Philippians 1:7-8

John Bunyan

John 15:18-20: “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. 20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you.”

2 Timothy 3:12: “Yes, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.”

Luke 14:26-27: “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.”

Text: Philippians 1:7-8 “It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.”

Unified Gospel-Joy Through Persecution

I. Persecution Helps Us Appreciate the Grace of God Given Through the Gospel. (vs.7) “It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel.”

A. Joyfully Sharing the Reproach of the Gospel Will Help Us to Love One Another, Uniting Us. “It is right for me to feel this way about you all, because I hold you in my heart…” (1:7a)

Jonathan Edwards: “All the fruits of the Spirit which we are to lay weight upon as evidential of grace, are summed up in charity, or Christian love; because this is the sum of all grace. And the only way, therefore, in which any can know their good estate, is by discerning the exercises of this divine (love) in their hearts; for without (love), let men have what gifts you please, they are nothing.”

B. Joyfully Sharing the Reproach of the Gospel Will Unify Us In Our Equal Partaking of God’s Grace. “…for you are all partakers with me of grace…”(1:7b) John Newton: “Amazing grace! How Sweet the Sound! That saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found. Was blind but now I see!”

Ephesians 2:8-9: “For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not by works, lest any man should boast.”

Grace = “unmerited favor” John 1:13: “not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.”

C. Joyfully Sharing the Reproach of the Gospel Will Unify Us No Matter What. “…both in my imprisonment…” (1:7c)

D. Joyfully Sharing the Reproach of the Gospel Will Unify Us “in the Defense and Confirmation of the Gospel” (1:7d) - “defense” (ἀπολογία; apologia) and “confirmation” (βεβαίωσις; bebaiosis) are legal terms - ἀπολογία = “apology”; “apologetics”: refers to a speech that is given in defense of something or someone

Mark 16:15: “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel”

II. Persecution Helps Us Appreciate Other Christians with the Proper “Affections” (vs. 8) “For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.”

II. Persecution Helps Us Appreciate Other Christians with the Proper “Affections” (vs. 8) “For God is my witness, how I yearn for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.”