Friends, we need to get one thing out of the way really quickly, which is Dave Gibson has new shoes. Thank you.

You're well aware that he didn't purchase them, that his daughter-in-law purchased them and gave them as a gift, and he's deeply grateful. The girl loves him a great deal and I had enough courage to wear them. So, ignore them from now on.

Although I'm stinking happy with him so. Mother's Day. Happy Mother's Day to the mothers here. I am very happy about that. You saw we have a photo booth out in the back. You can take your photo with your children or anybody whom you would like to have it taken with. Of course, another special part about today is that this is the exact day 22 years ago of the birth of Faith Community Bible Church. So, bless God. Yeah, praise God.

God is showing nothing but kindness to us in 22 years. Great generosity, great mercy, great help. Two things I want to do #1 if you were here at the founding, will you generously stand up? If you were here at the founding, bravo.

David, you're in a little trouble with me, bud.

If you've been here less than 22 weeks, that's about six months. Would you generously stand up for less than 22 weeks? Boom.

Welcome. We are very glad that all of you were here. I was thinking about doing a five-year increment and have you standing up and everybody sitting there. I don't know exactly when I came and that's just not going to work. So, I abandoned that.

My name is Dave Gibson. I'm the interim pastor here. I will hopefully encourage you by saying that I'm getting more and more interim every day.

As we are making wonderful progress speaking to our elder candidate, our lead pastor candidate, and if God wills, we'll be introducing His name to you very soon and scheduling a visit from him to preach here and everybody can meet him, ask Him questions and such. Be gracious to the man. I've done this twice in my life. It is a grueling weekend to preach in front of people you don't know and then meet 800 new people and answer a bunch of questions the same. Same questions at the same time.

There's an outline in your bulletin. You're welcome to look at that if you would like. And I'm going to read for us the passage that we're looking at today. We're on

the second paragraph of Philippians chapter 1.

LISTEN! Sometimes things must go horribly wrong to go wonderfully right.

Very often God wins His greatest victories out of the greatest defeats

Principle: Our circumstances can always work out for the greater progress of the Gospel—if you approach them as Paul did.

First, what is the Gospel? (vs 12)

I Cor. 15:1-4; Rom. 6:23, Eph 2:8,9

· Jesus died. Proof: Buried. Jesus rose. Proof: Seen by hundreds over 40 years.

· ·Sin, separation, substitution, trust. This message demands a response.

Philippians 1:12 Paul says, “Now I want you to know, brethren, that my circumstances have turned out for the greater progress of the gospel, so that my imprisonment in the cause of Christ has become well known throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and to everyone else. And that most of the brethren trusting in the Lord because of my imprisonment have far more courage to speak the word of God without fear. Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife. But some also, from goodwill.

The latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel. The former proclaimed Christ out of selfish ambition rather than from pure motives causing me distress in my imprisonment. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed. And in this I rejoice. Yes, and I will rejoice, for I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayers and the provision of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope that I will not be put to shame in anything. But that with all boldness. Christ will even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life. Or by death.”

Let's pray, please. Father, may we have your guidance, your Spirit's teaching as we think about this paragraph, as we think about the question of what we should be doing, as we think about what you mean, we want to be people who do not in any way mock you by hearing your word and leaving unchanged. So thank you for this book. Guide us, I pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Friends, sometimes in life things must go horribly wrong. To go wonderfully right. They must go horribly wrong to go wonderfully right. There's a lot of examples in the Bible. There's Naomi, who goes down to Moab, sojourns in the land of her enemies, her husband dies, her two boys die. She comes back to Bethlehem destitute and ends up, through her daughter-in-law, in the line of the Messiah.

Things went horribly wrong. And then, wonderfully right, there's Jonah, three days in the belly of the fish. He gets spit up on the shore. He goes to Nineveh. He preaches. The entire city repents. There's the example of Jesus in the grave for a short period of time and then coming to life again, and then billions of people get saved because something went horribly wrong and then wonderfully right.

