Good morning Connect Church. How are we doing this morning? Good. Well, I’m so excited that you guys are here and joined us this morning. If we have not had the chance yet to meet, my name is Charlie and I get the privilege of serving here on team in the area of community engagement, which basically means I’m here to help you take your next steps, see me as a tour guide maybe, but I’m here to help you take your next steps, whether that’s going to DNA, if you haven’t gone to DNA, it’s happening right now, you can go do that. Or maybe it’s finding community in a connect group or maybe it’s navigating the process of how do I join team and begin to serve? Or maybe it’s something as simple as taking a step in salvation and getting water baptized. How many know we love to celebrate those things as well.
So my job is to help you take those next steps and if you are joining us for the first time this morning at Connect, can I just again say thank you for joining us. There’s an incredible churches and ministry happening all over Middle Tennessee, so the fact that you are here with us truly is an honor, especially today we have donuts. How exciting is that? We’re celebrating our nine year anniversary that’s worth clapping again for certain. Now, maybe for some of you that don’t know, the church actually started about nine and a half, 10 years ago, but they started by meeting in Pastor Devin and Pastor Ashley’s family room. Like what you see today was a group of 2030 folks that were committed to carrying out the mission and vision that God gave them. And so maybe there’s some in that room today. If you were in that family room, raise your hand.
We got a couple. Okay. Yeah, we got some couple waving in the back. Perfect. Well, I just want to say thank you for your investment as well into Connect Church because of all of the hard work. We are being able to reap the benefits here of that today, and you might be thinking like, wow, this is pretty cool. A church that started nine years ago in a family room is now this, and I wish there was a way that I don’t really want to go to that DNA thing, but I wish there was a way that we could learn about the church and figure out why did they plan another church in Middle Tennessee. Don’t we have enough churches in Mount Juliet and what’s the mission of this whole thing? Anyways? Well, if you’re asking those questions, we’ve created a night just for you on October the eighth, right before we kick off all connector team night, we are having what we’re calling one big night.
The night’s going to get kicked off at four 30 with mega DNA. What that basically means is we’re going to take both the Connect class and the Discover class. We’re going to combine ’em together and we’re going to knock it out in an hour. It’s going to be an incredible evening. Pastor Devin, pastor Ashley, they’re both going to be teaching that live. Then we’re going to do the assessments, the spiritual gifts and a personality assessment, all the things to help you better understand how you are uniquely wired. And you might be asking why are we putting such an emphasis on this? Pastor Devin mentioned it last week one, and primarily it’s because eternity is at stake as more people are coming to connect, and as we begin to continue, you’ve seen the dirt being moved as we are preparing for what is next.
Can I tell you that we need more of you serving? We need more of you. That will actually take the step. So you might be saying, who is this mega DNA for? Well, very simply and primarily it’s for those who have yet to actually take the step and go to DNA. So if that’s you and you know that then mega DNA for you October the eighth, but there’s also another segment of the folks that might be sitting in this room that are needing to come to mega DNA as well, and that is the 132 of you. There’s 132 of you. Again, they put the guy in charge of D NA to promote this right now, but 132 of you have started DNA. You’ve either gone to the Connect class and not the Discover or you’ve gone to Discover, but not the connect.
We are inviting you 132 people to show up that night finished DNA and take the next step to get on the team. Our goal is simple. We just want to remove as many barriers as possible to help you get taking that next step. Now, here’s the reason why. We’ve already talked about it, that eternity is at stake, but we’ve also come to find out, and we believe this passionately, that you get a lot more out of church when it moves from both just being a service that you attend and it becomes a place that you belong and a community that you’re a part of. So we invite you out to that. Speaking of community, last Sunday, our connect group fall semester launched. All right, we got some of the folks here that are taking a part of that and I want to share just a couple numbers and hear me clearly on the front side of this.
We aren’t sharing these because we just celebrate numbers. We’re celebrating these because each of these numbers represents a life that is going to be changed this semester. So this semester alone just now in this 10 week semester that started last week, it’ll go all the way until November the 18th. We have 52 connect groups with over 355 unique people in a connect group. What that means is if you’ve signed up for multiple groups, we’re only counting you once. So 355 unique people, but it gets better if we add in our students who are also meeting in Connect groups each and every single week in our movement ministry. There are five groups with over 500 individuals in a group this semester, and I share that for this reason only because you probably, we become Charlie Brown teacher want want, and you hear us talk about connect groups, connect groups, connect groups.
