1. "We strive to lay hold of Christ because Christ has already laid hold of us. You strive to possess Christ because he's already possessed you. You ride the wave, so to speak, because the wave has caught you."

2. "If you're running a race, it does you no good to turn around and look back behind you, perhaps to see how much ground you've covered or who might be gaining on you. That will only distract you. That will only slow you down. The only way to run is to fix your gaze on the finish line and not let anything take your eyes off of it."

3. "Past achievements can be every bit as deadly a distraction as past sins."

4. "When any sin of yours comes to your awareness, whether in the recent or more distant past, look long enough to see yourself plainly and no longer. Look long enough to take a sin's measure and take responsibility for it before God, then confess your sin to God and if necessary, confess to others, then move on."

5. "Christianity is not a couch sitting religion, but a race running religion. If you're not running, you're not believing. If you're not striving for the prize, you're not saved. The Christian life is not a moving walkway like you see in the airport, but a running track."

6. "There is only so much you can learn from a blogger or podcaster or preacher or, dare I say it, Instagram influencer who lives a thousand miles away. You can't even know if they really practice what they preach. You don't have access to their life."

7. "One crucial test of the faithfulness of any purportedly Christian teaching is whether it whets your appetite for heaven or dulls it. These false believers are trying to find their heaven on earth."

8. "For our part, we must not become people who denounce but who do not weep. Neither may we become people who weep but who never denounce. Too much is at stake both ways."

9. "Our final hope as Christians is not that we'll go up to heaven, but that God will bring heaven to earth. Right now, our hope is stored up in heaven where Christ is."

10. "All true Christians persevere. And only those who persevere are true Christians."

Observation Questions

1. In Philippians 3:12, what does Paul say he has not yet obtained, and what reason does he give for pressing on despite this?

2. According to Philippians 3:13-14, what two actions does Paul describe as "one thing I do," and what is the goal he is pressing toward?

3. In Philippians 3:17, who does Paul instruct the Philippians to imitate, and what should they keep their eyes on?

4. How does Paul describe "enemies of the cross of Christ" in Philippians 3:18-19? List the four characteristics he mentions about their end, their god, their glory, and their minds.

5. According to Philippians 3:20-21, where is our citizenship, what are we awaiting, and what will the Lord Jesus Christ do when he comes?

6. In Philippians 4:1, what affectionate terms does Paul use to address the Philippians, and what specific command does he give them?

Interpretation Questions

1. Paul says in verse 12 that he presses on "because Christ Jesus has made me his own." How does Christ's prior action of taking hold of Paul relate to Paul's ongoing effort to pursue Christ? What does this teach us about the relationship between God's grace and human effort in the Christian life?

2. Why does Paul emphasize "forgetting what lies behind" in verse 13? What kinds of things from the past—both positive and negative—might hinder a Christian from pressing on toward the prize?

3. In verses 18-19, Paul describes people who "walk as enemies of the cross" yet seem to be within the Christian community. How do the four descriptions Paul gives (their end, their god, their glory, and their minds) reveal what is fundamentally wrong with their faith?

4. What is the significance of Paul saying "our citizenship is in heaven" (v. 20) rather than simply saying "we will go to heaven"? How does this present reality of heavenly citizenship shape how Christians should live now?

5. How does the promise that Christ "will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body" (v. 21) provide motivation and perspective for enduring the hardships of the Christian race?

Application Questions

1. Paul describes his pursuit of Christ as "one thing I do" (v. 13). What are the competing priorities or distractions in your life that fragment your attention and keep you from single-mindedly pursuing Christ? What is one practical step you could take this week to simplify your focus?

2. The sermon mentioned that past sins can trap us in guilt or self-pity, while past achievements can lead to self-complacency. Which of these backward-looking tendencies is more of a struggle for you, and how can you practice "forgetting what lies behind" in a healthy, biblical way?

3. Paul instructs believers to imitate godly examples and keep their eyes on those who walk faithfully (v. 17). Who in your local church community demonstrates a Christ-like pattern of life that you could learn from? How might you intentionally spend more time with them to observe and learn?

4. Considering that we are called both to follow godly examples and to become examples worth following, in what area of your life do you need to grow so that others could safely imitate you? What would it look like to invite someone into your life to learn alongside you?

5. Paul's command to "stand firm" (4:1) implies that there are pressures threatening to knock us off course. What specific trial, temptation, or opposition are you currently facing that makes perseverance difficult? How can the truths about your heavenly citizenship and Christ's coming transformation strengthen you to keep running?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Hebrews 12:1-3 — This passage uses the same imagery of running a race with endurance while fixing our eyes on Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.

