Paul started his letter to the Philippians with a prayer. This daily devotional discusses how prayer brings joy.
Nuggets
- Paul, in part, gave his standard salutation, but in part, didn’t.
- Paul remembers to pray for the church, bringing him joy.
- We can be joyful regardless of circumstances.
Devotions in the Joy in the Gospel series
It is a new quarter in our Sunday Morning Bible Study. My Ladies and I enjoyed Ecclesiastes, but we are looking forward to Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon.
The first six lesson are in Philippians, talking about joy. The last seven lessons in Colossians and Philemon focus on the gospel. We are to find joy in the gospel.
We start out with a doozy. Too often, we don’t find the joy in prayer. In fact, we frequently say our prayer life needs work.
Let’s see what we can pick up here to help us. Paul has to set the stage first.
Let's Put It into Context
Here is a running list of what we’ve discussed previously.
Paul Said Hello
“Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus: To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil 1: 1-2 CSB)
Paul, in part, gave his standard salutation, but in part, didn’t.
Some may say that Paul had a storied life before his conversion. He studied under the great teacher Gamaliel and thrived. In fact, Jenkins said he soon had no equal.
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It is probably safe to say that Paul was proud of his accomplishments when he was known as Saul. We do know that he wasn’t content with what he had, though, because he admitted his covetousness.
Glossary
After his conversion, Paul switched that intensity of purpose from persecuting the church to championing it. Because of his life as Saul, Paul saw himself as the chief sinner.
We might look at Paul’s former life as qualifying him for the chief sinner position. But look at it this way. It also trained him for his job as missionary extraordinaire.
Paul included Timothy in the salutation. No, that doesn’t mean Timothy helped Paul write the letter. It was all Paul’s.
Timothy was well known to the Philippians. He had served the church at least twice already.
Paul frequently called himself a servant or a slave of Jesus. The world says that is a demeaning title. They couldn’t be farther from the truth.
Sovereign God allows us to take a part in His work and be useful. We can do that only through Jesus and His sacrifice for us.
What Paul didn’t say was that he was an apostle of Christ. To me, that says he did not have to defend his position.
Pope noted the familiarity with which Paul wrote. The Philippian disciples probably knew him well enough that they didn’t question his position.
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Paul frequently addressed his letters to the Saints. Saint means holy ones. We have been set apart. He was referring to the church members or those who have been consecrated.
Consecration is the process of being set apart from the world by God’s grace so that we may serve Him. Consecrated is the result of being set apart.
Parker made an interesting statement. He wrote, “Saints take precedence of bishops and deacons forasmuch as character is immortal, while office is but temporary.”
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Wow! That isn’t exactly how we see it, is it? We think bishops and deacons are at least a step or two above us because they have positions of authority in the church.
But those positions won’t be needed in Heaven. We will all be on the same level.
Now we see why we are focusing on character this year!
We can only be “… saints in Christ Jesus …” (Phil. 1: 1 CSB). If we aren’t in Christ, we aren’t set apart.
Glossary
Notice, Paul didn’t put any qualifier on saints. He was talking to everyone.
Philippi was in what is modern day Greece. It was on a major east-west highway.
Paul founded the church on his second missionary journey. It started in Lydia’s home.
Goadby reminded us that Paul had known the Philippians for ten years. This was a strong relationship.
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Most of the greetings at the beginning of Paul’s letters talked of his desire of grace and peace for them.
• Grace is a free and unmerited gift from Heavenly Father given through His Son, Jesus Christ that enables salvation and spiritual healing to believers by the work of the Holy Spirit. God’s grace is the product of the joy of a life with God and His purity.
• Peace is a fruit of righteousness manifested in an inward tranquility resulting from a balanced life with spiritual order, equity, and truth that implies cooperation, humility, integrity, communication, and cohesiveness.
Johnstone wrote that God’s grace is transforming as we navigate the Sanctification Road.
- Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal requickening in us that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit to give us new character.
- Spiritual death is the separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
- The perfected state indicates the combination of the spiritual graces which, when all are present, form spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Spiritual graces are worldly morals that have been submitted to God to further His kingdom instead of enhancing this world.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
We know that God is the God of peace and Jesus is the Prince of peace. That is comforting for disciples while we live in a world full of chaos.
