Philippians 4:8-9
Please turn in your copy of God’s
word to the New Testament book of Philippians. Our reading today
will be Philippians chapter four verses eight through nine. As
you’ll note, we’re getting towards the back of the book. And so
next week we’ll look at verses 10 through 20, where the apostle
Paul gives a thanksgiving, and then we’ll look at the final
greetings in the weeks to come. And so we’ll end our study of
Paul’s prison letter to the Philippians. But in the little section where
we have been in chapter four lately, the apostle Paul has
written to the Philippian church, he’s written to us about how
to have peace. And in the early verses of chapter
four, he spoke about peace between two ladies in the church that
had gotten into some difficulty. He encouraged them to have the
same mind of Christ, to agree together in the Lord. And he
encouraged a brother in the church, an unnamed brother, to see to
it that they got back together. And then last week we looked
at verses four through seven. where our study led us to see
how personal piety, personal spiritual growth, personal holiness
helps bring individual peace, which then brings corporate or
whole church piece. If a whole church of holy people
gets together, it’s a peaceful place. And you understand the
opposite. Well, today, the apostle Paul
is gonna speak to us about what our minds and our actions ought
to be as Christians in the new covenant community. And so let
us hear God’s word together. Just two short verses from chapter
four, verses eight and nine. He says, finally, brothers, Whatever
is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is
pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable. If there is any
excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about
these things. What you have learned and received
and heard and seen in me, practice these things and the God of peace
will be with you. This is God’s word, let us pray
together. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we pray that you would
teach us, teach us from your word, your will, teach us from
your word, the ways we should live, teach us from your word,
the means of salvation by faith through Jesus Christ, teach us
from your word, how not to live like the world and have chaos,
but how to live as citizens of heaven and have God present and
bringing peace into our lives. This is not too difficult a thing
for you to do. And so we boldly and in faith
ask for it. And we thank you in advance that
you do wonderful and amazing things for us and in us and through
us by the power of your holy word. So give us grace. We pray
in Jesus name. Amen. If you were to write a
recipe for peace, What would be the ingredients? What would
be the way you would measure it and mix it and prepare it
and bake it so that when you pulled your piece out of the
oven, as it were, you would have a wonderful and pleasing product
to show? What will resolve chaos? What will resolve disorder? What will resolve and settle
discord amongst believers or maybe in your family or your
work life or in other spheres? Well, it’s only the peace of
God. It’s only the God of peace who
can do this for us. And so the apostle Paul in our
passage today gives us a recipe for peace in the local church. And we can apply these principles,
these things to finding peace in other situations where we
may find ourselves, peace in the family, peace in other spheres
and relationships. But most of all, you understand
we need the God of peace. We need the peace of God to rule
and reign in our lives. And that can only happen according
to the Apostle Paul here in chapter four of Philippians by how we
think and what we do. So there are two things we want
to consider from this passage. We want to think about certain
things and we want to practice certain things. The apostle Paul,
God himself through the scriptures is going to call us to think
and to practice. So first verse eight teaches
us the things that we should think about. Verse eight says
these words, finally brothers, whatever is true, honorable,
just, pure, lovely, commendable, if there’s anything excellent,
if there’s anything worthy of praise, think about these things. And so verse eight gives us our
first point, our first lesson from God’s holy word, think about
these things. Now thinking brings up the subject
of the human mind. The human mind is utterly amazing. What it is able to do, what it
is able to remember and recall, the functions it is able to perform. You know, I grew up in Burlington.
It’s been about 20 years since I’ve really lived here before
I came back. But as I drive around Burlington, as I drive around
Graham and the surrounding communities, there are sometimes I will pass
something that has not really changed over the years and I
can remember it just as it is or just as it was when I was
a child or a kid. It’s amazing how our human minds
can tuck away little bits and pieces of things. Isn’t it amazing
how we can all, whatever age we are and however many years
it’s been, we can remember little nursery rhymes and school songs.
about our ABCs and our 1-2-3s. We can remember Bible songs.
