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Collierville First Baptist Church
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gonna talk about keeping moving forward. Keep moving forward.
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From the very beginning,
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God has been at work with a primary go.
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The Bible teaches in Colossians chapter one, verse 16, that all things were created through Christ and for Christ. In Psalms 19 verses one through four, the heavens were created to declare God's glory.
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Isaiah 43, seven, it says that we were created for God's glory. Everything God has done has a purpose, your purpose, and a goal to glorify Him.
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Genesis one, 26 through 27 tells us that we're made in the image of God,
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meaning we have been uniquely created to reflect Him, His character, to represent Him. We are designed to display His love, His justice, His mercy, His creativity,
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and to be His stewards.
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Because we are made in His image, we are created to work. Now, my sons used to say that work was part of the fall. Well, they didn't read the Bible close enough.
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Because it says that God has always been at work. That's what Jesus said.
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So He created us to work
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and to work towards meaningful goals that honor Him and glorify Him. And it's not accidental. Did you know that He has wired us biologically to find pleasure in achieving goals?
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When we achieve a goal, a neuro transmitter dopamine is released, and we feel satisfaction. He wired us to find pleasure in achieving goals and glorifying Him. But if we're gonna be honest right now, look, you're in church, you probably know what the Sunday school answer is going to be, but don't use the Sunday school answer right now. I want you to be honest. So what's your goals?
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As a parent, you probably have a goal to equip your children with life skills that are necessary to achieve in life. You want them to show tolerance, empathy, respect. You want them to help, you want to help them manage difficult situations, to learn how to cope to succeed and to go forward.
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Simply put, you wanna raise good kids.
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But teenagers, students, kids, you set goals. Some of you are probably working right now to improve your ACT score because you wanna get that scholarship. Some of you are trying to improve your GPA. Some of you, financially, you may be getting ready to turn 16 and you're wanting to get that job so you can buy that car or pay for that insurance.
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Also, you may be an athlete and you wanna get a starting position or more playing time. Musically, you might wanna make all West. You might wanna get the next cheering band
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or you may have a simple goal of getting a better score in roadblocks or Grand Theft Auto 6. These people don't know what I'm talking about, but you guys do. (Audience Laughing)
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If you're a businessman,
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your goals may include increasing sales, reducing costs, increasing productivity, improving profitability, getting better customer satisfaction. Now, I can kinda relate to this.
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Some of you know where I come from,
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but many of you may not, that 27 years ago, I left a position working in a Fortune 500 company, Shaw Industries.
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And Mr. Shaw was always aggressively setting goals for our company.
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One goal was set to increase our sales six-fold within 10 years. From 500 million to 3 billion, everybody thought he had lost it.
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He said we were going to knock down the walls. He actually gave a brick to every attender of that meeting to remind us that we were gonna knock down the walls to get to the goal that we had set.
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This led us to look at every possible avenue to reach that goal, product diversification, modification and sales strategy, buying market share, and so on and so on. Now, I could go on and on talking about goals regarding our health, our relationships, our finances, but I wanna draw your attention to Philippians chapter three,
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specifically verse 10.
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In this verse, the Apostle Paul shares what his goals is, what his goal is. And it should be the number one goal for each of us who claim to be followers of Jesus. Now, I'm gonna read from the Holman Christian Standard version.
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I think it states it the most clearly. All the other versions are good. But it states his goal very clearly.
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My goal is to know him, Jesus.
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And the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering
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being conformed to his death.
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That is what our goal is to be.
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Now, it may seem like it's a threefold goal,
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but it's really one goal. It's to be more like Jesus, to know him, experience him.
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Now, you may think, how can that be? Well, this is gonna share a story.
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A few years ago, a nonprofit came to me
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about the possibility of leaving this church and go to lead that nonprofit. But God made it very clear to me that we were in the middle of the pandemic and he, I thought, gave me three goals. One, to help the church recover from the pandemic. Number two, to help our pastor finish strong. And number three, to help the next pastor start strong.
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But I did not realize so lately that it was one goal to strengthen the church.
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It just takes multiple facets. And here we have one goal stated three ways. The first, it's Paul's greatest desire. His life goal is that I may know him.
