Christ Is Our Confidence

Jonathan: Good morning, everyone. Wow! Good morning, Ryan. I'm fine. Yes, let's work on that. If you're at the Lockport campus, you're watching online, try to outdo what you just heard. Let's try that all together. Good morning. Yeah. That sounded like a church. Anyway.

My name is Jonathan. If you're just kind of jumping in, this is Ryan and we're going to - we have the privilege of sharing from God's word today. And what we're going to do for the next few weeks, this is a little different because we've been journeying in the book of Philippians and we're going to continue to do that and as we process through the rest of this book, today we're going to be tackling a part of Philippians together and then over the next couple of Sundays some different of our pastors will be speaking to some of the remaining portions of that book and so we're going to tag team this passage today and we're excited to do that because we believe that God has something specific he wants to say to you. It's not an accident that you're here. God has orchestrated life's events to the point that he wants you here to hear something from him - from his word. And so we're excited to be able to do that. So if you have a bible, grab it, get to Philippians chapter three. And as you're turning to Philippians chapter three Ryan, why don't you give us kind of a recap of where we've been in the series and maybe some context that's going to be helpful for us today.

Ryan: Absolutely. Well a couple of things, over the last few weeks, if you've been paying close attention to the sermons that have gone on in the book of Philippians, actually one of my favorite books, we've learned about Christ as being life. Christ is life and he is Savior and he is Lord. He's the God-Man.

And so today we're going to learn about how Christ is our confidence. Christ alone is our confidence. That's where we're going to be going and today we're going to be looking at Philippians three verses one to eleven and as it relates to the text as a whole there's just a couple of things to have that background - what's going on as this letter is being written and then how do we apply it to our lives today.

Number one, Paul the author is in prison as he's writing this. In addition to that, this letter, the letter of Philippians is kind of interesting in comparison to some of Paul's other letters because it's a letter of low rebuke. O.k.? And Carson and Moo who are some really, really good New Testament scholars, they have this really good quote about the book of Philippians. It says the following. Many of Paul's letters were called forth by serious problems in churches, but Philippians is that comparative rarity. It's a letter to a church of Paul's own foundation in which he, on the whole, is well pleased. Now that doesn't mean that there aren't problems. That there aren't challenges and that there aren't, as parents will say, teachable moments for the people that are learning and growing in their faith.

And actually Paul is going to talk today. He's going to talk about the dogs in and around the church that he's battling on two fronts. O.k.? And so Paul, in this letter, he's facing a battle within the church that there are some within the church of Philippi that are kind of, not necessarily happy with the way that he's going about preaching or style or whatever, and then there's also people outside of the church that just don't want to see this church advance.

And so there are two groups in particular that are referenced here. One would be Judaizers and this would likely be a group of folks within the church that would be saying hey, listen, Paul's right about Jesus as Messiah but in addition to that you also need to practice the Old Testament law. So Jesus yes, but you also must practice Jewish custom and adhere to the law. So those would be Judaizers. And then obviously there's the other group which very likely are Jews. So Paul comes out of the people group the Jews and they're not real happy with Paul's most recent decisions. Lastly Paul is going to be point us, he has done this already and he's going to do it again in this text. He's going to point us continually to the cross in this letter.

So if you have your bibles and you're ready to go we're going to look at verses seven to eleven. We'll start there with a crescendo and we'll work our way back through the text. It says the following in verse seven. It says but whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 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, that I may gain Christ and be found i him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ - the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. I want to know Christ - yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead.

Jonathan: When I'm reading the scripture, I look for things that are repeated. Usually when something's repeated multiple times it's like a clue that the author's trying to get our attention. And so what's repeated in those verses that Ryan just read from Philippians three, over and over Paul says the words I consider. So he says I consider these things. I consider or maybe some of your bibles say I count or I reckon. Basically he's using accounting terms. He's saying what maybe used to go in the loss column now is in the profit, the gain column. And what maybe used to be what I thought were gains, now I put those in the loss column. He's using this reckoning, this accounting term because he's saying, look, here's how I interpret life's events. And Paul's giving us insight into what his filter is. So that as something happens in life, he's able to process that and say, yeah, that goes in the loss column and that goes in the gain or the profit column. And so he's going to show us what that, really what that filter is because he's had his fair share, as Ryan just unpacked for us, he's had his fair share of difficulty. Things that haven't gone as smoothly.

