[Generated Transcript]

Would you open up with me to Philippians 4, and we’ll start in verse 10. As we’re closing out Philippians this week, we come to the last section, and we see sort of this is the occasion that he wrote this whole letter. They had sent him a gift, and now he’s letting them know that he’s received the gift, and he’s thanking them for it.

Now there’s something peculiar about that because it’s just here at the end. And some people will make much of that and say, well, it’s all just a way of him thinking, the whole letter. But it’s sort of like if you write a birthday card to maybe your mom. And it’s because it’s a birthday, but you end up writing a whole page because you have a lot to tell her about. But it’s not just because you had to fill out paper to say it.

Paul’s thanking them for a gift, but really he’s trying to teach them something. And so this is sort of the occasion, but the gift, as we’ll see in this section, is not actually the focus of what Paul’s most concerned about. So as we go through, you’ll see that he’s speaking about the gift, but he’s trying to teach them a number of things.

He tells them about his own contentment in Christ. He celebrates that they’re partners with him in the work of Christ. And then he says that his joy is that they’re gonna benefit from their labor in Christ. So those are kind of the three things that Paul is trying to communicate in this section. But underlying all of that, he’s trying to, as he’s done the whole letter, try and give them the mind of Christ.

How do you walk as citizens of Christ’s church? How do you have a mindset to process things according to a whole new reality? Something that’s so hard for us to understand from the world that we live in, that we’re actually united to Christ. Not just that we want to be like him, or we want to draw on similarity, but underlying this whole section is something called union with Christ. That Paul is one and the same with Christ. The church is one and the same with Christ. And that they are completely together. So we’re gonna go through three things, but we’re gonna also look at how underneath all of that is Paul’s trying to communicate this new reality that we live in as Christians. that we are completely joined up with Christ.

Let me read and then we’ll get into the exposition. Starting in verse 10. Oh, I’m sorry, I did not pray yet. Let me pray. Lord, as we come to you in prayer, our prayer here is not just an afterthought or a side thing, but it’s deeply necessary. because we need Christ to speak his word into our heart. We need you to tell us the truth, to enlighten dark areas, to teach us obscure things to us, to give us rejoicing and joy, generosity, communion in Christ. And so you are the only one who we can come to to ask for those things. Would you bless us in Christ today?

Amen. Starting in verse 10. I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

Yet it was kind of you to share my trouble. And you Philippians yourselves know that in the beginning of the gospel, when I left Macedonia, no church entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving except you only. Even in Thessalonica, you sent me help for my needs, once and again. Not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit that increases to your credit. I have received full payment and more.

I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God. and my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen. Greet every saint in Christ Jesus. The brothers who are with me greet you. All the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar’s household. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.

This ends the reading of God’s word. As we come to this section, I want to draw out a few things which actually are background, but when you think about this as sort of like a missionary report letter, they are a little bit peculiar that they are background issues. So he says at the very end, all the saints greet you, especially those of Caesar’s household.

So he’s writing from Rome, and he’s telling them just with that one little comment, Oh, right in the emperor’s own domain, there are Christians. There are believers there. He doesn’t say anything more about them, and he probably couldn’t say much about them or they might get in trouble, but he just tells them that there are those of Caesar’s household who know you and are thanking you because they are in Christ. Isn’t that an amazing piece of news? It’s like you have a missionary in a closed country, and he finally says, we’ve got some converts. I can’t tell you much about them, but there are people coming to faith.

That would consume a whole letter. And for Paul, it’s just a little side comment here. It’s not that he doesn’t care about the conversion of people. He clearly does, because he wants to communicate about it. But he’s not just celebrating the fruit that he has. Look what I’ve been able to do. Do you see that? There’s a reason that this is just background. It’s information to communicate. Let’s celebrate this. But I have things I want to teach you. There’s something else that’s quite strange.

This section here is speaking about a gift that they have sent. If you remember when we talked about Epaphroditus, he was the messenger that they had sent, sort of their apostle, their missionary, and he had brought their money to them. Now, we think of this as sort of a regular transaction. Maybe you send $200 a month to a missionary at the church.

That wouldn’t be the way that they would do things here. Imagine I had some news for you that your bank called, and they said, OK, you know, Story of Our Moves is closed, and diesel prices are up, and there’s going to be some changes for how much it costs to wire things. This next month, it’s going to be about $60,000 to wire the money.

