Joy | Philippians 2

Southland, y'all ready to go today? All right, good, good, good, good, good. Hey, a couple of housekeeping things real quick. Let me double down on the summer worship night thing that you just saw. I want you to circle, highlight, underline this date right here, July 8th. Go to southland.church. It's gonna be all over the front page of the website and all that kind of stuff because we don't just do this for fun and games, although it's all kinds of fun, but we do this because worship is war, okay? So that's why we have first Wednesday worship. That's why we have this. We're not gonna be having first Wednesday worship this coming Wednesday because we're gearing up for this one because this is a unique experience where we get to all come together as one church that's usually in multiple locations in one place. So you're not going to want to miss that. Another quick thing, we got like 500 students and leaders who are leaving, I think it's on Tuesday this week, to go to camp. And so I just wanna challenge our whole church to just be praying for our students, our leaders, and our staff that are gonna be going to camp that they would have a radical experience with the real Jesus.

So many of our lives have been changed because we've been in those experiences and we're gonna see the next leaders of Southern Christian Church emerge out of these kinds of experiences because I am a testament to that. All right, second thing, or third thing, whatever it is, is this. If you've been here the past couple weeks, you may have noticed I wasn't the one preaching. And I just kind of wanna give you a grid for if you show up here on a Sunday and I'm not the one preaching, there's three things that you should assume. It could be any of these things, it could be all of these things, but one of the things that you need to just assume out of the gate is that I have a very deep conviction that I should not be the only voice in our church. While I may be the primary voice in our church, I think it's really, really helpful to have a multiplicity of voices, whether that be from inside our team, our teaching team, or whether that be from outside our team. I think that's just really, really healthy for our church. Second thing you could assume, because a lot of times, especially if you're here at the Nicholsville campus, you may just see me sitting where I always sit with my family, just worshiping alongside of you.

I like to get to do that sometimes and not have to be the one who steps up here to preach. Sometimes I just shut it down and take a break because I think it's important for me to obey God in actually doing that and demonstrate for you what it looks like to cease and desist and to take a break and to rest, because I not only preach, I have a bunch of leadership responsibilities, so you don't want me preaching tired and angry. That's not a good thing for any of us. Just ask my family, all right? The third thing that you can assume is that every now and then, this happens about two or three times a year, probably, I will fly somewhere or I'll drive somewhere so that I can serve the capital C church, and so I'll go preach at a church, I'll do the weekend services, I'll do a conference, or in this case, a couple weeks ago, I was doing both. I was doing a men's conference and preaching the weekend services, and this was a unique and special experience for me and my family because it was back at Flatirons Community Church out in Colorado where we had spent 11 years of our lives giving blood, sweat, and tears at that place, and so it was just this beautiful moment because not only did we get to go, but a whole bunch of dudes from this church

actually went to the men's conference and then stayed around for the weekend services, and so I got to see the two churches I love just collide in such a beautiful way, so that was really, really cool, and by the end of it, man, I had just wrung myself out. I was so dog-tired, and the group from here was flying from Denver back home to Lexington. I was flying on to Jacksonville, Florida, so that I could be a part of a cohort of pastors. We got together for several days down there and we talked shop and ministry and preaching and all the kinds of things, and I was supposed to fly out before the crew that was leaving to Kentucky, but I boarded my plane, and some of you have had this experience, and we just kind of sat there for a long time. Seemed like too long, and then the pilot came over the intercom and said, hey, everybody, our plane's busted. That's not how he really said it, but he did it in pilot speak, ladies and gentlemen, but he basically was saying, plane's busted. Y'all got to get off. We got to get a new plane, which is frustrating, but you would much rather find that out while the plane is firmly planted on the ground than when the plane is 40,000 feet in the air. You don't want to hear the plane is busted,

