There was an elderly man that was on his deathbed and he suddenly smelled the aroma of his favorite chocolate chip cookies downstairs. And it revived him -- a little bit -- at least, enough to get him propped up on the bed and he rolled out of bed and was able to stagger to the door and grab a hold of the railing that led down the stairs. And, with feeble effort, he just sort of leaned against the doorframe and gazed into the kitchen. There on the table, were over 100 freshly baked chocolate chip cookies -- right before his eyes. And, he thought, "What am I in heaven? Is this a dream? Or is this the last token of love from a very devoted wife?" He thought it was the latter, and so with all of the energy he could muster up, he finally thrust himself toward the table, landing on his knees in sort of a crumpled posture. Right in front of his eyes were those cookies laid out and his parched lips parted, he could already taste them in his mouth, he's coming back to the life, and his old, feeble hand goes toward a cookie -- just about to grab it, he can't wait -- and suddenly his wife smacks him with a spatula and says, "Stay out of those! They're for the funeral!" That poor guy. His future didn't look that good and he can't even enjoy the present.

How does your future look? If you were to summarize your life by a motto or a slogan, what would it be? We live in a very slogan-oriented culture. Bumper stickers that sum up an ideology. I decided to notice a few bumper stickers this week. Visualize World Peace, is a slogan. One that is more popular on many cars: Practice Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty. Which, by the way, has got to be the most self-contradictory statements on earth. How do you practice anything randomly? But that's another issue. Nike's slogan: 'Just Do It.' 'Easy Does It'. 'Just Say No'. Well, Paul has his own motto, his own slogan, found in our text in chapter 1 of Philippians, verse 21: "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain." How's that for a bumper sticker?

This is the motto that not only summed up Paul's life but it was the lens through which he viewed his future. We want to look at three verses in particular -- verse 19, 20 and 21. Before we do, let me reintroduce you to Paul. I know you know something about him, but I want to just give you a quick sketch. We know that he always wanted to go to Rome, right? It was his driving desire to get there and to spread the message that so changed his life. Well, he got to Rome -- but he's a prisoner in Rome. He's shackled between two guards, writing this letter. Do you remember back to when he was converted in Acts chapter 9? The Damascus road experience? Knocked off of his beast of burden, saw the bright light, etc, etc? When he gets to Damascus, in that same episode, Jesus Christ tells Ananias to go tell Saul this message: "Go tell him how many things he must suffer for My name's sake." How's that for an introduction? 'Hi, I'm Jesus. By the way -- you're in for a lot of suffering! God bless you.' That's how he started out. We don't even make it before the end of the chapter, before we read that he's in Damascus and they're already trying to kill him. They have to let him down the wall with a basket and he has to flee for his life.

So then, Saul of Tarsus turned Paul the apostle, goes to Jerusalem to sort of link up with the early leaders of the church and they don't even accept him. They think 'this guy's out to kill us', they didn't want anything to do with him. So, he goes on his first missionary journey. What happens there? Let's see, he gets opposed, oppressed, persecuted, mobbed, beaten and left for dead outside of Lystra -- but he moves on, establishes churches. Many of those churches fall into some sour theology or carnal practice. He gets put into prison at least five times: Jerusalem, Caesarea, Philippi, twice in Rome. And so, we begin to wonder, if when Paul went into a city if he didn't first check out the jail -- just to see where he'd spent the night.

Listen to how Paul sums up his own life in 2 Corinthians: "I have been in prison more frequently, I have been flogged more severely, I have been exposed to death again and again, five times I received from the Jews forty lashes minus one, three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent the night and a day in the open sea, I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep. I have known hunger and thirst and I have often gone without food. I have been cold and naked." Next to the word 'victim' in the dictionary, we should probably put Paul's picture. This guy had it all happen to him. And that's the perspective I want you to get as we climb into this text. Because, as you know, Philippians is the one letter after all that happened to him. He writes with joy. Joy in his present circumstances of being imprisoned -- because God is sovereign and the gospel is furthered. Joy surrounded by problem people -- because, hey, the gospel is preached. And now, joy as he faces his future. And this is the lens through which he faces his future, not knowing exactly what will happen, let's look at verse 19-21.

The thought actually begins in verse 18, where he talks about rejoicing. He says, "I will rejoice, for I know [or because] this will turn out for my deliverance, through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. According to my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body whether by life or by death. For me to life is Christ and to die is gain."

The future never looked better for this apostle with radical joy. Because he was confident in his future deliverance. That's what he says in verse 19: "For this I know" That means, 'I have a settled confidence' "that this will turn out for my deliverance, through your prayer and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ." Now we're not sure what kind of deliverance Paul is thinking about. We do know that the word he used for deliverance is soterion. It's the common Greek word for salvation. That's why the King James says, "I know this will turn out for my salvation". But we know Paul's already saved. It's not like he has some weird thinking where, 'if I really endure this pain, then I'll be saved, I'll get some kind of indulgence for doing hard labor.' That's why there is another rendering of the Greek word soterion that means escape. And that's why a lot of people read this and they think Paul was predicting that he would be sprung from prison. 'This will turn out for my escape'. But that can't be right either because, the very next verse, he says, "Whether by life or by death I want to magnify Christ". So he doesn't know if he's going to live or die. And that's why the other translation of the word soterion simply means 'well-being'. What Paul is saying, metaphorically, is this: 'I know the future looks good. I know that everything will turn out for the best, whatever it is.' It's simply another way of stating Romans 8:28: "We know that all things work together for good to those who love God and are the called according to His purpose." That's what he's saying. He is confident in his future deliverance.

