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—my favorite song. That was beautifully played. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to WCC. As always, we are very happy to have you with us to worship our Lord together, to learn from his words, and to fellowship with each other. And today is a little special. Our attendance will be relatively low because our youth, they are setting up for car wash. Yes, they are doing car wash today as a fundraiser for our summer mission trip. So if you are not particular about how your car is washed, you can please park your car to the back. And if you parked in the front, don't worry about it. After the service, you can move to the back. Yes, they would try their best, and they have been doing this for years, so they have some experience. They are not completely brand new. But anyway, so we do have a lot of things going on this summer. We have the Honduras mission trip, we have Advent Taiwan, and Village Gospel, and also Work Camp and the VBS. So if you or your children are looking for something meaningful to do this summer, please consider participating in some of those activities. And interestingly, today Minister Paul is preaching from the book of Philippians chapter 1. And Jesus begins this chapter with gratitude and affection for the believers in Philippi. And he sees them not just as converts, but also as partners in the gospel work. And he, you know, you and I, we are also coworkers and partners in the gospel work, and we are all commissioned to contribute and participate in the gospel movement. So let us think about what we can do this week or this summer for the gospel work. All right, let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we pray for this summer. Pray for all the mission trips and summer activities. We pray that they will be fruitful, impactful, and Spirit-led. We also pray for all the participants for their health and safety, their ministry, and their own spiritual growth. For those of us who are not doing anything special, Lord, please also help us to find opportunities to share the gospel, to serve, and to show love and compassion to others. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Okay, good morning everyone. Could you all please rise and join us as we worship? Sing you give life.

You give life, you are love. You bring light to darkness. You give hope, you restore every heart that is broken. Great are you, Lord. You give life. You give life, you are love. You bring light to the darkness. You give hope, you restore every heart that is broken. Great are you, Lord. It's your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise. We pour out our praise. It's your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise to you only. You give life. You give life. You are love. You bring light to the darkness. You give hope. You restore every heart that is broken. And great are you, oh. It's your breath. It's your breath in our lungs. So we pour out our praise. We pour out our praise! It's your breath— In our lungs so we pour out our praises to you only. Your breath— In our lungs so we pour out our praise. We pour out our praises to you— Breath in our lungs so we pour all of these things to you only. Great are you, Lord. Great are you, Lord. Sing and all the earth. And all the earth will shout your praise. Our hearts will cry, these bones will sing. Great are you, Lord. And all the earth will shout your praise. Our hearts will cry, Our hearts will cry, these bones will sing. Great are you, Lord. And all the earth will shout your praise. Our hearts will cry, these bones will sing. Great are you. One more time, and all the earth. And all the earth will shout your praise. Our hearts will cry, these bones will sing. Great are you, Lord. It's your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise. We pour out our praise. It's your breath in our lungs. Our lungs, so we pour out our praise to you only. It's your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise. We pour out our praise. It's your breath in our lungs, so we pour out our praise to you only. Great are you, Lord. Great are you, Lord.

Saying there's nothing worth more.

There's nothing worth more that will ever come close. Nothing can compare. You're our living hope. Your presence, Lord. I've tasted and seen of the sweetest of loves when my heart becomes free and my shame is undone in your presence, Lord.

Come on, we welcome the Holy Spirit.

Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Come flood this place and fill the atmosphere. Your glory, God, is what our hearts long for, to be overcome by your presence. Lord, your presence is Lord. Sing, there's nothing worth— there's nothing worth more that will ever come close. Nothing can compare. You're our living hope. Your presence, Lord. I've tasted and seen. I've tasted and seen of the sweetest of loves. When my heart becomes free and my shame is undone. In your presence, Lord. Oh Lord! Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Come flood this place and fill the atmosphere. Your glory God is what our hearts long for to be overcome by your presence. Lord, Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Come flood this place and fill the atmosphere. Your glory, God, is what our hearts long for, to be overcome by your presence, Lord. Lord! Your presence— ohh! Ohh! Your presence— sing let us become. Let us be calm. More aware of your presence; let us experience the glory of Your goodness! Let us become more aware— —of your presence; that we'll see Spirit's Glory of Goodness. That will speak up for all our praises Let us experience the glory of your goodness. Let us become more aware of your presence. Let us experience the glory of your goodness. Lord, Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, you are welcome. Come flood this place and fill the atmosphere. Your glory, God, is what our hearts long for, to be overcome by your presence. Lord, Holy Spirit, you are welcome here. Come flood this —your presence fill the atmosphere. Your glory, God, is what our hearts long for, to be overcome by your presence, Lord. Your presence is Lord. Your presence Your presence, Lord. Your presence, Lord. The name of Jesus. You didn't want heaven without us. So Jesus, you brought heaven down. My sin was great, your love was greater. So why concept? —now. What a wonderful name it is. What a wonderful name it is. The name of Jesus Christ, my King. What a wonderful name it is. Nothing compares to this. What a wonderful name it is. The name of Jesus. What a wonderful name it is, the name of Jesus. Sing death could not. Death could not hold you. The veil tore before you. You silenced the boast of sin and grave. The heavens are The praise of your glory, for you are raised to life again. You have no rival, you have no equal, now and forever, God, you reign. Yours is the kingdom, yours is the glory, Yours is the name above all names. What a powerful name it is. What a powerful name it is. The name of Jesus Christ, my King. What a powerful name it is. Nothing can stand against. What a powerful name it is. The name of Jesus Christ, my King. —come on, deathhead! —dead could not hold you. The veil tore before you. You silenced the boast of sin and grief. The heavens are roaring the praise of your glory, for you are raised to life. Oh yeah, you have, you have no rival. You have no equal, now and forever. God, you reign. Yours is the kingdom, yours is the glory, yours is the name above all names. What about the name? It is What a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus Christ my King. What a powerful name it is, nothing can stand against. What a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus. What a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus. What a powerful name it is, the name of Jesus.