so we were frustrated, but we were also grateful, so we get off the plane. They said, we got to get a new one. It's coming from Albuquerque. That's not that far from Denver. Well, you know the story, so then the text messages started appearing. It's gonna take another two hours, another three hours, so eventually, I just had to rebook and fly out the next day. Now, for those of you who know me really, really well, you're like, that was probably bad for you, and you're right because I don't love flying. I don't love the whole airport experience. I don't like any of it, and here's the primary reason I don't like it. It reveals this reality. I'm not in control. Anybody else struggle with that reality? Rest of y'all are lying. Raise your hands high. We all struggle. We all struggle with that reality that we're not in control. In fact, here's where it's arrived with me. Some of you have this same mentality. I've taken on this belief that if I can drive there in a day, I would rather do that than fly. That's just kind of my mentality, and here's why. I get to decide who gets in my truck, all right?

Not on a plane, and don't be all judgy. You know you sit there like I do, and you see people coming down the aisle, and you're like, please, please, please, don't let that person sit next to me, and then they do because God wants to give you grace and patience for other people, that kind of thing, but when. I drive my truck, I get to decide, and I get to go to Bucky's and things like that. I get to stretch my legs. I get to put pickets on the radio. There's all the things I get to control. It at least gives me the illusion of being in control. If you got your Bibles today, then you better. Go to Philippians chapter two. We're gonna be diving into a moment in the Apostle Paul's life where everything's out of control and it's pretty ironic because he's writing from prison back to a place in Philippi where he had been thrown in prison. So it's very, very interesting. His life got out of control while he was in Philippi and now his life's out of control again. He's thrown in prison probably in Rome this time, but when he was in Philippi, he and his buddy Silas, they get beaten with rods. Don't just read over stuff like that like it's no big deal. You ever been beaten with rods? I have not.

Sounds really, really brutal. Sounds really, really painful. Thrown in basically a dude's dungeon beneath his house. He's the jailer. Their feet are put in stocks, and then this is what we find out in Acts that they're doing. About midnight, Paul and Silas were praying, check it out, and singing hymns to God and the prisoners were listening to them. Don't overlook that. Here's what they're doing. Looks like life is out of control. If they're under anybody's control, they're under the jailer's control, they're under the authority's control that threw them into the prison, but what they're acknowledging in this moment is, oh no, no, no, we're under Jesus's authority even in this moment while we're suffering. You tracking? And that's our first value around here. And because we recognize Jesus's authority in all things, we defiantly worship in the midst of all things. So here's what they're doing. They're singing through the suffering. And when you can sing through the suffering, that carves a channel through your soul for joy. So last week, I was seated right over here to my right, your left, behind Carl Kuhl

before he got up here and delivered just an amazing sermon. And right as we began to sing, he stepped back to me and he said, hey man, one of the things I love about Southland is that while you guys, you worship in kind of a chill way, y'all still sing really, really loud. And I was like, yeah, that's so true. Now, cards on the table, I would love for us to not be so chill in worship, okay? And here's the thing. I know some of you are delighted and excited to be here today, but someone needs to tell your face, okay? That's the thing. And so all I'm saying is, because I've seen y'all, I'm there, like if you're at Kroger Field and you raise your arms when the Cats score a touchdown, and God willing, there's gonna be a lot of touchdowns this fall, I'm just saying maybe our arms should go up when we sing to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. That is a true statement. At the same time, y'all do sing really, really loud. And here's what I know, because I know y'all. Thousands of us, every single Sunday across all of our campuses, are singing through the suffering. Some of you were up last night pouring out your soul on behalf of your prodigal son or daughter. Some of you, you are right now in the middle of the most painful experience of your life.

