The true people of God are those who serve God by means of the Holy Spirit (living the Christian life by exposing ourselves to the Spirit’s influence and cooperating with what he does) and who glory in (rely on, hope in, rejoice in, count on, run after, regard as supremely important) Christ alone, rather than putting any confidence in the flesh.
Philippians 3:1 Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. 2 Watch out for those dogs, watch out for those men who do evil, watch out for the mutilation. 3 For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who have put (perf) no confidence in the flesh— 4 though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless. 7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ
Introduction
Slaving All These Years
Let’s play a little game. It’s called “Name that Story.” Who can tell me what Bible story this line comes from: “I have been slaving for you.” More context: “All these years I’ve been slaving for you.” More context: “All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders.” More context: “Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends.” It is the older brother in the Prodigal Son story, when he is complaining about the fact that his father threw a party for his prodigal brother (Lk.15:29). Does anyone know who the older brother represents in the story? The Pharisees and teachers of the law from verse 2. The legalists. I don’t blame you for not recognizing that line about slaving, because that is not really the main point of the parable. The main point is to show how the Pharisees were grumbling about sinners coming to repentance while God was rejoicing and celebrating. When a sinner repents and turns to God, that’s a cause for celebration and joy, not looking down your nose at him. That is the main point, but it’s interesting that the character who represents the legalistic Pharisees makes this comment about slaving all these years. Here is a kid who was born into a wealthy family, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, grows up in a good household with a loving father, and he describes it as “slaving.” That’s what it’s like for legalists to try to live the Christian life. It feels to them like slavery.
Review
We have been studying through the book of Philippians and we are in chapter 3 where Paul is describing the difference between the true people of God, and the legalists who think they belong to God but really don’t. Legalism is the approach that 99.99% of all people on the planet take - trying to become a good person by living up to a list of standards. That’s what religious people do, it is what secular people do, and Paul is very clear that no one who takes that approach is going to heaven – even if their list of standards comes right out of the Bible.
So if the legalists are not the true people of God, who is? The answer is in verse 3: it is we who are the circumcision (which is another way of saying, “It is we who are the true people of God”). Why? What is it that makes us the true people of God? Two things: the source and the object of our worship.
3 … we who worship by the Spirit of God
That is the source.
… who glory in Christ Jesus
That’s the object. We worship Jesus Christ, and we do so by means of the Holy Spirit. And then the last phrase (who put no confidence in the flesh) applies to both. Instead of confidence in our own flesh, all of our confidence is in the Holy Spirit and Jesus Christ. So let’s take a close look at both of these – the source and the object.
The Source: The Holy Spirit
He says we worship by the Spirit of God. Our worship comes from the Spirit. The two most common Greek words for worship in the Bible are proskuneo and latruo. Proskuneo emphasizes the posture and attitude of worship. Latruo means to carry out religious duties of worship. So it focuses more on action – the activities of religious observance and serving God. And that’s the one Paul uses here. He picks a word that would have really appealed to those Judaizers – they were all about religious observance and the works of the law.
Not Less Activity, but Spiritual Activity
But notice that he does not say, “You Judaizers are way off track because you’re all focused on serving God and doing all this work. But we are the true people of God, because we don’t focus on works and service.” No, that’s not what he says. The problem with the Judaizers was not that they were striving to serve God; their problem was they weren’t doing it by the Holy Spirit. Paul says, “You serve God; we serve God. But we are the true people of God, because when we serve God, we do it by the Holy Spirit.”
Some say legalism is when you get to working too hard or doing too much. That’s not true. Serving God and working hard are great things. We saw that in chapter 2 and we will see that again later in this chapter. God doesn’t want us to be dormant. Worship involves action. The Christian life is to be a whole lifestyle of serving God with everything you do.
Romans 12:1 … offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship (latruo).
