12-29-2019 Weekly Messages

Meditation of the week: Psalms 17:1-15

Text: Philippians 3:1-21

Word title: The power of life to rejoice in the power of resurrection

          Apostle Paul exhorts outside Saints  to rejoice in the Lord while he was in prison. At that time, Christians are urged not to lose their lives of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit, even when there was too little in the environment to rejoice. His message is also what the Holy Spirit gives Christians living in the end times today.

        They were severely persecuted by the Jews at that time. When Apostle Paul spoke of them,  they were doglike and wicked workers, because they were without the Holy Spirit. Therefore, they were ones that trusted in the flesh. Therefore, they could not worship God in the spirit and seek joy in Christ Jesus. It is the same as today’s carnal Christians, who are not born again by the Holy Spirit. But they believe themselves that they truly worship God  in spirit and truth.

          Apostle Paul confessed that what he most ennobles is the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and has confessed that he had the  life of loss by throwing away all that is gain to him in his life. This is because all things that were good for him were things that keep him away from the Lord. He confessed to God that God’s righteousness is everything by discarding all his righteousness and only believing in Christ.

         Therefore, he confessed that his goal in life is to have fellowship with the saints in the power of Christ’s resurrection:

”  That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death;

11If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.

12Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.

13Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,

14I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.“(Philippians 3: 10-14)

          He was convinced that his soul had already been saved by the regeneration of his spirit into the Holy Spirit. Therefore, he had only one thing: waiting for the resurrection of the body, filling his body with Christ’s suffering and death, hoping for his reward on the day of the resurrection, forgetting all that was behind him, he could look and live a joyful life in Christ. In other words, he always exhorted the Saints to rejoice in the same hope, living their lives to rejoice in the day when Christ appears in the air, in the day of Christ.

        Therefore, with this conviction, he exhorted the Saints to live all of their lives making him as an sample. The Holy Spirit is still speaking to all Christians living in the end times including us.

          Apostle Paul exhorted with tears to watch out for those who were then enemies of the cross of Christ. The God they served was their own belly, and they think only of earthly things, testifying that their end is destruction. He gave the same warning message to the Colossians.

” If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.

2Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.

3For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.

4When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.

5Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry:

6For which things’ sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience:” Colossians 3: 1-6).

          Finally, Apostle Paul testified of the spiritual position of Christians living in the world, and what glory they shall receive in the future resurrection of their bodies:

” For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:

21Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself..” Philippians 3: 20-21)

         In the English King James Version, citizenship is translated as conversation rather than citizenship. Conversation means to talk to each other. Therefore, our conversation in heaven means that even if we are now living in the earth, we should have  dialogues between the saints as if we were already living in heaven.

         When Apostle Paul witnessed in the Holy Spirit that our vile body is to be transformed like His glorious body in Christ’s day, as all things obeys immediately upon the word of God, as there was light when God said “There be the light! ”  It is the testimony that when Christ appears  in the air, and speak unto us,  our body shall be transformed like Christ immediately and ascends to heaven immediately. Apostle John testified of what happened to him:

” After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter.

2And immediately I was in the spirit: and, behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne.

3And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.. “(Re 4: 1-3)

           King David, like Apostle Paul, lived with joy in Christ’s sufferings, looking forward to his life’s goal not on earth but in the day of resurrection to be like Christ in that day :

” As for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness. “(Psalm 17:15)

          When Jesus was in the world, he personally told what would happen when he come back and bring all Christians who believed in him to heaven:

” Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.….. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:

28And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

29My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.

30I and my Father are one. “(John 5:25; 10: 27-30).

Amen! Hallelujah!