Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church

Guest (Female): You are now listening to an inspirational message from the Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, where Dr. Michael Wesley Sr. is pastor. Please join the service in progress.

Dr. Michael W. Wesley Sr.: Oh, what manner of love this is. What manner of love God has for you and me. It is amazing, isn't it? Amen. Pray with me now as we ready our hearts.

Father, we thank you now for this privilege, the opportunity to come again into your presence, to stand again behind this sacred desk. Pray now that you will lift again your human outer self, fill us with the Holy Spirit, speak to us and through us in this moment. Bless the words that are in our mouth, the meditations on our heart, that it may be acceptable in your sight. With you, there is a word. Without you, there is no word. Bless us now, Lord Jesus. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen.

Something that's just laid on my heart that I feel the need to address this morning: the book of Philippians, chapter two. Philippians chapter two, verses one and two. Really, one through four encompasses what I'll be talking about over the next couple weeks, so I just want to read that for you.

If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels of mercies, fulfill ye my joy, that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. This is the word of God for the people of God.

I want to preach from this subject today: Unity, Please. Unity, please. That is such a critical issue. It's critical for our nation. Unity, please. We're on the brink of Super Tuesday and divisiveness, seeds of discord have been scattered throughout the nation. People are lining up to cast their vote for people that they know have a different agenda.

So there's a need in our nation, and I'm not going politics on this, but I do need you to know that there is a need for unity in this nation. If we're not careful, we're going to be on the brink of another Civil War unless somebody can help bring us back together. Unity is not only needed in our nation, unity is needed in our communities. We can't get along no more. We can hardly stand to disagree, and we want to settle our issues with guns and not with diplomatic behaviors. Unity in our communities, please.

Unity is needed in our homes. I'm just telling you, more and more every day, you're finding people doing stuff in the home. Now let me just help the brothers just for a moment here. Much of this disunity comes because we don't want to help the sisters out. But let me just tell you like it is: females are expensive. Their upkeep is going to cost you. So you just need to find somebody in your price range and keep going. Unity, please.

Unity is needed in the church. It is such a fragile issue. Changes are made all of the time. God changes the world. Nothing stays the same. People don't stay the same. People don't stay in the same place. People move. But we can lose it when something happens. And so I'm crying unity, please.

Paul is crying unity, please. The church at Philippi was a good church. They were good people. Every time Paul talks about these people, in chapter one, verse three, he says, "I thank my God upon every remembrance of you." I felt that way while I was away. Every time I thought about it, I kept track of the service, kept track of what time it was and what ought to be happening. I just said, "Thank you, Lord, for the people there."

In verse four, he says, "Always in every prayer of mine for you all making request with joy." Verse five, "For your fellowship in the gospel from the first until now." Paul had a great relationship with the people at Philippi. They loved Paul, too. There is nothing in this entire epistle about doctrinal error. The people were doing what was right, they were following the will of God. They always supported him generously. He speaks about the offerings that they had sent to him time and time against.

But in spite of all of the good things that were going on in the church at Philippi, there was a deadly poisonous snake. That deadly poisonous snake was disunity and discord that was creeping into the church. He frames this whole letter around the issue of unity. He mentions it first in chapter one, verse 27. "Only let your conversation be as it becometh of the gospel of Christ, whether I come and see you or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that you stand fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel."

He talks about that in chapter one. In chapter four, he also talks about the unity. He said, "Now, there are two people in that church, you can't let them tear it up." He talked about Euodia and Syntyche. He said, "Y'all get those women together and get them on the same accord so that there be no division among you." And so now, when we look at chapter two, the most familiar portions of the letter to Philippians, we see that this is what he's talking about again: the issue of unity.

May I help you understand that Paul was always concerned about unity? In every letter that he wrote—when he wrote to the Romans, in Romans chapter 12, 13, 14, he's talking about the issue of unity. When he writes to the Colossians, he brings it up again: unity. When he writes to the Ephesians, he brings it up again: unity. And when he writes here to the Philippians, he's talking about it again: unity.

Can I help you understand that one of the greatest challenges of spiritual oversight of any church is to keep the church unified? Because it is so fragile. Can I get personal for a moment? There was something I don't like and something that I fear, and I'll just be honest with you. What I don't like is for people to become apathetic about spiritual things. When we act like we don't care about the word of God, and when we don't care about prayer, and when we don't care about developing ourselves as spiritual beings, that bothers me.