So work is involved – rigorous work, as we’ll see in verses 12-14. The problem with legalists is not that they are overboard on works. It’s that they do their works from the flesh rather than by means of the Holy Spirit. And anyone who does that – serves God without the enablement of the Holy Spirit ? is not one of the true people of God. So this is important. People who serve God in the flesh will go to hell; those who serve by the Spirit go to heaven.
Everyone Who Knows Christ Has the Spirit
Here’s how salvation works: the moment you first place your faith in Christ, you receive the Holy Spirit.
Ephesians 1:13 And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth … Having believed, you were marked in him with … the promised Holy Spirit.
Romans 8:9 … if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
So when you first place your faith in Christ, at that moment you receive the Holy Spirit, and then at that point it’s the Holy Spirit who activates the Christian life in you. If you think of grace as being like computer software, the creator of the software is God the Father. God the Son paid the price to purchase it for us. And the Holy Spirit then takes it and installs it in your heart – makes it a part of you and operates it. And so everything that is anything in the Christian life is accomplished by the Holy Spirit. If you try to pray, and it ends up being a real prayer – God actually hears it, that’s the work of the Holy Spirit. Any flicker of love you have for God in your heart – that’s not natural. Natural people don’t love God. If you love God, that’s being caused by the Holy Spirit. If you do anything that glorifies or pleases God, that’s the Spirit.
Romans 8:8 Those controlled by the flesh cannot please God.
If you have a submissive posture towards the Lordship of Jesus Christ - 1 Corinthians 12:3 says that no one can do that except by the Holy Spirit. If nearness to Jesus Christ ever seems more desirable to you then the pleasures of sin, that’s the work of the Spirit. A natural, normal human being is not capable of seeing Jesus Christ as more desirable than the pleasures of this world. Anytime you use your spiritual gift, that’s obviously the work of the Spirit. If you ever read something in the Bible that used to bother you, but now your heart welcomes it and loves it – that is the enlightening work of the Holy Spirit. Anytime you have joy in the Lord, any time you take delight in the experience of one of God’s attributes, anytime you receive peace from God, or patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, or self-control – those are byproducts of the work of the Holy Spirit. Every part of the Christian life – every detail of presenting your body as a living sacrifice holy and pleasing to God – every bit of that is the work of the Holy Spirit of God.
In the Old Testament times, the Holy Spirit would occasionally come upon certain key leaders in Israel and enable them to do some great thing. But the prophets talked about a day when there would be a new covenant that God would make with his people, and at that time he would actually put his Spirit inside all of his people. And so right before Jesus died he said:
John 14:16 I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever—17 the Spirit of truth … he lives with you and will be in you.
We have a greater experience of the Holy Spirit than even the greatest Old Testament saints had. The Spirit is constantly working in you, 24/7, changing your desires, changing your motives, changing your outlook, changing your behavior, making you more like Jesus Christ.
No Confidence in the Flesh
And that’s why we have no confidence in the flesh. We are the true Israel because we serve God by the Spirit rather than serving God in the flesh – “flesh” meaning our own, human efforts. Any religion that can be done by a natural human being is not acceptable to God. The only religious activity that God will accept is that which comes from his Spirit.
The Law
So where does that leave us in relationship to the law of God? Should we strive to obey it or not? People get really confused about this because they think if it’s the Holy Spirit who is acting, then we must be passive. “Let go and let God” – as if God were paralyzed and couldn’t act unless you “let” him act by going limp. Is that what living the Christian life is like– you just sit around and wait for the Holy Spirit to start moving you around like a puppet? No, remember we saw back in 2:13 that yes, it is God who is working inside us but the way he works is through our willing and acting. And so it is our responsibility to work our salvation with fear and trembling (2:12).
Exposing Yourself to the Spirits Influence
So what is the difference between us and the legalists? They see a law in the Bible and they try to obey it – that’s as far as it goes. But what do we do? We see a command in the Bible and we think, “Wow, if I’m going to pull this off I’m going to need enablement from the Holy Spirit.”
Galatians 5:16 So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh.
