Merredin Uniting Church

TEXT: Philippians 3:10-21  Hebrews 12:1-3   (Audio Version: http://sermon.net/daviddekock)

Should Christians be ambitious –striving for success?

Some would say not, that we should rather go through life taking whatever comes as “God’s Will”.

This is a foolish thought –it makes this life irrelevant, a mere waiting room for that which is still to come. This life that God gave us has a purpose, otherwise we might just as well have been born straight into heaven instead of in a nursing home on this planet.

From the Book of Acts and from his letters we know that Paul was a fiercely ambitious man –he had an immense desire to succeed. Before he was a Christian this drive was directed at the persecution of the church which he saw as opposed to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. After his conversion, he remained just as ambitious but the direction was changed. Suddenly, on the road to Damascus, when he came face to face with the resurrected Jesus, he realised that Jesus was the One of whom the prophets had spoken. This was God made flesh and come to save the world. In a moment his ambition changed –now he was suddenly the most ardent supporter of the Christian faith. He realised that the Christian faith was not to be opposed but to be seen as the fulfilment of everything that God had promised.

John Stott said that, “ultimately there are only two controlling ambitions … one is our own glory, and the other is God’s”. Paul always sought God’s glory but on that desert road he realised that in opposing Christ, his ambition was misdirected.

We saw in the previous sermon in this series that Paul’s new confidence had come from knowing Christ and having His righteousness. Now, right in mid-sentence, he moves from the ground, or basis of his confidence to the focus of his ambitions.

He says that his ambition is “to know Christ”. This is much more than knowing about Christ –he wants to know Christ as a person. The new and central focus of his life is to have a personal relationship with Him -an exhilarating and intimate union with the Lord who had personally come to earth.

He gives three descriptions of how this ambition is to be realised – in the power of the resurrection, in the fellowship of Christ’s suffering and in his own expected resurrection from the dead.

First, he wants to know Christ in “the power of his resurrection.” He is not simply looking to acknowledge a historical event but to see this “power” as dynamically at work in his own life. In Romans 8 he says, “if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies, through His Spirit, who lives in you.”

The Spirit of God brings this resurrection power to our lives –yours and mine. By the power of His death and resurrection Jesus disarmed Satan, broke the hold of sin and defeated death. This power is available to all to enable us to live holy lives and to minister to others with resurrection power.

With all his heart, Paul wants to know this power in his own life.

If you want victory over sin and evil in your life and in your world, if you want to live a holy life, then you too must long to know Christ and the power of his resurrection with all your heart.

Second, Paul wants to know Christ and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings. He does not seek suffering, but he knows that it is inevitable –it is not a penalty but a privilege. We will never suffer in exactly the way that Jesus did but we will face sufferings as the practical result of our Christian life.

For some, this will mean severe persecution, but for most of us it will be the pain and struggle against sin. Ask a drug addict or an alcoholic or even a cigarette smoker if it is easy to kick the habit of the old life. You will then hear something of the kind of struggle and suffering that we have to endure in order to be rid of our sinful nature and so to know Christ more fully.

God does not take away our sin, we have to give it to Him in confession and repentance –our bad attitudes and habits, our hateful speech, our lack of love. Few of us are murderers or adulterers or blasphemers –if we were we would readily seek forgiveness. Our struggle is with the “little sins” that we don’t care to admit. And it is these that are likely to cause most suffering as we offer them to the God who came, suffered and died for us because they demand a radical lifestyle change if we are to truly know Christ.

It is in these moments of suffering that we experience “fellowship” with Christ, and it is that fellowship which Paul wants –no matter the cost.

Third, knowing Christ means sharing His destiny, “somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.” When Paul says “somehow” he is not expressing doubt or uncertainty –he had no doubt about his eternal life. In Romans 8 he says, “I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” He is telling us that while he is not there yet, it is his primary aim and ambition. In verse 13, he says “the one thing I do” –he is absolutely single-minded about his ambition to know Christ, and he will allow nothing in his life to conflict with that ambition.