The disciples in a boat with this horrible storm. We're going to die. They wake up Jesus, He calms the storm. Nobody dies. They see the power of Christ. They believe more because they see who he is. Stuff goes horribly wrong to go wonderfully right. Now here's the rub. It's all a great principle until I'm the one in the belly of the fish. Or I'm the one in jail. Or I'm the one in a boat in a storm.

Then it's not quite such a happy principle. Because I'm always wondering, hey, is this going to work out? Is this going to be OK for me? Sometimes God wins his greatest victories through the greatest apparent defeats.

The cross being the most amazing example of that. The principle is sometimes our circumstances workout for the advancement of the gospel, even though they're not very pleasant. And that's what is going on with Paul in this paragraph. He's in unpleasant circumstances and the gospel is absolutely blowing up. I want to examine that with you. If you haven't outlined, you're welcome to follow. It's a 10-point outline. Please do not panic. I'm watching that clock and we'll be done on time.

First question is what is the gospel? The gospel is a very simple message.

It's not a difficult message. I once went to a conference for 9 days where they presented the gospel to professional football players four times in nine days.

Four different speakers and all four speakers told these men and their wives what they needed to do to become saved. And all four of them told him something different, and not one of them told him what the Bible said.

It was depressing. It is not that difficult. 1 Corinthians 15:1-4. The only time where Paul specifically says this is the gospel. First Corinthians 15:1-4. “Now I make known to you, brother, in the gospel which I preach to you, which also you received, and which also you stand by, which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word I preach to you, unless you believed in vain, for I delivered to you of in

First importance. What I also received here is the gospel that Christ died for our sins. According to the scriptures and that he was buried and that he was raised on the third day according to scriptures.”

That he appeared to Cephas, and then to the 12, and then he appeared to more than 500 brethren. At one time, the Gospel message is simply this. Jesus died. The proof is he was buried. You don't bury living people. Jesus raised. The proof is he was seen by hundreds of people over the span of 40 days, sometimes alone, sometimes a crowd of 500. He died, he was buried, he's raised, he was seen. And the message to us is this is the kind of message that.

Hands of response if someone stands up in this room and screams fire. We've got to respond. We've either got to run out or we've got to call security and say this person's an idiot. We got to do something about that, and the fact that Jesus died for our sins and that he rose again means I must do something. When I understand that my sins separated me from God, that I couldn't fix it, that Jesus paid for it as my substitute, I've got to make a decision.

Do I accept that payment? Do I reject that payment, or do I just let it ride until I die, which is in essence rejecting? Not in essence is perfectly rejected. I either say yes or I say no. There's two ways to say no. I can say no or I can die without deciding. And then I said no to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul is very passionate about progress. Of the gospel, most passionate Pharisee, who ever lived.

Acts 9, arrested by Jesus with a bright light, becomes the most passionate.

Disciple, apostle, whoever lived, and he's very passionate about the gospel. And part of the question is what about me personally? What about us corporately? Are we also passionate about the gospel?

Second, what were Paul's circumstances? Verses 13 and 14? It's simple. He was in the slammer in Rome. This is about AD 60 to 62. It's called the first Roman imprisonment. He's under house arrest. He's changed to some guards.

We're going to talk about that a little bit later. He is facing trial before Caesar. As a Roman citizen. He had that right to be tried before Caesar.

Third question, What was Paul's approach to these difficult circumstances? How did he take it? Well, number one, he accepted it. He adjusted to it. He just kept preaching the gospel. He said this is what's real. This is how I'm going to live. This is what's going on. It's a difficult, unknown situation, but I'm just going to deal with it. I am a deep believer that Americans, including American Christians, have a very horrible addiction. It's the addiction to comfort and ease and leisure and discretionary time. I have it myself in spades. I have to fight it all the time. We as Americans have been trained to be people.

Who is comfortable? We love being comfortable. We would rather not have things disrupted. If you go down to Ecuador with this team or with me and another team, or if you go to the Island of Old Cars with me and our team from FCBC in November, let me tell you what's going to happen in eight days. You're not going to see one food item that you've ever eaten before.