Again, he's writing from prison and so he's able to view these things that maybe for some people would be devastating things but that he now, because of what his filter is for processing life's events, he's able to have a different response. The situation doesn't change but his response to the situation changes. Let me show you. You know how this works. You just don't maybe realize.

So let's say you, at your job, you think that your boss is always out to get you. Right? Like he or she is always looking over your shoulder and can't wait for you to mess up and all of these things, right? So you're constantly thinking my boss is out to get me. And so you then get called into your boss's office Monday morning with your filter that they are always out to get me, right? What are you expecting when you walk in on Monday morning? Probably expecting a pink slip, right? You're going to be released or hey, we're restructuring and that doesn't involve you. And so you're expecting that, right? But let's just say, let's just say that you believe that your boss values what you do. Your boss appreciates you, thinks you do good work, all of those things, right? You get called into the office Monday morning and that's what you believe about your boss. You're not expecting to get released. What you may be expecting, you may be expecting, yeah, it's about time for some boost in pay, right? The situation didn't change. You got called into the boss's office but what your filter was for that event dictated to you what your response was.

And so Paul is going to show us and the reason we began with this passage is here's Paul's filter. Christ is my confidence. That's his filter for everything in life. And really what he's going to show us is that there are two choices. That's the first choice, that Christ is his confidence. But the second choice is that his flesh is his confidence. We know that because verse seven begins with this contrasting word but - but whatever were gains to me, he says, there's a contrast.

So he's going to show us that there really are two choices. Either your confidence is in Christ, or your confidence is in the flesh. And when your filter is that your confidence in the flesh, when life's events happen, that filter will determine your response to those things. But when Christ is your confidence, that will change your response. You see this is going to equip us, not only as Paul was equipping the Philippian believers, commending their good work but preparing them for opposition, that's going to be the case for us. So, Ryan, maybe as a beginning point, kind of the first question we want to answer is what does confidence in the flesh look like?

Ryan: Yeah. Real quick, if this is camera one, I just want to look very clearly into this camera. Pastor Jerry, Pastor Daryl, Pastor John. We love our jobs. So you call us into the office Monday, we've got high level of confidence.

Jonathan: Yeah, high level of confidence.

Ryan: Alright. So let's talk about confidence in the flesh. I would say that the first thing that sticks out to me in this passage is being careful of religious performance. I think that's one of the first things that we see in this where if we were to have confidence in our flesh. Now, I'm going to read the first six verses. I'm going to talk about Paul then I'm going to work back into maybe how that may have affected my life. How I could see my life that way before coming to know Christ.

So, it says here in verses one to six: Further, my brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you. Watch out for those dogs, those evildoers, those mutilators of the flesh. For it is we who are the circumcision, we who serve God by his Spirit, who boast in Christ Jesus and who put no confidence in the flesh - though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If someone else thinks they have reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.

Now, it was interesting as Jonathan and I were preparing this week, we were looking at this text together. Paul kind of steps up and puts some credentials down for us. Just letting us know, like hey, I've done some good things in my life. And so what was interesting about some of the things that he mentions here, some of them - they're really not of his doing. He's just born into them. Right? And then others are actually of his doing. And so let's look at each of them real quick. Circumcised - not of Paul.

In fact I think if Paul knew what he was getting himself into on the eighth day he probably would have said no, thank you. O.k. And so that's not of him, that's Paul's mom and Paul's dad saying, hey, it's the right thing to do. He's a male Jew, eighth day, boom, we know what we're doing. He was a Jew. He was born into that. That's not anything that he did. He was of the tribe of Benjamin. That's not of him but something that he was born into. He was a Hebrew of Hebrews.

Now an interesting thing about this statement - and I've read this passage a number of times - but only recently have I discovered that when Paul's saying I'm a Hebrew of Hebrews, he is kind of saying, hey, I'm the Jew of the Jews just to let people know this, o.k.? But underneath that is an understanding in the original audience that what he was saying also is that my bloodlines are 100% pure. Mom - 100% Jew. Dad - 100% Jew. Look at what they created. Another 100% Jew. O.k.? So those are all things that Paul has as credentials but they're not really anything that he did. They are things that he inherited or was born into. But, in regard to the law he was a Pharisee. All right? So Paul's - I mean, trained under Gamaliel. He's ridiculously smart. He knows the law front and back. He is one of the - he's the Pharisee of Pharisees. O.k.? He is well known and reputable in his sphere of influence if you will. With regard to zeal - he's a persecutor of the church. Paul did not believe in Yeshua from the get go, o.k.? And he was adamant about protecting the Jewish line of thought and the different understand of who the Messiah would be. So much so that if you go back into Acts you can see that as Stephen is about to be stoned they throw their coats at Paul's feet and Paul said he's o.k. with it, o.k, the stoning of Stephen. With regard to righteousness based on the law and not the gospel, he was faultless. He had adhered to the law.