This does not mean for us, that we should put aside any ambitions for our marriage, family life, career, work or ministry. Instead all of these things must be drawn into our central ambition –this is why we seek Christian marriage, and the strongest argument for baptising infants must be that we want to draw them into the centrality of our own faith and overriding ambition to know Christ. If we marry in church just for the atmosphere or bring our children just to have them “done” then we have utterly missed the point. The primary objective must be to have “knowing Christ” as the central ambition of our life and all that surrounds us in that life.

In the desire to fulfil this ambition, Paul paints a picture of himself as an athlete. Like a runner, he does not look back but strains for that which lies ahead. Like a man climbing a ladder, he looks up to his goal, concentrating on the next rung and forgetting those that he has left behind. In our desire to know Christ we cannot live on past successes or be bogged down by past failures, despair over past sins or bitterness over past wrongs done to us –instead we must “press on towards the goal to win the prize for which God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus”.

And Paul makes the point that this is not a solitary pursuit. In Christ we are not alone in our ambitions. He says, “Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you.” There are very few who have come to really know Christ by being alone in their journey –we need the company of others who are going in the same direction. We need our church fellowship, we need our friends.

Today is the KEP Ultra-marathon – a 100km race from the Mundaring Weir to Northam. I can imagine that it would be much harder to run that route on any other day than today. There would be none of the camaraderie to spur each other on, none of the organization to keep the traffic out of your way, no support tables offering water, Mars bars and bananas and no-one to massage aching muscles. If our ambition is to know Christ, we need to join with others and follow the pattern of those who lead the way for us and who will support us on our journey.

Next, in verse 18, Paul turns to those who have rejected this ambition of knowing Christ and who live as enemies of the Cross of Christ. Does he reject them, make them his enemies? No! He weeps for them. He sheds tears of anguish and despair. He sees that they are missing out on “the resurrection of the dead”, and their terrible end is “destruction”.

No doubt they are unaware of where they are heading. The devil never tells us our destination as he leads us along his path.

Unlike Paul’s great and overriding ambition to know Christ, these have other ambitions –we could call them man-centred ambitions.

First, their appetites dictate their lives. Paul says, “their god is their stomach”. No doubt there are some who lives revolve around their eating and drinking habits but Paul has something more in mind. He is referring to those whose god is personal satisfaction and sensuality –literally the satisfaction of our senses: feel, touch, taste, smell and so on. Even a brief excursion through a lifestyle magazine will confirm this. Advertisements for clothes, perfume and alcohol dominate everything and they all offer sensual pleasures.

Many people are driven by the satisfaction of their bodily desires, for others it is in fame or money or power. But such ambitions always lead to dissatisfaction. Even when attained they still leave an emptiness, and often a despair. The lives of the rich and famous might well be filled with glitter and glam as we watch their exploits on the television or in the magazines but when their guard is down they are mostly unhappy and dissatisfied.

This leads us to the second thing about “the enemies of the cross”. They boast when they should blush –Paul says “their glory is in their shame”. They are like robbers who boast about their ill-gotten gains, or criminals who must always return to the scene of the crime. Or like the man who must talk about his sexual conquests or how much he drank the night before. The glory is in the event, the so-called success –but isn’t it strange that it is always the boasting that becomes their downfall. They have built their life out of a pack of cards –they must keep adding to it because what they have is not yet enough. And the more they add, the greater the danger of collapse and ruin. This is quite unlike the Christian ambition to know Christ, which builds one up, gives satisfaction and ensures success.

Thirdly, their minds are locked into this planet. Paul says that “their minds are on earthly things”. Elsewhere, Jesus says, “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

The Christian is a citizen of heaven, not of this planet. This planet, like our earthly bodies is wearing out. The things of the earth that we seek for satisfaction only temporarily meet our needs. Our eyesight fails, we often experience humiliating illness, we must constantly battle to control our tongues and our appetites. It is absurd to make a god out of these things.

If however we seek God’s glory, Jesus will transform these bodies which are subject to decay and sin to be like His glorious body which will never age or decay or be subject to sinful desires.

