2026-09-08 Philippians 2 Wednesday Part 2

0:00Today is the day you have. Welcome to Today in the Word with Pastor Bob Larson of Calvary Chapel Caldwell. Pastor Bob will be with us in just a few minutes, but first we'd like to let you know that Calvary Chapel is located on the corner of 10th and Everett across from the library in downtown Caldwell. We have two Sunday morning services at 9.30 and 11.30. If you prefer Saturday nights, we have a Saturday night service at 7 p.m. We also have a midweek service Wednesday night at 7 p.m. You can watch Today in the Word on Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. on ABC channel 6.1. Join us as we broadcast Calvary Chapel Caldwell's Sunday Morning Church Services. Where Pastor Bob teaches you how to apply the truth in your Bible to your everyday experiences, so that you might enjoy better life. In Matthew 7, 15, he talks about wolves and sheep, clearly they're aware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but outwardly are they are ravenous wolves. So they look like a sheep, they look like a Christian, but really they're like a wolf,

1:00and how do you know the difference? Well, because they are to destroy, right? Jesus said that there would be people who come into the church like wolves and they want to destroy God's sheep. So they do it a variety of ways and doctrine is one of the ways, get them believe in weird things and they want to stir up God's people to complain and argue and cause division, come into the church and I can't believe this, I can't believe that, right? So division and strife and complaining are from the kingdom of darkness, not from God. And so if you've ever thought to yourself, I have the gift of complaining, what's not from God, right? Remember the story with Solomon in 1 Kings 3, 16, where two women who were Harlet's came to the king and stood before him and the one woman's son died at night because she laid on him and so that's why you don't have your babies in your bed. But verse 20, so she arose in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while your mate servant slept. Then the king said, bring me a sword so they brought the king a sword. So this woman, there's two women and one of them her child died.

2:02So she took the other ladies child and she said, this is my child. Now when the little babies, you can't tell, they can't talk, you don't know their name, they all look the same. I mean, there are cute ones in anyway. But so they said, this is my baby, they'll say, no, it's my baby. So King Solomon says, okay, we want to know whose baby it is. All right, get me a sword. You're like, what is he going to do? Verse 25. He said, divide the living child into and give half to one and half to the other. So King Solomon says, here's what we're going to do. We don't know whose baby it is. Give me a sword, chop the baby in half, give one lady a half and give the other lady a half. Right? Now, what? Well, he says in verse 26, then the woman whose son was living spoke to the king for she yearned with compassion for her son. And she said, oh, my Lord, give her the living child and by no means kill him. The other woman said, let him be neither mine or yours, but cut him in half. Right? Which one do you think is the real mom? The one that says cut him in half? Well, depends on how old the baby is. If it was new, probably not, but if it was too, anyway, but it's not, that's not the mom.

3:07This is cut him in half. Verse 27. So the king answered and said, give the first woman the living child and by no means kill him, she is the mother. Right? And so what's the lesson there? That the person who would divide the child is not the real mom. And the picture is the person who would come into a church and divide the body of Christ is not of the Lord, right? And so when the second mother said, cut the child in half, obviously that's not the true mother. And anyone who wants to cause division in the body of Christ through arguing and complaining and division, right, that it's just carnal, sinful, selfish nature. It's not of the Lord. And so he says in verse 14, do all things without complaining and disputing that you may become blameless and harmless as children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. Now, can I get an amen? Do we live in a crooked and a perverse generation? Amen. Right. So, and what are we to do? We're to be innocent, harmless, right? So are we supposed to be attached sheep? No, right.

4:08Innocent, right? In a world that's crooked and perverse, among whom you shine as lights in the world. So in this crooked perverse generation, God wants us to shine as lights for him. Now, what he's saying is don't complain because complaining and disputing is just like the world. That's carnal. That's selfish, self-centered, right? But a Christian who doesn't grumble and complain is a shining light in the world, right? When a Christian goes to work and their boss asks them to do something and they just do it, then that's a good example, right? If a Christian goes to work and the boss says, hey, can you do half of the work I hired you to? And they're like, oh, I can't believe you want me to do all that. Well, it's only half what I hired you for. I know, but man, do kids or anything? Last I can, though, right? Do you think he's thinking, man, you're awesome. Can I get another one of you, right? I mean, no, they're not. And so, Matthew 514, Jesus said, you were the light of the world in the same way let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and praise your Father in heaven. Jesus said that for us, every one of us, who's a Christian, that we need to live our life