We can remember the little things, what do they call them, the mnemonic
devices that we learned in order to learn basic building blocks
of life and faith. Our minds are incredible. But
you know, one thing we have to remember The truth of God teaches
us that when Adam and Eve fell in their original sin, and that
sin because it was passed down to us by ordinary generation
through our parents, we too fell with Adam and Eve in their first
sin. And one of the effects of sin,
there are many, but one of the great effects of sin is what
we in theology call the noetic effects of the fall. It’s the
fallenness of our mind, the noose, Our brains, just like our hearts
and our actions and our beliefs and whatever else, they are utterly
devastated by sin. And so when the apostle Paul
calls us to think about things that are true and good and beautiful
and lovely and commendable and honorable and just, he’s telling
us to do something redemptive. He’s telling us to do something
that the human mind, apart from Christ, cannot do. You see, when
God saves us, when he begins the work of redemption, he’s
not just giving you a train ticket to heaven. You know how it is
these days. We say to somebody, if you were
to die and you were to stand before God tonight, he should
ask you, why should you let me in my heaven? What would you
say? And we tell people, you don’t
want to go to hell now, do you? And we treat salvation as if
it is a bus ticket, as if it is a train ticket. And we just
lay hold of that ticket knowing where our eternal destination
is gonna be. And we put that ticket in our back pocket, and
should the chariot swing low, should the conductor of the train
call all aboard, we whip that thing out of our pocket and we
get on. No, the Christian life, brothers and sisters, is a life
of faithfulness to God. And yes, God will take us home
to heaven to be with him. but we are to be thinking Christians. We are, as Paul says to the Romans
in chapter 12, verses one and two, we are to be transformed,
not conformed to this world, but we are to be transformed
by the renewal of our minds. And so we have to understand
that part of Jesus redeeming us is yes, he saves our soul
from hell and unto heaven into the eternal presence of God.
But he is saving our minds. He is redeeming our minds. He is putting back what has fallen
down. He is fixing what is broken.
And so for the Christian, when we read a verse like verse eight,
we need to keep in mind We need to keep in mind that Jesus is
at work through his word, fixing our brains. And the education
system cannot do it. Though we can be smart about
math and science and vocational skills and those things, they’re
good and helpful. The educational system can’t
fix it. Parenting can’t fix it. Only the reading and the preaching
and the study and the blessing of the Holy Spirit through the
power of God’s word can fix our minds ultimately to think about
the things that Paul lists. Now, before we land into this
beautiful list of wonderful things, I want you to remember what the
Bible says about people who are not Christians, people who do
not possess faith in Jesus, and who are still living with the
broken minds of sin. The Word of God says that our
minds, apart from Jesus, are depraved. Our minds, apart from
Jesus, are minds of the flesh. Our minds, apart from Jesus,
only think death and futility. Our minds are hardened to the
knowledge of Almighty God and less Jesus. and the Holy Spirit
come and strike the word into our heart and save us. Our minds
are hostile to God. Our minds only love what is foolish. Our minds are filled with ignorance. Our minds are defiled apart. from the renewal of the mind
that comes by salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. And so
when we are privileged as Christians to come to the word of God and
to have our minds challenged with things that are true and
good and beautiful, we need to recognize that God is taking
us from our deep darkness and bringing us into his marvelous
light. He’s saying, you’ve been eating at the banquet table of
the prodigal son. and the pigs die. And I’m taking
you to heaven’s banquet table, where there will be things that
you will see and know and experience that are far greater than you
can ask for or imagine. And so we need to have our minds
transformed by the very word of God. And in the word of God,
God gives us heaven. He gives us his best and he gives
us that which glorifies him and brings us the most good, even
peace in our lives and in our church. And so we’re called to
live a life that is focused on this list. We find in verse eight,
he says, finally, brothers, whatever is true, honorable, just, pure,
lovely, commendable. If there is any excellence, if
there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. You see, he is calling us to
live a life, a thoughtful life, a life of meditation on what
is good and right and true in order that we can have the best
and that we can have peace. We’re called to live. We’re called
to focus our minds on these things. Now, as you read this list, and
we’ll look through it here in just a moment, think of this
list like a spray of flowers. You know, we sometimes give a
dozen roses, sometimes we give tulips or whatever’s in season.