Yes, let's bow our heads in prayer. Lord King Jesus, we welcome you with open arms this morning. Lord, on this Pentecost Sunday where we remember the promise that was sealed to us, given to us by the Holy Spirit, Lord. And as we welcome your presence, Lord, we pray that we— every moment that we take this morning, every breath that we take, that it would draw us to the cross, that it would point our eyes to the King, to the Lord of our lives, Jesus Christ, our Savior, our Lord. So Lord, we thank you that we have that promise this morning, that we have your presence, that we have your goodness. Lord, we pray that you would continually abide with us and that you would empower us this morning through your Spirit to walk out all the promises that you've given us, to live out the lives that you've called us to live. And this morning that we will be able to gather together in worshipful hearts and connect communion with one another, and most importantly, in communion with you, Lord, knowing that we've been made right through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. So Lord, help us to rest in that this morning, that we would lay down our burdens before you and come before you with open hands and clean hearts, that we might receive whatever you have for us this morning. Maybe it's just a reminder again that you're here with us. Maybe it's just a reminder again that you're good and that you're loving and kind even when we don't see it. But Lord, whatever it is, we pray that as we listen to your message, as we listen to the words that you have for us this morning, that you would give us a sense of overwhelming comfort, of overwhelming awe and wonder just at the beauty of your name. Let it all be for your glory and all for your, your praise and and wonder. Lord, we eagerly await you to come. Lord, thank you for this time. Thank you for this moment. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Before you're seated, could you please take a few moments and greet each other?

Good morning, everyone. My name is Huy. Thank you all for giving me an opportunity to share part of my journey to Christianity. I grew up in Vietnam in a non-Christian Chinese family. I came to the U.S. in the mid-'80s and in 1997 I got married. And through my wife's college, I came to know Pastor Trinh, a Vietnamese pastor here in Delaware. At the time, both his wife and my wife were working for DuPont. He invited us to his church in South Philly and to Bible study at his house. Paul's. And for a while we borrowed this church facility for the Vietnamese church meeting also. So some of you maybe remember that. This went on year for years, but my heart wasn't softened. It wasn't until 2018 that over 20 years since I first know about Christ that I finally accepted Christ as my Savior Savior, and in that year I was baptized. It wasn't one moment, one single moment that changed me. It was a series of gentle nudges along the way, conversation with believers whose peace that I could not explain, moment of unexpected grace, and a sense of peace that I slowly experienced myself. Become Christian does not make my life become magically perfect. I still face struggle. I still stumble. But now I walk with Christ, and that changed everything. It feel good that I don't have to carry all the burden alone, that I have a grace that is not earned. But freely given, and have a hope that does not rest on what I can do, but in what he has already done. My wife and I have been blessed with two children. Our older son, Brandon, has a job and lives in California. The younger one, Justin, is attending a university in Delaware. They don't know Christ yet, yet, but we continue to pray for them. Brothers and sisters, it took me over 20 years to find and accept Christ. Along the way, many people have prayed for me, and I'm grateful for that. And I want you to know that Jesus never stopped pursuing me even when I wasn't looking for him. He won't stop pursuing you either. Thank you for letting me share my story.

