Welcome back to the podcast on Monday last time we looked at a duality at work in our

Bible reading of how God encourages us and then warns us, he encourages us, and then he

warns us.

There's a healthy balance of encouragement and warning that we need in the Christian life and

we get that balanced diet as we read through the entire Bible as a whole.

And that leads us nicely into something else where we are going to encounter in the Bible as we read,

and we're actually going to encounter this together over the next two days in the Navigators

Bible reading plan. We're going to be reading together, Philippians 3 verses 8 to 11.

As we do, it reminds me of a couple mistakes to avoid in the Christian life, specifically about

our precious Savior, Jesus Christ.

One mistake is to simply emphasize him as the victor, as the king who is enthroned in heaven,

he's resurrected, shining, sovereign over the universe, triumphant.

On the other hand, we can overemphasize Jesus' victim as the suffering servant,

only as the bleeding lamb who died for us on the cross.

In Philippians 3 verses 8 to 11, Paul holds together both of these glorious realities of

Christ's weakness and his power.

And then he braids them together into our experience of the Christian life.

It's a remarkable example of theology in application as Paul wants us to experience Christ

in the power of his resurrection as we share in his sufferings becoming like him in his death. In other words we experience his

victorious power not by escaping the suffering of this life but by enduring the suffering of this life, but by enduring the suffering of this life.

Pastor John, do what you do so well and just walk us through this text and explain how Paul pulls this off.

In 1992, I listened to one of Jay Oswald Sanders' last messages.

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