And so we pour all our energy into exposing ourselves to more of the influence of the Holy Spirit. How do you do that? How do you expose yourself to more of the influence of the Holy Spirit? Well, the most obvious way is through prayer – just ask him directly for enablement. Another way is through the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God – the Bible (Eph 6:17). And another way is through the gifts of the Spirit, which comes through fellowship with the saints. (And there are two parts to fellowship – using your spiritual gift to serve others, and being served by other people’s spiritual gifts.) So Scripture, prayer, and fellowship – that’s how you expose yourself to the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Learn what Scripture says, pray for enablement, and devote yourself to fellowship. And the more you do those three things, the more the Holy Spirit will activate the Christian life in you.
The Object: Christ
3… it is we who glory (or boast) in Christ Jesus
So this time instead of the word worship, he uses a different word. Some translations say boast in Christ, and others say glory in Christ.
The Meaning of Glorying
The translations are so different because this is just a very difficult word to translate. There is no English word that is anything like this Greek word. And yet it’s important for us to understand what it means because it appears very frequently in the New Testament, and in some very important theological statements – like this one. The difference between someone who is lost and on his way to hell, and someone who is saved and on his way to heaven is that the saved person boasts (or glory’s) in Christ. So it is crucial that we understand what this word means.
But it really is hard to translate. The problem with translating it as glory is that that doesn’t mean anything to most people. Nobody walks around talking about glorying. The problem with translating it as boast is that we normally think of boasting as the same as bragging. But this word is nothing like bragging. First of all, bragging is a verbal thing; but this word refers to an attitude. It has more to do with the orientation of your life than with what you say.
Secondly, bragging is always prideful and sinful, this is neutral. It is a sin or a virtue depending upon what you boast or glory in.
So for the sake of this sermon let’s just use the word glory. To glory in something means you point to it and say, “That’s the thing in my life. That’s the thing that I have to have in order to be happy. That’s the thing that will give my life meaning. That’s the thing that will keep me safe from harm. That’s the thing that really matters.”
There are a lot of things out there that are really wonderful, and you would love to have them, but you don’t feel like you have to have them in order to be happy. You don’t feel like you have to have them in order to be fulfilled, or in order for your life to be what it’s supposed to be. And there are a lot of things that you already have, and you’re very glad that you have them, but you could lose them and you wouldn’t be devastated. Those aren’t the thing in your life. The thing, (or the things), for you, are those things you’ve got to have.
If you don’t have them already, then you are unhappy, and you believe that you will always be unhappy until you get that thing(s). And so you would crawl over broken glass to get it. If you do already have it, then you will do absolutely anything to avoid losing it.
For you it might be having a wife or husband or child. For a teenager it might be getting your freedom. It might be good health, a certain job, a ministry. For some people it’s winning – being the best. For a lot of people the thing is money. For some people the thing is approval – their dad’s approval or their friends’ approval or everyone’s approval. For some people it’s fun or physical pleasure.
Now, when you see someone has his thing – you see him really enjoying his thing, or depending on his thing, counting on his thing, or you see someone running hard after his thing, trying to get it, or pining away wishing for it; when you see that, you are witnessing someone glorying in their thing. That’s what it means to glory in something. You glory in that which you consider most valuable and most important. That’s why you run after it and rely on it and rejoice in it.
You can tell what’s most important in your life by those three Rs: run, rely, and rejoice. What do you run hard after? What do you rely on the most? What do you rejoice in the most? That’s what you glory in - that’s your thing. And everyone has a thing. Everyone glories in something. Everyone places his confidence and security in something and derives his happiness from something and runs hard after that thing. And there are really only two possibilities: it’s either something in this world, or it’s Jesus Christ. And what Paul is saying here is that the most fundamental difference between a Christian and everyone else in the world is that the Christian glories - relies on, gets his joy from, and runs hard after Christ, not anything in this world.
