Transcript

Good morning, church. Well, it's great seeing all of you here this morning. Thrills my heart to see you on this second Sunday of 2026. And we're continuing this series, seeing your place in God's story, getting God's vision for our lives. Not your vision, not my vision, but his vision.

What does he see? It's his story, after all. And where's my place in his story? Last week we talked about getting a heart vision. It starts with each of us individually getting a vision for who you are in Christ.

And now today we're going to talk about the home. Not just your house, but God's house. We'll talk about both today because both have to do with your family, God's family. And if you're a member of God's family because you've received Jesus, but also your biological family, your house and God's house. We're going to be talking about how God's vision shapes our families, our relationships.

Then next week we'll talk about what we've called hands, which is about where you work, where you go to school, what's God's vision for your work and your service. And then we'll conclude with harvest. What's God's vision for your part in the world? God has a world size vision that you're involved in, that you're called to. So that's what we're talking about.

But today we're going to focus on the home, your house and God's house. It says in the Book of Proverbs, where there is no vision, the people perish. And we need a vision from the Lord. We need to get focused on what he would call us to do. Without vision, our lives lose direction, they lose purpose.

Most homes and churches don't fall apart all at once. They drift. They drift into a worldly vision or, or a selfish vision or a vision of comfort. Conversations get shorter, patience grows thinner, and many of us are exhausted. And it's not because we don't care about our relationships.

It's because we have the wrong vision for our relationships and we need a God sized vision. When God's vision is missing both at our house and God's house, we lose the warmth and direction that he desires for our families. So how do we stop the drift? How do we get a vision for my house, your house and God's house? Well, in the book of Philippians, the Apostle Paul gives us insight.

He reminds believers that since they had already been given the mind of Christ, they were called to live out of that new mindset in all of their relationships. And I believe, as those that are in Christ today, those who have asked Jesus to be your Lord and Savior, that you had bestowed upon you as a gift of the Holy Spirit, the availability of the mind of Christ, the wisdom of Christ for you that you can draw upon. And as we live according to that, as we live that out, I believe that it will cause. As we're looking at these five verses today from Philippians chapter two, it'll motivate us to make three shifts of mindset, from a worldly mindset, a fleshly mindset, to a spiritual mindset. Having the mind of Christ.

So let's dig in. We're in the book of Philippians. Last week we were in chapter one. Today we're in chapter two. We're just going to pull a few verses out and really dig in verses one through five.

So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interest of others. Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus. This is God's word.

Amen. We're looking for three mind shift, mindset changes or shifts. The first shift is having the mind of Christ. We can shift from rivalry to unity. From rivalry to unity.

As you're looking at these five verses, take note that the word mind is in there three times. You can see it in verse two and again in verse five. When we speak of mind here, the Apostle Paul is talking about your mind, our mind, but primarily the idea as believers that we have available to us the mind of Christ. And since we have that, he's talking about what that looks like and how it changes the way we think, it changes our perspective, it changes our perceptions. So you see it here three times, that he wants us to get a vision, to see others through the lens of Christ.

So we begin to see others the way Christ sees us. And then we see in these first couple of verses, the first two verses that he's using if then language. So if he gives you what's called a conditional phrase here, he begins with a condition. In fact, he begins with four conditions. And then he describes four outcomes or conclusions here that really are just one.

And what is that one? That we would be one. That we would be in unity. So let's unpack it. Let's look at these first two verses of the how the mindset of Christ, the vision that God has for us, is to shift from competitive thinking to think of each other as rivals and to begin to think of each other, one another as one in Christ.

This is the move, the shift that he calls us to notice. He has four any's, four innies here. So if any see those. Now, before I move on, I should mention that the so if presumes that you read chapter one, if you read the New Testament in the original Greek, there are no chapter and verse markings. We added those later to help us find our place.

And so if you're at this place in this letter, because this is a letter from Paul to the church at Philippi, he's already said some things up here. He says, for in verse 29, for it's been granted to you that for the sake of Christ, you should not only believe in him, but also suffer for his sake. Engaged in the same conflict. He talks about their oneness, but he also talks about conflict. We've got to remember when Paul planted the church at Philippi, he was publicly whipped along with his partner Silas with 40 lashes in the marketplace, stripped down to the waist and put his arms around a pillar and chained there and whipped publicly and put in a jail.

