I want you to think of someone right now that's
really, really discouraged that you care about.
What's the best thing you could give them? Would
it be money? Would it be a great vacation? Just
a little relief? I'm going to tell you there's
something far better and more important. Stay
with me. Welcome to this edition of Living on
the Edge with Chip Ingram. The mission of this
daily program is to intentionally disciple Christians
through the insightful Bible teaching of Chip
Englund. And in just a minute, we'll continue
our study through the book of Philippians as
we dive into Chip's series, I Choose Hope. In
the coming programs, we'll learn how to confidently
face any circumstance in life by holding tightly
to the hope only Christ can offer. Now, before
we get going, to help you get the most out of
this series, let me encourage you to download
Chip's message notes. They contain his outline,
scripture references, and much more. Get them
by visiting the broadcasts tab at livingontheedge
.org. At listeners, tap fill in notes. Well,
if you have your Bible handy, go now to Philippians
chapter 3 as we join Chip for his message, Finding
Hope. A couple years ago, I had a chance to listen
to a speaker, and he is a very, very effective
leader. He's a guy that I've admired. I would
call him a friend. I don't know him real well,
but we've hung out a few times, and when I get
close to someone that I can tell is really real,
it's very exciting. And he was giving a message
and he said, there's actually something in our
day that you can measure, that you can actually
grow, that has a higher ability to predict the
future than either your IQ or even your EQ. He
said, there's something called an HQ that depending
on how full your HQ is, that will tell you a
lot more about the future of your marriage, your
future in school, your future with people, your
future in work. than even how smart you are or
your emotional intelligence. And I was leaning
forward like, I'd like to know what that is.
He says, HQ is your hope quotient. And then he
talked about a research project that had started
at the time seven years earlier, and it came
out of a conversation with his daughter who was
in school at the time and in a class on leadership.
In fact, I put the question that she asked him.
It was a homework assignment. And the homework
assignment was to find a leader and ask questions
so you could learn about leadership. So she thought,
my dad's a leader. I'll ask him. So they began
to talk for a couple hours. And he said her last
question was question number 20. And it was the
best one. She said, what's the single most important
thing you do as a leader? Now think of that.
The single most important. Is it strategy? Is
it planning? He happens to pastor one of the
largest churches in all of America. Is it prayer?
I mean, what is it? And he said, instinctively,
after all these years, I said, oh, that's easy.
I make sure I stay encouraged. And I remember
sitting there listening to him, because when
she asked that question, I wanted to know, what
is it? But that's not what I thought he would
say. And then I got to think about it, and he
went on to say, well, when I'm encouraged, I
make good decisions. When I'm encouraged and
emotionally whole, I relate to people well. But
when I'm discouraged, I make bad decisions. When
I'm discouraged, I tend to fall into temptation.
When I'm discouraged, I lose confidence. When
I'm discouraged and live in a discouraged manner,
I start losing credibility with the people around
me. And then he went on to say, he said, the
greatest gift parents can ever give their kids
is hope. The greatest thing you can give your
marriage partner is hope. The greatest thing
you can give your employees or your friends is
hope. And I thought to myself, I have never thought
about it like that, but it rings true. I found
a quote by my mentor, Howard Hendricks, speaking
of the flip side of hope. He says, discouragement,
this is a great line, is the anesthetic. that
the devil uses on a person just before he reaches
in and carves out their heart. That's graphic,
isn't it? Well, what is hope? I've done a lot
of research, and I could give you biblical words
and dictionary words, but as I put them all together,
I think the heart of hope is this. It's the mental
and emotional outlook that life is good, the
future is promising, but Progress is certain
even in the midst of challenging circumstances
or difficult relationships. It's an emotional
and intellectual outlook. It's just you get up
and there's something about your emotions. There's
something about your thinking. And it's like
life is good. Hey, life is good. Of course, there's
challenges. But the future, the future is promising.
The future of my marriage is promising. The future
of my singleness is promising. My future at work
is promising. And progress is absolutely certain
even in the midst of difficulty and challenges.
