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We cruise along thinking everything seems worth rejoicing in—until something smacks us over the head and forces the question of what really matters. Paul faces that same reckoning in Philippians 3, listing every credential and mark of status he once counted as gain.
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This transcript has been automatically generated and may contain errors.
So we started about a month and a half ago exploring real rejoicing versus fake rejoicing. And if you recall, as we re-examined that opening video, we realized that there are several forms of fake rejoicing, right? There were things that just were askew, that were upside down. There are also things that were AI-generated that didn’t exist at all but looked good. Sort of the way it is in life in general, I think we have those moments where we’re cruising along, everything seems nice, it seems worth rejoicing in, and then something smacks us over the head. We have to evaluate what’s real, what’s really meaningful.
I can’t help but think every year, yesterday was January 11th, I can’t help but think of that date every year. I’ve shared this story somewhat in the past, but it was on January 11th, 1998, that my grandparents’ house burned down. And if you’ve been through a house fire, you probably know a little bit of what I’m describing. But I can still smell it, the burnt stuff that was slowly thawing in the January charred snow. I remember driving—this was before the 364 extension—you drive over 70 to get to their house; they lived in Maryland Heights. You drive over there and normally it was just happy, you’re driving in St. Louis County, I’m getting close to my grandparents. I remember that day seeing this giant plume of smoke from the bridge and you just knew. You knew it was bad. I didn’t have any idea at the time just how bad. My grandparents never really were the same after that. They got out of the building physically, but mentally neither of them were ever the same. And my uncle who lived with them struggled a great deal after that for a variety of reasons as well.
And so it was one of those moments that the night before we’d had our end of the Christmas season Christmas party, because we love spreading out Christmas in the family. And so I remember being at their house and the lights were lit, and it was, there was snow on the ground. It was a beautiful January night. Grandma made a beautiful Christmas dinner and everything seemed like it was worth rejoicing in. And then, where are you? January 11th when it’s burnt down. We walked through the steps with someone who’s dying. It also brings you to that point, and it sort of amplified for me tonight. I know most of you know my uncle is actively nearing death, and we went to see him just before coming here. He’s not responding anymore at all. And we know it’s just a matter of time probably, a matter of hours. And it does challenge you to think about everything.
I find myself thinking about things he loved to do, things he loved that he had. His prize possession was a 1985 Trans Am. It was beautiful, bright red. And outside of that, it was his birds that he took care of. And as he declined, we had to dispose of the Trans Am and find someone to take the birds and care for them and watch those things that meant the most to him go away. Other than, of course, his family. He loved us deeply, and there was no doubt in our minds on that. And you get to those last moments and you think, well, what really matters? And in that moment, we’re challenged. But you don’t want to get to that moment before you’re challenged. And we struggle as people to know what really matters.
Paul talks about this in Philippians chapter 3. If we turn to verse 4, we read these words: “Though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh, if anyone else thinks he has grounds for confidence in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised the eighth day of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews, regarding the law a Pharisee; regarding zeal, persecuting the church; regarding the righteousness that is in the law, blameless. But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ.”
Let’s pray. Father, as we come to Your Word, we do pray that You would help us to be those who remember what is truly gain and what’s truly loss. Would You help us to hold on to it? And if we haven’t yet, to make tonight the night that we hold on to it. We pray in the precious name of our Savior Jesus. Amen.
Paul, by worldly standards, had the things that matter, the things that you rejoice in. In his culture, he had all the marks of status. He was a Pharisee. Now, we use Pharisee as an insult. It sounds like, Paul, I thought you were trying to build yourself up here, and you’re tearing yourself down. No, Pharisee was a compliment. Today, we use it to talk about someone who’s hypocritical and legalistic, but he was at the height of achievement. We know from this and other places where Paul writes, when he’s talking about being a Pharisee, he’s not even just your everyday, ordinary Pharisee that managed to get by with low grades at the off-campus, long-distance Rabbi Learning Institute somewhere. No, he went to the Ivy League. He studied under the best rabbis. He knew the Bible probably better than any of us ever will. When he cites the Old Testament, he’s more than likely not looking up in the scrolls. He wouldn’t have owned them. People didn’t have personal Bibles. They couldn’t afford it. What was he doing? He memorized it. And not only did he know it, Paul lived it.
