Please turn with me in the Word of God to Paul's letter to the Philippians, the first chapter. We'll read the first 11 verses, and then we'll skip down to chapter 2 at verse 12. Paul's letter to the Philippians, beginning chapter 1, verse 1. Let us hear God's own Word. Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, to all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons, grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart. For whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God. And then moving down to chapter 2 at verse 12. Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence but now much more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. Do everything without complaining or arguing so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing. For even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. So you too should be glad and rejoice with me. So far the reading of God's word. Here we are at 2003. I suppose it's one of the signs that I'm getting older, that it seems to me only about a week ago that we celebrated the turn of the millennium in the year 2000, and now already years have gone by, and we face a new year. And as is common in our society, many have talked about New Year's resolutions. It's probably not an altogether bad thing to give some thought to how the last year went and what we might do better in the next year. But I suspect that for most of us, and certainly for most of our society, we quickly discover that New Year's resolutions don't last very long. I'm already off my diet. And therefore, tonight I thought it would be better that we not spend so much time with resolutions as with reflections. Our desire as the people of God, our desire as a congregation here in Escondido, is to live the new year with Christ. To live the new year for Christ. And what we need is not so much resolution as, I think, reflection on what would that mean. What is the life in Christ? What is it that we are called to be and to do as God's people? How should we orient ourselves as we take up this new year? And I think Philippians is an excellent place for us to turn. This is one of the congregations that Paul knew intimately and deeply loved. He speaks of how they were in his heart. He speaks of his joy in them and what the Lord had done in them. He speaks about how he has the same affection for them that Christ has for his people. This is a congregation about which he cares deeply, and he wants to encourage them. He wants to lead them on, and I think these words will be an encouragement to us tonight. as we face a new year and we think about the Christian life. And here in the first place, it seems to me that Paul, as he calls upon Christians to live the Christian life, he begins with praise. He begins with thanksgiving. This is the foundation of all Christian living, that we should reflect on not what we are going to do, but begin in the first place to reflect on what has been done for us. Paul's praise begins focusing on the work of God. I thank God for you. Paul doesn't begin by saying, I thank you for all of your wisdom, all of your goodness, all of your accomplishment. He does talk about the good things that they've done in the course of the letter. But Paul begins by saying, I thank God for you. I recognize that what you have, what you've accomplished, the progress that you have made in faith and in holiness, all of that comes from the hand of God. And therefore, the praise and thanksgiving of the Apostle begins by turning to God, by reflecting on God and thinking about what He has done. And that's where we have to begin in the new year as well. We mustn't focus on ourselves in the first place. We must focus on our God, who He is and what He's done. And particularly, we have to praise and thank Him for the work that God has done for us. Now in a minute, we'll turn to the work that God has done in us. That's a particular focus of Paul's discussion in this letter. But undergirding it all is his deep commitment to what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. He begins with the declaration of blessing on the congregation, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's where Christian living begins. It begins in Christ. And in Christ's work. He talks about fruit in the Christian life. But in verse 11 of chapter 1, he makes very clear that that fruit is a product of the righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the focus. Jesus Christ is the foundation. He is undergirding all that we are. All that we hope to be. All that we have become. He is the foundation for our living. And that's why Paul, later in chapter 3, can say, I glory not in my own flesh. I glory not in my own accomplishment. But I glory in Christ. Now, Paul goes on in this letter, doesn't he, to say, well, if anyone had a cause for glory, I have more. And then he recites what we might call his Jewish or his Old Covenant credentials. And we might rather quickly say, well, that's right. That's passed away. That's not so important anymore. But, you know, Paul could have put up a pretty good list of new covenant credentials, couldn't he? I'm in prison right now for my testimony to Jesus Christ. I've left family and friends behind to go throughout the whole Mediterranean world for Jesus Christ. I'm ready to be martyred for Jesus Christ. There's a lot in my life that's important, he could have said. But he doesn't for