The God Who Came to Us | The Rev. Dr. R. Leigh Spruill

I'm so grateful John and his team for this service decided.

Let's take a look at the letter to the Philippians since it's coming up in our worship over these weeks of early fall.

And if there is any letter that we have inherited in the New Testament from St. Paul that is filled with as much love, I don't know what it is.

This is a favorite letter of Paul's for Christians down through the generations for a variety of reasons, not least because it's relatively short.

It's, I think, easy to read.

And it's just filled with such great affection.

I'm going to just put up the first two verses that you heard already today.

And, you know, Paul is writing to this congregation.

I'm going to share a little bit more of context in just a second.

But, you know, complete my joy that I have in you.

If there's any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

What I want to point out here right off the bat is some prepositions.

In.

Not necessarily says in Christ, in the Spirit, in full accord.

In other words, in union with one another.

Paul is trying to communicate through this correspondence that when we are in Christ, we are in the Spirit, because we wouldn't know Christ except for the Holy Spirit.

And that not only draws us in love to God the Father, it draws us into the love that Jesus has for the Father, which is the most potent kind of love.

And that can't help spilling out from each one of us personally into our relationships to one another.

Why did Paul write this letter? Fundamentally, he wrote it because he wants them to know this love, this love in Christ, this love made possible through the presence and the power of the love of the Holy Spirit.

And I often use this kind of analogy or it's really kind of a physical gesture that what Paul is saying here is that the love that exists between the Father and the Son, with Jesus now exalted to the right hand of the Father, the Holy Spirit comes and brings us into there.

So like we're sitting on the lap of the Father with Jesus.

And the love they have for one another is also the love that we can have.

for God the Father and Jesus as well.

That's made possible when we're in the spirit here.

So again, we're doing the sermon series on Philippians.