God talked about living a righteous life, following His law. Paul lived His law. You try to look at Paul’s life and point someplace where he fell short; you couldn’t find it. Not by the standards of the law. Now, he’s writing to Christians, so saying persecuting the church isn’t exactly a compliment, but they know where he’s coming from, from the standard of being a Pharisee, from the standard of being someone who is part of the religious establishment of Israel. Paul’s persecution of the church wasn’t him having an anger management issue or being judgmental. It was being zealous for the Lord, for saying, “These weirdos, you hear what they’re talking about? They’re talking about that God came down in the flesh, and they’re calling some person that was an enemy of the state God himself. Do you realize what kind of blasphemy this is?”
Paul, by every measurable worldly standard of the time, had the credentials, had the abilities, had the blood, sweat, and tears, and the willingness to go and then fight for the Lord. If he listed off these things, if he’d taken them to the Sanhedrin, the council of the leaders of the religious establishment, if he’d taken it to them and said, “Look, here are all the things that I’ve done,” they would have said, “Now let’s see what kind of new medal we can give you. What can we do to commend you, Paul? Let’s give you the Lifetime Achievement Award. Let’s give you Alumni of the Year Award for Jerusalem University. You are amazing, Paul.” That’s the kind of thing that they would have respected and loved. Paul was a rising star.
Today, he would have had one of the most followed TikTok accounts. He would have been the preacher that everyone cites and the one that gets on the New York Times bestseller list before the book even becomes available. “How to persecute upstart churches.” Paul had it all, and he was on a trajectory where what he had was going to build to what he would have. As he aged, and in this culture, they respected age. As he grew older, he’d be a wise and respected veteran rabbi. What would they have done? They would have said, “I want to study under him. He knows all this stuff.” And as we look at his letters, we know Paul didn’t just know the Bible, which of course is the most important thing, and they agreed with us on that— that’s what you should know. He not only knew that, he knew the knowledge of the world. He could write letters that held up to ancient standards of composition. He knew the philosophy and the poetry of the day.
Paul was an incredibly learned, incredibly accomplished man. And not very different from today, those are the sorts of things we like to brag about, right? We accomplish something, we win an award, find some way to kind of just flip it in the conversation, right? “Oh, I’m so sorry I couldn’t come over last week. I was receiving recognition for getting the top salesperson of the year. No big deal.” We might just try to put some false humility over it, but those are the things that still drive us so often.
It’s kind of interesting thinking over this week. I can’t help but spend a lot of time thinking about death. And as I think about when I’ve walked with families through death, you have those conversations preparing for a funeral, and you talk about, “Well, if I don’t know the person,” and I’ve had the blessing at times to come alongside families that don’t have anyone to do the funeral and to do those funerals. And so you’re trying to learn about the person. You ask about this person, you start to hear the stories, and you hear some beautiful stories of these people. But oftentimes you also hear some things like, “You know, he was so successful. She accomplished all these achievements that were recognized by this body or that body.” And I’ll think about those, and I’ll know that those are the things often the family’s still holding on to. These are the things we want you to know about this person. These are the things we want you to talk about as you share about the person during the message.
And I’ll keep probing because, well, exactly where does that get you now? And there’s usually a way to talk about them still to respect the family’s wishes because, okay, I’m trying to get some of the flavor of the person and use that to then step into the hope that we have in the gospel. But sometimes it’s a challenge because it’s all about these worldly accomplishments.
Paul has all these worldly accomplishments, and Paul could have spent his whole life continuing to charge towards them. Last week we looked at King Herod and the wise men, and you think about them as they approach the promise of the Savior coming into the world and how different it is for the wise men versus Herod. Herod wants what is in the world, and to the extent that he doesn’t have it, he’s not the beloved king. He’s not even recognized by many of his own subjects as the legitimate king of the Jews. He wants that.
But the wise men, what do they have going on in their lives? The funny thing is we don’t really know. We can speculate. We have some idea of where they probably came from. Did they probably come from Babylon or that general region? They came from the East, we know that. What were their lives like? We don’t even know their names. There’s tradition that came hundreds of years later. We don’t even know their names. The one thing that Scripture records, the one thing that God wants us to know was consequential about them was that they came and responded to this promise and came and saw Jesus. That’s the thing. Not where they’d studied, not how many languages they spoke, not how respected they were, revered, or how often they had the ear of their kings and emperors. They came to see Jesus.
