Think Focused. Think Large!

Paul has urged us to think about what happened in Jesus: Hymn in 2:5-11. Think this one thing. Reason: What God said by raising and exalting Jesus was God defining the very nature of God in a new way. Yes, there have always been ways of feeling after God in sacrifices, vows, temples, myths, liturgies, care for ancestors, etc. But God chose to define God’s self by emptying, becoming human, no ordinary power, signs of care and the depth of reality, humbling, slave, death, cross. This human is God’s own self- expression! This self-giving love, service, empathy in a broken world - God, Lord!

This is your lens to bring everything into focus. (Very different from rigorous orthodoxy.) No matter who you are: Actor, mechanic, financier, social worker, educator, CEO. But through that lens you see everything. In a world of Hubble one; we need Hubble two.

Whatever is true. What a category! God is the center of reality and everything that’s true is in some way related to God, revealing the reality God built into the world. The world is open for exploration, science, history, literature, social research. Scientific method can’t have God as an object, but God includes science. Physicist, biologist, poet, creator.

Often what is true is not good, especially about humans. In literature, history, psychology, art, etc., we try to understand the potent mix of bad and good in us. True, not distorted.

Whatever is beautiful.... The bad tends to control the images and talk. We’re drawn in. In a world of slavery, conquest, no human rights, Paul says stay true to what’s deeply true.

Refusing Anxiety in a World that Needs Prayer

In vv 4-7 Paul echoes Jesus. Don’t be anxious! The world’s a mess! Paul’s in chains. If we wait for right circumstances, for justice and love from empires or people, we’ll wait!

But you together are in reality defined by resurrection, "in the Lord." Jesus didn’t leave. He’s right here. Don’t ever be satisfied with brokenness in the world or yourself. Shape your thought and action to God’s character by prayer. But don’t let anything stop celebration. As you learn God’s Grace let it create reasonableness, gentleness. No person is your enemy, outside God’s love and desire for relationship. Don’t be afraid.

As you live a life shaped by Jesus, God creates a peace that helps you deal with all the circumstances of the world. It guards your hearts, minds, in the Messiah King Jesus.

Practice, Practice, Practice!

In vv 9-13 Paul picks up the guidance of earlier passages. Finding real life is the most important thing you’ll ever do. It’s a gift of God but God doesn’t overwhelm you. He works in you and with you to bring beautiful life to realization now and beyond.

Every follower of Jesus is a learner/disciple. Learn from/imitate those with experience. Put your values into practice. Create habits, virtues, character, defined by Jesus: God and image of God for us. Paul highlights their help. Also his own long learning process.

"Self-sufficient" is surprising. It depends on learning who our "self" is, as a beloved creature of God and "in the Lord." Resurrection means my "self" includes God/Jesus/Spirit who initiates me through experience to be strong. A call to excellence, beauty, Grace, Truth.

Jesus - Resurrected but Unrecognized

Paul writes to the believers in Philippi from a hard situation: he’s in prison and they’re facing persecution. It focuses the mind. He helps them think about life and death. He takes them into the core reality that brought him to them and changed their lives:

In Jesus God showed his self-giving love concretely. By raising the human Jesus from death, God shouted that Jesus taking our suffering is God’s very identity LORD/Yahweh.

But really grasping the meaning of resurrection has always been hard. The Gospel resurrection narratives point to this by recounting how disciples often could not recognize Jesus. Road to Emmaus: prod, scripture, bread. Mary Magdalene: name! We live with death. New glorious physical life beyond death is challenging. What does it mean? We snap back into old fears, old priorities. We lose who we are in Jesus. Paul leads the Philippians into knowing Jesus in his resurrection by modeling the path.

The Challenge: From Hymn to Community Project

Paul want them to "think" the reality of the hymn of Jesus by putting it into practice. He solemnly challenges them. But it’s not to individual "works" salvation based on fear. This is a community working together in loving and caring for each other, and taking that so seriously that they realize life and death are at stake. Love, laughter, inclusion, joy, and empathy are the most serious things in the world. They’re to do it together!