Why does it matter? It matters because researchers
tell us you can go about 40 days without food,
about three days without water, about eight minutes
without air, but probably not more than two or
three seconds without hope. The moment you lose
hope, You cave in. You lose hope in your marriage,
you quit. You lose hope in one of your kids,
you give up. You lose hope at work, you don't
show up as the same person. You lose hope. Everything
begins to cave in. He went on in his research.
He said, why does it matter? Here's 11 things
that people whose hope, think of hope as like
a little tank inside of you. And I want to ask
you in just a minute, is your hope kind of low?
Is your hope kind of medium? Or are you just
filled with hope? Do you have this buoyant sense
that life is good, the future is promising, and
progress is certain? People that think like that
the majority of the time have more satisfying
relationships. They're more productive. They're
affected less by stress. They're more successful,
more satisfied. They're more compassionate. They're
more willing to help people in need. Their physical
life, they're healthier. They hold a higher moral
and ethical standard. They're more likely to
assume leadership positions. And it's interesting.
They're more likely to see God as loving, caring,
and forgiving. So let me ask you just before
we get going here. If, you know, just think,
you know, your hope meter, let's make it just
a 1 up to a 10. If you had to give yourself a
number of hope right now, what do you got? What's
going on inside? Discouraged? Encouraged? What's
the source of your hope? Now, I know the Sunday
school answer, right? Jesus, right? Jesus is
the source. Okay, we got that. That's the right
answer. Now, let's get to the honest one. If
you honestly would say, what's your hope? What
are you hoping for? What do you intuitively or
unconsciously believe if this would happen or
if that would happen? My life would be good.
The future would be positive. I know I'd make
progress. Maybe a different way to come at it
is look at the negative. What is it that when
it happens, discourages you and gets you down
quickly? So that'll probably tell you where a
lot of your hope rests. You know, the really
big question, I'm asking you to think about it.
I've done a lot of thinking about it. And just...
We're not going to have all the right hope all
the time. But here's the big question that we
want to ask and answer in this season, but in
this series, is how do you find and keep hope
alive? Because, you know, I don't have a lot
of control over my IQ. I can study. I don't have
much control over my EQ. You kind of can learn
some things. But I'm going to tell you, you have
one. 100 % control of your HQ. You can raise
your hope. You can build your hope. You can fill
your hope. The Apostle Paul is writing to a church
that he loves, the Philippians. We need to get
a little context because we've taken a break.
He's in difficult circumstances in chapter one.
He thinks he may die at any moment. And so he
chooses joy. His C plus P equals E. His circumstances
plus his perspective equals experience. And he
has an upward focus and an outward focus. And
he says, God, I know you're in control. In chapter
two, there's disunity in relationships. And we
learned that you can choose love. You develop
a I am second mentality. It's about humility.
Pride kills relationships. Humility always causes
grace to flow. And so you follow the example
of Jesus and you consider others as more important.
You choose to love others in ways that are meaningful.
In chapter 3, he's concerned about them because
culturally there's chaos and confusion. Some
false teachers kept following Paul. Paul would
plant a church, Galatia, Ephesus, here in Philippi,
and there'd be a group called Judaizers. They
were new Christians, but they were Jewish Christians,
and they said Jesus is great and grace is important,
plus. You need to be circumcised. You need to
keep the law. Here's 17 rules you need to do.
And so they would follow Paul, and then they
would teach their false doctrine and take loads
of guilt and put it on people. Now you've got
to keep all the Jewish laws. Well, no one's ever
been able to do that. It's been fulfilled. It's
not Jesus plus anything. And so he writes chapter
3 because the hope is getting shifted. from a
grace -loving relationship that God says, you're
his son, you're his daughter, I'm for you because
of what I have done. And the hope is getting
shifted to, this is what you got to do. And in
order to measure up, you need to do this and
this and this and this. You're listening to Living
on the Edge, and Chip will be back in just a
minute to finish today's talk. But quickly, this
program is supported by the generosity of listeners
like you. And right now, during our mid -year
match, it's a great time to partner with us.