In this passage Paul tells us that everyone is on one of two paths. There are two destinations: one is headed for heaven, the other is headed for destruction. There are two powers at work: the resurrection power of the Holy Spirit and the power of bodily appetites. There are two possible lifestyles: those who are willing to share in His sufferings and those who want a lifestyle of ease and comfort. There are two possible gods: our Lord Jesus Christ or our stomachs. There are two possible attitudes to Jesus: either friendship at the most intimate level or enemies of the cross. Ultimately there are only two ambitions: either His glory, Christ-centred ambition; or our own glory, self-centred ambition. Paul says in effect: “I have changed my ambitions. Now I am Christ-centred. Will you join me?”

So what is my ambition? Since becoming a Christ follower my ambition has changed radically. To that point my ambition was worldly success – to be rich and famous. I was the International Economist of a major banking group, travelling the world, speaking at conferences. I was comfortably well off with a string of degrees, including an MBA from a prestigious university and I was about to launch a unique concept for dealing in foreign currencies. When I met Jesus, my ambitions changed – since then and even more so now, my ambition is to help people by word and action to become joyful followers of Jesus in a life which is completely satisfied, having left behind their past and seeing clearly what God has promised for them. I don’t want to be any different to the person that I am now.

Let’s pray …

Lord God Almighty, Maker of Heaven and Earth and all that is in them. It is not my desire to worship created things nor to be caught up with the gods of this world. I do not want to be an enemy of the Cross. I want to live my life for Your glory. I want to know You and the power of the resurrection, I am prepared to share in the fellowship of Your sufferings and I want to attain the resurrection of the dead. By the power of Your Name I would count everything as loss for the sake of knowing You.

Grant to me the wisdom and power of the Holy Spirit to have but one ambition for my life –to know You deeply and personally as my Lord and Saviour.

Amen

Tags: ambition, life worth living, philippians

TEXT: Philippians 3:1-9    (Audio Version: http://sermon.net/daviddekock)

Where do you find your confidence?

Confidence is an important thing in life. It makes us able to step out of our comfort zone, to experiment, to try new things, meet new people and so on. It helps us also to find meaning in life.

Sometimes however people are a bit over-confident. George Bernard Shaw once said, “My speciality is being right when other people are wrong.”

The atheist philosopher, Friedrich Nietsche said, “There cannot be a God because, if there were one, I would not believe that I were not he.”

On the other hand there are those who have no confidence. They are inwardly afraid, feeling inadequate, insecure and worthless.

James Dobson points out that 80% of teenagers don’t like the way they look, and often this carries on into adulthood.

For example, Michele Pheiffer, the movie star who most people regard as stunningly beautiful says, “I’ve got small boobs, big lips and a bent nose. My face is completely wrecked. I have never been confident about my looks.”

The greatest demand for plastic surgery is in Hollywood –the place of beautiful people!

But its not just about looks –often the lack of confidence goes much deeper. Madonna, who has recently been in the news for ending her latest show by singing while standing crucified against a lighted cross, says, “All of my will has been to conquer some horrible feeling of inadequacy. I am always struggling with that fear. I push past one spell of it and discover myself as a special human being and then I get to another stage and I think I’m mediocre and uninteresting. And I find a way to get out of that. Again and again. My drive in life is from this horrible fear of being mediocre, and that’s always pushing me, pushing me. Because even though I have become Somebody, I still have to prove that I’m Somebody. My struggle has never ended and it probably never will.”

We do need to be confident in life but there is a huge difference between false confidence and true confidence. And this difference, as we shall see, has to do with faith –it has a significant spiritual aspect.

FALSE CONFIDENCE

In our text from Philippians, Paul warns the Philippian Christians to wach out for those whom he describes as “dogs” –referring to the wild dogs which roamed the streets of Philippi scavenging and fighting.

He is referring to a group who had infiltrated the church and are insisting that the new Christians at Philippi should be circumcised, forcing a Jewish rite on Gentile Christians in order to make the “real” Christians. For them faith in Jesus was not enough. Paul describes them as “those men who do evil, those mutilators of the flesh.” He ridicules their false confidence in circumcision and insists that it is not necessary.

Christians are already circumcised for in their hearts they are set apart for God. In Romans 2:29 we read that true circumcision is “circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit”. It is not the outward form that matters.

By insisting on circumcision, this group is suggesting that faith in Jesus Christ is not enough to be confident before God. But maintains there is nothing which we can add to that which Jesus has already done for us on the Cross.