2. 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 — Paul describes the Christian life as a race requiring self-discipline, where we run to obtain an imperishable prize rather than a perishable one.

3. 2 Timothy 4:6-8 — Near the end of his life, Paul reflects on having finished the race and kept the faith, awaiting the crown of righteousness from the Lord.

4. Colossians 3:1-4 — This passage develops the theme of setting our minds on things above where Christ is, since our life is hidden with Christ in God.

5. 1 John 3:1-3 — John teaches that we are already God's children, and the hope of seeing Christ and being made like him purifies us as we wait for his appearing.

Sermon Main Topics

I. The Christian Life as a Race Requiring Endurance (Introduction)

II. Pursuit: Single-Mindedly Pursuing Christ as the Ultimate Prize (Philippians 3:12-16)

III. Patterns: Imitating Godly Examples and Avoiding Ungodly Ones (Philippians 3:17-19)

IV. Perspective: Seeing Our Home and Hope in Heaven (Philippians 3:20-21)

V. Perseverance: Standing Firm in the Lord (Philippians 4:1)

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Detailed Sermon Outline

Endurance. Never did any ship bear a more fitting name.

On December 5th, 1914, a crew of 28 men, including their captain, Ernest Shackleton, set sail for Antarctica from South Georgia Island. Shackleton's goal was to accomplish the first crossing of the whole continent. Within two days, the ship encountered pack ice. A month later, a northerly gale blew the pack ice against the land, and the ice flows against each other, and the ship stuck fast. No way forward, no way back.

As one crew member put it, the ship was frozen like an almond in the middle of a chocolate bar.

They had been within a day's sail of their destination, but now the ice was slowly drifting them in the wrong direction. All they could do was wait and drift with the ice that they hoped would eventually break up. They drifted for 10 months. Then one day in October, pressure from the ice buckled the ship, so the crew had to abandon it and start living on the ice. About a month later, more pressure from the ice crushed the boughs, split the mast, lifted the boat up above the ice, and then the pressure released and the boat sank to the bottom of the sea.

The whole crew drifted on the ice for another six months until the ice they were living on split beneath them. And so they had to scramble into boats and make for nearby Elephant Island. But of course, who's ever going to find them there? And they only had so much supplies. So Shackleton and five others took a 20-foot lifeboat and sailed back to South Georgia Island 800 miles away through massive seas and hurricane-force winds.

After riding out the storm, a storm that sank a huge tanker, After riding out the storm, they landed on the opposite side of the island from the whaling station they needed to get to. So they cut a line through extremely dangerous mountain terrain, a path no one had ever taken before, covering 32 miles in 36 hours. They found the whaling station, they made contact, and then Shackleton made three failed attempts to rescue the crew who were stranded in Antarctica. Eventually, his appeal to the government of Chile prevailed, and they sent out a small tug to rescue the 22 men who had now been stranded for another four and a half months. Thanks to Shackleton's and others' astounding endurance, every single crew member's life was saved.

Not many of us will face such agonizing physical hardships or such staggering natural obstacles. But in light of an extreme example like this, it's worth asking, what in your life calls for endurance?

When are you tempted to quit?

And what will you lose if you do? If you're not a believer in Jesus, what prize would you say you're seeking to obtain?

What do you have to give up in order to get that prize? How do you know the prize will be worth it?

The New Testament repeatedly describes the Christian life as a race, and every race requires endurance. Hebrews 12:1, Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance, the race that is set before us. Your daily life may have nothing of the drama of being trapped on an ice floe in Antarctica, but as dramatic as Shackleton's endurance was, the New Testament teaches that in the end, the stakes of every one of our lives or even higher. If you do not run the Christian race all the way to the end, what you stand to lose is far worse than losing your life.

And if you do persevere, the prize you gain is infinitely greater than anything in the world. So what does it take to run the Christian race? That's the question Paul answers in the passage we're going to consider this morning, Philippians 3:12, down to chapter 4:1. The passage begins on page 981 of the Bibles in the pew. Please follow along as I read.

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus had made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize 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 also to you. 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 thus in the Lord, my beloved.

What does it take to run the Christian race? Our passage answers in four parts. Point one, pursuit. Pursuit. To run the Christian race, you must single-mindedly pursue knowing Christ as your ultimate prize.

This is Paul's point in verses 12 to 16. Start by looking back to verse 12. Not that I've already obtained this, or am already perfect. What's the this Paul is talking about? He's really pointing back to all of verses 8 to 11.

