What if your success is garbage?

Introduction

Thanks, Micah. For the youth guys, we’ve got a little sheet there. Is that at the back, Miles? Yep. If you want to run back there and grab a sheet, Miles will hand you a writing implement and one of those. We’ve been reading through and following through in Philippians. This passage here gives us one of those great verses that’s really excellent to use out of context. That’s the one that says, “Let all who spiritually mature agree on these things. And if you disagree at some point, I believe God will make it plain to you.” If you’re ever trying to make a solid argument, you just say, “If you disagree with me, I believe God will make it plain to you.”

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the show Shark Tank. It’s been around for 16 seasons now. It’s been around a little while. It’s not about aquatic life, although that could be maybe more entertaining than the show about a panel of business people and people pitch their ideas to those business men and women. They are the sharks, and you’re thrown into the shark tank to pitch your ideas and see how they go. Part of the entertainment of the show is some of the ideas really stink, right? That’s part of the entertainment of watching it and watching the sharks devour them.

You get things like ideas like this one. This is the skinny mirror. It’s a mirror that makes you look skinny. She says, “Amazingly, shops that put the skinny mirror in their shops sell 17% more products.” Particularly, she said, “Women’s clothing sells 17% better if people look at themselves in the skinny mirror.” To which the sharks say, “Of course they do. That doesn’t mean you should use it.” And they tell her, “Your idea stinks. This is not something people should be doing and putting in clothing shops just because it makes people feel good about themselves.” That shouldn’t be one of our tactics to try to get people to buy products. And so they say, “Your idea stinks.”

But some ideas literally stink. This one is the no fly cone. It uses a sticky surface like a lot of fly traps, but the bait is your dog’s poo. So, you use your own dog’s poo as the bait to attract the flies. So, rather than cleaning up the poo, just leave it there. Stick this cone over it, the nofly cone, and your fly problems are gone. Well, not totally gone. They’re there. They’re just in that now breeding trap of space right there. That is an idea that stinks quite literally. Or this next one, this is the man candle. Jason Bailey solved the problem of when you’re having your mates over and your house doesn’t smell great. You want it to smell nice, but all you reach for the candles and it’s lavender and vanilla and all the girly smells. So he said, “Problem solved. I will make the masculine smells.” And so the man candle comes in the smell of football, comes in the smell of basketball, or the true American comes in the smell of freedom. I’m not quite sure what freedom smells like, but he does. And you can buy it and light that candle and your house will now smell like a man. It’s clearly what you’re after, right? Amazingly, his bestselling candle is the fart candle. He wanted to call it the mother-in-law begone. It is an idea that truly stinks, and the sharks decided so too and weren’t keen.

As we look at this passage in Philippians, Paul tries to say that like these guys that present on Shark Tank, we often have this idea of what we think is fantastic and we’ve invested our life into it. This guy that made the man candle, he spent $40,000 of his own money, him and his wife investing into building these candles. These people have invested everything, and you can see the heartbreak in their eyes as the sharks start telling them this is not a great idea, we don’t want to invest in it, and you can see they are sold on their idea, they’ve been putting everything into this, they’ve come out, put themselves out there to invite others to be part of it. Paul says a similar thing with our lives. He says often there’s things we do that we have invested everything into and we’re totally sold called this is the thing. Paul says actually the thing often that we think we’re invested in, Paul says that often stinks. He shark tanks himself in this passage. We started at verse 8, and we skipped over the first bit that was mostly so that Micah didn’t have to say the word circumcision four times in the chapter, so you can thank Miles for that. That’s youth ministry done right.

Paul’s Credentials

Reasons to Boast

What Paul says is he says I have the reason to boast. I have all the credentials. One of them say he says I personally in my life all the ceremonies that a Jewish man goes through including circumcision. He says in my life was done to perfection on the eighth day just like the law says. I went through that ceremony. I’ve done it. That’s in a Jewish perspective. That’s a reason he can boast. He says, “I’m a pureblooded Israelite.” In fact, not just a pure-blooded Israelite. He says, “I’m from the tribe of Benjamin.” He says, “I dedicated my life as a Pharisee.” In all the spectrum of religious leaders of the day, the Pharisees were known to be one of the strictest religious leaders. So Paul is saying I have committed my life to that kind of strict religious expectations. He said in my life I have obeyed the law very carefully. If anyone has a reason to boast, if anyone has the report card to put in front of everyone and say look at what I’ve done, Paul says that’s me. I had that.

Counting it All as Garbage

But he says all that, like these people presenting in front of Shark Tank, all that stinks. It doesn’t mount to anything. Paul says, in fact, this is his exact words. This is verse 7, sorry, verse 8. He says, “For the sake of Jesus, I discarded everything else.” He says, “Counting it all as garbage.” The CEB Bible says I think of it as sewer trash is the words, or the NE Bible says I regard them as dung, or the children’s Bible says big stinky pile of poo. It doesn’t but it should. The Greek Bible, the word that Paul actually wrote says scubalon is the word. It’s the close closest word to a swear word in the Bible. You know, when you’re learning a language and your friend teaches you a couple of words, scubalon is the first one the Bible would teach you. If you’re looking for the naughtiest words, it’s all kind of this garbage that also means poo. It means dung. It means something that smells.