And it’s going to take about two months for it to get there. Sorry, it’s just inflation. It’s just the way it is. That would be a huge thing, right? It would really change the way that we support missionaries, if that’s the money it costs for it to get there. But this church had to send the money through Epaphroditus. And this was like a 700-mile trip.

And he had to pay his fare to go on overseas and maybe pay his fare to go over land to avoid trouble. they estimate that it probably was a whole year’s wage just for his traveling fees to get to Rome. And then there’s all the time that he has lost where he would have been working. So you’ve just lost a congregant who’s not able to work anymore, and you’re sending him on this trip. And then you have to give him a whole year’s salary just for him to travel, not even to support himself. And then he’s carrying money that has to make that trip worth it.

So we don’t know how much money Paul received, but just knowing those numbers, this was a huge amount of money. And this is not a large church. This isn’t like a thousand member mega church that’s saying, okay, well, we can throw out a few hundred thousand over there. This is a small little group of congregants, and they’ve pulled together a ton of money.

And then they’ve lost a congregant to go and send him off. So whatever Paul’s received, they want this report to know, did it make it there, or was it stolen? Did anything get lost? And he tells them, that’s made it. But he’s received a substantial amount that’s covering his expenses, and then probably the expenses of other workers with him. This is a huge amount of money that this church is giving Paul. And he doesn’t focus on how big it is. Say you gave a missionary, here’s three quarters of a million dollars.

You’d expect a thank you letter, right? And it better be pretty profuse, right? But they don’t get that. They get a letter of thanks, but mostly teaching. Because Paul has other priorities. Do you see how this is a little bit strange? There are probably a number of things in this section that we could spend a lot of time on. Could think, wow, how much are these people giving in order to be able to send this much money? What’s the generosity of their heart? And there’s things that are going to convict us. But we’re going at a macro level. We’re going over all these verses at once.

And that’s not actually the focus of the letter of Philippians. As we’ve gone over in other parts of Philippians, the focus of the letter is not actually getting into the minute detail, make you convicted, change some behavior over here. The point of Philippians is, I want to change your manner of life. I want to change your mindset. I want you to live as citizens of the new kingdom. That’s what Paul hits on over and over and over again, that it’s about a mindset shift. And that mindset shift then changes behaviors.

But if you try and mess with the symptoms, you’re never going to get to the disease underneath. There’s realities to the life of a Christian that are hard for us to understand, that have happened to us because we’ve been converted and we are in Christ, but we need to learn what it actually means so that we can live out of that reality. And that’s what Paul’s been trying to teach us the whole time through Philippians. And that’s what I’m gonna focus on in this section.

Because it’s underneath everything that he’s gonna teach us. And so I don’t want you to focus on, yeah, you can go back and think about some of the lessons that you’re hearing. Well, could I grow in generosity? Or could I grow in contentment? But the main point I want you to think of is, well, what’s my mindset? How do I think about Christ in relation to my life? Because that’s what Paul’s doing in this broader section. There’s a manner of life, a union with Christ that permeates everything that Paul does. I want to start by seeing that in Paul’s own contentment.

Starting in verse 10, it says, I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. So Paul’s rejoicing because of what the Philippians have sent to him, but he speaks about it as a concern for him. I’m glad that you’re now concerned for me. Now, he has a caveat and says, well, I’m not saying you weren’t concerned before, but now you’ve had a chance to be concerned. There’s an opportunity, and you sprung for it.

But then he immediately turns and says, but I’m not really in need. It’s not about my need. Why does he say that? He’s been given a gigantic sum of money, and he probably does need that money. He’s in jail. But he says, ah, it’s not actually about my need that’s most concerning for me. And why does he say that? I’m not speaking of being in need.

He says, for I have learned in whatever circumstance I am to be content. the contentment of Paul. He’s been given a gigantic sum of money, and he thinks, well, that was nice, but I would have been fine without this. Do you see that? I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. Paul has said, this isn’t something I just had, but through my ministry, through Christ growing me, I’ve been able to actually be both rich and poor and be content in Christ in both circumstances.

Now, we tend to think of contentment as only, well, how would I do if I was really poor? How would I do if I was starving? How would I do if I was in a lot of pain? Would I be content in Christ in that area? But I think that there are some of us who also struggle as much on the other side. Well, if I also had a lot of money, or what if I was satisfied with my life, if things were going well for me, would I still be content in Christ? And Paul sees dangers on both sides and says, actually, I’ve been in both sides, and Christ has taught me to be content no matter what he gives me.

