Good morning everyone. Can I ask a question? Besides that one! When you think of the word gentleness, what comes to mind?
When I think of the word gentleness I think of BABIES!!! These tiny bundle of a blessings come into the world completely helpless and fragile. It’s absolutely necessary to be gentle with a baby. You can’t toss a newborn, you cannot swing a newborn. You need to cuddle and care for a newborn. You need to watch over and feed a newborn very carefully. Gentle touch soothes a crying newborn and a soft word calms a fussy little one.
But somewhere along the line we loose that gentleness. We let irritation, anger and annoyance come into play. We forget that gentleness is a necessity not just for a newborn- gentleness is required for EVERYONE. It is one of the attributes of a believer who is growing in their walk with God.
What you need before you have gentleness
LOVE- You cannot have gentleness without first having love. Love IS the ground work for Gentleness
JOY- believe it or not JOY is huge – Joy encourages our gentleness
PEACE is the root of our gentleness. It dives deep from our love and gives our gentleness strength.
PATIENCE is the backbone of our gentleness It gives our gentleness stability
GOODNESS is the REASON for our gentleness.
FAITHFULNESS keeps us gentle, even when it is hard.
Gentleness is the practice that leads to self-control (Yep that comes tomorrow).
Gentleness is an outpouring of all of the previous traits of a believer. And that gentleness seen in some believers is the greatest positive influence believers could ever have. Imagine of ALL believers had and practiced this kind of gentleness.
A quick study of the word gentleness/gentle in the Bible will land you in Proverbs,
Proverbs and Gentleness
Verse 1- A gentle answer deflects anger, but harsh words make tempers flare.
This is the other thing that pops into my head when I hear the word Gentleness- this verse has been HUGE in my spiritual walk!
Verse 4-Gentle words are a tree of life; a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.
Verse 28- The heart of the godly thinks carefully before speaking; the mouth of the wicked overflows with evil words.
In Light of verse 4 and of the godly attributes listed in Galatians 5:22-23 This verse just goes on to speak of gentle words. And these verses come from just one Proverbs chapter- Chapter 15.
So many times we have this idea that gentleness is all about a soft touch but when we look at the Bible we see that most of the time gentleness is mentioned it’s about our speech.
And it is starkly contrasted with harsh speech Hence verse one of chapter 15.
We have a choice to make
Like all of the preceding traits we do have a choice to make. Are we going to deflect anger or are we going to fan the flame of it?
That’s a very hard heart question and one we have to take very seriously because our words are so influential. They can build up or they can cut down. They can encourage someone to reach their dreams or they can poke holes into the hearts f those who trust us. We have great power- we just need to choose how to use that power- The power of our influence- the power of our words AND our actions.
So what needs to change? We will ALL need to grow in this area throughout our lives. But what choices and changes can we make now to change our influence from a negative one to a positive one.
I am so glad that you have joined me today and I pray that these posts have been an encouragement and a challenge to your heart!
Goodness– The quality of being morally good or virtuous. (Oxford Languages)
As I looked at this definition I made a connection from our study over the last few days. And something finally made sense or maybe was made even more clear than ever before..
Going back to Love we see that in First Corinthians 13 that the opening verses 1-3 (specifically 3) is talking about goodness and good things and Paul is saying we can be “good” in all sense of the term but if you don’t have LOVE than all of your goodness is in vain- worthless. And then I look at the steps of the Fruit of the Spirit and I see that :
Love. comes first. Then Joy, Then Peace, Then Patience and then Kindnss and right there is the middle is goodness. And my brain swirls with the realization as children right up through adulthood we are told that goodness comes first.
Luke 6:45
And as promised from yesterday we will Focus on the beginning part of Luke 6:45.
It states:
“A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart”.
“From a treasury of a good heart”. A Treasury is something that is stored up. Usually a financial term- A king has a treasury that is usually filled with gold, money, jewels and TREASURES. So let’s take a tiny step back…
As a believer if you have taken the time to grow in LOVE, JOY, PEACE, PATIENCE, and KINDNESS and you have stored them in your heart (That’s your treasury) then you will do good things, and you will be a good (RIGHTEOUS) person.
BUT if you take the opposite of those things HATRED, GRUMPINESS, ANXIETY, IMPATIENCE, RUDENESS they aren’t good or righteous things they are evil . (Be patient with me on the anxiety thing it’s not what you think)
AND NO MATTER which one you choose you also choose what kind of power you influence has….A positive OR A negative influence.