One of the ways we understand how words are used in ancient times because language changes over time is we look at the way other people have used that word. Scubalon’s one of those words. We can look at other ways that the Bible has that people have used it, not just the Bible. For example, this is Artus. He’s a medical doctor, Artus. He lived just shortly after Jesus. He’s considered in history one of like the second most prominent Greek medical doctor that has written down his observations about medicine. So this is a 2,000 old year old document that describes sickness. Okay, this is what he says. He says in some cases these sick people they pass just a watery discharge. Yep, you get the picture, right? That’s the I was climbing up a ladder. I heard a sudden splatter diarrhea. That’s that one. He says I hear just a watery discharge. When the boughels are moved, I’m getting to a point. Just hold on there. There is nothing but crude watery scubalon. He says it’s history. Yeah, it’s good. You want me to continue? The fluid is very thin and dirty gray and has a bad odor. That’s history. That’s right. That’s what Artaus says is scubalon. Paul says everything, all this religious stuff he’s done, all the things that he counted as credentials, he says it is scubalon.

Last night when I was preparing my sermon, Jet came in and said, “What are you working on?” And I said, “I’m researching ancient ancient pooh.” And he did not believe me. And I could not convince him. No, I’m reading a document about 2,000-year-old pooh. And I couldn’t convince him. Diarrhea specifically. Yep. Why does Paul say these good things, these things that we work at a scubble on? He says it’s all about comparison. It’s all about comparing them to what it is, the goodness of God. He says, “Yes, everything else is worthless.” This is verse 8. Everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Jesus, my Lord. This is the truth that Paul wants us to hear. Jesus is of infinite value. The creator who loved you so much that he came to get you, that he gives his spirit to live in you. That is of infinite worth. And because that is of infinite worth, anything that doesn’t lead you to that, anything that doesn’t build that up, he says by comparison, it is scubalon. That’s a beautiful truth for us that Jesus is of infinite worth.

The Hard Truth

We Love the Garbage

The hard truth is often we love the garbage. The hard truth is we keep running back to the garbage heap that even in those moments where we can truly grasp the goodness of God and feel that in ourselves, we still know that there’s those moments where we’re going to look to other things, the things that are garbage by comparison, and we will run to them. I want to say that to you guys, the NextGen crew, as you think about your life and the decisions you’ll make in your life, the reality is even those moments when you truly are in love with Jesus, there are other things that will just turn your eyes from him. Moments like when we find a romantic relationship, a romantic partner that doesn’t point us to Jesus, doesn’t build up our faith. There’s moments like that that we would say, I mean, I just want that and I just want to be with that person. And even though things that point us to Jesus are infinitely more valuable, we will still often run to those other things.

The same thing is true when we think about the things that we consume on television, on movies, on social media, on the internet. No matter how great we feel the value of Jesus, the infinite worth, we will still run back to the garbage heap and find other things that we say, “Yeah, but I just like this and I like watching this and I like consuming these things.” The same thing is true as we think about our career and the things we invest in and the friendships that we invest in. The same thing’s true when we think about retirement and how we spend our time. There is this constant draw to us to take our eyes off Jesus and run back to the garbage heap. And Paul wants to say it stinks. It’s not good for you. And Jesus is so much better. Run back to Jesus.

It’s Not About Your Success

In fact, one of the most amazing things about Paul’s own when he shark tanks himself, one of the most amazing things about that is his example of things. His example of things, his report card he gives isn’t that he ran off to worldly pleasure. Paul’s story isn’t that story of saying, “Oh, when I was a kid, I was into drugs and I was doing all these terrible things and then God saved me from all that.” He says, “When I was a kid, I was doing all the religious things and I was pursuing all the what seemed like godly things.” And he says, “God saved me from that.” Isn’t that crazier what he says? Because for Paul, he’s saying the opposite to pursuing selfishness, the opposite to trying to please yourself, working to please yourself. The opposite of that is not working to please God. That’s not the opposite of working to please yourself. Or the opposite of trying to earn people’s favor. The opposite of that is not trying to earn God’s favor. Because all those scenarios are still focused on your own success. You hear that? Even trying to work for someone else’s favor and trying to work for God’s favor are actually much more closely related than we think because both of those categories are trying to it’s all about our own success. How successful can I be in gaining other people’s favor? And how successful can I be in gaining God’s favor? Paul says, “It’s not about your success. It’s not about what you’ve done. It’s about what Jesus has done.”