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He's not merely satisfied with an intellectual knowledge. Paul already possessed extensive knowledge about Jesus. Look, he knew the Old Testament prophecies better than any of us. And he had personally encountered Jesus on the road to Damascus. Yet his greatest desire, his goal in his life, was to know Christ more fully each and every day.
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In that passage in the Bible, the word know frequently describes a personal intimate relationship rather than just information or knowledge. It denotes fellowship and communion.
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Paul's desire was to experience Jesus daily, grow in intimacy with him through faith, obedience, worship, and dependence upon his grace. Knowing Christ means entering into a living relationship with Jesus so that he continually transforms our hearts, our minds, and our character.
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And the good news is Jesus wants that kind of relationship too.
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Revelation 3.20 says, "See, I stand at the door and knock. "If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, "I will come into him and eat with him and be with him."
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Jesus wants an intimate relationship with you. See, it takes time for people to grow together.
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I married my wife about 47 years ago, and she's probably gonna get on to me for even mentioning her name from up here.
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She knew some things about me, and I knew some things about her,
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but we know each other much better now because we have been through life's trials together. We've been blessed by God together.
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There's things that I have seen him do in our life
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where he was glorified and worked for our good.
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That comes with time, and if you're not having time with Jesus, you can't grow. You can't get to know him.
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Knowing Christ is not an academic exercise. It's a relationship,
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and it begins by knowing the power of his resurrection.
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This power refers to the divine power that God demonstrated when he raised Jesus from the dead.
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The resurrection publicly declared Christ's victory over death, Satan in the grave. It confirmed Christ is the son of God,
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and it validated his saving work on the cross. But see, too many times, we just wanna settle for knowing that here
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and not knowing it here.
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Paul is not merely interested in believing in the resurrection, that it occurred historically. His desire was to experience it personally every day. See, the same divine power that raised Christ from the grave is now active in every believer
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that caused Jesus, Lord and Savior. Romans 6, 4 says, "Therefore, we have been buried with him "by baptism into death in order that "just as Christ was raised from the dead "by the glory of the Father, "so we may too walk in the newness of life." The power of the resurrection makes you a new person.
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Second Corinthians 5, 17.
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"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, "he is a new creation. "The old has passed away and see the new has come.
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"The power of the resurrection gives you new priorities, "new focus, new purpose,
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"and it gives you a positive outlook on the future."
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First Corinthians 15, 54 through 55.
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"When this corruptible body is clothed "with incorruptibility,
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"and this mortal body is clothed with immortality "when we are glorified,
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"then this saying that is written will take place. "Death has been swallowed up in victory. "Where death is your victory? "Where death is your sin?" You know why Christians are the most positive people? Or they should be the most positive people? Because they have experienced victory, victory over sin, and victory over death in the future.
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If you have a negative distribution, I was disposition, I was gonna say it another way, but the Holy Spirit got hold of me.
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If you have a negative disposition, you need to be saying, am I abiding in Jesus? No, you're not.
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Am I allowing the power of the resurrection to work in my life? Because you need to have a positive outlook. Look, this is a negative world. There's a lot of bad stuff going on, but I know who's gonna win in the end, and I know I'm on his team.
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When we are saved, we who were spiritually dead because of sin, we are made alive in Christ. We receive a new heart, a new identity, new desires, and the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. This is the beginning of resurrection life.
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We need to know Christ, the power of his resurrection, and we also share in his sufferings. Now, whoa, sufferings?
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That sounds surprising. When I accepted Jesus, everything's supposed to be rosy.
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That's not what the Bible teaches.
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One of the greatest abominations is the gospel that says everything's gonna be okay, the prosperity gospel, because that's not what the Bible says. See, we want the victory of the resurrection,
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but we don't want the pain of the cross,
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but suffering for Christ is no exception to the Christian life. In fact, it's the normal path.
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Philippians 1, 29,
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"For it has been granted to you on Christ's behalf."
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"Not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him."
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1 Peter, chapter four, beginning in verse 12.
