West Greeley Baptist Church
August 11 2002
Philippians 1: 1-3
“Memories, prayers and a bright future”
By Pastor Mark Hensley
3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
Introduction: A man by the name of Von Neumann was a brilliant mathematician. He also had an incredible memory, His feats of memory are described by Herman Goldstine:
As far as I could tell, Von Neumann was able on once reading a book or article to quote it back verbatim; moreover he could do it years later without hesitation. He could also translate it from its original language into English. On one occasion I tested his ability by asking him to tell me how the ’Tale of Two Cities’ started. Whereupon, without pause, he immediately began to recite the first chapter and continued until asked to stop after about ten or fifteen minutes.
How’s your memory? Von Neumann’s ability is not only amazing but intimidating! Though we may never be able to retain every word we read or perform complex math problems we all can make the most of our memory!
The ability to recall events that have happened years before is an incredible gift!
With memory your children can be two again….check that, that may not be the best use of memory! Memories allow us someone said, to “Have Roses in winter”
Memories of the major events of life come to us, and the smell of freshly mowed grass or Old spice cologne and it’s as if we have stepped back in time, however briefly through the gift of memory!
Transition: The memories of a wonderful ministry and the joy of service with God’s people are what were on the mind of the Apostle Paul when he wrote Philippians.
The epistle to the Philippians has long been called the Epistle of Joy. "Joy is the music that runs through this epistle, the sunshine that spreads over all of it" (Lenski, p. 691).
Paul and his companions had laid the foundations for the church in Philippi with the conversion of Lydia and the jailer (Acts 16). Philippi, known as "the gateway to Europe" thus became the birthplace of European Christianity. Philippians is considered the most personal of Paul’s writings. As compared with other epistles there is a marked absence of formal doctrine presented in a thematic format. It breathes of a strong personal attachment and joy in Gospel partnership shared between pastor and people.
Today in a message titled “Memories, prayers and a bright future”
We will be privileged to look inside the great heart of the Apostle Paul and his deepest hope for the people of God in Philippi and the people of God today in Greeley and the world. Philippians 1: 3-6
3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
I. Memories: 3I thank my God every time I remember you.
If there’s one thing this difficult summer of 2002 has taught me it’s that relationships should be a priority as we journey through this life! Memories are forged and created in the way we react and interact with those we meet, those we know and those we love. When people meet you, what memory begins to take shape? I am afraid that for too many they see us as hurried people who are pleasant enough, but who move to quickly to ever be able to get to know!
God wants more from us, He expects us to walk through this life and take the time to build friendships, friendships that will be of particular help to each of us when we face a dark day! Would you be willing to risk being vulnerable and having your own personal schedule altered if it meant establishing relationships that have real depth? Paul needed the people from the church in Philippi. And we need each other!
Quecreek Miners Kept Each Other Alive
In what the news called "The Miracle at Quecreek," nine miners trapped for three days 240 feet underground in a water-filled mine shaft "decided early on they were either going to live or
die as a group."
The 55 degree (Fahrenheit) water threatened to kill them slowly by hypothermia, so according to one news report "When one would get cold, the other eight would huddle around theperson and warm that person, and when another person got cold, the favor was returned."
"Everybody had strong moments," miner Harry B. Mayhugh told reporters after being released from Somerset Hospital in Somerset. "But any certain time maybe one guy got down, and then the rest pulled together. And then that guy would get back up, and maybe someone else would feel a little weaker, but it was a team effort. That’s the only way it could have
been." They faced incredibly hostile conditions together -- and they all came out alive together.
What a picture of the body of Christ!
Paul’s in prison and he has time to reflect on his life and those that made it joy filled and in his stark and harsh surroundings, He remembers a church, people really because that’s what a church is people who have come into a relationship with the son of God!
Feel the joy, the memories that call out to him of a more pleasant time when freedom was his and friendships were something to take pleasure in, and to get pleasure from! And so he writes and so he remembers: 3I thank my God every time I remember you. Paul thanks God for the church at Philippi because there were no regrets in all of Paul’s relationships with them! Kenneth Wuest, Word studies in the Greek New Testament pg 31
The challenge before each of us is to so love and so live, that we have no regrets in the relationships that are apart of our life!
He not only remembers them He prays for them!