You’re like, yeah, I bet no one even joins those things. Well, you’re in the minority if you’re sitting in here because the majority of our church is in a connect group. And so I’d tell you that if you’re not in a connect group, go sign up. Go to the lobby today, find someone. Give me the new area, come talk to me. Go to the app, get on the website wherever you go, just get signed up. You haven’t missed anything. First week, I promise you, they were just figuring out who was bringing the Doritos. So you have not missed a thing for this next one. We also mentioned it in Connect News, but I do want to highlight it one more time next Sunday, if you are new here, you’ve been kicking the tires and just trying to figure out what it is to be a part of Connect and who all the people are and who’s on team, we invite you to the new here, lunch next Sunday, immediately following the 10 45.
I love the way that Connor said it. If you’re new here and you like lunch, then we invite you to the new here lunch. Do that. Well, today I get the privilege of continuing our series through the study of the book of Philippians. Obviously Pastor Devin and Pastor Ashley are not here. They have a unique opportunity. They’ve been traveling the last couple of days, but I was talking with them this morning and they are in the country of Tanzania. Yeah. Wow, that’s fancy. Yeah, so they’re in the country of Tanzania, but they’re there on the specific mission. They’ve been invited by one of the bishops of the largest denomination in the country to be a part of their national conference and church planting initiative. So they’re going to be speaking to pastors and church planters for the next three days. Now hear this, pastor Devin is in charge of leading three 90 minute sessions back to back, back for three days in a row.
So be in prayer for Pastor Devin. He wanted me to share with you. They both had a message for us this morning. Pastor Devin wanted me to let you know that whenever they go out and they represent connect, we all are going with this. So thanks to your investment, your involvement, we can simultaneously be making impact here in Mount Juliet while they’re making impact across the globe in the continent of Africa. And Pastor Ashley’s message, she kept yelling, go Gators, go Gators. I guess she’s from Florida, so I guess we’ll let it slide in that. Well, we are grateful to have pastors that will not only invest here, but will invest globally. And so I do want to take just a second. I know they’re not in the room, but would we just take two seconds and they show our honor and our appreciation for Pastor Devin, for Pastor Ashley, for all that they are leading.
We love you guys. We know that you are watching Paige and I wouldn’t be where we are without your investment. So I personally just say thank you. Well, today, maybe you’ve missed the last couple of weeks, but today we’re going to continue our book series, as I mentioned, and we take one sermon series a year and dedicate it solely through a book study. And now that may mean something different to you, but what we mean by that is we are going to go chapter by chapter verse by verse. And the reason why we believe that this is such a great approach is because it’s really becomes less about what we think and more about, well, what does the Bible say? So how many of you enjoyed the series so far? We’re in week three. We’ve gone through Philippians one. We’ve gone through Philippians two, and so today we’re in Philippians three. As a quick refresher, or maybe if it’s your first time here and you’re not as familiar, the book of Philippians was written by the apostle Paul. Apostle Paul was a Pharisee that killed the early Christians. Along the way, he had a miraculous encounter with Jesus that turned him then into a church planter. He’s become known now as the greatest apostle Along the way on his journey, he was beaten shipwrecked and imprisoned countless number of times. All while doing that, he somehow managed to write the majority of the New Testament.
This letter is written to the church in Philippi to help them grow and to help them and just remind them, Hey, you need to rejoice in the Lord. That theme is so central that the book has often been entitled or called the Epistle of Joy or the Book of Joy because in just the four chapters alone, Paul mentions the word joy or rejoice 16 times. So we can all agree that it is very clear. The theme of the book is Joy. So who’s ready to get started? Philippians chapter three, verse one. Say, you’re ready. I’m ready. Let’s go further. My brothers and sisters rejoice in the Lord, boy, just like that. We’re right back to where we started. Paul says, rejoice in the Lord. He has this central theme here He is repeating himself again as we move into the third section of this letter.