But think about a full spray of flowers and it has something
of everything. And it has something of every
color, something of every species available. It has greenery, it
has the little, you know, the little white things that add
a little flair and flavor. But you have pink roses, you
have yellow this and green that and purple this. And you have
this wonderful spray of flowers and you stand back and you look
at it. And you say, wow, what a beautiful bouquet of God’s
creation. That’s what this list ought to
be like for us as Christians. Let’s run through this list for
just a moment, if you will. They say it’s bad form for preachers
to go through a list and give definitions, but we’re going
to break that rule today because this list is really wonderful. We’re
to put our minds on whatever is true, whatever is honest,
whatever is genuine. We’re to put our minds on whatever
is honorable, that is worthy of respect or majestic. It is reverence, it is dignified. We’re to put our minds on whatever
is just. Now the word here that is used
is the judicial legal word. It is the same word that is used
to express our justification before God, our legal standing
before the God of the universe. And so we should put our mind
on things that are righteous. things that are just according
to the standard of God’s holy word. We’re to put our minds
on that which is pure. It is undefiled. It is holy. It is set apart. It is ceremonially
clean and able to be used in the worship and the presence
of almighty God. We’re to put our minds on whatever
is lovely, whatever is dear, whatever is widely accepted as beautiful
among the culture. We’re to put our minds on whatever
is commendable or worthy of praise. And you see with these six adjectives,
what will begin to happen in your life and in the life of
the church is you will surround yourself with things and ideas
and music and culture and television and hymns that we sing in church
and conversations. Every aspect in the sphere of
life will be excellent, will be beautiful,
will be pleasing in the sight of God and in the sight of others. And then he gives two nouns here
at the end of this list, whatever is excellent or worthy of praise,
whatever is virtuous, whatever is recognized by all as pleasing. And you see, When we as a congregation,
we as a group of Christians who gather together under the name
of First Associate Reform Presbyterian Church, if we want peace, then
we gather around the highest possible standard of truth, it’s
in the scripture, of beauty as defined by God, and holiness
as defined by Jesus. And you see what happens when
you gather around the highest ideals. You see what happens
when we gather around the things that make for peace. And so this
list is a wonderful list. It is a spray of flowers. There’s
another interesting thing about this list. This list is a list
of virtues from the Greek culture. It is a list of virtues that
the Hellenist or the Greeks who were the most influential at
the time of Paul’s writing, they believed in the true and the
good and the beautiful and the honorable and the just and the
lovely. These were pagan principles, pagan virtues. And the apostle
Paul sees them as common grace from God Almighty, the creator,
who is truth himself and has made all things for himself and
his glory. And he is stealing back this list from the Greeks
and saying, in Christ, Christians, individual Christians, Christian
communities ought to love what is good and right and true and
just and beautiful. And we apply these things to
our relationships, to our behavior, to our love of the arts, our
love of culture, our love of beauty, what we select to watch
on our televisions or in the movie theater, or what we choose
to view on the internet. We take to mind this list. Whatever is true. Honorable,
just, pure, lovely, commendable. If there is any excellence, if
there is anything worthy of praise, we put our minds on these things.
And you see what the opposite is. We are to not put our minds
on things that are untrue. We are to not put our minds on
that which is dishonorable, or unjust, or impure, or unlovely,
or not commendable, or that which does not lack excellence, or
is worthy of praise. We don’t waste our thoughts,
for we are the redeemed ones of the Lord, and God is at work
redeeming our minds. When I was a little kid in the
nursery at our church, there was a little poem, and it was
a little poem, and I forget how the, The beginning of it went
and the body of the point went, but it ended this way. It said,
God don’t make no junk. And dear brothers and sisters
of the faith, we ought to set the standard. We need to be the
standard bearers in this world, in this world that is careless
about its thoughts, in this world that watches and digests and
loves useless things, in this world that does not think but
only follows the device that is attached to their palm permanently.