II. Paul’s prayer for his friends: 3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.
This was a church that had stood with the Apostle in helping him through prayers and financial gifts to preach the Gospel. The word partnership is also understood as fellowship and refers to joint participation in establishing the church. Paul remembers the kindness of Lydia who opened her home to the preaching of the word of God.
In Acts 16:15 we read about her: 15When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. "If you consider me a believer in the Lord," she said, "come and stay at my house." And she persuaded us.
Acts of kindness, people pulling together, believing God for something more, that was Paul’s experience and I assure you the memories of that dear church were like warm embers in the cold and difficult environment he finds himself in!
How could he not pray for them, they were not only in his heart but on it! 3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.
Paul was thanking these believers for their love for him, their faithfulness to pray for him and not neglecting his financial needs. In fact in these verses he is not only thanking them for past partnership but present help. They had just sent a monetary gift through a man named Epaphroditus. It’s impossible to convey in our English language the depth of love and appreciation the Apostle felt for the faithfulness of Gods people.
I am concerned that in to many of our churches we want to do the least in assisting those that come to us in need. Our own support of missionaries while good could be better!
I have read as you have of care packages sent to missionaries that contained clothes out of fashion and at times better suited for rags than wearing!
Several years ago a home mission emphasis called the church to “Extravagance” in mission giving! When I think of extravagant displays of love and kindness I think of woman in Mark 14, in our story that would rather give it up and die to self than anything else. Her name is Mary. She is mentioned a number of times in scripture. But here is the story, beginning in verse 3.
“While he was in Bethany, (Speaking of Jesus) reclining at the table in the home of a man known as Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on his head. Some of those present were saying indignantly to one another. "Why this waste of perfume? It could have been sold for more than a year’s wages and the money given to the poor." And they rebuked her harshly.”
Mary had no problem giving up a very expensive jar of perfume, worth a year’s wages. Compared to our standards today, probably about $18,600 is a year’s wages. Jesus didn’t rebuke her; he saw the gesture for what it was…the response of a loving heart to the one who loved her most!
Paul too had known the incredible generosity of the people of God! They had been generous in praying for him! His relationship with them was authentic and sincere. And their memory is rich and warmly pressing into his conscious mind while in prison.
He can’t help but pray for them, in his prayer reasserting his gratefulness for their faithfulness in prayer support and financial support. The support isn’t something that is regulated to time past but to the present and Epaphroditus gift from them is like a sweet aroma in the stark and somewhat suffocating confines of his jail cell.
Paul, writes of Memories, Prayers and notice:
III. A Bright Future: 3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
Paul can face the future and imprisonment and all that waits because he knows God will ultimately deliver him to his heavenly home and Paul looks forward to what lies ahead! He is confident! Confident that what God starts he finishes!
Norman Vincent Peale was once flying on an airplane when the Captain’s voice came over the loudspeaker: ’We need to inform you that one of our engines has shut down, but the other three will enable us to complete our journey.’ Then he added, ’to reassure any of you who might be worried’ let me tell you that we have four Anglican bishops on board today.’ A woman sitting beside Peale called a stewardess over and said, ’With the greatest respect, could you please tell the Captain that I’d be much more confident if there were 3 bishops and four engines.’
Confidence is a funny thing.
But the word ’confidence’ is really the major theme that comes through when we look at Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi!
3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
Paul wrote this letter from prison, probably in Rome.
Keep in mind:
Paul may well have been facing execution
•Paul had spent only a short time with the people of Philippi.
•Paul was committed to the central message of the Grace of God revealed in Jesus Christ.
•Philippi was a wealthy trade center. Folks in Philippi would have understood wealth and power, what they may not have understood as well was humility and suffering.
Paul reminded them as he reminds us that God will make away! God calls us into relationships with each other, and properly appreciated and nurtured those relationships can provide memories that we all will need someday, somewhere.
He prayed for them, and we must pray for one another because this is a shared work, a partnership. We can depend on God to complete what he initiates, no unfinished projects for God, be it people or churches or the spiritual growth of every one of us here. With the eye of faith we can see the end, and it’s really just the beginning!
Doubt sees the obstacles;
Faith sees the way.
Doubt sees the darkest night;
Faith sees the day.
Doubt dreads to take a step;
Faith soars on high.
Doubt questions, "Who believes?"
Faith answers, "I!"... Gregory Dawson
Faith is not a distant view but a warm embrace of Christ.
John Calvin.
Appeal:
God wants for each of us: Memories, Prayer and a Bright Future!
