Working Out Your Salvation

Well, I'm speaking to you today on working out your salvation. And some of you look just like the picture on the screen. Working out your salvation, some of you look like Lucy. You're a little shocked at that theme. Some of you are a little skeptical. You look like the guy in the picture there. You're not sure what I'm going to talk about today. So let's, before you accuse me of heresy or false teaching or something like that, let's quickly open our Bibles to Philippians chapter 2, where we see that very expression used by Paul in Philippians chapter 2 and verse 12. Philippians chapter 2 verse 12. Therefore my dear friends, as you have always obeyed not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. The word therefore ties this verse to what has come before it. And so we can't really understand what Paul's talking about to understand what we've seen thus far. So let me just briefly remind you of what Paul has said thus far in the book of Philippians. In chapter 1, Paul has talked about suffering for Christ. He's talked about his own suffering. He's in prison. He's talked about the fact that the Philippians may well suffer for Christ and they should stand together in one spirit as they do suffer for the Lord Jesus. So chapter 1 was all about suffering for Christ. Chapter 2 is all about serving Christ and the theme seems to change to the idea of serving the Lord Jesus Christ. We are to serve Him together in unity. Paul has said in the first four verses. In order to display that kind of unity and serving together in unity, we must be selfless. The prime example, the greatest model of selflessness in the Bible is the Lord Jesus. Paul uses him as a model of selflessness. We're to serve as He served. We have the same attitude that He had. We're to serve selflessly. In verses 12 through 18, He talks about serving as a lifestyle. This whole concept of serving together in the body of Christ selflessly as Jesus did is to become our lifestyle. We are to live this way. We're to serve this way all the time as an outflow of our lifestyle. And that concept is summarized in those words, work out your own salvation. In order to grasp what Paul is talking about there, we're going to look at that this morning and see what he says about it in these verses. We'll begin with the meaning of those words. What is the meaning of working out your salvation? First of all, what it is not. Obviously, if you know anything about your Bible, if you know what Paul has written in other places in the New Testament, and if you know anything about your Bible, you know that Paul is not saying that we are to work for our salvation. He's not saying we do works to gain or earn our salvation, not saying that. It's not possible for that to happen. And Paul certainly would not say that. I mean, in another letter that he wrote, at about the same time to the Ephesian church, he said this in Ephesians 2 verses 8 and 9, for it is by grace you have been saved. New faith. And this, not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works so that no one can boast. Paul has made it very plain in that passage in Romans 4 and Galatians 2 and many other passages. And the whole New Testament makes this very clear that salvation is not by anything we do for God. It is not by any works that we do. Not by works. It's a gift. God gives it to us as a gift. Not by his grace. That means simply because of his own good pleasure and will and because he loves us, he chooses to give us salvation. We cannot earn it. We cannot do anything to deserve it. He simply chooses to give it to us. And we receive it as a gift by faith. We trust the Lord Jesus as our Savior and the work he did on the cross. And so by that act of faith, we simply receive Jesus Christ as our Savior. So salvation is not by any work that we do. It's not by being baptized. It's not by joining a church. It's not by attending church. It's not by doing better than you did last year. We're trying to get rid of some bad habits that you've had trouble with. Salvation is not through any work that we do. Paul cannot possibly be saying that. Salvation is not a work that man does for God. It is the exact opposite. It is a work that God does for man. The work that God has done for us is to send his own Son, Jesus, the perfect sacrifice for our sins, who himself never sinned and thus qualified morally to be a perfect sacrifice. And he gave his life. He paid the penalty of death for our sin when he died on the cross. And so that's all the work that needs to be done. Nothing we can add to that. We simply respond in faith and trust the Lord Jesus as our Savior. So Paul is not saying that we work for our salvation. We work in order to earn our salvation. He's not saying that. He's not saying that we work for our salvation. Then what is he saying when he says, work out your own salvation? Well the key to understanding that concept is found in the two words, work out. Which basically means to carry something out to its goal, to carry something out to its ultimate conclusion. Now here's what the Bible teaches about salvation. The Bible teaches salvation as a gift by the grace of God. We receive it by faith. But the Bible also teaches that we were saved for a particular purpose. And that purpose is that we might live a life of good works. And thereby please God that we might live for him. Glorify him. Become more like Christ in our daily lifestyle. That's the purpose of our