She left you, she cheated on you, she took half of what you got, and you're like, this is not what I expected the last half of my life to look like, but that is now your reality, yet you are still singing through the suffering in the middle of pain and worry and anxiety and fear. So many of you are singing through the suffering, and that is carving a channel for joy in your soul. So Paul, here he is in prison. He's writing back to these people that he's poured out his soul for, and he loves so much, and he's again in prison, and he wants to give them his primary outlook on the rest of his life, regardless of how long his life's gonna be or potentially how short his life is gonna be. It's a very famous passage in Philippians 1, verse 21. Paul says, for me to live, if I get to live, man, that's Christ, but if I die, hey, that's gain. This is what his paradigm is. He's going, if I get to live, regardless of whether that's five seconds, five years, or 50 more years, my life is gonna be all about Jesus Christ. My life is gonna be poured out, wrung out for him, be all about him, but hey, listen, if my life is just five more seconds, guess what that means? That means I get to be with Jesus. That's gain. That's the lens that Paul sees his life through.

Now, if someone were to ask you your five-year plan, you're not saying that unless you're just trying to be churchy, let's be honest. That's not what you and I, that's not the way we think, but that is the way he's challenging us to think, because here's the thing that doesn't get said enough, and I don't know who said this first, but it needs to be said over and over again. The birthmark of every believer is a bullseye, y'all. You understand? The second we go from death to life in that watery grave of baptism, and we are raised to new life, the enemy Satan paints a target on us. Because when you're dead, he's not that interested in you, but when you're alive, he certainly is interested in you. This is why new believers, they need not only our prayer, but they need our support. And here's what you gotta understand, we've had up to today, I think, 647 people be baptized at Southern Christian Church in this calendar year. And that is worth, like you should be doing something right now, like that's a big deal, okay? Now, here's the other thing, I need you to lift your eyes and recognize and look around, because some of y'all don't know this, this is important to understand. God's not doing this in isolation, do you know? Did you see what happened at our friends

down in Jacksonville, Church of 1122, two weeks ago? All over the news. 2,500 people got baptized at the beach in one day. We think that might be the biggest baptism service in the history of the United States of America. And that's not true. That's true in the United States of America. And that's not the only place where that's happening. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's happening there, it's happening here. Our friends down at Lake Point in Dallas, baptized like over 700 people on just a random weekend a few weeks ago. Our friends right up the road in Indianapolis, Traders Point Christian Church, hundreds of people have been baptized this year. Right up the road in Louisville, hundreds of people at Southeast have been baptized this year. Out in Phoenix at CCV, Flatirons in Colorado. God is on the move. Listen, but here's the thing you gotta understand, the gates of hell ain't happy. So the birthmark of every believer is a bullseye. So if you're a follower of Jesus, here's what Paul wants you to know. He's like, man, you can't lose. So in light of all that, if there's any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit,

any affection and sympathy. So we should be tracking with that and going, well, there is. Like, if there's any encouragement in Christ, yeah, there is. If there's any comfort from love, participation in Spirit, yeah, there is. Affection and sympathy, yeah, there is. And Paul says, so in light of that, complete my, what's the word right here? Joy, that's the theme. Joy by being of the same mind, having the same love and being in full accord of one mind. You see, joy is certainly a theme and some would argue the primary theme of Paul's writing to the Philippians because the word joy and rejoice and different forms of it are used just over and over and over again in this really short letter. But that's honestly second place because in 104 verses, the name of Jesus is used 51 times. It's the name of Jesus that is the primary word on the lips of Paul. That's why I love that song, I Speak Jesus. Years ago, somebody did this, one of our tech crew, they did this thing where they took my sermons. I don't know if you know how they did this because it was before AI. And they ran it through some kind of filter and what it did is it extrapolated all the words that I use in a sermon and put the ones I use most

in some big bold print in the middle of this graphic and put the ones that I use least in light print on the periphery of the graphic and right in the middle of the graphic was the name Jesus. And I thought, awesome. That's what I want my life to be spent on. If I'm not known for anything else, when I die, I want y'all to go, he was about Jesus, he said Jesus, he spoke the name of Jesus, he died and went to be with Jesus. That's what I want my life to be about. Now, way easier for the name of Jesus to be the name that's on my lips in preaching than for my life to be a living demonstration of who he is and what he's done. That's a different challenge, isn't it? And that's the heartbeat of Paul as he writes this big chunk of scripture that some people think became basically a hymn in the first century church going on in Philippians two, verse three. It says, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. And who does that remind you of? Who did nothing from selfish ambition or conceit? Jesus. But in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Who did that? Jesus. Let each of you look not only to his own interests

