Good morning, Jack. Did you tell everybody that you wrote that melody? Jack wrote that melody everybody. That's the talent of people at this church. Hey, good morning, good to be with you, good to be with you online as well. And as Steve said, if you're a guest with us, we are so glad that you're spending time with us today. We hope you feel really wanted and welcome because you are. And it is my great privilege to continue our worship with the preaching of God's Word. And so we're going to do that by continuing our sermon series through the book of Philippians, which is an incredible little letter from the Apostle Paul. And we're going to be in chapter three today. So if you want to turn in your Bibles to Philippians chapter three, I'm going to read our passage here in a moment, chapter three, verses 12 to chapter four, verse one. So that's what we'll be studying this morning. And I would encourage you to keep your Bibles open so that we can look at the text, let God's Word speak directly to us. But also we need to go back to a previous passage and grab a few things so that we have the right context for today's passage. So keep your Bibles open. So while you're turning to Philippians chapter three, let me ask you this question, what is your top goal in life? I'll wait. Now it's a rhetorical, you don't have to answer out loud, but that is an interesting question. Maybe one we're not asked as often as we should. What is your top goal in life? Well, I can tell you that some of the top goals of 18 to 25 year olds are very interesting. A research organization did a study on the top life goals for 18 to 25 year olds, here's what they found. 81% of 18 to 25 year olds say their top goal in life is getting rich. 51% of 18 to 25 year olds say their top goal in life is being famous, which is good because about half the world gets famous, right? That will work out. 30% of 18 to 25 year olds say their top goal in life is to help people who are in need. That's pretty cool. 22% say their top goal in life is to be leaders in their community doing good things for that community. 10% say that their top goal in life is to be more spiritual. 10%. Very interesting. So what is your top goal in life? And maybe we'll edit that even a little bit more. If you are a Christian as most of us are, what should be our top goal in life? What should be the goal that we're reaching towards every day when we wake up, every week, every month, every year, every decade, every century, if we live a long time? We're going to answer that question out. We're not Paul his and it's pretty wonderful. So with that on our mind, what's the goal of the Christian life? Let me read this passage and then we will learn from God's word together this morning. Here now God's holy, true and life giving word. The Apostle Paul says, not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own, but one thing I do, for getting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal, for the price of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let those of us who are mature think this way. And if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that to you also. Only let us hold true to what we have attained. Brothers, join in imitating me and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us, for many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their end is destruction, their God is their belly and they glory in their shame with minds set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself. Therefore my brothers whom I love and long for my joy and crown stand firm in this way in the Lord, my beloved. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God, let's pray together. Father, we do thank you and praise you for your glorious grace and mercy and kindness to us in Christ. We thank you that though we deserve to hear not a word from you, you have spoken to us, you are speaking to us through your word and spirit even today. Give us ears to hear, Lord. And would you do a work in us as we are gathered here in person and online? Would you do a work in us that we might know Christ more when we leave than when we came in? And would you use this time through the power of your Holy Spirit to shape us and equip us and excite us for our mission to make disciples? And we pray these things in Jesus name. Amen. So let me once again reiterate the question that we're trying to answer today from what the Apostle Paul says here, what is the goal of the Christian life? What should be our goal as we get up each morning and go about each and every day? And what I would submit to you is that Paul is going to teach us here in this passage and reaching back to a couple of verses in the previous passage. This, the goal of the Christian life is ever increasing spiritual maturity. The goal that when we wake up every day and say my goal today is to grow spiritually, is to grow to be more spiritually mature today. That should be our goal every day, week, month, year, decade. And we're going to see that really spiritual maturity is very much equated with knowing Christ. So, with that in mind, the goal of the Christian life is ever increasing spiritual maturity. Since we're going to be talking about maturity, I want to do five things, right, and that's two more than normal. So hang on, we got to move fast today. Five things we're going to talk about having to do with maturity. The maturity mindset, Paul is going to tell us how to think about maturity, spiritual maturity, Christian maturity. Number two, the maturity method. He's going to tell us an absolutely essential way in which we grow more mature spiritually and know Christ more. Number three, the maturity menace, a menace is a threat or something that will harm you and so he's going to warn us about something. Number four, the maturity medicine. Something that helps us heal and keep moving forward and finally the maturity motivation. What