salvation. In fact we just looked at Ephesians 2 verses 8 and 9. In the very next verse verse 10, Paul says this after talking about salvation by grace through faith, he says, for we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works or to do good works which God has planned ahead in advance for us to do. So God saved us by his grace through faith. But for the purpose of living out that salvation, of carrying it out in our daily lifestyle, so that we might live for him in good works that glorify him and that show Jesus Christ in our lives. That is what he means when he says, work out your salvation. We are responsible to carry out the implications of our salvation in the way that we live every day. We are responsible to live out our faith. Let me illustrate it this way. When someone sits down at a piano or an organ or another instrument to play a piece of music that's written out on a sheet or in a book or something, they're not writing something they have composed. They're writing something that was given to them, a gift to them by a composer. But the person who's playing the instrument is responsible to work out those notes on a page and the rhythm that's there and the rests that are included and all of those things. They are responsible to work that out to play it in such a way that it becomes not just notes and words on a page, but it becomes something that is enjoyable and is heard by people. They work out the gift that the composer has given them. They make it practical. When you get sick, you go to the doctor, at least most of the time. You do. Your man takes a week or so, but you go to the doctor eventually when you're sick. When you go to the doctor, the doctor diagnoses what's wrong with you. Now they do some tests and they ask you questions and figure out what's going on. So the doctor diagnoses what's wrong. And then the doctor will take a little slip of paper and he or she will write out what medication you need or treatment or whatever. But if it's medication that you need that will help you get better, they write it out on a sheet of paper, then you take that to a pharmacist. And the pharmacist calls the doctor to find out what they've written because they can't read it. But then once they figure that out, they fulfill that prescription. Now up to this point, everything has been done for you. Your problem has been diagnosed. Medication has been prescribed. The medication has been filled by a pharmacist. But the next step is up to you. You have got to work out what has been done for you. If you take that medication home, stick it on the shelf, never do anything with it. You're not going to get better. You must then work out what has been given to you in practical implications to recover so that others can see you're better. You need to do what you've been told to do. Obedience. And what Paul is saying here is that the work of salvation has been done for you. You cannot do anything to help yourself recover. But you have a responsibility after God gives you the gift of salvation to live that out, to live out your faith, to live out the implications of what it means to be a child of God. It's taking what we know and what we have been given in salvation and living it out every day of our lives. Now the living of that out does not save us. It does not get us to heaven. It does not in any way make sure that we'll get there, but we are responsible to live that out, to work it out in real life, to show, to demonstrate what God has done in us by salvation. It is not enough. God is not pleased when we receive His gift of salvation and then we just say that's it. I'm on my way to heaven. I'm just going to coast through life. I'm not going to try to live for God at all. I'm not going to tell anybody else about Jesus Christ. I don't care about growing. I'm not going to read my Bible or pray or anything. If that's the case, I would really question whether or not you ever received the gift of salvation because there's something within us that wants to work out what's been put in us by way of salvation. So we are responsible to live out our faith. That's what Paul's talking about in verse 12. So what it means, we are not working for our salvation. We are working, living out what God wants us to do and obedience to Him because of our salvation, because God's given us that great gift. But how do we do that? Well, Paul goes on to describe the manner of working out your salvation. What are we to do? How are we to work out our salvation? Three things Paul says in verses 12 and 13 about that. First of all, we are to work out our salvation on our own initiative. This is on our own initiative. Look at verse 12, therefore my dear friends, as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence. Paul is saying, work out your salvation, not just when I'm around and can see you, but live out the implications of your faith, live for Christ, live out your salvation even when I'm not watching. And much more in my absence. Paul's point here is that this living out our faith must be done on our own initiative. We can't expect someone to do it for us and we can't depend on other people to help us all the time. Do this. We should, on our own initiative, read the Word of God, study the Bible, pray, grow in our Christian faith and live out our faith, not just when somebody's telling us what to do. Now we all need the church. We all need the accountability of brothers and sisters in Christ. We all need