but also the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. And here's the key phrase I want you to highlight today. But he emptied himself by taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God's highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee would bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Now, I've preached, I don't know how many sermons on that passage as a pastor in my life and I can preach hundreds more, but today I want to lock in on that one phrase. Jesus emptied himself. That is a loaded phrase. He emptied himself for a purpose and the question I'm gonna ask in so many different ways today is simply this. Did you know that you are emptying yourself? Did you know that? The only question is, for who or what? You're spending yourself on behalf of.

Someone or something and the question is for who or what and in case you're sitting there going man I I just don't even know what that would be you're in luck because Jesus himself has given us a very precise Diagnostic tool that will tell you exactly what you are being spent on and you're gonna hate it. Just fair warning, okay But I need you to remember. I'm just the one delivering the mail. I Didn't write this. Okay, so when you're mad about this, the email address is like Jesus underscore heaven, you know org, that's it But here's here's the tool Jesus said it's famous Matthew chapter 6 for where your treasure is There your heart will be also and don't try to over spiritualize treasure know what it means money Where your money is being spent reveals what you are spending your life on period and stop. That's it If you want to know what you're spending your life on look at what you're spending your money on and there's a big distinction between good giving and gospel giving There's a big distinction between this and and here's here's what I know some of us I'm not one of not one of you in this but some of us we are very subject to what I call Shivering puppy commercials, you know, I'm talking about who's watching a ballgame and all of a sudden There's a little shivering puppy out in the rain with a big collar around it You know I'm saying and then that Sarah McLaughlin song kicks on, you know You know, it's not about puppies at all at all But all of a sudden you just find yourself writing checks to save shivering puppies. You don't even know You only know where it's going. You don't know if puppies are getting saved, but you're just crying and writing checks. That's all good That's fine. I love puppies. I'm a fan of puppies. All right, I'd love to save shivering unhappy puppies, but That ain't gospel giving do you understand? The brother of Jesus said the gospel giving looks like this religion and that's really just a word that gets translated for worship That our God and Father accepts as pure and faultless is this to look after orphans Widows and their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world and for some of us were like, yeah, man That doesn't really do it for me Which is super weird and here's how I know this is like a thing. Okay, some of you remember this I've told this story twice Years ago when my family and I we moved we moved back to Kentucky We bought this really old house started doing these renovations and when they knocked over a wall

Inside of one of the walls they found a mummified cat. It was dead this dead cat Mummified which begged so many questions and I've shown you guys pictures of that before and then a couple years ago Told that story again And I also talked about how my son Silas had found one of we were crawling with barn cats at my place We'd found one of the barn cats dead and a stall and I put those pictures up there And I just didn't think a thing about it But for about five people they were greatly offended at the sight of the reality I don't know if y'all knew I knew this the death rate for cats is a hundred percent. Did you know that? It is it's about five people were so offended they actually drove to the church and wanted to Physically confront me because they're they they couldn't they couldn't deal with seeing a dead cat now Here's why this like rocked my world because just a couple weeks prior in a sermon We had put a picture on stage on the screens that won a Pulitzer Prize in It's of a famine in Sudan and in the foreground there is a dying starving child and in the background there's a vulture Guess how many people drove to the church to confront me about that one? zero and I'm just saying What's happening in a human heart that gets all up in arms about shivering puppies? But doesn't get all up in arms over that does not align with Jesus And so the question I have for you is this do the things you give your money to Result in more people hearing and responding to the gospel the things you're giving your money to does that result in having being more? Crowded or not because we can save whales and build houses, but if people go to hell, what are we doing? There's good giving there's gospel giving And I mean this sincerely Jesus emptied himself that is the Inescapable point and if we are followers of Jesus We're called and commanded to empty ourselves as well. And there is no exemption clause for our bank accounts In fact, the Apostle Paul loved this metaphor when he wrote this famous passage in 2nd Corinthians 8 9

