“PHILIP”
TEXT: JOHN 1:43-46, JOHN 6:1-7
Sunday, March 7, 2004
We are on a twelve week series on the disciples if you are visiting with us. We are walking through Lent with those who walked with Jesus, learning the lessons they learned in their lives, how God encountered them, discovering their flaws and their triumphs and the type of people Jesus calls into service. Today we are talking about Philip. He is our eighth disciple, or fifth on the list if you read the list of disciples. There’s Peter, James, John, Andrew and then number five is always Philip. Philip, early in the gospels, is always paired with Bartholomew, whose is also called Thaddeus. Later he develops a friendship, an affinity, with Andrew.
His name means lover of horses. It was a common name, used particularly of those who were leaders of countries. There was Philip, the king of Macedonia; the Governor of Jerusalem under Antiochus Epiphanies which is about 170 to 190 B.C., was named Philip. There was Philip the Tetrark who was the brother of Herod Antipas, the son of King Herod the great. King Herod of course is the Herod of the Christmas story, and Philip is the ruler whose wife was Herodias who went to be with his brother Antipas, which irritated John the Baptist. There’s also a Philip in the book of Acts, Philip the Deacon, and you read about him in Acts chapter 6. This Philip the Deacon is also the same Philip who preaches to the Ethiopian eunuch. You know that because in Acts 21:8 Philip the Evangelist is called one of the seven, not one of the twelve [one of the seven refers back to Acts 6], one of the seven deacons who was chosen to do practical ministry in the church. Therefore, Philip the apostle is not the same Philip who preached to the Ethiopian eunuch.
Philip lived in Bethsaida which is a fishing town on the Northern shore of the Sea of Galilee. He was the second disciple martyred eight years after James lost his life for the Lord. Philip died. He died in Heopolis, which is in Phrygia, Asia Minor, which is around an area of Turkey.
If you were to look at Philip’s life at the height of his ministry, you would be amazed to discover his past because who Philip was in his past wasn’t anything like Philip later in his life. Before he was martyred multitudes came to Christ because of the power of his preaching and, if you imagined that, and then discovered what his past was, you would say there is no way; they are not the same two people. Do you know people who are like that: they are a certain way now, and you look at their past and you would never believe what they were like before? I had a good friend, Donny Hudson, who was studying to be in the ministry like I was. He was a gentle, big guy, gentle though, loved the Lord. He told me about his life: he, at one time, was a brawler in a bar, just long hair and a hippy type and I said there is no way that could have been. The same thing is true of Philip. He was a wonderful godly man of faith later in his life, but when you read the gospels you get a very different picture, and we are going to look at two of those pictures.
You’ll find the whole story of Philip in the gospel of John. Again, because of the gospel of John, we get a fuller understanding of who Philip was. Without the gospel of John we really wouldn’t know anything about Philip. You read about Philip in Chapters 1, 6, 12 and 14 and we are just going to take two snapshots of his life, first in John chapter 1, versus 43-46:
The next day Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, ‘Follow me.’
Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael and told him, ‘We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote – Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.’
‘Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?’ Nathanael asked.
And then in John, chapter 6:
Sometime after this, Jesus crossed to the far shore of the sea of Galilee (that is, the Sea of Tiberias) and a great crowd of people followed him because they saw the miraculous signs he had performed on the sick. Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples. The Jewish Passover Feast was near.
When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, ‘Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?’ He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was doing to do.
Philip answered him, ‘Eight months wages would not buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!’
What do you know about this man Philip? Well, as you read all the stories about Philip, what you discover, surprisingly, first (in his future) he is a dynamic, confident preacher. You discover that when it comes to spiritual things, now he is really out of his element. He really does not know what he is talking about. He doesn’t comprehend the Bible very well and he doesn’t comprehend Jesus and his teachings. He is just kind of slow when it comes to spiritual things. He just can’t catch on. He just can’t grasp it. You get a sense for this in Chapter 1 where he is excited about meeting Jesus. He believes he is the Messiah, but he doesn’t know the Bible well enough to know that there is no connection with Nazareth and the Messiah, but he doesn’t care about that. He tells Nathanael, passing on some bad information. Nathanael asks him a single question, “Nazareth, can anything good come from there?” He challenges Jesus’ origins, which he should have, and Philip doesn’t have an answer. It’s a simple question. It’s only one question and Philip doesn’t have an answer for him.