is the key motivation Paul has for pursuing spiritual maturity and that we should have as well, the motivation? Okay, the mindset, the method, the menace, the medicine, the motivation, all about maturity. So we're going to have to move. All right, let's talk about the maturity mindset. Look at verses 12 through 15, but put your finger there and then also turn back or scroll up to verse 8, chapter 3, verse 8 and verse 10. We've got to have context if we're going to understand what Paul is saying here. Okay, and so first maturity mindset. What I would submit to you is Paul's teaching us here that spiritual maturity is to be measured by the amount which we know Christ, relationally. That's how we should measure how spiritually mature we are. How well do we know Christ? Now you might say, now hold on, Pastor Matt, spiritual maturity is measured in whether I'm being good or not. No, it's actually by Paul measured in how much he knows him. Now the more you know him, that changes your life, but the goal is to grow spiritually and spiritual maturity is really about knowing him. Now we'll let's see that. Look at verse 8, chapter 3, verse 8, and notice what Paul says before he says what he says here in verse 12, chapter 3, verse 8, he says, indeed, I count everything as lost because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ, Jesus, my Lord. Remember Paul ditched his spiritual resume a couple weeks ago, so we all ditched ours as well. We're not going to rely on that. And so he ditches all of his spiritual resume and he says that he's given up everything for the surpassing worth of knowing Christ, Jesus, his Lord, not knowing about him, not knowing propositional truths about him, but actually knowing him, having an ever-expanding relationship with Christ. Now verse 10, Paul reiterates it again, chapter 3, verse 10, that I may know him. And then he lists a few more things. The power of his resurrection, his sufferings becoming like him, but all of those are under the banner of knowing him. So Paul has twice here emphasized that all he does, all he wants is to know Christ fully, to know everything there is to know and to know him relationally. And then you get to the verse 12, and after he's talked about the importance of knowing Christ, that he lives to know Christ, he humbly says, and I have not arrived. Look at verse 12, he says, not that I have already obtained this, what is this, a full knowledge of Christ, all there is to know, a full relationship with Christ, he says, not that I've already obtained this or I'm already perfect. And by the way, when he uses the word perfect, that's a scary word in the English language because we tend to think perfect and we think moral perfection, but that word literally means mature or complete or fulfilled. He uses the same exact word a few verses later in the English standard version translates it as mature. So why they put perfect here? I don't know, but it means fulfilled. He's saying, I've not already obtained this, I'm not already complete in my relationship with Christ, and all that I know, all that there is to know about him. He goes on to say, brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own, this full knowledge of who Christ is and all that he's done. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on towards the goal. That's the goal to know him more and more and more. And then he goes on in verse 15 to say that let us let those of us who are mature think this way. And so that's the maturity mindset that Paul is teaching the Philippians and God is teaching us that God wants us to know him, God wants us to know Christ more and more and more and our spiritual maturity level is really kind of tied with how well we know Christ, my old friend and mentor Mike Francis when we would meet and he would talk to me about following Jesus. He would when we would talk about marriage, he would always say, he'd say Matt, his wife's name is Maria and he would say Matt, my goal and marriage is to know everything about my wife. I want to know everything there is to know about Maria. He would say I want to get a PhD in Maria and after 20 years of marriage, I'm in third grade
and brothers, that's a good tip for our marriages by the way. But it also helps us understand what Paul is saying here. Not that we would get an academic PhD but that we would have this lifelong pursuit of knowing the one who has redeemed us, knowing him, having an ever-expanding relationship with him and not equating our spiritual maturity with whether we read our Bible every day and go to church every Sunday and do the service thing all the time. That's good stuff, we want to do that but that's not the main goal. The main goal is to know our God, to know more each day, more each week, more each month, year, decade and so on and so forth. When we talk about repentance, we usually connect it with sin and that's true because repentance is changing your mind about something and turning away from sin. But the word repentance literally means to change your mind and so there's actually some repentance we can do right now and that is to change our mindset from the normal way we think about maturity. I do all the right things to the real version of maturity which is I know Christ and we want to pursue a greater and greater knowledge of him. Isn't that amazing? Another one thing he wants for us is to know him more. What a king. How can we do that? Paul tells us, okay look at verse 17. After Paul is driving home this importance of knowing Christ and understanding maturity as knowing Christ more deeply, more expansively than he teaches us about an incredibly important method for how we grow in our knowledge of Christ and therefore grow in spiritual maturity. So looking at verse 17, here's what Paul's teaching is here. Spiritual maturity is partially attained by imitating the practices of more mature Christians in any