Our citizenship is in heaven

Right, so our verses today are two, and I was excited to see that these ended up in my tarp. I haven't taught here for three months, and it's interesting the way that the Lord has allowed these to be on my doorstep in terms of our topic today. The entire book of Philippians builds up to these two verses, and then we're going to transition into Philippians 4. The theme changes a little bit when we move into 4, but these two verses culminate, I think, what's been happening up until now. the importance of these two verses in culminating what we've read. I'd like to really read the entire third chapter because it really sets the stage for the importance of this book. And I'll go ahead and read this.

Finally, my brethren, verse one, rejoice in the Lord. For me to write the same things to you is not tedious, but for you it's safe. Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of mutilation, for we are the circumcision who worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh.

Though I also might have confidence in the flesh, if anyone else thinks he may have confidence in the flesh, I even more so. Circumcise the eighth day of the stock of Israel, the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews concerning the law, a Pharisee concerning zeal, persecuting the church, concerning the righteousness which is in the law, blameless, But what things were gained to me, these I have counted lost for Christ.

Yet indeed I also count all things lost for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith. that I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings being conformed unto his death. If by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead, not that I have already attained or am already perfected, but as I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. The one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Therefore, let us, as many as are mature, have this mind, and if anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this unto you. Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind. Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk as you have us for a pattern, for many walk of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose God is their belly, and whose glory is their shame, who set their mind on earthly things.

For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body, according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things unto himself. So, we've set the stage, and the verses before us today begin in verse 20, For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. So, best interpreted, for our citizenship in heavens. more than one? Scripture describes kind of three heavens. You know, there's like the third heaven, the stellar heaven, and the highest heaven with the Lord. So, I don't know. You know, some versions say heavenly places.

Anyway, I don't think we need to dissect this too carefully. I think the text is somewhere out of this earthly sphere and with the Lord. So, I think we just accept that for whatever it's worth. We don't need to micro-dissect that. In contrast, this is us by the way, our citizenship, in contrast to the verses that Jeremy covered last week. The enemies of the cross of Christ dot dot dot whose end is destruction. Now I think we have to be careful here. I heard some discussion listening to the tape last week. And so this is not annihilation but lost.

So you could apply this to unbelievers who Paul is grieving that are enemies of the cross, or you could say the works of those who are believers, who in fact is contrary to the cross. Ultimately, the works themselves will be annihilated. So I mean, I think you can go either way with this. And I think in context, Paul's writing to the church, isn't he?

So it would seem most consistent that he's talking about believers whose theology and philosophy of their citizenship has gone astray. But nevertheless, I don't think we need to dwell on this. He could be talking about unbelievers, but he's writing to the church. take it however you want, and I look at this in some detail, and the commentaries are in conflict here as to who this relates to. So we don't need to dwell on this. We're not about our citizenship, not the enemies of the cross, and I think everybody in this room would not consider themselves an enemy of the cross. So I think we have good company here. Let's move on.

So what's citizenship? What do you think about when you think of citizenship? Where your loyalties might be, or your your heart might be focused. I mean, I think here we have the Olympics going on. I think we're, you know, thinking about, and you hear those athletes and they're talking about, I'm doing this because I love my country. I'm so excited. You know, I think that's what it's talking about.

Well, you're talking about allegiances. You're really talking about solely kind of a legal term. It's being included in a form of government and the laws by which that government operates or is administered. So it's kind of a legal term. It's kind of an earthly term. But ultimately, it does relate in terms of earthly citizenship to the laws of the local government.

And when you're a citizen of Romania or a citizen of China or a citizen of the United States, in fact, that's earthly citizenship. But don't you think too, because Paul is writing this, When he says the word citizenship, people would understand what that meant in that context, because if you were a citizen of Rome, which you were, in Philippi, then you had special rights. put above other people who had citizenship of other places. And that would be, in context, the local interpretation of citizenship. But Paul is addressing a different type of citizenship. Well, sure, but he's using the term, I think, so people would understand. But this is very relevant to living in Philippi, which was some distance from Rome, right? But yet they were Roman citizens. So keep that in mind as we go forward.

And so, what are the laws of a heavenly government? So I guess the first question, what are the laws of an earthly government? Let's go back. Let's answer that question first. What are the laws of an earthly government? It depends on how it's established, I guess. I guess there are good laws and bad laws, and good governments and bad governments. But if you're a citizen of that nation, in fact, you follow the laws of that nation, right? How are these laws generated typically? By the administrators within the government.