As we saw last week, there Paul says that the gain he wants, in light of which he counts everything else as loss and rubbish, is to know Christ. So at the end of verse 8, that I may gain Christ. And then verse 10 into verse 11, that I may know him in the power of his resurrection.

And may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection of the dead. But doesn't Paul already know Christ? How can Paul say, not that I have already obtained this? He isn't just making the obvious point that he's not yet been raised from the dead. He's saying something much more profound.

Paul's point is that the fullness of knowing Christ, what his heart longs for more than anything will only be his when he sees Christ face to face. He already knows Christ, but he doesn't yet know him fully. And when Paul goes on to deny that he's perfect, he's referring to this whole package deal of being raised from the dead, freed from sin, given a glorified body, and seeing Christ face to face. This point isn't primarily about not yet being morally perfect, although it includes that, certainly. So any teaching that claims Christians can become sinlessly perfect in this life runs aground on Paul's teaching right here in this verse.

So what does Paul do? He says, I press on to make it my own. Paul fervently pursues this prize. He puts all he has into striving to reach this final goal of perfect unending fellowship with Christ. And why?

Why does he press on? Here's a sweet encouragement. Because Christ Jesus has made me his own. We strive to lay hold of Christ because Christ has already laid hold of us. Paul is referring to his dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus when the risen Lord Jesus Christ literally stopped him in his tracks and claimed Paul's life for his own purposes.

If you're a Christian, your conversion may have been less dramatic than Paul's, but its consequence is exactly the same. Jesus Christ has personally taken hold of you. He has gripped you with his omnipotent hand and he is not going to let go.

These two verses show us the whole shape of the Christian life, just like we saw back in chapter 2 verses 12 and 13. You strive to possess Christ because he's already possessed you. You ride the wave, so to speak, because the wave has caught you. In verses 13 and 14, Paul repeats both of this affirmation and denial. Brothers, I do not consider that I've made it my own, but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Here Paul's athletic imagery becomes even more explicit. When he says in verse 13, I press on toward the goal, he's referring to an ancient Greek custom of putting a big stick, a big rod at the end of a race so that all the runners would have something to fix their eyes on as they ran. If you're running a race, it does you no good to turn around and look back behind you, perhaps to see how much ground you've covered or who might be gaining on you. That will only distract you. That will only slow you down.

The only way to run is to fix your gaze on the finish line and not let anything take your eyes off of it. DC is a big running city. Many of you are impressive runners. Half marathon, marathon, ultramarathon. Throw in an Ironman for good measure in case you need to tire yourself out a little bit before you run a marathon.

I myself am a very amateur runner. If they gave out prizes for slowness, I might qualify. I don't run often, and when I do, I don't run far.

Back in December at the Elders Retreat, I went for an early morning run with Mark Kalenak, Drew Allensbach, and Sam Lamb. The pace was very forgiving. But I was still panting the whole time. Sam Lamb kept asking me these kind, thoughtful questions about how my family's doing, and I kept having to answer him in one-word phrases between gasps. I don't really know if Sam noticed.

My legs and my lungs could not handle the distraction of trying to talk and run at the same time.

So here's my question for you: what distracts you from fixing your eyes on the prize at the end of the race?

Looking at verse 14, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. When Paul refers to this upward call, he's talking about God's effectual act of bringing someone into fellowship with himself through faith in his son. And he calls it an upward call because it sets us on a journey to heaven. So how does the prize relate to the call?

The prize is promised by the call. And secured by the call. The prize is the goal of the call. And again, what is the prize? It's Christ himself.

To feel the full weight of this, we need to zoom out and consider what God has called us out from, which will help us measure rightly the true worth of Christ as our prize. Every single one of us has rebelled against God and alienated ourselves from God. What you deserve from God based on how you've treated him is not a prize but punishment, eternal punishment. And because God is just and righteous and holy, he promises to eternally punish all those who persist in rebelling against him. But God is also rich in mercy.

And so he sent his son into this world to become incarnate for us and to run his own race of endurance. On our behalf. He sent Jesus into the world to win the prize of salvation for us. Jesus suffered opposition and persecution, abandonment by friends, physical harm and humiliation, and all of that culminated in his death on the cross. In his death, he paid the penalty that we all deserve for our sins.

And then he triumphed over death. He rose again from the grave. His course did not end there. But he came up out of it. He obtained that prize of eternal life for all of us who will trust in him.