given room of Christians. There are some who are more mature than others. That's not a moral judgment, that's an objective call. There's people who've been walking with Jesus longer than others have experienced more of his glory and his power and his grace and his life changing gospel. And so what Paul's showing us here in verse 17 is that spiritual maturity is partially attained by learning from those who are farther down the road, imitating the practices of those who know Jesus better than you do. Look at verse 17. Brothers, join in imitating me. Do what I do, he says. Not only him, he says, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. So he's not just saying do what he does, he's also saying look for others who have a big relationship with Jesus, who really know him and learn from them. Do we grow spiritually through reading our Bible and praying and going to worship? Absolutely, serving according to our gifts without a doubt. But a big method for how we grow spiritually is by learning from people who know Christ better than we do. There's people in this room who know Christ better than I do. We can all learn from people who are farther along. There's probably a lot of people in this room who know Christ better than I do. It makes me think of my friend Drew Anderson. When we were kids, we would play tennis. He was one of the two things about Drew. Drew was one of the most amazing tennis players I knew at that age and also Drew had the most incredible calf muscles I have ever seen on a human being. It's like he had watermelons back there. They were just gigantic. And I should probably stop talking about Drew's calves, but they were something else. Now, he was tremendous a tennis, tremendous, and we would play and he would destroy me. He would win six oh, six oh, we play six games and he'd win all of them. Then another six and he'd win all of them. He would just destroy me. I would say Drew, I'm so bad. And he would say yes, but you're getting better. And I would say how am I possibly getting better? You're clobbering me every single time. He said yeah, yeah, yeah, but you had to understand how tennis works. And anybody who plays tennis knows this. The way you get better at tennis is by playing somebody who's better than you. If you play somebody that you can clobber, you're not going to get better at tennis. But every time you play somebody who's better than you, you grow. You become a better tennis player. Now, I give up a tennis, so I'm just going on theory here. I'm just what I've heard. That's what I've heard. But many people have said that over the years that the way you get better at tennis is you play somebody that's better than you, somebody who's been playing longer, somebody who knows more about the game. And brothers and sisters, this is what Paul is teaching us. This is why Paul is calling us to imitate. Not about tennis, but about knowing Christ. There are people in our midst who know Christ more than you do at this point. And so I think the way you can apply that, this gets really practical. When we think about the importance of mentoring and discipling one another, listen, if you are a mature Christian, if you have a big relationship with Jesus, this might be God's prompt to get you to look for someone who is less mature, still learning a lot, still needing a lot of particular direction and counsel for how they know Christ. And maybe this is a time or a season when you could reach out to someone who's younger in the faith than you and teach them what you know and therefore expand their knowledge of Christ by learning, letting them learn from you. And if you're younger in the faith, don't ever, ever be ashamed of not knowing what you will know in a year or 10 or 20 or a million. God was his calling you to learn to know him better. And a big way you do that is you humble yourself and you look for someone who knows Jesus better than you do and you say, well you show me what you know. And here's the people you're looking for. The people who are most mature, they're going to be humble, they're going to be gracious, they're going to be kind, and they're probably going to say, I don't think I know enough to help you, which proves their humble. But that's the method. That is such a huge part of how we grow through, think about this for a second. God wants us to have a better growing relationship with Jesus by having growing relationships with one another so that we learn from each other about how to learn more about Jesus. See how he keeps proving that we need each other? Man, he's amazing. That's the method. Okay, what about the menace? The menace. What is the big threat to growing to spiritual maturity? And that would be worldliness. Spiritual maturity is harmed even destroyed by worldliness. Worldliness is when we are indulging the desires of our sin nature. Another way to think about that is worldliness is when we are giving ourselves over to the things that God has taught us in his word our wrong or sinful or damaging. And Paul is going to remind the Philippians here. Now you and I today that there are people who have given themselves over to indulging the flesh or indulging into sinful behavior to their own destruction. Look what he says in verse 18. For many of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. Wow, it's powerful language. Their end is destruction which means they are not saved. Their God is their belly. They glory in their shame with mindset on earthly things. Now most scholars don't think Paul is talking about anybody in the Philippian congregation because next he's going to use the word hour and so he seems to be referring to a different group of people that he has seen over the years that have rejected Christ ultimately. Humanly speaking they've gone and rejected him in favor of pursuing these sinful desires and behaviors. And so it's a warning against worldliness. He's wanting us