Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern. (18) For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and not tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the costs of Christ:  (19) whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose  is in their shame – who set their mind on earthly things.  (20) For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, (21) who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.  

4:1 Therefore,my beloved and longed for brethren, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, beloved. 

The apostle Paul wrote the letter to the Philippians. Philippi was a Roman colony at the time Paul founded the Christian church there and many veterans of the Roman army retired there.  It was an outpost of Roman life and enjoyed great privileges of that Roman world.

In our verses today Paul is warning his readers of corruption – of drifting – and he is telling them they have a higher calling and that is to be citizens of heaven rather than citizens of this world.  Paul points to himself as  example of how to live in this world the right way.  Paul was not being arrogant – he was aware that while still a sinful man he took care to live with integrity.  Apparently there were among the Philippians certain false Christians, people who decide freedom from the law meant freedom from Gods moral law.   Paul writes – in tears – of their end which was destruction. Those of this world live for the things of this world.  God is not the center of their pleasure and pleasure itself is a god.

Deeds, or fruit, are certain evidence of people’s conviction. We behave as we believe and the point of our verses today is we Christians are not to live as citizens of this world.  We are not to deny the reality of the truth revealed in the gospel.  All things will be subject to Christ and we should live accordingly  so we will meet our savior, not our judge.  So we will not hear the words of the Lord as recorded in matthew 7:23:  And then I will declare to them “I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness!”

But what does it say?  “The word Is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (That is the word of faith which we preach):  (9) that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.  (10) For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.  (11) For the Scripture says “Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.”  (12) For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call on Him.  (13) For “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

The letter to the Romans was written to the Christian church in Rome by the apostle Paul. Paul had been kept from visiting Rome and in his place he sent this letter of doctrine and instruction and truth. Our verses today contain a message of eternal salvation – this message he keeps repeating is that the way to salvation is through faith in Jesus Christ – belief in Jesus as Lord.

This letter contrasts righteousness based on law with righteousness by faith and we cannot be saved by keeping the law. Paul is saying we don’t have to go through a difficult process to find Christ and that we are saved through faith in Christ – that we must believe in our heart and express or confess that belief. Confession is not a requirement but an inevitable outcome of genuine saving faith.  Israel failed to achieve righteousness because they tried – the Jews wanted to establish their own righteousness, not to receive it as an act of grace. Righteousness by works is a man made system for salvation. It is not Biblical and it will not work.

Saving faith is a matter of heart. It is also an intellectual assent to the gospel. We must first know Jesus to trust in Him – and this does not mean the Jesus of our imagination -and this all boils down to knowledge of  Scripture.

Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, (2) by which you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you – unless you believed in vain.  (3) For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received:  that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, (4) and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, (5) and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve.  (6) After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep.  (7) After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles.  (8) Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time. (9) For I am the least of the apostles, who am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.  (10) But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.  (11) Therefore, whether it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.

The 1 st letter to the Corinthians was written by the apostle Paul. Paul wrote this letter of correction and guidance to resolve minor problems within the church in Corinth but in chapter 15, he turns to the subject of death and the doctrine of resurrection of the dead.  Chapter 15 is a very clear definition of the gospel of Christ Jesus.

in verses 1 – 11, Paul approaches the denial of resurrection of the dead indirectly – at first. A foundation is laid by detailing the bodily resurrection of Christ and the centrality of that both in the gospel and in Paul’s own conversion. The Corinthians believed in the resurrection of Jesus but were in denial of the resurrection of men/women. He begins by emphasizing that the gospel is not from the minds of men; it is revelation from God.  The gospel has been received by the apostles and delivered by them.  Paul writes of the transformed, resurrected body of Christ which is the foundational principal of the gospel.

This good news concerning unmerited saving grace through Christ is the only way men can be forgiven their sins – the gospel is based solely on the work of Christ Jesus. Paul writes of the certainty of Christ’s resurrection and therefore the resurrection of all men – he writes of the connection between the present and the future, the natural and spiritual body.

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;  (5) does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; (6) does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; (7) bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  (8) Love never fails.  But where there are prophecies, they will fail; where there there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge it will vanish away.  (9) For we know in part and we prophecy in part.  (10) But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.  (11) When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.  (12) For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face.  Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am known.  (13) And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

the first letter to the Corinthians was written by the Apostle Paul. Our verses today are almost always taken as a presentation on love, but in fact Paul was talking about the gifts of the Spirit to the faithful in Christ. In chapter 12 of 1 Corinthians Paul writes about  purpose of the gifts and how they are related to the church  – and in chapter 14 Paul addresses the perversion of these gifts by the Corinthians. In chapter 13 – which is not a digression but instead is a link between chapters 12 and 14 – Paul talks about the use of the gifts of the Spirit for the help and blessing of the Church.  These verses are not a dissertation on love but are meant as an appeal for application for benefit of the Church.

Essentially Paul is saying that spiritual gifts without love are wayward and minister to personal pride. Words can be eloquent by themselves but if not motivated by love and truth words are just rhetoric – sounding brass or clanging symbols.  jUst as philanthropy without love can by worth nothing to the donor – a gift can be a blessing to a cause no matter the motive – but the man/ woman who gives is not blessed without love.

Paul talks about seeing through a glass darkly- in the ancient world the mirrors were of polished metal, giving a wavy indistinct image.   But the promise is that while we know now in part – and think we know what we don’t really know – some day we will see fully.   Paul is telling the Corinthians – and us – what biblical love is.  The Corinthians equated the social status of the spiritual gift with the significance of the one who has it and Paul tells the Corinthians that all of the spiritual gifts are temporary while Christian love is eternal.  Apparently the Corinthians abandoned Christian love and they are being warned that without love, the value of the spiritual gift is diminished.