Indeed, if it were possible to have other things which could enhance one’s standing before God, Paul declares that he has them, “If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more”. He then lists seven areas which might have given him confidence, but which actually only gave false confidence. The first four come by birth and the last three by voluntary choice.

First, he had all the outward marks of religion. He had been circumcised on the 8^th day after his birth. As a baby he had received the outwards mark of being a member of God’s family. Although baptism is not the exact equivalent of circumcision, it is nevertheless true for us, that baptism on its own is not enough. There also needs to be faith. This is true of both infant and adult baptism. Churches which practice infant baptism follow that with confirmation, or profession of faith at a later stage. Those which practice adult baptism have done so because they believe that faith must come before baptism. In the Uniting Church we accept both forms of baptism on the basis that both faith and baptism are necessary and that the sequence and interlude between the events is not defined for us in the Bible with accounts of people being baptized both before and after coming to faith.

Paul does not count his circumcision as sufficient grounds for confidence before God and nor can we count our baptism as sufficient. There must also be faith.

The second reason that Paul could claim was his national privilege. He was of the people of Israel and thus of the chosen people. Today many have a false confidence because of pride in their nationality, because they are Australian, or British or American.

The third possible basis for Paul’s confidence was his family background. He was of the tribe of Benjamin –Benjamin, the youngest son of Jacob, was the only one of the 12 patriarchs was born in the land of promise. From this tribe came Israel’s first King and Paul, who was previously known as Saul, probably was names after King Saul.

Today many people seek to derive their confidence from their background –their ancestry, their schooling, their class or even their name but none of these things can give us confidence before God.

The fourth reason was his racial purity. He was a Hebrews of the Hebrews –not only was he born of Hebrew parents but he lived and practiced the Hebrew way of life. Again there are those who pride themselves on their racial purity –an Englishman, a Scot, a Zulu, a German or an Italian. National customs, language, manners and etiquette are good things but they are not grounds for confidence before God.

On personal grounds, Paul could also claim that

Fifth, he had been religious. He was a Pharisee, belonging to the strictest sect in Judaism and was scrupulous in keeping every law and every rule.

Today there are people who say, “I have never done anyone any harm” or “I have always been religious” or “I go to church each Sunday”. Not one of these things can give us confidence before God.

He had also been sincere in his beliefs and energetic in carrying out what he believed to be God’s will in persecuting the church. No-one could doubt Paul’s zeal or sincerity. But sincerity is not enough –it is possible to be sincerely wrong and Paul recognized that he had been sincerely wrong in persecuting the Christian church.

The last reason which Paul could have claimed as a reason for confidence was the fact that he had lived a good life. He  had considered himself as faultless, he had no bad conscience and compared himself well with those around him. Today there are many people who have great problems with the idea that they need forgiveness. They feel that they have led a good life, that they are not sinners and that they therefore have every reason to be confident before God.

But Paul realizes that none of the achievements of the secular world could bring true confidence –as his eye travels down the list that he had just made and which we have just reviewed, he says that he had previously counted these are profit but now he considers them a loss –rubbish, compared to what he has now found as basis for his confidence –the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus.

This is where his new confidence comes from. One day he encountered Jesus on the Road to Damascus and from then on he had lived a vital, lively, continuing relationship with Jesus Christ.

It IS possible to know Jesus, the man we read about in the Bible. We do not see Him physically but we can talk to Him and listen to Him speaking to us. We can spend time in His presence, experience His love and we can know Him as Paul knew Him.

This new relationship stems from a new righteousness. Paul says that he considers all his previous accomplishments as, “rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own but the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.”

He had found another righteousness, quite unlike what he had previously. He sees now that he had no righteousness of his own.

To be right before God means to be in right relationship with God. This is something which we cannot be achieved on our own, it can only be received as a gift from God. We do not deserve it and we cannot earn it. But Jesus made it possible by what He did on the Cross.

John Calvin said, “The Son of God, utterly clean of all fault, nevertheless took upon himself the shame and reproach of our iniquities, and in return clothed us with his purity.”

Because of what Jesus has done, we can have confidence for the judgement day, for in Christ we will not be judged on our achievements or even our sin but on the righteousness which comes from Christ. And because of that we can have confidence for today also, and tomorrow and for everyday until Kingdom come.

