Communion Sunday - The Illusion of
Self-gratification
By Rev Jeff Fry, Darwin Park Community Church
Philippians
2
Imitating Christ's Humility
1If you have any encouragement from being
united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the
Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2then make my joy complete by being
like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. 3Do nothing
out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better
than yourselves. 4Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also
to the interests of others.
5Your attitude should be the same as that
of Christ Jesus:
6Who, being in very nature[a]
God,
did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
7but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature[b]
of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
8And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to death—
even death on a cross!
9Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
Theme: We
should be assured that self-gratification does not satisfy
I.
Intro
A.
In the #1 bestselling book "Looking
out for #1" by Robert Ringer sets out his philosophy of
self-gratification. It was a book which
was on the NY Times bestseller list for one whole year!
B.
In the book Ringer writes, "Looking out for number one is the
conscious rational effort to spend as much time as possible doing those things
which bring you the most amount of pleasure and less time on those things which
cause pain … In everyday terms it means feeling refreshed instead of
tired. It means making enough money to
comfortably afford the material things you want out of life instead of being
bitter about not having them" (intro).
C.
And on it goes ..
D.
My question: is this what life
is all about - I, I , I ??? Or is there something greater than just myself to
live for?
II.
We should be assured that
self-gratification does not ultimately satisfy us.
A.
State
1.
Instead of self-gratification
we should have the "consider" "look" attitude of Jesus (the
two verbs in verses 3 and 4)
a)
Consider others
b)
Look to their interests.
2.
After reading the first two
verses of our passage we begin to realize that the church in Philippi had a problem – lack
of unity. And Paul urges them to unity
saying, “2 amake my joy complete 1by bbeing
of the same mind, maintaining
the same love, united in spirit, intent on one
purpose.(NAS).
a)
At the moment the Philippians
are a group of individuals each going their own way without regard for the
other members of the group.
b)
they are not the “body of
Christ” that they should be – all members working together for the common good,
caring about one another and looking out for one another.
c)
Note: Paul is not urging
uniformity, just unity. He's not telling
them HOW to be of the same mind, the same love, and united in spirit because
that it going to look different in every person's life. Rather he's saying "strive to work
together to see God's purposes fulfilled".
3.
Then Paul moves on to the root
of the problem – the lone-ranger, I, I, I attitude that prevailed in the
church. And Paul called for a we, we,
we attitude.
a)
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility
consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look
not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Your
attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
(1)
"selfish ambition" = lit.
"disputes", "rivalry"
(2)
"vain conceit" = vain-glory, groundless
self-esteem, empty pride; empty conceit, vain pride, (groundless) boasting (PH
2.3); cheap pride; conceit, cheap desire to boast
(3)
Do you get the idea? Whatever it is
it is focused on oneself.
b) This isn't the way of
Jesus says Paul. And it isn't even a
wise way to live. Listen to Isaiah
5:8 on greed and selfishness:
(1) Isa 5:8 "Woe to you who add house to house
and join field to field till no space is left and you live alone in the
land"
(2) As a practice Israelite tribes inherited land so everyone could work the
fields and harvest food - live from the land.
But what started to happen was that one of the tribe sold the land for
money and the whole tribe was left homeless or "alone".
(3) "Alone" that is a scary word in this verse. Greed destroys community, destroys families,
destroys friendships. It happens to
those who are focused on self, who are greedy and who hoard. Eventually they are left alone. Nobody wants to be with a greedy person, one
who discourages instead of encourages.
(4) If you want to have friends - learn to have this attitude of Christ in you.
(5) God didn't create us to tear each other down, but to build each other
up. God created each one of us uniquely,
valuable and full of worth. We must
treat each other with the respect and value by which God created us.
B.
Illustrate
1.
Difference between the
following two attitudes:
a)
ATTITUDE #1: You’ve blessed me,
now I want to bless you back in some way
b)
ATTITUDE #2: You've been
blessed – now let’s see how much I can get away with without having to bless
back.
c)
Everybody has something to give
and offer each other even if it’s simply the powerful words “thank you”.
d)
Be creative in what you can
offer back to people who help you. You
are a creative bunch of people. Some of
you have musical talent, computer talent, talent with repairing cars,
child-minding talent, technical abilities, language abilities - and the list
goes on.