Philippians chapter 1, verses 1 through 11. Let's read together. To the committed Christians in Philippi, especially the elders and deacons, from Paul and Timothy, servants of Jesus Christ: Grace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Shalom. Every time I think of you, I thank God for each of you, and always in every I joyfully make mention of your continuous faithful partnership in the gospel movement, with the confidence that he who initiated this good work in you will bring it to fruition on the day Jesus is revealed as Messiah. It is only natural I should feel this way about you because of your heartfelt concern for me. By grace, you are my collaborators. In the protection and promotion of the gospel movement. And now, even in my imprisonment, God is witness how I long for you with the affection of Jesus Christ. Now I pray that you be filled with the fruit of righteousness. May your love increase in knowledge and wisdom, may your judgment improve, and may your hearts be pure and behavior blameless, so that the Christian era will abound in glory and praise to God. You may be seated.

Thank you.

Good morning. In 2 Kings 2 Kings chapter 6, about 850 years before Christ, we read this story. When Elisha's servant rose early in the morning and went out, behold, there was an Aramean army surrounding the city with horses and chariots. Now, we know that a lot of these Bible stories can be understood today as parables that apply to us. Some people, when you look out at the world today, you don't see enemies. And others of us are afraid when we look out, and we're afraid at the world around us. Some think everything's okay. Some think that there is evil everywhere. But this servant knew what to do. He ran to Elisha, of course. Help, master! Master, what should we do? Because this servant had noticed that the enemies were surrounding the city. Elisha said, Do not be afraid. Those who are with us are more than those that are with them. And in this picture, you can see the contrast in the anxiety in the face of the servant versus Jesus the prophet, who doesn't seem to be bothered at all, does he? More— those that are with us are more than those that are against us. And in this contrast, you see all the difference between faith and faithless. Even though the battle hasn't been engaged, there's no fight has taken place, and yet the man of God, knowing God is with with us is confident and the servant is not. And we know that God's more powerful than evil, but sometimes when we're facing trouble, we don't know if he's right there at that moment. Do we have faith that God will be with us conquering evil? Where do we see it? We don't see it, but it says in Romans that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the the word of God. Well, Elisha could see on the face of the servant that he wasn't convinced by this reassurance. So Elisha prayed and said, "O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see." And the servant went back to the window and looked out, and he saw, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. And he was calmed down, wasn't he? Because he knew that indeed he could now visualize, he could see the spiritual forces that were allied, that were arrayed around the good guys. So he wasn't afraid anymore. Or as we read in Romans 8, "If God be for us, who can be against us?" Unfortunately, unlike Elisha's servants, we don't get to see see this miraculous vision into what's going on spiritually. So instead, we visualize it, and that's what we're going to talk about today. And when we do, our fear can become faith. Even in the valley of the shadow of death, we will fear no evil. Even in the presence of our enemies, our sorrow will turn to rejoicing. And that's what these Bible stories are showing us again and again, that God is with us, that God is for us. So today we're going to visualize victory. Visualize Victory Today is both the title and it's the outline. So we're gonna talk about visualize, victory, and then today. And we will see that what I'm talking about in visualizing is really what we do when we pray. Pray and what faith involves. It's like what we see in our mind's eye. And we'll find that Paul in the book of Philippians, the chapter that we just read, is visualizing a kind of victory for the church, God's kingdom. And then we'll look at how we can apply this today. So when we visualize— did I skip something? We will use new eyes. Remember how when Paul, before he wrote all the scriptures, he was actually a Jew that was pursuing and persecuting the Christians. And it was on one of these trips to the road to Damascus, as you know, that Paul, called Saul at the time, was struck down from a horse and blinded by this light and lost his vision altogether for 3 days and 3 nights until someone came and prayed for for him, and his sight was restored. And he described it, he said, "As if scales fell from my eyes." Did you ever catch a fish and you have to cut the scales off of it? It's like the scales were covering his eyes and now he had new eyes to see. And that's what we need. So visualization is a powerful thing that happens when we pray and when we exercise faith. That if you ever were on a sports team or were coaching a team, you probably asked your athletes to use this technique. They call it mental imagery. So what do you see going on in this? This is a basketball game and everybody stops and the athlete goes to the free throw line and now has a few moments before they throw the ball in. No one's going to block the shot. So what is she doing? What is she doing? Why isn't she throwing the ball? Before she throws the ball up, what does she do? She's just looking at that basket. What is she thinking? She's imagining the ball, whoosh, all net, and that little sound that it makes when it hits. That's what she's thinking. So this is that moment when she is watching it going in even before it goes in. And prayers are a little bit like this. This and notice how Jesus even taught almost the same thing in Mark 11:24. It says, "Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it." Believe it went through the net. "And it will be yours." Does anyone know the context of this? When he's saying this, he's describing— it was just after he'd cursed a fig fig tree, and the fig tree withered up. And then he pointed at a mountain, and we know it's either one of two mountains that are within view of that road that he was on. And he says, "Even if you point and say to a mountain, 'It will be cast into the sea,' and you believe in your heart and do not doubt, it will fall into the sea." Now, I remember when, as a teenager, when I first saw that verse and the The guy in the Bible study was basically saying that, you know, you can do anything you want. You can pray for some wild and crazy things, like even mountains falling into the sea. But this is a particular mountain that had a particular temple on it that Jesus had prophesied was going to collapse. And so he was saying that even this mountain is going to be cast into the sea. To be destroyed. So that was the particular prayer that he was praying, but he was imagining that, and it did happen some years later. Now, there is a problem here, which is you could overthink. And so the athletes— have you ever watched American football, not European football, when the— especially at the end of the game, when the whole game is going to be decided by this last field goal —goal, and the kicker is lining up for the shot, and there's only— in this case, there's how many seconds left? They're in overtime. So the time is up. This is the last moment. And so the kicker is doing that same thing as the basketball player and just imagining he's going to kick the ball and it's going to go right through those uprights. And then what happens? Just as he's about to hike the ball, the other opposing coach calls timeout. Why