The Secret to Our Citizenship

This morning we're talking about the secret of our citizenship.

So in Philippians 1 that we preached last week, what we saw was that Paul had this inner dialogue about his reality of being imprisoned.

And he said, There's a part of me that wrestles with, do I die and go be with the Lord, or do I remain living so that I might have fruitful labor among you?

And his resolve was that he would go on living so that there would be fruitful labor among the church in Philippi.

And then he gives this charge at the end of chapter one.

He says, Therefore, live as citizens of heaven in a way that is worthy of the gospel.

Right?

There's this charge that Paul gives his people.

So then, live as citizens of heaven, worthy of the gospel which you proclaim, of which you hold fast to.

And then he says something really interesting.

He says that you, Christian, have been granted, graciously given, both the faith to believe in the gospel and the suffering that comes with believing.

Both of these things have been granted to you faith to believe and suffering for that belief.

And he kind of leaves us there until we come into chapter two.

Chapter two, at the beginning of Paul's dialogue, we see this big so in light of, therefore, Paul is connecting what he's about to communicate to the church in Philippi with what he had just previously said.

That you are to live as citizens of heaven who are worthy of the gospel, and you have been given faith to believe, and you have been granted suffering for that belief.

He's going to bring us into a secret.

A secret about the reality of who we are and what we have in Christ Jesus.

And he's going to unveil that secret for us here in this passage.

And as he comes into the beginning of chapter 2, he lays out this rhetorical phrasing of these series of questions.

If there is any, and then he gives an attribute among you.

So he has four distinct attributes: things like encouragement, comfort from love, participation in the spirit, affection and sympathy.

These attributes are assumed realities for the Christians at the church of Philippi because they are in Christ.

Paul understands that yes, there is encouragement.

Yes, there is compassion and love and comfort.

Yes, all of these things abound because they have been lavished upon you in Christ.

The first one, encouragement.

When we hear the word encouragement, you and I might think of like K-Love or Star 93.3.

We're just uplifting and encouraging.

Right?

When you listen to Christian music, do you feel good?

Sometimes I do.

If it's good music.

If it's bad Christian music, I just feel sad for our testimony, a witness to the world around us.

But there are times where I feel good and I feel encouraged, right?

I feel built up or lifted up.

That's kind of a modern understanding of the word encouragement, though.

That's really not what the Bible is speaking to when it says, if there be any encouragement among you.

It literally means to build into your heart courage, strength, boldness, bravery.

We need this.

If we're going to face suffering, if it has been granted to us to endure suffering because of the faith we confess, then we need courage built into our very hearts by one another.

Do we encourage one another to face our fears, to go through the things that this world is bringing to us in suffering and trials and persecution?

Do we have courage?

Being found in Christ should make courage be built into us, boldness to face the suffering that we have been granted to undergo.

Then Paul says, if there be any cur comfort from love.

This word comfort is this language of consoling.

Imagine a family member who has just lost one of their dearest loved ones.

And you come around them and you console them in the midst of their suffering.

You comfort their heart, you bring lavish love upon them in the way that you embrace them and you weep with them and you comfort them.

That's what Paul is talking about.

That if there be any consolation, comfort from love, to be comforted by a love that is greater than the despair that we may face in this life.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, a pastor from Metropolitan London in the 1800s, says this about consolation.

He says, consolation is the dropping of a gentle dew from heaven on desert hearts beneath.

Many of us, as we face things in this life, there's this temptation for our hearts to become these desert lands, dry, brittle, hard.

But what happens in consolation?

They become soft again.

They become tender.

They become able to love as they are comforted by it.

Then he says, participation in the Spirit.

This phrase more literally means a partnership that is both forged and empowered by the Holy Spirit to be undivided in our primary views, to receive the same truth, to contend for the same faith.

It's a unity that has the power to make the weak strong.

The weary endure.

The fearful courageous, and the suffering able to be withstood.

This partnership in the gospel, in the spirit, enables us as a community of believers to do what we didn't think we could.

When we felt like we couldn't stand anymore, when we felt like we couldn't endure anymore, when we felt like we couldn't press on anymore, this partnership in the spirit enables us to do these things that we thought unimaginable.