Now, I want to give you some perspective for me growing up. You know, just kind of put this into context of today. We understand it in it's origin. What would that look like, maybe for some of us today? So I'm going to speak to my own personal walk as a Catholic growing up prior to fully understanding Christ alone, o.k.? So now I can't compete with Paul on Jewish blood line, o.k.? I got no royalty. The Kozeys - nothing special in their family name. Some mill working blue collar people from Cleveland, Ohio. The Varneys - my mom's maiden name - a bunch of hilljacks from Boone County West Virginia that were coal miners. There is nothing real special and if you want an interesting family reunion, you can come join me. My wife can attest to that. I love my family. I love my family but there's no royalty there, o.k.?

But as a Catholic, as I was growing up and participating as a Roman Catholic and I - let me just qualify this. I'm not saying this of all Catholics. That's very important for me to articulate. But I will say this. As a Catholic if you were to ask me growing up where my confidence is found, here's the reality. As I was walking in an understanding of what I thought I would inherit the kingdom with, it was not in Christ alone. Now, I'm speaking from my own personal perspective. Baptism would have come to mind. Participating in the Holy Communion so that I could now receive the Eucharist. Confession - believe it or not I actually liked confession. I didn't like confessing my sins necessarily but there was an aspect of being ceremonially clean after confession, o.k.? At least the sins I wanted to tell my monsignor, right? Now you don't tell them all 'cause it's like I don't want Father Moran to know that, you know? Confirmation, all right? Practicing toward confirmation. Regular faithful participant in the sacrament of the Mass. That was - these were things - I would not say Christ alone. I would throw them at you and say this is what makes me qualified for the Kingdom. Service - to the poor and to the marginalized.

You know I tell people, when I've gotten this passion to serve the least of these, the reality is this. I learned that predominately from Catholics growing up. Lay parishioners - you know my fellow Catholics - but from my priest to my monsignors, but probably most predominantly from nuns. They were faithfully introducing me to the least of these and to our responsibility toward the least of these. But here's what I would say if you were to ask me about why I would inherit the kingdom, I would give you those things and I would not give you the gospel. Ok. So it was not found in the gospel alone. The driving force for me was religious activity, not the gospel. But but that's only one thing that we see in this passage. There's more.

Jonathan: Yeah and and the second thing if you're taking those would be spiritual arrogance. Spiritual arrogance. So Paul lists his pedigree as Ryan outlined for us and some of his activity. But behind every action there is a heart attitude. And so examine what that would be for Paul. I mean he's got this incredible, incredible status that has been bestowed on him. He's been given this. But he's also done quite a bit with it. And he's kind of in this elite class of people that was revered and honored in their society. And he was more than ok with that. He thought he was really something. You can hear it in his language as he's talking in regard to the law of Pharisee. For zeal, persecuting the church, righteousness based on the law, faultless. He really thinks he's something. So it's not just what he was doing, but why he was doing it. He thought that he was really doing something for God and so behind the activity, behind the performance, the religious observance for Paul really is a heart issue that I can only describe as spiritual arrogance.

And the reason I can kind of describe it that way is because I read this text and have read it many times. I kind of see myself, unfortunately, I see myself in that story as well. And I'm I'm able to label this spiritual arrogance, because I know exactly what that looks like my own life. And so if I could just show you my perspective for a moment. I realize not everybody knows me and knows my story, but I grew up at this church. And so here's my resume as it were. Dedicated at The Chapel. Baptized at The Chapel. The son of a pastor at The Chapel. In pursuit of pastoral ministry at The Chapel. As to education, Christian. As to the expectations that people had on what a pastor's kid should be: faultless.

Ryan: I would agree.