And we talked about this last week and how he led the Philippian jailer and his whole household to Jesus, and they were like early members to the church of Philippi. So he knows something about arrival. He knows something. And he's writing this letter from a Roman prison. He knows there's fighting going on out there.

Do you recognize that the world is full of rivalry? Have you watched the news lately? Try not to. It's on social media. TikTok.

It's on X, what used to be Twitter. Right. It's everywhere. And the only thing that makes the news is bad news. But I'm here to give you good news.

Paul says, I know all about that. But when you come into this house and when you go into your house, don't let it be that way. Make a mind change, make a new way of thinking, a new perspective. Is, we're not competitors, we're not rivals, we are one. Now let me get back to my four enies.

I was getting ready to say that, but I wanted to set up where we're at in the context of the text. So if, okay, there's fighting out there, but. And it's almost tongue in cheek here, like there Ought to be these conditions, these four conditions in your life, believer. I'm assuming they're in your life. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, do you have that?

Do you have any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from his love? Do you have. I'm assuming Paul's like, I'm assuming y' all came to Jesus and y' all got the same Jesus I got. You got the encouragement from Jesus, you got the love of Jesus, then he's got the third inning. You got any participation in the spirit?

That word participation is the Greek word koinonia. It could be translated communion, partnership, participation, fellowship. Are you in the fellowship of the Spirit?

Are you a participant? You have that. He's got a fourth. Any. Any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy?

Have you got that for each other in the mind of Christ, do you have that? In the original language, the word affection is literally vowels. In fact, if you have a King Jimmy in your hands right now, reading from the King James, it says that it just literally translated. It doesn't work as well in modern English. I got bowels for you.

Not quite as. But the idea is a deep affection from my gut. I have affection for you like that. And now that works. Now that I've explained it a little bit right, affection.

Do you have that? Because if you do. And then he gives us the first imperative. There are three imperatives in these five verses. The first imperative is complete my joy.

Here's what Paul says. I'm in a Roman prison. I'm locked up for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. He's already told us in chapter one, in all my remembrance of you, I always pray with joy. Every time I think of you, I think I pray with joy.

But you want to really make my joy overflow. You want to make it complete. And then he gives us these four outcomes of these four enies. If you have the encouragement of Christ, if you have the love of Christ, if you have participation in the spirit, if you have affection and sympathy, make my joy complete. Then he gives four bys by being of the same mind, have the same mind, have the mind of Christ, have the same way of thinking.

By having the same love, you got the love. Have the same love. That word, both times it's there. Twice is agape love. That's God's kind of love.

That's unconditional love. It's not based on a condition. Phileo is another Greek word. It's where we get the name of the city. Philadelphia.

It's the idea of conditional or brotherly love. I love you because you're my brother. That's not agape. Agape is I love you because God has poured out his love in me through the person of Christ. And I love you in spite of who you are.

It's unconditional love.

That's the second by same love, full accord. So you're in full accordance with each other because of the participation in the Spirit. And then finally one mind. He goes, you want to make my joy complete? You want me to hear from the church at Philippi and know how you're doing?

Be one, be unified. How's that going at your house? Do you see your spouse as a rival? As someone you're trying to win arguments with? You're already thinking like the world.

Do you see that relationship with your teenager parents? Like you're in a competition, like your rivals?

You're already behind. You're already thinking like the world. Are you in a friendship or a relationship at this church where your rivals. Friend. You're not walking according to the Spirit.

You're not living by the mind of Christ, which is yours. As a believer, it's a possession of the believer that we have been made. The mind of Christ has been made available to us, that we can think his thoughts, that we can know his will. He's given us his written word, and he's given us his discernment by His Spirit. We have the mind of Christ.

Therefore, since we have this encouragement, since we have this love and comfort, since we have this participation in the Spirit, since we have these bowels of affection, since we have the sympathy, then let us be one.

Let us be one with our spouse. Let us be one with our children. Let us be one with their parents. And let us be one in our community groups, our home groups, our ministries, our relationships. You want to know if you're in the will of God in this area.