Most of the greetings at the beginning of Paul’s letters utilized the dual greeting of “… God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1: 2 CSB).
Remembering Brings Joy
“I give thanks to my God for every remembrance of you, always praying with joy for all of you in my every prayer, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now” (Phil. 1: 3- 5 CSB)
Paul remembers to pray for the church, bringing him joy.
Paul, as usual, started out thanking God for the things that the Philippians had done right. Johnstone noted that “prayer offered with thankfulness will be distinguished by gladness.”
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First, Paul assured the Philippians that he remembered them frequently in prayer. Then, he went on to qualify it from there. He remembered them with joy.
God wants us to remember. He wants us to think back on what it was like before we submitted our lives to Him. He wants us to remember how He has provided for us.
Glossary
Another thing God wants us to remember is each other. It strengthens our unity when we pray for each other.
God wants these memories to bring us joy. Parker said remembering each other enlarges our hearts.
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Memories also serve to influence the future. They not only show what needs to be changed in the present, but they also show what worked and what didn’t. That impacts the decisions we make in the future.
Ballard said that the memories also should help us in evaluating our moral worth. When we are evaluating where we are on the Sanctification Road, these memories serve to help us find where we are and what we need to do to get where God is leading us.
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What Paul was implying is, if he can remember the help the Philippian church has given him and their unbroken friendship and support, God will remember also. God will reward them for that help.
Paul points out that he was talking about “… my God …” (Phil. 1: 3 CSB). He not only was distinguishing his teaching from that of others — which theirs might be false teaching — but he was also showing that, with God, a personal relationship is required.
This was also Paul’s acknowledgment of all that God has done for him. God redeemed him. God gave him a purpose in life. Whenever the world persecuted him, Paul knew God was right there.
It is more than that, though. Paul knew that “… my God …” (Phil. 1: 3 CSB) was their God.
The whole purpose of Paul’s ministry was to share the love of God with as many people as would listen. We know that Paul initially went where no missionary had gone before. “My aim is to preach the gospel where Christ has not been named …” (Rom. 15: 20 CSB).
But Paul didn’t just ride of into the sunset and drop them. He discipled them through his letters. He made sure that “… my God …” (Phil. 1: 3 CSB) was their God.
It is the mission of the church to expand God’s kingdom. Johnstone said that we have to do that through fellowship and peace.
This is enhanced by something Ballard said. He called the relationship Paul had with God a reciprocal community. The feelings were mutual.wa
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The love and sympathy were mutual. God blessed Paul to the amount of effort Paul put in to the ministry.
Ooo, baby. Don’t we sometimes think it is an one-way relationship? We want the blessings without putting in the time.
We think that reading our Bible takes too long. Plus, we say we don’t have the time or the resources to put in to understand it.
Many times, we can barely get it read. Then if we do understand it, that leaves a minute of the time we’ve allotted to try to figure out how we are going to apply it to our lives.
No, no, no, no, no. That isn’t what God wants. He wants us to put Him as our priority.
Here Is Where the Joy Comes In
“always praying with joy for all of you in my every prayer” (Phil. 1: 4 CSB)
We can be joyful regardless of circumstances.
Paul was always praying for them with joy. So, he was always joyful.
Ballard said that the joy came from being in communion with God, not from our circumstances. It isn’t contingent on what was happening in Paul’s life or even that for which what he was praying.
The joy came from God. It was extended by prayer for others.
Making the Connections
Parker made a great point. We know Paul as the Energizer Bunny for God. We don’t know about many individuals from the Philippian church, but we do know about them collectively.
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God was still able to use them as a whole to expand His kingdom. We need to be used by God, too.
Yes, that means collectively as a church. That also means individually as a disciple.
How Do We Apply This?
- We need to consider what memories we are leaving behind.
- Are the memories we are leaving pointing to God?
- After God has pardoned our sin, we need to let it go. We shouldn’t keep biting on ourselves.
- In the Weekly Pulpit’s sermon Fellowship and Progress, it said that we should live to serve God as much as — if not more — than we do for self improvement.
- All of our being and all of our lives need to be submitted to God for His use.
Resources
Joy comes to us through prayer. Communion with God brings joy as does being concerned about others.
Father God. Thank You for letting us come to You in prayer. Help us to intercede for others. Thank You for the joy this brings. Amen.
What do you think?
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