Episode 77 - Philippians 1:9-11 (We Gotta Walk the Talk!)

The Burt (Not Ernie) Show

Well hey there everyone - hello hello. Welcome to The Burt (Not Ernie) Show - getting the promises of God into the people of God, one podcast episode at a time. This is episode number 77. And I am so glad you are here!

Today we are taking a look at a few verses from the NT.

Philippians 1:9-11 from the Amplified.

Let me read them to you:

And this I pray, that your love may abound more and more [displaying itself in greater depth] in real knowledge and in practical insight,so that you may learn to recognize and treasure what is excellent [identifying the best, and distinguishing moral differences], and that you may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ [actually living lives that lead others away from sin]; filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God [so that His glory may be both revealed and recognized].

Okay, wow so that is a lot, right? I mean, reading it was kind of like drinking from a fire hose. There is a whole lot here. How do we even begin to live this?

Well the answer, and you already know it, is we don’t do it on our own. It is literally impossible to do life as a disciple of Jesus on our own. We must have, rely on daily kind of must have, the Holy Spirit leading us, correcting us, teaching us, giving us wisdom, providing all the fruits of the Spirit, doing His good work in us and then through us.

We will find Phil 1:9-11 becoming our reality by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Right there, right from the get-go, we have this instruction about how to become people whose love abounds more and more, love that keeps displaying itself in greater and greater depth - in real knowledge (like, is it practical as these verses say? What good is knowledge that just puffs us up? No good, as far as the Kingdom of God goes - and time is too short to dabble around in puffy uppy knowledge. NO, thank you!)

Let’s just go through these verses one little step at a time and find the promises God has here for us. He is always speaking to us via His Word and that is not going to stop - so we need to get into our Bibles with a mindset that the Lord speaks through His Word. I believe we can expect that to happen.

First, make a plan to pray. And I mean, plan for prayer time. Don’t just hope you can grab a bit of time here and there to pray. Yes, pray here and there and talk to the Lord all throughout the day - do that, but don’t not do the other! And the other would be to have time to really just be with the Lord and pray. The kinds of things the apostle Paul was talking about here don’t happen with flippant, just got a couple of seconds praying, right?

What did he teach us to pray for?

That our love may abound more and more. This is for all Christ followers, for the big C church every one of us. That our love will display itself in greater depth. OOH, that’s good. And the reason it’s good, is because it’s gonna leave a mark. Like when one of your siblings pops you real good and another sibling laughs and says that is gonna leave a mark! Yeah, love that displays itself in greater depth will leave a mark. Will it sometimes be hard? Uncomfortable to love that? Sure. How did Jesus love us? He didn’t stay in the comfortable lane, and so part of our sanctification, our becoming more and more like our Lord, will be uncomfortable.

Paul prayed for real knowledge and practical insight - this is for the real world, the walking around world, the nitty gritty world we live in every single day folks.

Real knowledge will help you in your job - in your relationships - in your decision making - in your parenting - to know when to put down the phone and take a break from social media and when not to reply to somebody with that snarky comment. Practical insight.

Next Paul says, so that you will learn to recognize and treasure what is excellent. What is excellent? Um, well, whatever God would qualify as excellent, that’s also what we want to call excellent. Learn to recognize the goodness, the excellence, of God at work in this world, in your life. Learn. Look for it. Ask Him to make it clear to you. Expect Him to be doing stuff - because I promise you He surely is! And then, treasure those excellent things. Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father, says the book of James. Every. No wiggle room there. Something good? Perfect? It’s from the Father. Period.

The AMP clarifies a bit about excellence - it says identifying the best and distinguishing moral differences. Yes! When we can identify the best, wow, just think of what that does in our lives? Time isn’t wasted so often because we can identify the best versus what’s pretty good. And distinguishing moral differences - hey, there has possibly never been a time when we have needed this ability more than now! Things like everywhere are moral issues now - everybody has a moral stance on an issue of the day. And hey, surprise, not all their moral stances align with the Word of God. We need to know what God wants us to know in these days.

And that you may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ.

I don’t want anything getting in the way of my focus on having oil in my lamp, being fully ready when Jesus returns. And every day, every moment, literally brings us closer to His return. So, when I meet Him face to face, I want to be pure and blameless. But to be pure and blameless on that day, I need the Holy Spirit to help me be pure and blameless on this day and every day until that day. So yeah, praying these verses has an impact on my right now and on my last day. Thank the Lord He has given us His word and that we can learn from it, grow in it, believe it, pray that He will bring it to fruition in our lives. I am just so grateful for that! And I hope you are, too. God’s Word is always, always bringing us hope.

But we must yield to the Holy Spirit! When He is leading, don’t resist Him. Don’t fight. Where He leads me, there I will follow. I’ll go with, with Him all the way. He wants our lives to lead others away from sin.

Sin has collateral damage. It just does. Jesus wants that collateral damage to be the absolute minimal it can be. He wants people out of sin. And He wants us to live lives that lead others out of sin - away from it. Far, far away from sin.

Filled with the fruit of righteousness - think of the fruit of the Spirit. Having lives marked by evidence of the Holy Spirit, so that people can actually see the difference Jesus makes in our lives. And in their lives! If I am living for the Lord, it ought to make an impact on somebody else, too!

To the glory and praise of God - so that His glory may be both revealed and recognized.

Now if you start praying this over your spouse - your kids - your co-workers - your local church and your small group Bible study - over what you post on social media - your free time - your neighbors. Ummm, can you even start to imagine what could happen?

A lot. A lot, that’s what.

Also, if you would like to sign up for my email list at my website, I am going to start sending out more regular emails. Nothing overwhelming, our inboxes are so full already, but things like a Bible verse and a prayer and maybe the verse for the next podcast episode. I have seen my sign ups increasing the last few weeks and I think I should be better about encouraging listeners and readers with God’s promises.

Pray big prayers based on the Word of God this week and expect to see God move in answer to your praying!

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