I mean, we shouldn’t really be surprised. I mean, it is the book of Joy. So the fact that Paul’s calling us and reminding us to rejoice in the Lord should really be no surprise. But maybe if you’re like me and have a biblical a d d, I’d sit there and wondering, does this guy not realize that he’s repeating himself over and over and over? Well, apparently Paul was a little bit more self-aware than maybe I am because if we keep reading this first verse, it says, well, and it’s no trouble for me to write the same things to you again. So Paul knew that he was repeating himself. And so when we take a deeper dive into this, I believe that what we see is Paul intentionally was repeating himself. He must have known that we as humans are prone to forget or need be told multiple times.
Maybe you’re a little bit more stubborn headed than your neighbor. So we need this reminding and this repeating of this theme of joy, rejoice in the Lord as we look at it. I don’t necessarily think that it’s because he was running out of words to say or he just liked hearing himself talk. When we really look at it, I believe that Paul was repeating himself because Paul was a leader and Paul was a good leader at that. You see, being a good leader, he knew that to be effective in communication and instilling this idea into the congregation at large in the Church of Philippi or the Church of Philippi, he had to be effective in his communication by repeating and repeating and repeating. It’s often said that when you’re no longer willing to repeat yourself, you’re no longer willing to be a leader. I think about this quite often because through our work with the Fellowship of Christian athletes, we have nine different character coaches covering different sports teams over at Wilson Central.
So this is kind of the idea that we’re always trying to get and the sports teams that I work with, I’m always trying to give them this idea that, hey, we all want to be leaders. We all want to grow. And so first off, I just want to say thank you for your investment into our partnership with F C A because of your investment. We are making an impact. We are building leaders, we’re imparting biblical knowledge and we’re shaping the future of our community, one student athlete at a time. So this morning, if I can take just two seconds and I want to talk to you like I talk to them. So how many of you want to be a leader, right? We should all want to be a leader. We want to be a leader because we want to lead our family. We want to lead our kids, we want to lead in our marriage, we want to lead in the workplace.
But the question that we have to ask is, are you really willing to do the work? Because the work of a leader requires repeating the important things. It requires the constant repetition of repeating the mission, repeating the values, and repeating the why. You see, leadership is not a position. Leadership is influence. Now you maintain this influence by repeating the same things over and over and over. It’s in your words, it’s in your actions. It’s in what you communicate. So how many of you want to lead now? So the question becomes great if you want to still lead, but are you willing to do the work?
That was a freebie there, right there. That has nothing to do with my points this morning, but anytime I can see a good leadership lesson, I have to point it out. I’m just trying to make Jesus and John Maxwell proud this morning. So Paul, he’s repeating himself. We get that right. He’s repeating himself, but if you’re tired of the repetition, I have news for you. You’re in luck today because that’s the last time that we see the word rejoice or joy in the book of Philippians through chapter three. So today, Paul doesn’t press in on that. Paul tells us, Hey, we’re going to have joy, but then he goes straight into, as a good pastor would a four point message. So today I want to look at the message that Paul gives to the Philippian church because I believe just as it was relevant to them, it’s relevant to us today. Paul wastes no time, and in verse two of chapter three, we get his first point. His first point watch out.
Verse two says, watch out for those dogs, those evil doers, those mutilators of the flesh. Wow, that sounds pretty intense. The direct warning though that Paul is giving to the church in Philippi is to be aware of what were called judaizers. They were a faction of the early Jewish Christians that regarded the laws of the New Testament as still being binding on all Christians. Essentially, what they believed is that a belief in Christ alone was not enough to be a true Christian in their eyes, to be seen as a Christian. You also had to uphold all of the Jewish rules and the rituals and the practices as prescribed by the law of Moses. If we take a quick look at what theologians call the Pauline epistles or in layman’s terms just the books that were written by Paul, we know that Paul is not very keen of these people.