With the possible exception of rice. You're going to ride in the back of some old vans for a long distance and feel very cramped. You might not have electricity at night and you might not be able to run a fan to sleep. You are probably going to see a lot of stuff that's not comfortable for you. You're going to have to be uncomfortable in somebody's living room saying what's true about Jesus. These kinds of things are a small fraction. Of what Paul did. Paul did this for a lifetime.

For a lifetime he was uncomfortable. Because of the cause of Christ. In my previous ministry, I was a missionary based out of Dallas, working in foreign countries. Went a number of times to China. I mean Beijing, China for a two week period with a coworker. I woke up 1 morning at 5:00. I get up, my coworker's already up. He's sitting in the hallway on a cold concrete floor with his bare back against the cold wall in his underwear. Banging out emails. And I said, Bill, aren't you cold?He said. “Dave, I've lived in the Far East for 40 years. I no longer have a category for personal comfort.”

I don't think about that anymore. It's pretty stunning to me, friends. It's pretty stunning to me because personal comfort is a real challenge for us. Paul was willing to be uncomfortable for the progress of the gospel.

4th question, how do you derail the progress of the Gospel (and in the process derail your own mental health?

Rage and obsess: When something difficult happens, when something goes wrong or it's unexpected, well, the best way is to rage and obsess. Just get crazy angry. My mother used to call it a tissy fit. Throw a tissy fit when it happens.

· Resist and grouse: You can refuse to adjust, you can just grumble about it. And the third way is to self select out of gospel work, self select out of ministry.

· Self-select out of Gospel proclamation: Too many believers have said it's just uncomfortable. I don't want to do it. I don't want to share Christ. I don't want to. I don't want to help in the nursery. I don't want to come to work day, it's just too uncomfortable. Let me just encourage you not to take that particular tact with the IRS. I'm opting out of Texas. I'm opting out of jury duty. I just don't feel like doing this. I'm opting out of the speed limit. I just don't feel like doing it. I just don't want to do that. Those are some ways to derail your gospel involvement and make yourself miserable in the process.

Just as I finished seminary 40 years ago, 45 I forgot how long ago, a man told me this statement, he said, “I made a decision that I will adjust to life immediately, completely and graciously.” Exact words I will adjust to life immediately, completely and graciously. It's helped me a lot. I'm not particularly good at it with all the practice I've had, but it has helped me a great deal.

Exp: Paul rejected all of these tactics and he suffered a great deal more trouble and discomfort that I ever had.

Fifth, how did Paul’s circumstances advance the Gospel? (Vs 13)

Paul was under house arrest and a lot of people were hearing the Gospel:

· To the whole Praetorian Guard. Historians think there were about 9000 elite soldiers who guarded Caesar. And guarded the top Roman officials. And they've been assigned to keep Paul from running away. Because Paul is a critical prisoner. He's a prisoner for the sake of Christ. They want to get him all the way to the trial. And so the historians think he was chained to one or two of them on a six hour rotation. So every six hours a couple new guys came in, got chained to Paul. He's renting his own house arrest. He can't leave the house. It's hard to leave with two guys chained to you. You can't leave it and he's paying the rent. But he is staying there and these people are coming in on a rotating basis.

· To Everyone else: This probably refers to unsaved members of the Jewish community who are hearing the gospel. (Acts 28:17-29)

· To the Believers: The believers are getting great boldness. They're allowed to come in and visit him. They come in and visit with Paul all the time. They heard what he was doing and knew about the salvation happening and talked he taught all day long. They go out. The Gospel is just making terrific progress because Paul is in prison, but the gospel is not.

NB: Guards get reassigned. People travel. Word goes out. Paul is evangelizing the Roman world from a rented house somewhere in prison—a house he is never allowed to leave.

· NB: Paul is in prison but the Gospel is not!!!

·

You can't put the gospel in prison, now, always free to roam about the whole world. The Gospel has no barriers. I want to read to you what I consider some of the most fascinating verses in the Bible. Last two verses of the book of Acts. This is talking about, by the way, about the very same imprisonment that we're looking about at Philippians very same imprisonment. Here's what it says. Verse 30, “Paul stayed two full years in his own rented quarters. He was welcoming all who came to him, preaching the Kingdom of God and teaching concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all listening to this with all openness. “

Unhindered. That's the last two words of the book of Acts. Openness unhindered. That's different than ending a book with. The end.

