Philippians 1:8-14 – That Your Love May Abound

Philippians
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Text: Philippians 1:9-14
Title: That Your Love May Abound
Date: November 20th, 2022
Location: Christ Covenant Church – Centralia, Washington

8 For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ. 9 And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; 10 That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ; 11 Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God. 12 But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel; 13 So that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace, and in all other places; 14 And many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.

Introduction

Last week we said that Philippians is Paul’s happiest letter, and in our passage this morning, he really starts to pour on the love. But before we get into these verses, let us refresh our memories with the context for this letter:

  • Where was Paul when he wrote Philippians?
    • Rome, about 800 miles from Philippi. It would take about a month or more to travel this distance.
  • Who brought Paul a gift from the Philippians?
    • Epaphroditus (Phil. 4:18). Paul calls him in Phil. 2:25, “my brother, and companion in labour, and fellowsoldier…” And Epaphroditus almost dies from sickness (likely from traveling), but God has mercy on him, and he is on the mend.
  • How long has it been since Paul planted the Philippian church?
    • About 13 years. He planted the church in Philippi on his second missionary journey in 49 AD, and he writes Philippians in 62 AD.
  • Where in the book of Acts are we given this story of Paul planting the church in Philippi?
    • Acts 16:8-40.

One of the reasons this is Paul’s happiest letter, is because the Philippian church is the first church to financially support Paul’s ministry. He thanks God for their “fellowship in the gospel,” and calls them “partakers of my grace.”

  • Whatever rewards Paul receives from God on judgment day, the Philippians will have some share in it. This is how God’s economy works. And this is how we work together as one body. As the missionary William Carey said before he went to India: “If you will hold the rope, I will go down.” The Philippians are holding the rope, as Paul goes down to suffer for the Name. Now what does holding the rope look like?
    • We might think of Lydia, who was the first Christian in Philippi. She was a merchant who sold purple stuff. And this Christian “business woman” (we might call her), is doing kingdom work when she provides beautiful colored clothing for people, when she runs her business in an honest and profitable way, and does it for the glory of God.
    • And then, when the opportunity arises to bless or help someone else, she has the means to do so. We cannot give what we do not have, and God had placed Lydia with means, in Philippi for this very purpose.
    • There is a long chain of people and circumstances and sacrifices big and small, that God uses to bring us into His kingdom. Think of your own story.
      • How did you come to faith?
        • Your eternal salvation depended upon God’s good pleasure in arranging someone to tell you the good news. Whether by a preacher in the pulpit, or parents spanking the sin out of you, whether by a YouTube sermon, a conversation with a friend, or a Bible left in a hotel room, there is a long chain of events that God used to save you, and all of them trace back to what we read in this Book.
        • So what we might consider in the moment to be of very little significance, can have ripple effects into eternity. We would not be here without the work of the apostles, and those that supported them, and countless other people in between.
        • So when we read Philippians, or any other book of the Bible, treat it as though you are reading your own family history because you are. We as wild olive branches have been grafted into this story (Rom. 11).
        • Now with all of this in mind, let us proceed through these next seven verses, verses 8-14.

Outline

We could divide these seven verses into two sections:

  1. Verses 8-11 give us the contents of Paul’s Prayer
  2. Verses 12-14 give us Paul’s explanation of his imprisonment

Starting in verse 8, He says,

 8 For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.

  • Paul calls God to witness the genuineness of his longing for the Philippians. That is to say, what I feel for you in my heart, God knows and sees and can testify to. And I appeal to Him that my love for you is “not in word only, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18). This is the strongest language Paul can use to communicate his love by letter.
  • He then goes on to say that this love for the Philippians, is not merely the natural love that a mother might feel for her baby, or that two unbelievers might feel in the bond of marriage. Those natural loves are good, but this love Paul has for the Philippians is supernatural, it is a gift from God, what the Christian tradition has called “charity.” And we know this love/charity/agape is supernatural because it is “in the bowels of Jesus Christ.”
  • What are “the bowels of Jesus Christ?”
    • In Greek the word is σπλάγχνοις and it signifies the inward parts of your being, what we might call “the feels” or your gut. It’s where you experience anxiety, nervousness, love, excitement, changes in your appetite, etc.
      • According to modern science (take that FWIW), they say about 95% of the serotonin in your body, is actually produced in your gut. It’s not all in your head, it’s in your bowels, your innards.
    • So the σπλάγχνοις of Jesus Christ refers to this deep affection in God, in Jesus Christ, which Paul participates in. He loves the Philippians with the very love of God. That is what supernatural love is: to love someone with the love that God has for them. And this is what we should pray that we start to feel for one another.
      • If you look around this room, we are an odd-looking family. We come from different places, we are different ages, we are in different stages of life, we like different things, and despite what we might think, we are not all inherently lovable.
      • And it will take supernatural love to keep us together. We are going to have cover one another’s sins in love. We will have to tell one another at times, I was wrong, I sinned against you, I meant that mean thing I said, and it was sinful, will you forgive me?
        • It will take supernatural love and humility to keep us together.
      • And so we must ask God to give us this love that is in the bowels of Jesus Christ. So that what God feels for others, we feel in ourselves.
  • So Paul longs for and loves the Philippians in Christ. Now how does this love manifest itself?
    • Well love is manifest in words, we should say that we love one another. Start there. But more than that, this love compels Paul to pray, and there are three things he prays for in verses 9-11.

Verses 9-11

And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; 10 That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ; 11 Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God.

The first thing that Paul prays for is…

#1 – That your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment (vs. 9)

  • Now because God is infinite and we are finite, there is no end to which our love can increase. So if God’s love is a vast and endless ocean, our love is the size of whatever cup, or bowl, or bucket that we can bring to that ocean, fill up and carry us.
    • It says in Psalm 119:32, “I will run the way of thy commandments, When thou shalt enlarge my heart.”
    • Our love can abound more and more when God gives us strength to carry a bigger bucket to the ocean. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 6:11-12, “O Corinthians! We have spoken openly to you, our heart is wide open. You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted by your own affections.”
    • Paul’s prayer is that the Philippian’s would have love without restriction, and that God’s supernatural love would be constantly pouring out from one member to another. When you are low, I fill you up, and when I am low you fill me up. This is what it means for love to abound in the church.
  • Now this love must not be confused with mere sentimentality (warm feelings for one another). That is good, it is nice to feel it, we hope we have that, but notice that Paul prays for this love to abound “in knowledge and in all judgment.”
  • What does this mean?
    • First, it means that love is not ignorant. Paul says in Colossians 1:9, I “desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding.”
    • So one of the ways you can know that God’s love is inside of you, is that you desire to know Him more. You want to read your Bible, you want to talk to Him. You want to talk to other people, and you are interested in other people besides yourself.
      • As it says in 1 John 3:14, “We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death.”
      • Is your love abounding in the knowledge of God and His people?
    • Second, this love is to abound in all judgment.
      • We live in day that says love and judgment are opposed to each other (they are opposites). Our culture has made being “non-judgmental” the defining characteristic of love. But this is anti-Christ. This is the opposite of how God defines what love is.
        • 1 Corinthians 13 says, “Love does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoiced in the truth.”
        • Hebrews 5:13-14 says, “For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. 14 But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.”
      • And so mature God-like love does not simply approve of everything that someone does. And in fact, it is unloving to do so. If God’s love for sinners simply approved of them, then why did Christ die? If God’s love for sinners was non-judgmental, then why does command everyone everywhere to repent?
        • For us to approve of sin is actually to hate the person we claim to love, because sin is destructive to the person doing it.
        • God says in Proverbs 8:38, “He that sinneth against me, wrongeth his own soul: All they that hate me love death.”
      • So far from approving of sin, love requires judgment, discernment, a sense of right and wrong. Love is to seek someone else’s good, and without judgment, how can you know what that good is?
      • And this leads to the 2nd petition in Paul’s prayer (verse 10)…

#2 – That ye may approve things that are excellent (vs. 10)

