Philippians 4:8-9
All right, if you remain standing, we’re going to read just a couple verses of scripture from Philippians chapter 4. This is verses 8 and 9. And Paul’s beginning to wrap up his letter. And let me read the words on the screen and you can follow along. Paul writes, Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if there’s anything that is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things.
And whatever you have learned or received or heard from me or seen in me, put into practice, and here’s the promise, and the God of peace will be with you. All right, well, we’re in the homestretch of the book of Philippians and were in chapter 4.
Last week we looked at the first seven verses and thought about the three areas of peace that God wants us to have. And I call it the triad of peace. It’s the peace with God, Romans 5:1, the peace of God that Paul talks about in Philippians 4. And then we talked about peace with others.
This morning, we get to verses 8 and 9, and we’re just going to spend about 30 minutes on these two verses. And Paul begins to wrap up his letter. In fact, he begins this section with the word finally.
And we’re going to think about the battle for the mind that he talks about in verses 8 and 9. When we move down to the next section, 10 through 20, Paul’s giving them a thanks, because you know that this letter is really a thank you note. The church at Philippi, and Paul was the founding pastor, they sent a gift through Epaphroditus, traveled 800 miles to bring Paul that gift. Where’s Paul? He’s in prison, isn’t he? He’s in a Roman prison.
He’s awaiting trial. And so, Paul’s really saying, thank you for the gift that you sent. In fact, if you remember back in chapter 2, Paul says he’s sending Epaphras back.
In fact, it says that he got sick on this trip and he almost died making this journey, this 800-mile journey to take this gift to the church at Philippi. And then the last couple of verses, Paul gives greetings from Caesar’s household. So, what happened when Paul was in prison? He made wise use of his time.
Then he wrote four prison epistles and he’s sharing the gospel. And some of Caesar’s household comes to faith in Christ. Well, this morning we’re going to look at verses 8 and 9. And I’ve called it two pleas, P-L-E-A-S, and a promise.
We need to be aware of the ongoing spiritual battle in our lives
And we’re going to think about the battle for the mind. And just an introductory thought here as we think about the battle for the mind is this, we this morning need to be aware of the ongoing spiritual battle in our lives. We need to be aware that as a follower of Jesus, there is an ongoing spiritual battle that goes on in our lives.
The Bible talks about three enemies that we have. Enemy number one, the world. By that, the Bible means the world system.
And we live in a world whose system is opposed to God, anti-God, and opposed to the truth. That was true in Paul’s day as well. Enemy number two is the flesh, Romans chapter 7. Even though we come to faith in Christ, our sin nature is not eradicated.
And so, we still struggle with the pull of sin and temptation in our lives. Paul talks about it in Romans 7. He says, the things I want to do, I don’t do. And the things that I don’t want to do, I end up doing.
Oh, wretched man that I am. Though Paul struggled with sin, probably you and I do as well. That’s part of the sanctification process.
But the third enemy in our life is very clear from Ephesians chapter 6, and it’s Satan. Years ago, a book was written, Satan is alive and well on planet earth by Hal Lindsey. And Paul talks about our enemy in the Ephesians chapter 6. Let me just remind you of these verses.
Verse 10, be strong in the Lord and his mighty power, put on the full armor of God so that you may be able to take your stand against the devil’s schemes. The King James, the old King James uses an old outdated word, the wiles of the devil. The Greek word is methodeia.
So, Paul’s saying, be aware of how your enemy works, how Satan works. We do that today. In fact, I was just watching the news yesterday and they’re talking about the defense department and the budget.
And they say, you know what, we need to kind of refashion the way we focus our energies and finances in our defense budget because people operate with drones today. You know, 30, 40 years ago, that was unheard of. There’s always shifting tactics and Paul says, be aware of how Satan works.
That’s why Paul wrote to Timothy. He says, I want you to endure hardship like a good soldier. And so, if you’re trying to live for Christ, if you’re trying to stand for truth, if you’re trying to make a difference in your world, guess what, you’re going to face opposition and there’s a battle going on.
And the battle is for your mind, your thoughts. That’s where Satan started way back in Genesis chapter three. And Paul warns about it in his letter to the Corinthians in 2nd Corinthians chapter 11, verse three.