He says, affection and sympathy, or better understood, love and compassion.

In Christ, we have eternal love and eternal compassion given to us.

And in this love, we are called to love the brotherhood.

How will you know that?

How will the world know that you are my disciples by the way that you love one another?

With the love that I have loved you, you are called to love one another.

What we have received from Christ in love and compassion, we are to bestow upon the brotherhood, to display and express the love and compassion that has been shown to us.

We're a redeemed people, church, who are called to express the reality of that redemption in the body to one another.

These four attributes bring us to an understanding of what verses one through two are really trying to portray to us.

That undivided, we stand.

Undivided, we stand.

Because what are these four attributes going to lead Paul into?

He's going to come into this introduction of this first imperative that we see in the entire passage.

Complete my joy.

If there is any encouragement, if there is any love and compassion, if there is any partnership in the spirit, if there is any consolation, then complete my joy.

How?

By being unified.

One mind, one spirit, one body.

Paul's imploring the church to make his joy complete by demonstrating the reality of all of these Christ-centered attributes and producing unity.

One mind, one love, being in full accord.

This is what we are to be striving for.

And these are the four realities of our union with Jesus to accomplish it.

You see, to see the church in all its diversity be united around the purpose and mission of the kingdom, so that they might stand in the midst of suffering is what would complete the joy of the apostle.

Here begins the introduction to the secret of our citizenship.

If you are a citizen of heaven who's living a life that is worthy of the gospel, then it will be granted to you that you would both believe and suffer for that belief.

So be in unity.

Be found undivided.

It's the heart of community.

We don't seek to build a community around homogeny.

We seek to build a community around unity.

You see, the gospel allows and even demands that it be filled with diversity.

Diversity of ethnicity, culture, diversity of all the peoples of the earth.

But they're unified around something common.

It's the gospel and his kingdom.

This is what we are united around, a church body undivided, bound in Christ, being the strength, comfort, love, and compassion that each other needs.

Why?

So you can stand.

So that you can stand when it seems like you don't have what it takes alone.

In verses 3 through 4, we see a self-investment in others.

A self-investment in others.

Here we're reminded to walk humbly with one another.

That the aim of Christian life is not to have your own best interest in mind, but to have it set on others.

Remember that the two commands are the 600 and some odd commands of the scriptures are distilled into two simplistic ones.

Love God with our heart, soul, mind, and strengthen.

Love your neighbor as yourself.

This is what we are called to do.

And when we're brought into the body of Christ by grace through faith, we're then enabled by the Spirit to fulfill those commands.

We're able to actually live them out faithfully.

And here Paul is reminding us that we are to desire the good of others.

When it speaks about loving your neighbor, your brother as yourself, it's speaking of desiring the same level of good you desire for yourself, for them, and working to that end.

Whatever you desire for good for you, you should desire also for your brother, and you should work to that end.

He says, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.

Our choices, our actions, these should be for the good and benefit of others, not self.

The word here for conceit, it's the only place in the entire New Testament that this specific word is found.

And what it means is that we project an image of ourselves that is unable to be backed up by substance.

It's kind of like the American dollar.

No, I'm joking.

Anyway, we project an image of ourself of power, prestige, prominence, but we don't have the substance to actually back it up.

That's conceit.

A lot of us try to project ourselves bigger, right?

When you encounter a bear in the woods, what do you do?

You try to make yourself bigger, but you know if that bear attacked you, you're done.

You have no substance to back that up.

Right?

No right hook that you could land on that bear's skull is going to do anything.

You don't have the substance to back it up.

We are inflated in conceit.

It's.

You see, it's in the grand scheme of the unfolding redemptive plan of God that we have to ask ourselves, who are we?

Who are we really in the big picture of what God is doing through his pursuit of redemption?

Who are we?

As we understand the gospel better, we see God bigger.

As God becomes bigger, we see ourselves smaller.

This is a right reality of the gospel both believed and lived out.

That Jesus becomes bigger and bigger, and we become smaller and smaller.

But some of us don't see Jesus very big.

In fact, we see ourselves as very big, and Jesus is very small.

This is disbelief of what the gospel calls us to.

To see Jesus magnified is to not see ourselves at all.