Jonathan: The people who laughed were supervising me in the children's ministry twenty some years ago. So but in all honesty, like here I just want to expose.. I'm just gonna be candid with you okay? And so growing up, here's my heart. I'm going to give you a snapshot of my heart and I'm not like saying this is a good thing or a noble thing. Here's my heart broken up. At least I don't do what they do. At least I'm not off doing what they're doing. And yeah my parents really should be thankful for me, right? And if I could just take this a step further. And again I'm not I'm not saying this is like something I'm proud of. I'm not.

But if you were.. I maybe wouldn't have been able to put it in these words as a teenager when this really just came to a head for me. But if I were to summarize the way of thinking in my life at that point. It seriously would have been this: God's pretty lucky to have me. Honestly. Because at least I don't. And the things I would point to look differently than what Ryan would point to but, at least I don't do what they're doing. At least I spend time in the scripture. At least I pray. At least I have obeyed Jesus as best I can. At least I'm not making these major blunders. Can I just tell you: spiritual arrogance. The form looks different for every person and that's that's not just a pastor's kid problem. But that is a problem. That is a heart disease: spiritual arrogance. Thinking that God is lucky because I've done what he asked me to do. I've done what he's asked me to do and I haven't done what he said not to do. And so by comparison to a standard that maybe was pressed in on me knowingly or unknowingly, I felt very good about myself. But my heart was sick. My heart was full of confidence in my flesh. And I just gotta be honest with you that that is exactly.. when I read Philippians 3 I fall under the this deep awareness of how thorough that infected my thinking. And even, I mean just being perfectly honest.

Even in preparing a message with Ryan on putting no confidence in the flesh and putting our confidence squarely in Christ. Even then, I see it trying to rear it's head. That that flesh creeps back up to say: "Man, you've got something for them." I hate that. I hate that.

But you see, spiritual arrogance is a byproduct of confidence in the flesh. Because when you think you've got it together, you are never more full of spiritual arrogance then in that moment.

You might be thinking Jonathan, I'm not a pastor's kid. Ok, but maybe you grew up in the church. And so you had exactly that comparison that I talked about. And that was where you, that was your go to. You know the old adage: "I don't drink I don't chew, I don't run with girls who do." Right? Have you heard that? Ok. So but maybe that was what you would point to. Is that you would list off all the things that you avoided for God. But you weren't avoiding those for God. You were avoiding them for your flesh. Because you took confidence in those things that distinguished you. Made you better. Maybe you're at a completely different spectrum and you're maybe seeing - I don't have that problem. Jonathan, growing up - me - that wasn't my issue at all. Listen, right now. Right now. When you struggle with his maybe not some of the things in the same way, but the heart issue is the same. Because you are your own barometer for truth. You don't need God. You don't need a god to interfere with what you think. Even if you show up on a Sunday and give him a shout out every now and again, you don't need him to interfere with how you live. Because you'll figure that out thank you very much. And so you pull things from Christianity that you like. But you also pull from the Dali Lama. And your favorite political figure. And from Oprah. And you've kind of made his own conglomerate of things that you like to hear and you don't need anyone to tell you differently, because you like what you hear. But you've only put in front of you what you want to hear.

And so while my spiritual arrogance manifested itself in a "God's lucky to have me" kind of attitude, your spiritual arrogance reveals itself in the fact that you don't think you need God. My problem: "God's lucky to have me. I've got it all together." Your problem: "I don't need God. I've got it all together." Both of us are not making any progress because we have our confidence not in Christ, but in our flesh. And I don't know if that's like the spirit of the age that "Hey we're self made and we're gonna figure it out for ourselves." But here's what I know. That's a dead end. That leads nowhere. I'm not saying that hypothetically. I'm speaking from experience. That is a dead end. And until you come face to face with your spiritual arrogance and how it rears its head in so many ways in your life, you will never make any progress in the direction of finding any sort of confidence in life of any kind. You need to come face-to-face with your spiritual arrogance. There's a third thing.

Ryan: Yeah the third thing I would see in this in this passage as we were looking through it together, it just clinging too tightly to the things of this world. So in verse seven, it says "But whatever were gains to me, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 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."

There is a mindset struggle when we're looking at our confidence in the flesh to be prone to things like the gospel and versus the gospel alone. At the very beginning of this passage, it says whatever were gains to me, I now consider loss. And in a commentary by Fosetin Brown, they had this really interesting explanation here that Paul is not just considering these things that he lost, he is actually.. He suffered the loss of these things. He is lamenting the loss of the things that he had here. Paul lost his people when he gave himself to Christ. He lost his people. Paul lost friends. He very likely lost his social network. He also lost his career. You don't go from being like hey I'm a Pharisee. Now I believe in Jesus. Well, job security issue number one. Okay. He lost it. He suffered that very real loss.