a minute. It doesn't even seem to occur to him. What he wants to say is he glories not in his own flesh. He glories not in his own holiness. He glories in Christ, in who Christ is, and what Christ has done. He says, what I long for myself, what I long for you, is to know more of Christ, more of His suffering, more of His resurrection power. I want to look away from myself to Him, so that I can see what a glorious and good Savior I have, so that I look up above the struggles and the difficulties and the sins and the frustrations of this life, and I see my Savior in glory. I see His perfection. I see all that He endured in this life and on the cross. I see Him coming forth from the dead in power to reign forever over His people. And there's my glory, Paul says. There's my hope. There's the motivation of my life, that I have such a Savior, that I have such a Lord. You see, Paul begins by reminding us all that the first element of the Christian life is to look away from ourselves to another, not just to anyone, however, but to Jesus himself as our only hope, as our only Savior, as our only Lord. This approach to living stands at such fundamental odds with much of what goes on in the world that we live in. One of the things I love to do with odd moments is to go to bookstores. And I'm always fascinated to see what new books are in the bookstores. I could probably retire if I hadn't bought so many books over the years. And I was really struck by a book I saw. Actually, one of many, but the title seemed particularly gripping that I saw not so long ago in a bookstore that was entitled Awaken the Giant Within. And the whole premise of this book, as with many other books on spirituality in our day, is we have within us all the resources, all the strengths, all the wisdom, all the insight that we really need. And our only failure is we just haven't looked inside enough. We haven't seen our strength. We haven't released our strength and the nobility of who we are. And you know, that's tragic because it's such a lie. The only giant within us outside of Christ is the devil and his works. We are not good and noble and wonderful in ourselves. We live in a world where almost every night it seems on the news, there is some new atrocity, some new horror springing from human hate. Even today the news came of, what, 28 more people killed by suicide bombers in Israel. A large number of them, not Jews, but poor workers from poor parts of the world, Asia and Africa, come to try to raise a little money to send home to their relatives. killed. And then we're told how good and how noble and how wonderful human nature is and how all we have to do is just have a little more education and all will be well. The truth is left to ourselves. We are filled with hatred of God and our neighbor, as the Catechism says. And we need to look away from ourselves. Look to one who really is good and loving and kind and saving. Our Lord Jesus Christ. What Paul says is that the God who has worked for us in Christ to save us, to bear our sins away on the cross, to assure us of eternal life in His resurrection and ascension, that God now works in us to conform us more and more to Christ. Paul, in that famous statement of Philippians 2, verses 12 and 13, does indeed call for us to work out our salvation, but immediately goes on to say, for it is God who is at work in you. If you belong to Jesus Christ, God is at work in you. God is making a difference in you. God is the motive power for your working out your salvation. It is God who is the primary worker, and he's at work in you. He's making a difference in you. And out of that should come a wonderful confidence for us, as there was a wonderful confidence for the Apostle Paul. Did you notice that here in this text? He's confident of what is happening to these Philippians. In verse 7, he can say, all of you share in God's grace with me. That's his confidence for them. He's known them. He's worked with them. He's been with them. And He can testify to them, I know God's grace is at work in you as a church of Jesus Christ. It's a grace that He says is going to persevere with them and is going to grow in them. Look at those wonderful words of verse 6. Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Here's one of our great Calvinistic doctrines, but of course we ought to be a little more humble and say it's a great Pauline doctrine. It's a great biblical doctrine. He who begins a good work always brings it to completion. God never starts anything that He doesn't finish. And Paul says, I look at you, beloved people of God, and I have confidence in you that the God who has begun a work in you will continue with you day by day by day till that last day when Christ appears in glory and all is made new and the struggle of holiness is ended forever and the perfection of holiness in God's people. I am confident in you. What a wonderful foundation for living in Jesus Christ. We do not live out of fear. We do not live out of doubt. We do not live out of desperation as so many do in this world. But we live out of a rock-solid confidence in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that if He has ever laid hold on us, He will never let go. No matter how great the struggle, no matter how great the difficulty, He will not let go. But what He begins, He will complete. What He started on the first day for those Philippians, He will complete on the last day