But what frightens me more than anything else is for the church to become divided. The church can easily become divided. It can become divided because somebody don't like this, somebody don't like that, somebody don't like the color, somebody don't like the song, somebody don't like the leader, somebody don't like the preacher, somebody don't like whatever it is, and before you know it, you got a mess. Unity, please. We cannot be a reflection of the world. We have got to be the examples to the world.

But what I want you to hear this morning is that unity is not some external, mechanical experience, but it is made possible by the internal dwelling of the Holy Spirit. Let me see if I can illustrate it in my own way. I know I'm trying to be quick here, at least to get us through it.

If I had in my pocket a bag of marbles—I used to shoot marbles when I was a kid. They don't play marbles no more. But we used to go to the store and buy those cat-eyes, all of that, and we'd shoot marbles all day. We'd come home with a pocket full. But marbles in a plastic bag are kept together, unified, because they are in the bag. The unity is created by the container. But if you open the container, you open the bag and you tear the bag, the marbles will go all over the place because there's nothing there to keep them together.

Now, on the other hand, if I took a magnet and I took metal shavings, they would all be drawn together—not because they were in a container, but because they were all being pulled by the same internal power. If the church is going to be unified, it's not going to be based on the container, the building, just because we are all in the same building. No, we need to be together because we're pulled by the same power. And when we are pulled by the same power, you don't have to make nobody be unified because you're drawn by the same power to one another.

Christ is the magnetism. He draws you to Him, He draws me to Him, He draws each of us to Him, and He holds us there. That's what Paul is speaking of, and that's the plea today, is that we don't allow external things to mess us up. We've had a few changes in our church, and there's going to be some other changes because that's just the nature of the beast. The people who were here 40 years ago are not here anymore. The songs we sang then, we can't sing them now. The things we used to do, we don't do those things now.

And if you are still trying to be the exact same person you were 40 years ago, shame on you. It means you have not grown. You have not developed. You have not matured. If you're still keeping up the same mess and lost in the same stuff, something has gone wrong.

And so Paul, having now made the plea for unity in the text for the morning, he gives us the motive, the reason, the why you ought to be together. And that's what I want to give you. I'm going to drop these three, four things in your spirit. And if you're wondering about how to do that and why to do that, come back next time and we'll talk about that. But today I want to just help you understand.

In verse 27 of chapter one, he said, "Stand fast in one spirit." So we gotta stand together. And he says that with one mind, we have to strive together. The picture there is of an athletic team. A team don't win championships with one person standing out by themselves. A team wins championships when they work together. And we've got to work together for the glory of God. Okay? We gotta stand together, we gotta strive together, we gotta share together, and if necessary, we have to suffer together.

I mean, you can't go through this by yourself in this life. I don't know how it makes you feel. Maybe God had to make some of us sick to get that sensitivity. I always thought that I was a little sensitive until I got sick. Then when I got sick, I really understood what it meant to be compassionate toward somebody else.

So Paul goes on here in chapter two, in this first verse. Verse one and two is where I'm focusing on. In verse one alone are four motives. Verse two has at least one more, but I want to look at the four for the morning. He says—and I guess I gotta give you the technical Greek before I can give you the explanation of it—he says in chapter two, verse one, "If there be therefore any consolation in Christ." Now, you gotta understand the structure of the sentence, and this is what I want preachers to understand: that when you're breaking down the Scriptures, you have to understand how it's put together.

And in classical Greek, there is a cause when the word "if" is used. It is used as a positive cause. There are four calls, three causes that it could say. It could say, "If this is happening, then this is true." It could also say, "If this is happening, then it's possibly true." Then it could also say, "If this is happening, then it is not true." But because this is stated in the positive cause, it is definitely true. So we can change the word then, and instead of saying "if there be therefore," you can say "since there be therefore" or "because there is something going on here."

And what he's talking about is the motives. Because this is the truth, you ought to be unified. So what is the truth? The first thing he says is, "because there is any consolation in Christ." What does that really mean? That is really saying, is there any real experience with Christ, any encouragement? That's what he's saying. He said, because—use the word because—because you have been encouraged in Christ, that's what he's saying. You ought to be what? Unified, one mind, like-minded.