does he do that? Because he wants the guy to keep thinking about it. He's hoping the kicker will lose his nerve. So you see, the kicker's got all ready, he's got all his energy, he's doing his thing with the visualization. Now he's got to do it for 2 more minutes, and so that throws him off sometimes. And I think that can even happen with our prayers. Have you ever heard of over-praying? Well, you heard it here, maybe for the first time. And I'm going to illustrate that by this story from the life of King David when his son Absalom rebelled against him and David had to flee from Jerusalem on a moment's notice. He's walking down the hill, he's crossing over, he's walking up the other side, Mount of Olives, and it was a bad— it was bad. And everybody's crying and, you know, it's like this rebellion has broken out. And it was told David, Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom. And David's— and so that's bad news because Ahithophel is like the number one advisor. His advice is like the word of God is what they said. And so when he heard Ahithophel has gone with the rebels, that's really— nothing could be worse. And so what does he do? He prays. One sentence O Lord, please turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness. One sentence. He had no time to like say, you know, call a halt to the fleeing armies and let's, you know, let's stop here. I'm gonna pull over and pray for a while in my little prayer closet. There was no time. So they're all fleeing and they're going. He prays one sentence. Now what happened just a few moments later, maybe 5 5 minutes, 10 minutes later, and you know because he's climbing this hill up the Mount of Olives. Just as David was coming to the summit, one of his lieutenants named Hushai came to meet him. When David saw him, guess what? He had this flash of inspiration. He said, "You go back to Jerusalem, defeat the council of Ahithophel." He knew that this guy Hushai could become one of the conspirators. He could infiltrate fustrate Absalom's circle of counselors. And indeed, that's what happened. And Hushai went down and he became one of the counselors, and indeed he was able to frustrate the counsel of Ahithophel. Ahithophel ended up killing himself. It's a great story. But the point here is, imagine if David had never prayed that prayer and he'd run into Hushai. He may never have even noticed or occurred to him that, that, that's this answer to his prayer. In other words, David visualizing this— God turned Ahithophel's counsel into foolishness— it set him up for the next step. So when God presented the solution, he was able to see it. And that's what we want to do. Now it says in Hebrews 11, there's that long list of people who exercise faith, that faith is assurance "of things hoped for, conviction of things not seen." So this is a way that he described that our visualizing is really exercising what our faith is. Now, can we see God? No. Can we feel God? No. But we can see a lot of things, right, like creation. And God has given us so many ways of imagining what he's like or thinking or touchstones or analogies. And one of them is the clouds. And this is mentioned all throughout the Old Testament how God's Spirit is like a cloud, like a cloud that led the children of Israel through the wilderness. And— or the cloud being like the Spirit appeared like a cloud. And clouds are kind of— I don't know, do you ever go up— do you remember like when a kid the first time you're rising up in an airplane and you're How are we going to— you know, you think you're going to hit the clouds, right, because they look solid from below, but once you get up there, you realize they're kind of airy. So that's just one example. And there's now— there's even some man-made things. And this, to me, this is like a picture of the World Wide Web. It's like the networks are all like networked together by these like stringy, invisible stringy things, wires. You can't see them, but when you're logged into the internet, you can communicate with people all over the world. And to me, this is a great way of picturing the Kingdom of God, how we're— the people of God are all connected even though we're all over the place and different shapes and sizes. Okay, that is visualizing. But what are we visualizing and what is Paul doing in the book of Philippians in chapter 1? And his— what he's looking at and what does victory look like for him is three 3 things, and we just read about it, but we're going to go back over so I make sure you catch it. He's visualizing this movement of Christianity, this gospel thing that's just still really a baby is going to mature into what we call Christianity today. He's also visualizing— because he knows he's dead. I mean, he's going to have a death sentence. He's probably never going to get out of jail. He's going to be gone Soon. So he's visualizing these others, leaders that are going to take his place. So he's definitely concerned about leadership transition. And third, he wants people to have— to experience life in the Spirit, the so-called right living or the fruit of righteousness, and not just because they will enjoy it, but because it gives glory to God and it makes this whole thing work. So what is this gospel movement maturing into Christianity. Now to get a perspective on the New Testament church, it's helpful to look at the Old Testament church and how it got started. And you could consider Paul is like the Moses of the New Testament. Have you ever heard that? Paul is the Moses of the New Testament. Moses is the Paul of the Old Testament. And just like Philippians is written towards the end of Paul's life. Deuteronomy is written towards the end of Moses' life. Now, did Moses go into the Promised Land? Remember how he made it right up to the edge. He could see from Mount Nebo. He climbed Mount Nebo, which was in Moab. He could see across the Jordan into the Promised Land, but God had told him he would not enter personally. But he knew. He could still see, and he could rejoice because the He knew that Jericho is going to fall, wilderness is in their past, and the Promised Land is ahead of them. They're about to enter. Well, in the book of Philippians, what's going on? The book of Philippians, the fall of Jerusalem is in view, the end of the Old Covenant, and once that's gone, this gospel movement, which is like a sect of Judaism, is going to become dominant, and it will turn into the age of Christ. And we'll see that again in a second. But Paul knows that just like Moses is about to perish, he knows even himself, he is about to perish, and that's why he's so concerned about leadership transition. Now, who took over after Moses? Who was his successor? Moses' successor is Joshua. And that's— you can read all about it. Well, who is Paul's successor? Some— I heard Timothy and I heard us. Which is right? Both of them are right. So Paul is actually with Timothy writing, and when he writes, we'll see that it is us and it's Timothy. But it's not— it's really a group. We'll see in a moment. So what happened in AD 62? And some of these dates are a little fuzzy, and if you look at Wikipedia, some people think '61, '62, '63, so don't quote me on the exact month. But what happens just prior to the writing of Philippians is that the Book of Acts, you can see it ends sort of abruptly when Paul arrives, he's arrested, he's transported to Rome, and it says he stayed there for 2 more years teaching from house arrest. Rest. And those are some of the times he had to write some of the scripture, but he— that's the end of Book of Acts is in 62. And then he gets word that James, who was the head of the church in Jerusalem, Jesus' brother, was killed, executed in Jerusalem, also in 62. And that same year, Nero Caesar began to rule. He had been named emperor, but he had these regents that were over him, but then they One of them died, one of them