There was this count in the 1700s in Austria named Count Zinzendorf, and he has this famous quote: preach the gospel, die, and be forgotten.

That should be our aim.

Most of us in this room, if not all of us in this room, probably a generation after we're dead, will be forgotten.

Our stories won't go on from generation to generation.

We won't be remembered.

Our gravesite won't be visited.

We will be forgotten.

Let us find joy, not that we strive to be remembered, but that we made Christ known.

Because that will have an eternal impact on people.

So what is the contrast of a life built on selfishness and a false sense of self?

Paul helps us understand.

In humility, he says, count others more significant than yourselves.

In humility.

What does it mean for us to be in humility?

It means for us to have an honest perception of our inadequacies and to have a complete dependence on his strength.

That's humility.

What's conceit?

You have a dishonest perception of yourself.

You are inflated, and you have no real substance to back it up.

Humility is you have an honest perception of your inadequacies and you look at God's power and strength to rely upon.

That's humility.

And Paul says, in that, in that, count others more significant than yourself, to think and speak more highly of others than you do yourself, to value what they bring to the table of community, to shine a light on their accomplishments instead of your own.

Ultimately, this is a commitment to live in the tension of who you are without God and who they are in Christ.

What tension are we to live in?

The reality, the honest perception of who we are without God, nothing, and who they are in Christ, more significant than yourself.

That's what Paul's calling us to live to in community with one another.

He concludes the string of instructions with a charge to each individual to look out for the interest or good of others.

You see, there's a strong assumption in the scriptures that you will have no problem looking out for your own self-interest.

This isn't some type of thing of self-love.

I've got to be able to love myself first so that I can love others better.

No, you don't understand the scriptures.

The scriptures believe and have no issues with the reality that you will have no problem loving yourself.

It just simply demands that you then love others to the same measure.

That's what the scriptures call us to.

It understands our depravity, our selfishness, our desire for gain and power and prominence.

It knows that.

It's asking us to lay it aside and try to see that built up in others.

To be a part of the undivided body means to look out for the interests of others because it is in the total health of the body that the health of the individual is most known.

The commentator I.

He says, mutual unselfish interest in building others up, enabling them to achieve and enjoy things that they scarcely thought possible for themselves.

That's the call of the church.

To see the others accomplished before you do, to see others' needs met before yours are, to see others more significant than yourself.

To be able to stand in unity in the midst of suffering, Paul calls the church to self-investment in others.

Not self-love, but an investment of the self in the good of others.

That's what we're called to.

To have yourself strive and labor for the betterment of others within the community of faith, to invest your whole self into the whole good of another.

And Paul doesn't just leave us there, right?

If Paul just closed the book and said, hey, good luck with that, how frustrating would that be?

We failed to do that in our own.

In fact, given our own propensity, we would probably lead ourselves into self-righteousness, trying to earn and strive and accomplish this and merit it to ourselves in our own workings and power and strength.

Paul doesn't do that.

He doesn't just leave us to fend now.

Paul calls us to feast.

And feast on what?

The gospel.

Here he's going to unveil this mystery, the secret.

Where is it?

It's in Christ.

He shows us that all of this is yours in Christ Jesus.

Do you see what Paul sets us up here in verses five through eight?

He shows us that we are a body that's shaped by the mind.

A body that's shaped by the mind.

Verse 5, have this mind among yourselves, which is already yours in Christ Jesus.

This mind, have it, and guess what?

It's already yours in Christ.

Just as encouragement was yours in Christ, just as consolation was yours in Christ, love and compassion was yours in Christ, so is this mindset so that we can actually live out what Paul's called us to through the power of the gospel instead of the power of self.

It's not simply the example of Christ that we're called to follow here.

We are called to lay claim to the mind of Christ given to us because we've been united to him by faith.

To be in Christ Jesus means to be found as a member of his body, which he is the head.

It is the mind of Christ that gives power for the body to be shaped.

And so we are individual members, yes, but we are shaped by the same mind into the same image, the image of the Son.

Next, Paul goes into this theological treaties of the nature and person and accomplishment of Jesus.

This is probably the crux of the letter.

This is the main meat of this letter that Paul writes to the church of Philippi.