Now the question is, have you been encouraged in Christ? Has God—and what is encouragement? What is consolation? It's when someone comes along beside you. And the Holy Spirit is called the Paraclete. And the Paraclete is what? Someone who comes along beside. And has God ever come along beside you in your life? You know the obvious answer. If you are a child of God, if you've been born again, you know the truth. The truth is God has come along beside me and God has helped me.

God has been kind to me. God has been merciful to me. He has forgiven me. He has picked me up. He has made a way. He has done a lot, and I have received a lot of encouragement. Anybody in here ever been depressed? Anybody here ever been down? How did you get out of it? It wasn't because you took certain medicine. All that did was put you to sleep. But to come out of that cloud, God had to come along beside you.

Now, listen at what he says. And because God has come along beside you, the implication is there should be obedience, and there should be gratitude. What is the obedience? That we ought to do what makes God proud and happy. Now, what does make Him happy? Unity. How you know it makes God happy? Come on, Jesus. John's gospel, chapter 17. When Jesus was in the upper room before He went to the cross, He prayed that high priestly prayer, and He said, "Father, I thank you that you and I are one, and I thank you for these that you have given to me, that they may be one with us." So what was Jesus praying for? He was praying for unity among God's people.

And so listen at what Paul is saying. And because you have experienced the encouragement from Christ, are you now saying that you don't want to do what's necessary to bring Him joy, which is to be unified? You know what that is? If you're not willing to do that, it means you're selfish. And it means that when you sin like that, you're not sinning against the institution of the church, you're not sinning against the institution of religion, you're sinning against a relationship that you have with God. If He has encouraged you, and you know that what He wants from you is for there to be unity, then how in the world can you be out here in the world trying to tear the world up? Or how can you be in the home trying to tear the home up? Or how can you be in the church trying to tear the church up?

I'm talking about present experience. I'm not talking about theology. I'm talking about present experience. The issue is, has the Lord done anything for you? And if you have received encouragement from Christ, then you ought to be willing to do what pleases Him. And what pleases Him is to keep being of one mind, striving together, standing together, sharing together, working for the common good of the unity in the faith.

That's what this is. This is a very practical lesson. And all I'm trying to do is just help you see it. Because see, I already know that we like to get in little camps. And in my little camp, we're going to raise hell about this. Now you think it's not true? Look at just what happened in the Michigan primary for the Republican Party. There were over 100,000 people who chose not to vote for President Biden. Not because they were going to vote for President Trump, but because they were protesting. They decided, "We want you to know that if you don't do what we say, we ain't going to vote for you."

Are y'all hearing me? We have that same game going, and that is not pleasing to who? All right. So that's the first motivation. The second motivation is right there in the same verse and it's almost the same thing: "if any comfort of love." If you received any consolation of love. Where do you get love from? You get love from God. Don't tell me boo now, because there's some time you can't stand him or her. And you know it's the truth. I know you got to look the other way, you can't smile, you got to look under your breath, got to swallow deep, but do whatever you need to do, but it's true. Because in human beings, we don't always get along, we don't always like one another.

But we need to understand that we love God because God first loved us. And if we have received any comfort of love—and the word "consolation," the word "consolation" is used here in a different translation instead of the word "comfort." But it really means, if you look it up in the lexicon, it is interpreted as "gentle speaking." God comes along and gently speaks to us.

You know it's the truth. Four o'clock in the morning sometimes you're laying there with your eyes open, everybody else in the house sleep, and you're looking up and God comes along and He just gently speaks. He gives you direction, He gives you understanding. Things you've been wrestling with, He just gently shows you the solution to it. The challenges that you might be facing or anticipating, He gently just whispers what you need to know in your own ear. Now, have you ever had that experience? Then you know what the comfort of love is.

And that comes because God loves you. Paul is not fussing at the people, and I'm not fussing either. He was just wanting them to understand what it is that they need to be considering and what they need to be aware of and why they need to go about it in this way. Because you have received comfort, gentle whispering from God in your heart, then you should not want to be the kind of person who is trying to disrupt what God loves.

We're pulled on the same magnet. This comes from within. This doesn't come from without. The gentle whispering that I have received in my head causes me to be more willing to pray for others rather than fuss at others. It causes me to be more willing to forgive other people rather than try to get in their face. Are you understanding? It's a spiritual message because this is a spiritual enterprise.