5:10at school at work wherever we're at, that our light shine, that people look at you and say, man, God is good because He created you and the way you are and the way you roll and the way you work and the way you are to people, man, it's good, right? And so what is Jesus saying, that your relationship with Jesus is not a private matter. Wherever you go at work or school or your neighborhood and wherever you're going, that you're to let your light shine for him, wherever you're at. It doesn't have to be at school or at work. You can be in the grocery store. You can be anywhere, right? I mean, you know, as the person, you know, ringing up your groceries that cost twice as much, hey, how you doing today? And you know, sometimes they're like, well, I'm having a terrible day. You can say, hey, can I pray for you? And you look, they look at you like, is this going to be weird? I was not going to be weird. Okay, and you can pray for him, right? Whatever it is. But just to be a light for people or to help people or bless people at work or at school, if somebody needs help and you volunteer, hey, I'll help you, then people like, what's wrong with you? Isn't everybody selfish and self-centered? Yes they are, except for God's changing me on the inside. So I want to love people and serve people and bless people, help people, right?

6:12And so that's what it means to let your light shine. In verse 16 he goes on to say, holding fast the word of life so that I may rejoice in the day of Christ that I have not run in vain or labored in vain. So there were these two women in the church, had this conflict and Paul is insinuating that they need to stop complaining and disputing because it might undo all the work that the Apostle Paul had done there in the church. As he started that church in Philippi and had been doing great things, they had been doing great things. And he was saying, look, we don't want these two women who are complaining and arguing to undo all the work that the Apostle Paul had done. Now, if you think that two women back 2,000 years ago could undo the work of an Apostle, how much more could two complainers in any church in America today undo the work of an average pastor? Right, I mean, just think. I mean, this is the Apostle Paul we're talking about. And so he's just saying, people shouldn't think that it's no big deal to grumble and complain. And that's why the Bible gives us so many illustrations because it's not good.

7:13It's not good for you. It's not good for your mental health, your physical health. It's not good for your attitude. And we've read all the research before so I didn't even bring it out for you because you've all heard it in a thousand times. People who look at the good and people who want to be helpful are much happier than people who are always looking at the bad and complaining. It's a physical fact. And so, but you get to choose what you want to do. And this is such good news, right? And this is why we need to come to church to be reminded you can think about what you want. Now, if I were to say to you, do you get to change the channels at your house or are you stuck on one? You can only watch one. People watch what everyone, right? When you go on social media, can you only see the posts from Cavertchappal or do you see them from other people? You get to see what everyone, right? And so too in your brain, your brain is just like the remote control with your TV or scrolling through Facebook or Instagram or I don't know how you what you do on Snapchat. But do you scroll on Snapchat? Yes. Yes, you old person don't you know? Well, I'm not on there. Anyway, I don't want to tell you why, but because I know what goes on there and I think

8:14that's not a good place for my brain. So I don't go there. I get to choose which social media I want to be on, right? I know Facebook's for the old people, right? So I have Greg Laurie and you know, Ralph Reese and a bunch of pastors and a bunch of you people at church. So don't post weird stuff because I'm your friend and I see your stuff. So odd to see someone from church posting some person out of somebody like, oh, anyway, but you're all like, that's not funny. Yeah, it's not. But so you get to choose what you want to think about, right? And I would encourage you to think about what you think about and whether you're choosing it or you're letting somebody choose it for you, right? Yeah, anyway, he goes on and says verse 17. And if I am being poured out as a drink offering on the sacrifice, on the sacrifice and service of your faith, I am glad and rejoice with you all. Now Paul pictures himself giving his life like a drink offering, right? And so there was the burnt offering back in those days before Jesus where they would bring

9:14an offering to the Lord and they would burn it till it was ashes, right? And it represented a person giving the offering and it represented a complete consecration to God. God, my life is yours. Use it however you see fit. Your will be done. And then the drink offering, sometimes they would pour it over the burnt offering and Paul compares his life to a drink offering being poured out for the service of the Lord. So he's saying he's pouring out his life to service to serve God. Now, the truth is every one of us live our lives for something. Some people live our lives for ourselves. Some people live their lives for their dog. Some people live their lives for fishing or some people live their lives for, I mean, it's amazing how many hobbies you can have as an American. You can be a kayaker. We were rafting some years ago and I said, so what do you, this is your hobby. You guys do it every single weekend. What do you do in the winter? We go to California, like, oh, in Arizona. I mean, there's people that just, they give their life for something. Rafting, fishing, hunting, whatever it is. I mean, people just give their life, everybody is pouring their life out for something.