Basically, what the writer is saying, what the Holy Spirit is saying, this message is just going on to be continued. We live in Acts 20:25. That's our chapter, Acts 20:25. The Spirit of God is still up to stuff. He's still going places. It's all openness unhindered. Paul is in prison and the gospel is not. It's just roaming around the world. Paul said in this, in this very verse 12, “I want you to know about the progress of the gospel.”

It's a nautical term used at sea to talk about a ship making headway despite adverse conditions. It's like going forward, despite the blows that keep coming against you. And Paul is saying this thing is still going forward. The gospel is plowing forward. Every six hours, the gospel leaves the rented jail. In the mouths, hearts and minds of the Praetorian Guard. Every six hours. New missionaries going out. Paul is in prison, but the gospel is not. Romans 1:16. :I'm not ashamed of the gospel. It's the power of God for salvation for everyone who believes to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” And so you can't stop it with prison bars, you can't stop it with laws, you can't stop it with despots, you can't stop it with pandemics. You can't stop it with anything.

The gospel is free to roam about. The world. It's not dependent on what our own personal freedom is. The main thing that slows the gospel in our world is Christians who will not open their mouths. That's the main hindrance is believers who know the message and won't open their mouth. A man named Gordon Fee said, “Leave Paul alone and he is and his companions turned the world upside down.

Acts 17:6, “Put him in prison and he turned Caesar's elite soldiers upside down.”

Philippians 1:13. Not to mention Caesar’s very household Philippians 4:22 He is a person not just making the best of his circumstances but actually turning them around for the glory of God. No wonder that joy abounds.

Sixth, how do the believers respond to his imprisonment? (vs. 14-18

· Response A, most of the believers:

Trusted in the Lord: They did the spiritually wise and courageous thing of trusting God rather than being bullied by the circumstances

Far more courage. They spoke the word of God. They proclaimed the word of God. They were out there getting it done for the cause of Christ. The gospel was advancing because Paul's imprisonment combined with his boldness was motivating folks to go out. Now we're going to have a mid sermon quiz here. It's a multiple choice. Please don't panic. It will not affect your final grade. And it's also what's called a softball question. You know, it's like it's one that the teacher throws in so that everybody will feel good.

OK, here's the softball question. If you were God and you had a seeker, a lost person who'd come to the end of their rope, they can't make life work anymore. They're thinking about pursuing God. They bought themselves a Bible they started reading. They're in the early stages of trying to figure out the spiritual life, and they have a business meeting in Dallas, so they have to fly from Boise to Dallas.

All right, that's the setup. Who would you, if you were God, to set that seeking person next to? In the airplane, an unbeliever. Be a believer who didn't understand how to present the gospel. See a believer who knows how to present the gospel. What was unwilling to do it? Or a DA believer who knew the gospel had demonstrated a track record to open their mouth and share the gospel. And we're skillful at it. Who would you put that person next to?

Softball question.

I have a friend who's a natural native evangelist, and he leads more people to faith on the airplane. I've known the man for 50 years. I'm saying, Larry, why do you get all these chances on the airplane? He said. Dave, because I've demonstrated I'm willing to open my mouth. I started opening my mouth a lot more on airplanes, and I have led people to faith on airplanes because I was willing to open my mouth. And the issue for Paul is I'm just going to move the gospel forward, whether I'm on an airplane or I'm in prison.

Friends, God assigns airline seats. Please be conscious of that. You may have somebody next to you who needs the gospel. Little known secret in the Christian faith. The believers who are taking flak. Are the believers who are closest to the target? You know the Air Force adage. “You know you're over the target if you're taking flak.”

Here's a second little known secret: The believers who are opening their mouths and taking flak are having all the fun. It is so fun. If you've ever sat 3 feet from a person who put their hope in Christ, he will say it's Turkish Delight. What do I do to get that again? I don't care what it takes. I want to experience that again because it's so encouraging to see a person come from the Kingdom of darkness to the Kingdom of light and they're sitting just three feet in front of you. When that happens, it's the power of the gospel.

