Love abounding in knowledge
Philippians 1:9-11 · Andrew Molloy · Jan 28, 2024
Philippians (2021-24), No. 04
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261933577045

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Okay, Philippians 1, 9-11 is what we're studying today, starting in the 9th verse, but I'll read the first Reading from verse three here, and then I'll read our verses for today. I thank my God in all remembrance of you, verse three, always offering prayer and with joy in my every prayer for you all, in view of your participation in the gospel from the first day until now. For I'm confident of this very thing, that he who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus. Verse 7, for it is only right for me to feel this way about you all, because I have you in my heart, since both in my imprisonment and in the defense of the God and confirmation of the gospel, you are all partakers of grace with me. For God is my witness, how I long for you all with the affection of Christ Jesus.

So that's the first That's actually the second paragraph of Philippians. The first paragraph was when he opens the letter and says, Paul and Timothy to the saints at Philippa. That's the first paragraph. Above is the second paragraph. And we're going to the third paragraph now, which is our lesson for today, starting in verse nine.

And this I pray that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere in blameless until the day of Christ, having been filled with the fruit of righteousness, which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God. So verse nine is, I'll just begin with the first phrase here. uh... it's a it's a prayer working on just my screen here, I apologize.

So he begins his prayer, and whenever Paul prays, he gives, it's a prayer, he doesn't pray, he gives this purpose and substance of what he's praying about on a daily basis, or probably, how many times does he pray a day in prison? But he says, this is my purpose, in substance of the prayers that i pray for you so not the actual prayer but the content of his prayers and he says that your love will abound still more and more is what he's been praying. Love is, and this is review for us, love is agape love, it's divinely sourced, and it's characterized by being a sacrificial love, it's focused on the beneficiary of that love, and it's non-rescindable, it's undeserved love, and it's the love that Christ has for his church, right?

So that's agape love, that's what he's talking about, should abound more and more. And this is from Macaulay, and I like what he says. He wraps this into the definition of agape from First Corinthians Chapter 13, he says, love endures all things, and that's our word meno, to abide up under or bear up courageously. Love bears up courageously under things. So he says, when love has no evidence, it believes all things. When the evidence is adverse to circumstances, love hopes all things. And when love is disappointed, love endures all things. And that, he has this kind of circular form of looking at 1 Corinthians chapter 13 and the definition of agape love there, which is really nice. I like that. So that love may abound.

Abound is persuo. It's to be preeminent. and to excel, but even beyond that, even further than that, to excel still more and increase in excellence. Now, I want to get back to that word parasuo, and I'll write it down. Um, you, you see that it has, it can increase in excellence. We'll want to remember that. Um, it's an active verb because we're going to come up with another word, uh, in verse 10. Excellent. But the verse, the word in verse 10, which is excellent, doesn't really mean excellent, but we'll see that.

Um, so he, the second phrase here that your love. will abound still more and more. Not only does Paul use Pairsuo or to go further, but even further than that, he adds this in, still more and more. So it's ever increasing degrees of agape love. So it's super abounding love. So I see this as he uses the word parasuo, and then he says still more and more, which is excel, excel more, and it's like a triple triple excel.

You see how that is? He's got a lot of excelling in this verse nine, doesn't he? And growing. And so there's this, all this, and what Verne would say, Verne Peterman, he'd say, he really wants you to know that your love should really, really, really, really Excel is how he stated. He just added in a lot of reallys. I like that, how he did that.

However, there's a qualifying element to this love abounding, and that's in real knowledge and discernment in that sphere. So it's limited to real knowledge and discernment. And real knowledge is, and this is, we know this word too, it's epinosis. It's precise and correct knowledge, but only in divine things. It's true because it relates to the things of God, and God is true, and the things of God are true. So it has to be true knowledge and correct knowledge. How do we get epinosis? Anyone wanna venture a guess? So Andrew, I think that's an experiential knowledge that comes from a direct and frequent relationship.

I don't know if that's well-worded, but. Right. And how about this too, by taking in doctrine, right? The intake of doctrine. But it could be intellectually well-founded doctrine, but not have the experience, right? Yeah, right. Yeah. And we'll get to that in a few more points. But without the doctrine, You can't have the experience.

Well, I agree with that, but you know, there are people who go to seminary and know the Bible. That's right, and don't have the exosis. I mean, it's known the Lord Jesus Christ, is it not? Is it that with all of us? True. Could it be another way of saying it is we can know it, but we don't necessarily metabolize it. It's like eating food. It can either go through you and go on out, or it can go in there and metabolize and change the way you think. Wow, thanks. Can you walk me in a spirit as part of that? You guys are reading my mind here. It must be. We're all in the same mind, aren't we? Yeah, that's true.