And the unity, the one mind, the one heart, the working together for the common good of glorifying Him in the world comes because He speaks. You know what the songwriter said? "He speaks and the sound of His voice is so sweet that the birds hush their singing, and the melody that He gave to me within my own heart is singing." And then he goes on to say—Jesus had a brother and his name was Andy—Andy walks with me, Andy talks with me, Andy tells me that I am His own. And the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known.

Now, God is saying, if you have that kind of fellowship with Him, are you going to be so hateful that you're going to come into His house and do things that are divisive when you know that He wants the people in the house to be what? That's what the message is. Unity, please.

So the first two in the passage are related to God, the second two comes directly out of the Holy Spirit. Look at number three in the same first verse of chapter two. "If any fellowship of Spirit." No, since there is fellowship of the Spirit, or because it is true that we have fellowship of the Spirit, that's the third motivation. What does the Holy Spirit do? The Holy Spirit baptizes us into how many bodies? In the one body. We have been all baptized into one body by how many spirits? By one spirit. We have one Lord, one faith, and one baptism. And one God who is above all and in you all. So the Holy Spirit is all about unity.

And if you have had fellowship with the Holy Spirit, then what does that imply if you choose not to want to be in unity with your brothers and sisters? I'm just trying to help you understand. Don't put it on "I can't stand them." Don't put it on "they did something." No, you violated your relationship with God. That's way it is. That's the only place it can be, if you're reading and understanding what I'm reading and understanding.

So the word is again: unity, please. If you have the Holy Spirit, He's all about unity and He wants to see unity in the church. So Paul makes the plea in verse 27 again, "Stand fast in one spirit, with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel." And in nothing, don't you worry about your enemies. You don't have to worry about them. God got them. All right?

All right, so that's three motives, three reasons, three purposes, three values, three attitudes that we have in Christ that helps us to know what unity is all about and why we ought to have it in the church, and in the home, and in the world. And it just blows my mind. That's why I sometimes just have to sit back and just stand in awe at the television when I'm listening to some of this news because the hypocrisy of it is just so amazing. It is so amazing to me how they don't want the girl over in Georgia to try a case, but the person that she's trying has done far worse.

It's just hypocritical. And that's the same thing that we see when it comes to this. Okay? We can hallelujah and praise the Lord and all the other things and then we get in a group—"oh, that old girl, that old guy"—or we go on Facebook or we go on Instagram or we go somewhere else and we just murder folk. And we come back the next Sunday, "Oh, thank you, Jesus."

Go look lastly with me. I don't want to keep us long, I gotta get to Communion, but there is another one right here in verse one of chapter two. Chapter two, verse one. "If any bowels of mercies." Now what that is, is there any affection and compassion? Since you have received affection and compassion from the Lord, then that ought to motivate you to be affectionate and compassionate toward other folk.

Because see, the Jews, they used the term "bowels," which means the place where you feel things out of your gut. It's translated gut. That's why the word bowels is used. It's where you feel the deepest emotion. You say it like this sometimes, "I have a gut feeling." Sometimes I feel it in my heart or feel it in my gut that something's not right or something is right. I feel it in my gut, love, I feel it. You know what you're talking about. You're talking about from the deepest place of affection that you can feel something.

Listen once again at Paul. He said, since or because you have received this deep affection and compassion from the Lord himself—now I mean, I know in my deepest place that the Lord loves me. That agape love is so real. You know in the deepest place right now that you are saved. That's why it makes it impossible for someone to argue with you about your relationship with God, because you know where the seat of that relationship is. Regardless of what external activities may be, regardless of what anybody else may think, you know in the deepest part of you that there is a true relationship with you and God. And you feel it there, you hear it there, you understand it there, and you are comforted there.

And when trouble is on the line, you just know in your gut that God is going to work it out. I just know that sometimes I can't see, but I know in my gut where my eye can't see, my gut can feel. What my head can't wrap around, my gut tells me it's going to be all right. You're going to come out of this. It's going to be better. Another day is coming. Hold on a little while longer. And from that place, I have the assurance.

And listen at what Paul is saying. He just keep throwing the shade on us. He said, and if you've had that kind of relationship—no, because you've had that level of assurance and affection and compassion from God himself, are you saying that you don't care about the people God cares about? Unity, please.