Actions and words are an outpouring of what’s in your heart (Remember the end of the verse?). Goodness is the very character of God. We CANNOT be a Christ emulator- an image bearer of Jesus and have evil in our hearts- You just can’t.
Some passages to Study
James 4:17-17 Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.
2 Corinthians 5:17-17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
Romans 6:1-8:39 (6:1-4)–Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace?2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it? 3 Or have you forgotten that when we were joined with Christ Jesus in baptism, we joined him in his death? 4 For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives
1 John 3:4-11-4 Everyone who sins is breaking God’s law, for all sin is contrary to the law of God. 5 And you know that Jesus came to take away our sins, and there is no sin in him. 6 Anyone who continues to live in him will not sin. But anyone who keeps on sinning does not know him or understand who he is.
And I could keep going.
I plan on dealing with a lot of this when we deal with the opposite of goodness in the Negative influence traits starting next week But from Galatians 5 I want to take a few just to demonstrate what Goodness is and isn’t.
What Goodness is and isn’t
Galatians 5:20-21
Goodness puts others above ourselves- we call it dying to self. This is setting aside our desires and wants (aka selfish ambition). Goodness isn’t self focused. We choose to set aside our preference. Once upon a time we called them sacred cows- things that we thought were Biblical but upon study of God’s word we realize they are just preferences. We need to lay those sacred cows on the altar and offer up to Jesus our will over his so that there isn’t some bovine distraction keeping others from Jesus.
Goodness is self-controlled- it doesn’t have outbursts of anger.
Goodness is filled with Peace It isn’t defined by quarreling. Have you even been around children or adults who are constantly bickering, It’s downright destruction to an atmosphere of peacefulness. BTW. quarreling is usually two individuals/groups fighting to get their own way! (AHEM SELFISH AMBITION).
Goodness is rooted in love not hostility. Have you ever met a hostile person. They are full of bitterness. And it oozes from every word and action. They can bee very conniving too. Always seeking their own way- their own agenda. AND they will do whatever it takes to get it.
Goodness is unifying-it does NOT create dissension and division. It doesn’t seek to drive a wedge between groups of people and create problems. We have actually heard people say it was their job in church to “stir the pot”. To create problems. To create disunity. That’s not GOOD!
Heart Influence
Goodness (or evil) is an outpouring of what is really in our hearts.
When we have thoughts that go against the goodness of God it is sin. And that is really what becomes our greatest influence. We all struggle with these thoughts and feelings- It’s what we do with them that is so very important and the first step to getting these things right with God is repentance. That is the act of asking God for forgiveness and then TURNING AWAY from that sin. It’s a 180 degree turn in the opposite direction.
It’s Your turn- Hard questions
Is there something you are haboring in your heart? Does it spill out into your actions and words? Do you think it is your job to “stir the proverbial pot?” Do you think of yourself better than someone else or that your opinions, desires or boundaries are more important than someone else?
Then let me challenge you to take these things to Jesus! Ask him to change your heart and THEN turn away from it and make choices that take you in the opposite direction. Run away from it. As fast as you can.And when you do that your influence will shift and the very act of making that change is a HUGE positive influence.
Ah Patience. It’s the fourth in line of the Fruit of the Spirit AND it’s the first descriptor of LOVE. But what on earth is patience?
Upon a quick google search I discovered a pretty simple definition of what Patience is.
Patience is defined as the capacity to accept or tolerate delay, trouble, or suffering without getting angry or upset. (Oxford English)
But I’m not super fond of this definition….I mean it’s good and all but this seems like it is built on our circumstances rather than how we LOVE people. Now in Galatians its not just talking about people it’s talking about our entire lives. The circumstances we have going on AND the people we deal with. Patience should be a trait of our entire lives.
So about our Circumstances
Hebrews10:36 says:
Patient endurance (the fact or power of enduring an unpleasant or difficult process or situation without giving way) is what you need now, so that you will continue to doGod’s will. THEN you will receive all that he promises. (NLT)
Life is difficult- running a race is difficult. the Bible talks about life being like a race. Not a 200 meter sprint but a long distance run. And it’s not a race AGAINST other people….it’s a race WITH people. I think we get the idea that if we can talk a good talk and look the part then we have succeeded as a Christian.