Does that relate to the people? Does it relate to just the rulers? Does it relate to one or both? Well, in this case, in Rome, it was the Roman, what was it called? It wasn't a congress. The ruling body. Yeah, whatever the ruling body was in Rome, they did have a ruling body. But I think the final word in Rome still came down from Jesus. Well, let's be very temporal and colloquial. What's USA government laws based on? Constitution, I guess. Constitution. What's the Constitution based on?

Let's ask Barack Obama and Mitt Romney here. We're not going there. Theoretically this country was founded on the principles of God. God and his righteousness. The question is were the founding fathers really true believers or were these legalists that were using the Old Testament kind of word of God to establish the legal I think we could talk a lot about that, but we're not going to. Basically, they're man's laws, are they not? But they're established by God. God in Genesis said He set up governments for a reason.

That's because we're sinful. We need to have rules and laws and regulations to keep sin under control. So the laws are of man, even though they may be founded in godly principles, initially for this country for sure, ultimately they go astray because the Constitution has how many amendments, right? It wasn't perfect. God never intended it to be perfect. He tended it simply to be a watchdog over the evil nature to keep men in line. Now what are the laws of the heavenly government? stump the stars here today. They should reflect God's character, who God is, his very character. Okay, God's character.

Other thoughts? That's not necessarily a wrong answer, I'm just trying to... People are very quiet today. But are there really laws? I mean, we're talking about... We're talking about citizenship, and citizenship implies a set of legal principles, right? I think there's an answer to this question that's close. I'm sure you think so.

The law of heavenly government is grace. Period. We hear about the law of Christ. The law of Christ is scriptural. It's in the epistles and Paul writes to that. The law of Christ is in fact grace in its most extensive manner portraying the life of the believer under that law.

So anyway, I think different kinds of laws, different source of the laws, and ultimately citizenship relates to being underneath those laws. These are different. Law of Earth and Law of Heaven are different purposes, different laws, and altogether different administrations. So this statement that our citizenship is in heaven really takes us out of this earthly you know, set of laws, purposes, their source, and puts us under a whole different umbrella.

And I think this is critically important. We're going to build that story a little bit further. So what's pilgrimage? It's not in the text. But, you know, if in fact we're citizenship. Pilgrimage relates to our citizenship. If our citizenship is in heaven, then we must describe ourselves somewhat differently than in fact we're living on this earthly environment, right? So what's being a pilgrim? Well, one who comes from a foreign country into a city or land and resides there by the side of the natives.

That's a Webster definition, by the way. This is not a Thayer's lexicon definition. This is a Webster definition. I kind of liked it, actually. We're living among the natives. Now, natives are not, you know, the Native Americans, or they're not native aborigines, right? We're talking about the natives of this earthly sphere. Okay? All right. Well, Bob, it's really cool. If you think about the totality, I'm sure you're going to get there.

We've been born again. We are, I mean, very well, you know, it all hangs together as it should. I mean, we've been born again, we're a new creation in Christ, so we are foreign to this life. Even though we had a birth here, we have another birth that is a heavenly birth.

So it's just wonderful. Yeah, Sharon, my late wife, had a sign on the refrigerator that said, Heaven is my home, Earth is just my business address. And in a sense, that puts it into perspective. And I'll never forget that. So we're sojourners in kind of a strange place. We're foreigners here. I mean, that sounds really weird, doesn't it, because we go to bed each night, we wake up the next day, we all have tasks and jobs and responsibilities, and all the invoices we have to look at and pay. But we're still foreigners, and that's a good perspective to have, because it really takes us through the tough times.

And I think it's more than just a pillow for a soft head, it's biblical truth. So in the New Testament metaphor in reference to heaven as the native country, We're ones who sojourn here on the earth because this is really not our eternity. Remember Ephesians, you know, we bless with the heavenly blessings from the beginning of time, you know, on to eternity. So this eternity has no time limit. And God sees us in that eternity, not in simply our period of sojourning here on earthly turf.

How did Paul bring us to this point? It's one reason we read the chapter. What are your thoughts? And I look at, again, these last couple of verses, really a culmination of the first three chapters. We could have read the first two prior to this. Well, in the middle part, he said, I haven't arrived. I mean, it's like I haven't gotten to this state. I'm in process. I'm sojourning. I'm seeking. I'm pressing on. But I am not there yet. He's in progress, right? Absolutely. It would be as you're traveling or you're sojourning.