when the Son returns in glory. And so that's the foundation of living for Jesus Christ. It's the foundation of praise for what God has done in Christ and what He is doing in us as the fruit of Christ's saving work. Do you have that praise in your heart? Do you have that apostolic confidence? Do you know that that grace has begun to work in you? If you don't, what you need to do is look away from yourself to Christ. The Christ who always stands before his people to say, come unto me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. And when we come, when we rest in Him, then we can enter into this praise and thanksgiving of the Apostle. Then we're really ready to live for Him. Well, Paul here encourages us to reflect not only on the praise of our hearts in living for Christ, but also his very particular prayer. In verse 9, he particularizes the prayer for this wonderful church. And he says, this is my prayer, that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ. Here is Paul's basic prayer for the church of Jesus Christ, that we might abound more and more in love. that we might be growing as a community in love, that we might be growing more to love Christ, to love one another, to love the neighbor, to love those in need. And why does he focus on love, do you think? Because love is in some ways the most difficult thing, isn't it? Love is self-giving. The word for love here in this text is agape, that self-denying love that sacrifices for the other, That love that Christ showed for us. That's the love He wants us to grow into. And it's so contrary to our own human nature apart from Christ. It's so contrary to the wisdom of the world. What is the point of sacrificing when we should be getting and acquiring? And Paul says, no, I'm praying for you that you'll be growing in that love that sacrifices, that cares, that looks away from self. And then he helps us to see that this love is not at all the sort of sentimental thing that the world so often means when it uses the word love. It's not some fleeting thing that passes quickly away. It's not some feeling that's here today and gone tomorrow. But he defines love here as knowing the best and being the best. He says, first of all, my prayer is that you might abound in love through knowledge and depth of insight so that you're able to discern what is best, so that you'll be able to discern the things that really matter. That's not easy, is it? What really matters in life? What is really important? What is of lasting importance? Paul says, those who really are growing in love grow in a greater and greater discernment and clarity about what are the critical things of this life. What is really important? What are the most important things to which I should give my time and my energy? We all know the great temptation to waste time, to waste money, to get on track with the fleeting standards and values and accomplishments of this world that ultimately don't leave much of a record behind, much of an impact for Christ and for His church and kingdom. He said if we're really a loving people, if we're a people growing in Christian love, then we're growing in an insight into what's really important in life and to a deeper and deeper commitment to those things. It's growing in a love that knows the best and growing in a love that makes the best of us. Paul is praying that these Philippians may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ Jesus. and then down in chapter 2 at verse 15, he says again, so that you may become blameless and pure children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation in which you shine like stars in the universe. I won't ask all of those who are pure and blameless here tonight to stand. Maybe I'll start with a consistory, though. This language, I suspect, makes us as good Calvinists just a little nervous. Our catechism says, after all, question 114, even the holiest of men in this life have only small beginnings of that obedience to which we're called. But we mustn't tone down what the Apostle is saying here. His prayer for the people of God is that they will be pure and blameless and without fault. I don't think he's talking about an absolute moral perfection here. But I think he is saying to the Philippians and I think he is saying to us, those who are growing in love are growing in a desire for holiness. They are growing in a desire to be conformed to the moral character and will of God. They are not people content to say, that's just the way I am. I know I should be better, but it's just the way I am. They are not people who are willing to take refuge behind the idea, well, after all, you know, we're really still pretty depraved. I think Paul would agree 100% with our catechism. Compared with the perfection of God's righteousness, our moral improvement in this life is only a small beginning. But we mustn't forget that that question of the catechism goes on to say, yet with earnest purpose we begin to live according to all the commands of God. That's what this purity and blamelessness really is all about that the Apostle is talking about. It's a commitment. It's a sincerity. It's a devotion to live a holy life for Christ. Not because we hope thereby to earn God's favor as if we didn't have it. But because thereby we hope, as Paul says in the second chapter of Philippians, to shine like stars before a crooked and perverse generation. Christ intends His church to