But here's what's fascinating. That as Paul contemplates that there is a paradigm shift in this text, where Paul truly has become. He's in a position where after reflecting on these things, his mind then flips to its fixation on confidence that he can have in Christ. And as that happens. As that fixation happens, it begs a question for us today in this passage. And that is: well, then what does confidence in Christ then look like? So let's get away from confidence in our flesh, and let specifically take a deeper look at what does it mean to have confidence in Christ alone?

Well, the first thing that we see in this is that there is a surpassing worth of knowing Christ. The front end of verse seven: But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything of loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage that I may gain Christ. The greatest gains toward your righteousness or whatever forms that you gave to prove yourself worthy outside of the cross of Jesus Christ. There's a word for this in the Greek and it is called skubalon. And you know what that means? It means it's crap. It is dung. And actually one commentator says it would be like the equivalent.

If you want to put confidence in your flesh. It would be.. Here would be the wisdom in that. It would be like when they sacrifice an animal and all the parts that are left over, the entrails, the innards that are left over they can't be used for anything. Those are called ophals. And you what they do it ophals? They throw them to dogs. And the dogs eat the scraps. And so what they're saying here what skubalon in essence is helping you to understand as a word is, don't do it. It is foolishness to put yourself in a measure of hope in anything outside of the cross alone. Man or woman cannot make other things they're gain or their chief confidence and at the same time gain Christ.

So the dichotomy here for us is because of this text, the dichotomy that we have here is there is no Christ and component to be allowed here in the gain. It is either the gain of Christ alone or the hope of other things that will produce gain. And when Paul sees what he has lost, he is reminded of the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus alone. That's it. That's all he needs. The second thing is, when we look at this passage through the lens of confidence in Christ alone, we can see suffering as an opportunity to deepen our faith.

Paul writes about this a little bit here in participating in the sufferings of Christ. But if you want something this week in you're quiet times and then maybe you're looking at the sermon notes this week, I'd encourage you to take a look at 2nd Corinthians 11 verses 16-33. Paul kinda gives us his "Hey listen if you want to talk about suffering for the gospel, I got a few things for you."

Has anybody ever seen the movie Jaws? Show of hands. I know it's kind of a generational miss for the young folks but I don't care, ok. So the movie Jaws. There's this point where the captain of the ship goes down with one of his first mate's into the galley. Thank you Ken, I forgot what the galley was on a ship. And so he corrected me in between services. But basically they did they go down into the galley and there's some libations. I'm not recommending the film Jaws. I'm just saying have you ever seen it. So shame on you if you're convicted. But there's a point where these two dudes. Here's what happens. Like you think you're tough? You think you've been through a lot? Look at this I got this from a Marlin here. And then these two guys who are full of libations. They just start showing each other scars about how tough they are or how they've earned their keep as true sailormen on the high seas. Okay.

Paul does that a little bit in 2nd Corinthians 11 where he talks to us about being in jail repeatedly. I mean he's writing Philippians from jail. He's been beaten and I don't mean beaten just in the sense of oh he was shamed. No, he was flogged repeatedly. He was publicly humiliated for what it was that he believed. He was shipwrecked for he was he's been a part of a ship that went down. He's traveled extensively. And I don't think anybody has pointed to anything where Paul is staying in the Fountain Blue hotel as he was traveling the Middle East to advance the gospel in his day and in his age. And he labored extensively for the gospel without much fanfare at all.

And here's the thing that we need to be careful of as Americans. The Americanization of Christianity can make the idea of suffering unpalatable to many of us. We don't want to take a moment and submit ourselves to the idea that we might have to suffer and we might grow in participating in the sufferings of Christ. I've had the opportunity to be overseas and I've seen my brothers and my sisters face persecution; face being ostracized for their faith. And it is a truly humbling thing to go to different parts of the globe and celebrate with other brothers and sisters in Christ and just be like oh dear Jesus. I dont have it as bad as they have it at all. And they they have such joy. Forgive me Lord. I repent, Lord of some of the ways that I have felt.