Paul, in his life, what was he doing? Let me list it out here. He says, “I was going around persecuting the church, the people who saw Jesus, the people who spoke of seeing Jesus, the people who believed in the promise of the Messiah. I persecuted. I got praised for it. I got on the cover of all the magazines for it. You know, when JNN had its Sunday morning news show, I was on all the time talking about these Christians and all the problems they had. I was the respected religious expert.” But it wasn’t what really mattered. Just as Herod having the ostensible power wasn’t really what mattered because he wasn’t following the Lord, Herod could have had a different story. Herod could have been the puppet king of Rome, yes, but the faithful man who in that role sought to recognize what God was doing. He could have done that. He doesn’t choose to do that because why? He wants to hold on to the worldly power and acclaim.
But what did the wise men do? Well, they’re in their comfortable place and in likely a very comfortable setting in a comfortable capital with every resource they could possibly want in the ancient world. And as the Holy Spirit worked on them, they studied God’s Word. And surely they were wise men. That was their job. They were those who studied the ancient knowledge, so it was part of their job. But they somehow were drawn into this Word that had probably been left with them because of the exile and the time that the Jews had spent in Babylon. And they start reading through the prophets. And they read through the prophets enough that when something happens, they’re ready to recognize it.
And I thought, well, quite possibly one of the things they read, for example, was Numbers 24:7. As Balaam, another pagan, another non-believer, is used by the Lord. He says, “I see him, but not now. I perceive him, but not near. A star will come from Jacob, and a scepter will arise from Israel. He will smash the forehead of Moab and strike down all the Shethites.” They probably knew that. And when they saw that star, that was probably one of the prophecies they thought of. And they decided to do something different than Balaam, because Balaam was in it for the money. Balaam was in it for the glory.
And he gives this prophecy, and he actually is interacting with God. He, I mean, he gets to talk to a donkey. If you don’t know that story, you should go back and read it. It’s just—yes, there is a talking donkey. Doesn’t sound like Eddie Murphy, I don’t think, but talking donkey in Scripture. Because the Holy Spirit comes upon this animal and uses the animal to speak to him. What does he do? Told a few chapters later, he comes up with a plan to ensnare Israelites into sin. He says, “Okay, I’ve encountered the Lord. I’ve given these prophecies in spite of myself about the majesty and the power of the Lord. I’ve felt God prevent me from doing the things I wanted to do. He’s that powerful. Never felt that from any of the other gods that I tried to speak for. But I’m not getting anywhere by doing that. What does that do for me? It makes the kings that are normally my patrons angry at me because I’m giving prophecies that are reflective in a bad way towards them. I’m not speaking the things that make their subjects fear them. I’m not speaking the things that benefit them. I’m not smiting God’s people that are getting kind of large, and my normal customers are nervous about what these people are going to do. And I want that. I want the success. I want the money. I want the power.”
Those are the things that I count as gain. There are lots of opportunities for the Magi. They said, “We want to go see this baby. He can’t do anything for us, but we believe that God’s speaking, and so we want to follow him.” And if you’re here, you’re probably saying, “Well, I want to follow the Lord, too.” If you’re online tonight, you’re probably saying, “I want to follow the Lord.” But all of us say that, but then it’s a little harder to do it than to say it, isn’t it? Just a little. I get going really well. I am just charging along. I’m following the Lord right, and then I get out of bed. I think it’s harder. What am I going to do? What are you going to do?
We say, “Well, part of the problem is I just don’t know what to do. There’s all these things that are allegedly important. There’s things to achieve. There’s accomplishments to be praised for. There’s money and power and status, and some of that seems like it could even be useful for God’s work.”
You know, one thing that Paul doesn’t say as he goes along here is, “I really wish I’d never learned any of this stuff. I wish I hadn’t spent years agonizing over what Scripture says. I wish I’d never learned how to write a proper classical Greek letter. I wish I could just take it all out of my mind and forget it.” No, he doesn’t say that because he realizes God’s going to use it, but he realizes it’s not what matters, and that’s a key difference. And where we often get messed up, or I often get messed up, is trying to sort through the noise there. What are the things that God wants me to pursue and do because He’s using as a platform for what He intends, and what are the things that don’t really matter?