It's the power of the gospel. So friends, these people, this first group of people were doing this. Out of good motives, out of love for God, love for the lost people, love for the word of God, love for Paul. They had very good motives. And the critical issue though, is the power is in the gospel. It's not in the motives. We're going to say a little bit more about that in a minute. Here's the skills to present the gospel.

Pray. Learn the gospel clearly. Learn the transition questions clearly. Courageously open your mouth. Say what's true about Jesus. Sin, separation, substitution, trust. Invite them to trust Christ. Zip your lip.

Make him say yes, nor maybe. It's not difficult. I bet everybody in here, with maybe a couple of exceptions, can tie their shoes. And can ride a bike. And can read English and can drive a car.

Those are all skills that you learned. Sharing the gospel is a learned skill. I know from experience it's a little harder than learning to tie your shoes. And a little easier than learning to ride a bike. It's not difficult. It's something we can do. God doesn't mock us by telling us to do things we can't do.

· Response B - Some of the believers were preaching Christ from terrible motives. They were people who were proclaiming Christ and they had horrible motives because they were trying to make Paul envious, jealous. They were trying to discourage Paul. For whatever crazy reason, they're saying what's true about Jesus. Leading people to faith. And they were doing it for horrible reasons. They had bad motives. Now, friends, I don't want to minimize or justify bad motives.

But it's still better to do the right thing, even if my motives are not good. An American preacher named Vance Havner. He died in the 1980s. He once said on my best day, my motives were 35% pure. I'd like to think I've gotten above 35, but maybe not. But doing the right thing isn't critically important. Even if I don't have the greatest of motives, God uses the right action. So these people were motivated by envy, strife, selfish ambition, evil motives, they were trying to distress Paul. They were doing it from pretense. And here's the problem. Some of them might have been pretty big deals in Rome. Until Paul blew in. Because Paul's a really big deal in the Christian faith.

So if you grew up in Riggins, you became a high school baseball star. You led your team to the state championship. You stole home to win the championship. Then you got a scholarship to college. And then you led your team to win the World Series of college baseball twice. And you move back to Riggins. You build a nice house. You marry your high school sweetheart. You take over your dad's insurance business. And you're a pretty big deal in Riggins. Because you were sorry. You're a superstar, you're a baseball player, and you go to the cafes and the social gatherings and you hold court about the time that you did this or you did that.

And then Nolan Ryan. Moves to Riggins. Build a big beautiful house. Played 27 years in the big leagues. Seven no hitters 5700 plus strikeouts into the Hall of Fame on the 1st ballot with 99% vote. Three different professional teams retired his jersey when he retired. He moves into Riggins and starts hanging out at the cafes and it's a social gatherings.

You're not such a big deal in Riggins anymore. Now it's Nolan Ryan.

The Apostle Paul blew into town. Nolan Ryan moved into jail there. And you're not such a big deal anymore, even if you were a big time evangelist before. And some of these people didn't take it well and they felt like. Now that Paul is in prison, I'm going to make him feel bad by sharing the gospel. Pretty stupid thinking, but that was their thinking. And Paul, Paul is fine with it. He doesn't ever condone bad motives, but he's fine with Christ being shared.

Doctor John Wahlberg The greatest problem of the world, then and now, is not that the Gospel is imperfectly preached, but that it's not preached at all.

Seventh, what was Paul’s resolve and why? (v. 18). What is Paul's response to the two responses? He just simply rejoices. In fact, he says. What then? Which can be translated? What does it matter? What does it matter why they did this? They preached the gospel. I'm fine with it. The gospel is going forward.

Eighth, what is Paul’s resolve and why? (vs 18b-20)

· I will rejoice because of what I know!

Because of what he knew. He's willing to rejoice because of what he knew. I'll do these quickly.

· He knew who God was. God was his shepherd. He knew that he would be delivered by life or by death. The imprisonment was not eternal. He's either going to be released and preach the gospel, or he's going to die and go spend time with Jesus. It's great stuff. Either way. He's a happy man.