How are you viewing one another? As rivals or as one body, as one family? This is what Paul is talking about. You want to make my joy complete? You want to make me just fill with joy, be one.

I think Paul has the mind of Christ here because that's how Jesus prayed on the last night before his crucifixion. You've often heard that the Lord's Prayer. You hear it referred to as the Lord's Prayer. Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. But that's not really the Lord's Prayer.

That's the Lord's teaching prayer. Lord, teach us to pray like you pray, the disciples said, and he said, pray like this. Our Father, which art in heaven. So it's like a teaching prayer. But if you want to see, if you want to lean in and hear the Lord from his heart, go to John 17.

It's the last prayer. He prays in the garden of Gethsemane before his crucifixion, knowing he's going to be crucified, knowing that he's going to be betrayed by one of the 12. Knowing all of this, he prays that we would be one. Look what it says in verses 20 through 23 of chapter 17. I'm praying not only for these disciples, the ones that are with him, but also for all who will ever believe in me.

That's us through their message. Here's Jesus the night before his crucifixion. He's praying for me and you. He sees us across the centuries. He knows us.

He prays that we'll be one. How does he pray? I pray that they will be one, just as you and I are one. As you are in me, Father, and I am in you. May they experience such perfect unity that the world would know that you sent me and that you love them as much as you love me.

That's how the world will recognize us, because we will be like aliens. While they're all in competition in that dog eat dog world, we will be unified. How's that going at your house? And what are you bringing from your house into this house?

Are you at one? You know that was God's will right from the beginning for the husband and wife. We don't have to go far in the book of Genesis, do we, until we see and the two will be one flesh. We don't see that for this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife. And the two will be one flesh.

We don't see. We don't have to go far to see that. And then Paul grabs a hold of that truth from Genesis and he writes this in Ephesians and he connects it as a mystery that describes not only our marriages, but also our church family. He says, in the same way, husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife, loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church because we are members of his body.

So Paul goes from talking about your house to his house because there's something about the way God made us so that he made us in his own Image. What we see in Latin is the imago dei, that we are made in the image of God, and our purpose was to display his grace and beauty to a dark world. But because of sin, that image has been marred. We still possess the dignity and deserve the dignity of treatment towards others that God made us in his image. But it's marred, it's broken.

But then Jesus comes. And Colossians chapter one says, who being in the image of the invisible God, he's the one that now we go, okay, that's what we were supposed to look like.

And so then marriage becomes also an image of God. Christian marriage. Husband and wife being one, loving each other with the mind of Christ, so that the world sees what a family is supposed to look like. And then Christian marriages come in together and build a church together. And then we see a church.

Oh, so that's what God looks like. Because it's alien to the world. This. This idea of unity. Think of a symphony orchestra or a great huge 2 or 300 member choir.

I've played in an orchestra before. I've sung in huge choirs in the past. If we had a bigger stage, we'd have one here, maybe someday. My background is music. That's how I thought I would spend my whole life.

I thought I would spend my life as a musician. I love music. But if you go to an orchestral concert or a choir concert and you have someone, maybe it's the first trumpet. The first trumpet is the best trumpet player in the trumpet section. He sits in the first chair.

But let's say he's a little too full of his opinion of himself. And when the trumpet section comes out, he plays the loudest. Oh, he plays as loud as he can. And now the harmony of the concert is ruined. He made it about himself.

Or let's say it's a choir. And there's that soprano, you know, the one with the crazy vibrato. You know that one, right?

Somebody told her she could sing. They were afraid to tell her the truth. She got in the choir and nobody heard the music because one person drew all the attention to the themselves like that. A choir is supposed to sound like one voice. An orchestra is supposed to sound like one instrument.

And when it does, people, they go away. That was beautiful. But it's not beautiful when one sticks out. It loses its harmony. What's going on at your house?

What's going on in your community group? We call our home groups that meet during the week, that get together and study God's word and pray together, eat together, are you in one, by the way. I hope you are, but how's that going there? Are you making it all about you and your community group? Every week I got to tell everybody what's going on with me.

