. We'll get there. But on the way, the guy becomes sick. He got really sick doing this. Think about our times right now. Everyone's afraid of getting sick. He put himself in the line. And it was almost unto death, says Paul. This man risked his life to go do this. I mean, this was hard. 800 miles, this is not like traveling today. Because Epaphroditus was full of love for this church, and for Paul, I'll go. He risked his life to fulfill the commitment and bring what was needed to sustain the life of an apostle. That's no little service. In those days, people just didn't recover. They didn't have medicines. You got sick like this, because Paul says it was to death. You got sick, you didn't go get medicine. You can go get vaccines. This was a sickness to death. He put his life on the line for, to help Paul. And Paul was distressed. And the church was distressed. And so Paul got on his knees. Please help him. And Paul says, guess what God did? He helped him. He had mercy on him. He got well. We should think a little bit like that more today, I think. Not only on him, but God helped us too, me too, because I would have had sorrow upon sorrow in prison if I knew that this guy was bringing the gift and then he dies on the way. I couldn't handle that. Look at the love in the body. You see how this is just selfless. It's being presented to you. The point is, look at this brother's service. He gives his life. He almost dies in the midst of his sickness. All he cared about was fulfilling his mission to help Paul. And yet through it, he longed in soul to go home to his church because he knew that they were mourning over his sickness. Epaphroditus. I got to get home. Epaphroditus is a no-name. It was really amazing that he gets inscripturated like this. No one ever talks about Epaphroditus. Paul says in verse 30, he almost dies for the sake of Christ, not regarding his own life. So wait a minute. Apostle, my life is being poured out on the sacrifice and service of your faith. No, no, that's not just for apostles. Same thing Epaphroditus did. That's the mind of a servant. Welcome to the mind of a servant. It's awesome Christianity, by the way. You know? It's really awesome. Imagine the effects such a thing would bring. And again, I speak to myself. We all struggle with caring for ourselves first. This is why you have passages like this. This is our problem. This is what we do. My greatest problem is caring for myself. I understand that. And I know you do too. You struggle with that. but imagine this, fear came upon the world when Christians who lived this way, they saw the care. I don't know if we'll ever get to a point like the first century, but this is why the book of Acts started saying, you know, they had to start giving up their own possessions to help one another because things were that hard. This is the Christian life. You don't need to be a Paul, Apostle Paul. You don't need to be a Timothy. I think Epaphroditus is the strongest example outside of Jesus here right now in the book of Philippians for a purpose. You know, I get calls about the church and every time I get questions like, well, what does your church have to offer? Tell me about the programs you got. Do you have a children's ministry? Do you have children's church? Do you sing contemporary music? This is like endless as a pastor. Rarely have I got somebody to say, you know, I'm called to be a servant in the body of Christ and I want to be a blessing to your church. What are your needs in the church and how can I give myself for that? In the early church, I always think of 1 Corinthians when they came to worship and they had worship problems and all these things. And Paul says something really together. Each time you come together, everyone has a psalm, a teaching, a tongue, a revelation, interpretation, and that went south. But there was an understanding in the church that there was a responsibility to bring something to the table. let all things be done for edification. The mentality is how can I be a blessing to my neighbor and help them on the sacrifice and service of their faith through that service. The peril of the church today is that everyone comes and sits in the pews, voices complaints about what they like or don't like. Very little giving in the life of the church of sacrifice and then go home and expend massive amounts of energy on efforts to preserve their lives. Massive amounts of time, energy, and money to preserve their own lives. And your whole culture sits and tells you to worry about it every day. Your whole culture tells you to get absorbed, to save your life. When Jesus said, if you will save your life, you're going to lose it. What can I do? It's not really rocket science. Pure and undefiled religion is to visit widows and orphans in their need. Got a lot of people who have needs and who hurt. It is to be a servant when a newcomer comes among us and say, hey, I'm not worried about my seat. Come sit here in my seat, or I want to sit with you. It is to take a meal to the afflicted. There's your Epaphroditus. It is to write a letter of encouragement. It is to invest yourself in the body of Christ who Christ died for. Look at the examples among us. I'm going to give maybe a few tonight. And one would be really mad. He knew I did this, but he's not here, so I'm going to do it. I'm going to talk about Dr. Godfrey for a minute. Raised, right? You know his story. Brought into the church in Alameda in the CRC by himself being invited to one of the events. The church enfolded him. Don't you see among us now, we're going to celebrate here in a few weeks, end of October, 40 years of service in this church. He hasn't been paid for that. He has given himself to teach you, to be a blessing to you. This energetic pastor among us, this servant who has for years taught this Sunday school, and selfless act because he loves God's word. And how much, you don't even realize it, how much he has been a blessing to keep this church in the truth. We just take that for granted. There's your Timothy. There's your Timothy. Now let's go to Epaphroditus. Should I just pick a dead one now? Because if I do a live one here tonight, somebody will get really irritated. We've had a lot of servants among us. You know, I could go through the servants that we lost over this last year and a half, and I'm not, they're all servants in their own way. To pick one is really difficult because it's not picking one over the other. Think of somebody like an Elko Brower or somebody of a hybrid Timbor. Particularly, I think of Pete DeYoung. I miss seeing his joy in the gospel. I miss seeing him run around to the visitors that come in. The guy who, when I was in seminary, took me door-to-door evangelizing in this community. No matter who answered that door, he was not afraid. I miss that. I miss it a lot. You are just as important. You are being made into the image of Jesus. He is living. The spirit resides in you. And his life is being, your life is being remade to look like him. He came here, Jesus, not seeking his own. The interests to drink the cup of the Father's wrath for you. To come as a sacrificial lamb to serve you and to become a slave. to serve and give his life a ransom for many. And if you are his, then be assured he's recreating that mind in you. That being the case, on with it. We see men and women lay down their life for their countries. Look at how much interest there is to give their life for a country. How much more should we for our king? and his cause. It's not a monastic life. It's a life in the trenches that you enlisted in when you professed your faith. Not in the mountains, tops, but in the valleys. Shown to you today in the life of Paul, Timothy, and Epaphroditus, of which together all of that shows us the mind of Jesus. And that mind is yours. That's his gift. What is your place in the kingdom? You play just as important of a role, no matter who you are. Hear me. Go to your brethren. Serve one another with gladness. Serve the Lord and one another with gladness. And as Jesus said, when you do it to one of the least of these, I see it. You're doing it as unto me. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, what a wonderful encouragement tonight from this text. To be servants. Because we're earning anything. But because the servant saved us. Thank you for so rich a salvation and thank you for giving us real purpose. Help us to think more about how we can be a blessing to others. Think less about ourselves. And more about loving you and your kingdom. Thank you for giving the body of Christ that we go through this together in this life, that we're not alone. And may the mind of Jesus fill this place in the Escondido URC. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.