So I like this how Merriman puts this epinosis and he says it's an intensified form of knowledge. Intensified because You and i've done this before i think first john classes same sort of definition you personalize it because. in your inner man. It's intensified because it goes down to your inner man. And I like how he says it here.

It's knowledge that gets a hold of you. You have it, and it has you. And it gets to your core. And he says it's a wow knowledge. It's not like a take it or leave it knowledge. You're going to, when you have that understanding, you're going to go, you know, and you've all had that experience where you're like, wow, that's incredible information.

Well, yes, like Romans 7.22, in my inner man, I delight in God's law. Yeah. So it's our inner man that really enjoys the fellowship with Christ. Yeah.

Merriman says, it starts out as gnosis. And once gnosis works its way down, like Bob was saying, to the inner man, it becomes epinosis, experiential. I like how he says, and here's also what we've just been discussing. He calls it, Doctrine is a fortifying protein for the inner man. The inner man builds itself up on systematic taking in of God's word, the ordered teaching of God's word. And once it gets in there, it builds. And the inner man can then flex.

And Merriman describes that as, in your inner man, that you'll have Bible knowledge, but then you'll grow and become strong. information or doctrine will work itself up through the soul and cause your soul to operate and act out through the facets of the soul and to a living experience, so walking by faith.

So I like how he says that, but that's exactly what Bob W there, and you're in the back of the room, aren't you? You're paying attention. And that's basically what he exactly what he's saying there which is cool So did you do you like that Merriman? So he says that your love may abound in in Real knowledge.

We looked at that epinosis and then he says all discernment And discernment is eisthesis. That's all discernment. And that's perception. And that has to do with the senses, too, and also the intellect. But you're doing this mental exercise. You see the word thesis in there, and that's proving something out that's a, well, it could be a scientific, kind of pursuit, but we're not talking about science, but it's using your mind to take in doctrine and perceive it. And it comes out through the soul, making it real.

Yeah. Just a parallel thought to what you guys have been saying. This is epi, which is upon knowledge, and it's a, if you will, spiritual versus physical distinction here, so that there is a discernment that goes beyond what is physical, and things that are heavenly, things that have to do with divine reality. Oh, and that's all wrapped up in epi, Roy? Yeah, I think so, because he's taking you into the realm that we now live as new people, new creations.

A pawn. OK, yeah. And you must be, because I'm getting to that too, Roy. But you said it much better, perhaps, than I'll get to it. But we'll look at that. Yeah. We have to remember, that's a great point. It's a heavenly sphere that we're in. This section here is a heavenly sphere, which is all wonderful.

So Paul uses a similar, I call it a superlative, description of Bible knowledge in Colossians 2, 2, and 3, that their hearts may be encouraged, having been knit together in love, there's our word agape, and attaining to all the wealth that comes through the full assurance of understanding, resulting in a true knowledge, that's I didn't look that up, but I would bet you $100, that's epinosis. So if anyone wants to win $100, if it's not...

True knowledge of God's mystery, that is Christ himself, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. And that verse really wraps a lot of this into what we're studying here, into one verse there. It has a result, so that, and this is Paul's probably favorite purpose clause, he uses a lot of so that's.

There are two of those in this verse 10. Result, The result of having your love super bound more and more in all real epinosis and discernment will then lead to you being able to approve the things that are excellent. There in verse 10, in the middle part of verse 10. And it can be translated, better translated this way.

I'm moving you guys out of my screen again. So that's the reason for the pauses there. I'm trying to move around my mouse here. It's translated this way, that you may approve or try the things that differ has the same meaning. To put it to the test is what that means. So it's best if you have new American standards, which I do, and I used, but it'd be better if you lightly with your pencil crossed out the word excellent, and put in differ or distinguish between so that you may prove things that differ or distinguish between. Evaluate. evaluate.

Yeah, yeah, that could be that's a cinnamon, cinnamon. That could be wrapped in there. I would be good with that. Cornelius Stam has this book, Things That Differ. Same kind of what we're studying today. And he has a whole book on how things that differ in the Bible. And he says, he describes it this way, different things going to different places, like a post office. So you have stacks and 10,000 mail items at the post office. What they don't do is they don't stack it up.