10:15And Paul is saying, I'm giving my life to serve the Lord. And what does that mean? It means the love people, bless people, serve people, help people. And it means when you get to heaven, that you get rewards that last throughout eternity. Now, people who are just living for self, when they get to heaven, if they get to heaven, they get no rewards, right? Yeah, and we don't want that. So he says, in verse 18, for the same reason, you also be glad and rejoice with me. Now, I love that Paul says, rejoice with me. He's talking about that he is in prison. Remember, we talked about at the beginning of the book, that he's in prison for telling people about Jesus. And he's basically saying, if Caesar takes my life, then I want you to rejoice with me, because I showed the gospel with people. And why is that? Well, because Paul didn't view his life as, you know, my life is for me to spend it on myself. No, in Philippians 1, 21, he said, for me to live as Christ and to die is gain. See, this was Paul's perspective on the Christian life. He said, if I die and go to heaven, that's great. And if I continue to live here on earth and serve the Lord and be a blessing to other

11:18people and to help the church grow, well, then that's good as well. So he saw heaven as a promotion, right? He saw it. Hey, if he got persecuted, put to death for serving Jesus and ended up in heaven, like, hey, that's a promotion. That's not a demotion, right? Now, sometimes people in America, we kind of, our life is just, you know, it's just so important to us and we don't want to give any of it to anybody else. But the truth is, the good news of the gospel brings joy to people about being set free from selfishness because selfishness really is just empty. And God wants us to be able to share with people, as Paul did, about the joy of having a relationship with Jesus. And there's so many people in this world that are just looking for something to satisfy the emptiness in their life, right? And sometimes people, they don't even know what they're looking for. They're like, something's missing in my life. And they chase after things, they think, oh, if I get a career, if I get money, if I get a spouse, if I get children, whatever it is. And so often when people get all those things, they're like, there's still something missing.

12:19And really what it is is that it's a relationship with God because God created us to be spiritual beings. And when people don't know about that and they don't have, they're not alive spiritually, they're not born again, but they're missing out on part of their life. Thank you for joining us for today in the world. We'd like to share with you a couple of things that are going on here at Calvary Kids of Caldwell is currently enrolling infants to 12-year-olds. We are a licensed daycare offering infant and toddler care, as well as pre-kindergarten, kindergarten and after-school programs. We provide Christian-based learning programs at affordable rates with flexible options to accommodate most work and pay schedules. We are located in downtown Caldwell and are open from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. Call to 08453-9653 to request more information or visit us online at Calvary Caldwell.com. Calvary Chapel Caldwell would like to invite you to our Saturday night service at 7 p.m. This is an alternative for those who cannot make it to our Sunday morning services. Like us on Facebook at Calvary Chapel Caldwell or check out our website at CalvaryColdwell.com.

13:26You can watch today in the world on Sunday mornings at 10.30 a.m. on the CW channel 2.2. Join us as we broadcast Calvary Chapel Caldwell's Sunday Morning Church Services. For Pastor Bob teaches you how to apply the truth in your Bible to your everyday experiences, so that you might enjoy a better life. If you would like to listen to Pastor Bob's message today and its entirety, you can visit our YouTube page. Just search Calvary Chapel Caldwell and you can see all of the latest messages from Pastor Bob. Make sure to click the notification bell so you know when. We post new content. If you are not currently attending a church and are in the Caldwell area, we'd like to invite you to one of our services. We're located on the corner of 10th and Everett across the street from the library in downtown Caldwell. You can also visit us on the web at calvarycoldwell.com. If today in the world has ministered to you and you would like to support this radio outreach ministry, we encourage you to pray for us. You can also partner with us financially. Simply visit calvarycoldwell.com to make a donation. Thank you for joining us for today in the world. May the Lord bless you and may you have a great day.