be a light set upon a hill. A light that will attract God's elect by the holiness of their life, by the work of Christ being done in them. And so how can we be content with anything less than a prayer to press on to be pure and blameless in the life that we live as a way of showing our love, of growing in grace? In chapter 1, verse 27, Paul sums this up by saying, lead a life worthy of the Gospel. What a challenge that is. A life that measures up to what was done for you by Jesus Christ on the cross. A life that really reflects all of His love and passion and devotion and sacrifice. If we're inflamed with a vision of who our Christ is, how could we do any less Then long to be pure and blameless, shining like stars in a dark world, that our lives might be described as those worthy of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And so Paul calls upon us to live our lives with praise for the work of God, with a prayer that we might abound in love. Finally, he reminds us that we can live this life only with partners. Part of the real motive of this letter to the Philippians is to encourage the Philippians to abound in love and get along. They're getting along pretty well, but they can do better. We have the famous passage in chapter 4, I plead with you, Odea, and I plead with Syntyche to agree with each other in the Lord. Here are two good women, two women who've done a lot of work for the gospel, and they've been feuding recently, and it's harmed the church. And Paul says, we need a partnership in the church. We need Christians to get along with one another. We need Christians to cooperate in the work of the gospel and upholding the truth of Jesus Christ. And that's one of the great manifestations of growing in love, isn't it? Jesus had said, by this the world will know that you're my disciples, that you love one another. I think we as a church have been good at that. I think this has been a welcoming, warm, harmonious church in many ways, but we always have to be working at that. That we recognize we can never live the Christian life alone. The Christian life is never a matter of rugged individualism. It is lived only in partnership with God and with our fellow believers. Paul says he's a fellow worker with Christ and he calls us to be fellow workers with the church getting along with one another one on one as Euodia and Siddicae are called to do getting along with one another as a church it's interesting that Paul begins this letter by saying Paul and Timothy servants of Christ Jesus I think he does that very deliberately to say, Timothy and I are partners in the work of the gospel. You need to be partners with us in the work of the gospel. The church needs to be harmonious and filled with love for one another that the work of the gospel might get done, that the truth of Jesus Christ might be preached. And it's interesting that he says there in that first verse, To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons. Overseers is another word for elders. He writes to the whole church and then he adds a particular greeting. This is the only place he does it in his greetings. A particular greeting to the elders and the deacons. And I think he does that to underscore the fact that the elders and the deacons have a particular responsibility for the harmony and love and truth of the congregation. they are to exemplify that in their own work. Nothing is harder on a congregation, I think, than elders and deacons and ministers all squabbling with one another. It undermines that commonality that we have to Christ, that common work and devotion that we're to have in Christ. And at least my experience on the council of this church has always been that there's been a wonderful and remarkable sense of unanimity. And even when there has not been perfect agreement, there's been a great respect, a great will and eagerness to work together. And tonight, as we constitute a new consistory, I commend to you this apostolic appeal that you work together in harmony so that you can lead all of us in harmony so that we can make Jesus Christ known and not only may our individual lives shine like stars, but the life of this congregation may shine like a star. It's a great responsibility. But as the apostle had confidence in the Philippians, so I have confidence in you and I have confidence in all of you for what I've seen in this congregation. That we are a congregation that praises God for the work that he has done. A congregation that prays that we might be a holy people. A congregation that partners with one another to do the work of the Lord. May that characterize us more and more so that our life together in the new year may be, as the Apostle calls us, a life that glorifies our Lord Jesus Christ, a life that is worthy of His grace. God grant that that may be true for us. Amen. Let us pray. O Lord, our God, our hearts are filled with thanksgiving for Jesus Christ and all that he has done. And our hearts are humbled as we hear the call to the life that is pure and blameless. And our hearts are encouraged by the love and partnerships that we have experienced here in this church to encourage us in our living for you. Grant to our new council, grant to our ministers, grant to all of us who are members of this congregation the blessing of your Holy Spirit in the new year that we may live faithfully for Jesus Christ our Savior. For it's in his name that we pray. Amen.