that. But we've also got to learn how to stand on our own two feet and not be dependent on someone standing over us telling us how to live. You know the problem with legalism is that legalism basically says, I need someone over my shoulder all the time, tell them what I need to look like, how to live, where to go, where to go, what to do. Every move I make is in a code book. And what Paul is saying is even when I'm not around, you ought to be able to get your Bible, understand how God wants you to live and live out on your own initiative, what God wants you to do and how he wants you to live. You know it's much easier for children to be obedient when their parents are watching than when their parents are not in the room, right? Every parent knows this. Some of you will remember the old art link letter programs. Remember the things they did with kids? They would ask them questions and get them to, you know, they'd make funny responses and stuff. But one of the things, if I remember correctly on that program was they would, they would film children when they were alone and they were given instructions to not do something and they would walk out of the room and then the child would be there. Here are some cookies over here on the table. Now don't eat those until I get back. And then they would film the child's responses as the adult left the room and kids would be looking at the cooking and they'd look around and fiddle with their fingers and look at that cookie again. Eventually, when I'm going to grab the cookie and devour it because nobody's watching. They didn't think anybody was watching. It's a lot easier for us, sadly. I think it shows we're still children. This is the case. It's a lot easier for us spiritually to live like we're supposed to live when somebody's watching. You know, when we're at church or you know, go in the store and you see preacher or somebody, Bible fellowship teacher, I got straight nothing now, preacher's here. And somebody's watching, but what Paul is saying is on your own initiative, if nobody's watching, we ought to be living out our faith. We ought to be able to do that on our own initiative. Secondly, he says, as to the manner of working out your salvation, not only do it on your own initiative, but live out your own salvation, work out your salvation. He says there in verse 12, with fear and trembling. With fear and trembling. It's a very interesting expression. Paul uses this several times. It's an attitude that Paul says we should have and Paul himself demonstrated. For instance, look at these verses on the screen in 1 Corinthians, chapter 2 and verse 3, Paul said regarding his own ministry to the Corinthians, he said, I came to you in weakness and fear and with much trembling, fear and trembling. Paul says that marked my own ministry among you. In other words, he didn't come with brash self-confidence. Look at me, look at what I can do. Here I am. No, he came with fear and trembling. Recognizing his own weakness and that if anything was going to be done, it must be about the power of God. Paul used this expression again to the Corinthians. In 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, chapter 7, and verse 15, when he was talking about having sent Titus to check up on them after some hard things Paul had to write to them and he says, speaking of Titus, his affection for you is all the greater when he remembers that you were all obedient, receiving him with fear and trembling. What he's saying is, I'd had to write a very tough letter to you to correct some things and straighten some things out, command you to do some things that God wanted you to do and sent Titus to check up to make sure that you were living the way you were supposed to live. When he came, he found you being obedient with fear and trembling. Were they in fear of Paul? Were they trembling because of Paul? Well they were trembling only because Paul was writing them the Word of God and telling them what they needed to do from God. And they had a fear and a trembling in their relationship with God that caused them to want to be obedient. And then Paul uses much the same expression in Ephesians 6 in verse 5 when he says, slaves, obey your earthly masters with respect and fear. With this kind of fear and trembling or respect, honor and he says with sincerity of heart just as you would obey Christ. It's interesting that he says in the very next verse and do this not as men pleasers, not when people are watching you but as serving the Lord Christ. The idea here is that we are to live out our salvation not with a brash self-confidence that I can handle life and I can work anything out but with a sense of fear and trembling. In other words, I don't trust myself. I recognize my weaknesses. I realize if I'm going to live out what God wants me to do, I have to do it in dependence upon Him. That's the attitude that I am supposed to take. That's the attitude Paul says we should have. Fear and trembling, recognizing we've got some powerful enemies. The devil is against us and he's pretty powerful. I mean the Bible says that even Michael the Archangel would not dispute with the devil when there was a dispute about what to do with the body of Moses. Not even the Archangel would rebuke Satan but said the Lord rebuke you. It's God's place and only God can do that. So we need to be careful. There's a lot going around in our world today about you rebuke Satan. You tell Satan to get out of here and you