Sermons About Vindication
Philippians 1:18b-26 - A Certain Confidence
Paul puts the Gospel first in ministry because for him to life is Christ and to die is gain. Everyone lack confidence but when it comes to the worship of God a lack of confidence is either from sinfulness or ignorance. Why do we cherish or treasure things that don’t make God great? Paul’s answer was that we center our living on the false, fake, limited, and/or powerless things. For Paul Christian ministry must get back to a cross Center life that gives the greatest confidence. This Cross centered worship give us confidence that results from 1) Confidence in the Final vindication (18b-20), 2) Confidence in Life or death (21-24), and 3) Confidence for ministry to others (25-26). Focusing on the cross in Gospel worship gives us confidence that we will be vindicated in the last judgment. It did not matter what other did to him, he was on a ultimate mission. No matter what postmoderns say today, we can have certainty about things even thought knowledge of reality may sometimes be partial. It is ludicrous to say that you are certain that you are not certain. You don’t have to be omniscient to be certain about reality because our resources are outside of our selves – i.e. revelation and the supply of the Holy Spirit. Personal conversion and commitment are what is needed to the revelation that is given to supply our certainty. Confidence for Paul also came because of how he value life and death as profit for him. It did not matter because for Paul the apex of his values in his life and worship was Christ alone. Worship that brings confidence is radically God-centered, radically satisfying, and radically an end in itself. This freed Paul to have confidence to minister to others and it will give a great confidence to.
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To Be the People of God (Exodus 3)
What does it mean to be the people of God? From Exodus 3 we see that: the Holy One will dwell with his people; the God of Abraham will deliver his people; I AM WHO I AM will be with his people; and the Mighty One will vindicate his people. We will see different facets of who God is and what it means that the holy God dwells with us, delivers us, and vindicates us.
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