You should, but are you listening first? That's what they always tell you. If you're in a great choir, they go, listen to the voices around you, try to get your vibrata to match theirs. Get loud and soft, according to the conductor, which is the mind of Christ.

Let there be one voice, one mind.

This is the mind of Christ for your house. This is the mind of Christ for this house. That's the first shift.

Do you have it? Here's the second shift. It's from self interest to humility. From self interest to humility. We're in verses three and four.

Now circle the word humility in verse three. You see it there? We're going to be noticing a second imperative in verses three and four. It kind of sneaks up on you. In the original Greek, the word do is not there.

It's an unusual way. The first verb that you encounter in this, in the original is the word count, which is later in three. It literally just sounds like this. Nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility, count. And there's the imperative that's driving this next one.

Count yourselves.

Count others more significant than yourselves.

Not out of selfish ambition. That's self promotion.

Can you believe there's a social media, it's been around for years now, called Facebook? The whole idea is to get your face out there and to promote your self promotion. That can be used well. I try to use it well. I put a daily devotion on there.

I take pictures of my grandkids and my family and I put those on there just. Just because I'm sharing. Because a lot of my family members live in other states and it's a way of them seeing, oh, somebody had a birthday, et cetera. That's basically how I use it. I don't converse about politics on there because some of you are of different political persuasions than I am.

And the only offense I want to give anybody. There's one offense I'm willing to give. That's the offense of the good news of Jesus. I don't want to be known for what party I vote for or my opinion like that. So I don't use it like that.

So I try to use it. I'm not perfect at it, but I try not to use it for self promotion. I try to promote the word of God. What's going on in my family that my proud of or the church that I'm proud of. I put a lot of stuff about the church on there or asking people to come to church.

What's with these young people though, with these glamour shots and the hissy lips? What's that like? Do you realize your pastor sees that picture of you, teenager? Like I see one of those and I go, oh, back to you too.

What's that about? Who you kissing? I don't know. Just having a little fun here. Nothing from self promotion, selfish ambition.

Nothing from conceit, which is the opposite of humility. It's thinking that you're better. But in humility, the word humility might. It might be best understood. This is kind of a mystery.

It was a C.S. lewis quote originally. His is more complex. This is my simplified version. Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.

Humility is not thinking less of yourself, not putting yourself down. Humility is not going, I'm nobody, I'm nothing. Woe is me. That's not biblical humility. Christ didn't put himself down, he lifted others up.

Humility is not thinking less of yourself. It's thinking of yourself less or not at all. Instead, think of others.

In fact, the word count here, which is the comparative word in the original, it's the driver of our second shift. It's a mathematic word. It's like, do mental math. Do this computation in your head. Paul says count.

It's an accounting term. Calculate, look at others and go, you're more significant than me in my ledger, my mental ledger. I'm going to count you above myself in the way I talk to you and listen to you and treat you. This is a problem for us. It's a problem for me.

It's a problem for you. Because from the time the doctor spanked us on the beehive and we let out our first cry, we've been thinking, I'm significant.

I, me, me, me. That's the way we're born. We're born with the sin gene, every one of us. Selfishness, Me, me, me. But when you get the mind of Christ, you think of yourself less, you think of others more, you make a shift.

That's verse three. Boy, that's so much. How in the world. I can't do this. You're right.

And he's not asking you to do this in your own strength because that's contrary to the gospel. Because the gospel is not about earning. But the gospel does involve effort. You can't Earn. But you do need to put on the mind of Christ.

You do need to yield your thinking to his. There is something to do, but it's not the I'm going to work really hard of. Don't think of yourself. Don't think of yourself. Don't think of yourself.

And now all you're thinking is of yourself. Because you're thinking not of yourself, but instead take your mind off yourself and put it on others. And Holy Spirit, help me to do it. Help me to get the mind of Christ. Let me see if I can listen to you first, really listen to it, not be thinking of my comeback before you even finish verse four.

Let each of you look not only to your own interest, but also to the interests of others. This is not about being nosy. This is about really hearing what's going on with others, really hearing your spouse. It's especially difficult at those daily transition times. In the mornings before you're getting ready to head into your day, one of you is in a hurry, or both of you is in a hurry and you say things offhandedly.