It is doable only because God is part of the community, creating desire and fulfilling it so that the community becomes an outpost of the new world of God’s beautiful kingdom.

Knowing Jesus - The Radical Make-over

Paul knows the challenges. He takes them through his own experiences. He had positive accomplishments. But as God brought him to see the reality in Jesus, they lost their decisive quality. God raising the crucified Jesus was a divine exclamation that turned all other values upside down. Paul had been really good at Torah - within his reach. Jesus pushed him to a life quest totally beyond his reach. But Jesus reached out and took hold of him and set him on a quest to learn the self-giving love in Jesus’ death.

True life is beyond human accomplishment. It is a quest new every day. But it is already given in Jesus. God exalted Jesus to the heights! In Jesus we receive nothing less than that same call. A life of beauty, justice, and love now. Life that is true victory over death.

Who is God? The Quest to Know God’s Glory

What does "God" mean? "We seek to worship and glorify God." Sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, eternal, glorious beyond imagination. Does that carry over to his people? Paul is in a center of emperor worship: God is real power, Augustus, Rome, empire.

Or is God exalted far from human life, distant watchmaker, maybe breaks in with miracles.

Paul’s been dealing with his own chains and the Philippians’ suffering. Do they belong to a glorious God? The true God? Then why chains? Why not empire? Where’s God’s glory when you’re in prison, your family in danger. Paul models, challenges, guides.

He describes a way of life focused on a way of thinking - community in Messiah Jesus. He leads them into a hymn about Jesus centered on the remarkable journey from "God’s form" and "equality with God" to "death on a cross." But the hymn is not just about Jesus. It is about God and God’s glory. Jesus’ resurrection and exaltation by God is God’s most emphatic and defining statement about God’s identity. Jesus is graced with God’s own name "LORD" (Kurios) the translation of Yahweh. God calls for scripture to be read in a new way - to understand we must see where God is going.

Jesus - The Story of Israel, Humanity, and God

Much of scripture is about revealing God’s glory, name, identity. God creates all that exists plus humans in God’s image, bearing something of his glory. The Exodus unfolds the revelation of God’s glory: his name, deliverance from slavery, manna, Sinai, Tent of meeting. But always with an edge of Israel’s brokenness. Is this only Israel’s national god? No. God created and claims all that exists, all beings.

Jesus comes as a human like Adam and Eve. He takes a slave’s form like Israel in Egypt. He embodies the whole human story: true humanity’s rule and broken humanity’ suffering and death. But he also comes as one truly "equal to God" revealing true divinity. Being true God is self-giving love that takes on the experience and hope of God’s creatures. He shows God’s love and intention for his human creation and what he will do in love.

God’s Amazing Glory and Our Life

Jesus, God says, is Me, Yahweh, LORD, my Glory! Now truly enfolding you, broken human! This is what the whole story is about! Take that in! Focus your mind and understanding.

Out of it flows a whole, beautiful, glorious life (even in prison). Encouragement, Love, God’s Spirit, true empathy and mercy, self-giving for others in a whole community.

Amy delivers the Sunday morning sermon for Mother's Day, 2019.

How Jesus’ Story becomes My Story

Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection are the climax of the whole event of Jesus among us. Jesus’ followers realized that this great event changed their perception of everything and everyone, including God and themselves and all creation. The NT is the record of their explorations of what it means to live in a world with Jesus’ cross and resurrection.

Paul brought Jesus’ whole story to Philippi. Jews, Pagans, women, slaves, Roman veterans, were drawn into a community. There was violent reaction, beating, prison, release. Paul left for other cities. Now he’s in prison in Ephesus. Philippi sent help, but worried.

Paul describes his situation, expressing the way being in Christ (Anointed King) shapes life, death, calm before opponents, hope. He proclaimed a new emperor in a center of Roman power and doesn’t back down. He wants more boldness: To live is Christ.

The diverse believers in Philippi experience persecution. He wants them to stand firm,
but how? Everything they see around them says no. Paul moves from how his own life is shaped by Jesus to how their lives can experience the same power. The love that is the heart of Jesus - God’s self-giving love, our response in heart and action - becomes the lens that lets them see what really matters (1:9-10).