We see so many studies today on the things that matter for our health, right? We want to live healthy lives, and so some studies make us more excited on that end than others. I get really excited every time I see a new study promises health benefits from coffee. I love those. Jeff, I know that I can get an amen from you on that one. Health benefits from coffee. There was a brand new one this week that said that if you consume three cups of coffee every morning, that group that they studied over the course of 10 years had something like one-third fewer heart problems. This is a good study. I like it. Now, we’re speaking truth, right? But the problem is what we realize, and I often say when I refer to one of these studies, I say it half-jokingly because I know there’s another study someone’s going to pull up that’s going to say the opposite. There are going to be debates on these things, and it’s going to change not just because there isn’t a truth to some of it, but because we’re still studying it and trying to understand complex systems and how different things interact, and so maybe it’s really good in this way and not in that way.
You just scan the last few months. They’re not that long ago. There was a headline on how much alcohol would be good for people to drink to stay healthy. I’m a teetotaler, so who knows what that means for me, I guess. But then you find one that says, “No, it’s going to cause liver damage, and it’s bad,” and so on and so forth. It’s really important that we are engaged and lively and interacting with people a lot, because that keeps us mentally sharp. And then another that says, “You know, the problem in our culture today is our minds don’t have enough silence to rest and stay healthy.” What should I follow?
And what’s true for our health is true for our spiritual health, because we have all kinds of people saying, “Well, here’s what God’s Word says, and now let me tell you what it means now. Here’s what you should do. Here’s my 10-step book. Here’s my 20-step book. Here’s my three-step express, better new you in the new year book.” And we think, “Well, some of them are saying opposite things. They’re saying this is how I grow in my faith, but now what?”
Paul had lots of people telling him how to grow in his faith. Paul doesn’t deny that. He doesn’t say, “You know, when I was a young Pharisee, I was really incredibly arrogant, and all the elder rabbis that told me how to follow the law, I ignored them all. I just rejected them, and I went my own way, and I did these horrible things.” No, Paul says, “I followed them. I heard what they were saying. I said, I want to be used by the Lord,” and I charged out. And I was going, I was willing, I was willing to actually bring capital punishment on those who wouldn’t give proper respect to the Lord. I’m willing to go that far.
But where is Paul as he reflects here in Philippians 3? As he comes later in life, as he is imprisoned, and the freedoms that life that he had embraced would have continued to grant him are no longer there—in fact, rejecting them has put him in this place that he’s in—what does he say? They don’t really matter. It’s like when we are there, and all of us someday, unless the Lord returns before then, we’ll be there at some point. What matters when we’re the person not being the visitor to the dying person but are the dying person? What’s going to matter then?
Verse 8, Paul says, “Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and may share His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death.”
Paul says, “You know, it felt pretty good. I can list these things out, and I’m listing the right things because I know the things that cause people to praise me. I know the things that cause people to say, ‘Hey, you’re a pretty big deal. You’re important.’” And for that matter, you think about it. We’re told in Acts there’s a fear initially as people encounter the convert Paul. Well, why? Because they already knew who he was.
And you think about the people that you like least, and imagine for a moment they would actually fear you so much, they wondered if it was even safe to be around you, because you were so zealous for your cause. I’d imagine in that time before his conversion, I would imagine that Paul felt pretty good when he knew that there were people trembling at the mere name Paul, or rather Saul at the time. Now, what does Paul do? He’s the one being beaten and persecuted and imprisoned, ultimately the person who’s going to die.
I believe Paul’s realistic in that, in this moment. Yes, he’s still alive, but I don’t think Paul of the letter to the Philippians would be the least bit surprised at his ultimate death. Paul’s not saying, “Everything’s going to go okay for me. The reason I don’t mind giving up all this stuff is because Jesus is going to send down a chariot of fire like he did for Elijah, and everything’s going to go great for me.” No, Paul says, “I just want to be like Jesus. If it means being rejected like Jesus was rejected, that’s what I want. If it means dying as He died, that’s what I want.” Because all the things I held on to, all the things that achieved comfort for me, and gave me a life that was the life that from when I was a young man I thought I wanted, all those things ultimately, they’re not the thing.
Now, Paul had a pretty great teacher to help him be correct on this, you might say. He actually encountered Jesus Himself, and Jesus said, “Hey Paul, we need to make some corrections here. We need to do things a little differently. You’re persecuting Me.” We don’t usually have that kind of utterly dramatic conversion experience, but where each and every one of us is, we’re constantly challenged as we come to this. This is why Paul’s writing this. He’s not writing this just because he wanted to make sure that his autobiography was recorded. Paul’s writing this because he knows each and every one of us is going to have those places.
