Today’s passage: Philippians 3:17-4:1
Helpful thoughts:
- Discipleship is both taught and caught. Christians, other believers are watching you, whether they are trying to or not, and everything we say and do teaches.
- Verse 17 also gives us great encouragement to read good biographies of brothers and sisters in Christ who went before us!
- The enemies of Christ follow after their own selfish passions (“Their god is their belly” is the same thing as the modern encouragement to “follow your heart”). Their end is destruction.
- We stand firm in the Lord by (Working backwards from 4:1):
- Looking forward to the resurrection.
- Eagerly awaiting the return of Christ.
- Remembering where our citizenship lies.
- In contrast to those who are enemies of Christ, we are to focus our attention on heavenly things.
- We are to be so heavenly minded that we become of heavenly good in this world.
- In contrast to those who are enemies of Christ, we are to focus our attention on heavenly things.
Questions to consider:
- Who are you discipling right now? Not, who are you purposefully spending time with for discipleship…but who are you discipling right now in the normal course of your every day life? How can this thinking help us to grow and become more proactive in our thinking about how we can encourage others?
- As our hearts become more conformed to the image of Christ, how can following your heart become a good thing? We all follow our hearts (“We do what we do because we want what we want”). What must therefore be the delight of our hearts? How does that improve our understanding of the nature of repentance?
- Can you be so heavenly minded that you are of no earthly good? How do heavenly minded Christians make this world a better place? How does being heavenly minded change the order of our goals and priorities in this world? How can being heavenly minded help us not get discouraged when the world’s activities look hopeless?