And now he sits at God's right hand in power and glory, and he calls all people everywhere to repent of sin and trust in him. So if you've not turned from sin and trusted in Christ, turn and rest in him as your Savior today. Christ himself is the prize of God's upward call. Christ himself is the greatest gain you could desire. Christ himself is worth giving up everything in order to gain.

Why? Because Christ himself is infinitely loving and infinitely lovely. Christ himself is infinitely satisfying. Christ himself is able not only to deliver you but to delight you. He himself is able not only to give you life, but to be your life.

If you're not a believer in Jesus, at what times in your life do you struggle for motivation?

Have you ever come close to burnout? The philosopher Byung-Chul Han has provocatively argued that the whole structure of our society is a conveyor belt toward burnout. Endless pressure to achieve creates an overwhelming sense of failure when you don't.

How can you find relief from that pressure? Christ is the prize of every Christian and he's the greatest prize. So let's talk about how, how to run, how to pursue him. Looking at verse 13, Paul tells us how he does this. But one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, forgetting what lies behind.

What in your past do you need to quit paying attention to in order to pursue Christ?

Past achievements can be every bit as deadly a distraction as past sins. As Charles Spurgeon warned, Self-complacency is the mother of spiritual declension.

In light of your need to pursue Christ with all your might, how should you view your past sins? What's the right way to forget what lies behind with regard to your own sin. There are certainly lots of wrong ways to view your past sins. So don't view past sin fondly. Don't let your mind drift back to it with lingering affection.

And don't look at past sins without the blood of Christ between you and them. All your sins have been covered and canceled. All your sins have been thrown into the bottom of the sea. So don't let past sin trick you into present guilt. Christ has paid for all of it.

Also, don't view past sins on repeat, endlessly replaying the game tape. Don't linger over what you could have done, would have done, should have done, and can't do now. Instead, when any sin of yours comes to your awareness, whether in the recent or more distant past, Look long enough to see yourself plainly and no longer. Look long enough to take a sin's measure and take responsibility for it before God and then confess your sin to God and if necessary, confess to others, especially if you've sinned against anyone and then move on. As one theologian put it, when it comes to considering and confessing your sins, be brief, be blunt, be gone.

Once you've confessed, get your eyes back on Christ. He is your sufficient help and satisfying prize.

When a kid who's two or three years old falls down on the playground or the blacktop, there's often a split second in which they pause, they look up to mom or dad, and they're wondering, Does this hurt?

Should I be crying right now? And the expression they read on your face will tell them what to do. So when it's a minor scrape, not like a major injury, Kristen and I have a phrase we've used with all of our kids. We just say, Dust them off. Wipe the dirt off your hands, wipe the dirt off your knees, get up, keep going.

When you fall into sin, You absolutely must take it seriously. Minimizing your sin will do no one any good, least of all you. But there's also a temptation to get stuck, to stay down, to fall into self-pity and to get trapped instead of getting up. So brothers and sisters, Members of CHBC, how can you help another brother or sister who's fallen into sin get up and dust them off? When someone you know and love has fallen into sin, how can you help gently pull them up, get them back on their feet, and help them start running again?

Paul's word to all of us this morning is simple: Strain forward to what lies ahead. Devote every ounce of mental and spiritual energy you have to pursuing the prize of knowing Christ perfectly forever. Christianity is not a couch sitting religion, but a race running religion. If you're not running, you're not believing. If you're not striving for the prize, you're not saved.

The Christian life is not a moving walkway like you see in the airport, but a running track. The only way to the end is one stride at a time.

So it's a little bit on how to not look back in the wrong way. What about how to look forward in the right way? How can you run and keep running a few quick encouragements. Make use of the weekly workout and tune up. We all get in corporate worship.

Learn from our corporate prayers how to approach the Lord in private and family prayers. Let the teaching you receive on a Sunday stoke a hunger to meditate on God's word throughout the week. Keep Christ before your eyes by reading Scripture. Keep Christ as the focus of your heart and your desires by meditating on and praying through Scripture. And keep Christ on the tip of your tongue by making him your favorite topic of conversation.

Is Paul, in his single-minded pursuit, an exception, not the rule? Is this whole striving for the prize thing just for apostles and super Christians? Paul rules that out in verses 15 to 16. Look there with me.

Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained. Paul is explicitly saying that he is a model for all of us. To be mature is to have Paul's mindset.

And he's not giving you an opt-out like, well, I'm good with being a Christian as long as I don't have to be mature. He's saying that this is your model, this is your standard, this is your pattern, this is what it means to run the race.