to see that when we give in to sin God wants us to fight against sin because you can't know Christ when you're sinning because a huge part of how we know Christ more is by trusting him than obeying him and watching how that changes our life. And so he calls us away from worldliness. My favorite Puritan is Thomas Watson. And Thomas Watson had an illustration for worldliness I've never forgotten. He says that a ship is designed to be in the water. The problem is when the water gets into the ship. A ship is designed to be in the water. The problem is when the water gets into the ship and brothers and sisters in Christ you and I are designed to be in a broken fallen sinful world. We're designed to be in the world but we're not to be of it. We don't want the world to get in because of the destruction it does in our hearts and so we have to be ready to repent. In fact let me tell you this often when I'm not growing spiritually and often in situations where I'm ministering to individuals when people aren't growing spiritually it's often because they're indulging in some sort of sinful pattern and it's not until they turn from that will they begin to grow again. Let me tell you two words I say about a thousand times a day in my home because I have a puppy drop it drop it drop it and then I get a little treat right drop it let's make a trade okay you drop that thing in your mouth that either is going to destroy you or you're going to destroy and then I'll give you this milk bone one time out of 10 he drops it and then I give him the milk bone and what he finds is by dropping the thing now he gets the reward he gets the treat and listen to this your God loves you so much that when you have picked up sin he says drop it drop it and here's the treat when you seek to turn away from it the power of the Holy Spirit helps you drop it and the treat is now you know Christ even more so if there is something that has got a hold of your heart if there's something if you're in sin right now a you're in good company we're all sinners here be drop it turn to Christ ask Christ for help believe in the power of the Holy Spirit turn away from that welcome accountability drop it and get the treat of knowing your king even more he's ready to welcome you he's ready to empower you to turn away so we want to avoid the menace and then we also need the medicine we need medicine right we take medicine to heal right and we are damaged and broken people by the fall and therefore power of how God heals us is he gives us medicine through identity and let's talk about the maturity medicine looking at verse 20 through the end of the chapter and here's what I would submit to you Paul is teaching us spiritual maturity is healed by identifying as a citizen of the coming kingdom now we get back on track we experience some healing when we identify as citizens of heaven as citizens of the coming kingdom and just think about this for a second how much talk and languages there in our society about how people identify and therefore their identity leads them to live a certain way that's we're all like that how we identify yourself determines how we end up living and so Paul reminds us of our identity give us some a dose of spiritual medicine let's let's inject it what does he say verse 20 but our citizenship our identity our citizenship is in heaven and from it we await a savior the Lord Jesus Christ who will transform our lonely body to be like his glorious body by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself and he calls them therefore to stand firm our citizenship he wants us to wake up every day and before our feet hit the floor to remember we are citizens of heaven that's our identity now I got to do a little excursus because I told you I would two weeks ago we talked about how back in verse 11 chapter 3 verse 11 Paul says that by any means possible he wanted to attain the resurrection and I want to come back to that because I said that first 2021 clear up what he was saying there wanted to make sure we know that when he says attaining the resurrection he's not talking about earning or gaining something from his own work or merit he's just talking about receiving something he's talking about receiving this glorified body that all Christians are promised and there's two ways to receive it or two ways we will get it or attain it number one we will die and then Jesus will come back and he'll raise our body from the dead and we'll have a resurrected body number two if you look at verse 20 and 21 it's as the Savior Lord Jesus Christ who will transform our lonely body to be like his glorious body in other words the other way is if Jesus comes back while we're still alive he'll just transform our bodies into the glorified body so there's two means by which we have a glorified body we die and rise again or rely and he just transforms us and so then when you go back and see that Paul said by any means necessary I attain the resurrection he's saying either by dying and then being raised or by just being transformed when Christ comes back okay excursus over back on track here we go um identity identity how you identify yourself has a major impact on how you live you know it's thinking about this and I read about how way long time ago when there wasn't a fixed border between Laos and Vietnam the Leotian King the leader or King of Vietnam made a deal that all these people on the border all lived in the same area and some were leotians and some were being amazed and so they figured well how do we know who to tax how do we know who belongs to each kingdom and they made a decision they decided well we'll look at the homes of all the people on the border if their homes are decorated with leotian cultural things then they belong to Laos and if they if their homes are decorated with Vietnamese cultural things then we'll identify them as Vietnamese and the Vietnamese King contacts