· He knew the Philippians were praying for him. This is the crazy part, friends. The prayers of believers move the hands of Almighty God. How does that work? I do not know. How does a finite being motivate action in an infinite sovereign God?

The Bible says it does. I've seen it happen. You've seen it happen. The prayers of believers move the hands of God, and Paul knew that they were praying for him.

And that was going to result in his release. He said twice, both in chapter 2 and chapter 4. I know I'm going to be released. And he was right. He was released at this time, the first Roman imprisonment. He was released, but he was trusting God for whatever worked out in all of that.

· He knew the Holy Spirit would make provision for him. He wasn't left here as an orphan. We can feel alone. We are certainly not alone.

· He knew his earnest expectation and his hope.

He was a person of faith as opposed to a person of hope. So those are two starkly different things. Are you going to pass the graduate record exam? I hope so. Didn't study a lick. I mean, I don't really have a prayer, but I hope so. This is settled conviction. This is faith.

· Paul knew he would not be put to shame in anything. He understood he was going to stand before God and he was going to hear the words, well done, good and faithful servant. At the end of Second Timothy, he said. “I finished the course, I've run the race, I've kept the faith.” I'm not going to be put to shame when I see God. I don't have anything to shrink back for.

· He knew that Christ would be exalted in his body. Whether he lived or died. Christ would be exalted.

Ninth, so what for us? What will we do? What will I do? So what for us, what do we do? What do we do in a set back? What do we do when stuff happens that we didn't see coming and we didn't want to come? What happens when we're chained to the Pretorian Guard? What do we do?

Well, let me suggest this, remember?

Remember, God is

up to something and God is good. Doesn't matter the circumstances, they don't

change the fact that God is always taking initiative.And God is always good.

Second thing, admit God has no obligation to run stuff past me.

What the God of the universe comes to say, hey, Dave, I was thinking about doing this in FCBC or in your neighborhood or whatever. What do you think, Dave? That would be? That's ludicrous. God has no obligation to run stuff past me. He's brilliant on his part not to do that. We rejoice based on the word of God, based on the fact that our circumstances are known.

We pray our prayer moves the hands of Almighty God we expect. God to

do something. Expect God to do something if God is really good, if he really takes incessant initiative. We expect he's going to do something even when my circumstances have gone sour.

Tenth, is there a present-day example of the Gospel being advanced by trouble?

Well, there's trainloads of them. I want to tell you one that you probably know.

Johnny Erickson

Tada dives in the water at the age of 16, breaks her neck, becomes a

quadriplegic at the age of 16. Today at the age of 75. Been a quadriplegic for

decades. Unusual to live that long as a quadriplegic. Founder of Johnny and

Friends sharing the gospel around the world. Getting free wheelchairs to people

in need around the world. Helping people in chronic pain in crazy ways around

the world.This woman has had the most unbelievable spiritual impact.

That you can imagine. Despite this horrible tragedy, this horrible struggle.

The woman is the hero of mine, she said. She said one time there are 10

words that changed everything about my own suffering. Before I read you those words, let me say. My best friend is a great friend of hers and he tells me that she is in chronic pain, 24/7 pain. Chronic pain. And she said, here's the 10 words that changed my life. God permits what he hates to accomplish what he loves.

God hates for his guy to be chained to Roman guards, you know, but he's accomplishing what he loves. Paul adjusted to it. He hates for his daughter Johnny Erickson Tada to not be able to walk, but he's working through it. It's the same with the U.S. central idea. Any set back has the possibility of enhancing the gospel.

If I will adjust to it and keep my mind on the gospel, any set back has the possibility of catalyzing boldness in me. Sometimes things have to go horribly wrong. Before they go wonderfully right,

Let me pray for his friends.

Father, we give you thanks to Paul for the example of this paragraph. We give you thanks that you wrote this down and preserved it for two millennia. Thank you that we have it in a language we can read. I pray for myself and for each one of us. That you would make it clear what adjustment we need to personally make in our lives based on this paragraph. Today we ask your help in Christ's name, Amen.