And when he addresses the possibility of disagreement, I think Paul's point is simply to express confidence that God is still at work in them. As he says in Philippians 1:6, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Christ Jesus. And when Paul promises that God will set their minds right, he's displaying both the limits of all human teaching and the depth of divine teaching. The best any human teacher can do is seek to persuade you by teaching from without. No human preacher can make you believe anything, but God teaches within.

God renews your mind and heart by the power of his own Spirit at work within you. And so Paul's concluding call in verse 16 is to hold the ground you've already gained. Don't slip backward. Don't let Satan recapture territory you've fought hard to attain. Keep going, keep striving, keep running.

But is there anyone you can look to who won't distract you from Christ but instead will direct you to Christ? Point two, patterns.

What does it take to run the Christian race? Patterns.

In verses 17 to 19, Paul exhorts us to imitate godly examples, and to be on guard against ungodly ones. First, consider the godly examples we should imitate. In verse 17, Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. Join in imitating me, meaning this is something we do together, something we do with others. So why should we imitate Paul?

Because he practices what he preaches. He's already told us he's not perfect, but he is pressing on and persevering in pursuit of the prize of Christ. That's what we're meant to imitate. Why should we imitate Paul? Ultimately, because Paul imitates Christ.

As he says in 1 Corinthians 11:1, Be imitators of me as I am of Christ. Christ. And notice too, that we're not just to imitate Paul, but also to follow those who follow Paul's example. Keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. And I even think that us is a genuine plural, like Timothy and Epaphroditus, they have an example in them too.

So it's not only Paul's good example we should follow, but everybody else he holds up and then everybody else who follows those examples. There is an effective chain of replicating godly examples going on here. Sometimes zealous young Christians think that the only example worth following is Jesus and nobody's really managed to do that too well for the last 2,000 years. So thankfully they now are here to show us how. But you don't have to skip over 2,000 years to find an example worth following.

If you know someone who is indwelt by the Holy Spirit, if you know real flesh and blood people who are born again, you can learn from them what it means to follow Christ. So look around. Find real Christians who are imitating Christ and imitate them. This exhortation to imitation is not about slavish copying. It's not about turning other people's preferences into your rules.

Instead, it's about replicating in your own life the same cross and resurrection shaped pattern that you see played out in other mature believers' lives. It's about boldly contending for the gospel, patiently suffering for the gospel, and loving other believers with a selflessness sustained by the gospel.

Sometimes people are suspicious of calls to imitate other believers because it sounds like you're just meant to be copying individual aspects of behavior, as if it's just somehow, okay, here's your new rule sheet, poof, you just take a scan of somebody's life and go do that. Well, not exactly. The point when Paul says, Follow the example you have in us, The point is to find the patterns. The point is to discern the overall shape of life and live like that. And the right kind of imitation brings not slavery but freedom.

Not all of you will know that in a previous life I was a jazz saxophonist. When I first started learning seriously how to play under the guidance of a wise teacher, one of the the biggest parts of my sort of practice regime was transcribing solos by jazz greats like Dexter Gordon, Sonny Rollins, John Coltrane. When you transcribe a solo, you are learning by ear every single note that player played. You can write it down if you want to, but that's just a prompt. The point is to hear what they're doing, get it in through the ears, keep it in your brain, and have that influence your fingers.

And really, it's meant to even get down to the point of like an impersonation where you can copy the little inflections, you can do even the tiniest little details they're doing. The goal then is not to go sound like a clone of any of those players but you're trying to learn the decisions they're making, the skills they're displaying, how do they do what they do. And it gets in there in the form of muscle memory. So Paul's telling us here as Christians, you want to develop a kind of spiritual muscle memory patterned on people who are exemplifying Christlikeness. You want to copy what they do, not to get the sort of external details but to get the essence, to get the point of why they're living the way they are and how.

And again, remember that Paul is just as happy for the Philippians to follow other godly examples as he is for them to follow him. And there's a sense in which they need other examples even more than they need his because Paul's stuck in prison. He's far away. They have spent time with him in person so they can remember his example. But what they need are flesh and blood examples in front of them.

There is only so much you can learn from a blogger or podcaster or preacher or, dare I say it, Instagram influencer who lives a thousand miles away. You can't even know if they really practice what they preach. You don't have access to their life. Paul is saying, Follow those whose lives you have access to. You can learn infinitely more from a member of your own church than you can from your favorite Christian personality far away.