In fact, most of the book of Galatians is written in direct response to both the division and the confusion that they were causing to these newly converted gentiles in Galatia. You’re going to soap through it later this week. And for those of you that are new or aren’t familiar, we have a scripture reading plan called soap. It’s very simple. It stands for scripture, observation, application and prayer. We give you one chapter, a day to read, to observe, to apply to your life, to pray through, and then you’re going to see those verses again repeated in the Sunday message. So you’re going to soap through this, I believe Thursday this week, and it’s in Galatians five. Paul writes this, mark my words, Paul tell you that if you let yourself be circumcised, Christ will be of no value to you at all. Now here what Paul is talking to is he’s speaking directly to one of the core teachings that was being pushed by these judaizers is.
And what Paul is arguing though is that our faith, our faith should be in the completed work of Christ alone, not in the faith, in our flesh or in some attempt to try and uphold these unreasonable standards through our own actions or things that we can control a few verses later. Paul continues this idea when he writes in verse six. He says, for in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. So we can see clearly that Paul has no patience. He has no tolerance for the teachings of these judaizers. And while to us today, and maybe you’re sitting here this morning and being like we’re looking at an argument about circumcision, it’s actually much deeper than that. It’s really an issue of faith. You see in verse three of Philippians, Paul writes this.
He says, for it is we who believe in Christ, we are the circumcision, we who serve God by his spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus and who put no confidence in the flesh. You see, this symbolic act of circumcision was really a deep rooted belief by these judaizers that their own works and confidence in their own flesh could somehow play just a small part in their true salvation. But Paul on the other hand, he’s very adamant in saying that, no, no, our faith in Christ alone is what matters. So while on the surface this debate of circumcision may not seem very relevant to us today, I believe that the warning that Paul gives to the church is very, very relevant. It seems clear to me that Paul is telling us that we are to watch out. We’re going to watch out actually for anything that makes us put confidence in our own strength, in our own might, in our own ability, basically putting your confidence anywhere other than in Christ.
See, in verses four through six, Paul begins to list off his own pedigree. Basically, what he is saying here is, Hey, this standard that they’re trying to get you to live by, you can’t do it. It’s not possible for you. But Paul had a little bit of self-confidence. He said, if anyone can, I can. It says this. It says, though I myself have reason for such confidence. If someone else thinks that they have reasons to put confidence in their flesh, I have more. He goes on to say that he was circumcised on the eighth day. He’s of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews in regard to the law, he was a Pharisee. As for his zeal, he persecuted the church, and as for righteousness, based on that law, he was faultless. If we look closely at Paul’s pedigree, what I begin to see is there’s actually five key areas in that, that Paul is saying that, Hey, I’m putting faith in this, or you guys are putting faith in this.
The first one is he’s putting faith in or he’s sharing out in his pedigree, his family history, his family heritage. You see, he states, I was circumcised on the eighth day. I was from a people of Israel. I’m from this tribe of Benjamin. What Paul is actually saying in this is he saying, I come from a good Jewish home. My parents made me learn, made me teach it and learn it and do all the things. I am a good Jew. They gave me all of the knowledge. I grew up in a home that was in the right way and following God in that way, but he’s also saying, I’m part of God’s people and that’s for the tribe. He said, I’m not just from any tribe. I’m from the tribe of Benjamin. Now, this in this context would begin to start pressing into this idea of social status. Want to have a quick Bible quiz for you? Does anybody know where the first king of Israel, what tribe did the first king of Israel come from? The tribe of Benjamin? Now we’ve got a bonus question. Who was the first king of Israel? Saul. Okay, we got Y are much smarter than the first service. Don’t tell ’em I said that for all my Jeopardy fans. This is the daily double.
What was Paul’s name before his conversion? Saul. Saul. So the first king of Israel comes from the tribe of Benjamin. The first king of Israel is Saul, and Paul’s name before conversion is also Saul. So in this, it becomes pretty evident that the apostle Paul is very likely a direct relative of King Saul, meaning that he has the social status, he has the prestige, he’s got the family background, and he’s got the social clout. Then it says in regard to the law, in verse five and six, he said he was a Pharisee. He said, I’m a Pharisee. Now today when we hear that we have our own negative connotation, and normally rightfully, but in this context, what Paul is saying is, is that I actually have gone through rigorous training. I’ve memorized the majority of the known scripture at that time. What Paul was actually saying is, Hey, my biblical knowledge, it’s unmatched. You can’t touch it.