It's this unveiling of who Christ is and what he's accomplished for us.

And then all of the instruction of the church, the obedience that we're Being called to is rooted in this unveiling.

To bring us into the mystery of his two natures, to unveil the humility of his obedience and atoning sacrifice.

This is the mind of Christ that we are being called to have in us.

And he starts in verse 6 who, though, speaking of Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.

The form of God, this heavenly being, this presence.

This really speaks to the mystery of the Trinity.

Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality of God a thing to be grasped.

Anytime we try to understand the Trinity or we try to communicate some analogy about what the Trinity is, we tend to land ourselves in heresy accidentally, usually.

Good intentions, bad results.

But thanks be to God that we are a church who finds beauty in the confessions and creeds of the ancient church.

And they have labored to try and help us communicate the mystery of the Trinity.

And there's this creed named the Athanasian Creed, of which I want us to read from together.

And the Catholic faith is this lower C Catholic, universal church.

What do we find ourselves united around?

That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in unity, neither confounding the persons nor dividing the essence.

But there is one person of the Father, another of the Son, and another of the Holy Ghost.

But the Godhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost is all one, undivided, unity, the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal.

Paul is helping us understand that Jesus is eternally coexisting with the Father.

That he was equal in essence.

But he did not count that equality something to be grasped.

We see the eternal reality, the pre-existent reality.

Even in Jesus' own language, he speaks of this.

In John chapter 17, verse 5, he says this, and now in a prayer, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.

John 17:5

The eternal son did not count equality with God a thing to be what?

Grasped for, white-knuckled, clenched fist.

What did he do?

He opened his hand, and in that he emptied himself.

What was owed to him?

Glory, power, majesty, what he deserved.

If there was anyone ever whose image was of power, prominence, prestige, and had the substance to back it up, it was Jesus.

It is Jesus.

But what does he do with that?

He lets it go.

He doesn't find it something to be grasped, to be held on to.

He lets it go and he empties himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

Instead of white-knuckling what he deserved, he demonstrated complete humility through becoming man.

It wasn't an exchange of divinity for humanity, but a fusion of the two totally, where his glory was veiled behind the flesh that he would now adorn.

Taking a form of a servant.

This would be the mode of which he emptied himself.

This language of taking the form of a servant is to become a slave.

When a person put themselves into slavery in biblical times, they forfeited all their rights and privileges.

And they had one purpose to serve.

What Jesus could have claimed as his own, what he could have grasped, he let go.

He forfeited so that he might serve us, so that he might consider our interest eternally benefiting us in his death, burial, and resurrection.

Being born in the likeness of men.

This is the manner of his emptying.

If taking the form of a servant was his mode, his manner was being born in the likeness of men, he was born into our experience.

Through the womb of a virgin, he was born under the very law of which he himself spoke to his prophet Moses.

Galatians 4, 4 says that, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of woman, born under the law.

Imagine that he subjected himself to the very law he uttered to his prophet.

And he fulfilled it perfectly.

Goes on to say in verse 8, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.

Jesus' face was set like a flint to fulfill the will of the Father.

Being born, he was born to die.

The cross showed for us what ultimate trust and obedience looks like.

Paul says it was even to the point of death, even death on a cross.

We see in the scriptures that cursed is every man who hangs from a tree.

The blessed king becomes a curse for us.

Yes, he was obedient to the point of death, but more than that, he was obedient to the point of death on a cross to become a curse, to absorb the wrath of the Father in our place that we might have eternal life in him.

Paul says, have this mind in you.

This mind.

The humility of Jesus that did whatever it took to accomplish the good for us.

The very thing that was impossible for our own hands to obtain, they sought the eternal interest of others at an imaginable, unimaginable cost to himself.

This mind is yours in Christ Jesus.

And we're called to be shaped by it.

Verse 9 through 11, we see bow now or bow later.

Bow now or bow later.

Christ emptied himself, took on the form of a slave.

He was born in the likeness of men.

He was obedient.

In humility, he was obedient even to death, even death on a cross, but it doesn't stop there.

Paul says, therefore, because of his humility and because of his obedience, God the Father has exalted him and given him the name that is above every name.

He has been exalted.