retired, and so he's in control. And that was bad. And Paul, who was in the palace guard, he knew a thing or two about this young Nero Caesar, and he knew that that was a bad sign. So this is when Paul writes Philippians, and indeed he himself has only got 2 or 3 years to live. People aren't sure exactly, but 64 approximately. So he's close to the end of his life. Now, this translation, I don't know if you noticed, it was said translation by Paul Condrell. That's me. And so I went, I just took Greek in college and then again in the seminary. And this is like the last assignment after 3 semesters of Greek was to pick a chapter. And so it was this chapter, these 12 verses or 11 verses that I went through like word by word, line by line. And so this is, I'm using my own translation. I wouldn't do that for other chapters, okay? But if you have any quibble over the translation, let's talk about it later. But there are— I did take a few little liberties. My professor said, "I prefer to stick with the text." What he meant was, you know, just stick with the— anytime you translate, there's a spectrum between word for word versus thought for thought. Have you heard of that spectrum? Now, I lived in China for many years, and I learned that if you go word for word, word, it doesn't work very well. More often than not, you know, if you go by the exact words, you're going to be misunderstood. So you have to be listening for what's really being communicated. All right, so let's not quibble over that. So it starts here: To the committed Christians in Philippi, especially the elders and deacons, from Paul and Timothy, servants of Jesus Christ. And the emphasis I put is on the word especially. So if you read a lot of the New Testament, it's kind of like a new believer might take it in, like let's say Romans. It's sort of instruction for new believers. But Philippians is not for new believers. Philippians is for old believers. It's for people that have been coming for 20 years, right? Because it's giving them instruction for how to lead. It's not instruction for how to become Christian, and you'll see that as we go along. Now, in the— but it's also from Paul and Timothy, so it doesn't quite answer the question. Question of who is going to be Paul's successor just yet from this verse alone. Now he says, "Every time I think of you, I thank God for each of you, and always in every prayer I make mention of you, your continuous faithful partnership in the gospel movement." So he's kind of "chui pang," we say in Chinese. He's kind of building them up or he's acknowledging their work, but also he's saying, as Yuna was just He's saying, "We're in this together. Okay, we're partners. We want you to be partners." And he's designating them really as partners both in the past and he goes on to say, "With confidence that he," God, "who initiated this good work in you will bring it to fruition." When? "On the day Jesus is revealed as Messiah." Now, this in some ways in some translations is assumed to be someday in the future yet. But as I understand the whole context, it's coming up like any day now. But Paul is saying, any day now, you are going to be taking over for me. You are going to be the new leadership. And your partnership is going to be brought to fruition. In other words, you're going to take over. So that is what is going on. Let's see, where am I here? Now, one of the songs that we sang— Jonathan, you did a great job of choosing the songs. He always is very thoughtful about how he chooses them. It's not until the second chapter of Philippians that Paul states what the goal is or what it looks like when the gospel movement is fully bloomed, and that is that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on on earth and even under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Well, who else could be Lord? Who is he competing with? And if you had lived, if you could try to like put yourself in the shoes of the people in the '60s AD, the reigning Caesars were the ones whose coin— the coins had the face of Caesar on it. It said Caesar the Divine. They had this emperor worship thing going. So the idea of who is God or who is Lord, people would say, well, the Roman Empire is Lord or Caesar is Lord. That's what the Gentiles would think. But if you were in the church— sorry, if you were in the Old Testament covenant or in the Mosaic covenant, if you lived in Israel, who was going to be— who was Lord? It would be like the high priest. The priest would be the one who is calling the shots, and we know that they had a big clash with Jesus. So there was a— it seemed like the people had 3 choices. You could either be a Jew, or you could be a Gentile, which meant Roman Empire, or you could be Church of God. And at the time, these 2— as you know, the story of how Rome and Israel kind of wrestling and having these wars are going on, and they're wrestling over Jerusalem. Jerusalem and the siege and so on. But once the battle was cleared, and at the time the Christianity was like below the radar screen, but once both of them, they kind of like committed suicide and then Jerusalem was destroyed and even the Nero, when he died, he was the last of his dynasty that started with Julius Caesar of the Judeo-Claudian dynasty and after he died, that was the end of this emperor worship, although I'm still trying to find evidence evidence of that. You could see that that is the time that everyone knew that Jesus had succeeded, that his prophecy that the mountain would fall into the sea had actually come true. And Paul is saying, "You are going to be there," even though he knew he was dying or he was going to be killed, that the elders and deacons would still be there. Now this going on down to verse 7. He says, "It's only natural I should feel this way about you because of your heartfelt concern for me." And if you've read the whole of Philippians, you know that at the end Paul thanks them for their gift. The Philippian church had given a financial gift to Paul in prison. Now I guess prisons today, they give you 3 meals, but in those days, if you had no friends to give you any meals, then you were in bad shape. So they had provided for Paul in prison and he was very thankful. So that was one of the occasions that he even wrote the letter to this particular church and had singled them out because they had gone the extra mile to give him this financial gift. So he says, By grace you are my collaborators in the protection and promotion of the gospel movement, and now even in my imprisonment. That is through their gift. God is witness how I long for you with the affection of Jesus Christ. And if you reread this whole chapter together, you can see there's a lot of emotion in Paul's writing. And it's partly— have you ever known somebody who's like terminally ill? Or maybe just someone who's old? They kind of cry easily? Like they just will— they will get emotional. And I think this is— you can see that's kind of happening with Paul. 