cast these demons here and there and tell them what to do and where to go. We need to be very careful. The whole issue of spiritual warfare is not to be done brashly. I'm in control and all these demons are subject to me. Satan has to do what I said and no no my friend. He's a much more powerful foe than you are. It's Jesus Christ who is the power to do all of those things that need to be done. Boy, if spiritual warfare. We live out this Christian life in fear and trembling, recognizing we have a powerful enemy against us. It's not a brash self-confidence in our lives but a fear and trembling kind of spirit. As we live out our faith, it is with a fear and trembling that if I do this on my own, I will fail. I'll make a horrible mess of things. So I need to trust God. I need to look to Him for strength. I need to believe that He will enable me. That's how I work out my salvation. I live out my faith. But then thirdly Paul says, here's how we do it. Not only on our own initiative with fear and trembling but also by the power of God, verse 13. 4. We continue to work out our salvation with fear and trembling 4 or because it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose. This beautiful balanced statement, verse 12, is our responsibility. We are responsible to work out our salvation, to live out our faith, to be obedient to God. Yes with fear and trembling but to be obedient to God, recognizing all of the time that it is God who is working in us, both to will and to act according to His good purpose. Almost every word of that verse is important to understand the real meaning of what Paul's getting across. It is God who works in you. The word work is the Greek word, energy. We get our word energy from it. He energizes us. It's an inner working, an inner power. So God energizes us and He energizes us in two ways. He energizes us first of all to will. That means to desire and secondly to act. They have the ability. God gives us by His power as He energizes us, works in us. He gives us both the desire and the ability to live out our faith. That's why we have to do it fear and trembling because it's not up to us. You see it's not in our own strength. It is God who's constantly working in us, energizing us and He does that by giving us the desire first of all and then as we step out in obedience to do what He's telling us to do, then He infuses the power, the ability to do it. That's how it works. Maybe God has been energizing you, working in you, speaking to your heart about forgiving someone. What you need to do is step out to do it. You have a responsibility to work that out in your daily living. And as you take that first step, dial the telephone, sit down to write that letter, go to talk to that person, what you will find is the Lord giving you the strength to do it. God gives you the desire. He gives you the strength. Working all the time to energize you to do it, you still have the responsibility. Take that step and do it to work it out. You see, that's how it works. God may be working in you, energizing you, speaking to you to confess some sin of your own, to turn away from some sinful behavior or activity or thought process for something you've been really struggling with. God's been speaking to you about that. He's working in you. He's energizing you to give you the desire to get out of that kind of sin. You need to take the definite step of obedience to work that out, to do what God tells you to do. And as you do it, God will give you the strength. He'll give you the ability to do that because it is God who is constantly energizing you to give you the desire and the ability to do what he's commanded you to do. There's a beautiful balance here. This is not a philosophy of the Christian life that says, let go and let God. Now, that sounds wonderful. It's unbiblical. It's not let go and let God. It is take hold with God. God is at work constantly in you, both to give you the desire and the ability. You have the responsibility to obey. And as you purpose to obey, God's energy will be there to give you the strength to do it, whatever He's telling you to do. That's how Paul says this, working out your salvation works. We do it by the power of God. But what is it going to look like? When we determine in our lives, in our minds, in our hearts, that we are going to really live out our faith, that we're not just content to be of shelf Christians, just trophies on a case, but we're really going to live it out. We're going to work this out in the daily lifestyle at work and in our neighborhood, when we determine we're going to do that, what's it going to look like? In the next few verses, Paul gives four marks of working out your salvation. Four marks. This is what it's going to look like. It's how you're going to be marked if you live out, work out your salvation. The first mark is we work out our salvation and attitude toward problems. Our attitude toward our problems. Look at verse 14. He says, do everything without complaining or arguing. One of the toughest verses in the Bible to live out, isn't it? But this is where the rubber meets the road. This is where we really have practical expression of our salvation, of our Christian life, is we are to do all things without murmuring or arguing, without complaining or arguing. Two different attitudes are addressed here. One of them is more inward, one of them is more outward in its expression. The first one, complaining, is more of an inward attitude. It's