He is seated at the right hand of the Father, the place of blessing, favor, and honor.

And he has been given the name, something previously unowned to him, but now given because of his accomplishments, a name that establishes him as ruler of the cosmos.

Look at Ephesians 1.21.

Look at the majesty and grandeur of this name.

Far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age, but also in the one to come.

This is the scope of the authority of his name.

And it's at that name.

Every knee will bow, every tongue will confess.

Paul says this is the scope of it.

In heaven, on the earth, and under the earth.

Meaning every created thing will bow.

It will bow.

To what name?

Lord.

Jesus is Lord.

Yahweh.

The Lord will be worshipped.

He will be worshipped by all created things and all to the glory of God the Father.

You see, it is both the humility and the exaltation of Christ, holistically together, that brings God the glory that he deserves.

There is no king without a cross.

And so these work in harmony and this symphony of one another, the humility, the obedience, but also the exaltation, the glory, the name.

There is no king without a cross.

Many will bow the knee to him in joyful adoration.

Many of us in this room have bowed the knee in joyful adoration to that name.

Though some who remain his enemies will find themselves doing so in shame.

And so bow now or bow later.

What's Paul doing for us?

He's giving to us an unveiled secret to our citizenship.

An unveiled secret to our citizenship.

This is what Paul's delivering to us in this text.

If we are to live as citizens of heaven in a manner worthy of the gospel, being granted both the faith to believe that establishes our citizenship and the suffering that comes with it, then we will remain steadfast in the faith through humility-driven unity.

That is what he's trying to help us see and unveil to us that if we are going to be steadfast in the faith, then we will do so through humility-driven unity.

The great threat to unity is pride.

Pride divides.

Because pride does what?

Well, it thinks of itself too highly.

And it contends for its own needs and desires first.

This is what pride does.

This posture will only breed selfishness in our minds.

It will not produce the mind of Christ that is yours because you reside in him.

Pride doesn't operate in encouragement.

Pride does not operate in comfort from love, in participation or partnership in the Spirit, in affection and sympathy, love and compassion.

Pride, no, it operates in ignorance, strife, meaningless debate, envy, railings, evil, perverseness, disputes, corruption of the mind, living in air, covetousness, greed, this is what 1 Timothy chapter 6 lays out for us.

1 Timothy 6 · chapter mention

This is the fruit of pride.

Does that not seem in direct contradiction to what Paul's calling us to as a community of people?

If we're going to remain steadfast in the midst of persecution, we have to pursue unity through humility.

If we allow pride to rule over us, we will fall.

If we're going to remain steadfast, we must strive for an undivided body.

The way towards unity is humility.

To endure through suffering that has been granted to us, it will take the collective effort of a church community, one that doesn't look out for its own well-being as individual members, but that humbly pursues the better of the body collectively.

This is the secret of a citizenship that's worthy of the gospel.

And the secret is unveiled to us.

How?

Through the revealing of the person and work of Jesus.

Yet many of us, though, in Christ still function of a mind committed to selfish gain.

Committed first and foremost to you.

A brother or sister's good and embedderment are always residing second to your own, and will only be worked toward if at best there are remaining resources to do so.

Do I have time left over, energy left over, stuff left over?

This is a mind of the world.

Not a mind that has been transformed by the knowledge of Christ and his gospel.

Through the mind of pride, we create division within the body whose only outcome is falling, not prevailing.

We do this in two ways.

Some of us we display pride through selfish ambition.

Selfish ambition.

This is what Paul calls us to not do at the beginning of chapter two.

Well, what is selfish ambition?

Selfish ambition pursues drawing people unto themselves through giftings.

To try and create a following, to try and pump yourself up as the best teacher or preacher or music leader or Sunday school leader or businessman or whatever.

Fill in the blank.

It doesn't just have to be within the church.

Many of us will use our gifts that have been freely given to us by grace through the Spirit to try and create a following after self.

This is self-ambition.

What's the problem?

Inevitably, you will destroy the very people you've tried to get to follow you.

Why?

Because one day they're going to see you don't have the substance to back up what you claim.

One day they're going to see you're just conceited.

It's like with my children.

A good father does not point their children to themselves as the hero.