He said for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, though. He was rich man He was in heaven yet for your sake he became poor so that you by his poverty might become rich. So, if you aren't experiencing the joy of Jesus, here's the deal. It's because you aren't emptying yourself for the things of Jesus, which is a lot more than financial sacrifice. No doubt, but make no mistake, it's not less than that. So back to Paul in Philippians 2, in light of all that, beginning in verse 12, he says, therefore, and wherever you see therefore in the Bible, you should always circle it. Because this is as a result of whatever's been said before it, therefore, my beloved, as you've always obeyed, so now, not only is it my presence, but much more my absence, underline this whole thing, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Now, this is very important to understand what he did not say. I want you to notice two things at least. Number one, he did not say, work for your salvation. What did he say? Work out your salvation. In other words, wrestle with the implications of the reality that you are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus alone.

But wrestle with the reality of the grace that Jesus has given you, and also, notice that he said, work out whose salvation? Your own salvation. It did not say, work out her salvation. Work out his salvation, work out their salvation with fear and trembling. It says, work out the implications of your salvation with fear and trembling. So, here's the problem in the church world sometimes. Some of us fancy ourselves like bouncers at the gates of heaven. Somebody hops into baptistry, and you start thinking to yourself, or at worst, whispering or saying out loud, I hope he cleaned himself up this week, because last time I saw him, he was still drinking and smoking and chewing and going with girls ado. Like, no, no, no, no, listen. What's the gospel? That you clean yourself up and then go to Jesus? No. The gospel is you go to Jesus and he cleans you up, right? So, we should not see people in the baptistry and be thinking, well, I don't know if that's sincere. I don't know if that's real. I don't know if they understand. No, no, no, we have, listen, one job when we see people raise up out of that watery grave,

what did Jesus say all of heaven does when one more lost sinner repents, when one more lost and broken person comes home? What does all of heaven do? Yeah, that's it right there, thank you. There's one person listening to me, the rest are like, we gotta go to lunch, all right? So, our job is to sing and celebrate when one more lost person comes home. And certainly, we need to understand this reality. If the birthmark of every believer is a bullseye, that bullseye is there because Satan painted it. And here's one of the problems in the church, we shoot our own. Anybody ever experience friendly fire in the church world? I have, yeah. And that is like the worst, right? And here's one of the problems, we overuse these phrases. There's these phrases we overuse, and what happens is it diminishes the real thing. So, like right now, everybody's talking about church hurt. Church hurt, church hurt, I got church hurt. So, here's the thing, there is such a thing as being hurt by the church and people within it. But let me tell you what church hurt is not. Church hurt is not when you disagree with what the preacher said, or you're offended by it, or something like that, or you really love cats. That's not what it is. Church hurt is not when you're held accountable

for your sin. Church hurt is not when you're told you can't serve in a ministry because you didn't do what you said that you were gonna do. Church hurt is not when the songs don't match up with your preferences. Again, we're not singing to you. Yeah, but I don't like them. That's neat, but we're not singing to you. Nobody cares, we're singing to Jesus. This is not about our preferences, this is about our corporate prayers to our king. But all that being said, there is such a thing as church hurt that if I'm being super honest with you, you wanna know the group of people that I've experienced in my life that have more church hurt than anyone? Pastors, which makes a ton of sense if you think about it. Like we may dish it out the most, but we certainly receive it the most. So let me just say this, I'm so thankful for you all, and I sincerely mean this, because I do not receive a ton of mean-spirited criticism from inside Southern Christian Church among our church body. You know what I get from you guys? All the time, this happens to me all the time, no matter where I go. People come up to me and they go, hey man, I just want you to know I'm praying for you and your family every day. Do you know how much that means to me?