And so that when I receive this huge sum of money, I’m not overwhelmed with, wow, this is exactly what I needed. I don’t know how to survive without it. He says, well, I would have been okay. I’m content with whatever God gives me. But what I wanna get to is how. How does he get to that spot?

He says, I can do all things through him who strengthens me. Paul’s contentment is because he knows he’s resting in Christ. Because he knows that, well, I may be really hungry right now, but I know that God won’t forget me. I know God will give me what I need. I may be really poor right now, but I know he’s gonna provide. If we had that assurance, we would have that contentment too. Or on the other side, well, I have all of this money, or I have all of this food that I enjoy, but my contentment’s in Christ because I know that it’s not worth what my mind tells me, or my taste buds tell me. I know that it’s not gonna actually satisfy me, so I’m still content in Christ.

Well, how does Paul say this? The reason he says this is that he knows he’s united to Christ. He’s united to Christ. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. We’re going back to verse 10. He’s rejoicing, but he says, I rejoiced in the Lord. The Lord’s the one who provided this for me. Well, how can he be so sure nothing’s gonna fall? Because he knows that God takes care of his children. He knows that he’s one of Christ’s.

But we’ll get to more of that later. Paul then moves and he says, here’s what I am appreciative of. So he just went over and he said, in verse 10, I rejoice that you revived your concern for me. But let me correct you. It’s not that I needed it. It’s not that I was at this point of desperation. OK, well, what are you rejoicing in?

And in verse 14, he says, yet it was kind of you to share my trouble. Here’s the first thing that Paul gives him joy, that he rejoices in. Their partnership, their partnership with him. Yet it was kind of you to share my trouble. What he’s saying by this is, look, I was at a spot where I needed something, but God was going to provide it. Why am I so joyful now? Because I wanted you to be the vehicle. I wanted to be in partnership with you. You’re the one who I wanted to share this with. The partnership is the thing that gives him joy. It’s not the money, but it’s the fact of we are doing this together. I wanted you to provide this for me because you’re my friend.

It’s like if your wife gives you an anniversary present, and you’re going to go, I don’t know if it’s something to hit all of you, but you’re going to go to the baseball game that you’ve always wanted to go to. You’re going to watch the Super Bowl live. And then you get it, and you start to feel glad, and you think, we can only afford one of these tickets. I’m going to have to do this all by myself. You think, man, it’s just not the same. I wanted to do this with you. How about we go and do something that we can do together?

What he’s really glad about is, I’m glad that it’s you that I’m doing this with. I’m glad God didn’t just provide me support through some pagan, or the church here in Rome, or something that fell out of the sky, because I want to be in this with you. Because then he goes on in verse 15, he shares how much they’re united together. You Philippians yourselves know that in the beginning of the gospel, when I left Macedonia, no church entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving except you only.

It says right at the very beginning. There’s an interesting phrase there. The beginning of the gospel. This is the beginning of the gospel of Christ. But for them, it’s right at the beginning, right when I first delivered the gospel to you. That was the beginning of the gospel for you. And right from the very beginning, that’s when your support, that’s when your partnership happened.

He’ll go on to say, even in Thessalonica. So what he’s recalling is Acts 16. He arrives in Philippi. He’s there for a brief time. And a small little church is planted. And then he has to leave, and he goes to Thessalonica next. And he has three or four weeks in Thessalonica where there’s a lot of oppression and he has to leave. But it’s the very next place he goes and he’s left a little child church in Philippi. But even right afterwards, they’ve already started sending him support.

Right at the very beginning of their walk with Christ. And they were the only ones. This small little church. He knows all of these churches in the area and he says, you were the only ones who joined with me. So this church in Philippi, it’s like his own baby. But it says, well, you actually were the only ones who helped me out. You were the only friends I had of that kind.

And you started it right away. You send a kid off to college, and he starts working, and he starts sending money back to you. You think, well, that’s not the way it’s supposed to happen. Don’t expect your kids to do that, by the way. But that’s what happened. You send the kids out of the house, and immediately they’re sending money to help you.