But to get a vision of how can I help her start her day better? What's causing the crazy in her life? Or how can I help him when he first comes home from the office or work or whatever, how can I help him? Have a moment where. My wife's father used to say this when he would come back from the corporate job he had, we'd go visit for the weekend and he would get there late.

Let's say we went in on a Friday and as he would come in, he would say, he'd say to us, give me a minute to get human again. You know, you come a long drive. He drove like an hour to work one way. And he'd be like, I need to get human again before I get around people. Well, I think what I'm saying to you is a step above human.

How could you get the mind of Christ? How could you get really spiritual? How could you really get there so that you can hear one another? It says in First Corinthians that we're to put others good ahead of our own. Let no one seek his own good but the good of his neighbor.

It says in James that. That God becomes our enemy and we become an enemy of God when we self promote, when we are proud. It says in James 4, 6, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. You want to be in opposition to God? Be a self promoter, be a proud person.

But he lifts up the humble. You know, earlier I talked about the last prayer that Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane. But his last service before his greatest service at the cross is found in John 13, where it says at the beginning of the Last Supper, as all the disciples were taking their seats and, you know, he told them to get the room ready, and they're trying to get the food where it's supposed to go. And they grew up with the Passover, so they know who brought this, who brought that, and you. And you know what that's like at your house.

Everybody's scurrying around trying, and everybody wants a seat closest to Jesus. Like, are you going to sit there? If you're not, I'm going to squeeze in next to Jesus. Everybody's trying to figure that out. And in that quiet moment, Jesus knowing that he's going to be crucified the next morning, knowing that Judas is going to betray him that night, knowing that he's the Son of God.

And after he accomplishes this great victory and he's going to be lifted up to the highest place in the heavens at the right hand of the Father, and be given the keys to death and sin and Hades and the keys to the whole universe. The authority above every authority. Knowing that he's going to be the king of all things, he strips himself to the waist and takes his outer garment and ties it around his waist as a towel. And he gets down on his hands and knees and gets a pan of water and starts at the end of the table and starts washing those old dirty feet, wearing those sandals. Those dusty streets of Jerusalem.

He gets to Peter. Peter says, lord, you're not washing my feet. He goes, if I don't wash your feet, you have no part of me. He goes, well, dunk me in. Wash my hands, wash my head, wash. And he goes, you don't understand what I'm doing now, but you will.

You'll understand later. And then he says this. He says when he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place at the table, he said to them, do you understand what I've done to you? You call me teacher and Lord, and you are right, for so I am. If I, then your Lord and Teacher have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet.

Now notice in his humility, he doesn't demean himself. He says, you call me teacher and Lord, and you're right, I am. He knows who he is. Humility is not about thinking less of yourself. It's not thinking of yourself at all the king of the universe strips down to the waist, gets on his knees.

He says, watch this.

Learn from this. This will be the mark of my people. You'll be like me. You'll think like me. You'll wash one another's feet, and you won't look like the world.

So this week, practice mental math. Do the computation count others more significant than yourself. Not because you have a low self image. No. You know who you are in Christ.

You have his image of yourself. I don't need someone else to tell me who I am. I'm not going to navel, gaze and look inside and discover who I am from the inside. Because I don't know anything. Why would I tell myself who I am?

And why would I let you tell me who I am? I'm going to ask the one who made me has a purpose for me and has a vision for my life and my place in his story. And I want to fulfill in this generation the thing he made me for. Don't you? Come on.

Don't you?

So I'm going to ask him. Okay, so he made me this. And I'm not going to be ashamed of being that. I'm not going to be afraid of being that. But at the same time, I'm going to be willing to get down on my knees and do what he calls me to do.

So practice mental math this week. Before you walk in your front door, before you roll out of your bed, wherever it's at, just say, okay. Lord, give me your mind. Help me right now. In my married life, in my relationships, instead of focusing on our differences, instead of being in a rivalry or a self interest, I want my way.

I want my way. Instead of focusing like that, focus on the mind of Christ. And then watch the unity. Focus on the mind of Christ and watch. What does she think?

How can I hear her? What does he think? How can I serve him? And watch the oneness. Watch this.