He does something smart, however, he knows when he doesn’t have the answer not to fake it. Maybe he knew Nathanael better; maybe he knew the type of person Nathanael was and he didn’t want to get into an argument with him, so he said, you know what, I am not going to argue with you. Just come and discover him for yourself, which is not a bad strategy when you do not know the answer to things.
You get a snapshot of this in Chapter 6 when again, like in Chapter 1, Philip said: I believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the one that Moses wrote about. The understanding of the Messiah and the expectation of that day is when the Messiah, the real one, comes, he, like Moses, will feed the people bread in the wilderness. Where are they now? In the wilderness. What does Jesus want to do, this Messiah Philip believes? He wants to feed the people bread. He says, Philip how are we going to do this? Philip doesn’t have a clue. He should have said, Lord you know you’ve changed water into wine, you have done the miracles, you know the answer to that. Instead, he says, it’s impossible. I have figured it out and it can’t be done Jesus. So he doesn’t make a connection. He doesn’t even include Jesus in the equation.
In Chapter 12, the Greeks want to have an audience with Jesus. We want to meet Jesus and we go to Philip because Philip’s name was Greek. I misspoke a while ago when I said Nathanael had the only Greek name, actually, three people did. Andrew and Philip also have Greek names. What would you say if someone said, I want to go and meet Jesus, I want to go meet the preacher. How would you respond? Well, of course, you can see him. He’s a nice guy. I’m a nice guy aren’t I? Come on. He’s nice. He’s cordial. Who is Jesus? He is very gracious. He has reached out to the Samaritans. He healed the servant of the Centurion. Philip doesn’t have a clue: I don’t know; is it right? Is it protocol? Let me check with Andrew. So he doesn’t bring the Greeks straight to Jesus. He has to ask Andrew.
Then in Chapter 14, after Jesus was very explicit about who he was in Chapter 10, he said it couldn’t get anymore clear. I and the Father are one, if you see me, you’ve seen the Father. In Chapter 14 Jesus says the same thing over again. Philip’s head perks up. You are going to show us the Father? Lord, show us the Father and it will suffice for us. At the end of Jesus’ whole ministry, after this hallmark moment (let your hearts not be troubled, if you believe in God, you believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions), Philip asks who is the Father? He doesn’t get it at all. He has never made the connection, though Jesus was so clear.
In Philip you get this picture of a guy who, in his life, has left church and those religious things to his wife. He has better things to do. He doesn’t have time to get into that religious stuff. That’s a crutch. That’s what women do. That’s what women need. I am too busy for that. He has really neglected spiritual matters in his life and he is very passive. Maybe he has been in the synagogue, he has come and listened. He hasn’t read Scripture very much; maybe he peeked at it now and then, but he just doesn’t grasp it.
He is not dumb. He is not dumb at all. He is very sharp in fact. In fact, in a moment’s notice he could calculate how much bread it would take to give 25,000 people a taste. He could calculate that very well, so he wasn’t dumb. However, when it came to God and religion and spiritual matters and the Bible, that just wasn’t his thing, it wasn’t his bag.
Do you relate to that? Do you know someone who’s like that? Perhaps you are like that. What does Jesus have to say to you? Oh now here comes the hammer. Jesus says this to Philip: follow me. Wow! In fact, it is an unbelievable statement because note that Philip is the only disciple Jesus went out and got. Philip didn’t have enough faith in himself or maybe he thought he was dumb, biblically speaking, and you can’t possibly follow Jesus and be dumb. I am just not worthy. Jesus goes out of his way to find Philip and says: Philip, I want you to be part of this ministry as well. I find that amazing. What does it say to us? Wherever you are, maybe like Philip you don’t have all the answers. Maybe you are new to your faith. Maybe you don’t know the Bible that well and leadership is for those who really are spiritual. Jesus said: no, no! Sometimes real spiritual people get in the way of ministry and service. Jesus said: no, I want you! I want you just like you are! Now you are going to grow in your faith as you serve me. You are going to mature, but don’t believe that you have to be some huge spiritual giant to be a great theologian, like Nathanael, or some great natural-born leader like Peter was to serve God. You don’t.