You think, wow, you must really care for me. That’s unusual. And they were the only ones, a unique partnership right from the beginning. But then it says, even in Thessalonica, you sent me help for my needs once and again. This wasn’t just a thank offering. Let me send you something quick. But repeatedly, they checked up on him, and they sent him gifts. Now, he was only in Thessalonica for a few weeks, but they sent repeated help.

This is something about the partnership, the friendship that he feels with them. We are so united in this work that over and over again, you sent me help. Right from the very beginning, we were united as equals. You weren’t just my child, but we were brothers and sisters right there, right side by side, doing the work. And that’s what he finds joy in. Celebration that it’s them. The joy is that he has a partnership with them, and then he sees it tangibly when they send this gift.

It came from 700 miles away and says, we’re still with you. We’re walking side by side with you. We’re partners in this, even though it takes two months for it to arrive. We’re doing this ministry with you. Even though we’re facing all this persecution back home, we’re with you.

And what Paul is joyed about is, man, I have a partner. I have a partner. The second thing that he is joyful about, verse 17, not that I seek the gift, but I seek the fruit that increases to your credit. Paul says, there’s one other thing that brings me joy is knowing that this is gonna be for your benefit. Look what he says, verse 18, I have received full payment and more. I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, a fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God. Now in that verse, he communicates, look, I’ve received your gift, and I know that this is the full gift.

Nothing was stolen, nothing was lost. This is everything that you sent. But immediately he turns and brings it not from his gratitude or his thanks, but he says, now here’s how God’s gonna view it. Do you see that turn? I’ve received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, but here’s what those gifts mean, here’s what they are.

A fragrant offering, a sacrifice acceptable and pleasing to God. As they’re giving this to Paul, he says, God is smiling on this. He’s looking at this as a gift given to him because this is God’s work that he’s in. And your offering is a pleasing aroma. It’s grabbing from the language of Noah when he comes off of the ark, and he burns a sacrifice, and then the smell of it goes up to God as a pleasing aroma, and it causes God to make a covenant with the whole earth.

And he says, well, your thanksgiving that Noah gave, I wanna pay back. I’m gonna give a covenant out. And that’s where Paul goes. My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. Can you think about the magnitude of that promise? Paul’s telling the Philippian church, now God is gonna pay you back according to not Paul’s riches, but Christ’s riches. That’s a lot of riches, isn’t it? That’s a lot of payment. And what Paul is doing is he’s paralleling it. The Philippian church, this small little church, has given, as soon as they had opportunity, this huge amount of money. We don’t seem to think that they’re super rich, but they gave abundantly out of all the riches that they had.

Let me tell you why I think that. Verse 10, the second half of that, it says, you were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. He says it wasn’t like it just popped into your head, oh, we should send them a gift. But he’s saying, oh, the Philippians have always had me in mind.

But as soon as they had opportunity, that’s when they sent something. Now we have enough money. Now we know where he’s at. Now let’s get something over to him. As soon as they were able to. They supplied Paul out of the whatever riches that they had. And Paul says, well, God is gonna pay that back out of his riches. And he’s gonna supply every need that you have. Now this may sound a little charismatic or Pentecostal, but do you see what he means by that? He’s not saying, look, you gave money and now God’s going to give you money. But you gave money which is going to fade away. What are the riches of Christ? Life. Joy, peace, the fruit of the Spirit, the things that you can’t buy with money. Out of the riches of Christ, you’re going to be paid back with the fullness of who Christ is.

Now, isn’t it interesting that what Paul is most concerned about, he’s received this huge sum of money, and his joy focuses on, I’m glad I have a partner, and I’m glad that you are going to be benefited in Christ. If you were given a vast sum of money, would that be the first thought on your mind of, ah, that’s what I’m thankful for. I’m glad that they thought of me to give me a half million dollars. Or is it, I’m glad I have half a million dollars now. I might change jobs. But no, he’s thinking, ah, here’s how it’s going to benefit them. Or I know I have a partner in the work.

That’s the mindset of Paul as he receives this gift. But I wanna now turn and look at what’s underneath all of this, because that’s actually, I think, the thing that we should be learning. The thing that we’ve been looking at through Philippians is there’s a mindset that Paul is trying to communicate, to illustrate, that underneath all of this, he’s seeing himself completely united with Christ. It’s something that’s a little bit hard for us to understand because there are people that we love, that we feel united to, but Paul is actually speaking in strong language that he is completely bound up and united. Let me kind of work our way back through and show you a couple examples.