We need to set the standard of thinking. of what is good, and
what is right, and what is true, and what is eternal, and what
is praiseworthy. Today we’re singing two hymns
of the opening hymn, Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee, and in
just a few moments we’ll sing God All Nature Sings Thy Glory,
both written to the same tune. You’ll think I’m crazy, but I’m
not. There’s a method to my madness. I want us to see that when Beethoven
wrote Ode to Joy. He wrote a piece of music that
was fit for use in the church and that we can sing all kinds
of hymns. Do you know I can count at least two dozen hymns that
you can sing to Ode to Joy, Beethoven’s wonderful music from his 10th
symphony or ninth symphony or whatever it is. It’s beautiful,
it’s good, it is true. And you take that example and
put it in all aspects of life, architecture, art, music, theater,
all the spheres of life. Everything we do as Christians
ought to be true and good and beautiful. Let me encourage you
to take a little exercise in this vein of thought. Get out
a piece of paper and write the virtues you find in verse eight.
Write out the virtues of whatever is true and honorable and just
and pure and so on. And then write their opposites.
Get out a dictionary if you need to. Write out a list of what
is false, what is dishonorable, unjust. And you draw a line down
the middle, a big, dark, thick line. And you write the things
in your life that you do that are good and right and true and
whatever follows that list. But on that other side, make
a list of the things that you’re watching, that you’re reading,
that you’re engaging in in some way, shape or form, the things
that are coming out of your mouth, the things that are taking place
in your workplace or home life or whatever. And you clearly
mark what are the Christian things and what are the pagan things.
And you set your mind on that left side of the list. of what
is biblical. And you seek to work in your
life by the power of God and by the work of the Holy Spirit
as he convicts you of your sin to say, out of my life goes that
which is false and that which is dishonorable and that which
is unjust or impure or unlovely or not commendable. And it lacks
excellence and it is not worthy of praise. Because you see one
side of that list leads to chaos. The other side leads to peace.
And as you read the word of God and as you think about your life
and as you meditate on the truth of God and as you pray, may God,
by his grace, give you things to think on and to fill your
mind with. Now, the second thing this passage
teaches us. We find in verse nine, he says,
what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice
these things and the God of peace will be with you. And so the
second lesson from the scripture today is practice these things,
practice these things. The apostle says, the things
that you have heard and seen in me that you have received
and learn. Now, What do we practice that
the apostle Paul has done in his life? If we were to get a
private investigator and follow around the apostle Paul and say,
you know, you come back to us and we’re going to pay you some
money for doing this little secret operation here. You tell us.
what he’s teaching. You follow the four words in
verse nine. You tell us what you learned from him, what you
received from him, what you hear from him and what you see, because
we’re going to take that list and we’re going to do them. We’re
going to put them into practice in our lives. You see, these
are the words of a student. Back in the Apostle Paul day,
you lived with your teacher. You were with them and you watched
them. You heard them. You saw them
and you mimicked them. You put into practice the things
that they were doing. And so what is the Apostle Paul
taught them? What have they received from
him? What have they heard from him? What can they say? We have watched him do, and therefore
we must do. Well, they’ve heard his teaching
from the Old Testament. His new apostolic teaching is God the
Holy Spirit has given him the 13 books that he writes. He’s
an eyewitness to the risen Jesus, and he has had much to teach
them. He has given them also what they’ve received, the apostolic
faith. They’ve heard his words. They’ve heard the beauty of God,
the majesty of Christ, the way of salvation. And they have seen
him be joyful under suffering, imprisoned by the Romans. They’ve
seen him have joy in the midst of his tribulations. They’ve
seen him proclaim the gospel, preach the word, worship. They’ve
seen him and do all the key things that a Christian ought to do.