And then when you come into the post office, say, oh, Roger, your take off the top. Bonnie, here's the next one. Margaret, your third down. Here's your mail. Because the mail has to go to different places. So they divide that out by zip code. And then they put it in your, in Telluride, we have a peel box. So they, I get it in the box. So that's different things going to different places is what this means here.

And with And we're talking about the Word of God here. So testing things that differ. And it dovetails with this discernment, I see this. And it seems to me to be an exercise in turning over in your mind doctrinal truth and examining them or evaluating them, as you said, for true meaning for our own personal spiritual benefit and growing up our inner man. Andrew? Yeah. You know, the Holy Christian Bible says approve things that are superior, not just different. You know, we need to test and approve the things so we can get a superior knowledge of God, I would think. Yeah, and the things, and one of the sub-definitions of that word is excellent or superior, the things that differ, and you're ordering, so it has that, It has that meaning, too. You know how different words have a couple different meanings?

So it's wrapped into that, certainly. And the things of God, right, that's true. I think that they use that in the Holman because they are superior, right, to earthly things or man-made knowledge. You know, Jameson, Fawcett, and Brown Their footnote on verse 10 is with a view of proving, and so proving and embracing the things that excel, not merely things not bad, but the things best among those that are good, the things that are more advanced excellence.

It's not just things we approve anything, but the things that really excel. Yeah. That's in comparison with what follows. Andrew hasn't gotten to that. No, no. It's a contrast. Oh, that's nice. And remember when I said, hold on to that word per seo a few slides back? That word has excellent in it, or excel. and things that are excellent too. So, that word is better, kind of, if you place our English word excellent with that word, than this word, this things that differ.

He's basically saying the same thing he said to Timothy, to Timothy 2.15, be diligent to present yourself approved to God, and there God is proving you out, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. And there's that word, rightly dividing. That's the word actually excellent in verse 10. So same sort of, Same concept is what he's giving the Philippines as he did to Timothy.

So here's Young's literal translation in verse 10, and he says, for proving the things that differ, that you may be pure and offenseless to a day of Christ. So I think those are better translations than my new American standard here. So we need not be ashamed, like the Bereans, right? That's what they did. They examined God's word carefully and closely, and they scrutinized it. I think for its differences. And one of the example is the difference between Israel and the church, what God, plan that God has for Israel, plan that God has for the church and what portions are their portions and what portions are our portions.

Okay, still on verse 10 here, in order to be, here's another kind of further purpose clause that Paul uses that you may prove out the things that differ in order to be sincere and blameless is what he goes on to say. He's making a further result clause here so that you'll be sincere and blameless. I'll start with blameless and that word is And that means without offense or not stumbling, not being led to sin or even lead others to sin, it could be. And now we'll look at the word sincere.

In Latin, it's sine sera. You see it there. And sine means without. Sera means wax, without wax, or without wax works. And I just pulled this from a previous lesson. Was it in 1 John? The word sincere appears. So we've looked at this before. And in Greek, it's elykrones. There, you see it. Very similar meanings to the Latin meaning. Elykrones means pier. Or it comes from the word hele. You say H-E-I-L-E, which is the sun. means to judge by the sun, judge by the rays of the sun. And I think by this time, you probably know where I'm going with this.

And that's the, they used to make these fine porcelain vases, and they were very hard to make perfect, so they didn't crack. But when a crack appeared, They would sell it anyway, but what they would do is melt wax, fill in the crack with wax, and then the wax would cool, and they'd sand it off. It'd look nice as white. They'd paint it over white. And so you're trying to buy a fine porcelain vase, but it has a wax seam running down the middle of it. So they'd paint that over, and you couldn't tell, And the way you would tell is to go to the market and then hold it up to the sun and you'd see that dark seam of wax on your fine porcelain base. Jean here did that one time. A guy was working at the house and my fine ceramic base got broken and she glued it, or he glued it back together. And it looked perfect. But then I was like, oh, wait, I see a scene here. And she told me what happened.

So you can see this wax by holding it up to the sun. And that means judged by the sun. So in Greek, it's the same thing as what the Romans did in Latin, sine sera. Honest manufacturers or honest merchants would then advertise their vases as Sinacera, without wax, or without wax.

So that's how we are to be, you know? Sincere, sincere. Also a good, by the way, some of you know Andy Williams has a wonderful song called, Are You Sincere? And it adds a new meaning to that song. So we're to be sincere and offenseless or blameless until the day of Christ and Now, we've got easy work for us here because last week we looked at the day of Christ. But just a little more from our man, Gerald B. Stanton.