Again, that’s what no confidence in the flesh means. Our confidence, our joy, our hope, our motivation, our longing – is focused on Christ more than on anything having to do with the flesh – anything in this world. We don’t desire anything more than we desire closeness with Christ. If we were to lose Christ, that would be more devastating to us than losing our spouse or health or our money or family or anything else. The greatest badge of honor that we can possibly imagine is that we know Christ. He is what motivates us. He is what gets us out of bed in the morning. He is what we would suffer adversity for. He is what we rely on, hope in, care about, long for - he is our great treasure.
Some of you may have been taught that becoming a Christian is simply a matter of praying a prayer and inviting Jesus into your heart. If you were taught that, I’m sorry that you are misled. That is not what the Bible says. There are millions of people who prayed that prayer, invited Jesus into their heart, and meant it with all their heart, and they are not on the way to heaven. Nowhere does the Bible teach that a person is saved by praying a prayer. The only way to be saved is through faith, and you can tell you have faith in Christ if you glory in Christ. If you do not glory in him, then you do not have faith in him, and you are not saved.
So who are the true people of God? It is the people who serve God by the power of the Holy Spirit, and who glory in Christ alone and who put no confidence in the flesh. That is verse 3. Then in verse 4 Paul starts describing what used to be his thing, namely, legalistic religion.
3 … who put no confidence in the flesh 4 though I myself have reasons for such confidence.
Flesh Credentials Are Loss
It’s not like Paul turned to Christianity because he washed out of legalistic Judaism. Paul was the king of legalistic religion.
4 …If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day
Ishmaelites were circumcised at age 12. Gentiles who converted were circumcised as adults. But for Jews, the Old Testament law said they were said to be circumcised on the eighth day. And what Paul says here, literally, is, “with regard to circumcision, I’m an eighth day-er.” By the books right out of the hatch.
5 …of the people of Israel
That should really be translated an Israelite by birth. And not just an Israelite, but of the tribe of Benjamin. Most Jews of Paul’s day didn’t even know what tribe they belonged to. And converts to Judaism didn’t belong to any tribe. But Paul knew his heritage. He was a pure stock Benjamite, and that was the best tribe. Of all the heads of the tribes, Benjamin was the only one born to the beloved Rachel. He was Jacob’s favorite son. He was the only one born in the Promised Land. The tribe of Benjamin was especially favored by God (Dt. 33:12). Benjamin was the only tribe that remained loyal to David’s dynasty when the kingdom split. The first king of Israel came from the tribe of Benjamin – Saul. That’s who Paul’s parents named him after.
5 … a Hebrew of Hebrews
At the time of Jesus, there were two different kinds of Jews. A lot of Jews had kind of intermixed with Greek culture, and adopted the Greek language and certain elements of Greek religion. And then there were other Jews that stayed separate and stuck with the Hebrew language. Paul was born and raised in that second group. He was a Hebrew born of Hebrew parents, he spoke Hebrew, and he could read the Scriptures in their original language.
So all of that was what Paul was born into. The next three have to do with his achievements.
5 …in regard to the law, a Pharisee
Nobody was stricter when it came to Old Testament law keeping than the Pharisees.
Acts 26:5 … according to the strictest sect of our religion, I lived as a Pharisee.
Galatians 1:14 I was advancing in Judaism beyond many Jews of my own age and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers.The Pharisees followed every rule to the letter.
5 … as for zeal, persecuting the church
He didn’t just talk about his beliefs. He acted on them. If he saw a threat to Judaism, he went out there to destroy it. After Paul became a Christian, here’s what they said:
Galatians 1:23 … “The man who formerly persecuted us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.”
People often say, “It doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you are sincere.” Paul was sincere. He really lived out what he believed.
5 …as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.
You couldn’t find a single thing wrong with him when it came to following all the legalistic rules. You could interview friends and family, do your research – there wasn’t one single skeleton in his closet. None of those Judaizers could match up to Paul. When it came to following the ritualistic laws, he was unsurpassed in his generation. And that used to be his thing. That’s what he gloried in. That’s what he was relying on.
Loss
So then what does he say about all that? Does he say, “I had all that, but it wasn’t quite enough. Then I added Jesus, and that put me over the top”? No!