A good father points their children to Jesus.

And I tell my kids, I'm going to hurt you one day.

I'm going to disappoint you.

I'm not going to be there when you need me.

I'm going to fail.

Because whatever you think of me and your kids think the world of you as little children.

They think you're Superman.

And I've had to look them in the eye and say, sweetheart, I'm not your hero.

Jesus is.

Because Jesus has the substance to back up what we need from him, what we hoped to gain from him.

I don't.

The same thing with husbands.

Point your wives to Jesus, not to you.

The same thing with the church.

Us as the elders, if we're pointing you to us, if we're calling you to follow after our giftings, oh man, we are going to destroy you.

Because you're going to see me as a man.

You're going to see me as someone who doesn't have the substance to back up what you thought was in me or what I can portrayed to you.

You see, what happens is when we pursue selfish ambition, we believe our grace gifts are ones that have been merited, ones that have been earned.

I have this gift because of my effort, so you should follow me.

We don't walk in gratitude toward the gifts that God has given us.

We walk in entitlement instead.

But who am I?

Who are you?

We believe God exalts the talented, not the humble faithful.

We do not look for God to exalt us.

When we pursue selfish ambition, we look for others to exalt us.

And that's only going to end in tragedy.

Some of us, though, we display pride through self-interest.

We display pride through self-interest.

How is self-interest different from self-ambition?

Well, self-ambition is seeking to draw followers under yourself through a gifting.

Self-interest is the selfish pursuit of your own welfare.

It causes us to function in selfishness.

We believe that if we're going to be taken care of, it's going to be by the work of our own hand.

There's many of us, even in this room, have experienced some type of pain or hurt in our life, and we convinced ourselves, or we allowed the devil to convince us, that if we're ever going to actually be taken care of, we're going to have to do it ourselves.

And what does that cause us to do?

Become calloused in heart?

To grasp for things that we don't have claim to, to be greedy and to hoard, to look out for me, because no one else is going to do it.

And what is that communicating about our faith?

We fail to trust God.

We fail to believe his promises.

We believe that resources are scarce and need to be white-knuckled.

We fail to see the abundance of God's resources and his joyful distribution of them.

Is God not the perfect God?

If you ask for a fish, is he going to give you a serpent?

If you ask for bread, is he going to give you a stone?

Does he not feed the sparrows?

Does he not clothe the lily?

Does he not count the hairs that fall from your head?

Has he not numbered your days?

Is he not a father who loves you?

Then why is there such a chasm between our inability to believe he is good and the promises that he's made to us and fulfilled in Christ Jesus?

Because if we're honest, we don't believe him.

And maybe it's because we saw our dad as a superhero, and one day we saw he didn't have the substance to back it up.

And then we project that on God.

Well, I've heard empty promises before.

I've been let down by a word that meant nothing.

I don't know, God.

If you're real, that's great, and hopefully you take care of me, but I'm gonna make sure that I'm taken care of through my own strength.

You see, both of these, selfish ambition and self-interest, these heart issues foster division in the body.

Through the mind of pride, our only outcome is to be divided and fall.

In our ever pursuit of exaltation, we discover ourselves disgraced.

You see, that's what both of those are really striving for.

Selfish ambition and self-interest ultimately together are pursuing exaltation.

In our being, we want to be exalted.

You and I, that's what we really want.

And so we work for it.

In our own clawing and scraping, self-serving, we are working to be exalted.

We've been called to an undivided reality through a mind of humility so that collectively we might remain steadfast.

In our pursuit of exaltation, we fail to believe the truth of the gospel.

And the truth of it is that we are delivered from selfish pride because Jesus is Lord.

You and I are delivered from selfish pride because Jesus is Lord.

Jesus is Lord.

He became the lowest.

He took the form of a servant, he was born in the likeness of men.

He was humble and obedient even to death.

Jesus became the lowest.

But Paul inserts that therefore in verse 9.

He also became the highest.

Jesus exalted above every name of this age and the age to come.

Christ has been exalted.

The cross produced its crown.

And in him, in Christ, remember, this is what Paul's helping you understand.

Have this mind that is yours in Christ Jesus.

While, how are we in Christ?