And then it says, as for zeal, persecuting the church. Now again, in context, we know the story of Saul before he becomes Paul, and then he’s persecuting and killing the early church. I mean, he’s there at the stoning of Stephen, the first martyr of our faith. But in that context, he was doing exactly what every good Jewish person should be doing. He was living by the standards of the religious activity of the day. So he’s basically saying, yeah, I have the religious activity to prove that I can live up to this. And finally he says righteousness based on the law. Faultless as for his righteousness, he was faultless. Paul was basically saying, I’ve lived a completely moral life, completely moral life. What I’d like for us to do here is just a second, is let’s take Paul’s pedigree. Let’s take these five filters that he uses to apply to what he’s put faith in or what these judaizers have put faith in, and let’s look at that today in our own life. Family heritage. Well, I mean, I grew up in a Christian home, so I just want to make sure that my kids, they’re raised the right way. We’re going to send them to Sunday school and we’re going to send them to V B Ss. We’re going to send ’em to camp, and we’re going to do all these things. They got to be raised the right way. I mean, we come from this family heritage. We have to do these things. I got to find a strong Christian community.
What about social status? Oh, no, my kids, they can’t do that. Nope, definitely can’t do that. No. In fact, actually they don’t go to school there. They actually have to go to this school or they have to go to this place or they can’t be on that sports team. They got to be on this sports team. And what about biblical knowledge? Oh, we do really good at Bible memorization in our household every night before bed, and we actually spend about 15 hours a day just memorizing scripture. That’s all we do. We just take the soap guide and just read it over and over. We can actually almost recite the entire Old Testament all the way through. What about religious activity? Oh, we are in church every time the doors are open. In fact, we serve on three teams. We’re in 14 connect groups and we do an outreach every weekend. Every weekend we’re doing an outreach project. What about your moral life? Moral life? I’ve never, it’s been six years since I’ve watched any secular movies. Now, while I’m being a little bit facetious in this, when you see, when we start to place these filters on our lives, in most cases they’re not bad things and probably honestly, things that we would actually aspire to. I mean, if someone was describing my life and someone was describing your life, I’m sure that these would be the descriptors that you would want them to use.
However, I believe that the point that Paul was trying to drive down to is are there areas of these in your life that have become the main thing? Has there been something in this list? Is there something in these areas that this is where I’m beginning to place my confidence. This is where I’m beginning to place my identity. This is where I’m beginning to place my hope. This is where I’m beginning to place my faith. That’s why today I believe it’s just important as it was to the church in Philippi, we have to watch out. We have to watch out for where are we placing stock. Watch out for those that might lead us astray, lead us to put our hope in more things that are less of Christ and are more of this world, even if they’re cloaked in religiosity,
Because none of these things can I tell you right now, none of these things matter. None of these things will matter in the kingdom of God. In fact, I can confidently say that because Paul says it of all of these things, and again, Paul has the pedigree of pedigrees when it comes to being a Jewish person in that time. He says, of all of these things, all the things that I’ve been striving for, all the things that you could be pushing for, Paul simply says they’re garbage. Verse seven and eight, he says, but whatever were gains to me, I now consider losses. What were the gains? All of the things that he had, all the family heritage, the social status, the religious activity, all of those things were against to him, but now he considers them loss. What is more? I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage. See, I think Paul is clear that his family heritage, his social status, the knowledge, the religious activity, his moral pursuit in life was worthless all of the time he spent pursuing that all the energy he spent doing that was worthless. Why? Because it was separated from Christ.