Paul is like a parent. He was a pastor, but he cared about these people who cared about him. If I had a child—and I've had sons—and I've had to get on their case. But there's a difference in how you get on their case when they're children and when they get grown. When they're young, you do what I tell you to do because I told you to do it. And I don't want to hear nothing else about it. But when you get older, you have to help them go behind the scene and understand the reason for what's there.

And so, I remember once when one of my boys, Mike, was 15, so he decided he wanted to try me. I said, "Okay. I tell you what, you ain't got to live here because I ain't going to hurt you, but I ain't going to let you stay around me. So I tell you what, get in the car, let's go." We got in the car, I went over to Bushlawn. I said, "You don't want to live with me? Get out!" He said, "No, Daddy, I don't want to go in there." I said, "All right, let's go around here. Get in the car." Let's go around here, we went around to Loveman Village. I said, "You don't want to live with me? Get out!" He opened the door and gunfire went off: "pow, pow!" He said, "No, Daddy!"

I said, "Well, there's somewhere they can keep you." I said, "Let's go over here to Juvenile Court." I said, "Get out." And he said, "No, I don't need to go in there." So I said, "Let's go to the army recruiter." Recruiter looked at me and said, "Man, take that boy back home." He said, "Ain't nothing wrong here." He said, "Take your son back home." And I went back home. It wasn't long, he went away, finished high school, went off to college. He came back home one weekend and he said, "Daddy, it's amazing how much sense you have gotten." How much sense I have gotten.

But you have a different conversation now. Same boy, I would have a different conversation now today. I wouldn't say, "Okay, you don't want to do what I tell you to do then ben over here and I'll just beat you to an inch of your life." No. The conversation would be different today. The conversation would be, "Have you not been loved? Have you not been supported? Have you not been given every opportunity and every resource that you've needed in your life? Then would you not want to show some level of concern about the things that concern me?"

Wouldn't that be a different conversation? That's the conversation Paul is having here. Since, because you have received the affection, the encouragement of Christ, since because you have received the comfort, the gentle whispering of God's love in your heart, and since and because you have had and enjoyed the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and since and because you have felt in your gut the assurance of your salvation, your sanctification, and your future glorification, can you not at least be willing to stand beside another brother and sister and strive together for the unity of maintaining one mind and one heart concerning God's will and God's design?

And finally, since I got three minutes, I'll take you to one more, verse two. And he said, if that ain't enough, then at least do it for me. Look at what he says in verse two: "Fulfill ye my joy, that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and one mind." The Philippian people loved Paul. They valued the relationship with him, and he valued the relationship with them. Paul said, "I know that you've heard now that I'm in prison, and you've sent me one of your boys, Epaphroditus, to take care of me, and you sent a gift with him, and for that I'm grateful. But if you can't recognize the spiritual benefits that you've already received and let that be enough for you to get with Euodia and Syntyche and beat back the growing poisonous snake that could disrupt the fellowship," he said, "at least do it for me. Do it because you care about me."

That's my word for the day. If you can't do it for God's sake, then at least as Mama used to say, respect the gray hairs, because I got them with you. When I came, it was jet black. When I came, I had a big Afro and a full beard. Today, gradually fading, salt and pepper has mixed together. A lot of other things have happened. So at least do it for me.

What I'm saying is that if I walk the way He wants me to walk, He'll show up. If I talk the way He wants me to talk, guess what? He'll show up. If I live the way He wants me to live, He'll show up. He'll show up in me because Jesus is the light that shineth in me, and He's the light that shines in you. If He's shining in you today, then allow Him to demonstrate His show-up-ness by being like-minded and practice unity, please.

Doors of the church open. Doors of the church. Might be somebody here, come today by letter, come on your own Christian experience, come as a candidate for baptism. Doors of the church open. Anytime doing this song, give God your heart. Give us your hand. Let's make it.

Guest (Female): Hope you enjoyed the broadcast. You have been listening to a message from the Greater Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, where we are reaching the world for Christ, located at 2135 Jefferson Avenue Southwest, Birmingham, Alabama, 35211. For a copy of a CD or DVD, you can reach us at 205-925-5972, or visit us on the web at www.greatershiloh.org. For an uplifting message, please join us for the next broadcast.