The whole time I am writing this a song is playing over and over in my head from my childhood. I was 14 when this song came out. the video impacted me greatly AND if you know my story you know that 14 was a big year. It was the year I had my eye surgery to repair one of my eyes. It’s not a Christian song by any means but it illustrates this patient endurance,
https://youtu.be/gGTLerCCZWY
Standing Outside the fire by Garth Brooks. This song was pivotal for me. It was long before I knew the names ofAny of the Christian artists that echo through our home now.
There is a picture of a mom and a dad and a boy with Down Syndrome. Never in my wildest dreams did I picture that my future husband and I would be parents to a child with a developmental disability- but we are. Thankfully we both act as the mom did in this video. But there are plenty of people in this world who act as the dad and coach do at the beginning.
Patient Endurance isn’t easy
Endurance is slow- It’s not a matter of a fast kick off- it’s not full speed ahead. It means that you need to keep going. It’s not about not falling and not gettign banged up in the process it’s about picking yourself up dusting yourself off and finishing well. You keep the eye on the prize…..The prize is “Good Job faithful servant”.
I HIGHLY recommend the book Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan. An allegory for the Christian life. Every person I know who has had a conversation with me about this book has said they have found themselves within the book. AND not always in the best places.
What about being Patient with the people in our lives?
So many times as Christians we to play the role of the dad and the coach declaring “Certain people don’t belong”. They don’t fit in our “RACE”. We want to run a clean elite race- OR better yet we want to sit in the stands and watch others RUN a GREAT CLEAN race. We are satisfied to turn on TV, Radio, or open a book and be spectators to other people’s races. We want to stand outside the fire. We don’t want to be patient with how God will use us in the race. We want to be used on our own terms. We don’t want to get too involved or in the too messy of situations.
But it is true in the song he says
Life is not tried it is merely survived If you’re standing outside the fire
That’s not what the Christian walk is all about. We are called (all of us, not just the pastors, missionaries or other full time Christian worker) to get our hands dirty in ministry. We are not called to be consumer Christians.
The Church’s attitude
Now I know that this isn’t a Christian Song but the attitudes are the same.
The opening stanzas of the song depict what kinds of people fit and our attitudes towards them.
We call them cool Those hearts that have no scars to show The ones that never do let go And risk it the tables being turned
We call them fools Who have to dance within the flame Who chance the sorrow and the shame That always come with getting burned…..
…….We call them strong Those who can face this world alone Who seem to get by on their own Those who will never take the fall
We call them weak Who are unable to resist The slightest chance love might exist And for that forsake it all
The difference between these two sets of people is one makes us comfortable and one makes us uncomfortable. One pushes our LOVE. The other is EASY . And I had some questions about how to be patient with BOTH sets of people.
I went back to the Bible…..
and did a quick word search for “Patient” And the verse I landed on was PERFECT!
Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other’s faults BECAUSE OF YOUR LOVE!! (Ephesians 4:2 NLT)
Wait WHAT?
Yes you read that right..”.Because of your love”. So the first building block of the Fruit of the Spirit is LOVE and because of that LOVE we CAN have Patience!
This isn’t a new concept for me. See I know this really cute pastor (Ahem -my husband) that taught this very concept of the Fruit of the Spirit being a series of attributes and as you grow you add more steps.
And we will se this as we move throughout the rest of the traits. YOU CANNOT HAVE ANY of the other nine traits if you don’t first have LOVE. Love is the root of all this other traits.
Let’s be Honest though…..
The reason we don’t have patience to begin with is because we don’t want to LOVE THEM ( who is your THEM?)…..for each one of us THEM is different…..and usually it’s because they are way too different from me.
Senior Adults vs Children
Teenagers vs Teenagers
Christians VS EVERYONE
various Races against other Races
Democrats vs Repbulicans (And vice versa)
People with disabilities vs those who do not
and the list is never ending.
For every way we have a difference there is an opposing force ready to let us know how unloved and impatient they are with us. (Note I am not saying that we need to agree on everything- There can still be right and wrong AND love and patience..
Let’s not miss the HOW of being patient
Right smack in the middle of the verse it gives us the “how” ro be patient.
“Making allowance for each others faults”.
” EACH OTHER’S FAULTS”. That indicates SIN !
Oh man this goes against all of culture that says- “I need to protect me”. (Now let me be very clear. THIS ISN’T ABOUT ABUSE. I have spent a huge part of my adult life helping people who have endured and come out of abusive relationships.). This is about the everyday stuff.