But notice what's attached to that: 'I'm confident as long as people keep praying.' He says "through your prayer". Now, Paul must have assumed that his audience, the Philippians, were already praying for him, but Paul is never too big to ask for prayer. In fact, in a lot of his letters, he says, 'now, you guys keep praying for me, I'm going through some tough times'. He wanted to be linked in partnership with them. First few verses, remember we uncovered the fact that they were partners in the gospel? Part of being a partner is a prayer partner. That's important whenever we support missionaries. It's not just that we send them a check, pat them on the back, God bless you -- but we support them continually by our prayers.

Leonard Ravenhill said, "The church has many organizers but few agonizers. Many who pay, few who pray. Many resters, but few wrestlers. Many who are enterprising, but few who are interceding. A worldly Christian will stop praying and a praying Christian will stop worldliness. Tithes may build a church, but tears will give it life." Paul knew that. And Paul said, "I face the future with great confidence as long as you keep praying with me and for me".

One of the reasons we need to pray is because spiritual work must be done with spiritual tools. Unfortunately, a lot of Christian work is done all in the energy of the flesh. That's why there's no lasting results. Something that will last must have spiritual tools -- and that's where prayer comes in. it's indispensible. Here's another reason we need to pray, intercede for people: because, though God is sovereign (and sometimes we think, 'well, God will do whatever He wants anyway), God works in concert with our prayers as weak and feeble as they may be and as weird as that might seem, sovereign God works in conjunction and in response to the prayers of His people.

James said, and you're familiar with it: "The fervent, effective prayer of a righteous man avails much." Or 'does a lot of stuff, gets the job done'. One of the great things about this Christmas season is a group in the church that decided that they would pray for our staff. We got the letter that said, 'We're going to pray for each one of your staff by name." All through the year. Wow. The future never looked better for us. Notice what else is attached to verse 19: Paul is confident in future deliverance as long as the Spirit keeps supplying, for he writes, "and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ." The word supply -- let me give you a better rendition -- 'lavish supply'. We get the English word 'chorus' from this Greek word. It's not just one voice, it's a multitude of voices lavishly supplying the melody. The way this word was used in ancient times, is when a Greek town would put on a festival they would take up donations from the people who lived in the village because they needed singers, and dancers, and food -- they wanted it done right. And because people in the community wanted to throw a big party, they would make sure the donations were lavish. This was a once-a-year event.

And so Paul is saying, "I face my future with confidence because I have a network of people who are praying and I am tapped into God who always supplies whatever I need whenever I need it." Boy, it's great to know that the hand of God will never lead you where the grace of God cannot keep you. Whatever you need when you need it -- God is able and willing to lavishly supply. As the prophet said, "It's not by might, it's not by power, it's by My Spirit says the Lord." That's the idea here.

Today, all of us here stand, in a sense, looking at two parts of the same road. The part behind us where we've already walked, lived, made decisions, made mistakes. And the future -- spotless, no tracks on the road. If you look back, and you think, 'Has God been faithful to me? Has He supplied everything that I need?' How'd you answer that? Now, be careful, I didn't say 'did God give you whatever you wanted?' God's a lot smarter than to spoil His kids -- He gives us what we need. He'll lavishly supply, but He'll give us what is best for us. I've got to look back and say, "God has done exceedingly, abundantly above all that I could ask or think." And so now, look at your future. With that track record, how does your future look? Pretty good! What will happen in your future? A marriage? A death, a loss, a tragedy? I don't know. I don't want to know. For the life of me, I still don't quite get those late-night 1-800,1-900-PSYCHO lines, excuse me, psychic-lines (I think the first description was better) -- where people are trying to figure out their future. I don't want to know what's going to happen down the road, I'd be a basket case if I had all the details. I do know that when I get there, God will be there and He will pick up the tab. He will lavishly supply whatever is needed at that moment.

Paul has that confidence -- that's why he can face it with such joy. He has a network of people that are praying, he has the supply of the Holy Spirit in his life... I had a girl I was speaking with last week and she said, "I don't have many Christian friends." And I said, "Well, you've got to make sure that you get some. Because there's going to be a time when you're needing for them to pray for you and support you in counsel." You need to be connected. Paul was connected this way and that way -- and he could face his future with confidence.

Second, in verse 20, Paul is concerned about his future witness. He says, "According to my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed but with all boldness as always so now also Christ will be magnified in my body whether by life or by death." Have you ever noticed that Paul can pack a lot of stuff in one verse? That's a lot of stuff that we just read -- we've got to unravel it.