The way this righteousness is achieved is not by anything which we do, but “through faith in Christ”. Faith is, however, not the way of earning the gift –rather it is the way we receive the gift. If someone gives us a gift, we cannot suggest that we have earned it, but we do receive it, unwrap it and enjoy it. By faith we receive God’s gift of righteousness and we can enjoy it.

Despite our messed up lives, notwithstanding the fact that we are much less than we think God wants us to be –He has made us righteous … and we receive that gift by faith. And because we weak humans have had nothing to do with it, we can stand confident in the righteousness of God.

Paul has a confidence before God and men so that he could say in 2 Corinthians 5:6 “we are always confident”. His confidence came from knowing that he is forgiven and that God sees him as righteous through Christ.

This is the great difference between false and true confidence.

Someone once said – “Secular self-esteem involves valuing oneself over and against God. Christian self-esteem involves valuing oneself in and through Christ.”

As a person whose life is centered on Christ you can go through life with growing confidence as you realize – meaning, receive for yourself what is already yours in Christ.

When we walk in the steps of the Master we can be steady and bold in our walk; when we trust in His unfailing love we can be firm and committed in our relationships; when our hope is in Him we are already winners.

Praise God. Amen.

Tags: confidence, life worth living, philippians

Text: Philippians 2:19-30 John 15:9-17 (Audio Version: http://sermon.net/daviddekock)

Julian Krieg from Wheatbelt Mens’ Health recently told us to “talk to a mate” and challenged us, for our own physical, emotional and spiritual health, to have three kinds of relationships:

1. A partner, who is your intimate friend,
2. A mentor, who can give advice for the journey on which he has already travelled, and,
3. A mate, who is someone who thinks like you, has the same fears as you do and dreams the same dreams as you do.

A major problem in the world today is that friendship does not have the same high value which it once had. CS Lewis wrote that “To the Ancients, Friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves. The modern world though, ignores it … it has become something quite marginal, a diversion, something that only fills up chinks of one’s time.”

Yet, friendship is an essential human need. It is the core of Biblical Christianity and it should be at the heart of church life. We were made to live in relationship with God and with each other. In Genesis 3 we see God’s desire to walk with Adam and Eve on the cool of the day. And just one chapter before that God says that “it is not good for man to be alone” – we need to have relationships!

And isn’t it interesting that it was the sin of Adam and Eve which not only caused the breakdown of their relationship with God, but also with each other. From that moment on men and women have lived in the tension between both desiring and needing human friendships (because that is how we were created); and yet finding those friendships hard (because of the inherent sin in us and in the world around us.)

The good news though, is that on the cross Jesus not only destroyed the barrier between us and God but also the barrier between people by “destroying the wall of hostility” as Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:14. One of the essential aspects of Jesus’ redemptive work was the restoration of friendships.

He also set us an example of friendship. He was not only fully God, but He was fully human, and, like us, He needed friends. He constantly describes His disciples as “friends” and within that larger group of men and women was a small group of just three special friends (Peter, James and John), one of whom was His closest friend.

And then, in our text from Philippians today, we get a fascinating insight into two of Paul’s special friendships and we see four marks of what it means to be a Christian friend.

The first is Genuine Love.

Timothy was from Derbe or Lystra. His mother was Jewish, while his father was Greek. While he was brought up as a Greek it was through his mother Eunice, his grandmother Lois, and Paul that Timothy became a Christian. Paul, being older describes their friendship as being like that of father and son and he describes him as “my son whom I love”.

They became very close friends and went through a great deal together because Timothy often accompanied Paul on his travels. They had been imprisoned for their faith and Timothy was often associated with Paul in his letters. Paul also used him as a messenger to carry information, advice or encouragement to various churches.

Here, in this text, Paul pays special tribute to his friend, saying, “I have no one else like him, who takes a genuine interest in your welfare.” And he makes the comment. “For everyone (else) looks out for his own interests.” Paul loved Timothy because he took a genuine interest in others.

He also loved Epaphroditus and says of this friend that his death would have caused him great sorrow. He is ungrudging in his praise for him and shows a genuine concern for his safety.