He says, universally, it's a time of blessing. Nothing is predicted as having to take place before the day of Christ will come. In contrast, the day of the Lord, earthly, right? And day of Christ is heavenly. The day of the Lord is marked by all these signs that Christ gives in Matthew 24. Signs in heaven and things on earth, earthquakes. And he's talking about the day of Christ there. And that comes off the top of my head is you'll see wars and rumors of wars and earthquakes is what he says. But day of Christ, nothing anticipates that.

So he says it's the termination of the church's pilgrim journey here on earth. when we're taken up in the rapture, which is a time when He'll catch up His redeemed people to meet Him in the air, as 1 Thessalonians 4, 17 says. And the time for which He promised He'll come again and receive us to Himself, that where He is, there we will be also, John 14, 3. And Stan goes on to say, it's a time when our salvation will be completed, when we shall be with our blessed Lord, and we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.

That's very comforting, isn't it? Yes. In all our circumstances, especially being in a gray and dreary Maryland today. Oh, and I was going to say, if you're going to buy some, if I was to sell some porcelain vases to you, fine porcelain vases, I would just have you come over on a cloudy day. That's the way to handle that issue. And I won't have to be sincere.

Okay, here's verse 11, having been filled with fruit of righteousness, which comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God. Boy, these are meaty verses, aren't they? They are. about a 75 cent words as well. So having been filled this play, oh, there you see it. P-L-E-R-O-O is what it is in the transliteration.

But that's what the filling, that means to fill and the filling of the Holy Spirit. It's a perfect passive participle. So the Holy Spirit is the agent who does the filling. And so I take it that perfect passive, something done in the past and then have abiding results never to be repeated again, having lasting results into the future and the present and the future is what the perfect passive would be, right?

And Roger, you can kind of confirm that, right? But then I thought, well, aren't we to be filled with the Holy? And it's both, basically, because Ephesians 5.18, be filled with the Holy Spirit, that's a present, and that's a command. So I kind of turned this around. Well, this is what I was turning around and evaluating, and the same thing of what it says to do here, trying to figure this out. So it was a wonderful work. I was doing the same thing as the verses I'm presenting.

So what would that filling in verse 11 pertain to if it's the perfect passive? And then I thought, well, logically, it's the moment of salvation when we believed on the Lord Jesus Christ's work on the cross. And for forgiveness of sins, as it says in 1 Corinthians 15, one through six, then we are filled in with the Holy Spirit. And he came and dwelt us and filled us with the presence of Christ.

So that would be the perfect tense, passive voice. And Acts uses the same It's a different word, but it's when... And who was the gentleman who received Paul at Damascus? That's... Ananias. Ananias, okay. Yeah, right. Ananias. So he said, come here, Paul, and you must be filled with the Holy Spirit. And so that was the moment of Paul's salvation there when he was filled. So it's the same kind of thing. So filled with what content?

Is there a quote? Anyone have a comment? Well, Andrew, isn't this really the teaching of John and his epistles? I mean, the idea that we're the branches and he is the vine, and the verse that says the purpose is, or the manner is by Jesus Christ, right? So in a sense, the filling is the life of Christ manifested by the power of the Holy Spirit. So we're the branches, and we're the ones that express the fruit, but He's the one who's doing it.

Oh, that's a good way to go, too, is that passage in John. the abiding. I didn't think of that. I used another passage. I used John 17 kind of to describe this all. And you'll see it. But that's good too. So the content then is the fullness and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ and his person. And there I have some verse references in the Ephesians and John. There it is,

16. And then John 17. And also 2 Corinthians 4, 6 and 7. I said, wow, this fits too. It's for God who said, light. For God who said, light shall shine out of darkness is the one who has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge and glory of God in the face of Christ.

And then inside us by this, but we have this treasure in earthen vessels so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves. So that's right down the lane of what we're being filled with and who's in us, just as you said, Bob. So when it says that we'll be filled with the fruit of righteousness, which comes through Jesus Christ there in verse 11, Christ is righteous, that's his very nature, is righteousness, he's righteous. So that fruit we share with, right? So we have that righteousness and he gives it to us freely, is the way I read this verse 11. And it's his righteousness, not ours.

And the result, again, is to the glory and praise of God. If then we are filled with Christ's glory and His person, This glorifies the Father, right? From John 17, one through five, you know, glorify me together with yourself, with the glory I had with you before the world was, as well as when Christ was transfigured on the mount, the voice came out of heaven and said, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. So that's God the father praising his son there to the praise and glory of the father, God here.