We are in Christ in encouragement, in love and compassion, in partnership in the Spirit.

We are in Christ so much so that we are exalted with him.

Our vain pursuit of self-exaltation finds itself in its end, in a humble state of honesty, exalted with Christ.

Because he has become exalted, and in him we are seated there also.

Ephesians chapter 2, verse 6 shows us this and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 2:6

Why can we walk in humility that produces unity?

Why do I not have to fend for myself anymore?

Why do I have to make sure that my needs are taken care of or that I have some type of following because of some gift that I didn't even earn but was given to me by grace?

I can do that, I can lay my life down because my striving for exaltation has been fulfilled eternally and ultimately beyond all that I could ever obtain in my own effort in Christ.

I'm seated with Him.

This is the secret.

This is the secret of our citizenship.

All of our sinful strivings for exaltation do two things.

One, they show a chasm of disbelief between our understanding and the truth of the gospel.

And number two, they fall infinitely short to the exaltation that Christ received through humility and obedience.

Church, have this mind in you, which is already yours in Christ Jesus.

And what's awesome about this is this is the thrust of repentance.

How do we define repentance?

To think the way God thinks.

Have this mind which is already yours in Christ Jesus.

To think like he thinks, to think in his ways, in his purposes.

This is the thrust of repentance.

What's Paul calling the Church of Philippi to?

Repent.

Stop only looking out for yourself.

Stop trying to create some following.

Stop serving yourself and being selfish.

You're creating division.

And there's persecution and suffering that's going to come your way because of the belief that you confess.

And if you keep allowing this pride, selfish ambition and self-interest to foster, you're going to fall.

Because you'll be a church divided.

But you want to know the secret of your citizenship?

That because you're exalted with Christ and seated with Him, you can live in humility, seeking the interest and good and betterment of one another that builds unity.

And undivided you will stand.

That's the church.

That's what we need to do, church.

Christian, come out from beneath the weight and destruction of pride and enter into the rest and beauty of humility.

I don't have to strive anymore.

I don't have to contend for myself anymore.

I don't have to hoard up and grasp for and white knuckle resources anymore.

I don't have to.

Because I'm in Christ.

And instead of pride and arrogance that just wears me down and destroys others in the process, I get to joyfully walk in humility and I get to actually experience rest.

And I can serve you before I serve myself because I know I'm already taken care of.

I can love you.

I can see you get a light shined on you.

I can see you be putting in places that I only ever imagined or dreamed that I would be in.

I can see you being elevated into places of influence.

And so I can see you win.

And I don't have to be afraid of it anymore.

Because I'm exalted in Christ.

Since we have been exalted in Christ's church, we can joyfully lower ourselves for another's lifting up.

So my hope, my prayer for us as a church is that we would be a steadfast community of humble, selfless citizens.

That we would be a steadfast community of humble, selfless citizens.

Persecution is coming in one way or another.

Trials are coming because of the faith that we confess.

Here's how I know that's going to be true.

I don't have to look at the culture to know that to be true.

I can look at the way you're being emboldened with the gospel to know that that's going to be true.

Where we've allowed the culture to make us quiet so that we don't have to endure suffering or go through hardships.

What I'm seeing in this church body is an emboldenment to share that very gospel, no matter what cost it comes at.

The only reason that the church has not suffered persecution in greater forms is because we've allowed ourselves to be quiet.

It's not because the culture's shifting or changing to be more aggressive toward Christianity.

It's that we haven't been as boisterous as we should have been for too long now.

So how is persecution coming?

Because we're going to get bolder.

We're going to share the gospel.

We're going to evangelize and call people to repentance and trust in the finished work of Jesus.

That's going to bring persecution.

How do I know that?

Jesus promised it would.

Paul said it's been granted to us.

So how are we going to stand when that comes?

How are we going to keep from one another falling away?

How are we going to persevere and be found steadfast?

We're going to be a community of citizens of heaven who live lives worthy of the gospel because we stand undivided through humility.

That's how we'll stand.

No matter what comes our way, if we're committed to have this mind in us, which is ours in Christ Jesus, to seek the good, embeddement, self interest of others before we do ourselves, we will foster an undivided reality of community that hell itself cannot shake.

Let's pray.