This is solely about us being humans and having faults. We all make mistakes and we all have a sin nature. But it is our nature to be like, ” well that person has 3 strikes and then they are out!” Life is not a baseball game people and we need to stop burning bridges. I COMPLETELY understand what it means to be hurt by people. But in the same respect I also have seen some amazing stories of people who were patient and loving and God took that and built something beautiful out of a very messy situation.
Forgiveness is the Root of Patience.
As I sit here writing this I think about all the times I have been impatient with people and it’s a lot. And as I contemplate WHY I was impatient with them, it comes right down to mostly the same things I hear myself say over and over again.
They didn’t do it MY way
They hurt ME
They didn’t do it fast enough….for ME
They made ME uncomfortable.
I didn’t like what they did.
That’s not the way I want it,
We throw a proverbial hissy fit. We revert back to our two year old selves and say “fine if it can’t be my way than I’m taking my toys and going home”.
And we forget the forgiveness given to us. Jesus is our example in this patience and forgiveness.
Forgiveness says ” I have messed up many times and yet Jesus still loves me. He died for ALL of my mistakes. And because he did that I can forgive_______ for _______. Patience is meeting a person where they are at NOT where you want them to be. Patience doesn’t live in expectations of others.
A Big Contrast
This stark contrast is seen in the difference between Jesus and the Pharisees. Jesus wanted to be whole and free from whatever was holding them back. The Pharisees were unhappy with the outcome as they saw it and wanted to make an example of those who didn’t meet the expectations.
Who had the Bigger influence? Jesus who met people in their messes and patiently loved them to a right relationship with God or the Pharisees who lived by the unattainable laws they had created (because the standards of what God gave wasn’t enough)?
BOTH!
Jesus had the biggest POSITIVE influence and the Pharisees had the biggest NEGATIVE influence. And we can tell that by the OUTCOMES of how they treated people.
Jesus’ patience resulted in changed lives. The people who were changed by his loving patience went out and excitedly told other people.They turned away from their sin and said “Look what Jesus did for me”. Or Jesus wasn’t;t afraid of the law- He knew that uncleanness wasn’t what was most important. He HEALED PEOPLE
The Pharisees on the other hand invoked a spirit of fear and dread. Their reputation was known as being judgmental and exclusive. The made scars deeper. They hurt people. Physically, spiritually and emotionally.
Now it’s Your turn
So have you ever experienced impatience at the hand of someone else? Did it have a positive or negative influence on your life? Do you struggle with with patience like me? What is a perspective change you can make so you can become more patient either in your circumstances or with people?
“I’ve Got the peace that passes understanding down in my heart! Where? Down in My heart! Where? Down in my heart to stay.”
This words echo in my heart as I sit here contemplating peace. These are the words of a Sunday school song that I sang as a small child and that I taught my kiddos when they were little as well. So many times we say we want World peace- or a peaceful home. But let’s be honest we live in a pretty chaotic world and our homes can be just as chaotic- and I’m not just talking busy. Busy doesn’t equal chaos. Chaos is defined as complete disorder and confusion. There have been times in our lives when we have lived in complete chaos. BUT just because our circumstances can be chaotic, it doesn’t mean we have to be. The world sees our peace in the middle of the chaos….and they want it AND that can be a HUGE influence.
But as I thought about it I had to ask myself what really keeps peace in the middle of chaos. Because even though the world we know is going crazy around us and even though we feel like we are spinning out of control we can have peace…..The Peace of God is what separates followers of Jesus Christ from the rest of the world.
So how do we get this Peace that passes all understanding?
Amazingly, we have to look no further than the book of Philippians for the answer!!! (I must confess when I started studying Philippians I had no idea that we would be camped there for the majority of this writing series).
6 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7 NLT
Let’s break it down
First off we have a two fold command
Do not worry about ANYTHING
INSTEAD Pray about EVERYTHING
I just love it when the Bible tells us how to replace a problem- it gives us an alternative to combat the sin that is going on in our hearts. BUT it doesn’t just leave it at pray. it tells us how to pray.
Tell Him what you need
AND Thank him for all he has done.
You really do need both steps here. You need to converse with God about what is wrong. BE HONEST. God wants us to communicate with him. He wants to know our hearts and what is weighing on them. He wants us to trust him with that. It’s an act of faith. AND then he wants us to recall and thank him for his past faithfulness. THIS IS HUGE. This is the very reason I choose to do a thankfulness challenge here on my blog every week. Because I know I need to be reminded of God’s faithfulness and goodness.