So I wanted to turn back to a couple of verses here. What verses stand out to you in this section of Philippians that really point to this? I believe in the first part of the chapter where he talks about his background and he says, this is who I was, but this is not what's important now.

I counted all these things as lost. So he's contrasting it. not who he is anymore. All right. What else? In fact, the minute it gets down to eight, let's just kind of continue on, it gets down to eight and he says it's counted all loss. All that earthly stuff I aimed at is nothing. As you go down through 9 and 10, that I may know him, etc., by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I've already attained or I'm already perfected, but I press on and I may lay hold. This concept is really founded on citizenship. He's not working to achieve this. He's growing in the faith that the citizenship may be more profoundly influencing his day-to-day walk. Could you maybe say that citizenship, the onus is in the administration, right? So if you are under the citizenship, regardless of who you are, the rights are the same for all there, right? Right. Remember, what's the law of heavenly places? Grace. And grace, there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.

So it's been superseded, would you say? Yeah, I think so. And we all try to achieve this. And I think achievement isn't through works. Achievement is by faith, ultimately being built up in the citizenship and who we are. And I think it's critically important in the way we view the trials and tribulations come our way. Gail, you look poised to say something. No. Okay, so Paul got us to this point gradually and slowly and has built up a foundation of really where our citizenship is and really how we're to experience it on a day-to-day basis.

Can we find more comfort? As to who we are and where our home is in any other phrase in scripture, I mean, we can pick out a great verse. I mean, the Bible is just enriched with uplifting and encouraging verses. But to know that our citizenship is in heaven, isn't that a tremendous rest and truth? And let's look at a couple of verses that kind of reflect this looking to our citizenship. Hebrews 11, of course, is a great faith chapter. So whoever gets Hebrews 11, 9, and 10, which deals with Abraham, and then 13 through 16 is maybe worthy of also reading here this morning.

By faith he sojourned in the land of Thomas, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same Thomas. For he looked for a city that had foundations, whose builder and maker is God. These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country. And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had the opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he hath prepared for them a city.

Okay, so in part I think the examples there relate to, keep in mind, I mean Israel was not defined at this point in time. I mean that's Moses, right? And subsequently this is Abraham. And what was the principle of which they looked at this land that was unknown, that was futuristic? It was faith, wasn't it? So the relationship here is the same way Abraham and the many, if you will, accomplishers of the faith principle, in fact, looked for that land that was future, that was promised. And in a sense, With our citizenship already being declared, keep in mind that we're sojourners among the natives. Not pejorative natives, but the natives of this earthly spirit.

So, based on this position of citizenship, we eagerly await the Savior and the Lord Jesus Christ. This is from which are whence, and this is the preposition ek, which means out of. So I think the interesting thing here, remember prepositions in the Bible are often so very important in terms of how we interpret the verse. I think this looking for the Savior is sourced out of our citizenship. And let's look at that in a little bit more detail.

How does this influence how we wait? How does our citizenship influence our expectations of the prophecies that are forthcoming for us individually? Well, it's that confidence and hope. And it's not a hope for hope, it's a confidence of hope. And we wouldn't have that, we wouldn't even be looking for it if that wasn't our citizenship. I mean, because the world is not eagerly awaiting the Savior.

No, that's right. Well, you know, but they may be, right? I mean, there are plenty of people in the world who are not saved or looking for better days tomorrow, are they not? Sure. Heaven's a good place and everybody goes there. Everybody's there, right? And it's all kind of a very plastic kind of, you know. Donna?

Well, I was thinking too of completion, you know, having everything, come together, have Christ, and be fulfilled. It's kind of like a puzzle that has all the pieces there. You know it's able to be completed. You're just kind of putting piece in by piece as we live by faith. And ultimately, the puzzle, once complete, is once we're with the Lord, totally. I mean, we know that it's all there. It's just a matter of working through it over time, not by works, but by faith, that actually the pieces are there, just now seeing it fulfilled.

Poor analogy, but at least perhaps a touch of what this might mean. Alternative sources. Why are they so flawed or fall so short? We alluded to that a minute ago, Roger, what you were saying. The world system you're saying? Yeah. I mean, how can we have a flawed view of the fact that we're based on our citizenship looking for the Savior, or at least something that's not scriptural? What might be another view of this, you know, after our earthly existence, death, we're with the Lord? Well, let's say there's reincarnation. Well, no, for the believer, clearly not. Oh, you're talking about for believers? Well, it could be either one, but that could be for unbelievers, for sure. What about the believer? What do you hear so often about going to home to be with the Lord?