God takes people just like Philip, average, normal, not really knowledgeable, and calls them into service. Don’t let your newness to the faith or your lack of knowledge or lack of spiritual maturity or limitations or handicap or a lack of what you think is lack-of-giftedness keep you from doing your part in God’s ministry. There are a lot of things you can do. You can do the soundboard. It is not because those guys up there are spiritually dumb; I am not saying that at all. There are a lot of things you can do. Maybe you say I can’t preach and I can’t lead worship, but you can sing in the choir, or you can pray in the praise team, or you can be a greeter, or there are a lot of opportunities for service and God calls you to that. Think of the 12 apostles. Can you name all 12 of them? Think about it in your mind right now. The first 4 are easy, Peter, James, John and Andrew. But can you name the other 8? Think about it. What is the message? The message is those 4 were pretty dynamic leaders, pretty gifted, but the majority didn’t have a whole lot going for them and yet God called them just the same. Normal, average people and he calls you as well.
The second thing I noticed about Philip is here is a man who is not very knowledgeable on spiritual matters, but he becomes knowledgeable as he serves Christ in his life. Here, also, is a man who struggles to move the stories of his faith off the page and into real life. He really has read, like many of us have read, the Bible kind of like the Grimm’s book of fairytales. They are nice stories, and I get the point, but can God do it for me, in me, here and now? It is something he did 2000 years ago, but is it real today? Will he do it now?
In Chapter 6 you get his problem, his dilemma. How are we going to feed these people? Jesus turns the problem over to Philip just to see what he would say, just to see what he would do, how to develop his leadership. Okay, Philip, what are we going to do? He is thinking about it and he doesn’t know. He has calculated and the numbers do not work. There is no way they can afford it; they don’t have that kind of money. Jesus, I know you just turned the water into wine. I have seen all around me people healed by your divine power, but when it comes to my problems, I am not sure that you are able to do anything about them. I have a hard time connecting it or believing it. I can pray for others and I can believe it for others, but when it comes to me, to really see it, for it to really happen, well that is a hard thing for me to accept. Will Christ do the same thing for me? I can’t.
Now Philip was right in that point. He can’t, but the answer to his struggle was right there, and he never gave Jesus a thought. Sometimes we do the same thing. The answer to our life’s problems is right there. It is in Jesus, but we don’t give him a thought. That is especially true when it comes to the provision of daily bread. Here Philip has seen the healing. He has seen the water into wine, but he has never seen if Jesus can provide those practical, daily things -- I mean daily bread. Can he really do that? He can do the spiritual stuff, but how about the practical things?
Of course, the answer is yes. God does provide. That is something we know as believers. We say it on our placard, but a lot of us have a hard time really believing it and we take the full weight of the load of being a breadwinner on our shoulders. We think that we have to do it all, and we become so identified with our work, that our work becomes who we are, and if something would happen to our bread-winning role, we are destroyed, we lose ourselves. We go into depression, we panic, we have anxiety attacks, and we don’t know what to do. Some of us even take our lives over work, not realizing that it is just a job. It’s just a job, a way of making money and making a living, and if we lose it, it’s no big deal because there are a lot of jobs out there and God does provide, but do you really believe it? It is easy to say it until you lose your job. Do you believe it?
Oftentimes we read the Bible and we mentally say yes, God can do that, but we don’t believe that he will do it and will do it for us. We believe, for instance, that Sunday is the day for rest, but when we get home, we don’t believe we need it. We believe that God’s standard for dating is no sex before marriage until we are single again, and we say that was for young people, not for old people who have already had the experience. We believe that Jesus can heal, because the stories in the Bible say so, until we become ill. We believe in the resurrection until a loved one passes away. We believe that divorce is wrong until our marriage goes sour and then we can’t believe that God can reconcile an impossible, difficult situation. We believe that God is love, but we discover it is hard for us to love someone who is unlovable and gives us a hard time. We don’t believe that God can give us the capacity to love that person, or to love that person through us. We believe that God can save, but not our spouse. Again, we believe that he can, we have mental ascent to this truth, but we don’t believe that he will, and there is a difference.