I wish I could express to you how much that means to me. You're the most kind and generous, prayerful church that I've ever experienced, and so sincerely, from my family, from the bottom of our hearts, thank you and please keep doing that. Because here's one of the things your encouragement does for me, your encouragement gives me courage. You understand? Because while I don't get a whole bunch of mean-spirited stuff from within, in our church, I get a decent amount outside our church. And here's the other thing that you need to know. So that encouragement that helps put steel in my spine is combined with something else that I feel like God has maybe even uniquely downloaded into me, and you just need to hear me say this, I fear God more than I fear you. You understand? Like I'm not here to please you, I'm not here to appease you, I'm not here to do a song and dance for you, I love you, but I'm way more afraid of God than I'm afraid of you. And I'm way more afraid of God than I'm afraid of people outside these walls of this church. Because I want you to notice, what did Paul say? He said, work out your own salvation, this is something we just don't talk enough about, with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you,

both to will and to work for his good pleasure. See, I think we've swung on a pendulum there, too. Because of Hellfire Brimstone preaching, we just ignored the fact that we are told the beginning of wisdom is to fear God. And I think C.S. Lewis just nailed this, and yes, I'll pay the teaching team again, all right? If you read the Chronicles of Narnia, you've seen the Narnia movies, there's this great dialogue, this interaction that happens about the Christ figure who's the lion Aslan, and somebody says, hey, is he safe? And the answer's like, no, but he's good. Our God is a terror to our enemy. The gates of Hell tremble at the sound of his voice. But if you belong to him, and you're under his care and provision and protection, you're in the safest place that you could ever be. And our confidence, we're told to approach the throne of grace with confidence, and we'll receive mercy and grace in our time of need. That confidence is not based on our own performance, that confidence is based on Jesus and who he is and what he's done on our behalf. But the problem is we forget. We forget and we end up suffering from this thing that Paul Tripp calls awe amnesia. So when we forget about how awesome our God is, do you know what the word awe actually means? The word awe means a feeling of reverential respect

mixed with fear or wonder. And we chase that feeling of fear and wonder, but the problem is we try to get that feeling from non-God level things, and it can't deliver, he can't deliver, she can't deliver, they can't deliver. And we keep chasing that feeling, and we overuse the word awesome. Like man, you might like hot dogs, but they're not awesome. You might love college football, but it's not awesome. Your kid may have won a bunch of awards and had all the ribbons and the ropes and the tassels and the things the other day at the graduation, but they're not awesome. You may be good at making money and business, but you're not awesome. Only our God is awesome. Some of us are old enough to remember this song. Our God is an awesome God. So Paul Tripp says this. Awe amnesia always leads to awe replacement. They who suffer from this have a theology of awe that puts God at the center, but between Sundays they live as if God doesn't exist. Hoping to be wonderstruck by an experience of some created thing, they're hurt, they're angry, they're jealous, they're frustrated, not just because life hasn't worked out as they wished, but because awe replacement has made that disappointment more profoundly discouraging of a reality for them.

That's a long way of saying what I say when I say, hey, when you make a good thing an ultimate thing, what's it do? It becomes a destructive thing. You take a good thing and you put that in the place that only God is supposed to have in your life, that very thing will burn your life to the ground. So here's the bottom line. The reason some of us are experiencing no joy is because we're not emptying ourselves, we're actually busy trying to fill ourselves. And again, Paul tells us that Jesus actually said it's more blessed to give than receive. But he didn't just say that, right? He actually demonstrated that. That's why the author of Hebrews says Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the, what's the word? Joy that was set before him endured the cross and scorned to shame. It was joy that was set before him as he went to that old, rugged cross. So let's just get really practical for a few minutes here. The primary reason if you're not experiencing the joy of Jesus is because you're not pouring yourself out like Jesus, and so that's why Paul can go on and just hit me right between the eyes with this next portion of Philippians, verse 14. Man, I wish this did not say do all things. I wish it said do some things, do a few things,