But I’m afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the certain serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray. So where is Satan’s focus? He begins to focus on our minds and our thoughts. That’s what he did in the garden of Eden, talking snake.
That’s a little weird, isn’t it? But it’s true. And Satan began to have Eve question God’s word, question the goodness of God. They had freedom to every tree in the whole garden except for one.
And Satan begins to focus on, well, God’s not, God’s restrictive. And God, if God was good, he’d let you take every tree in the garden. And then of course, Satan lied, didn’t he? He said, no, you’re not going to die when you eat of the fruit.
And that was a lie because God said in the day that you eat of that fruit, you will die. Spiritually, you were dead immediately. Physically, you began to die.
And so, Satan, who’s the father of lies, who’s the great deceiver, begins to attack our minds. That’s why Paul’s words this morning are so important and so instructive. And we’ll get to them in just a little bit.
But another book has been around for a long time, since 1980. Dr. Tim LaHaye wrote a book entitled The Battle for the Mind. Here’s what he says about our thoughts, our brains, and the mind.
I’m quoting him here. Scientists call the human brain the most complex living mechanism in the world. The average brain weighs about three pounds, contains 12 billion cells, each of which is connected to 10,000 other brain cells, totaling 120 trillion brain connections.
I’m convinced as you get a little older, I think I’m down to about 110, to be honest. But that’s a lot of connections. The brain is very, very complex.
He says your brain supervises everything you do, from the involuntary beat of your heart to the conscious decisions of life. And so, Satan’s attack is going to be on our minds and on our thoughts. And the Scriptures have a lot to say about our minds, don’t they? Verses like Proverbs 23:7, as a man thinks in his heart, and the Bible uses the word heart to kind of sum up our intellect, emotion, and will, as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
Matthew 22, verse 37, what’s the greatest commandment? Jesus said, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your, M-I-N-D, with all your mind. And so, Christianity is true, isn’t it? There’s some that have criticized Christianity. I remember Ted Turner years ago said, Christianity is a religion for losers.
It’s for people that need a crutch and can’t make it through life on their own. No, Christianity is true. It is intellectual.
It makes sense. Josh McDowell wrote Evidence That Demands a Verdict years ago. He started out to disprove Christianity.
As he investigated it, he discovered what? Just the opposite. This is true. And so, we need to love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind.
Romans 12:1 and 2, be not conformed to this world, but be what? Transformed by the what? Renewing of your mind. And that’s part of what we’re doing here this morning as we focus on God’s word. So, the battle for the mind.
i. Focus your mind and thoughts on God’s truth
And Paul gives us two pleas. Here’s the first one in verse 8. Focus your mind and thoughts on God’s truth. He’s encouraging us here in Philippians 4:8, to focus your mind, focus your thoughts on God’s truths, on the scriptures.
8 Categories to focus your mind on
There’s eight categories to think on and we read them in the scripture reading. Paul says think about things that are true, that are noble, that means honest, things that are right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy. And there’s a lot of good books around.
But I want to suggest to you that here’s one book that all those words would describe what? The Bible. Think about things that are true. What did Jesus say in John 17:17? Sanctify them with your truth, with my truth.
My word is truth. You will know the truth and the truth will set you free. So, in this day and age of people are wondering like, is there such a thing as absolute truths? Yes, there is.
God is the God of truth. God cannot lie. Titus chapter 1 verse 2. Every word in this book is true.
Every promise will come to pass. God’s word is true. Think about things that are right.
Psalm 19:8. The precepts of the Lord, the laws of the Lord are right. And we could go on through all of these eight characteristics, but focus your mind on God’s truth. It was Jim Morrison who was the lead singer of the Doors that said whoever controls the media controls the mind.
Whoever controls the media controls the mind. And so, in our day and age, we need to be very, very careful because media, entertainment, social media, secular universities are all out what? To control our minds. And not only are our lives at stake, but the lives of our children and grandchildren are at stake.
There is a battle for their minds. And so, in this day and age, we have these things, don’t we? Smartphones. According to the latest data that I saw, young people spend an average of seven hours a day on screen time.
Computer, cellular phones, TV, et cetera. 87% of the time on social media is on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. Compare that with statistics that says 3% of all teens say they read their Bible every day.