Verse 18, he says, I am well supplied, having received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent, and my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. Paul has received a gift, and Paul says, according to the Greek culture, well, now it needs a repayment, but who’s doing the repayment? The repayment’s always done by the one who received the gift, and it’s God repaying. Paul received a gift and he says it’s like Jesus himself received this gift. I didn’t even say that correctly. It’s not like Jesus received the gift. Paul is saying Jesus received that gift and is going to pay it back. You can hear that I even slipped into that mindset that we have. It’s a similarity. It’s like this. But no, Paul is saying it is.

It’s Jesus who received that gift and he’s going to pay you back. He says in verse 14, it was kind of you to share my trouble. That no church entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving, except you only. So they’ve given things to Paul, but it’s a partnership of giving and receiving because Christ is sending things back to them. He calls it a partnership even though they’re 700 miles away because They are Christians doing the work of Christ, and the work of Christ they’re doing is the stuff in Rome, because they’re partnered with Paul. The Christ who they are serving is the same Christ doing that work in Rome, and they’re supporting that work.

Do you see how closely that bond is? It’s not just that, well, we helped you along in your work. I gave seed money to a business, and now I own a part of it. but it’s actually saying you’re completely united in the work because Christ binds us both together. Isn’t that amazing?

When you then you look back and you see Paul’s contentment, well, how does he know that he’s secure, that his needs are gonna be provided? Because he knows how secure his bond is with Christ. Would the father let Christ the son go hungry? Not in his glorified state, right? Would he let him have any need? No, he’s gonna give him whatever the son needs.

And so he’s gonna give Paul whatever Paul needs, because they are bound up together. Not just Paul’s salvation is secured in Christ, but Paul’s livelihood, his good, is bound up in Christ. They are united fully together. That’s why Paul says, I rejoiced in the Lord His rejoicing is in the Lord because that’s where he sees all of the benefit. It’s all through his, he’s partnered with Christ.

Think of a man with three arms. Now, let me explain what I mean by that. So, it’s a weird illustration, maybe it’ll work, maybe it won’t. So a man had two arms, like all of us do, but then he lost one to amputation, and so then his arm’s off. But he got a prosthetic arm, so he now has three arms. There’s his real arm that’s cut off, lying there, his prosthetic arm, which looks really good, and then his real arm that’s still connected.

Now, say you walk up. Again, I told you this is a weird illustration. But you walk up to that man, and you stab his amputated arm. What would you say? Why’d you stab my arm? Is he right to say that? Yeah, it’s his arm. OK, you stab his amputated arm. Sorry, not the amputated, the prosthetic arm. You stab the prosthetic arm. That’s also his arm. But you’re probably not going to go to jail for either of those two things. But you stab his other arm, and he says, does he say, why’d you stab my arm? Or you say, why’d you stab me? You see?

So the prosthetic might look like a real thing. You might confuse people, and they might think it’s your real arm, but it’s not actually connected to you. It’s really similar. It imitates. But the church is the body of Christ. It’s the real arm. So you can stab the amputated arm. You can stab the prosthetic arm. Those aren’t really you anymore. Those aren’t you. They imitate. They were. But you stab the real arm, and that’s you. We are like that for Christ.

Christ doesn’t say, why’d you hurt my friend? Why’d you hurt my son? Why’d you hurt someone who’s maybe leashed to me? When Stephen’s stoned, Jesus stands up and he says, no, that’s my child. Or he tells Saul afterwards, well, why are you persecuting me, right? Why’d you stab my arm? Because when you hurt my church, you hurt me. Now, that’s not just in persecution.

We see this underlying all that Paul’s writing about in Philippians. that we have great security in our lives as Christians because we are that body. We are the body of Christ. So we have security that God will provide for my needs. I don’t need to reach this point of desperation. They need to send me something. Paul knows it’s going to be provided.

Because are you going to neglect your leg? Are you going to neglect your hand? No, it’s your body. You need to sustain it. You need to take care of it. It’s not just a prosthetic that you could take off if you don’t like it anymore and put on a different one. This is my real thing.

As he looks and thinks, well, this partnership, we’re doing similar work, we’re side by side. No, Paul is telling them, we are completely united in this work. Just like two hands of Christ doing the same thing, the same task. That’s how closely their partnership is. As he sees the joy and the benefit of the Philippian church, you’re gonna receive benefit in Christ. His joy is from within his own heart because he knows, well, I’m connected to the same body. I’m the same, I’m gonna receive benefit too. We’re all part of the same thing. What’s underlying all of it is this complete union. Isn’t that amazing?