Paul begins as he continues in this letter. He gives us our second point, and that’s that we have to redefine the win. We have to accurately define the in our lives. You see, if you’re living your life and the win is another zero in the bank account, if your win is stocking a little bit more away so that way you can retire a year earlier if your win is moving to the better neighborhood, if your win is getting the new car, if your win is finishing the degree so that you have a few more letters behind your name. If your win is climbing the corporate ladder for the next promotion, if your win is finding a spouse, if your win is having kids, if your win is anything other than Christ, it’s a loss. Now, I want you to hear me clearly this morning. Having plans and goals and dreams are not bad. In fact, I’m probably one of the biggest goal setters in the room. But at some point in your life when either tragedy strikes or when you’re breathing your last breath, you’ll start to realize that what you’ve been defining as the win,
All the things that you’ve been putting on your personal scoreboard were nothing, nothing. They were nothing but losses in comparison to the knowledge of Christ and an intimate relationship with him. I mean, Paul says that in verse 10 and 11. He says, I want to know Christ. That’s Paul’s only desire. I want to know Christ, yes, to know the powers of his resurrection and participate in his suffering becoming like him in his death. And so somehow obtaining the resurrection from the dead, I want to ask, is that your desire today? Can you stand here in full confidence and say that your only desire is to know God, is to have an intimate relationship with Christ, to know Christ so well that you believe that you can experience his sufferings and you can be filled with his resurrection power? And if that’s not your definition today, if that’s not your focus today, if that’s not your desire today, I’m here to tell you that you need to redefine the wind. It’s awfully quiet in here this morning. Knew this wouldn’t be necessarily popular teaching,
But lucky for you, Paul knew that as well because in the next verse, he said, Hey, by the way, not that I’ve already obtained all of this. Even Paul himself, the greatest apostle was saying, Hey, I still have work to do. I’m still trying to make this my only focus. I’m sure it was probably pretty hard tied up in chains to say, no, no, I’m going to focus only on Christ, not when am I going to get out of here, or when am I going to get the next jailer? He was much nicer, whatever the case may be.
If that’s you this morning, you’re like, this is making me a little uncomfortable, can I tell you, don’t beat yourself up. You see, even Paul was working and striving for this. However, what I do want to say is that does not give us an option to not press on today. What I would say is maybe take an account of your life, maybe take a look at the personal scoreboard that you have. Maybe ask the question, are there things in my life that I would consider worth more than Christ? That’s in my actions, that’s in my words, that’s in my schedule, that’s in my finances this morning. I just want to encourage you this week, sit in that and your quiet time. Ask that question and allow the Holy Spirit to just reveal things to you, to reveal the things where you’ve been defining a win that Christ never called you to define the win in something that’s outside of that personal relationship, the intimate relationship, finding that desire. You see, it’s Christ’s desire that we would be totally focused on knowing him to consider anything else no matter how noble or great it’s garbage. And while that may be a hard pill to swallow,
This isn’t the stopping point either for Paul and I want to tell you it can’t the stopping point for you today. See, even once we make this conscious decision that Christ is our new win, Christ is what we are striving for, there is still work to do. Paul lays out in the next verse in 13, he says, but I do one thing. He says, I forget what is behind straining toward what is the head I press on. So what’s the one thing he presses on? Well, Paul is saying is, is that I can’t just sit here. I got to press towards the goal, right? I understand that everything behind me has been garbage. I’ve now defined the wind that Christ is what I’m going after. But now because of that, I have some action to do with it. When we take a closer look though, there’s something else before that. In verse 13 and 14 it says, but the one thing I do right, forgetting what is behind, straining towards what is ahead. If we look at that exact same verse in the translation of the new Living translation, it says this, forgetting the past and looking forward.
You see the pressing on is the action that actually allows us to get to the end of the race and receive the prize. But too often in life, what happens is when we aren’t striving towards that goal, we forget that we have to forget the past and begin to look forward. You see, too often in life when we aren’t going forward, when we aren’t making progress, it’s because we aren’t doing these two things simultaneously. You see, too often we get focused on the past, our past mistakes, our past failures, our past losses, our past success. When we’re too focused on the past, our eyes become fixed on everything that’s behind us, and in that moment we are quite literally turning our backs to the future. What that means is when I’m living in the past, I can’t see even the future that lies ahead of me, or we get focused on looking ahead and we never deal with the past.