do a limited number of things, but it says do all things without two of my favorite things, grumbling and dispute. I mean, here's the way God has uniquely wired me. There's a good side and a shadow side to this. I've told you this before. He's given me a gift of discernment, which means dumb things don't make it through my radar very easily. The shadow side to that is everywhere I go, I just see the dumb things. I see the things that don't make any sense and it can drive me crazy. And so I find myself grumbling and disputing in these circumstances. Let me give you an example. I finally got that real ID. How many of you got your real ID? You got one of those? All right, I finally got one of those. Guess what? Mine doesn't work. It's awesome. Because the picture's too faded. So I get the joy and the privilege of God's sense of humor being played out in my life so that he can challenge me with this. Every time I go to the airport now, I hand it over and go, it's not gonna work. They go, well, let me try.

And then it doesn't work. And then I have to get patted down. They take off all my clothes and do all the things and yell at me. Because God's got a sense of humor and he's trying to grow in me. Patience. What is it for you? You really good at whining and complaining on the internet? How about comparing yourself to other people on Instagram? Hard to be joyful when you're doing that. How about playing the victim card? Quick question, did Jesus ever do that? What is it for you? See, here's where Paul's going. That you, so if you don't whine and complain and all that stuff, and you'd be blameless and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst of, here's the way he described his generation. Wonder how he would describe ours. Crooked and twisted, among whom you, followers of Jesus, shine as lights in the world holding fast to the word of life so that in the day of Christ, I may be proud that I did not run in labor in vain. As followers of Jesus, we're not just a little bit different, we're the complete opposite. We're lights shining into the darkness. Jesus said, I'm the light of the world,

then he told us, now you are the light of the world. Go into the darkness and illuminate for a lost and broken world who I am and what I've done. That's what your life goal, that's your five-year plan, shine. So Paul lands this passage. He says, hey, even if I'm to be poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrificial offering of your faith, I'm glad and rejoiced with you all because likewise, you also should be glad and rejoice with me. That's actually a really obscure reference to the book of Numbers, chapter 15, verse one through 10. This is for free. If any of you struggle with insomnia, have I got the cure for you. Go read Numbers tonight, all right? You're like, I don't think we should talk that way in church. Oh, come on. I know a bunch of y'all have tried to do the read through the Bible and the year plan. You rocked Genesis. You did pretty good through Exodus. You got to Leviticus and it got a little off balance. Like, that's a little bit weird. You got to Numbers and you quit because it's boring. But listen, there's some good stuff in there and one of the good things in there

is this description of a drink offering. You see, a drink offering was this cup of wine that was poured out over an animal sacrifice for sins as a foreshadowing of the ultimate sacrifice of our good Savior. And Paul's saying, I want to be poured out every ounce of me like Jesus emptied himself to pay the price for us. So, are you emptying yourself? Is your life an offering? Are you giving generously? Are you serving gladly? Are you sacrificially laying down your life for the glory of God and the good of others? Those are the questions resonating in our hearts and in our souls today. But I'm telling you, there is no path to joy apart from that kind of life. And I can just tell you from experience, the joy is real. Because let me just say this. When I got to go to Flatirons a couple weeks ago, yes, I got the honor and the privilege of doing this thing that I loved it. I hope you can sense this. I used to just wring myself out to do, like leave it all on the field kind of energy comes out of me. And I got to do that there, which was an honor and a joy and a privilege to get to do it again.

But here was the best part. When I walked off those five steps and I went down into that auditorium, I just had conversation after conversation. Here's how some of them went. I had this 18-year-old young man come up to me. His baseball team had just won the state tournament, the state championship. And he walked up to me and said, hey man, do you remember me? I said, honestly, I don't. I'm really, really sorry. What's your name? He said, that makes sense. My name's Mateo. You were my first baseball coach when I was seven years old. I'm like, Mateo, what's up, man? You played on the Rattlers with me? And he's like, yeah, man. Tears of joy, as we're just embracing each other in this place called Flatirons Community Church that meant so much to me, and now means so much to him. I had this moment where this man came up to me, tears of joy, and he just goes, you don't remember this, but you spoke words of life and encouragement into my wife and into me when we were on the verge of divorce, and now our marriage is stronger, and we're still together today, tears of joy. My friend Dan, I saw him like right back over here,