So, we got seven hours a day spent on screens. And 3% of teens, young people that may spend a little bit of time on the bible, guess who’s going to win the battle for their minds? It’s what’s been bombarding them seven hours a day. And so, we need to be very, very careful about our thought, life, and what we need is a daily intake of God’s Word.
We need a daily intake of God’s Word. I graduated from Cedarville University back in, when did I graduate? 1977, a long time ago. Cedarville University is a great, great school located in southwestern Ohio.
My older brother and sister-in-law spent about 30 years working there. They just retired a year ago. I tell you; it is one of the most outstanding Christian schools, not just in the Midwest, but in the whole country.
They have about 6,000 students. I still like to kind of stay in touch with the school. And yesterday was their graduation.
And in this day and age, you can watch graduations over livestream. So, I just spent about 20 minutes watching the graduation. And here’s what Dr. White, who’s the president of the school, as he was giving his concluding remarks to about 800 graduates, here’s what he told them to do.
Number one, he says, I want you to read your Bible. I want you to be in Scripture every day. Read your Bible.
He said, number two, I want you to go and find a local church that teaches and preaches the Bible. And don’t just go and enjoy the preaching and the fellowship, but I want you to get involved in that church. And then he went on to list three or four more things.
It’s exactly what Paul is saying here in Philippians chapter 4, verse 8. We need a daily intake of God’s word. There are so many options available for us today. And we have a lot of these on the back table, our daily bread out of Grand Rapids.
And these are worldwide. I don’t know how many of these they print every quarter. But these are daily readings that you can pick up and read.
You can have it sent to your phone. I read this every morning, every day, the daily bread. Walk Through the Bible has a lot of options for devotions and getting into God’s word.
Keys for Kids. And if you have young kids, go to keysforkids.org. And there is a whole raft of resources that will help you just begin to plant God’s word into the lives of your children. Well, the first thought, the first plea is to focus your mind on God’s truth.
ii. find a mentor who will help you put god’s truth into practice
But Paul continues in verse 9. And here’s the second plea. And we’ll put it in these words. Find a mentor who will help you put God’s truth into practice.
Find a mentor, someone who may be a little further along in their Christian Walk than you are. Because it’s not important, it’s important to not only know God’s truth intellectually, but what do we need to do? We need to learn how to live it out. Put it into practice.
So, what does Paul say here? Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me or seen in me. So, here’s that powerful combination of lips and life. Paul said, I not only taught it to you, but I also, what, lived it out.
I modeled it for you and what you’ve heard from me and what you’ve seen from me, put it into practice. And so, are any of us going to do this perfectly? No. But there should be a consistency that our kids and our grandkids and others see between what we say we believe and how we live our lives.
And when there’s a disconnect for that, especially in home life and when kids see parents, you know, worshiping and praising God on Sunday and then live in a totally different way the rest of the week, it becomes a huge turnoff. And they say, well, that’s not Christianity that I want. And so, Paul says, find a mentor who will help you put God’s truth into practice.
And that’s James chapter 1, verse 22, that familiar verse where James writes, do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Don’t just be a hearer of the word and walk away from your Bible study or a sermon and say, well, wasn’t that nice? But no, we need to think about, Lord, what do I need to do? Is there a sin I need to repent of? Is there something I need to start doing that I’m not doing? And Paul says, what can help us with that is to have a mentor who can model God’s truth for us.
Dr. James Dobson, in his book, Parenting Isn’t for Cowards, made this statement, attach a boy to a good man and he seldom goes wrong. The influence of a mentor, of a role model in a child’s life and the same is true of a daughter to a mom or a female. I think I mentioned three or four weeks ago that I can look back and there’s four men in my life that played a significant role in who I am today.
Number one was my dad, pastored for 60 years. Second one was a fellow by name of Tom Ladd. He was a youth leader in our church growing up in Cleveland, Ohio.
And he had kids and teenagers and him and his wife poured their lives into the young people. And I was the benefit of that. There was a Bible teacher in our small Christian school that I attended by the name of David Graham, who was my soccer coach, my Bible teacher and greatly influenced my life.
And then a fourth man by the name of Louie Konopka, when I was married and got to seminary and Louie was a little bit older than I and became a mentor to me and greatly influenced my life simply by spending a lot of time with him. Diane and I were newly married. Louie and his wife had pastored a church in Ohio for four years.
