“Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you.”
~ Philippians 3:17
Hi James and Ellen,
Your grandmaa and grandpaa are going to listen to life stories this week. Before your grandmaa and grandpaa listen to the life story of a gal who is a missionary with OC International in Bulgaria, the life story of a young gal who will just as soon as she can leave for Guatemala as an OC International missionary and the life stories of a Canadian couple who are moving to England as OC International missionaries where they will oversee the field missionary teams that OC International has in Europe, your grandmaa and grandpaa are to tell their life stories to these three gals and one guy. Your grandmaa and grandpaa cannot tell the kind of life story that Paul told in his Philippians Letter – in Philippians 3, that he sent to the Philippi Christ-follower fellowship of guys and gals. Paul sums up his life story by telling the Philippi Christ-follower fellowship of guys and gals that he was circumcised eight days after he was born because his dad and ma were from the people group of guys and gals who were made up of God’s specially chosen guys and gals – who are the Israelite people group guys and gals, just like every other boy who had a Jewish or an Israelite people group dad and ma were to have done to them, that his dad and ma were from the Benjamin tribal clan, that he was a Hebrew of Hebrews or a Jew of Jews, that he had been a Pharisee with a life passion to make ssure that every Hebrew or every guy, gal and kid who was Jewish observed the Mosaic Law, that his life goal was to persecute the growing Christ-follower family of guys and gals and that he did everything that he could to live a life that was legalistically faultless. The life stories that your grandmaa and grandpaa have begin with your grandmaa and grandpaa growing up in ‘leave it to Beaver’ homes. A ‘leave it to Beaver’ – which is an old TV sitcom, family was an idyllic family that really never had any serious family drama or crisis. Both your grandmaa and grandpaa had a dad and a ma who knew that going weekly to the meeting place of a Christ-follower fellowship of guys, gals and kids, daily reading the Bible and always praying were givens – that it was something that they taught their kids as an absolute to always do. Your grandmaa’s dad and ma and your grandpaa’s dad and ma exemplified what is said in verse 17, “Join with others in following my example, brothers, and take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you.” What kind of life stories do you hope to have?
Are you living your lives after the patterns that your dad and ma are setting for you through their lives? In his Philippians Letter, Paul wants every single guy, gal and kid who reads his Philippian Letter or who listens to his Philippian Letter being read to know that he started out his life doing it all wrong – that everything that he first did with his life gained him absolutely nothing. Paul had internalized what it was like to be an enemy of the new belief paradigm that guys, gals and kids were adopting throughout planet Earth’s developing world – a world that extended when Paul was alive from the city of Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and then northeast towards Asia, Macedonia and Italia. The new belief paradigm that Jews – like Paul, and the Gentiles – who were all the guys, gals and kids who were not Jews, were adopting as Christ-followers – accepted as absolute truth that a guy by the name of Jesus had been tied and nailed to a cross – on which He died as an atonement for their sins. As a Pharisee leader, Paul really believed that his life calling was to defend the Mosaic Law belief paradigms by putting in jails and killing as many of the new Christ-follower guys that he could find, that his personal responsibility to himself was to make sure that his stomach was being fed, that his status and reputation in his societal setting was to shame all the guys who were around him and that his life foci needed to be on earthly things, was divinely given the opportunity to discover that his real home and citizenship is actually in heaven and not on planet Earth. What do you focus on doing each day? Are you trying to make yourselves feel good or are you doing things that God – as God the Spirit, is prompting you to do? Are you putting aside pursuing having position, prestige and power – knowing that position, prestige and power are perceived earthly values but in reality are nothing more than garbage that evil guys – who Paul calls dogs, want, and are you pursuing the profits that are associated with the faith that you have – which has you knowing that the suffering that God – as God the Son – as Jesus, went through for you, is what is helping you to live your lives for God’s sake as Christ-follower kids in a world that an evil fallen angel wants to control?
Do you like to win prizes? How would you feel if your school chose you to be given publicly a prize because you did better in all of your classes in your school compared to what all the other kids did in all of their classes? How would you feel if your school chose you to be given a prize because you were the best behaved kid in your class? Do you think of yourselves as being perfect kids? Paul wrote that he was pressing forward – doing everything that he possibly could, for a prize that he was really looking forward to having one day. The prize that Paul told the Philippi Christ-follower fellowship of guys, gals and kids was that he was pressing towards is the same prize that all Christ-follower guys, gals and kids will receive – a prize that can only be found in heaven. When Paul was alive, the prize that was given to the winner of a race was a wreath of leaves and sometimes money. The prize that every single Christ-follower guy, gal and kid will invariably win is the prize of everlasting glory. You have a choice today; you can do everything that you can today to win earthly prizes that have meaning for just that moment or you can live your lives today in ways that evidence that you know that you are going to be given one day a heavenly prize.
Philippians 3 (709)