7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.
Everything that he thought was helping his resume with God was actually hurting it. It’s like if someone were applying for a job on a political campaign, and so he put together his resume and listed all his greatest achievements. And they are all on the Democratic side.
• I worked on President Obama’s campaign.
•
• I started up five Planned Parenthood clinics.
•
• I helped push through legislation that doubled taxes on the rich.
•
• I’ve worked on 10 different Democratic campaigns and all 10 of them were successful.
•
Then he shows up for the interview and finds out this is a job opening for a Republican candidate. So now, not only are all of his points not helping him, but they are hurting him. They are all reasons not to hire him. That’s what happened to Paul when he met Christ. All that stuff he was relying on and counting on to get him to heaven and to give him favor with God - suddenly he realized not only were they not helping his case, they were making him God’s enemy. And that is what happens to every legalist when they meet God. For years they have been relying on their rule-keeping.
“Look God, I got baptized. I went through confirmation. I kept all the rules. I give 10% of my income right off the top. I’ve been a faithful member of First Church of Whatever for the last 40 years. I never miss a Sunday, I teach Sunday school, I’m a deacon…”
And then they meet Christ, and they find out those are all actually strikes against them if they are relying on those things to get them to heaven.
In fact, those things are not just loss – they are even worse than that.
8 … I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ
That word for rubbish is a very strong word that can even refer to dung. I think the best translation would be filth. And Paul says that in order to gain Christ he has to consider all the things on his resume as filth. There is more than one way to live a filthy life. You can do it by doing all kinds of immoral lewd things. Or you can really live a filthy life by being squeaky clean and religious and relying on that to save you. Anything that competes with Christ for your reliance and trust is filth.
What Are You Relying On?
What if you got really sick this afternoon and by the time you went to bed tonight you are so bad you got to thinking, “What if this is it for me? What if I don’t make it? What if the next appointment I have is to meet God in the judgment?” If that happened tonight, would you be confident that you would go to heaven? On what basis?
“I had a really good week.”
Heaven help you if you think that way. Heaven help you if your answer is anything other than: “I know Jesus Christ through faith, and I glory in him alone.”
Augusta National is the most exclusive golf club in the world. Each member is issued one of their famous green jackets, and that’s the only way you can get in. You can’t apply for membership – you have to be invited, and that happens to very, very few people. The only other way to get the green jacket is to win the Masters. So if any of us were traveling through Augusta and needed a bite to eat, it’s not to be in the Augusta National dining room. We would be turned away at the gate because we don’t have the green jacket.
The gates of heaven are like that. You can’t get into the Augusta dining room without a green jacket. You can’t get into the marriage supper of the Lamb without a white robe. What is the robe? The robe is Christ. But here’s where that analogy breaks down: You get the green jacket through a spectacular performance. You get the white robe by regarding all your great performances as filth compared to Christ.
And so we sing:
In Christ alone my hope is found, He is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid Ground, firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
Till on that cross as Jesus died, The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid; Here in the death of Christ I live.
Then bursting forth in glorious Day Up from the grave he rose again!
And as He stands in victory Sin's curse has lost its grip on me,
For I am His and He is mine - Bought with the precious blood of Christ.
No guilt in life, no fear in death, This is the power of Christ in me;
Conclusion
When Paul was listing all the elements of his old religion, you notice one thing that wasn’t on his list – joy. There is no joy in legalism. That’s why this chapter begins: Rejoice in the Lord! So for the conclusion of my sermon, let me finally explain the introduction to my sermon. Why did I point out the older brother in Luke 15 using the word slaving to describe life in his father’s house? Because that is what it is like for legalists. People who think they have to keep their performance up in order for God to keep loving them and accepting them will inevitably get to the point where they resent God because it’s such a heavy burden to bear. Like Martha, who finally snapped at Jesus because her work was so hard and Mary wasn’t helping her, and she was missing the only thing that mattered – fellowship with Christ.