They were back at Grand Rapids Seminary. They had two children and we spent a lot of time with them. And I watched him.
Watched how he treated his wife. Watched how he disciplined his kids. Played a lot of Dutch Blitz together.
You know what Dutch Blitz is? Western Michigan thing. Okay, we got Henry back there who knows what Dutch Blitz is. Oh, we got another one.
Yeah, it’s a great game. Oh, we got three. It’s a great game.
More so on the other side of the state, maybe. But he was a mentor. And this is what Paul’s plea is.
Find a mentor. What you have learned, received or heard from me or seen in me, put into practice. Now, a fellow by the name of Bobb Biehl has written a book titled Mentoring.
And he says, why is mentoring so important in our day today? And he gives a couple reasons. Number one, he says, because of mobility. Because we live in a culture where society and people move a lot.
And so, years ago, the whole family unit was all together. And maybe you were influenced by relatives and aunts and uncles. Today, that doesn’t happen as much, it’s very rare.
A lot of relatives are thousands of miles or hundreds of miles away. The average American family moves 11.7 times. I don’t know how you move .7, but about 12 times.
And so, because of mobility, there’s a widespread rootless feeling and disconnection. And so that’s where the church can help and become so very, very important. Secondly, he said, another important reason for mentoring is because of the concept of manhood and womanhood.
You know that there’s some confusion in our world today about gender. That there’s some people on more of the liberal side that can’t even define what a woman is. And so, what we need to do is we need to have role models, godly mentors, of what biblical manhood is and what biblical womanhood is.
And that comes from scripture. That comes from others that are going to live that out and what it means to be a man, what it means to be a woman. Proverbs chapter 31 has got some good verses there.
This is what Paul writes to Timothy. I want you to teach God’s truth to other men who will be able to teach others. In Titus chapter, I think one talks about older women mentoring younger women.
And so, find a mentor who will help you put God’s truth into practice. Well, here’s the promise now. Two pleas.
Focus your mind on God’s truth. Paul says, what you’ve heard from me, seen in me, in my life, I want you to put it into practice, to live it out. And now here’s the promise.
This is from the last part of verse nine. Paul concludes, and the God of peace will be with you. The God of peace will be with you.
He’s the prince of peace. He’s the God of peace. Jesus said in John, the upper room, my peace, I give you, I leave with you.
And so, God wants us to have peace. And he’s called the God of peace. Now this is an important promise, isn’t it? Because Paul, their mentor is what? 800 miles away.
He’s in Rome and he’s writing to believers who are in Philippi, 800 miles away. And so, mentors can come and go. Family relationships can come and go.
Relationships in general will come and go. But there’s one promise. There’s one relationship that will never ever leave us.
And it’s the God of peace. Hebrews chapter 13, verses five and six, I will never leave you or forsake you. And so, Paul encourages these Christians and says, I want you to hang on to this promise of the God of peace.
We’re never alone. God is faithful. He will always be with us.
Practical applications
Well, this morning as we conclude, let’s just think about some quick practical applications of Philippians 4:8-9, and then we’ll conclude. Here’s the first one. What do we need to do with this? Number one, here’s just another reminder.
1. guard your mind
The scripture says, guard your mind. That’s Proverbs chapter four. And I’m not sure I have the right verse on the screen there, but let me get to it.
Proverbs chapter four. Here’s what the author of Proverbs writes, beginning in verse 20, Proverbs four. My son, verse nine chapters of the book of Proverbs is a father talking to a son.
And so, he addresses his son. My son, pay attention to what I say. Turn your ear to my words.
Listen to me. Do not let them out of your sight. Keep them within your heart for they are life to those who find them and health to one’s whole body.
Verse 23, here’s the verse. Above all else. Priority number one, guard your heart.
But we can say, guard your mind. Why? The last part of the verse, for everything you do flows from it. Everything you do is going to flow from what your thought process in your mind.
And so, we need to protect our minds. We need to guard our minds. Someone has said, sow a thought, reap an action, sow an action, reap a habit, sow a habit, reap a character, sow a character, reap a destiny.
Everything we do will flow from our thought life and from our minds. And so, we need to be very careful in guarding that today. And that’s a challenge.