'cause he knows he's like passing the baton. He might never see them again. This is where he says, you know, to die is gain. To live is Christ, to die is gain. Like even if it's the end of me, it's gonna be okay. So he's wrestling with this. And so he's very emotional. God is witness how I long for you with the affection of Jesus Christ. And I think back to all the years I've had to be part of different churches.. And sometimes like in church management meetings, and it can be very businesslike sometimes, right Paul? We have our vice chairman with us today, Paul. And sometimes it's like, you know, we're talking about church business and it becomes business. But we forget sometimes that, you know, we love each other. And so here you can see Paul doesn't make this mistake. He says, God is witness, I long for you with the affection of Jesus Christ. He's really overcome with gratitude for their gift, but also he knows that the Lord is depending on them to be there when Paul is gone. Okay, so that is the leadership transition. And the third thing that he covers at the end of this passage is about right living, which glorifies God. And we call that— he calls them in other places the fruit of the So we know, and this is the verse, we read it once. Now I pray you be filled with the fruit of righteousness. May your love increase in knowledge and wisdom, may your judgment improve, and may your hearts be pure and behavior blameless, so that the Christian era will abound in glory and praise to God. And I love this, I put those little parentheses in there. If you've ever studied Greek, the thing about Greek Greek is their sentences can be really, really, really, really long and they call it parsing. You have to like try to like puzzle pieces to see which clause goes with which other clause. But if you put the parentheses here, it enables you to connect the prayer that you be filled with the fruit of righteousness. Why? So that Christianity will abound in glory and praise to God. What good is it to have a bunch of churches and people in churches if God doesn't get any praise and glory, right? Right? So it's not just bodies in the seat that counts, right? It's the fruit, it's the save, it's the smell, the fragrance that goes out that gives glory to God. The fruit of the Spirit is, I feel it's like the engine for this victory that he's looking for. That if we do this right, the other things will take care of themselves. I know in the churches we sometimes want to see, how are we going to advertise? How are we going to do our website? How are we going How are we going to do our outreach campaign? How are we going to do— they have all of these plans. But in the end, it boils down to this. And I can remember the first time Hui was talking about being invited to a Bible study. I got invited to a Bible study in high school. And the only reason I went was because the girl was kind of cute. And Stacy knows who she is, so it's okay. And, you know, it was good. It was an okay Bible study. But at the end, they said, oh, on Friday we're having a party. Party. It was a Wednesday night Bible study. Friday night we're having a party, you're invited. I'm sure there's a lot of better parties than a Christian party, so I didn't make any commitments, but sure enough Friday there were no other parties, so I went. And it was at that party that I saw, it's like Huy mentioned the peace, that other people had this peace. What I saw, I wouldn't describe it as peace. Compared to the high school parties, like most high school parties, you know, the lights are off, and people are kind of, you know, off to the corner, and it was just, you know, checking each other out. But at this party, the lights were on and people are hugging each other and smiling, and it was— it was, wow, what a contrast. So that was my, my mini testimony right there. The fruit of the Spirit, I could see it. It was, it was visible. Okay, so that is the victory. Now what do we do today? And I wanted to summarize this. Does anyone know who is William Carey? William Carey was a mission— they call him the father of missions. He's one of the first. He went from England to India even before there was such a thing as missionaries. Am I right? 17-something. It was like way, way, way back. And you should see the movie of his life. It's just, I mean, horrific, but I won't get too far off onto a tangent. Tangent, except that after like 15 years being there, I just remember this one scene from the movie that England sent him a colleague, sent him somebody to support him and go out there. And William Carey said, "Oh, you're from England? You're looking for me?" And the first question he asked him, he didn't say, "What denomination? What was your degree? And did you study theology?" He said, "What's your trade? Can you do anything useful?" And it turns out the guy was a printer, and the fact that he was a printer, they ended up printing these little tracts and they printed little Bibles, and that changed the whole complexion of his ministry. Anyway, William Carey said, "Expect great things." I think that's wrong. "Expect great things from God." Expect great things from God. Attempt great things for God. That's the full quote. Sorry about that. And so that's what we want to do. That's why we're visualizing. That's the victory that we're looking for. Paul was looking for one in his was in his context, and now we're looking for one in our context. And this is what we do every time we get together in a prayer circle. So this is a little commercial for our Wednesday night prayer circle. We do it twice a month. And this is really exactly what we do. And those of you who have come, you could Zoom in if you can't make it to the lounge downstairs. Downstairs. This is what we do. We're talking about visualizing, imagining, and asking God for help in coming together, in developing people, in challenging people, and in moving forward with whatever he wants to do in this community. So that is what we do. We visualize and then we act. And so therefore we can reread this as a letter from Jesus to our church or from me to our church. It says, "To you committed Christians at WCC, shalom." What is shalom anyway? It literally means peace, but it's kind of like bigger than peace. It's like peace and tranquility and world peace and peace and flourishing. It's a big word. You can't just do it in English. "I thank God joyfully for your continued continuous faithful partnership. And that's what this church is. You know, this church had no pastor for 3 years. And was that a good thing or a bad thing? In some ways it was too bad, but in some ways it was good because now that I came in, I see all you guys are— you're taking your share of— you're like continuous partners. There's a lot of very partner-like people in this group. Do you know what I'm saying? Because you all had to do part of the work. So now we're still doing. So we are collaborators in the promotion of God's kingdom. May your love increase, may your judgment improve, and may your hearts be pure and behavior blameless, so that Christianity will abound in glory and praise to God. So I just want to finish because I know some of you are probably thinking, yeah, that sounds good, It's a little bit too good to be true or unlikely or something. So I just want to remind you of the words of Thomas after the resurrection of Jesus. In the circle of friends, the disciples are all telling Thomas, "We met him. We saw him." Thomas said, "I won't believe unless I see the nail wounds in his hands and I put my fingers into them and I place my hand into the wound." in his side. Thomas was not one to visualize, so what did he do? Well, kind of like Elisha's— gone— Elisha's servant showed him the picture. Well, in this case, Jesus appeared to them and said, put your finger here and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side and don't be faithless any longer. We've heard the news, and so it's up to us to visualize. When Thomas saw, he just threw himself on the floor. I can just imagine. My Lord and my God, Thomas explained. Then Jesus told him, you believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me. Let's pray. Father, we can see in our mind's eye that yes, you are true, you are— and Jesus is alive today. And we see it in churches, in the lives of believers who have committed themselves to you, the invisible God, and our invisible invisible Lord, because we know you live. And the evidence is all around us. I pray, Father, that we can learn better and better as we practice to trust and to imagine and to act knowing that you are indeed with us that you are powerful, that you are conquering over evil, and that greater days are ahead. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Could you all please rise and join us?