Epaphroditus himself was a loyal friend to both Paul and the Philippians. When he was seriously ill, almost to the point of death, he is troubled, not about dying but that the church in Philippi might have been upset about his illness.

We see the first mark of Christian friendship in these two men – a genuine love and concern for other people.

Those who care only for themselves seldom make many friends and those who want friends for selfish reasons never really make them. Friendship comes through a genuine interest in other people.

Dale Carnegie said that you can make more friends in two months by being interested in them than you can in two years by trying to get people interested in you.

And genuine love should never be confined only to fellow Christians. It is only by true friendships which show genuine love to others that we are able to successfully pass on the good news of Jesus Christ to them.

The second mark of a true Christian friend is the common interest which they share. Yes of course, friendships are almost always made by people with interests in common, but, as CS Lewis points out, “we picture friends as side by side, looking ahead, at the same thing but not at each other, whereas lovers are invariably face to face.” And, as Christians, we are called to love one another.

Christian friendship is of a totally different nature to ordinary friendships; it goes beyond interests in outside things to interest in each other. And from that common interest comes trust, security and openness which flows from a common focus in Jesus Christ.

Paul, in his various letters, refers to both Timothy and Epaphroditus as “brothers” for there was something in their relationship which brings them into fellowship with each other in a unique way – they are together of the family of God.

And just like Jesus accepted everyone but chose just a small group of friends, so did Paul, and so must we. We need to have those with whom our trust runs deep, who encourage us and who pray regularly for us.

The third mark of Christian friendship is the common vision in which we serve together in the work of the gospel. In our passage, Paul refers to Timothy as a “co-slave” (for that is what the words “he has served with me” mean) and he refers to Epaphroditus as a fellow worker. There was no sense of one being superior to the other, they had a common vision and they worked together to achieve it.

When we have no vision beyond ourselves we tend to be inward looking and friendships in such groups will often shrivel up and die. Conversely, when we work together – as we are beginning to see in the Men’s Group, then friendships blossom and flourish.

Finally, we see that Paul refers to Epaphroditus in three ways – “my brother, fellow-worker and fellow-soldier.” There is a sense of an ascending scale – common sympathy, common work and common danger. As friends we face the risks and dangers of the common life together.

The Christian life is not easy. We are as much fellow-soldiers as those who fought at Gallipoli and on other battle fronts. Our battles may not be physical but they are just as severe. The opposition we face may not be that faced by the early church of prison, torture and death, but the challenge from the world, the flesh and the devil is just as hard – we need Christian friendships to support one another in the battles of life.

We don’t have the full story of Epaphroditus’ situation but it seems from our text that when the Philippian Church could not help in Paul’s situation, this man stepped in “risking his life” for the work of Christ. It may well be that the “illness” to which Paul refers may have arisen from beating and torture which Epaphroditus endured in order to step in to help Paul. Whatever the full story was, it is clear that Epaphroditus showed reckless courage to help –that is the mark of true friendship.

In talking about this kind of friendship with His disciples, Jesus said, “Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” He was, of course, speaking of Himself but it is a divine description of true friendship which we have even applied to those who have given their lives in just wars.

All friendship involves taking risks, even with one another. Jesus made Himself vulnerable to His friends – He said to them once, “I call you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you” and yet, in the end, He was betrayed by one of them and deserted by the others. Real friendship will always involve the risk of rejection, hurt and being let down but that in no way means that we should not seek genuine friendships.

It is in giving that we receive. It is in risking our lives for others that we find life and friendship.

True joy – the ongoing feature of this life in Christ is to be found, not in seeking our own interests, but in seeking the good of our Lord and of others.

You might remember that definition of joy, which most of us learned in Sunday School – Jesus, Others, Yourself – in that order.

Epaphroditus had that order right, so Paul says, “Welcome him in the Lord with great joy, and honor men like him, ^?because he almost died for the work of Christ, risking his life to make up for the help you could not give me.”

First the work of Christ, then helping others, before having concern for his own life.

True friendships are vital to making our life worth living, and such friendships are found in genuine love for one another, a common interest in Jesus Christ, a common vision for Gospel outreach and risking all for the sake of Christ and one’s friends.

Tags: friendship, life worth living, philippians