But I would just tell you this. You don't even have to do an overseas missions trip. What you might want to consider doing is being very intentional and saying well where are other places that are not like where I live in the United States where I can go and I can see people handle contextually their Christian Christianity in a different context? Go to the urban core. Go to the poor urban core. Spend time. Be slow to speak and quick to listen. And you will see. You will observe some fascinating things for people that have difficulty as they pursue Christ.

Suffering gives us perspective. Hear that: suffering gives us perspective, either in the first person or as an observer. You know Jonathan and I, we have an opportunity where by God's grace and by His mercy we actually get paid to do this, which is an amazing thing. Ok. And I realize I'm gonna be sensitive to this. Not everybody that gets a call to ministry gets to make it their vocation. And so we are incredibly grateful that God would allow for this to happen.

But here is the thing. Ministry will give you a front row seat to suffering in the American west. In the west. Ok. To death. To terminal illness and disease. To marital destruction. To persecution that people experience because of what they believe in the job place or maybe it's at home with their family. Maybe families break down because somebody got right with Jesus, and all the sudden the family dynamic changes. That's not an easy thing. Some of you are here today and you may be going through that very specific thing. I've seen conflict handled appropriately and very inappropriately by Christians. And the suffering that happens there. And I've seen people walk the road of addiction. As they come to Jesus not perfect, trying to work out their addiction through the cross, through being fixated on the cross. There is much suffering to be gained there. And I will tell you this: when you hold the hand of someone who is walking through cancer. When you hold the hand of someone who's going through the pain of persecution, or the loss of a spouse because of their faith. Or a child that walks away because Mom and Dad got religious and then now they follow Jesus and I don't want any part of that. These are very difficult things for people. But it's amazing to watch them fix themselves upon the cross. And it's my hope and I know it's his hope that as God would bring that own suffering or their persecution into my life, or to my wife's life or my family's life, or his wife's life, that we would handle it with the same sort of fixation upon the cross of Christ. But there is more than just that.

Jonathan: Yeah, and maybe the last thing that we could say today. We could probably say more. But the last thing we will say today for confidence in Christ looks like this. Number three: seeing the difference between the gift and the giver. Seeing the difference between the gift and the giver.

Let me show you how this works. Verse ten of our text says: I want to know Christ. I want to know Christ that is his, that is Paul's chief aim. That's his goal. That's his pursuit. I want to know Christ. That's the most important thing to him. And where we get there we get mixed up. And we've all been in this spot. Where we get mixed up is, when we come to God with our laundry list of requests. Sometimes we focus so much on the gift and not on the giver. So we come to God and we say God I want this career. God, I want this relationship. God, I want this kind of financial situation. God, I want this, I want that, I want that car, I want that house. I want. I want. I want. I want. And maybe none of those things are bad inherently. Hopefully.

But something happens when we when we lose sight of the giver and we focus solely on the gift. We take good things and we make them bad things. We take good things and we elevate them to the status that only God belongs in our life. They're no longer good things. I wonder if I bring it to the ground floor. I wonder if sometimes when we come to God with that list. And God I want, I want, I want, I want, I want. And we list off all these things. I wonder if sometimes God is hearing that and saying "When am I gonna be enough? When am I gonna be sufficient? When will my love fill you to the fullest? When will you see the surpassing worth of Christ?" None of those things might be bad things on their own. But, when will you treasure the giver above the gift?

You see, for Paul if we look at this. I'm sure Paul had a list. God, I would love to not be in prison like every other year. That'd be great. God, I would love to not experience flogging and shipwreck. I would love to not feel alone. I would love to not worry about food, about finances. God I want this, I want that. But what Paul says in Philippians 3:10. His greatest want: "I want to know Christ." This reveals our heart, and really where our confidence lies.

Because let me ask you this: don't answer out loud, but ask yourself this internally. If push came to shove, do you want heaven? Bliss? Nirvana? Whatever you want to call it. Do you want heaven? Do you want the God of heaven? Jesus Christ. Do you want comfort? Pain-free existence? Or do you want the God of all comfort? Jesus Christ. Do you want a prolonged, disease free life? Or do you want the one who is the resurrection and the life? The God who heals.

You see, what we immediately rush to exposes where our confidence lies. Because when we know and we see. When we see the difference between the gift and the giver, we expose exactly what we've been treasuring all along. And those misplaced desires that lead us to places where we begin to have confidence in our flesh and in our ability to earn those things. And so we want heaven so badly that we will "Hey God look what I've done for you. You have to let me in. You owe me. Cause I kept your rules. My good has outweighed my bad. You owe it to me" And so we begin to treasure more the gift than the giver.