You sit under the same teaching. You see them weekly or more. You can be in their home, see how they interact with family and friends, watch how they live their faith out in real time. So Paul's explicit teaching in verse 17 is that we should all seek out and replicate godly examples. But here's a clear implication of verse 17.

Since we were called to follow those who follow Paul's example, We should also strive to be examples worth following. Every step you take to follow a godly example is at the same time, whether you know it or not, a step you take to become a godly example. So there are three steps here in applying verse 17. Step one, find and follow those whose Christ-like lives are worth replicating.

Step two, do what they do. Step three, invite others into your life so they can learn from you in the same way you've learned from others. There's always risk involved in allowing yourself to be seen and studied by others. Getting a closer view of your life means other people will see not just your successes but your failures. But the key is what you do with those failures.

Are you open to correction? Do you confess sin and strive for progress in holiness? If you do, even someone seeing your failures is going to help them keep following Christ because it's going to help them see what they should do with theirs. Teens in the congregation, One godly example in your life can make a huge difference. Who's an older Christian?

Someone more mature than you who you look up to? And how can you find ways to spend more deliberate time with them? And I would also say to teens that your example rubbing off on people your own age can have a tremendous impact. So when I was about 16, a Christian friend of mine went to the same high school, played music together. He was about a year younger than me, grade below me.

He challenged me to memorize Scripture with him. So I did. Then like a year later, he invited me to meet up with his pastor regularly. We studied Scripture together. We learned spiritual disciplines, met up with his pastor in his office like every Friday afternoon for a couple of months.

Those two investments of memorizing Scripture and meeting with his pastor had a huge impact on me when I was a teenager. They really kind of accelerated my growth as a Christian. You can have a tremendous impact on someone else at a young age.

But Paul doesn't just tell us who to watch, he also tells us who to avoid. That's in verses 18 and 19.

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 earth. Earthly things.

Here Paul describes professing Christians whose lives and teachings are the opposite of Christian. One reason we need to follow good examples is because of the abundance of bad ones. Paul's not talking about flat-out self-conscious non-Christians here. He's thinking about people who present themselves as examples to be followed, who try to win influence with other believers. Instead, so these are people who profess to know God but who deny him by their works.

The four descriptions in verse 19 tell us that these people's hearts, minds, and appetites are all set on earthly things. You can find nothing of heaven in them, and so they will not find themselves. In heaven. One crucial test of the faithfulness of any purportedly Christian teaching is whether it whets your appetite for heaven or dulls it. These false believers are trying to find their heaven on earth.

If any so-called Christian preacher promises you earthly abundance and prosperity, if only you have enough faith, they are training you to set your mind on earthly things.

Any such preacher is exactly what Paul says here, an enemy of the cross.

Like we saw last week, some theological and moral issues are big enough that the gospel itself is at stake. When Paul says their God is their belly, he means they worship their appetites and they try to use their faith somehow as cover for that. And he's crystal clear that those who live like this will not inherit salvation but damnation. That's why he often warned the Philippians, and that's why he did so with tears. As D.A.

Carson observed on this verse, For our part, we must not become people who denounce but who do not weep. Neither may we become people who weep but who never denounce. Too much is at stake both ways. How can you grow in spotting and resisting this kind of teaching? One of our goals in all the public teaching in this church is to help you do this, to help you grow in this kind of discernment.

Sunday morning, Sunday evening, core seminars, Wednesday night Bible study, one of our goals in all of that is to help you rightly understand all of Scripture and see how it all fits together, to know the genuine article so that you yourself can spot counterfeits.

In your own personal study, then, of Scripture, labor to master its whole sprawling narrative and all its interconnections. In other words, read Scripture both horizontally and vertically. What do I mean by that? Horizontally, see how the story develops. See how God's plans unfold over time.

See what is developed and changing and then what's fulfilled and the same from Genesis 1 all the way to Revelation 22. One way I'd encourage you to read horizontally is if you've never read straight through Scripture, find a plan, pick a friend, and go for it. But you should also read Scripture vertically, meaning read up to see who God is. Read up to understand how all things relate to God. Read up to see how every part of Scripture contributes to a coherent theological vision.

Of God and all things in relation to him. One way to read vertically is to read straight through a work of systematic theology and to look up the scripture passages it's engaging with all along. One way you can do that is by reading through Herman Bavinck's Wonderful Works of God with Ben Lacy and a group of CHBC members. I believe it's every Friday at noon. Or is it less often?

Anyways, Friday's at noon. Ben Lacy, you can ask him tonight. What do you need to run the Christian race? You need patterns. Study the pattern of life prescribed in God's Word so that you can reject ungodly examples and replicate godly examples.