And then we are simply beneficiaries of this relationship between the father and the son. In John 17, 22 and 23, it's him sharing his glory with us. Yeah, there I make the point, we are beneficiaries of the sharing between the two of them, and we have Christ's righteousness. And as Bob said, we are branches abiding in the vine, which is himself, and we have that union with him.

That's kind of neat stuff. And then I have, on the next slide, I have the addendum of the filling of the Holy Spirit from the major Bible themes session we did about years ago, Roger. So it has where I'm getting this from, the filling, and I'll let you see it here. Just so you know, I'm not lying. There it is. And that's where I got those scripture references, too. So yeah.

So final thoughts is I had this just thought that, can you study the intricacies of this doctrine too much? Other churches, it seems to me, to dwell on discipleship and following Jesus and things like that in these kind of broad terms. And they use the word accountability as a way to grow spiritually. But as you guys said in the beginning of the class, these doctrines are heavenly-oriented verses that we need to understand. So you need to bear down with these and get to know them, right? And grasp them. And they'll work themselves up through the facets of your soul. And then you can apply them. It's not so much just, I don't know.

Discipleship with Christ while he was on earth is, he was earthly then, and now he's heavenly. So we need to learn about these. J.B. Stoney says these, Philippians is a man in heaven. It's written to the man in heaven where we are. It's good. I like that.

So do you guys, I used to think that, I told my dad once that he asked if, you know, at Holly Hills, do we go too much into detail in the identification truth? And this was probably years and years ago, maybe 25 years ago. I said, yeah, I think so. You can go really into detail on that dad. But now I've changed my mind. You can't get enough of this to understand it, right?

It's not we're prone to go the other direction, the fluffier direction, and not know Him. The Christian life is about knowing Christ. If you don't spend time with Him and His Word and see who He is, then you don't know who you are. As opposed to, what would Jesus do? Yeah, I know. I think so many of the denominations, they're all about that. Right. You know? As opposed to knowing Him internally. Right. You know, when the trials come, it's a lot to take care of. No, no. It builds up your capacity. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, it's nice to have these footholds and these things to hold on to, doctrine, which you can grasp and hold on to, to help you through the experience of life, right? Because otherwise you're sort of floating around. But there's some specific information that Paul gives, really specific. Say, Andrew, wouldn't it be nice if the Lord was standing right here in front of us, teaching us? But in a sense, He is. He's right here in the Word of God. Yeah, right. So that's what's important, being in the Word of God. Exactly. Right. And this must be the information that Christ himself gave to Paul in the wilderness, right? That he learned all this. He learned these things of them. And, you know, in the 1030 hour, we're doing the identification truce again, right?

Many, a dozen, two dozen times over the many, but does it ever, do you ever go, oh, this is kind of got old. It's kind of, or no, no. new things each time you kind of go over it, don't you? So it's, yeah, and it's turning these things over in your mind is, I think, what these verses say, so. Hey, Andrew. Yeah. Yeah, next week, Roger asked me to teach, and one of the things that has happened so far is studying your verses and the next verses. Oh, right.

Yeah, is the focus here between God the Father and God the Son, that it's to the glory that the Father has in our Savior, His Son. That that's the plan of God, to glorify His Son. And in the process, when we look at it, we say, yeah, we share that glory of the Son. Well, who's giving the glory to the Son? Who's giving the glory, therefore, to us? It's our Heavenly Father. Isn't that something? Isn't that wonderful?

Yeah. Right. Yeah. And I hope that's okay to say. I mean, in John 17, it's the two of them, but we're between them and we're being able to just be beneficiaries of that. I think that's the way to say it. That's wonderful. Well, I like that along that line, we're a gift from God the Father, God the Son. I always think I'm a gift. I don't feel too much like a gift. That's a good question. I keep him humble.

$10 or less, right? Right. Oh, that's great. Well, this has been great. And I think it worked out well. I think you guys can hear me. No, that's great. Thanks, Andrew, for doing this. Yeah, well, yeah, it's been a pleasure and I look forward then to dovetailing this, uh, uh, Roy, uh, these things next week. That'll be great. Well, I'll close here.

Um, our heavenly father, we thank you for that. Oh, you share your glory with us. Um, and all the things that you've given to the son, Jesus Christ, uh, you give to us and we are, um, Abiding in Christ and we are branches in in the heavenly vine and we have all that All that fullness and riches that we are recipients of and we can utilize In our daily walk when you think for that and we we thank you for this time here this morning in Pray these things in your son's name. Amen Amen