2.
I remember when I was a kid
growing up in the suburbs of Philadelphia. I used to love to play basketball on the
basketball courts right across the street from our house. In the beginning sometimes I was allowed to
play with the older kids. They let me
play even though they knew that when I got my hands on the ball I was going to
make some kind of mistake from which the other team would profit. Once I remember that one of the older kids
said something to this effect insinuating that I should not be allowed to
play. One of the other older players
immediately countered him with the argument that "this was the way that I
would learn".
a)
He effectively let me into the
game.
b)
His attitude was not to lift
himself up by winning and being a winner, but lifting me up so I could learn
and improve my playing
c)
We have to let others into the
game.
d)
Some of you have been
Christians now for a while and you have set ways of doing things. We should do it this way and not this way. Others have not been Christians for so
long. We have to let the new ones into
the game and not demand that things be done our "old way". We have to include others. We have to be flexible in our practice so as
not to exclude others. This means we
have to think about what we are doing at our worship services here and how we
carry out our home groups so as not to inadvertently exclude those who are new.
(1)
Christian jargon can really
kill a home group. New people don't
understand Christian jargon.
(a)
"washed in the blood"
(b)
pre-millenial return
(c)
what are they talking
about? May as well be talking Chinese
e)
because it's not WHAT we do it
is WHO WE ARE that God is concerned with.
If we are growing to become more like Christ then we are growing in the
right direction.
3.
In the 19th century, Marie
d'Agoult left her children to follow after the most famous pianist of her day,
Hungarian composer and virtuoso Franz Liszt. After the
intensity of her infatuation cooled and the reality of missing her children set
in, Marie is said to have made this observation: "When one has smashed
everything around oneself, one has also smashed oneself."
4.
God is a God of relationships
and we were made to live in giving, self-sacrificial relationship with
others. God wants us to value ourselves
and value others because He made us all and all of us are of great worth in His
eyes.
C.
Apply
III. Conclusion
A.
Once upon a time, there was a
good and kind king who had a great kingdom with many cities. In one distant
city, some people took advantage of the freedom the king gave them and started
doing evil. They profited by their evil and began to fear that the king would
interfere and throw them in jail. Eventually, these rebels seethed with hatred
for the king. They convinced the city that everyone would be better off without
the king, and the city declared its independence from the kingdom.
But soon, with everyone doing whatever they wanted, disorder
reigned in the city. There was violence, hatred, lying, oppression, murder,
rape, slavery, and fear. The king thought: What should I do? If I take my
army and conquer the city by force, the people will fight against me. I will have
to kill so many of them, and the rest will only submit through fear or
intimidation, which will make them hate me and all I stand for even more. How
does that help them—to be either dead or imprisoned or secretly seething with
rage? But if I leave them alone, they'll destroy each other, and it breaks my
heart to think of the pain they're causing and experiencing.
So the king did something very surprising. He took off his robes
and dressed in the rags of a homeless wanderer. Incognito, he entered the city
and began living in a vacant lot near a garbage dump. He took up a trade—fixing
broken pottery and furniture. Whenever people came to him, his kindness and
goodness and fairness and respect were so striking that they would linger just
to be in his presence. They would tell him their fears and questions, and ask
his advice. He told them that the rebels had fooled them, and that the true
king had a better way to live, which he exemplified and taught. One by one,
then two by two, and then by the hundreds, people began to have confidence in
him and live his way.
Their influence spread to others, and the movement grew and grew
until the whole city regretted its rebellion and wanted to return to the
kingdom again. But, ashamed of their horrible mistake, they were afraid to
approach the king, believing he would certainly destroy them for their
rebellion. But the king-in-disguise told them the good news: he was himself the
king, and he loved them. He held nothing against them, and he welcomed them
back into his kingdom, having accomplished by a gentle, subtle presence what
never could have been accomplished through brute force. (Brian Mclaren)
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For
questions or comments or further information contact:
Rev Jeff Fry
Darwin
Park Community Church