14th May 2025

14th May 2025


Pray (ACts)


Read (Philippians 1:12-18a focus 15-17)


Message (Alan Burke)


What motivates you? I’ve come across many different motivations in people, from trying to prove parents wrong, to not repeat the same mistakes of their parents, to outdo a sibling, to making a difference in the world, to wanting to be remembered when someone dies, to being the best, to having their name in the Guinness World Records book. There are lots of things that motivate people. Paul was in prison, in how he responded to his circumstances the Lord had used him and because of it the gospel had become known throughout the palace guard and further afield. 


What we learn in these verses is that the Lord was using Paul’s imprisonment in a wonderful way, one that from an earthly point of view we might think is mere hyperbole but the Lord works where his people are and if they are living for him and his glory even in awful circumstances they find themselves God can do mighty things. The sad thing that is revealed to us here is that the motivations of those who were preaching were not right. We are told that some were preaching Christ out of envy and rivalry, they were preaching out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, they were preaching and supposing the they could stir up trouble for Paul while he was in chains. 


We're not told the reason that those who preached out of envy and rivalry did so. It may have been that they identified with some other church leader, maybe it was something like, 1st and 2nd Crossgar. OK, there isn't a 1st and 2nd  Crossgar, but there are plenty of places in this province where there are two Presbyterian churches within a stones throw of each other and they are doing things out of rivalry. They are competing for numbers, to be the bigger Church. Those who were preaching out of envy and rivalry were doing so supposing that they could stir up trouble for Paul when he was in chains. I've seen this to an extent whenever there has been problems in a congregation, and a neighbour in congregation has not sought to help in the midst of those problems but to benefit from what is going. And there were those in Rome who were likely pointing out, making a big deal of the situation that Paul found himself in. 


For as individuals and as a people what must motivate us is the Lord and his Glory. We must do what we do not because out of our own interests but because we want to see the name of Jesus lifted high, we want to see sinners come to salvation. In the presbytery where I find myself I have brothers whom I love dearly, when they share encouragements that are taking place I am filled with joy, if my heart is ever filled with anything else like envy I need to repent, when there are discouragement for them I lament for them and with them, if I were to celebrate then I need to repent. One such brother who was facing discouragement called round last week we lamented together and we prayed, it wasn’t his fault, it wasn’t his doing but he took it as a personal failure and I sought to comfort him. May our attitude be of those who are not doing things out of envy, rivalry, selfish ambition or anything else but be those do all that we do out of goodwill. Ie we are those who do what we do with the right intentions, doing what we do for the Glory of God.  Everything we do should be with that purpose.


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q83 Are all transgressions of the law equally heinous?
A. Some sins in themselves, and by reason of several aggravations, are more heinous in the sight of God than others.
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