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"Dear friends, don't be surprised "when the fiery ordeal comes among you to test you "as if something unusual happened to you. "Instead," here's the strange word, "Instead, grumble and complain." No, that's not what it says. "Instead, pow," no, it says, "Instead, rejoice as you share in the sufferings of Christ "so that you may also rejoice with great joy "when his glory is revealed." See, the Bible's not glorifying pain, but see, suffering becomes meaningful because it draws us into a deeper relationship with Jesus. See, veterans will often talk about the fellowship that they have which only could be forged in the battlefield, in the fox hose.
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In a similar way, there are aspects of knowing Jesus that can only be experienced when obedience is costly.
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Trials become the place where we discover his presence, his comfort, his strength, and his faithfulness in ways that are impossible during seasons of ease.
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You wanna know somebody?
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Go through a rough time with them.
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It's easy to be all smiley when everything's okay.
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You know somebody by how they endure. "When we willingly obey and put ourself in position "that we will suffer for being a follower of Jesus, "it refines us."
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Romans five, beginning in verse three.
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"Not only that, but we boast in our afflictions "because we know the affliction produces endurance. "Endurest produces proven character "and proven character produces hope. "When we suffer for Jesus, "it gives us an eternal perspective." Second Corinthians 4, 17. "For our momentary light affliction and producing for us "an absolutely incomparable eternal weight of glory. "Paul endured beatings, imprisonment, shipwreck, "hunger, and constant danger." And he's saying that, remember this, suffering is temporary. Today's burden is outweighed by tomorrow's glory. Temporary pain produces eternal gain. So how can we do this? How can we reach this goal of knowing Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering?
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So how do we get to this right goal? Well, it has to start with right priorities. Now we're gonna turn back a little bit. We're gonna go to Philippians chapter three, and we're gonna go to verse four to help us to see right priorities.
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Paul says, "Although I have reasons "for confidence in the flesh,
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"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.
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"But everything that was gained for me, "I have considered to be lost because of Christ.
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"More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss "in view of the surpassing value "of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.
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"Because of him, I have suffered the loss of all things "and consider them as done, as useless, "so that I may gain Christ and be found in him, "not having a righteousness of my own from the law, "but one that is through faith in Christ, "the righteousness from God based on faith."
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One of the easiest things,
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one of the easiest mistakes that we make
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is settling for good.
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Confusing good things with ultimate things. Settling for the earthly rather than the eternal. There's a lot of good things in life.
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I should probably apologize to Will for correcting him.
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Sports are good. I love sports. And I was one of the loudest voices up here correcting Will when he said, "University, Alabama, no, Georgia!"
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(Congregation Laughing)
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Look, I know Will, there's a lot of good athletes coming from Alabama, but Georgia, Tennessee, and a few other schools have produced some as well.
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Amen?
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Sports is good. Music is good. Hard work is good. Education is good. A moral reputation is good. Even religious activity is good. But when we look to those things to give us worth and security or acceptance or pleasure, rather than God, well, we have our priorities out of order. When they become the most important things in our life, and you know how you know they're the most important, what do you spend the most time on? What do you spend your money on?
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What do you keep your focus on?
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That's your number one priority. And if it's not knowing God, it's out of order.
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See, Paul knew, see, he could relate to that. His priorities were out of order. His priorities were about developing an impressive spiritual resume. He was a Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisees, passionate about persecuting the church, blameless according to the law.
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If righteousness could be earned, Paul thought he had done it all. He had achieved, but then everything changed. Everything changed to Paul, because he met Jesus on the road to Damascus. It changed who he was, it changed his priorities. The things he once listed as assets are now liabilities. He says, "I count them as lost." And they weren't necessarily sinful, but they were insufficient. Anything that we have as our top priority in life is insufficient.
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It can never accomplish what we're desired to do.
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Glorify God.
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In fact, sometimes our goals become obstacles, because they take our focus of what we're supposed to be about. So, what occupies first place in your life?
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Are you obedient? Am I obedient to the Lord's command? He said this in Matthew 6.33, "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, "and all things will be provided to you." Are you heeding the Lord's warning? Jesus said in Matthew 6.24, "No one can serve two masters, "since either he will hate one and love the other, "or he will be devoted to one and despise the other." You cannot serve God and money. You can only have one top priority. One.