Yeah, well, it's like I'm going to, you know, I'm going to journey to that place where we're already there. And the thing is, they leave out the critical part. We're already seated with him. We're already citizens. They leave out that he's already accomplished it. So that's all forgotten. And they just say, well, I'm going to go to a better place, or so-and-so's at a better place now. All right. To some extent, that would be falling short by faith of what the promises are.

What might be another rationale for wanting to go home to be with the Lord? I think that's where I'm going with this. I have all these trials and tribulations and all these burdensome distractions and all of that. I want to get out of here. I can't wait for the Lord to come back and get me out of all my circumstances. Wrong, flawed, not really truth-based.

Okay. Eagerly await. That's assiduously and patiently waiting for it. This is something that we just, oh, by the way, I can't wait till the Lord comes back. This is a casual thought. I mean, this is really an intent feeling. And I don't know that we really need to look at all of these verses, but these verses all point, the Romans passage, the first Corinthians passage, Hebrews 9, 23 to 28, all look at the expected circumstances that will relate to our eternal presence and the Lord returning. So we all wait for the Lord to come back and this is something that we need to be constantly thinking of for the right reasons. And look for whom we await. I thought this was interesting.

Savior, this is one of 24 such New Testament references. 748 times the Lord is used. 970 times Jesus is used. and 569 times Christ. Our foundation is pretty certain as to where our faith is and to whom it is sourced and exists. It's amazing how often these terms are used in relationship to the Lord Jesus Christ and the beautiful nature of who He is.

His return and our certainty with Him, what a position of great, and our eternity with Him, what a position of great certainty, rest, and expectation. I mean, this is backbone stuff and missed, I think, by so much of the church. They may know the term citizenship, but being able to relate to it daily and intellectually and emotionally and by faith to really give us the kind of reality test that we need is so very important. Other thoughts here? So here, and I just selected a large number of verses or commentaries, etc., that relate to this eternity with Him. And that's there for your, you know, perusal later if you want to just look at all these verses in terms of our eternity with the Lord, all New Testament based. And when the trials down here seem too large, too burdensome, and so distracting, we need to rest in that citizenship.

It doesn't take away the circumstances, it puts them into reality as us being sojourners and foreigners in somebody else's native land. And, you know, verses that take me there, this one among many, for a light affliction is but for a moment which worketh for us a far more eternal and exceeding way to glory. For we look not at the things that are seen, but the things that are not seen. For the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal.

And there's our citizenship. You know, that just is such an important part of our pulse is our citizenship. And when we lose track inside of our citizenship, we can easily get distracted and dismayed by expectations of things from this earthly existence. And I say that kind of glibly, because we all suffer from this, at least I do frequently, getting distracted by earthly things.

But boy, what a great truth. And I think it's not like kind of plugging in a light and turning it on. The light's already plugged in, but this is not kind of, oh, I'm going to think about my citizenship All of a sudden these things melt away. They don't.

But this ongoing sense of our citizenship becomes part of our life. And when that exists, ultimately these distractions, these trials, at least are put into perspective. It doesn't make them less. It just makes them be put into perspective and allows us to be encouraged and lifted up despite them. Thoughts? Okay, good.

Verse 21, who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to his glorious body according to the working by which he is able even to subdue all things to himself. How do you visualize this transformation and confirmation process? When you think about your lowly body being conformed to his glorious body, what do you think about? What thoughts enter your brain? We get to trade in this body from the earth to a heavenly body. Can you distinguish transform and conform? I tried to. Here's Transform is to change in composition or structure or even appearance. Let's look at 2 Corinthians chapter 11 verses 13-15.

And whoever gets that, someone other than Margaret can read that please. And she's frowning at me. For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore, it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works. Okay, so what's this transformation process related to there, Donna, in that text?

I'm thinking more of an outward, something you can see. Right, so it's appearance. It's based on structure or composition, but it's really the outward appearance that's a transformation. So keep that in mind as we're thinking about our lowly bodies, being transformed in outward appearance. All right? All right. And then conform, these are the Greek terms, is to have the same image and to display the same character. So although the first part of conform seems to relate somewhat to transform, this is taking on the character of this.