It’s a struggle that Philip had. It’s a struggle that we have and the answer is simply to tell God what you need. God is happy to supply it. It is put in the Lord’s Prayer; give us this day our daily bread. God does want to give us practical things. Tell him what it is. Do your part and relinquish it, and, of course, always factor in God’s power and God’s ability and not simply your own. God’s answer to Philip is: I provided food in the desert, bread in the desert, 1500 years ago, and I can do it today. I turned water into wine a few weeks ago and I can take the sack lunch and make it a country buffet. I healed people 2000 years ago and I can heal them today. I provided daily bread for my people the last 3500 years and I can still do it, and I do do it today. What has changed? Us. Do we really believe it?
What’s the last thing we learn about Philip? Well, not the last thing, just one thing I have time for. Here is a man who is also very practical. I like this guy because I am a functional type of guy. If it has no function, it is not useful and he is very practical. He is dollars and cents. He is a bottom line type of guy. If we can afford it, we can get it. If it is humanly possible, we can do it. If I understand it, then it is truth. If it makes sense to me, then I can accept it. But he makes a critical error in application to this situation. He makes a mistake in that he allows his current finances to determine and define his ministry (or God’s ministry) to these people rather than allowing the ministry to people to determine, to define, his finances. Now what do I mean by that? What I mean is this. Philip thought this way -- here is how much it is going to cost to feed these people -- we don’t have it, therefore it’s not getting done. Jesus’ attitude is very different. Jesus said, we need to feed these people because if we let these people go, some are going to faint, some are going to become ill, some aren’t going to make it, some may even die on the way, and I can’t allow that to happen because I care about these people - so we are going to feed these people.
The question is how are we going to do it? We may not have the money, but God, somehow, I’m not sure how this is going to happen, but God is going to supply, God is going to do it. That is something that we need to learn as well. It is a challenge that our church is going to face in the near future. First, it applies to church finances in that vision in ministry and finances always belong together. People who run your stewardship should be people who are good with money, but also people of faith, and I’m impressed that that is true in our church. We have a finance committee and search committee who are good with numbers but also are people of faith and vision. Our church understands that.
In the Presbyterian Church there used to be a separation between trustees and elders. The elders made the decisions for ministry and the trustees said can we afford it, and they were separated, and the result was the trustees of many churches became the determining factor of what happened. If we can afford it, then we can do it; it should be the other way around. If God calls us to do something in ministry, we do it and trust that he provides the finances. That doesn’t mean that we become reckless. That means that we have faith that he is going to do it. In our leadership retreat we talked about that and we were beginning to look at these cottage meeting results. There are two more so we are not jumping the boat, but there is a clear picture as to what God wants us to do that we have discerned over the collective vision of us all. There is a clear picture emerging. Immediately though, the question at the leadership retreat was this; we see what we need to do, we know what the people want in ministry, how are we going to afford this? I think God’s reply here is don’t worry about that yet. All you have to determine is the what. Once you determine what you are going to do, God is going to make it possible.
It was the same with the feeding of the 5000. Jesus determined what he was going to do first and then it was up to God to make it happen; the how. The story of Peter in the boat, Peter walking on the water, if he thought about how God was going to enable him to walk on water, he would have never gotten out of the boat. He didn’t think about how, he knew what Jesus wanted him to do. The how was determined once he got out of the boat and God made the how possible. The same thing will happen in our church and with us. We have to first determine what God wants us to do and if we know what God wants us to do, the finances will follow. It is something we have to trust. It is what God did then, and he can still do it today as well. Finances and faith go together.
Well, what have we learned about this man Philip? As you probably have seen, there haven’t really been any great inspiring qualities in his life. Maybe the one thing quickly to mention is that he did have an enthusiasm for Christ. He reached out to a friend and he brought Nathanael to the Lord. That’s good. That’s a good way of reaching people, beginning with your circle of friends and inviting them to meet Jesus in their own life, but by and large you get this disciple who if you were to give him a grade, it probably would be a C. He is probably a C disciple, and yet this average guy God used in profound and powerful ways in his life as he made himself available to God. You know what I like about average people? It is that they are so relatable. They make you so comfortable and it is like living room living when you get into their presence. They are so genuine that you know you can talk freely and you can relate to them on a human level because, if the truth be known, deep down all of us are C average. All of us are C average and if we have some ability, it is because of the goodness and grace of God working in our life; so may God take all of his C average students and may we work to his glory together.
[Let’s pray.]