Watch what God does in your family. Look out for the interest of your spouse, for your child, for your parents, and then church. Remember, we're making disciples. Our calling as a church is to make disciples. And we say it like this, we exist.

Eastgate Church exists in order to make disciples of Jesus Christ who have a growing heart for God, heart for each other, and heart for our world. And what I'm really leaning into here in Philippians chapter two is the heart for each other. We did the heart for God last week. Really? Yes.

Getting your heart right with God, but now heart for each other. And we describe it like this. We say the example of that in our church is to be active in fellowship and discipleship so that it's exhibited in our authentic fellowship and devoted discipleship. And so I want to challenge you to be discipled, to sign up for our life on Life discipleship process. I want to challenge you to be in a community group.

But when you get in one, be humble and seek unity. Here's the third shift. You ready for this one? This is the third one shift. From comfort to sacrifice.

From comfort to sacrifice. We've got one verse left, verse five. From comfort to sacrifice. It's our third imperative. It's unusual.

The imperative, the command is have this mind, have this thinking, think like this. But that falls short because it's think with his mind. You have it. Have this mind among yourselves which is yours. In Christ Jesus, already yours believer, you have access to the will of God through his revealed word and through the Spirit of Christ which dwells in you.

Ask James, chapter one says, don't ask double mindedly, but to ask. And whoever asks, he'll give you his will. You'll receive it, you'll hear from him.

You have it. But here's the thing. I just want to let you know it's always going to move you from comfort to sacrifice. When you get the will of God, he's going to move you from self to others, and he's going to move you from your comfortable place to a place that feels risky or feels, oh, I don't know how to do that.

I don't have the resources to accomplish that. I don't have the. I don't know how to do that. I'm afraid to do that. Oh, I've never done that before.

And so we want to stay in our comfort zone. But he says, no, I want you to have the mind of Christ. I want you to have the mind of Christ. Have this mind. May I say to you that there are at least two categories of people in the room right now?

I'm going to illustrate this from First Corinthians, chapter 2. I have that in your text or in your bulletins that you picked up on the way in. First of all, there are some of you in the room that your mind is still in the natural condition that you were born with. You think as the world thinks, as the flesh thinks, that the mind that we're all born with, that puts self first. Paul writes it like this in First Corinthians, chapter 2, verse 14.

The natural person, the natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit. Of God, for they are folly or foolishness to him, and he's not able to understand them because they're spiritually discerned. So this whole sermon for you has been disturbing. A lot of it's just going over your head, but you'd still like to have it because the Holy Spirit's knocking on your heart's door. But that's where you're at.

You're in that natural man condition. Christ is not in your life. You don't have the mind of Christ, therefore you can't discern the word of God. You hear the words, but they're not like food for your soul. But you don't have to stay there because look at verse 15.

It describes the one who has received. Jesus has the spirit of God living in them. Verse 15. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. Why?

Because Christ was already judged in that person's place. He's already received condemnation in our place. So there's no judgment, no condemnation left for the spiritual person. And then he quotes the Old Testament. For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?

It's kind of a rhetorical question, the way Paul used it. Because who could know the mind of the Lord? But Paul says, guess what? Because of Jesus we have. He says, but we have the mind of Christ.

Come on, you can know the will of God. You can know what God wants you to do and be. He can help you with every decision.

Teenager, single person starting your. You got your driver's license? My granddaughter just turned 16. I can't believe it. You know, I got two 16 year old grandchildren now.

What happened? I still feel young. Some of you going to go look in the mirror, Pastor, you'll change your mind. I know, just hanging on, doing the best I can. But in here I still feel young.

But I got these kids growing up and they're starting to date and maybe that's you and you're like God. I hear this from young people all the time. God, just reveal your will to me. I don't know what to do. Is this the right one?

Is this the right. Should I buy this car? Should I buy this house? Should I go to this school? The early teens, all the way up into the early 20s.

There's like every significant decision on planet earth you're trying to make them when you're the dumbest you've ever been in your life.

Is that okay if I said that like that? The old people are laughing, the young people are just Looking at me with like these really critical eyes right now. And I'll hug on all of y' all later. I'm sorry, but you really. You're going to know a lot more later in Christ as you grow up, but you're right now having to make these decisions.