So in a sense, the appearance of us in our lowly bodies being transformed will ultimately be not only the image of the Lord Jesus Christ in our spiritual bodies, but in fact will also be inhabiting his character. So it's kind of neat to think about that.

It's just not only our physical bodies, despite their incompetency and their inadequacies, but in fact our bodies will be conformed also to His glorious body. In context, our vile body of humiliation, subject to infirmities, disease, and death, will be changed into His glorious body, one that the Lord Jesus Christ assumed on His ascension and now has in His glorified state, and this is both in appearance and character. So we don't know what this body looks like, but we know he assumed a body on ascension that was described minimally. We don't have the physical appearance. But his glorified state will be our glorified state, but not only that, we'll have his nature. So this is both transformation, change in appearance, and also confirmation to his heavenly image.

Neat. Now we can't describe this, we can't draw a picture of this, but God didn't intend this to. And keep in mind, we have no physical description of what Christ looked like, but we have all these paintings and pictures and all these conceptualizations. But I think God was purposeful. We're not looking at the physical man. We're looking at, in our citizenship, the glorified man, the God-man, the Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Corinthians 15, 44. It is sown a natural body, and it's raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and then there's a spiritual body. This is night and day. Different appearance. Temporal versus eternal. Different character. Earthly, sinful, transformed into a heavenly creature eternally. Neat. Now, both Job and Daniel had this kind of perception of something was going to happen down the road. I thought this was kind of fun.

In Job 19, 26-27, it says, and though After my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another, though my veins be consumed within me." Neat. When the skin worms are done with me, I'm still going to see the Lord. I'm not sure I've ever seen that verse before in Job, but I enjoyed that verse.

Men and Daniel, a little less distinct, and they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they shall turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever. for the righteous or the wise in terms of eternal places. a land that was not yet given, and that land went far beyond simply the geographic land that God had given him. And by faith, he believed that ultimately, you know, the sand on the sea would represent the benefit of his faith and acted out over many, many centuries to follow. We get three glimpses of this glory in Scripture, and we can discuss this further if you'd like.

The first is Moses' face. Let's look at Exodus 24, 29, and 30. Anybody? Margaret, go ahead, you got it. And it came to pass when Moses came down from Mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses' hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses was not, I'm sorry, that Moses was not that the skin of his face, oh I see, I'm making Jamesoys. It was not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him. And when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come nigh him. Okay, so there's a glimpse of God's glory reflected in the face of Moses.

Let's look at Matthew 17, 1 and 2. This is the transfiguration. And after six days, Jesus took with them Peter and James and John, his brother, and led them up a high mountain apart. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his garments became white as white. And they were blinded, were they not?

OK, in the final example, this is just a selected example. We're talking about Stephens. Really, countenance at the time of this is, if you will, martyrdom is not the right term here. Let's do a look at this passage because I think it is revealing. Acts 7, 54 through 60. And again, what these are are simply glimpses of the glory of the Lord that God gives us in Scripture.

But now when they heard this, they were cut to the quick, and began gnashing their teeth at him. But being full of the Holy Spirit, they gazed intently into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God, and said, Behold, I see the heavens opened up, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God. But they cried out with a loud And when they had driven him out of the city, they began stoning him. And the witnesses laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul. And they went on stoning Stephen. And he called upon the Lord and said, Lord, Jesus, receive my spirit. And falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, Lord, do not hold this sin against them. And having said this, he fell asleep.

Yeah, so you get the idea of something very special occurring there, and ultimately, again, it's just a glimpse of his glory portrayed in the human experience, but at least maybe worth noting. And this is according to the working by which he is able. That's in verse 21. Now here, working is really a term that goes beyond just working. We think of working and, you know, putting an effort towards something and seeing the results.

In the New Testament, this is only used, this Greek term is only used as supernatural power. And that power can be of Satan and or the Lord. So remember, Satan's got supernatural powers too. So we can't dismiss that. So I have a couple of verses here, 2 Thessalonians 2.19. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan with all power, signs, and living wonders, or lying wonders. So same term, supernatural. working out or energies by which the lawless one or the Antichrist will come.

Ephesians 1.19, and what is the exceeding greatness of his power towards us who believe according to the working of his mighty power. This is God's work in us based on the truth of the cross and all that has followed subsequent to that.