But for Paul it wasn't like that. You see, if your confidence in your flesh, you will rush to your ability to earn those things. But when your confidence is in Christ you will rest in the fact that when you have him you have everything. Let me just square it for us. Until you have confidence in Christ alone you will never have confidence. Until you have confidence in Christ alone you'll never have confidence.

Because until you have confidence and your confidence rests in Christ alone, everything else is just hedging bets. You're just hedging your bets. So you better try to make sure your good outweighs your bad. Cause it's on you. You better go through all the right ceremonies because then God has to let you in. It's on you. You better take the best from every world religion just so you're safe. It's on you. But there's no confidence there. There's a word for that. Restless. Always pursuing, never resting.

And I want to extend to you exactly the same thing that Paul wants to extend to you from Philippians 3. That is that you don't have to run after those things anymore. That your confidence can be in Christ and you can rest in that. And you don't have to strive, you don't have to try to earn, you don't have to work for it. God has said to us through His Son Jesus Christ "you can rest in confidence in Christ." You see Jesus said come to me who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. Come to me he says. So if you are coming face to face with this reality today that your confidence has been in your flesh. In yourself. In your own ability. Play that out. You're gonna stand before God someday and what will you rest on? Your laurels? Your achievements? Your status? Your performance? Your hey God aren't you lucky to have me? Is that what you're going to rest on or will you rest in Christ?

And if Christ is not your confidence, why not? What barrier have you created? Listen, between you and him, he didn't create that barrier. We did. And we reinforced it with everything that we did to try to put more and more confidence in our flesh. Stop. Jesus says rest in me. Have confidence in me because until you have confidence in Christ alone you will never ever have confidence. Maybe you're here today and also you'd say you know what I'm a disciple of Jesus, but some things have been exposed in my heart. That my confidence in Christ has really veered into arrogance in Christ. You've forgotten exactly what he pulled you out of. You've forgotten exactly what he rescued you from. That he has saved you, delivered you, transformed you, redeemed you. How could we go back to our flesh and say well God are you glad I'm not like them. Your confidence in Christ has veered into an arrogance. Reject that. Leave that behind. Because until you have confidence in Christ alone. You will never have confidence.

Let's bow together for a word of prayer. I'd ask if you don't have to move right now that you wouldn't. What's God saying to you? With your heads bows, your eyes closed, zero in on, focus in on what God has been saying to you through His word. It's not something that Ryan or I could come up with to convince you but what God's word has said to you.

If you're here today, and you're a disciple of Jesus, you know exactly how you ought to live. Maybe some corners of your hearts have been unrelinquished. Still dominated by your flesh, the residual. Get rid of that. Confess that to Christ. Ask him to give you the confidence and assurance of His salvation in your life that will work it's way out into righteous living. This His righteousness will pour through you. That you don't have to try to attain it. He will give it.

Maybe you're here today and you're not a disciple of Jesus. You kinda maybe came at the invitation of a friend, or maybe for something pertaining to your family today and so you came. And you just came at an invitation and this was a new experience for you to listen to something like this. But maybe the lightbulb went on for you today. That was God getting your attention. He wants you to discover what it looks like to have confidence in Christ alone. And if you would make it your heart's prayer to say, "I want that. I want to know Christ." If that's where you are at today, then I would invite you before you leave this place today, that you would stop by a room called the Fireside Room in our atrium. It's clearly labeled Fireside Room. And just walk in there and say "I want to know Christ." Someone in there will pray with you, give you something to take home with you. The only string attached is that we want to help you. So however we can do that, that's the extent of it. But we want to help you on your journey of following Jesus. So come by the Fireside Room. All you have to say is "I want to know Christ." We'll help you.

God, we thank you for your truth. For your word. We thank you for Christ. That we can have confidence in Him. Because He has done what we could not. He has obeyed you perfectly. He came to this earth, lived a sinless, spotless, blameless life, only to die for our sin. To take our place. And to rise from the dead conquering sin, death, hell and the grave. God, I pray that everyone under the sound of my voice today, that we would place our confidence solely in you. Not in anything we can do. And that we would trust you by your Spirit, that you would work that out in our lives as we follow you. It's in the name of Jesus, our savior, that we pray these things. Amen.

Thanks everyone, we love you. You're dismissed.