And he says, what you have learned, what you have received, what
you have heard, and what you’ve seen, do these things. Do these things. Now, how is
it that we learn? Do we all get a textbook when
we come out of the womb that says, here little kid, here’s
how to live life? No, for a lot of years, our formative years,
we watch mommy and daddy and grandma and grandpa. We watch
brother and sister. We learn things at school. We
learn how to laugh, how to cry. We learn how to steal toys. We
learn how to hit back. We learn good things. We learn
bad things. But we learn by watching. We learn by what we perceive
as good. And so when our parents model
good things, we learn. And it’s the same in the church
for ministers and elders and deacons and Sunday school teachers.
We who are called to set an example for those who come after us.
People are watching and they hear what we are teaching them.
They receive What we believe is true. They hear from our mouths
the things that we believe are godly and they see us practice
in our lives. And so parents and teachers and
church leaders, we need to be heroes of the faith who live
out of the conviction that we must put our minds on what is
good and right and true and lovely and commendable so that the next
generation can say this is what is true and good and right and
commendable and praiseworthy and just and honorable. You see,
we have a standard. We have an example that we must
give. There’s one of our church members who every Sunday when
I see this person, they say, hello, Parson. And I love that
term. The word Parson, it means a person
who is up to par. They’re a whole person. They
are a person who is to be looked up to. And that’s a high standard
for any minister, any elder, any deacon, any servant of the
church of God, any parent. We want to be a whole person.
Now that term comes from the early days of Christians settling
in America. And it was very often that only
the minister knew math and science and general liberal arts education
in addition to his theological training. And so people in the
community would say, go ask the parson. He knows. And that term
became essentially a term for the minister. And we get now
the word parsonage. The parson lives in the parsonage,
the preacher’s house. But you see, we are called as
ministers, elders, deacons, parents, as faithful Christians, to set
an example, a standard, an expression of our piety and our Christian
faith ought to come out to such a degree that if little ones
or even new Christians want to know how to live the Christian
life, you can simply say, watch me, listen to me, see what I
believe and how it comes out into my life. And then you will
know how to live faithfully. Well, what’s the promise at the
end of this passage? The promise is peace. And it
says, and the God of peace, will be with you. Now notice back
up in verse seven, there was a promise of peace. It says,
and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard
your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. But here it goes
from the peace of God to the God of peace. It goes from God’s
general peace, Shalom, the peace of God accomplished in the work
of Christ on the cross to the God of peace will be with you. And so, dear brothers and sisters,
if there is chaos in your life, if there is chaos in your Christian
fellowship, if there’s chaos in your workplace, if there’s
chaos in your home, if there’s chaos in your extended family,
if there’s chaos between you and another person, Set your
standards high to God’s standards. Whatever’s true, honorable, just,
and lovely. And you put these things into
practice and let others see them and learn them and put them into
practice. You see the multiplying effect that this will have. And
the God of peace will be with you. And friends, do you know
that the only way, the only way to have peace in your life is
to practice these things. out of a position, out of a relationship
with Jesus where you have said, Oh Lord, my God, my life is so
full of chaos and darkness. Everything in my life is disturbing.
Everything in my life is falling apart. I need Christ. And you
know that Christ, when you receive him by faith, he comes into your
life and he kicks out the mess and he brings in order. And he
can give you peace, not only in your personal life, but in
your life of fellowship with others. And friends, only Jesus
can do that. And only Jesus can give that. So you see, we have a unique
message, a unique word to the world that is full of chaos and
disorder. and does not love what is true
and honorable and just. It loves just the opposite. And
we have a message of hope. And so let us live it and preach
it. Let us pray together. Our great
God, our Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we delight that this
list that these things which you have given to us for our
way of Christian living would be deep in our minds and in our
hearts. It would be the top of our to-do
list, and that it would be pleasing in your sight, glorious to your
name. It would be good for our church, but it would be good
for our witness. Help us to live by these high standards, and
may these high standards show the world what Jesus is like,
what heaven will be like, and what the beauty of heaven can
offer to those who come to Jesus by faith. Help us, give us grace. Uh, and may these things be so
in our lives. And we ask it in the name of Christ who brought
us peace. Amen.