Between now and June 30th, every gift we receive
will be doubled dollar for dollar. You can give
today by going to livingontheedge .org or by
calling 888 -333 -6003. Well, with that, here
again is Chip to continue his message. Open your
Bibles, if you will. Philippians chapter 3, he
gives him a command. Verse 1, he says, finally,
my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the
same things again is no trouble to me, and it's
a safeguard for you. He says, find your joy in
your relationship. He says, it's not a big deal
for me to remind you of this. But then remember
the end of chapter one, he said, you're experiencing
the same difficulty which you saw to be in me.
And he's just bringing their focus back. Yeah,
you gotta love other people, but you gotta find
your joy in your relationship with God because
everything and everyone else sometime sooner
or later is gonna let you down. And then he gives
them a warning in verse two. He says, beware
of the dogs. Beware of the evil workers. Beware
of the false circumcision. These are these Judaizers.
He gives them three labels. He calls them dogs
because don't think of Ranger. That's my dog.
Ranger is a golden retriever. The biggest problem
we have with Ranger is he walks up to you and
he just licks you to death. He's the most loving
dog in the world. These are scavenger dogs. These
are dogs that are running the city. These are
dogs that snarl. These are the kind of dogs that
people were afraid of and carried disease. And
he's talking to them in this negative language.
And it was a slang term also that Jewish people
would use for Gentiles. And he says, they'll
gobble you. They're diseased. They'll mess you
up. And then he says, not only that, but they're
evil workers. They have a works mentality. And
there's a play on this where he's saying, they're
works. are going to take you down a bad path,
and they're a false circumcision. If you were
a good Jewish little boy, the sign of the covenant
at eight days is the foreskin was to be cut,
and you're going to be circumcised. And even
after people came to Christ, regardless of their
age, the Judaizers said, you need to do that.
Keep the law. Keep the Sabbath. Keep the dietary
laws. And Paul says, these people are going to
take you down a path that will rob your hope
in your relationship with Christ. And here's
the reason. He says, for we are the true circumcision.
How? We serve God by his spirit. We boast in
Christ Jesus and we put no confidence in the
flesh. He gives three characteristics of the
false teachers and he said, no, no, no, no, no.
Hey, Philippians, we're the true circumcision.
Okay, it's of the heart. Romans, you might jot
down right above that. Romans 2, verses 28 and
29. He says people that are physically born of
Abraham, just because you're a physical Jew doesn't
make you right with God. He's going to say it's
a circumcision of the heart. It's a relationship
that we have with God through Christ. We're the
true circumcision, and here's the three characteristics.
We worship God by the Spirit. The Spirit of God
dwells in us, and we have relationship. Second,
he says, we boast in Christ. It's about a person.
Anytime religion takes you into the church, the
leader, you have to do these five things to be
right. If you ever do these two things, all that
stuff, he says, we boast in Christ and what he's
done. And third, notice what he says. We put
no confidence in the flesh. It's sarx is the
word. It means in what we do outside of what
Christ has provided. It's this idea that on bad
days, all of us, right, we've got this battle.
We want to do what God wants us to do, but we
live in this flesh. And it's a battle. It's those
desires and habits, time, form, that it's doing
things out of our own energy, out of our own
effort, out of our own motives. Now, notice then
Paul is going to shift gears here, and he's basically
going to say, let me prove this to you all. And
then I think there's three huge takeaways for
us about finding hope. Basically, he's going
to say to them, let me give you the sense of
it. He's going to say, these guys are saying
you need to keep all this stuff. Basically, he's
going to say, so if anyone wanted to go toe -to
-toe on really keeping the law, my argument is
not going to be that these guys do it and none
of us can. He goes, I'm going to tell you from
my life, I used to be in that group. In fact,
I used to be an all -star. I was the budding
star. In fact, Gamaliel was my teacher, and he
was the most famous teacher, and I was the rising
star. And he's going to sort of throw out his
pedigree, says, you know, kind of arguing like,
I mean, if anyone was going to get right with
God in that system, I was scoring 100 as far
as you could in that system. And then he's going
to contrast that and say, but all of that. He
says, I look at that, and he's going to use,
in fact, a little bit later, I'll have you circle
the word gain, loss, gain, loss, and the word
consider, because the word consider is an accounting
term. And he's going to actually look at his
life in Christ and his life before Christ and
his life with all of his good works, and he's
going to say in an accounting term, gain, gain,
gain, loss, loss, loss. Ready to follow along?