Life Together in Community

Paul knew from experience that genuine community among diverse people is hard. Crossing boundaries of ethnicity, politics, religion, gender status, enslavement, political rights, family hierarchy, cultural roots, prejudice, distrust, etc., to form friendship, shared life and identity, and united community was/is really hard. If each identity, individual can be separated, all can be drawn back into the dominant civic story.

Paul urges them to think and live as a community defined by the Royal Proclamation of the Anointed King Jesus (Gospel of Christ Jesus) - a serious challenge. But God’s Spirit will aid their solidity. Another metaphor: A team of athletes striving like one person for the life of trust in God that flows from this Good News. They reinforce each other and stand with strength for resurrection life against the message of violence and division.

Paul wants them to see their suffering more clearly. Suffering is hard, often destructive. But it can bring focus, testing what’s really important, giving self-knowledge, hope.

A Single Focus to Unite Diverse People

Paul is leading them toward a poetic description of the Jesus-Event (2:5-11). He prepares by leading them through a meditation on what matters, toward which all must be drawn.

The stress is on minds/hearts shaped by a single focus. Not for a code of correct doctrine. Paul encourages variety of practice. But a focus on Jesus - life, cross, resurrection. Without him at center, nothing else makes sense; lets us know God and his loving power.

The flow is from Christ/King to his/our Love in all its dimensions, united by one Spirit to share deep empathy. Paul’s joy for them is that single focus of united love and life defined by Jesus. It undermines individualistic strife and creates a community of true mutual support. To live is Christ, who comes to serve and give his life for us.

Learning the Joy of Faith in a World of Trouble

We focus on Philippians in this period between Easter and Pentecost: a time of Disciples beginning to grasp the reality and transformation of the resurrection. Paul is living and carrying that resurrection power into a world that had no grasp of it - Roman cities.

Paul is in Ephesus and writes to Philippi. Both were cities of Roman government. Ephesus, capital of Roman Asia, center of Artemis and Emperor worship. Jewish community, culture, magic, riots, etc. Luke shows complex situation. Philippi was a Roman colony. Little Jewish presence, but strong patriotism to Rome. Close relation to Paul.

What happened? Paul is in prison/chains in Ephesus. His Roman citizenship got him out of jail in Philippi, but not in Ephesus. Paul is in danger of execution. Paul has both supporters and enemies (Demetrius). Believers have become bolder. Paul’s friends are in danger. Many people are talking about this King that Paul proclaims!

Royal Announcement and Divine Life in one Word.

What king? In Greek "King" means "Emperor." Paul comes announcing the Kingdom of God and Jesus Christ. Christ isn’t a normal name. It means "Messiah" for Jews, which means "Anointed King." But there’s only one king/emperor, the Roman one!

Paul comes with a Royal Proclamation/Good News/Gospel. It’s about God’s Kingdom ruled by Anointed King Jesus. Where is this kingdom? Who’s Jesus? Well, it’s here! And he is a Jewish prophet who was crucified. Crucified? He’s gone. He can’t be king now! Oh, but he is! He was raised from the dead, conquering death for all of us.

The one word "Christ" - Messiah - Anointed King when applied to Jesus the crucified carries with it so much. It is a statement of resurrection against all the power of death. It is the promise of Life and More Life. It is a challenge to every structure of power in our death-dealing world. It is the remaking of all values and visions of life.

"For to Me to Live is ..." What?

How do we finish that assertion? Paul is in chains, and he’s heard about persecutions suffered by Philippians. But this reality of King Jesus (Life now, Resurrection, Hope, unbreakable peace) shapes him. He can’t bring himself to be angry at his guards, or officials, or those who want to torment him. All are beloved by God. Paul rejoices.

Life and death are both good. Both are Life! Both are Christ! A faith full of work and joy!