and I was like, hey man, what's up? I haven't seen him in over a decade, I don't think. We first became friends because I was speaking at this camp in Arizona. He was the dude who taught everybody how to do rock climbing and what the camp people told me was like, hey, Dan's actually a pretty angry atheist, but he teaches our kids how to climb rocks and stuff like that. I'm like, well, I'm not interested in climbing any rocks, but I'll go hang out with Dan. We struck up this friendship over the course of a few years and Dan ended up having a near fatal climbing accident, so when I would go back to Arizona, I would go visit him in the rehab facility. He struggled with pain and addiction to pain pills after that, and eventually he moved out to Colorado, became a part of our church, and became a follower of Jesus, and here we are all these years later, and we're standing there, and he's still fighting through the pain, and he looks at a friend of his, and he goes, hey, this is my friend Scott. He's one of the reasons I became a Christian. Tears of joy. And man, in this moment, at the men's conference where I was down front next to an older man who I love so much and a younger man who I love so much, and this older man has poured his life into this younger man, and then this younger man made a commitment to Jesus in that moment,

and then me and this older man from our church, man, we got to just hug and embrace through tears of joy, and I'm just telling you, that's what Paul was pending in this letter to the Philippians. Over tears of joy, he's thinking about people. He's thinking about Lydia. Read about it in Acts chapter 16. Met her by a river. Her life was forever changed by the gospel and by Jesus. Thinking about a little slave girl who was owned by some men who were using her and abusing her, but that wasn't even the worst because she was possessed by demons until Paul spoke the name of Jesus over her and she was delivered from that oppression, and now years later in Philippi, she's shining like a star in the darkness that once owned her, and he's thinking about this jailer, this old Roman retired soldier who was on the verge of taking his own life because Paul and Silas had been set free from this prison that he was in charge of. He had failed, and so he was gonna take his own life until Paul and Silas said, no, no, no, no, don't do that. Let us tell you about Jesus who did for us, set us free from this physical jail. He can set you free from what you've been in bondage to your whole life, and he and his whole family miraculously get saved and baptized on that very night. I'm just telling you, a life full of joy.

That channel gets carved when you sing through the suffering and when you empty yourself out for people that Jesus loves, and so here's the question today. Here in a minute, we're gonna take communion together after I pray, and we're gonna remember Jesus emptied himself for us, but we're also gonna have an opportunity to empty ourselves. Maybe today is the day that you finally say, I'm gonna stop trying to do this life on my own. It's been a disaster because I've been following my heart. I'm gonna follow Jesus, and you lay down your life to Jesus today. Our prayer team people are gonna be off to the sides as soon as I say amen. You go find one of them, they will hold your hand through this. For some of us, you've been holding on to something that you've never told anybody before. It's been a burden, it's been bringing you shame, and today is the day when you finally just surrender it, you empty yourself of it. You go tell one of our prayer team members, they'll pray for you. Maybe today is the day you finally start allowing Jesus to access your finances and watch what he will do with your heart, with your family, with this church. Maybe a whole bunch of us today, we just need to finally let go of our pride, and who cares?

Nobody around you is thinking about you right now, but when we're done with communion, and we all stand and we begin to sing our faces off, maybe your face will finally wake up to the reality that you're experiencing in your heart. Let's pray. Father, thank you for Jesus. Thank you for Jesus. Thank you for Jesus. Poured out his blood for us. Laid down his life for us. He didn't owe us that. He didn't have to do it. But motivated by your love, he did it. And it's changed us forever. Father, I pray for anybody today across our campuses that doesn't know that freedom. I pray that they will find it in your son, Jesus, in these next few moments. As we take this cup, and we take this bread, and we... and drink the cup. Remind us of who you are and what you've done. And then Father, would you use us to reach one more lost and broken people, person, so that they can be found. In Jesus' beautiful name, amen.