Some of you grew up in a house where there was a stifling list of rules and no matter how hard you tried you could just never measure up. Or maybe you feel that way right now. I get up here and preach about all the things God requires of us, and those things just hit you week after week as heavy, oppressive burdens. When that starts to happen, it’s probably a symptom of a Martha-like slipping from focus on why you are doing those things.
One way you can tell that’s happened is if you feel like God owes you something when following Him costs you something. If following or obeying Christ ever feels like loss to you, go back to verse 8.
8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ
The surpassing greatness of knowing Christ. Knowing Christ is far better than anything you give up to know him. When I was a little kid, very few things got me more excited than hearing that my grandma and grandpa were coming. They lived in Illinois and I think they would come less than once a year, so when they came it was a really big deal to me. If mom told me they were coming and would be there when I got home from school, I learned nothing that day in school. I just watched that clock from the minute I got there until the bell rang at 3:15. And if some friends invited me over to their house to play after school that day, I would say, “Nope. Not today.” And I would run half the way home just because I couldn’t wait.
Can you imagine me doing that and then getting home, seeing grandma and grandpa, and sticking out my hand and saying, “Don’t you think you owe me a little something? After all, look what I sacrificed to be with you. I turned down a chance to hang out with my friends after school. I ran half way home with my backpack. I did my duty as a grandchild, now don’t you think I deserve a little compensation?” That was the farthest thing from my mind. I didn’t feel like I sacrificed anything or gave up anything or lost anything. I felt like the luckiest kid in the world!
Life in the Father’s house only feels like oppressive slaving away if we don’t love the Father. The Christian life only becomes burdensome when we are glorying in something other than Christ. And the corrective is another line we sang this morning: All the vain things that charm me most, fade into nothing in his love.
Joyful Renunciation
Imagine you were involved in a ministry to help rescue women and children who are being kidnapped and sold into human trafficking but don’t have enough money to really do much of anything. You’re trying to figure out ways to come up with funds, and so you go to an auction where they are selling off property that was seized from drug dealers. You figure maybe you can buy something cheap and sell it at a profit to help come up with some funding.
There’s a piece of property for sale, but it’s $500,000- cash only. The only way you could come up with that much cash would be if you sold your house, sold your cars, sold every possession you own, and cashed in your retirement account. So even if you could sell it at 10 or 20 thousand dollar profit, it wouldn’t be worth it.
But then you get into a conversation with the guy standing next you and you find out that he is in the oil industry. He explains to you that that piece of land is sitting on top of a massive oil reserve. If you were to buy the land, you could lease it out to the oil company and you would have an income of $10-$15 million a year for the next 20 years. You think of how many women you could help with that kind of money, and now you’re so excited you can hardly contain yourself. Your house is on the market the next day, you cash in your retirement, you sell everything you own. And your friends see what you are doing and they say, “This piece of land is costing you everything! Aren’t you sad to be losing all this?” And you say, “No, I’ve never been happier! I can’t wait to get everything sold so I can get that land.”
That’s what it’s like when a person first comes to know Christ. Coming to Christ does cost you everything.
Luke 14:33 In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple.
It costs you everything to come to Christ. So why do people do it? One word: joy! They do it for the same reason you are selling your house and your cars and your clothes and everything else in that story I just told. It’s the same reason I said no to my friends when my grandparents came. It wasn’t duty; it was joy. Jesus told a story just like the one I told, except he managed to do it in one verse.
Matthew 13:44 The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
Rejoice in the Lord. Glory in Christ alone. Serve God by the Spirit of God. And all your loss will be gain.
Benediction: Hebrews 10:19 Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus…21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22 let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith.
Application Questions (James 1:25)
1) Of the three main ways of exposing yourself to the Holy Spirit’s influence (Scripture, prayer, and fellowship), which comes easiest to you? Which is hardest?
2) Are there any aspects of serving Christ that can sometimes feel burdensome to you? Or feel like loss instead of gain? What are they?
3) What things in this world are you most often tempted to glory in?