A New World of Life - Breaking Into the Empire of Death

Celebrating Jesus’ resurrection is rejoicing in a challenge that hits us every day and never goes away. We humans everywhere structure life around power over others in all its forms, raw violence, manipulative enticement, structures of control, financial reward.... Even our best intentions and policies must be enforced. Behind all is death’s power.

Jesus’ resurrection is the event in which God reveals that his own world/reality is creating life, not threatening death. He shows our patterns of religion, politics, life struggle, are not his eternal reality. He broke into our human empire of death with his Kingdom of life and challenges each of us to see his reality of Love, Grace, Trust. It’s there in plain sight, if we’re not blinded. But it’s hard. We are blinded by our little reality, by fear!

Creating a New World and Building on its Reality

We don’t create a New World. God did that in Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. Conquering death, revealing creation overwhelming destruction. Jesus invites us into that reality and commissions us to implement/ build life on that physical/spiritual truth.

God unites his world. Resurrection is historical fact that pushes our minds to see the world’s openness to God. It has a distinct shape. Not one of the disciples is from the elite classes. Jesus chooses to appear first to women, Mary and Mary, to break the assumptions of even those lowly apostles. Testimony in a world of distorted power.

God’s Forgiveness for the World

When God draws us into his New World, Jesus commissions tasks that seem impossible. He breaths the Holy Spirit in and commissions his followers to build a world of both forgiveness of sins, but also rejection of the old patterns of power, domination, death.

We are called to his life and to see all life within the reality of resurrection. In my person, community, family, nation, world, I’m called to disempower death by identifying sins, forgiving people, turning all from sins and living in a new way of self-giving love.

The Importance of Doubt, Knowledge, and Faith

Often teachers treat the resurrection as a doctrine, a concept, a story from which we can extract an essence and let the rest go. Thomas’s experience stands against that. As an event, it’s like all historical events. It happened and can’t be repeated. But it’s important that Jesus was really present, seen, bodily real to the disciples.

God chose very ordinary people but they were as hard-nosed as we would be. None of them expected this or could have constructed it from imagination. Much less a whole group. Yet they lived and died for this truth, for others who did not see it.

My Lord and My God!

The four Gospels include memories of the resurrection from various points of view. They make a point of including doubt. Thomas wants knowledge he can trust/believe.

Jesus gives it, and Thomas recognizes far more. Jesus points directly to us this morning!

The Turning of the Ages

Our modern world knows when the ages turned - Galileo, Newton, Enlightenment, French Rev. Breaking ecclesiastical domination, free thought, human autonomy. Important! But that eccl. domination had domesticated and hid the great revolution, the truly new age that we celebrate: Easter when God breaks in to overcome the ultimate power of death and create new life.

Palm Sunday and all this week sets the stage. Death is still master. Hopes blossom. A long history feeds anticipation with prophetic poetry. Imperial oppression holds in boiling resentments. Aristocratic religious leaders are threatened by the very faith they’re supposed to foster. Religio-political groups propose ways of reform. The crowds long for Passover deliverance!

A young prophet from Galilee, riding a donkey, comes over the hill and sees the city and temple and weeps over it. He sees things others can’t yet see. He is someone more than they imagine.

How Do You Recognize a King?

The Passover crowds recognize Jesus’ action from scripture. The King/Messiah who’s also humble like a servant. They want and welcome a King: palms, cloaks, Hosannas, "Son of David"! Could he really be the one? The city quakes all week with the question. The temple commerce is overthrown. Children shout and sing. Blind and lame come for healing.

But the chief priests, God’s ministers, see and hear only danger to the old world they lead. "Son of David"? Really!? No one really sees what’s coming. But the crowds and children and blind see God’s doing something. They long for it. God takes baby babbling and turns it to praise.

Jesus teaches in the temple and challenges Priests, Sadducees, Pharisees, all who controlled God. They’re blind to God’s power or claim to define God’s will and control others. He speaks of facing death in a way that even his followers can’t square with a new Kingdom rule.

Jesus sees the entire leadership of Herod’s temple, empty of God and headed to violent ruin. He leaves it behind. At a dinner, a woman anoints Jesus. Some object. Jesus points to his death.