So here it is.

Say, here it is, my alabaster heart. I'm keeping nothing back from who you are. No hidden treasure veiled Maki. You're a lifetime worth of worship, and that's only just the start. So here it is, my every waking day, the minutes, hours, the years of endless Praise for your worthy, far beyond all I could say. There's a lifetime worth of worship in the nuance of your name. So let it rise like incense, my whole life a praise fragrance every ounce here broken at your feet. And every breath and offering, my heart cries, these lungs to sing over you, my worthy King of Kings. There it is. There it is, your alabaster cross. Giving all you are for a whole lifetime. I can't believe that's the kind of King you are. How could I not bring a lifetime worth of worship to you, God? So let it rise like incense, my whole life a fragrance that re-ounce. Walking at your feet. And every breath, an offering, my heart cries, these lungs sing over you, my worthy King of Kings. Oh my love, oh my love, oh my love, you can have it all. Oh my love, oh my love, oh my love, you can have it all. All my heart and all my soul, all All I own, you can have it all. All my heart and all my soul. All I own, you can have it all. Oh, so let it rise like incense, my whole life a fragrance, ariau. Here, broken at your feet. And every breath an offering, my heart cries, is longing over you, my worthy King of Kings. Let it rise, let it rise like incense, my whole life A fragrance, every ounce here broken at your feet. And every breath an offering, my heart cries, these lungs to sing over you, my worthy King of Kings. Let's sing, all my love. All my love. All my love! All my love you can have it all! All my love! All my love— You can have it all! My heart and soul—all I own—you can have it all! Alright? Ohh... ohhh... alright?! Sing, let it rise. Let it rise like incense, my whole life, fragrance every ounce here broken at your feet. And every prayer and offering, my Our cries, these lungs singing over you, my worthy King of Kings. And let it rise, let it rise like incense, my whole life a fragrance, every ounce here spilled out at your feet, my King Jesus. Every breath an offering, my heart cries, these lungs sing over you, my worthy King. King.