There’s some place that people respect you, that it feels pretty good. I don’t know what it is for each and every one of you, but there’s some place where you walk in, and you know people feel better when you walk in. Well, one of them’s here. I’m thankful that when each and every one of you walks in, it certainly does make me feel better. And there’s lots of places like that. We want that, right? We want people to feel better, and that’s a good thing. When we think about what Paul’s telling Timothy, he’s saying be kind to people so they actually, they’re ministered to, ministered to by you. And so it’s good to make it so people are comforted when you come into a room.
But maybe it’s some place, maybe it’s when you’re at work and you go into a meeting and people know that you’re the person who knows what’s going on. You’re the person that can call the shots. Or maybe even if you’re not formally that, even the supervisors and bosses know that you really are the one that knows, and there’s certain comfort in that. Maybe it’s in your neighborhood. You’ve been there for a long time, and if someone new moves in, they know that they can come to you and find out something if they need it.
For those of you that, as you came here, you gave up being a part of a church you’d served at a long time, and suddenly you’re not the wise person that’s the keeper of this or that record or whatever, but you’re just one of the family. There’s a loss in that as well.
I grew up in a church where people were there for generations. My family had been there for five generations. And you know, if you’ve done that, you’re used to people saying, “Oh yeah, yeah, I know your great-grandmother helped quilt that quilt on the wall,” and it felt good. It did. It was kind of neat. “Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, she did. Over there, let me show you. I’ll show you some more,” right? That’s what really matters.
Sort of like going and getting produce right now. You go to the store, and especially once we catch up after the snow and the stores are properly stocked, you go into the produce department. There’s beautiful, beautiful fruit and vegetables all over the place, right? And so apparently, I didn’t think that you could even get watermelon this time of year in the past, but the last few years I’ve noticed you can. You can go to Walmart, and they have a watermelon waiting there for you right now. I love watermelon, so okay, let’s get one.
And I’ll say, next week, or how about this? At the annual meeting, we’re going to serve watermelon, fresh watermelon, and it’ll get you really excited, right? I’m going to come have this watermelon. Except if you know what off-season watermelon tastes like, I’m not getting you excited. Oh, you’re thinking, “Well, that’s the best refreshment we’re going to have at the annual meeting.” Come on.
If you have that watermelon, and then someone comes in with one from a farm field, and not that it’s rotten, it’s from before. They have a time machine, right? They come in, it’s from summer 2025. This is a fresh, farm-fresh, beautiful watermelon. Except, let me correct something. It’s not beautiful, because you know you go to the produce stand a lot of times? If you go to like a genuine mom-and-pop roadside stand that has the best tasting fruit and vegetables, have you noticed that they’re very rarely beautiful? You go and you see that watermelon, it’s not quite round. It’s sort of misshapen a little bit. Or you get some tomatoes, and they’re kind of gnarly looking. They’re not beautiful.
And if you never tasted either, and I take that bright, golden, or not golden, that would not be good, bright, bright red tomato, and I set it down there from the produce department. I set down the one that has some indentations and kind of twisted up that’s next to it from the mom-and-pop stand, and you never had tomato, you’d say, “Well, I’ll take that one.” Because what looks like it matters is the fact that they have so controlled the growing process that nothing’s affected it. The problem is it hasn’t actually grown with the care and the special treatment of that roadside stand.
And if you’ve had both, you know, I’m not telling anything new to you, you know that the one that looks ridiculously bad in comparison is the one that’s actually going to taste better. I take it every time. I take that roadside stand’s watermelon over the one that’s perfect that’s at Walmart right now. No offense to Walmart, just the season.
What really matters? A lot of the things that we hold on to in life, the things that Paul lists here, those are things that made him look like a grocery store polished apple. He was as shiny as could be, spotless, by every worldly standard. What he was missing was the flavor inside that God wanted in him, because he was actually turning against the very work of the Lord. He was running against the Lord and His people because he wasn’t treasuring the right things.