We simply just turn a blind eye, allowing the pain to just keep getting suppressed deeper and deeper inside of us. You see, when we only focus on the future and don’t deal with our past, what eventually happens is all of these things that we’ve been suppressing and not dealing with from our past begin to weigh us down, and emotionally we’re trying to move forward, but emotionally, everything is piled up and we’re pulling a boulder. It was once said this way, a complete oversimplification, I know, but it says dwelling too much on the past is depression. Worrying too much about the future is anxiety. Now, while this doesn’t address clinical levels of either depression or anxiety, I believe it’s a pretty good rule of thumb because here’s what I’ve found in both of these scenarios, when we’re either focused in the past or looking forward only, we become stuck and immobilized. Now, we know that the enemy has come to steal, kill, and destroy. We see that in John 10 10, but he’s come to steal your joy, to kill your hope, and to destroy your future. And can I tell you, when we’re stuck and immobile, he’s winning.
But we know that Jesus has come to give us life and life to the fullest. So what Paul is telling us here is that to experience this life of fullness, we have to press on. We have to forget the past and look ahead at the same time. Now, I want to be clear here that this phrase, forgetting the past and biblical context does not mean that you’re going to get some kind of spiritual amnesia. This forgetting the past is better defined as dealing with your past. You see, when we deal with our past, we begin to see our pasts in a different light. We begin to see our past in the lens and through the eyes of eternity. That’s why the writer of Proverbs can say, lean not on your own understanding. You see, when we deal with our past, we move from this idea of woe is me to how great is God?
This is a lesson that my wife and I know well, and unfortunately something that we can speak to directly because we’ve walked it. It was early in 2020. We had been married just a little over six months, and if I’m being honest, we were just enjoying life. It was great. I mean, I think there’s a reason why they call it the honeymoon phase, right?
Things are going really well. I had just gotten promoted at work, and while so many people were fearing covid and economic hardships, the industry that I was in was booming, thanks in part to a tornado that ravaged our community and the ongoing pandemic. Paige was working as a nurse. We had great job security from a financial standpoint and from a career-wise, we couldn’t have asked for anything better.
And then just as everything was going up and to the right, we get more good news. pH finds out that she’s pregnant. So we buy a house and we begin to embark on this new journey of life that we were set out to take to say that 2020 was on its way to being the best year of our lives would not be an understatement, not even in the slightest. Then on November 2nd, I’m at work and I receive a phone call from Paige and she calls to tell me that her blood pressure has been elevated most of the morning, and she called the OB and they recommend that we go across the street and that she gets checked out. So I meet her down there and after a few hours, they run some tests and they give her some magnesium trying to lower her blood pressure to ensure that both her and our son are staying safe. The doctors come in and they begin to consult and they say, we think everything is okay. Everything looks fine. It looks normal, a little bit elevated, but for the safety of everyone, it’s best if we just admit you for a couple days. And while they knew that it was serious, it was not much to be concerned with that short admission stay turned into a 27 day hospital stay.
Paige was on bedrest and every single day, the same thing, ultrasounds and monitoring just to ensure that we were all healthy and growing our goal each week. Just get to the next. And then finally, we hit a turning point and the doctors had determined that based on all that they had been watching and the fact that we finally reached the ultimate goal of getting page to 34 weeks, they set a delivery date for Sunday, no, November 29th, 2020, and at 10:30 AM our son Harrison was born. He was a whopping three point or three pounds in 14 ounces. He was small, but he was mighty.
Obviously due to his weight, he was taken directly to the nicu, but he was thriving from the very beginning, began to thrive. So Paige and I began on this journey that we started calling Operation Breakout of the nicu, and after 52 days, it’s a few ups and downs. We finally were able to bring Harrison home and get out of the nicu. And for the next few days, we were settling into what life would be like as new parents, and we were just adjusting and things were great, not how we drew it up, but hey, it could be worse. Then just 10 days later, we found ourselves headed back to the last place that we wanted to go. As we arrived to the hospital, Paige begins to describe the signs and the symptoms and the things that we’ve experienced over the last 12 hours with Harrison, and it was a matter of minutes and just a matter of minutes, one of the residents and the team of doctors, he said, what you’re describing, it sounds like this is related to a genetic condition. So next thing you know, Harrison now has a team of doctors and they begin to work around the clock. They diagnosed him with a rare genetic condition. It was a mutation on the ears two gene, and this caused a rare metabolic disorder that prohibited him from properly breaking down protein into energy.