a grumbling spirit. It's some translations use the word murmur. And that's kind of a good word because it's, what do they call it? An omumata, a pea or something like that. It sounds like what it is, okay? Murmur. When you murmur, you kind of grumble under your breath all the time. What happens? You're not, you're not, you're not. That's murmuring, that's complaining, that's grumbling. And some people just go through life with a grumbling spirit, you know? They're complaining all the time about everything. And Paul says, don't do that about anything. Do everything without that kind of murmuring, grumbling spirit. Some of us look like we are made to grumble. A British novelist by the name of JB Priestley wrote this. He said, I have always been a grumbler. I am designed for the part, sagging face, weighty underlip, rumbling resonant voice, money couldn't buy a better grumbling outfit. Why is everybody suddenly smiling? You don't want to have that long face and drooping lip grumbling outfit, do you? Well, we shouldn't, and I know some of us are just made different physically. We may look like a grumber or not be a grumber. But some people grumble and complain all the time. Just the attitude, the spirit of pessimism, looking down on everything, upset about everything, finding fault with everything. Paul says, do everything without murmuring or complaining. We get enough of that in the world, don't we? If you ever watch the evening news or look at the newspaper very much, there's a lot of grumbling that goes on. There's a lot of doom and gloom about everything that's wrong with our world. And we need to be counter-culture in our spirit and attitude. I love what Swindall said and Chuck Swindall is a book called Laugh Again. It's kind of an application commentary on the book of Philippians. He quotes an article in the LA Times. This article was written tongue in cheek about those who are gloom and doom prophets about our world. They're all time concerned about there's going to be a nuclear holocaust, there's going to be pesticide poisoning, we're all going to die. There's going to be global warming to the point that we'll be in and day with the oceans and everything. And just all kinds of gloom and doom and just all negativeism. And this writer in LA Times wrote an article to kind of counter that. And he said there are some other things, some catastrophes that scientists need to really be thinking about. He said if everyone keeps stacking national geographics in garages and attics instead of throwing them away, the magazine's weight will sink the continent 100 feet sometime soon. And we will be inundated by the oceans. If the number of microscopic specimen slides submitted to one St. Louis hospital laboratory continues to increase at its current rate, this metropolis of St. Louis will be buried under three feet of glass by the year 2024. That's gloom and doom. That's really pessimistic. Here's another one. Beach goers keep returning home with as much sand clinging to them as they do now, 80% of the country's coastline will disappear in 10 years. If you want to look for doom and gloom and pessimism and negativeism, you can find it. This guy, brilliant article that kind of tongue in cheek says, okay, I'll give you a dose of your own medicine if you want to talk about that kind of stuff. You know what Paul's saying? He's saying his Christians will live a different kind of lifestyle. Don't grumble, complain murmur, fuss about everything, find fault with everything. There ought to be a different spirit about us as believers. The world ought to be able to look at us and say that person's got something different. That person is different. Why? Do they have that kind of spirit of joy? That's what they ought to be able to say about us. So how do we work out our salvage? What does it look like in our attitude toward problems? We're not negative, pessimistic, always grumbling. And then the word arguing, that's the more outward expression. That's the real getting it out, verbalizing it, fighting the verbal sparring back and forth and Paul says, don't live that way in your relationship with each other. Don't grumble and complain murmuring under your breath all the time about stuff and don't fight with each other. Don't argue about stuff. There ought to be a different spirit among believers. Do everything without complaining or arguing. So in our attitude toward problems, it looks different for us who are believers. That's the way we're supposed to work out our salvation, live out our faith. Secondly, we ought to live out our faith in our testimony before the world. In our testimony before the world, verse 15, so that, don't miss those words. They tie this verse to verse 14. Do everything without complaining or arguing so that you may become blameless and pure. In other words, this world is going to see a difference in you if you have a different kind of spirit about you, if you're not grumbling and arguing all the time. If you have that different spirit, then your testimony to the world is going to be enhanced, he says, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault and a crooked and depraved generation in which you shine like stars in this universe as you hold out the word of life. That's a long sentence and in fact, he's not done with the sentence yet, but the sentence is very important in its description of what it means to have a good testimony before the world. He says, if you live with a