Though I myself have reasons for such confidence,
if someone thinks they have reasons to put confidence
in the flesh, I far more. Then he gives us seven
specific statements. Circumcised on the eighth
day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of
Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, with regard to
law, a Pharisee. That was the strictest sect.
As for zeal, I mean, someone was fired up, persecutor
of the church. As for righteousness, based on
the law, blameless or faultless. Paul's basically
saying, I was in the system. I was OCD spiritual
like you have never seen. I have all the pedigree.
I was born in the right place, born of the right
parents, born of a special tribe. My name even,
the first tribe came from Benjamin. He said,
I was circumcised on exactly the right day in
terms of religious or righteousness. I mean,
I fasted the two days a week like Pharisees.
I memorized probably all of the Torah and major
parts of the Old Testament. In terms of being
a religious person who fulfilled what you can
in your own effort and energy, I was the star
of Judaism. And as far as this whole, this sect,
this follower, this Jesus stuff, I tried to kill
him. And then notice the shift. His basic saying,
his point is, true spirituality, authentic relationship,
is going to be rooted in the person of Christ.
In the person of Jesus, not religion. Not in
a system, not in a group, not in a church, not
in a leader, not in what you do, not what you
can accomplish. And then after this, notice what
he says. But, you might put a big underline,
because this is the contrast. Whatever was to
my gain, circle that, or profit, I now consider
lost for the sake of Christ. Put a box around
the word consider. What's more, I consider, put
a box around consider, everything to be a loss
because it's surpassing worth of knowing Christ
Jesus my Lord for whose sake I've lost all things
and consider them as garbage that I might gain.
and be found in him. Not having a righteousness
of my own that comes from the law, but that which
is through faith in Christ, the righteousness
that comes from God on the basis of faith. Now
you're a very, very smart group, so what I want
you to do is if you see the word gain or loss,
circle it in your notes. I just want you to visually
see this. Circle it, circle it, gain, loss, gain,
loss, gain, loss. When you see the word consider,
put a box around it. It's going to open up the
whole text. What he's going to say is, like an
accountant doing a forensic audit, I've looked
at all of the religion, and I look at my relationship
with Christ, and now here's what it is. Here's
the gains, the surpassing value of knowing Christ.
And the word for knowing here is an intimate,
deep, rich, personal relationship. It's the opposite
of knowing about God. We have, I believe, millions
of people in the church, even an evangelical
church, that know a lot about God and have a
very unconscious mindset of what makes them right
with God. I come to church very regularly. I
read my Bible. Some, I pray when I can. I pray
to prayer at one time. And what they're really
trusting in is what they're doing. But if you
ask them, do you have a rich, deep, intimate
relationship? Do you have a passion in your heart
to get to know? Do you enjoy Jesus? Is there
a sense of growth and intimacy? Some of them
don't even know what you're talking about. This
is Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. And you've
been listening to part one of Chip's message,
Finding Hope, from our series, I Choose Hope.