It’s a bit hard to think about that in our own lives. We think about maybe a step away. But Paul’s trying to get us to see, well, no, actually, let this reality be the mind of Christ. Think about that from chapter 2. He doesn’t say in chapter 2, have this mind among yourselves which is like the one that’s in Christ. Chapter 2, verse 5, have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ.

We aren’t just trying to imitate something that we know we should be like. But Paul’s saying, no, it’s actually yours. This is actually how it works. Now, how does that reality play out in our lives? How are we seeing our interactions in the church through that respect? When you see a brother go off into sin, Is your thought, well, Christians shouldn’t do that. I should tell him about it. Or maybe you’re worried about his salvation.

Or is the actual thought, I don’t want to lose a finger. I don’t want to lose my brother. Is it that close of an attack on you that you realize, I don’t want to lose my pinky. I don’t want to lose my pointer finger. I need to fight for that. They’re the same body as me. You see them go into something and you think, ah, it’s not that big of a deal, but are you gonna let gangrene start on your right hand because you can write with your left hand? No, we’re united together. We need to care for one another. But is that the mindset that we often go at it? Think about it. That’s the way that, that’s what should be motivating us as we address people.

As you’re going out and you’re talking to an unbeliever, are you seeing someone and you say, I want you to join my body. I want you to be part of my church. It’s not just someone who, well, I want a soul over there. Someone’s saved over there. Are you seeing like, no, actually something’s being brought into us. It’s someone into the body of Christ. Or maybe what Paul is going through here, when you’re going through trouble, Are you seeing the help that people are providing you as just kind of platitudes? Or are you seeing it as the body of Christ?

No, they’re walking side by side with me. Yeah, there are things that they can’t do, but they are united to me in this struggle. That’s how close your brothers and sisters are. When you face a time of need, where you’re struggling with having a lot, Are you seeing it through the lens of, I’m united to Christ? That’s where my all is. What Paul is trying to get us to see is how everything comes together in Christ. As Christians, our whole life is different, and we are living according to a different reality.

And that’s where, throughout this letter, you’ve seen the love that he has, his heart for them. He’s reaching out, trying to share his joy, trying to fight for things. He says, you need to understand this better. But it’s because of a great love that he has for them.

Verse 21, greet every saint in Christ Jesus. The brothers who are with me greet you, all the saints greet you. Now you notice in verse 22, he says all the saints greet you, but in verse 21, he said greet every saint. That’s reflecting a different way that he said it. In the first one, he’s saying greet each and every one. That’s how close he wants to be with this church.

I can’t just send a broad greeting, but I want to greet each and every single one of you, because I want to know you personally. I’m united to you personally. And it’s all because of Jesus Christ. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit.

So even as Paul has received this wonderful gift, a huge, bountiful amount of money, even as he has all this great news, look who’s coming to faith here in Rome. Look who’s part of the church with you. What brings him joy is Christ and his union with Christ. And the things he sees in the Philippian church that are saying, wow, I’m glad that that’s happening to you, because I can feel it myself. That’s what brings me joy.

May the reality that we see, may our feelings, may our heart, for those around us and for ourselves in times of trouble, imitate that. May it actually, there, I’ve slipped into it again. Not imitate it, but may it flow out of the same reality. We are united to Christ.

That’s where our salvation is. That’s where our hope through life is. That’s the thing that’s gonna hold us secure through plenty or through hunger. That’s the thing that will give us joy when it seems like our lives have stalled and you see others succeed and you think, I’m glad that you’re benefiting because it’s like us both succeeding at once.

May the Lord give us the mind of Christ. Let’s pray. Lord, we come to you and we pray that you would give us understanding into your word, into realities that are underneath the things that we see, that Christ, who was born and died 2,000 years ago, is still the one that we are united to as he sits reigning in heaven, now raised and glorified. And though our eyes see the physical realities, may you help us to see the spiritual realities, which are true. which truly affect things. We pray that out of that change of mindset, that you would help us to then live it out in small ways, more ways than I can think of myself in preaching this, but that you would apply this truth to the hearts of each and every one of us, and that it would come out of our hands and not just remain in our hearts and in our head. Amen.