Human Empires and the Kingdom of God

Judas signed on for a victorious kingdom, not a dead prophet. He plans to hand over the deluded Jesus to the temple authorities, who’ll give him to the Roman governor. The Romans work like all human empires till today. Death, war, execution, threat is the ultimate control. You can’t be a king when you’re dead. If people want to overthrow our rule, stop them with death.

Jesus plans for Passover, feast of deliverance from death by death. Temple and empire are both willing to take their chance that death will stop this prophet. Jesus takes the disciples, even betrayer deeper into "my body...blood," into love that serves, into overcoming the world.

What’s Really Happening?

Jesus acts to create a new world of grace that is open to human faith, love, freedom. Do you see it? Will you follow it? We see the evil, injustice of crucifixion. Can it be God’s self-giving love? Saturday, death has won! Trusting a dead king is like baby babbling. Can God turn it to praise, life?

Jesus’ Astounding Authority

Jesus: "Change your way of thinking, for the kingdom of heaven has come near!" (Mt 4:17) Seek God’s kingdom! You don’t create it. It’s here, real! Do you know reality to see it? The change of mind is in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount and his signs of healing and life.

People flocked to Jesus for healing power, but felt something more - authority. "But I say to you" unfolds a vision of God, of solid life, of faith and everyday practice. Doing "the will of my Father" is the same as "listening to these words of mine and doing them."

Mighty Works by Your Name! ... I Never Knew You!

The idea of power is intoxicating. (I’ll use the ring for good!) Disciples wanted to be great, kingdom officials, fighters of demonic power, mighty deeds. Jesus rejects such a focus because we see power through our world and experience - conflict, domination, glory.

God’s power of self-giving love was unfolding toward true victory in cross and resurrection. As God’s kingdom comes ("on that day") only the power of life changed by Jesus’ words is true. Amazing displays of power are part of the problem. As the power of God’s Spirit broke in, many pushed it toward competition, control. Paul says that no manifestation of spiritual power is true unless it manifests God’s self-giving love.

How Do You Build a House on Bedrock?

Jesus: Listen to my words and do them! Not as law like Pharisees. But as a life adventure, a quest to know God’s reality - bedrock - in the midst of so much delusion - sand.

Listen to Jesus’ words: This is where God’s story, Law, prophets, has been headed. Blessing! You are salt/light: God’s glory in your beautiful deeds. Refuse anger, contempt. Choose reconciliation even over worship. Don’t let power, lust determine relationships, but faithfulness. Tell the truth without reinforcement. No bargaining with God. Refuse retaliation, violence, possessiveness. Give more than was taken from you. Don’t let defending possessions control you. Love to the uttermost, even enemies. This is God’s heart. Never settle for less. Your standard and My promise is God’s perfection.

Focus on a real relationship with God not on a display of piety. Secrecy helps. Pray for God’s realm to come on earth not vice versa. Forgive! Find the freedom God gives. Possessions are temporary stewardship. Don’t let them be master. Only God is master! Practice trusting God. See his work everywhere, birds and lilies. Refuse to be anxious, knowing that he knows what you need. Your life is bigger than things. Seek his kingdom!

You’re not the judge. You’re self-deceived. Trust God and be bold: ask, seek, knock. The road looks hard but it leads to life - the very best, beauty, meaning, security, God.

Every house gets hit by storms, trouble. No exemption. What the world sells as security is part of the storm. Only a life founded in the bedrock love that is God’s heart will stand.

This week we are going to look at how Paul’s words orient us HORIZONTALLY in light of our vertical relationship with God.

Paul views the gathering of vertically aligned people as an entirely new humanity.

The horizontal relationships we have in this body are critically important because in here we are being told a story that has the power to not only transform us, but to transform our families, our friends, our school, our work places, even our social media feeds. Taken all together, this story can change the world.

God intends for the church to be inside out kind of place, and Paul knows that in order for us to be what God intends, we have to be people who understand who we were as outsiders, before we were brought inside by the cross of Christ.