Challenge for parents, grandparents in this day and age of media. When I was growing up in Cleveland, Ohio, back in the 60s, I remember we got our first television set. I was in kindergarten.
And we lived in a city and we got this first television set. I was in kindergarten and we were fascinated with it. And the next day, my older brother wasn’t feeling good enough to go to school.
And to this day, I think he faked it. He wanted to watch the television. And I came back from school and you know what he told me? He says, I saw a horse on television.
Like what? You saw a horse? I mean, we lived in the city. Now we had three stations, Channel 3, NBC, Channel 5, ABC, Channel 8, CBS. That was it.
11 o’clock at night, they played the national anthem and the TV was off. We live in a whole different world. And it’s challenging.
2. maximize your intake of god’s word
Boy, do we need to be on guard, not only for our own minds, but to guard the minds of our kids and our grandkids. So be discerning, guard your mind. Number two, maximize your exposure and intake of God’s truth. So, maximize your intake of God’s truth.
So, what we want to do is we want to fill our minds with God’s truth. Over the years, I’ve had people ask me, what do you think about transcendental meditation? Well, I’m not sure. I’ve never really practiced it, but I did a little research into transcendental meditation, and it really has its roots in Hinduism, and it really teaches you to empty your mind.
Maybe focus on some sort of mantra that you repeat over and over. Well, I want to tell you the biblical mindset is God doesn’t want us to empty our minds. He wants us what? To fill our minds.
To fill our minds with God’s truth. And so, here’s the Navigator’s Hand illustration because it talks about five ways you can intake God’s truth in your life. Number one, you can hear God’s truth.
That’s what we’re doing this morning. Romans 10:17, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. You can read God’s word.
Revelation chapter one says, blessed is the person that reads the words of this book. You can study it. That’s Acts 17.
The Bereans were studying the scriptures every day, and Paul writes to Timothy and says, study to show yourself approved unto God. You can memorize it. Memorize scripture.
3. start early teaching your children god’s truth
You can meditate on scripture. And so, maximize your intake of God’s word. Thirdly, start early teaching and giving exposure of God’s truth to your children.
Start early in teaching and exposing God’s truth to your children. Now it’s never too late to start sharing God’s truth, but the best way, the best way to do it is what? To start young. Paul writes to Timothy, his last letter, 2nd Timothy chapter three.
Here’s what he’s writing to Timothy, who’s a pastor in Ephesus and Paul was his mentor. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of because you know those from whom you learned it. He had some mentors.
It was his grandmother and mother, Lois and Eunice and some others, Paul. And then verse 15, here it is. The King James uses the word child and NIV uses the word infant and how from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
The Greek word is brephos. It means from a baby you knew the scriptures. So somehow Timothy’s mom and Timothy’s grandmother, I don’t know how they did it, but from early on they started to pour God’s truth into the life of even a little baby.
Maybe that’s by reciting scripture. Maybe that’s by playing some worshipful songs when they’re young, but start early. That’s a good plug for cubbies, isn’t it? I think puddles is even before that, but I’m not sure I want to be in a class with young people that’s called puddles, but the main thing is start, start young, start early in teaching and training your children.
4. prayerfully seek out a mentoring relationship
Here’s the last one and then we’re done. Get involved in a mentoring relationship. Get involved in a mentoring relationship.
It doesn’t have to be a formal one-on-one meeting all the time, but just somebody that can encourage you or maybe just somebody that you’re watching their life and that you look up to and know that they’re living for Jesus and prayerfully seek out a mentoring relationship. Proverbs 13:20 says, walk with the wise and become wise. And so, the people that we hang with are very, very important because they influence us.
In fact, just the opposite is true in 1st Corinthians 15:33, where Paul writes these words, he says, bad company corrupts good character. And so prayerfully seek out a mentoring relationship. Well, there’s a battle for the mind, battle for your thought life.
And the encouragement this morning is to allot our minds and focus on God’s word and God’s truth and to build that into the lives of our kids and our grandkids. To find a mentoring relationship or to not just intellectually know God’s word, but someone that can help us live it out and put it into practice. And then remember the promise, no matter where you are, no matter what you’re experiencing, God is with us.
The God of peace. He’ll never leave you. He’ll never forsake you.