What about when you lack the motivation to keep going? What about when a good influence from the outside is not enough? Point three: perspective.

Perspective.

To run the Christian race, you need to see that your home and hope are in heaven. You need to see your earthly citizenship in light of your more fundamental citizenship in heaven. And you need to see all of this life's struggles in light of the glory that is coming when Christ returns. Paul provides this perspective in verses 20 and 21, starting with verse 20. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Here Paul contrasts fake Christians with real ones. On the basis of what stamps us and marks us, what defines us, where our loyalties are, who we belong to, and what we're looking for, where we set our eyes, where we find hope. A Christian is someone who belongs to heaven more fundamentally than they belong to earth as it currently is. That's false point in saying our citizenship is in heaven. That's where our deepest loyalties lie.

That's the Fatherland whose values shape us more more than any earthly culture. The Epistle to Diognetus is an apologetic work written by a Christian in the late second century A.D. And this epistle captures the sense of how Christians' heavenly citizenship makes us different from the world. The author writes, But while living in both Greek and barbarian cities, as each have obtained by lot, and while following the local customs both in clothing and in diet and in the rest of life, they demonstrate the wonderful and most certainly strange character of their own citizenship. They live in their own countries but as aliens. They share everything as citizens and endure everything as foreigners.

Every foreign country is their country, and every country is foreign. They marry like everyone, they bear children, but they do not expose their offspring. They set a common table, but not a common bed. They happen to be in the flesh, but do not live according to the flesh. They spend time upon the earth, but have their citizenship in heaven.

And Paul tells us not only to look up to heaven for our loyalty, but to look forward to what's coming from heaven for our hope. From heaven we await a Savior. Heaven is where Jesus is now, but he's not going to stay there. One day he'll come to us, and when he does, he will bring heaven with him. That's the point of verse 21.

We wait for 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. So this passage teaches that heaven is our immediate hope and the new creation is our ultimate hope. Our final hope as Christians is not that we'll go up to heaven, but that God will bring heaven to earth. Right now, our hope is stored up in heaven where Christ is. Like you might store up an ice cream sandwich in your freezer for a friend who's coming over for dessert.

When your friend comes, they don't have to climb into the freezer to get it. You bring it out to them. That's what God is going to do for us. At Christ's return. When Jesus returns to earth, he'll raise the dead and glorify all who have believed in him.

All things will then be subject to him, including death, which is what Paul is talking about when he says all things are subjected to Christ. Here Paul echoes Psalm 86, which says that at creation, God put all things under humankind's feet. Paul promises that Jesus will fulfill this calling more fully than David the psalmist ever could have imagined. Not only that, but it will be Jesus himself who exercises the divine power of subjecting all things to his perfect will. Jesus is the creator of all things and on the last day he will be the renewer and ruler of all things.

If you don't believe in Jesus, When you look at death, what do you see? Will anything you love outlast death? Do you have any hope in the face of death? Secular modern Westerners as a whole have no hope for the future. And so we are busy trying to make the present eternal.

The secular modern West is the most death denying culture in the history of the world. Can you do any better than denial?

In 1818, the Scottish explorer Captain John Ross sailed from London to Baffin Bay, far north between Greenland and Canada. He was trying to discover the Northwest Passage to the Pacific. He concluded that two of the bay's sounds were impassable, couldn't get through, but one of them remained socked in in fog. When the fog cleared, Ross looked down the sound and saw a huge range of mountains ringing it. So he concluded, No Northwest Passage there, and he sailed home in failure.

Then another explorer returned to the same spot less than a year later, saw the same mountains, and then sailed right through them. What happened? John Ross fell victim to what's called an Arctic mirage. It's a weird visual thing that happens up in the Arctic sometimes through a combination of hot and cold air that bends light way out of normal and makes real objects that are very far away appear right in front of you. Those mountains really existed, but they were 200 miles away.

What Ross thought was a blocked sound actually was the Northwest Passage.

What sin does to your spiritual sight is just like what that Arctic Mirage did to John Ross. It makes you see things that aren't there and it keeps you from seeing what is there. Sin clouds your vision of Christ. Sin makes satisfaction seem oh, so close if you'll just give in. And oh so far away if you keep saying no.

And suffering too can dull your spiritual senses so that it's hard to feel just how close God's promises are to being fulfilled. It's like when the Israelites were trapped in slavery and Moses comes with the message of deliverance and it says the people couldn't even hear him because their spirits were broken by their hard service. In order to keep running the race, you need to remember that heaven is your true home now and that one day soon, you'll be home forever because God is going to bring that heavenly home down here to earth.