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Our most important goal should not be pleasure, success, status, or even religious activity. Our goal should be to know Jesus. When he becomes our highest treasure, every other priority finds its proper place. So, we need to have the right goal.
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We need to have the right priority, and we need to follow the right process. Let's pick up at Philippians chapter three, at verse 10 again.
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"My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection, "and the fellowship of his suffering, "being conformed to his death, "assuming that I will somehow reach the resurrection "from among the dead. "As followers of Christ,
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"we must not only experience Christ's resurrection power, "but we must embrace the cross." The word conformed here describes an ongoing process of being shaped into the likeness of Jesus.
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It's a daily surrender of self. Every day, we're called to crucify pride, selfish ambition, sinful desires, and the craving for recognition, so that the life of Christ may be increasingly seen in us.
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Romans 6, 6.
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For we know that our old self was crucified with him, so that the body ruled by sin might be rendered powerless, so that we may no longer be slaves to sin. See, our old self is to be crucified, so that we can live a new life of obedience. We need to be conformed to the cross. And Paul celebrates that. And he says, the cross is an example.
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Christ is an example. Philippians 2, 6 through 8. Jesus, who existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited.
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Instead, he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity, and when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by a beating to the point of cross, even to the death of the cross. See, the cross is where we go to salvation, but we also need to use it as a blueprint for our life. Each and every day, we need to crucify ourself, so that we become increasingly more like Jesus.
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So we have to be conformed to the cross,
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and we must pursue Christ with a passion.
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Philippians chapter three, beginning at verse 12.
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Not that I've already reached the goal, or am already perfect, but I make every effort to take hold on it, because I also have been taken hold of by Jesus Christ. Brothers and sister, I do not consider myself to have been taken hold of it, but one thing I do, forgetting what is behind, and reaching forward to what is ahead, I pursue as my goal the price promised by God's heavenly call in Christ Jesus. Paul's saying here, don't look back. Don't live on yesterday's victories, or yesterday's failures. Keep your eyes on Christ. Keep moving forward. The prize is not a medal. It's not a title. It's not earthly success. The prize is Jesus himself.
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Paul's life was marked by a relentless pursuit towards this ultimate goal. But let me just say, notice this. He says, not that I've already obtained this, have already been made perfect. The greatest to me, the greatest Christian who ever lived claimed he was not perfect, that he had not arrived. Instead, he admitted that he was still a work in progress.
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That's the first lesson we need to remind ourselves about pursuing Christ. We never get there. I'm the perfect example of that. I have not got there.
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And if you're not willing to admit it, then you need to humble yourself because we never achieve perfection. And see, spiritual maturity is not about the faithless life here on earth, but it's about refusing to stop running, refusing to stop growing, refusing to stop pursuing Jesus. The more Paul grew in Christ, the more he realized his spiritual maturity is not marked by self-confidence, but by humble dependence.
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So we have to be conformed to Christ. We have to pursue with passion who Christ is. So how can we do it? He gives us a perfect illustration on runner.
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Paul refuses to look behind. He leaves behind both his failures and his compliments, and he will not be distracted by his past regrets or past successes. His eye is fixed on the finish line, and he strains towards Christ being like him daily. Colossians chapter three, verse two, it says, "Set your mind on things above, "not on earthly things." Keep your eyes on the finish line.
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Remove any hindrance. Colossians three, verse five. "Therefore, put to death what belongs to your earthly nature, "sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil, desire, and greed, "which is idolatry." See, we're to keep our focus, take off the hindrances, and those hindrances are a part of our sinful nature.
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They keep us from being what Christ wants us to be, and then he tells us to become more like him. Colossians three, in fact, I encourage you, go home today and read Colossians three.
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It is the chapter about discipleship. Focus, put off, put on. Colossians three, beginning in verse 12.
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"Therefore, as God's chosen one, holy and dearly loved, "put on compassion, kindness, humility, "gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another "and forgiving one another,
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"if anyone has grievance against another, "just as the Lord has forgiven you, "so also to forgive." And that short chapter, it gives you the three steps to becoming more like Jesus. Put off, put on Jesus.
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In 1954, there was a race, and it was called the Miracle Mile.
