Multiply | May 24 2026 (Part 7)

Once you turn with me in your Bibles to Philippians Chapter 1.

Philippians 1 · chapter mention

Philippians 1. Paul's letter to the church in

Philippi. If you have seen the movie

Braveheart, a very famous quote Every man dies.

Not every man really lives. Words of William Wallace, who

led the Scottish resistance against King Edward the First to

free Scotland from English rule. This man lived with a purpose.

He sensed that he had a very high calling.

And each one of us, do you realize that we have a high

calling? We have each one of us has a

high calling. Erwin McManus probably just kind

of an off quote of William Wallace, but he said the real

tragedy is not that we might die young, but that we might live to

old age and not truly live. Are you truly living?

Are you living the life that God has intended for us?

How would you define that? How do you how would you define

hey, this is really living. You know, you see the cake

commercials of people smiling around nice food and everything

is a good good time with friends.

That's a good thing. Maybe it's travel.

I wanna go go around the world, see the world.

I mean that's you know, that's really living.

Skydiving, anybody in skydiving like super massive big

adventure. That's truly living and all

those things part of life. While not probably for everybody

skydiving, but what the Bible defines as truly living is

giving ourselves over to a higher purpose, God's higher

purpose for each one of us. And He has a purpose for you.

And there's a reason why you're sitting in the seat today to be

hearing a message like this. You and I have been invited into

His church, which is His primary operating arm, for bringing His

grace into the world and to multiply His goodness, to spread

His goodness everywhere. That He as the, the, the great,

the holy and righteous, just and merciful kind God would be seen

in us and through us and that others would enter into that

friendship with Him as well. Every single one of us.

We received new members or new ministry partners today.

That is a step forward in saying I want to embrace a higher

purpose. I want to link arms with others

in joining the mission of Jesus in a very intentional way.

And we might say, OK, great. You know, this new ministry

partners, good for them. That's good, good for them.

But we need to realize it's good for us, it's good for everybody

that this happens. And so today I just wanna just

briefly talk about why that is the case.

Why is it so significant and why should we be celebrating an

event like this? So Father, in the name of Jesus,

we come to worship you this morning.

And Lord, as we open your word, we just recognize that this is a

living word, living and active, sharper than any double edged

sword, even inviting soul and spirit, joints and marrow,

exposing the thoughts and the intentions of the heart.

Lord, we thank you for this glorious, powerful word.

Lord, may it minister to us, comfort us, confront us, hold

us, and send us. For the glory of your great name

we pray. Amen Philippians chapter 1.

Philippians 1 · chapter mention

We're just gonna read the first 6 verses here.

Everybody with me. Here we go, Paul and Timothy,

servants of Christ Jesus to all God's holy people 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 and 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.

Amazing letter. I encourage you to read the rest

of the letter maybe later this afternoon.

But just a few things to point out.

So Paul and Timothy, Paul, Paul is the one that's writing this

letter and we know that as we walk through it.

It's just you know, he is he is referring to himself writing

this letter. Timothy is his obviously his

colleague and ministry, a fellow partner in ministry and he was

actually with him when the Church of Philippi was birthed.

And so the people of Philippi would know Timothy, now

Philippi, the church started in this secular city really with

the, the, the first conversion, which was Lydia, from what we

understand. So Lydia was a, a businesswoman,

a seller of, of purple cloth. And she came to Christ and she

was quite wealthy and she actually had a home big enough

to house many people. So a lot church services were

happening in her house. So she was, she was the first

convert. The Lord opened up her heart.

The second, from what we know, at least what's described in

Acts chapter 16, is a fortune teller who was possessed by

Acts 16 · chapter mention

demons and Paul cast the demons out of her and she becomes a

believer. And this actually lands Paul and

Silas in jail. And then the next believer, the

next person in Philippi that we understand has come to Christ,

is the jailer who kneels before Paul after seeing an incredible

miracle and just says, what must I do to be saved?

And so these are the very people the of the kind of the founding

members of the church that Paul's writing to in Philippot.