And as we sat in silence, the geneticists tried to explain how rare this condition is. You see, currently right now, there are only 19 active cases in the world. Statistically speaking, the probability of Paige and I both being carriers of this disorder, less than one in 4 million, you take that one in 4 million, that one, and you take that and the possibility or the probability rather of us meeting and having a child that was born with that condition, one in a million. So statistically speaking, shouldn’t have really even had a chance of this happening
A few days later as we’re at the hospital at just 72 days old, Harrison’s body couldn’t keep up anymore and he passed away. Well, I don’t have the time to share the dark places that I went personally or the long and still painful journey that we’re walking together as a couple. What I can tell you this morning is that the fact that Paige and I are able to stand before you today doing ministry and living out the call of God is only because we have and we are dealing with our past. Over the past 950 days, Paige and I’s journey has looked different. What she has struggled with and what I have struggled with have not always been the same for me specifically. There have been times when I’ve been stuck in the past and immobilized by the loss, but most often than not, I’ve suppressed the past and looked only to the future. And Mark Batterson’s book Win the Day. He says this of pain and grief, because we’re uncomfortable with it, we often move on too quickly, too easily. You see, he says, you have got to own the pain so the pain doesn’t own you.
Can I tell you this morning from experience, you have to deal with the past. Now, I’m not sure which side of the fence you’re on. Maybe you focus too much on the past, or maybe for you, you’re only focused on the future and allowing the past to be suppressed down. What I can tell you is that Paul’s next command is that we have to press on. We have to keep going and moving, but we can’t do that until we’ve dealt with the past. So for you this morning, I would say maybe your next step is counseling. Maybe your next step is signing up for freedom groups in the winter. Whatever it is, you have to deal with your past. You have to deal with your past so you can press on, and once you’ve dealt with your past, you begin this process of just pressing, and it wouldn’t be called pressing if there wasn’t resistance. So know that you’re going to meet some resistance and some opposition along the way. But as we’re doing this, all we’re doing is just take in the next step. Paul tells us in verse 17 to follow my example,
Join together in following my example. So as we deal with our past and we begin to press on, we can begin to take the next step and we can begin to just follow. You see, it was the writer of Hebrews who gives a very similar charge. Hebrews 13, seven soap through that later this week as well. It says, remember your leaders. Remember the ones who spoke the word of God to you and consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. You see, we see this example over and over. Paul says, imitate me as I imitate Christ. People are following Paul, but Paul’s just following Christ. You see, it’s no different for us today. We too must follow. We have to remember to look at all of those who have gone on before us to take a look at those who are a little bit further or more mature in their faith, and then we imitate what they’re doing today. I’m just imitating faith. I’m imitating the faith of all of those who have spoken life into me. I’m imitating the faith of mentors and pastors and family, all of those that have paved the way for me to walk right behind
Because I’ve watched their lives and I know how faithful God has been to them. I can believe and I can know that God will be faithful to me. You see, Paige and I, we love to share our story, and can I tell you, this isn’t the story that we thought it would be or the story honestly, that we even hoped it would be, but we share our story so that the faith of others would rise. So for people who are walking through tragedy or walking through a loss that just maybe just maybe that sharing the hope that we found in Christ, that they too would find that hope. That’s why Paul can be sitting chained up in a Roman prison and say, I have joy, rejoice in the Lord because he knew that joy was a choice. That’s why I like James says it this way. It says, consider it pure joy. Whenever you face trials of many kinds, whenever we face trials, we should be joyful. Why? Because James tells us, because our faith is getting tested, it’s producing a perseverance inside of us, and as we continue to work through this and our faith gets tested, we now have a slew of people that are following behind us as we are imitating those that have stepped before us because of our commitment and our faith to walk in that we can have people following behind us. Romans 8 28, all things will work good. All things why? Because we’re committed to following through
And we can rest in this one fact. Paul closes the chapter three This way. As a reminder, our citizenship is in heaven. See, Philippians three, I believe Paul gives us a very clear message. We have to watch out. We have to redefine the wind. There’s probably some areas in our lives that we need to focus on and things have gotten out of alignment. Christ isn’t the center, but we also have to press on. We have to deal with the past and look forward at the same time so that we can press on, and then in all of that, we’ve built a life now that we can follow him, imitate him, and bring others along on the journey.