Point four, briefly, perseverance. What do you need to run the Christian race? Perseverance.

Paul bookends his exhortation here and really he kind of puts a marker reaching all the way back to chapter 1 verse 27, the sort of opening exhortation in the book. By saying here in these affectionate words, Therefore, my brothers, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, Stand firm thus in the Lord, my beloved. So Paul addresses the Philippians as his brothers and sisters, members of the same household of God. He tells them he loves and longs for them. He wishes he could be with them and see them face to face.

He calls them my joy and crown, meaning you all are going to adorn me on the last days, the fruit of my labor. The Philippians themselves will be proof positive. Of Paul's faithful completion of his ministry. And then after the exhortation, he even sneaks in one more, My beloved, he just can't help himself. His heart is full of affection for these dear saints at a distance.

And what's his exhortation? His point is simple and pointed, Persevere. Three words, stand firm thus. And that supporting phrase, in the Lord. Meaning, keep following Jesus in this way.

Because of who he is, because of all that he's done for you. When Paul says, Stand firm thus, he means persevere in this manner. How? By single-mindedly pursuing Christ. By patterning your life on examples worth imitating.

By maintaining a heavenly perspective on every trial and temptation. That's how you will be stable and steadfast. That's how you will make it to the end. Paul is saying that the prize of Christ, the patterns of godly believers, and the perspective that the coming glory affords are like a windbreak in a storm, like a stand of thick trees that block out the wind and the rain. They help you stand upright, even if the hardest trials, even if the stiffest opposition, even if grueling temptation threatens to undo you.

This is how you keep going. So there's a sense in which all of these exhortations lean toward and push toward and cash out in perseverance. Here is how you keep going. To make it to the finish line, you need to keep putting one foot in front of the other. All true Christians persevere.

And only those who persevere are true Christians. As our Church of Statement of Faith puts it, We believe that such only are real believers as endure unto the end; that their persevering attachment to Christ is the grand mark which distinguishes them from superficial professors; that a special Providence watches over their welfare; and they are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.

About 10 years ago, David Helma, a pastor from Chicago, spoke at a conference on preaching that 9Marks hosted at Southern Seminary. At the end of the conference, Jonathan Leeman and I were chatting with Dave. Everything had wrapped up. Dave was about to get into a car, drive to the airport, He looks back at me and Jonathan, says with a casual smile, Keep swinging, boys. We're almost home.

Just a little throwaway line of encouragement. Just a little parting word. But I've thought of that line dozens of times in the last 10 years. And that is exactly what Paul is saying to all of us this morning. Brothers and sisters, keep swinging.

We're almost home.

Human eyes last glimpsed Shackleton's ship, the Endurance, on November 21, 1915, when it slid beneath the ice and sunk 10,000 feet to the bottom of the Weddell Sea. Until, that is, eight days ago. On March 5, a $10 million month-long mission came to astonishing fruition. Using undersea remotely operated drone submarines, researchers aboard the SA Argus two discovered the wreck and then mapped it using 3D video. As the expedition's leader, Dr. John Shears put it, We have successfully completed the world's most difficult shipwreck search, battling constantly shifting sea ice, blizzards, and temperatures dropping down to minus 18 Celsius.

We have achieved what many people said was impossible. Talk about endurance.

The pictures of the ship are stunning and haunting. It's been well preserved in the near-freezing water. You can see its helm on the deck, its name on the stern. Imagine that you were one of those researchers aboard that ship. You've spent a month at sea aboard an ice-breaking vessel in freezing temperatures, constantly huddled over a little monitor as your submarine went around 10,000 feet beneath the surface searching and searching and searching for an object with no precisely known location.

It's about a month. You're nearly at the end of the mission. Soon it'll be time to head back to port. But then, out of nowhere, the ship appears on the screen. What would you feel?

There's a researcher aboard ship who described the atmosphere that shot through the whole thing at that very moment. Fizzing in the air, doors banging, people running down corridors, euphoria. An overwhelming sense of happiness and relief.

How much more? And how much better will the end of the Christian life bring to every single believer who finishes their course. And Lord haste the day when the faith shall be sight. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for laying hold of us through Christ.

We thank you that it is your power that enables us to persevere. And Father, we pray that you would enable us to run and keep running and help others keep running all the way until whatever day you have ordained for us. To finish the race. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.