It's kind of the beginning. And so these people mean an

awful lot to Paul. And so he's writing this letter

to them. And, you know, he starts off by

saying verse in verse three, 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 1st until now. We need to realize, like, we

read these words. Yeah, that that's really nice.

Paul's in prison. He's in chains.

And it's not just these serving a little bit of time like his

he, he realizes his he's likely gonna be executed.

He ain't going home after jail. And what is he doing?

He's not adopting a poor me attitude.

It's not like oht, you know. Why is God doing this to me?

Nothing like that. He hasn't turned inward.

He's not angry, He's not bitter. He is thankful.

I thank my God and he's praying for these people.

He's writing a letter right now. He's ready to face his death,

but he's writing a letter to encourage other believers.

Like seriously, this is amazing to me that that is a sign of the

grace of God in this man. His joy has come to him as a

result of his giving his life over to a higher purpose, the

Gospel, verse 12. He says, no, I want you to know,

brothers. Here he is coming and

encouraging them. Like I want you to know,

brothers and sisters, that what has happened to me has actually

served to advance the gospel. He, he finds himself in jail and

he sees this as an opportunity because he has been redeemed by

grace. He knows the love of God and he

knows that that God is using him as a conduit of his love to, to

to bring the gospel to other people.

And he's thinking this is just part of part of God's plan.

Now we all end up in places, hey, that we would rather not be

from time to time, right? We're in dead end jobs that we

can't stand, right? We we're in schools that we

don't feel like we fit into. You know, we're in families that

we don't feel like we can handle very well.

We're in hospital rooms that for weeks.

And Peter, it is so good to see you here.

You know, seeing Peter in the hospital, who's been there, Like

how many weeks has it been now? Yeah, for I think is that I

think it isn't even. Is it for?

Yeah, yeah, OK. Yeah, a lot of time.

And so Peter in the hospital, right?

What do you do in a hospital room all by yourself?

They're all private rooms now in Grimsby Hospital.

Beautiful hospital, but he's praying for the hospital staff

and he's sharing the gospel with people that come into his room,

seeing that as an opportunity. OK, I would rather not be on my

back in a hospital room. But now that I am, and I have a

great God who has carried me thus far, I'm gonna share him

with other people. He sees an opportunity.

This is this is the apostle Paul in this letter.

This is this is gonna I'm gonna take this opportunity to bring

the gospel to other people. Recognises the sovereign God is

in charge of all of this stuff. His joy.

It's like he's writing this letter and saying, hey, guys, I

love you and I so appreciate you.

And it is a privilege to serve alongside of you like that.

You could see that these, they weren't just, you know, these

were friends in Jesus Christ. And that's what the church is

meant, meant to be. And that joy he describes comes

out of the partnership that they have in the gospel.

I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the

gospel, that word partnership. It's a business term, right?

Partners will, will, will, will come together and and form a

business and do business. But that word partnership it

it's the translation of the word Koinonia.

And so if you've been in church circles for some time, you know

that word coin ania is typically translated fellowship, right?

We think of fellowship, but fellowship is has become a

little bit more of a kind of kind of an empty term today.

Because what Paul's talking about is, you know, sometimes we

think of fellowship as, you know, the warm fuzzy feeling

that we get when we're all kind of all, you know, kind of

enjoying one another's company and enjoying one of those

company in church. That's that's a pretty big deal.

It's important that we doing that, but it's far more than

that. There's a joy that comes when we

know that we're linking arms and doing something of great

significance. And Paul?

Paul knows that participating together to make the gospel

known, New international version translates, Koinonia

partnership, ESV partnership, even the living translation.

New Living Translation Was it safe that we're partners in

spreading the good news about about Christ, the high purpose,

getting the gospel out and when we think about the gospel and

that word is sometimes a buzzword for people, right?