And Paul doesn’t tell us the whole thought process he goes through, but he was human. So I have to think, is he encountering Jesus? Yes, it’s probably a very rapid transformation because if you actually encounter Jesus, if He knocks you off down on the side of the road and you’re suddenly blind and He’s speaking to you—and I mean Paul doesn’t seem to have any doubt who He’s encountering—but somewhere in his mind as he’s going through this process, I would imagine there was some grief and maybe even a little bit of struggle. Because somewhere in there he had to say, “I realize everything I’ve been working towards isn’t going to count anymore. It’s not what really mattered. I spent all this time, all this effort, I’ve thrived on all this praise. It’s not what mattered.”
My prayer for each of us is as we reflect on that as we go into this new year, that we could really emphasize what matters. That it doesn’t take facing our own death or someone else’s death, but that we would think about what really lasts. Paul says, “I don’t even mind if I lose my life because all that stuff is rubbish. I’ve kind of lost. None of it’s going to carry me beyond a few years of joy and success. I’ve encountered Jesus, and in that I know that even though it’s costing me everything,”—first again—”Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things.”
And yet as he’d encountered Jesus, as he had that deep grasp of who Jesus is, and the Holy Spirit was continuing to strengthen Paul in this moment, Paul could say, “I don’t care. I have something better. I have the real thing that it’s worth rejoicing.” And in that Paul went from being far more like Herod, protecting his power, protecting his strength at all costs, even if it seems like it’s in opposition to what God had called him to do, because somehow, if it’s by my own will, I am going to be the one that’s the King of the Jews. I’m going to be the Pharisee of the Jews. I’m going to be the one who teaches. All that stuff, the achievements.
He becomes more like the Magi. I’ll travel to a foreign land. I’ll go where no one has any regard for me. I’ll go where people actively want to kill me. Not because I’m so brave, but because I know that the only thing that really matters is the thing they can’t take away from me. Not the trimmings. It’s not the beautiful fruit. Not all the things that we put on a resume. Not the things that even people often remember about us. “Oh, he was so ingenious on this, or so wise on that.”
The one thing that’s most important that we can pass on to those around us, and the one thing that’s most important for us to hold on to, is that Jesus offers His grace to us and to all who call on Him. And may we do that today, because that is where the only real rejoicing is.
Lord, we come before you, and we face different reasons for struggling. We face different reasons for counting the things we do count as gain, versus the things that we ignore. But for each of us, as we go into 2025, would you help us to be those who see that the real gain, the real meaning, the real hope, is in one place, and one place only, and that’s in the gospel that you’ve given us. And Lord, as we turn to that, would you help us to hold on to it, to be strengthened by it. That we, with Paul, could say, everything else I count as loss. Everything else, I’m okay if I give it up, because the one thing that matters is I have Jesus. And would you make us so confident in your promises, so full of joy from your promises, that we would be contagious with it, that we would show that kindness to those around us, that the people would come to know you as they encounter us. I pray this in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.
Thanks, Chris. As the communion goes around, the gluten-free is in the middle if you’d like that. The outer rings are gluten—excuse me—are gluten. As always, we do ask that if you do not yet know Jesus, we ask every week, would you please let these elements pass you by? If you’re online, would you not partake?
Now, why do we say that? Because there’s a real risk that what we do is that we take these trimmings, we take the little cup of juice and the little wafer, and we know that if it’s in one of these little plastic cups, it must be religious, right? It must be somehow sanctified somehow, something. And we say, “Well, this is what’s going to make me okay. I don’t know, I’m feeling uncertain, I don’t know what this year brings. I’ll take this, and that’ll be it.” And in and of itself, this is another thing to count loss.
But tonight, if you turn to Jesus, if just as Paul turned to Jesus, you turn to Jesus, and you say, “I need You. I am a sinner in need of saving.” Maybe you were scrolling online tonight, and you stopped here. We have an online church family that would love to pray with you. And as you do that, know that just as Paul encountered Jesus, so too can you. And He will give you the only thing that matters.
And then come back and partake of this with us next week. We’d love to celebrate with you, not some exclusive thing that we try to keep away, but something that we can’t wait to share with you. And as we do, we’ll celebrate, because together, then we share the only thing that no one can take away, for God has given it to us.
And the night He was betrayed, Jesus took the bread, and He broke it, and He gave it to them, saying, “This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.” In like manner, after supper, He took the cup, and He said, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, poured out for you under the remission of sins. Do this as I do.”
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