Scripture Reading: John 13:15; 1 Pet. 2:21; Phil. 2:5-11; 1 Tim. 1:3-4; 6:3; Acts 2:42; Titus 1:9; 1 Thes. 2:1-12<\/p>\n
I.Christ to us is not only life but also a pattern; we learn from Him according to His pattern, not by our natural life but by Him as our life in resurrection\u2014John 13:15; 1 Pet. 2:21; Eph. 4:20:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.In His life on earth, He set up a pattern as revealed in the Gospels; then, He was crucified and resurrected to become the life-giving Spirit so that He could enter into us to be our life\u2014Eph. 4:20.<\/p>\n B.When we have learned Christ, we are being conformed to the image of Christ in the mold of Christ as the pattern\u2014Rom. 8:29.<\/p>\n C.Christ also has suffered for you, leaving you a model so that you may follow in His steps\u20141 Pet. 2:21.<\/p>\n II.To experience Christ and live Christ, we must know Him as our pattern and take Him as our pattern\u2014Phil. 2:5-11:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.In Philippians 2:5-11, Paul presents Christ as a pattern; we must allow this pattern to be infused into us.<\/p>\n B.The pattern for the Christian life is the God-man Savior, who emptied Himself and humbled Himself and was exalted and glorified by God\u2014Phil. 2:6-9:<\/p>\n 1.\u3000Although the Lord was equal with God, He did not regard this as a prize to be seized and held onto; He emptied Himself, laying aside what He had, that is, the form of God\u2014Phil. 2:6-7a.<\/p>\n 2.\u3000Christ humbled Himself, becoming obedient unto death, even the death of a cross\u2014Phil. 2:8b.<\/p>\n 3.\u3000The Lord humbled Himself to the uttermost, and God exalted Him to the highest and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name\u2014Phil. 2:9.<\/p>\n C.Our pattern, Christ, is not only objective but also subjective and experienceable\u2014Phil. 2:5, 12-13:<\/p>\n 1.\u3000The One who set up the pattern and who is Himself the pattern is now the indwelling God operating in us\u2014Phil. 2:13.<\/p>\n 2.\u3000Christ, who is our pattern, is now the life within us\u2014Col. 3:4.<\/p>\n III.If we would take Christ as our pattern, we need to have the mind of Christ as our mind\u2014Phil. 2:5:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.We need to open ourselves to allow what was in the mind of Christ Jesus to be in us\u2014Phil. 2:5.<\/p>\n B.When Christ emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, being found in fashion as a man, and humbled Himself, He had this thought in Him\u2014Phil. 2:7-8.<\/p>\n C.To have such a mind, we need to be one with Him in the inward parts of Christ\u2014Phil. 1:8.<\/p>\n IV.The teaching of the apostles is the unique, healthy teaching of God’s eternal economy\u2014Acts 2:42; 1 Tim. 1:3-4; 6:3; Titus 1:9:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.The teaching of the apostles is the teaching of the entire New Testament, God’s speaking in the Son to His New Testament people\u2014Heb. 1:1-2.<\/p>\n B.The teaching of the apostles is the unique divine revelation of God’s New Testament economy, from God’s incarnation to the ultimate consummation of the New Jerusalem\u2014John 1:14; Rev. 21:2.<\/p>\n C.The teaching of the apostles is the factor that maintains the one accord, enabling us to have one heart, one way, and one goal\u2014Acts 1:14; 2:42a, 46a.<\/p>\n D.We must be those who hold to the faithful word which is according to the teaching of the apostles\u2014Titus 1:9:<\/p>\n 1.\u3000The churches were established according to the teaching of the apostles and kept the teaching of the apostles.<\/p>\n 2.\u3000We must speak the things which befit the healthy teaching of the apostles, which is the teaching of God’s economy\u2014Titus 2:1.<\/p>\n E.The apostles did not tolerate any teaching that was different from the teaching of the apostles\u2014Acts 2:42; 1 Tim. 1:3-4.<\/p>\n V.We, as members of the Body of Christ, should no longer be children, tossed by waves and carried about by every wind of teaching\u2014Eph. 4:14:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.The waves raised up by the winds of different teachings, doctrines, concepts, and opinions are sent by Satan to entice the believers and carry them away from Christ and the church\u2014Eph. 4:14.<\/p>\n B.Any teaching, even a scriptural one, that distracts the believers from Christ and the church is a wind that carries them away from God’s eternal purpose\u2014Eph. 4:14.<\/p>\n C.The only way to escape the waves raised up by these winds of teaching is to grow in life, and the way to grow in life is to remain in the proper church life, with Christ and the church as our protection\u2014Eph. 4:13-15.<\/p>\n VI.The apostles were a pattern of the gospel they preached\u20141 Thes. 1:5b:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.In the church, the person is more important than anything else; the person is the way, and the person is the Lord’s work; what you are is what you do\u2014John 5:19; 6:57.<\/p>\n B.The best way to shepherd people, to cherish and nourish them, is to give them a proper pattern\u20141 Thes. 2:1-12.<\/p>\n C.The apostles not only preached the gospel but also lived the gospel; they ministered the gospel not only in word but also in a life that demonstrated the power of God, a life in the Holy Spirit and in the full assurance of their faith\u20141 Thes. 1:5.<\/p>\n VII.Paul was a pattern to the believers, living Christ in his spirit and ministering Christ as The Spirit for the building up of the Body of Christ\u20141 Tim. 1:16; 4:12:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.Paul took Christ as everything\u2014as his life, his pattern, his goal, and his secret\u2014Phil. 1:19-21a; 2:5-16.<\/p>\n B.Paul lived by the spirit, walked by the spirit, sowed unto the spirit, and ministered The Spirit, being a spiritual man who lived and served in his spirit\u2014Gal. 5:16, 25; 6:8.<\/p>\n C.Paul lived and did everything in the Body, through the Body, and for the Body\u2014Rom. 12:4-5.<\/p>\n VIII.We must shepherd the flock of God by being patterns of the flock\u20141 Pet. 5:3:<\/strong><\/p>\n A.The elders should avoid lording it over others and instead be among them, taking the lead in everything related to the church life and becoming patterns of the flock\u20141 Pet. 5:2-3.<\/p>\n B.We must shepherd people according to the pattern of the apostle Paul, who was a good shepherd, caring for the flock of God\u20141 Tim. 1:16.<\/p>\n C.We have the Lord Jesus as our pattern, we have God operating in us, we are children of God with the divine life and nature, we are luminaries qualified to reflect the divine light of Christ, and we have the word of life to hold forth and present to men; what a divine and rich provision! By this, we are well able to work out God’s salvation to the uttermost\u2014Phil. 2:16.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" PERFECTING THE SAINTS SERIES ONE FELLOWSHIP FOR THE CHI […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=187"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":188,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/187\/revisions\/188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seq.qingmingshanghetu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}