You may be seated.

Good morning, everybody. A few announcements to be made. But before that, are there any visitors here today? Because if so, we've got something for you. If you just raise your hand, we'll get that to you. So if not, I'd like to go to the next slide. Right now going on In the parking lot over there is the car wash, as Yuna mentioned when we started. If you'd like to get your car washed and make a donation for the mission trips this summer, we should mention Advent Taiwan, Gospel Village Taiwan, the trip to Honduras, and the youth work camp somewhere in Pennsylvania, I believe. Yeah, and so if you could contribute to what the youth are doing this summer, there's adults going with them. But that would be great, and you can get your car washed in the parking lot today, starting right now after the service. If you're youth in here, they are looking for your hands if you can go out and help them with that. Next slide. I already mentioned the car wash. The something that's not on there that we forgot, so I need your attention since it's not in writing. Next Sunday afternoon from 3 to 6 is a Father's Day cookout barbecue, and it's also honoring our graduates this year. We have 10 or 11— 11 people I saw on Friday night on the list. And so that's this coming Sunday afternoon, 3 to 6, at Anson B. Nixon Park in Kennett Square. The reason why it's there is there's no indoor entrance fee like often in Delaware at the parks. So Pavilion Number 3, we'll have that in next week's bulletin. Sorry we didn't make it this week. And then also coming up on June 28th, a blood drive that we're doing here. Stacey has her laptop in the back and she can sign you up for that blood drive if you're willing to come. And it only takes her about a minute to sign you up and, and you get a time slot, and so it doesn't take as long as you might think to do the giving of the blood. And then next we have the registration for VBS going on right now, Vacation Bible School. And if you're around for the Fourth of July, we have the Fourth of July parade that we participated in last year. If you would like to take part in that, Paul is there and he'll sign you up. So I think that's it, except to say that we have a lot more details in the church bulletin, which you can find at the website listed there, wcec.churchcenter.com. Okay, I think that's it. And so if you would please rise for the doxology. Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Praise him all creatures Creatures here below, praise him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.

The benediction is from Philippians 1. Where else? To my committed Christians, peace. I thank God for your continuous faithful partnership. We are collaborators in the promotion of God's kingdom. May your love increase, may your judgment improve, and may your hearts be pure. And your behavior blameless, so that Christianity will abound in glory and praise to God. Amen. Thank you for being here today. We'll see you soon. Bye.