www.wonershchurch.com

Sermon 26

Sermon at Wonersh by John Metcalfe on April 23, 2006

Series – Hostile World

Your Profit and Loss Account

Reading: Phil. 2:19-3:11 (NIV p. 1179)

“Lord, may the words of my mouth, and the thoughts of all our hearts, be now and always acceptable in your sight. Amen"

I’m surprised to see so many here today – I thought more of you would have been running in the London Marathon! We’ve just heard about 2 guys who would have made good marathon runners, Timothy and Epaphroditus, both were prepared to go the extra mile out of commitment to their faith. And that made me wonder about their motivation, and also about how we compare with the examples they’ve set us.

Timothy

First let’s look at Timothy. If you want to follow what Paul says about him, please turn to page 1179 in your bibles. Paul’s writing this letter to the Philippians from jail in Rome, so clearly he can’t deliver it himself, and he intends to send Timothy as his representative. It’s a pity that we don’t know more about Timothy, but we do know that Paul and Timothy were very close.

We can gather some information from Acts chapter 16 and from Paul’s letters of encouragement to Timothy … Timothy was from either Derbe or Lystra, towns in what is now Turkey. His mother Eunice was a Jewess and his grandmother’s name was Lois. His father was a Greek, and he wasn’t circumcised, which indicates that he was brought up as a Greek.

We don’t know when he converted to Christianity, but do know that Paul met him on his second missionary journey. From then on, Timothy and Paul remained close, and Paul spoke of him as ‘his child in the Lord’ (1 Cor. 4:17), so perhaps Paul regarded him as a son. We know from chapters 18 & 19 of Acts that Timothy was with Paul in Philippi (Acts 16), in Thessalonica and Berea (Acts 17: 1-14), and Corinth and Ephesus (Acts 18:5 and 19: 21, 22), and he was with Paul while he was in prison in Rome (Col. 1: 1 & Phil. 1: 1). So whenever Paul wanted information from some church, or wanted to send advice or encouragement or a rebuke and couldn’t go himself, then Timothy was the person he sent. So Timothy was despatched to Thessalonica (1 Thess. 3: 6), and Corinth (1 Cor. 4: 17 and 16: 10), and to Philippi, and in Paul’s letter to the Hebrews we read that he too was imprisoned for his faith (Heb. 13: 23). It seems to me that Timothy was the epitome of commitment in his relationship with Paul, and to Jesus. He hung in there for the long run – he sounds like a marathon runner to me!

Epaphroditus

And then in verse 25 we come upon Epaphroditus. And here we have another story of commitment. When the Philippians heard that their friend Paul was in prison, they sent him a gift to cheer him up, and charged Epaphroditus with delivering it to Paul. Not only did they want him to take the gift, but they wanted him to stay on in Rome to look after Paul. Prisoners depended on friends to bring whatever they needed, including food, and as Paul was locked up on a capital charge, anyone who associated with him could suffer the same fate, so Epaphroditus was actually risking his life to serve Paul.

In Rome Epaphroditus fell ill, possibly with the notorious Roman fever which sometimes swept the city, and he was near to death. He knew that news of his illness had filtered back to Philippi and was worried that his friends would be worried about him. But God spared Epaphroditus, and Paul knew that it was time that he returned home. Indeed, he was probably the bearer of this letter to the folk in Philippi.

But that raised a problem – since the church in Philippi had sent Epaphroditus to stay with Paul, he would have been branded a quitter if he’d turned up unexpectedly. So Paul gives Epaphroditus a tremendous testimonial to silence any possible criticism of his return. Look in verse 25 – every word is carefully chosen. Epaphroditus was Paul’s brother, his fellow-worker, and his fellow-soldier. Then Paul calls him your messenger and the servant of my need.

That word servant doesn’t really do justice to the translation – in the ancient days in Greek cities there were men who took on great civic duties at their own expense, perhaps like those who fund Academies for Mr. Blair today? They might also have met the costs of an embassy, or supported a poet, or enabled a great work of drama to be staged, or even the fitting out of a warship and paying the crew. Imagine today someone offering to pay for the Ark Royal to put to sea! These men were supreme benefactors of the state and they were called leitourgoi, which is translated here as servant in describing Epaphroditus. Paul was really saying that Epaphroditus had truly gone that extra mile in his service to him, and in verse 29 Paul asks that the Philippians to “welcome him in the Lord with joy, and honour men like him. because he almost died for the work of Christ”.

Paul’s making it as easy as possible for Epaphroditus to go home. Perhaps that doesn’t seem too amazing, until we stop and think about Paul’s circumstances – he was in jail facing judgement and probable death, yet it mattered to him that Epaphroditus should not meet with embarrassment when he returned home. Isn’t that something? And doesn’t it show us something about Paul? How often are we so immersed in our own troubles that we have no time to spare for others?