  • Love not only judges and disapproves of sinful things, it also approves of and applauds that which is excellent.
    • And so one of the ways we can practice this as a church is by encouraging and honoring one another when something is done well.
    • This is what parents are to do with their children. We discourage vice, and praise virtue. When your son or daughter cheerfully obeys, praise them. That is excellent!
    • When your children reach the age where they start to look for a spouse, or must choose a career path or a place to live, will they want to come to you because they trust your judgment? Will you have demonstrated for the last 20 years that you love what God loves and hate what God hates. And that you approve of that which is excellent, and disapprove of things that would harm your children.
    • That kind of trust cannot be built overnight, and so begin now, wherever you are at. Approve things that are excellent, and disapprove of folly and sin.
    • The purpose of all this comes in Paul’s third petition for the Philippians in verses 10-11.

#3 – That ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ; Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God. (vs. 10-11)

  • The sense of this third petition is that the Philippians would be authentic Christians, not giving the watching world a reason to blaspheme.
    • This means reflecting Christ’s character wherever you are. At work, in the car, in your home, when you shop at Walmart.
      • Don’t be that frustrated parent who cuts down and demeans your child. Don’t be that annoyed and disrespectful husband or wife. And don’t just avoid looking like you are one of those, sincerely be the person Jesus is calling you to be.
  • When the church reflects the contents of these three petitions, abounding in love, approving that which is excellent, living in sincerity and without hypocrisy, the world will notice. Doors will open for us to preach and receive a favorable hearing. This is the kind of public reputation God wants us to have, but it must start in private, in the heart of every person here, in the places when nobody else is watching, except God.

So that is Paul’s prayer for the Philippians (vs. 8-11), and then he moves on in the next section (vs. 12-14) to give an example of how God is using Paul’s imprisonment to further the gospel.

  • Now if anyone was “sincere and without offense,” it was Paul. He says in 2 Corinthians 6:3-6, that we “Giving no offence in any thing, that the ministry be not blamed: But in all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings; 6 By pureness, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned…” (and it keeps going). Paul’s ministry was sincere and without offense, He was above reproach, and yet people reproached him all the time.
  • This is the guy who has been imprisoned multiple times, had mobs chasing him out of cities, is known amongst the Jews for preaching contrary to the laws of Moses (a false accusation) and was kicked out of Philippi for stirring up trouble. So when Paul says to be “sincere and without offense,” he doesn’t mean that everyone will think you are sincere and without offense; he means in the eyes of God and in reality you are.
  • So he wants the Philippians to have a heavenly perspective on his imprisonment, rather than an earthly one. Prison is not a setback, it is a step forward. He says…

Verses 12-14

12 But I would ye should understand, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the furtherance of the gospel; 13 So that my bonds in Christ are manifest in all the palace, and in all other places; 14 And many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear.

  • This is the beginning of a major theme in this book (and one that we will return to), and that is that Prison is a Prelude to Dominion.
  • What does this mean?
    • Who was the first person in the Bible to be imprisoned?
      • Joseph.
      • Like Paul, Joseph was persecuted by his brothers according to the flesh, they envied him, and wanted him dead. And yet Joseph’s imprisonment was the prelude to God exalting him to the right hand of Pharoah.
        • And more than that, Joseph’s suffering and then exaltation becomes the way that God actually saves the world from famine, including the very brothers who persecuted him. As he says in Genesis 50:20, “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.”
      • Paul knew the story of Joseph, He knew the story of Daniel, He knew the story of Christ and recognized the pattern, that in order to ascend, we must first descend. That the pit is where God prepares us for the palace. And that when we are down there, God keeps his choicest wines in the cellar of affliction.
      • This is the perspective Paul wants the Philippians to have. That even when the enemy gets what he wants, God has a glorious purpose in it for His people.
    • This is the story arc of the gospel, and the story arc of your life if you follow Jesus: Cross before Crown, Humiliation before Exaltation, Death and then Resurrection.
    • The disciples thought that the death of Jesus Christ was a real set back? Evil won. Injustice prevailed. And yet that is how God saved the world. That is how God saved you. And it is how He continues save people today.
  • If we believe this, then we don’t have to be afraid of anything. We can look death and prison in the face, and see God’s gracious hand in all of it.
  • In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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