In verse 7 we are given a promise
THEN you will experience God’s Peace. (It exceeds anything we can understand) And Then the verse says what that peace will do for us….His peace will guard our hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
What does this mean?
When we practice the Release (giving God all of our worries) and Remembrance (recalling and thanking God for all he has done) we experience the peace of God …..and that protects our hearts and minds from the effects of the chaos around us.
It’s easy to fret.
It’s easy to spend our days obsessing over things we cannot control. We live in a fear and worry induced society….Money, family, marriage, work, kids, home, animals, weather, COVID..Yep I went there. Loss of our freedoms (yep I went there too) Our health, our car, our world, the list goes on and on and on…..and each one f those has a million different things to fret over . Our days become filled with “what ifs”. Because our sight is turned inward . To quote Mary Poppins “we can’t see past the ends of our own noses”. We miss all that God is doing around us.
Story Time
I am only going to use this example loosely because it will be used more in depth in a few days in another blog post. BUT I have used this example before and for those who are new here I will give you a brief run down.
In December of 2020 I found myself in and out of the hospital in the worst excruciating pain I have ever experienced. I had two medical procedures (one an emergency). I was CONSTANTLY told “You are a very special case” and “we have never seen anything quite like this before”. Life felt so incredibly out of control and I spent most of December not knowing if I would wake up and need to go back to the hospital.
Low and behold there were lots of other things going on in my body that I had no idea was happening.
During December though as I found myself in the emergency room for the last time and one of the Doctors I had seen regularly came to visit me and see why I was there.. He clearly had looked at my chart before coming into my room. This was the absolute worst I had been in the 3 weeks since that nightmare started. The morphine wasn’t doing a whole lot. H e walked into the room and patted my foot. He told me what was going on…used those phrases agin. And we joked about all that was going on.
I was told that I had to have this procedure done. He used those phrases AGAIN and left. I was taken up to the OR and prepped.
The next morning this same doctor came to visit . I felt great- for the first time in a month. But just prior to him coming in the nurse had come in and flatly dropped a bomb shell. He walked in and I said ” we need to talk”. We talked about the incredible]y scary thing the nurse had said (he was frustrated she said anything). We talked about a few other things and then as he left He patted my foot again and he said ” You are amazing- I have never net anyone who has faced this type of trauma with such a good attitude”. He said that he has seen many other people be angry and rude and frustrated and I met it with a smile.
What he didn’t see…
He didn’t see the countless hours of tears and frustration welling up in my heart. I was at a point with the pain that I felt like I was going lose my mind. I had a handful friends that I could REALLY share my heart with and I knew they were praying for me. And in between moments of counting the tiles on the ceiling in my ER room or hospital room I prayed…about everything. Every little piece of the puzzle that didn’t make sense, every pain, every question, every concern, every what if….and then I thanked God for answering prayers from the day before and the hour before and the minutes before this moment. I had been working to build a life of gratitude for sometime before this. And despite all of the chaos swirling around me I found peace
Practice
In the months to follow the extremes from this experience prepared my heart for the anxiety and PTSD that would come. It was a vicious cycle for 9 months. Just because I had put Philippians 4:6-7 into practice didn’t mean that the anxiety and worry and fretting didn’t come again and again and again. It meant that when it did come my heart and mind were well equipped for the battle. So when my heart started racing in the middle of the night I could pray and sing and thank God for all of the needs he has met in the last year. My heart and my mind were GUARDED. JUST LIKE THE VERSE PROMISED!
Now it’s Your turn
How can you put these verses into practice? One of the most important things I have found is to have at least one person to remind you of these truths- who can ask you to recall how God has been faithful in the past!
ALL THE LINKS
Thank you again for doing me on this journey. Check out all the links below!.
Joy- As Christians Joy is a huge part of our faith. We memorize verses, sing songs and talk all about Joy.
But sometimes as Christians we think happiness and Joy are one in the same. And maybe for the rest of the world that is true. But happiness is circumstantial. Joy on the other hand is eternal. Our world can be crashing down around us and our hearts can leap with Joy at the thought of our HOPE- knowing with confidence tat Jesus died for us and we know he WILL fulfill his promises. Specifically the Hope of eternal life in Heaven.
Joy in the middle
We as Christians also get something else VERY WRONG. We think that Joy equals outward expression of happiness. (aka a smile) If someone is hurting and has an outward expression of such, THAT makes us very uncomfortable. So when they have a smile. on their face it is SUPER easy to pass by and we can feel comfortable that they are ok and that I don’t have to get involved.