them and the reason they did that is because people live according to their identity now if you if your identity is I'm here and I'm of this world then you're going to live like this world and it's going to destroy you but if your identity is I am a citizen of heaven I am awaiting a Savior who has already paid my debt on the cross and now he's going to come back and he's going to make all things new and I'm so I don't fit in here right now this is not my home yet Christ has not brought the kingdom in full yet he's not come and transformed me and the world that's who we are that's your identity and we should get up every day and identify as a member of the kingdom of God is a citizen of heaven where we feel only at home there or we will feel at home here when he comes and in the meantime we're soldiers here we're exiles here that's why we're different that's why we're weird that's why we don't live like the world does it's not our culture we're living the kingdom culture and that helps us pursue more knowledge of Christ so that we can live out that culture all right finally number five the maturity motivation the maturity motivation look at verse 12 and here's what Paul teaches us spiritual maturity or the pursuit of it is fueled by believing we are fully known and fully loved by Christ what fuels our pursuit what motivates us to know Christ more is believing that we are both fully known and fully loved by Christ this is really important Tim and Kathy Keller in their book the meeting of marriage they talk about how deep down we all very much desire to be fully known and to be fully loved and one of the reasons all of us are terrified of being fully known is because we do not think somebody who fully knows everything about me can fully love me because we all know there's a lot of sin and darkness and dirtiness and badness about us and so we are terrified of being fully known but look at why Paul makes his goal to know Christ more and more and more look at verse 12 he says not that I've already obtained this or I'm already mature but I press on to make it my own I press on to know Christ more and more and more why because Christ Jesus has made me his own because Christ Jesus has known for eternity everything about you everything all your dirty secrets all your sins all your failings all the things you hope nobody ever finds out about he knows it all and yet and yet he has sought he has chosen to make you if you're a believer to make you his own to unite himself to you to sacrifice himself for you to pay for your sins and to spend eternity with you here's the scariest thing about knowing Christ more and more and more the more you know Christ the more you see how good and pure and beautiful he is and that ends up revealing how dark and sinful and wicked we really are and so it's scary because if you really look at Christ and you really get to know him and you see how wonderful he is and how compassionate he is how patient he is how faithful he is how pure he is how wise he is how powerful he is how humble he is how courageous he is as you see how good he is you automatically think that kind of person would want nothing to do with me so I can Victor Hugo's book The Hunchback and Notre Dame quasi-motor The Hunchback says to Esmeralda I never knew how ugly I was until I saw how beautiful you are but here's the thing Christ knows how ugly we are and yet he has made us his own he has identified himself with us he has gone to the cross for us he has think about and this is where knowledge of Christ begins at the cross why because of the cross Jesus says the two most powerful things a he says this is what you deserve right this is what sinners deserve sinners deserve to be rejected by God and abandoned by God and punished by God condemned by God this is what sinners deserve that's one of the things that Jesus says to us at the cross but the other thing he says to you and I who believe at the cross is I love you so much I want to take that rejection for you I want to take that condemnation for you I want to take that punishment for you and if you think for a second the Jesus went to the cross so that he could love you since he already fully knows you you're wrong he went to the cross because he already fully loved you and he already fully knew you and he still went for the joy that was said before him he must for you for me for all who believe and so the one who has always fully known us and then has also fully loved us is calling us to return the favor that's what Christ wants from us and that's the motivation oh yes the one who has fully known and knows everything about me and yet still has made me his own he's fully loved me yes I want to fully know him I want to fully love him I'm going to set my goal in life as knowing him more each day each week each month each year each decade each century each so press on press on press on strain forward seek to know him more and more and more and more and you'll see that he really does fully know you and he really does fully and eternally love you let's pray father thank you that you teach us these profound truths and you enable us by your spirit to actually know Christ and I pray for those in the room who don't know Christ as much and would they long for knowing him more and those of us who know Christ better help us to realize like Paul we still have not arrived we have so much to know so much to learn there's so much about your glory Lord Jesus that we have yet to understand and comprehend and therefore Lord put us all on a level playing field let us see yes that we are just a community of people who want to know Christ more and to do it together and would you help us make that our goal and as we pursue that goal would you work in us and through us and transform our lives and help us impact this community that more and more people would come to know in Jesus name we pray amen on the first Sunday