different kind of spirit, working out your salvation, living it out in your daily life with a difference from the world, he says, you will become blameless. It's talking about what people see on the outside. They cannot find fault. They cannot find blame with you. And you will also become pure. That's talking about the inside. The word has to do sometimes in the New Testament with moral purity, but in context like this, it's probably talking about with sincerity, with a pure focus in life. No hypocrisy in other words. They don't see hypocrisy when they look at you. They see someone who is unmixed, which is what the word really means, unmixed, pure in their focus and ambition and attitude toward life. And then he goes on to describe it further. Our testimony to the world is that we will be children of God without fault. Now, it's not like doing these things makes us children of God. It's that doing these things, living this way, shows us to be the children of God before a crooked and perverse dark world. We become children of God in their eyes. They see us to be real children of God, one who is like our father. They begin to see there's a difference we are Christ like, we are God like in our character. That's what he says, that's what he means when he says you become the children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation. Interesting expressions there to describe the world in which we live. It's crooked and it's perverted or depraved. Cricket and perverted. We live in a world of crooks and perverts basically. What do you say? Really the two words both have to do with the idea of twisting something. That is crooked is twisted, something that is perverted is twisted away from its original purpose and meaning. We live in a world that twists everything around. As Isaiah said in Isaiah chapter 1, a world that calls good evil and calls evil good. It twists the standards of God. Let's face it, we live in that kind of world. We live in a world that says evolution is a fact. And creation is just mindless following. In fact, the only place in the university today where academic freedom is not exercised is if you get up in a classroom, try to teach intelligent design or creation. I've got articles, all kinds of articles about people who have been fired from universities, denied tenure because they taught intelligent design that there was a creator. We have a world that's twisted things. We have a world that says abortion is okay. We abort millions of babies throughout this world and even in our own country about a million to a million and a half every year. But it is a federal offense to tamper with the eggs of the bald eagle. Five thousand dollar fine. Something is twisted here. I've said this before. I don't agree at all with what Michael Vic was guilty of doing and I think he deserves whatever punishment legally he is given. But there's something a little twisted in our nation's thinking when someone is sent to jail for putting the death of dog but is honored for putting the death of baby. Something twisted there. Something twisted. We live in a culture that does not want marriage to be defined as God says it should be defined. It should be considered to death. Politicians are scared to death to define marriage as what the Bible says between one man and one woman. But they cower in fear at the homosexual lobby who wants to be recognized as a legitimate lifestyle. There's something twisted. We live in that kind of world that is twisted, perverted, crooked. Now what are we to do about that? Shout about it. Scream about it. Make a scene about it. No, no. Paul say, verse 15, in which you shine like stars in the universe. Shine. Shine. Shine your faith. Stand up for what you believe in the marketplace and shine your light for Christ so boldly that people will know where you stand and know that you love Christ and that you're a follower of His. We don't have to shout down the opposition. We simply need to shine our light. We live in a dark world and we need to shine our light faithfully for Jesus Christ. Shine like stars in the universe and He defines that even further in verse 16. This is all our testimony before the world. How do we shine in this dark world? We do it in verse 16 as you hold out the Word of life. The Greek word for hold out is also translated in the New Testament. Hold on to commentators different. How it should be translated here, but both are true. We are to hold on to this book and hold it true. What it teaches in spite of what all the culture is telling us, this book is true. God's Word is true. And we hold on to that and then we take this message and we hold it out. We offer it to a world that is in darkness and needs to see the light of God in His word. So we both hold on to it and we hold it out to others. We share its message with others. That's our testimony before the world. How do we live out our faith in a very dark world that gets everything backwards? It's all twisted in its view of life and what's right and wrong. We shine out the godly life and character of a servant and a follower of Jesus Christ and we hold out the message of this book to people to be saved. That's what we do. We live out our faith and our testimony before the world. Thirdly, Paul says, we live out our faith. We work out our salvation in selfless service. Look at it in verse 17. He says, but even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. Now Paul uses a very beautiful imagery