What this means is as we think about nextgen in our own church, it’s a classic example saying just growing up in the church is not the thing that will make you right with God. It’s faith in Jesus. This is what Paul says in verse 9. For God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith. It depends on trusting in him. That’s what Paul says. And so he calls us to put our faith in him. And he wants to say that’s not to say that’s just the easy way out. It’s not now you don’t have to do all the work because it’s just trusting in God’s work. He actually says by very nature because you put your trust in Jesus that will make you want to pursue him. Stop running back to the garbage heap and keep running to him.

Invest in Jesus

If You Invest in Garbage, Your Life Will Stink

He tells us if you invest in garbage your life will stink. Few years ago, I saw another story, one of those TV shows on hoarders, right? This lady was hoarding. In particular, the thing she was hoarding was she kept every magazine or newspaper she ever received. And her house was just full of these newspapers. Now, she also happened to be a lady that likes cats. I mean, she was the classic kind of true what we would class as the cat lady. Many cats and a house full of junk was her story. As they cleaned up these piles, like I mean piles of newspapers in her house. As they cleaned them up, at one point they found a cat that had fallen underneath a pile of newspapers some years ago. And the weight of the paper over time, the cat’s body, obviously not alive anymore, had got quite pressed. And so found kind of a pressed cat. You can This was probably the most eye openening moment to this woman who was really had a a medical issue with a mental issue with letting go of these piles of stuff. When she saw that the cats that she loved, she she thought this cat had just strayed had just left the house, but actually it was lying under this pile all those years. Over the course of cleaning up the house, they found something like three or four cats that had died that way.

Now, it tells you something about that house. If a cat can be decaying in your lounge room and you don’t notice, Paul says, “If you invest in garbage, your life will stink.” And so he says, “Turn your eyes to Jesus.” This is his words. I focus on one thing, forgetting the past and looking forward on what lies ahead. Paul says the opposite to investing in garbage is pointing our eyes to Jesus. If you invest in garbage, your life will stink. He says if you eat garbage, your breath will stink. I don’t know if you saw that in there, but it is in there.

Don’t Hunger After Garbage

One of the other ways that the word scubalon is used in history is Josephus. Josephus was a Jewish historian. He’s notable because he mentions Jesus but he wasn’t a Christian. And so in history he’s written he’s lived just shortly after Jesus’ time written the history around Jerusalem. And so Jesus is mentioned in Josephus. Another big part that Josephus mentions in the history of Jerusalem is the siege of Jerusalem, which is the war that happens in Jerusalem where Rome comes in and just wipes out Jerusalem. It’s a terrible situation. Happens in 70 AD. And this is what Josephus writes that they they surround Jerusalem. They lock all the people in and they starve them out. It’s a classic kind of war strategy. Don’t let any food into the city. Eventually, they’ll run out of food. So that’s what happens in the siege siege of Jerusalem. And so this is what Josephus writes. He says they were reduced that’s the people in Jerusalem. They were reduced to such desperation that they would gather up the old scubalon of the sewers and the dung of the cattle and they would eat it as if it was a delicacy is Josephus’s words. You can see the kind of desperation that things come to. If you eat garbage, your breath will stink. Paul says don’t hunger after garbage.

Says in verse 19, the enemies of the cross of Christ, he says their god is their appetite. They hunger after garbage is what he says. And they think only about this life here on earth. It’s quite interesting. Paul calls these people the enemies of the cross of Christ. But they’re not enemies, we’re told, because they’re fighting against the church. They’re enemies against the cross of Christ because they are pursuing this life and not the eternal life. These people Paul are describing are actually from what we can tell people within the church community there. People who were calling themselves Christians but actually were not living for Jesus at all but living for their own way. He says that is such a such a terrible thing. Their appetite for garbage actually makes them not just kind of living alongside Christians but actually enemies of Christ because of the way it undermines the good news about Jesus. So instead, Paul says, “Don’t hunger after garbage. Live for eternity.” Verse 20, “We are citizens of heaven where the Lord Jesus Christ lives.” This is the challenge to us to hunger after Jesus, to keep our eyes on Jesus. And to do that, we need to let go of the other things that distract us and draw us away and invest in the kingdom.

Let me finish with a parable that Jesus tells. You may remember it. The parable of the treasure. Jesus says, “The kingdom of God is like a treasure in a field. Man finds that treasure.” And what Jesus says he would do if he found a treasure in the field, he sells everything he has so that he can buy the field so that he has ownership of that treasure. Why would someone do that? Why would someone sell everything they have to buy the field? Only because they know that that treasure in that field is worth more than everything they have. It’s not that they’re throwing everything away. It’s that they’re investing everything into the thing that is of value. Jesus says that’s what the treasure that’s what the kingdom of God is like. It is worth all that. It is worth more than everything else. And so for the man with the treasure in the field, he sells everything to get that. Jesus is saying the same thing about following him. That that our faith comes by trusting in Jesus. But the result of that is to understand the value, the infinite value of life with Jesus. And everything else in comparison is considered garbage. It’s worth selling, getting rid of just for that one treasure. So he says, “Put what is behind. Look to what is ahead. Don’t hunger for those things, but hunger for Jesus. Everything else in comparison stinks.