But I am here to tell ou can still have JOY in the middle of whatever is going on. It doesn’t require a smile on your face either. Paul from the New Testament faced many hardships, he talked about his sorrow and his tears- life is hard. Paul knew that, Jesus knew that- Jesus Himself hand deep sorrow. He shared that too. He didn’t hide it.
Building On Love
Yesterday we learned all about Love and as we grow in our love the next step we take is built on top. of it- IT’S JOY When you have unconditional love- the same love Jesus gives us, You experience true Joy. Joy that is completely unexplainable.
Philippians: A Lesson in Joy
I have been studying Philippians for a while now and I am amazed at Pau’ls Joy despite his sorrow- (2:27). Paul is telling the Philippians that he God spared him (Paul ) from having sorrow upon sorrow when Epaphroditus almost died from an illness. This indicated that Paul was already dealing with sorrow. But you cannot read the book of Philippians with seeing that despite the sorrow he was still filled with great Joy.
But over what?
Well Right off the bat in Chapter 1 He prays for the Phlippian Christians with great Joy because of their partnership in the Gospel from the very beginning AND he is confident that God will complete the good work the God started in them.
Chapter 1
Then later in Chapter one we see a HUGE indicator of Paul’s Joy . In heres prior to 18 Paul talks about how some believers are taking advantage of him being in prison . They are sharing Christ out of selfish ambition but instead of being over taken by “righteous indignation” Paul’s perspective is Different In verse 18 he asks
But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or True, CHRIST IS PREACHED. And because of this I REJOICE YES I WILL CONTINUE TO REJOICE! (NIV- Emphasis mine)
Wow! We can get so wrapped up into what people think of us or what people are saying about us- but in this example Paul gives us a very healthy dose of perspective!
Chapter 2
Chapter2 starts with what will bring Paul even more- or maybe continued Joy.
Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.Rather, in humility value others above yourselves,4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
Paul’s Joy would be made complete by UNITY. Yes UNITY.
like-minded
having the same love (remember yesterday’s post?)
being one in spirit
and of one mind (the mind of Christ)
So then he goes on to give what exactly this looks like:
DO NOTHING out of selfish ambition (aka don’t seek your own way)
OR vain Conceit ( seeking your own glory)
IN Humility
value others above yourselves
not looking to your own interests but
to the interests of others
Then we goes on to explain even more (in case we couldn’t get the picture) That in our relationships with each other we should have the mindset of Jesus Christ : (verses5-8)
Even though Jesus was in the very nature of God had humility to not think himself equal with God (he could have used this rightly to his own advantage BUT didn’t)
But instead he made himself NOTHING taking on the very nature of a servant- he was made in Human likeness
in taking human form he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death (People he didn’t have to die He choose to die)
And because of THAT kind of humility he was exalted!
My own experience- Positive
I can honestly tell you that when serving with people who have this kind of humility it sparks HUGE JOY! Why? Well because it is a picture of what heaven is going to be like! We were all working together for a common purpose- wWe all had the same heartbeat for that ministry. We gave our all and I loved working on that conference team. We hit road blocks and struggles and sorrows and exhaustion. BUT what Joy!
I know that people say quite often that such and such a thing is “a little piece of heaven on earth”. BUT in reality we can’t really know that because this world is so flawed with sin. We cannot begin to imagine what heaven in all of it physical beauty will be like (physical beauty is usually what’s being referred to in those statements).
However I do believe when you are in the middle of serving Jesus with people who have the unity spoken about in this passage THAT is the closest thing to heaven ion this earth you will bget to heaven AND THAT kind of Joy that is sparked is and will be one of your greatest influences.
My Experience- Negative
What if there is no unity? Well that becomes our negative influence and unfortunately it becomes very obvious very quickly.
The reason….. is mentioned in just a few verses after this. And we will visit THAT in about a week or so! We will spend a LOT of time hashing this out because it is a huge problem and is rooted in entitlement the antithesis of what Paul talks about above.
The rest of Philippians
I know there are two more Chapters left in Philippians and there are still more reasons for Joy found in them but I want you yo dive into them and seek them out for yourselves. Part of this journey is seeking the treasure hidden within God’s wordAnd then I want to discuss them in the comments bellow.
Thank you so much for Doing me on this Journey Through the power of our influence!
