Thankful For Our Perfection In Christ Series

Sermon Brief

Date Written: November 22, 2013

Date Preached: November 24, 2013

Where Preached: OPBC (AM)

Sermon Details:

Series Title: Building a Foundation for a Thankful Life

Sermon Title: The 4th Piling – Our Perfection in Christ

Sermon Text: Philippians 3 [HCSB]

Essence of the Text: Paul stressed the need for believers to NOT focus on earthly things or put their trust in earthly institutions but glory in Christ and what He has done…

Essence of the Sermon: Paul’s words speak loud and clear to US today as we must NOT focus on the things or institutions of this world, we must not place our trust in anything other than Christ, but we must focus on Him and what He has done!

Objective of the Sermon: KNOWING what Christ has done brings us to a stark revelation! You see Christ has done what we could NEVER do… Christ has brought perfection to our lives…In Christ we know perfection before God!

Introduction:

The Scripture you heard this morning so far has said that troubles are GOING to come… we must brace for them and seek God’s help in making it thru them… We see how one of the most godly men in the history of the church also dealt with difficulty!

People we are going to see difficulty in this life… Just because you are a believer does not mean hardship or trial will NOT come your way!

So often we experience these hardships and we lose sight of the blessings we have IN Christ! Today I want to continue looking at the wonderful blessings we HAVE in Christ and what we have to be thankful for during this Thanksgiving holiday…and every day!

Now to this point in our series we have learned that we are called to be thankful… Paul calls us to come to God with all things, but to do so in a thankful manner…with a thankful attitude and heart! We see this in his letter to the Philippians (4:6-HCSB)

6Don’t worry about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.

What we have learned is that for us to be able to have a thankful attitude and heart that FIRST we must understand WHAT we are thankful for…

Over the past 3 weeks we have looked the WONDERFUL foundation we have as Christians…it is a foundation that brings a truly thankful heart and attitude to our hearts…

This foundation of thankfulness is where we (as believers) stand…

This foundation of thankfulness is where we (as believers) live…

This foundation of thankfulness is where we (as believers) build up our walk in Christ…

This foundation of thankfulness is where we (as believers) grow and mature…

What we have learned over the past 3 weeks is that this foundation of thankfulness has several anchors or pilings in it that keep it stable and firm… and a trustworthy foundation for our lives in Christ!

The first anchor or piling in this foundation is God the Father… God is God and we can know that the Creator of the Universe cares for us and loves us with a love we cannot fully comprehend!

The 2nd anchor or piling in this foundation is Jesus the Son… Jesus is Savior! We can see the love of God revealed in His Son Jesus in that He came and was willing to humble Himself to even death on a cross to redeem us from our sin and provide eternal life for us…

The 3rd anchor or piling for this foundation is the Holy Spirit… He is the comforter and counselor God provides for those who accept Him as Savior… The HS is the guide for our steps, the convictor of our sins, the revealer of all truth, the empowerment for our service, the encourager for our walk with God…

Last week we learned that we were not left alone as orphans when Jesus ascended to the Father, but that we are in fellowship with God thru His Son Jesus indwelled by His Holy Spirit in this life…

We have these things that anchor our foundation, but this morning we are going to look at one more anchor!

The fourth anchor or piling for this thankful foundation upon which we live is found as a result of the 1st three… this 4th foundational piling is Our Perfection found in Christ!

The perfection I speak of is NOT perfection as the world sees it... perfection or to be without flaw is something only Christ has achieved and it is impossible for us in this world we live in today.

The perfection that Paul speaks of here is a ‘wholeness’ or ‘completeness’ that believers can realize in Christ! We were 'incomplete' without Him, but made complete in Him!