What do we mean by gospel? It's not just like a body of

teaching. It's not like there's certain

style of music. It's a person and his name is

Jesus Christ and he has come in order that we as enemies of God

just by nature are now now can become friends that we in our

rebellion and our pride and our resistance toward God almost

every minute of the day, ignoring him, forgetting him,

doing our own thing. He comes to us with love and

compassion and embraces us and he takes these nails in his

hands and becomes the substitute in our place for what we deserve

for us in and then dies that incredibly awful death and is

raised to life so that you and I can have life that no

condemnation would ever be placed on us again.

All of our sins forgiven, completely washed clean, and we

can now walk in friendship with the living God all the days.

I mean, it's incredible. And now empowered by His Holy

Spirit, Pentecost Sunday, powered by His Holy Spirit to go

out and just spread this good news, this proclamation of how

good, incredibly good God is. That is the gospel to proclaim.

And this is what life is about, you know, Jesus said in in

Matthew chapter 8. He said For whoever wants to

Matthew 8 · chapter mention

save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for

me and for the gospel will save it.

We are meant to make sacrifices to get the gospel out, to enjoy

it ourselves, but not just to hold it in ourselves, but to get

it to everybody that we know. And we come together on a Sunday

morning just to remind ourselves of this incredible good news, to

remind ourselves why we're here, what life is about, and to, to,

to, to be reminded about how we can fully live, as William

Wallace might put it. And part of the amazing

privilege that we have together is to spur one another on in the

gospel, to speak the gospel to one another.

I need to hear the gospel every day.

It's not just the day that I was, I was saved.

I need to hear it every day. The love that God has for me

when I blow it and I blow it off.

And just to know, John, you're loved, you're forgiven.

There is no longer any condemnation on you.

And in fact, you've got the righteousness of I need.

I need to hear that. We need to hear that.

We need to speak the truth of the gospel to one another, to

encourage one another. And not just to fellow

believers, but also to coworkers and neighbors and schoolmates

and the people that we come in contact with rub shoulders with

every day, getting the gospel into us and getting the gospel

out to the world. And that is how verse 6 happens,

that you know, he says that 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 a work of God.

As we let the gospel marinate in our souls, God is completing

that work, good work in us that he began his beautiful Philemon

6 super small letters, the smallest letter in the New

Testament, powerful verse, verse 6, it says, I pray this is Paul

saying, I pray that your partnership with us in the faith

may be effective in deepening your understanding of every good

thing we share for the sake of Christ.

As we partner in the faith partnership of the gospel, as we

take that seriously, we're gonna understand more fully every good

thing that we have in Christ. It's a beautiful thing.

It's a beautiful thing that happens and that's why we no

longer will. I shouldn't say we no longer,

but we tend to not use the word membership as much anymore

because there, even though it's a bit, actually it's a biblical

term. It came from Scripture

membership to us today. Because you can be a member of

the fitness club, you can be a member of, you know, whatever it

might be, it's kind of lost its bite.

Membership in the body of Christ means that you're a vital part.

It is. You're a critical piece in this

family. And but partnership with

partnership communicate is something that we all know.

Yeah, we're we're joining together in a venture in order

to bring about something that God is doing.

And there's an engagement aspect.

Member is a little bit more static.

It's a little bit OK, sit back and remember everything's

alright. Partnership is know there's

something that needs to be done and we're called to do this

together. So we are certainly members, but

we like to call it ministry partners.

And when we get that idea in our mind that we are partnering with

the living God in our lives, that's when life gets exciting,

right? Because it's not all up to me.

God's up to something in this world.

And when we when we understand that and walk with Him and hear

the voice of the Holy Spirit and, and, and respond to his

prompting, we can be used of Him to do world changing things.

That's when life gets excited. So receiving new ministry

partners, it's a big deal. It is a super big deal.

It's not just a liturgy. It's not like a denominational

or ecclesiastical, you know, format or procedure that we're

doing. It is a celebration that a shift

is taking place in these people, that there's been movement in

their life. Like to talk about it in this

way. All of us start as consumers.

All of us are there. It's kind of like I'm coming to

church to get something out of church.

I'm a consumer and but we're not meant to stay there.