Chip will be back shortly to share some helpful
application for us to think about. In times of
uncertainty, where do you turn for hope? And
how confident are you in your source of comfort
to provide the stability you desire? As Chip
teaches through Philippians chapter 3, he'll
share what God has to say about our fears about
the future and how feeling secure is possible
even when anxiety comes. Learn how to embrace
a more resilient hope that will help you face
each day with certainty and peace. Well, Chip's
back in studio with me now. And Chip, according
to the studies by Barna and Pew, hypocrisy is
the top reason unbelievers criticize or reject
Christianity. So take a minute, if you wouldn't,
explain why this is such a prevalent issue and
how believers can respond well to it. Well, Dave,
I get that. I almost miss the Lord Jesus because
I grew up in a church that Christians didn't
live like Christians. And there was hypocrisy
everywhere. And so I decided to opt out. And
I think that's where a lot of people are. And
I'm thankful that I found people who lived out
their faith. And so what we need to understand
is that following Jesus is a radical choice and
it's a radical way of living. And what we at
Living on the Edge want to do is help people
connect that weekend experience of I went to
church to... How do you live out Monday and that
time of maybe reading the Bible when you felt
spiritual to how do I treat my wife or my husband
or what's it look like to be a single person
in a sex -saturated world? People need help and
guidance to navigate dilemmas, cultural pressures,
and know how to honor God. People need someone
in their corner who says, This is what scripture
says. This is how much God loves you. Don't take
the easy route. The road is narrow, but the rewards
are so great in this life and in the life to
come. We long, God longs, in fact, I think unbelievers
long for Christians to live like Christians.
When you support Living on the Edge, you're joining
a movement of God to help break the cycle of
hypocrisy. Join us during this mid -year match.
Give as God leads you, and let's be those kind
of Christians, and let's help others do the same.
Good word, Chip. If you want to be part of our
mission to authentically disciple God's people
worldwide, partner with us during our mid -year
match. From now until June 30th, every gift we
receive will be doubled dollar for dollar. To
learn how you can support us, go to livingontheedge
.org or call 888 -333 -6003. That's 888 -333
-6003 or visit livingontheedge .org. tap donate.
And thanks in advance for doing whatever God
leads you to do. As we wrap up today's program,
what I know for sure is many, many of you or
some of your closest friends or family members
need hope. I mean, they really need hope. I mean,
whether it's economic issues, marriage issues,
divorce, separation, drug addictions, loss of
a job. I mean, there's times in our life that
is so devastating and we can get discouraged
and we lose perspective. And the Lord Jesus wants
you to know and the people that you love, he
wants to give you hope. In fact, our hope quotient
might be the most important thing because if
you're discouraged, we don't trust. If you're
discouraged, you're not motivated. I love what
my friend Ray Johnson says in his book, The Hope
Quotient. He says, people, this is research,
people that have a high hope quotient, people
that have a sense that the future is bright,
that God is in control, that regardless of what
I go through, he's going to help me. They have
more satisfying relationships. They're more productive.
They're less affected by stress. They're more
successful. They're more satisfied. They're more
compassionate. They're more willing to help people.
They have higher ethical standards. And they're
more likely to see God as a loving, caring, and
forgiving God. And so what I want you to know
as we launch into this series and as we begin
to learn about hope. God wants to give it to
you. In fact, are you ready for this? He's already
given it to you. And so it's a matter of perspective.
It's a matter of beginning to lean into, and
it grows out of not circumstances being wonderful
and right and everything going your way. As we
learn from the Apostle Paul, it happens when
We're rooted deeply and intimately with the anchor
of our hope, the Lord Jesus Himself. That's my
prayer for you today. Lean in to the Lord Jesus.
Draw near to Him in the midst of your pain, your
suffering, and your discouragement. And here's
the promise, and He will draw near to you. good
reminder chip and as we close i want you to know
that as a staff we ask the lord to help you take
whatever your next faith step is now if there's
a way we can help we'd love to do that give us
a call at 888 -333 -6003 or connect with us at
livingontheedge .org. And while you're there,
take a moment and look through our resources
on various topics, many of them absolutely free.
Well, join us next time as Chip continues his
series, I Choose Hope. Until then, I'm Dave Drewy,
thanking you for listening to this edition of
Living on the Edge.