here, word picture, that people in that way they would have been familiar with, particularly those who were familiar with their Old Testament. They would understand there were different kinds of offerings. There were major sacrifices, five different major sacrifices and sometimes along with those sacrifices, animal sacrifice or even a meal or grain offering, there would be a corresponding offering, a drink offering. On some sacrifices that drink offering would be poured out on the main sacrifice and Paul is talking about his own life and service, maybe even his own death for Christ as a drink offering. Not the main offering, not the main show here. Something that's just poured out to help the main offering be done. He said, the main offering is your service, your sacrifice, your faith and if I could just be poured out like a drink offering on that and somehow make it possible for you to do what God wants you to do, then I would be glad and rejoice. And what Paul is saying is that's what I want in life is just to be a drink offering. I want to be able to be used of God to help others give God their sacrifice of their lives for His glory. And if I can be a drink offering that makes that possible, then I'll be glad. Now rejoice. That's one of the ways we live out our faith. And then finally he says, we live out our faith in our infectious joy. He says there at the end of verse 17, if I can do this, be this drink offering, I am glad and rejoice with all of you in verse 18. So you too should be glad and rejoice with me. Paul said, I'm rejoicing if I can be used of God in this minor way. I'm rejoicing in that. And that's infectious joy. We should rejoice too. We should be people of joy. And I'm one of the last ones to live this out as effectively as I should, really. I can grumble and complain with the best. I can murmur with the best of people. But Paul is calling us to is an infectious kind of joy that, remember, he's in prison while he's writing this. Remember his circumstances are not that great. But all the while he's writing this whole letter that is punctuated all the way through with joy, joy, joy, rejoice, rejoice. 19 times he mentions some form of that word in this little four chapter letter. Paul is saying if we are doing what God wants us to do, living for him and having the perspective he wants us to have on him and on life, we ought to be able to rejoice and be glad in life. Rejoicing. We live out our faith. We demonstrate to this world that salvation is real and we live it out when we live lives of joy and gladness. Not so serious and sour, but joy and gladness. Rejoicing in the good things that God has done for us and given us. When the world sees that, they see something different. What he's saying is we shouldn't even be complaining about the weather today because God is so good to give us this day to live for him, to be a part of his family. In any way, this can't last much longer. We rejoice that spring is coming. Just our perspective and attitude on life ought to be one of joy and gladness rather than doom and gloom and negativism all the time. That's no testimony to the world. Work out your salvation. Now friend, if you're here today and you want to know how to be saved, you want to know how to be right with God and know that your sin is forgiven and you have a home in heaven and you'll be in heaven when you die. You want to know that? You want to know how to be saved? You don't have to do a thing. You can't do a thing to work your way to heaven. So don't try to join the church or ask to be baptized or anything in order to work your way to heaven. You need the work that God has already done. You need Jesus Christ as your Savior. That simply comes by receiving God's gift, I say. Jesus has already done the work when He died for you on the cross. If you'll simply ask Him to be your Savior, receive, as John says in John 1-12, receive Him as a gift of God, you'll be saved. But then once you do receive God's gift of salvation, what God is saying is you need to start living that out. You need to start living like a different person, the person you are in Christ. And that has all of these implications about how we think about our problems and our testimony before the world and selflessly serving others and just an infectious joy about all that God does for us, all these given us. That's what we look like. That's how different we are when we're working out, living out what God has given us by way of salvation. Would you pray with me, please? Father, thank you for your great gift to us of salvation through Christ. Father, I pray that if there's anyone here today who's never trusted Christ as Savior, that today would be the day when they finally understand and they give in to the wooing of the Spirit, the working of the Spirit in their hearts, that conviction that is telling them they need Christ, pray that today would be the day of salvation for someone. And then Father, I pray for those of us who already know you, where your children are in your family, but we don't live like it. I pray that you'd rebuke us where we need to be rebuke. You'd help us to really work that out, that salvation you've given us to work out the implications of that in our daily lives, live out our faith in a way that shows that we're different from the world around us. We have something that this whole world needs. Help us to shine like lights wherever we are in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.