But guess what, young person right now, 8 years old, 18 years old, 28 years old, you can have the mind of Christ. And you can think better thoughts than an 80 year old who doesn't have the mind of Christ. And you can make right decisions. Should I date this person? Well, go to the word of God and learn the principles of God.

You have the mind of Christ. To discern it, go to Second Corinthians 6, 14. Be not unequally yoked with an unbeliever. Do not be yoked with an unbeliever. There you go.

Don't missionary date. Don't date. You know, I believe I can lead him to Jesus.

Maybe you can, but you shouldn't be dating him. Ladies, stop dating. Fixer uppers, right? I don't know why you ladies do that, but I'm glad one of you did.

I need to close. Don't I.

Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus. And then he gives us the illustration of sacrifice. Some call this a Christological hymn that perhaps in some of your translations will have it in stanzas, like poetry or song. Perhaps it was, we don't know for sure. Paul says, have this mind.

That's the mind of Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, whose God did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. Adam and Eve heard Satan say, if you eat of this, you'll be like God. And they grasped it. And he is God. He released his rights.

Who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men. That's the incarnation. That's Christmas. He became one of us. He's not finished going down the ladder of love.

He's taken off the insignia of majesty. He's taken off his royal robes. He's diminished himself to the point he's still God of very God. But his omniscience and omnipresence and these character traits that he's laid them aside, it's a mystery for a season to become one of us, limited inside of a human body.

He's not finished. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death. He took My death. He took your death. But he's not finished.

Even death on a cross, he was executed. The Old Testament says it's a curse for the one to be hung on a tree. He took the curse of sin, the death of sin. He climbed down the ladder of love all the way. And as the passage continues, God therefore exalted him to the highest place, even higher than the place he was before.

Oh, it's better for God to lift you up than to lift up yourself. Get this mind. Answer God's call on your life. He's always going to call you to go off road. If you give him the keys and the steering wheel and you get over in the passenger seat, I better not see anybody with that bumper sticker that says, God is my co pilot.

Give him the keys. He's going to go off road. He's going to take you out of your comfort zone. He's going to call you to a place that you'll have to depend on him. Now, church.

How are we going to do this in our house? Because we can't do it when we feel like we want our me time. How are we going to say, I want your time. Get out of your comfort zone. Do what God calls you to do.

How are we going to do this? We can't do it in our own strength. How do we get this vision? Paul does not say, try to be more unified. He says, have the same mind as Christ.

He doesn't say, work at being more humble. He says, count others as more significant than yourself. He doesn't say sacrifice through sheer willpower. But he says, you already have this mind. Live according to it.

And when this mindset takes hold, homes move from rivalry to unity. Families move from self interest to humility. And churches become out of their comfort zone. And they move out into their cities. And they are sacrificial.

They go to places like the Uganda team that's meeting this evening. We're going to Uganda in June for two weeks, like the Serbia team that's going to Serbia in October. But you don't have to go to Uganda or Serbia. We'd like to take you there. You can just go down the hall and teach in the children's class.

You can go down this other hall and change diapers in the nursery. You can grab some bulletins and be a greeter. You can be a servant. You can change. You can get a heart for each other.

He's not calling us to perfection. He's calling us to participation. He's not calling us to earn this but to let Christ in us, release this in us. Let's pray. Lord, I pray for that person that we described earlier, the natural person, the person who's never given your life to Jesus.

But today you sense the. The knocking at your heart's door, that it's the spirit of Christ calling you home, calling you to himself. Would you today say yes to Jesus? It's not so much the words that you say, but the faith and the trust in your heart that you place in him. You can express it through prayer.

I invite you to do it right now. You could pray with me right where you are. Dear Lord Jesus, I'm a sinner. I've fallen short of your glory. But I believe you died on the cross for me and that you were raised from the grave and that you live today.

Would you come into my life, forgive me of my sin, adopt me into your family as a child of God, would you transform my thinking so that I have your mind, the mind of Christ available to me on all things. I want to give my life to you and surrender all aspects to you. I pray it in Jesus name, Amen.