There's a movement when we become moved from a consumer to

a contributor and a contributor saying I'm gonna actually give

something of myself to this cause usually there's some

extreme limits on what I give, but I'm gonna give something.

But then there's a movement to that requires a bit more

sacrifice, and that's what I would call a collaborator, which

is what a ministry partner really is, is that I am now

joining with others in moving this mission forward.

And I'm willing to make some sacrifices for this.

We're gonna work together toward a common goal.

I'm gonna be an active part in shaping this ministry and as

well, moving this ministry forward.

So it's not so much, hey, good for them, but it's good for all

of us that we have people that are committed to seeing a local

church thrive. That's what partnership in

ministry is really all about. So, yeah, there's sacrifices to

becoming a ministry partner. There is, but man, when you look

at the words of Jesus, I mean what, what did he say?

I mean, I, I quoted from Mark 8. Let's just read the verse just

before that, Mark 834. Whoever wants to be my disciple

must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.

So in other words, the calling is not to be comfortable.

We're invited to fit our lives into his mission.

Not OK, Jesus, I'm gonna somehow fit you into my life.

But no, your life is everything, and I'm gonna fit my life into

yours. For whoever wants to save their

life, that is hold on to conserve their life, will lose

it. But whoever loses their life for

me and for the gospel, we'll save it.

The Church of Jesus Christ is calling the world with this

invitation of Jesus. Come follow me, come follow me.

Let's change the world together. Let's bring the good news to

every part of this planet. So what does that look like?

We call it just refer to it as abiding, loving and bearing

fruit. You know, there there's there's

a there's a basic commitment to growing.

I wanna grow in my love for God. I wanna grow in my love for

people and I wanna grow in being a better disciple maker.

That commitment. There's it's not a standard in

that you have to meet. It's just saying, my heart is

such that I want to get better at this.

I wanna love God more deeply. I wanna love people better.

I wanna, I wanna learn how to serve better other people, and I

wanna get better at multiplying disciples on this earth.

None of us are pros at this. Even those of us are getting

paid for it. We're not.

We're all learners, right? That's what a disciple is, a

learner. It's all about moving forward,

moving forward, moving forward. So I want to invite everybody to

stand if you, if you would, as we close this series off

multiplication series, it's I think it's important for us just

to recognize the sovereignty of God in all things.

This is Pentecost Sunday. This is this is this, you know,

50 days after Easter and and it's a it's the moment that the

the Jesus sends his Holy Spirit, his Holy Spirit is poured out

onto the church and the church receives these tongues of fire,

which enables them to communicate the gospel in every

language that was represented in the city at that time.

And I would just wanna pray for us that the, the, the Holy

Spirit would be poured on, on, on us so, so beautifully, so

powerfully that we'll, we'll have a new fresh boldness and a

capacity to, to clearly share the, the good news with the

people that were that we, that we love.

And sometimes we feel that we can't, we can't just say the

name Jesus, right? And to do it in a natural way,

not a religious way, but as as an act of love.

And so if you would just you don't have to close your eyes,

but if you could feel free to close your eyes with me and,

and, and pray this prayer. I just just one verse Acts

Acts 4 · chapter mention

chapter 4 and of Acts chapter 4. After they prayed, the place

Acts 4 · chapter mention

where they were meeting was shaken and they were all filled

with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.

Lord, we thank you that you are the same God who did that in

that 1st century church is the God that we're worshipping now.

And we turn to you, Lord, the close of this series.

And thank you for the things that we've learned.

Thank you for the great things that you have done and the great

things that you promised to do. And we open ourselves up to you,

nothing else but you, more of you in our life.

Send your Holy Spirit upon us, we pray, pour out your Holy

Spirit. Holy Spirit, you are most

welcome here. Lord, enter in power.

Every open heart this morning fill us that we could reflect

Jesus better. Lord, as individuals and as a

church family, help us enable us to communicate Your Word with

clarity and with boldness, and we ask that many would come to

faith as a result of it. Thank you for hearing our

prayer, Lord, for we all pray it in the name of Jesus Christ and

all God's people say Amen.