Eye on the Prize

Pastor Meng Chiam

Philippians 3:12-21
Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Following Paul’s Example. All of us, then, who are mature should take such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you. Only let us live up to what we have already attained. Join together in following my example, brothers and sisters, and just as you have us as a model, keep your eyes on those who live as we do. For, as I have often told you before and now tell you again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.

Big Idea :
When Christ is our hope and reward, we can progress in any and every situation.

1. Press on, don't switch off (v. 12-14)

Why do we press on?
- it's not our grip on Christ that's our security. It's Christ' grip on us that's our security, that helps us to press on

2. Keep on, don't slack off (v. 15-16)

The longer you are as a christian doesn't diminish the potential to sin.

3. Hold on, don't stray off (v. 17-21)

Philippians 2:5-8
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!

- Paul is telling us to model after Jesus, to empty Himself. He did not consider Himself as equality with God but lower Himself in human form.

Second example is model after Paul who have a list of credentials. Pure Jew, circumcised on 8th day, true blood Pharisee, Lineage of Benjamin.

1 Corinthians 6:13-14
You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also.

Follow the example models of those who are NOT the enemies of the cross.