So we’ve heard a little about Timothy and Epaphroditus, both of whom went the extra mile for Paul and for their faith. It seems to me that we could use them as examples in our own lives. These 2 guys were prepared to give large chunks of time to serve their Christian friends and to the work of Christ … selflessly. They probably left behind parents, and friends, possibly brothers and sisters, and were prepared to spend weeks travelling and months away from home for their faith. Yet sometimes we begrudge offering a few hours to work with the young people, or find reasons why we can’t be church warden or serve on the PCC when asked.

Perhaps Paul touches on the reason why we don’t leap at such opportunities in the first words of the next chapter. Paul exudes a sense of joy throughout this letter, and typically he starts chapter 3 by telling the Philippians to “rejoice in the Lord”. Paul was facing death; the Philippians were facing tough challenges; and perhaps you are too, but even in such circumstances nothing can separate us from the love of God which we can experience through Jesus. In John 16 (v. 22) Jesus tells his disciples that their grief will turn to joy when he’s taken from them, saying: “Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no-one will take away your joy”.

Let’s look together at some verses from Romans – please turn to page 1135 and find chapter 8, verses 35-39. Look at these verses as I read them: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? It is written: ‘For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered’. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” I’m sure it’s the love of God in Jesus that motivates Timothy and Epaphroditus, and the same love that allows Paul to rejoice whilst in chains? And can’t that same love inspire us too, if only we would give it the chance? If only we would let it fill our hearts.

Paul then goes on to warn the Philippians about the dogs, the pariahs that roam their streets, sometimes in packs, hunting amidst the rubbish dumps and snapping and snarling at anyone who gets too close. In the bible, dogs stand for the lowest of the low – not a nice simile if you happen to be a dog lover! The dog in scripture stands for everything that is shamelessly unclean.

But the Jews used this name to describe the Gentiles, and this is Paul’s answer to the Jewish teachers. In effect, Paul is saying: “In your profound righteousness, you call other men dogs; but it is you who are dogs, because you shamelessly pervert the gospel of Jesus Christ.” He calls them “men who do evil” and “mutilators of the flesh” because they insist on circumcision. And he explains that real circumcision is not a mark on the flesh, but is true worship, and devotion of heart and mind and life to God. His opponents could have attacked Paul saying, “What do you know about it, you’re a Christian; you don’t know what it is to be a Jew.” So Paul then sets out his credentials in verses 4-7, not to boast, but to show that he fully understands what it means to be a successful Jew.

But the key comes in verse 7. When Paul met Jesus on the road to Damascus, his whole way of calculating things was turned upside down. To begin with, he lost whatever was personally important –Paul had a great reputation as a scholar and as a religious leader and was proud of his Jewish heritage and his religious achievements. All these things were valuable to him, but were of no importance when measured against what Jesus Christ had accomplished for him. So Paul is warning the Philippians about false confidence. In Paul’s day, as now, Christianity can be more a religion than a relationship; about maintaining rules and regulations, rather than a living relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Remember what Jim Elliot said – he was the missionary who was murdered in Ecuador in 1956 with 4 friends: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.” This was Paul’s experience – he lost his religion and his reputation, but he gained a living relationship with the Lord Jesus. He became Jesus’ servant, and knew real joy as a consequence, just as we saw in the lives of Timothy and Epaphroditus.

It’s almost as if Paul is drawing up his personal profit and loss account. He weighs up all of the things that he had considered treasures, and discovered that he was spiritually bankrupt. He looked at Jesus, and saw perfection. Paul had been living successfully under a set of rules, but now he had a Friend, a Master, a constant Companion. He had exchanged something worthless for something priceless. That’s why, if we put our faith in the stock market or worldly treasures, we’ll ultimately be disappointed. Those who invest in face-lifts to maintain their beauty, or spend £275 a day at the hairdressers, will become depressed as their looks fade. People who live for things are never really happy because they must constantly protect their treasures, be it wealth or beauty, and worry lest they lose their value, as they most surely will. But if we do our sums properly, like Paul, Timothy and Epaphroditus, and place our confidence in Jesus, our treasures in Christ can never be stolen and will never lose their value. Indeed, as we share them, and as we give them away, they are multiplied a hundred-fold.

So, Paul urges us to move beyond our sinful natures and accept a new order – humbling ourselves and accepting that everything has been done for us in Christ Jesus our Lord. This is the mark of the true believer. This is the mark of the faithful. One who humbles himself and accepts what has been done on their behalf. One who has confidence to call God their father, not based on what they’ve done, or what they deserve, but based on their faith in what Jesus deserves. This is not arrogance … it’s the confidence that God gives to those who believe in him and his Son.

Let’s close by reading verses 10 and 11 together: “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.” Amen.

And now let’s close with a prayer:

“Loving Lord Jesus, we’ve seen how Paul rejoiced in you, whatever his situation, he used it to your advantage … and you used him to advance the gospel. And we thank you for the examples of Timothy and Epaphroditus, marathon runners in your service. Lord we offer you ourselves so that you may also use us in your service. We pray that despite our chains, we may still be useful to you. We pray that we may know the power of your resurrection and become more like you. Amen”

John Metcalfe

www.wonershchurch.com