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John Landy led Roger Bannister for nearly the entire race, but as they entered the final stretch, Landy glanced over his shoulder to see where Bannister was. In that instant, Bannister surged past him on the opposite side and won the race.
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Paul's saying, "Don't look back. "Don't live off yesterday's victory or its failures. "Keep your eyes on Christ. "Remove the hindrances and strive to be more like him." And here's the takeaway truth.
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This is what I want you to take home with you today.
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I like y'all to participate. I like you to see, I like you to hear, and I like you to speak it. So here's our takeaway truth. I'm gonna tell you, and I want you to repeat it back to me. Here's our takeaway truth. Keep moving forward. So what do we gotta do? Keep moving forward. Very good.
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This scene, this reminds me of a scene out of one of my favorite movies, Rocky Balboa.
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Not one, two, three, four, five, I think it's number six.
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There's a scene that takes place outside Adrian's restaurant in Philadelphia
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where Rocky Balboa, played by Sylvester Stallone, confronts his son Robert Jr.
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Robert has become frustrated, living in the shadow of his famous father, and he fears the consequences of Rocky's upcoming fight, his comeback, and it's one of the greatest speeches ever.
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Rocky responds with a motivational speech emphasizing personal responsibility, perseverance, a message that if you wanna reach your goals, if you wanna win in life, you got to?
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That's pretty good.
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So what's keeping you from reaching your ultimate goal of knowing Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering? Is there regret?
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Are you letting past failures hinder you in the race you're running?
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So this is what you gotta do. You've gotta forget what's behind, focus on the goal, and what are you gonna do? Jesus Lord.
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What about success? Are you so successful that you just feel that you don't need God, you've done it all?
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Here's what you've gotta do. You gotta humble yourself before he does. Focus on that goal, remove that pride, and what are you gonna do? Jesus Lord.
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It's comfort, recreation, or enjoyment, distracting you and hindering you from what God's goal is for your life. Here's what you gotta go. You gotta re-prioritize your life, and you got to? Keep moving forward. All right, keep moving forward. You gotta do three things.
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You gotta have the right goal.
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You gotta have the right priorities. You gotta have the right process.
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Our staff and our worship team, they're gonna be coming forward here right now.
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And I wanna challenge you, if you're a follower of Jesus, right now I want you to examine, what is your goal?
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Is it to know Jesus and the powers of resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering?
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Or is your goal to get to lunch here in just a minute? Because I know some of it's your goals, I'm gonna go ahead and do this. Everybody else is afraid to do this. Some of you are gonna get up and go out the door here in just a minute, because you're more worried about getting to lunch than you are about dealing with Jesus right now. And I wanna be honest, it's one of the most disrespectful things I've ever seen you do to the pastor, is that you decide instead of dealing with invitation, you decide to go out the door.
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It's time to deal with Jesus.
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So let me ask you, as a follower of Jesus Christ, where's your goals? Where's your priorities?
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Are you willing to serve him? Are you willing to fight against hell for him? Are you willing to tell your neighbor about Jesus?
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Where's your goals? Where's your priorities?
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Spend some time asking yourself that.
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Because we ain't gonna be the church. You ain't gonna be the person Jesus ever wanted you to be
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until you do that.
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But some of you are lost.
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Some of you are lost as a goose in a snowstorm.
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You're lost as I was when I was 10 years old, on the farm I took the wrong way and was lost for hours.
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And you're going the wrong way.
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So you can't move forward because you're going the opposite way, you're going away from Jesus. And what you need to do is you need to repent, place your faith in Jesus, come down here and share with one of these people what God is doing in your life. Because let me just tell you, I'm not satisfied with where we're at, we've gotta keep moving forward. We gotta become the church God wants us to be. We gotta become the people God wants us to be so that he's glorified in carrieval.
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Let's pray.
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Father, you are a great God.
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Oh, more than I deserve, more than any of us deserve.
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But in your kindness and your compassion, you sent Jesus to live the perfect life and die on the cross and be resurrected so that we can have the forgiveness and sin, the power of the resurrection, and that we might share in your suffering.
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Lord, spend your time right now with us, you're with us. Help us to not grieve the Holy Spirit,
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but help us to be faithful and obedient in whatever you lead us to do.
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In Christ's name we pray, amen.
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