And Colossians 2.12, buried with him in baptism in which you also were raised with him through faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead. So this kind of supernatural power that's changing us as the citizenship is portrayed in our lives, really it's the same kind of supernatural power. This isn't something we work at, it's by faith that we in fact receive this. So this is really an outward energy of the Lord that not only looks at our glorious body one day, but also is really the same kind of power that's enacting our day-to-day existence. Even to subdue all things to himself. Subdue, the Greek term, to arrange under, subordinate, put in subjection, submit to one's control, yield to one's admonition or advice, or obey. Strong term. And remember, even to subdue all things to himself.

This is the Lord Jesus Christ. And my question here is, who's in control here anyway? I mean, you know, sometimes I think God's ultimate control of this universe seems to fall short of my intellectual acceptance, particularly when we think about 10 days ago over in Aurora, right? I mean, to think, and by the way, I'm going to add a rabbit trail in a second. I mean, I read that apparently this guy had been seen by one of our psychiatrists on our faculty. I wouldn't want to be in her shoes right now particularly, but you know we live under these HIPAA guidelines today and there's all kind of this confidentiality and stuff, but by law she's supposed to let the law enforcement agency know if there's some evidence that he may be wanting to do harm.

Anyway, all that aside. But who's in control here anyway? I mean, the Lord's about his business. This is a sinful planet we live on, and I guess we can't have any expectations here, right? Any thoughts about that whole thing? Okay. All right, so 1 Corinthians 15, 26, and 27.

The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, for he hath put all things under his feet. But when he says all things are put under his feet, it is manifest that he is accepted, which did put all things underneath him. So the Lord even knows the last enemy is ultimately in his timetable in times eternal. And so again, who's in control here? I mean, it says here that the Lord himself, through the Lord Jesus Christ enacting this, will subdue all things to himself.

And I think we've got a few more days till this all occurs. But anyway. We need to rest in our citizenship that God's in control here and he's asking us to respond by faith, to believe him, that based on who he is and what he's accomplished already, that ultimately things will all be tucked in. So I think kind of the take-home message here is rest, trust, and live in your citizenship. It's really who we are. It's a different kingdom. And we're, again, I think the best way to think about it is we're really foreigners here. This is not our home.

And I think, again, that gives us an opportunity to really be encouraged and uplifted even during difficult times. And again, it's really something that I think we need to think of more often and accept by God's Word. So Paul, through the first three chapters of Philippians, has taken us kind of down the path of of what's preceded historically, looking at himself from an earthly perspective as a native of this planet, ultimately doing everything right. And then he counts that all but done, that he may ultimately bring God's glory by his active faith and knowledge of his citizenship, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death.

You know, we're stopping short, which is something I didn't expect. But we've got a small class. It's very quiet this morning. So thoughts, thoughts. Anybody have anything to share here? Well, it kind of reminds us not to hold on too tightly. We're not. This is not a permanent home. If you're traveling on a trip, a vacation or whatever. you don't cling to the motel too closely. I want to go home at the end of this trip. Well, at the end of our time here, we'll go home.

Is this something everybody here claims and senses is important in terms of their Christian walk? I really think that this is so critically important. And I think it's so sad that so many Christians don't have a clue about citizenship, because if they did, they would not be so anxious all the time, so disillusioned and despondent. Because if they just had a glimpse of what their citizenship is, it's just so sad.

You know, it's kind of this, not to overly simplify this, but it's responding to circumstances versus being reactionary in terms of when these things come across our path. Reactionary is ultimately flesh-driven, is it not? I mean, it's kind of defending the self-turf and really thinking about woe is me and somebody else is wrong and this can't be anything that I'm responsible for. Responding puts things into perspective in terms of citizenship, seeing that God's allowing these distractions and trials to enter into our life, that we might in fact be formed increasingly in our citizenship, and allowing that to be a modus operandi.

In that way, we're encouraged and lifted up because that's where he has us, in heavenly places, and that's where the principle of the law of grace exists. It sounds like an oxymoron, doesn't it, the law of grace, but in fact that is the law of heavenly places, is grace.

All right. Are we done? Roger, why don't you close us in for our place? Dear Father, we thank you for our time today, Lord. We thank you for the wonderful truth that we are seated with you in heavenly places and we can look upon our life as just your plan and purpose as Father. We can trust you. We thank you for our time. In Christ's name, Amen. Amen. Thank you.