2022.02.13 - The Gospel Is On The Move

Text: Philippians 1:12-18a Opening Statement: It is easy to say that advancing the Gospel is the most important thing but, how does your life back that up? When you examine your own life, do you look like someone who truly believes that advancing the gospel is the most important thing in the world? Where do you invest your time? Where do you invest your energy? Where do you invest your finances? That’s what makes this an especially challenging passage. I) The Gospel Advances in Spite of Difficult Circumstances and People (1:12–18) So, let us begin by first looking at Paul’s circumstances: A) Advancing the gospel was more important than freedom (12-14) You would think prison would slow things down, but Paul has a gospel perspective, and he shares with us two ways that prison has really served to advance the gospel. 1) Paul gets to share the gospel with the whole palace guard (13) Paul speaks of his chains in this verse, and that’s because he was literally chained to a Roman guard during the whole time of his imprisonment. Do you know what that meant? Paul had a captive audience! Paul didn’t think, “Rats, I’m chained to a Roman Guard.” He thought, “All right! The Roman Guard is chained to me!” Paul’s imprisonment allowed him to share the gospel with the whole palace guard. 2) Paul encouraged others to share the gospel more boldly (14) You would think that Paul being locked up would have created a greater fear of sharing the gospel for the other believers in Rome. Instead, it had just the opposite effect. They were encouraged to speak the Word of God more courageously and fearlessly. Paul’s imprisonment had a ripple effect on his fellow believers in Rome. Paul was sharing the gospel in prison, and the church was sharing the gospel outside of prison. B) Advancing the gospel was more important than comfort (15-18) 1) Some shared Christ out of wrong motives (15) Not everyone shared Christ from pure motives. Some actually preached Christ out of envy and rivalry. They were teaching the true gospel, they were p