Paul does have a concern. He has confidence as he looks to the future, but he is concerned, as he calls it 'an earnest expectation'. Apokaridokion is the Greek word. It's an interesting word. It means 'watching with your head stretched out', and the idea is that you are intently gazing at something coming at you from the distance. You are focused on one thing to the exclusion of everything else. He's just zeroed in on one thing -- an earnest expectation and hope. And what is that? His concern is for his witness before the world. How will the unbelieving world be impacted as they look at my life here in a Roman prison by what I do and by what I say? That's how Paul thought. I wish more of us would ask questions like that. I wish more of us would reason that way. A lot of times we say, "Hey, can I still do this and be a Christian?" "Can I get away with that and still go to heaven?" How about reasoning like, "How can my present situation, even suffering, relational difficulty, loss, whatever it is, impact an unbelieving world as they watch me go through it?"

And there's three things in regard to this that he's concerned with. First of all, that it be done without personal embarrassment. Notice, he says, 'that in nothing I shall be ashamed'. Shame is what prevents us from doing right, doesn't it? Shame is what prevents us from speaking up. We know we should, but there's embarrassment. We're ashamed of what the other person will think. Shame keeps us spiritually impotent. We blend in with the crowd. The most common fear, by the way, that people have about being public about their Christian faith -- guess what it is? The fear of rejection. We can understand that. Nobody likes to be the oddball out. People want to blend in, even if they say, 'I'm an individual!' they want to make sure they've got about five or ten other individuals that agree with them in their group.

The Billy Graham organization at their crusade in Detroit, Michigan asked the people who were coming to counsel the young believers, the Christians, this question, "What is your greatest hindrance to witnessing?" 9% said they were too busy to remember to do it, 28% felt the lack of real information to share (I don't know what I'm going to say if they ask me questions), 12% said their lives weren't what they should be, but the largest group, 51% said it was the fear of how the other person would react. I understand that. I've been embarrassed, I've been shamed before in a crowd. When I was first saved and I was working at Art Adam's Chevron gas station, pumping gas in Southern California, I was a brand-new believer and the guy that I worked with, he was my supervisor, was a bold, bristly guy named Angus MacIntosh. With a name like that, I guess you grow up that way. Well, this bold unbeliever and me, this little wimpering believer, wanted to confront (and I was so scared to do it). And that's Paul's concern, that's part of it, that his witness would be without shame, without embarrassment.

Notice the next phrase, he wants it to be with the proper expression: "that with all boldness as always so now". The word boldness means 'freedom of speech'; it's the direct opposite of embarrassment, of shame. The Amplified Bible puts it this way: "That I shall not disgrace myself nor be put to shame in anything, but that with the utmost freedom of speech and unfailing courage." You see, Paul didn't want to back down. He didn't want to chicken out like I did with Angus MacIntosh. He didn't want to be ashamed, but rather, as always, bold in this present situation. How do we do that? It's one thing to toss that out and say, 'You know, we ought to be bold in our witness!' Yeah, OK, how? We want to know that answer, don't we? Here it is, this is how you get bold: Acts 4 "And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and they spoke the word of God with boldness". Our boldness in our witness before the world is directly related to our being filled with the Holy Spirit. Praying for it, waiting on Him, trusting on Him, being controlled by Him. And that is part of Paul's confidence back in verse 19: as long as the Holy Spirit keeps lavishly supplying whatever I need, I'm going to be alright. And part of that is the filling of the Holy Spirit. Now, we've all been in situations where we're intimidated. It's an angry group or a hostile person we're sharing with, and the tendency isn't to be bold, it's to back down. That's Paul's greatest fear: is that he'd be ashamed, instead of standing up for the truth.

I always think of Polycarp when I think of giving a good witness. Polycarp died in 167 A.D. He was an early church leader, a father of the faith. When he was 86, he was arrested. His executioners looked at him and said, 'Polycarp, you can still be saved. You don't have to die. All you need to do is deny Christ. Just do it -- it'll take a second, and we'll release you. Just say it right here, just recant -- briefly -- but it will be over.' And Polycarp looked at them and said, 'For 86 years I have served Him, He has done me no wrong, how can I blaspheme my King who has saved me?" And they killed him.

We often wonder, 'Wow, if I was ever arrested would I have enough strength and boldness?' I think God will give you what you need at the time you need it. And that is what made Paul confident and Paul was concerned that he would do that toward the end.

Finally, the third part of being concerned about his witness is that it been done with passionate exaltation. Notice the last phrase, "that Christ will be magnified in my body whether by life or by death." Now listen very carefully, this is the central thought of the verse. Paul's earnest expectation, the reason Paul's head is stretched out gazing at what is coming so intently -- he is gazing at the glory of Christ. He wants more than anything else in his life, Jesus Christ to be glorified, to be magnified. How? By his body, he says. "That Christ will be magnified in my body." You see, Paul saw his body as the vehicle, the means, the instrument to glorify Jesus Christ. The way for God to get His message to an unbelieving world was through his mouth, his feet, his hands. He would glorify God through his body. That's why in Romans 12, it says, "Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God." That's why, in Romans 6, Paul said: "Present the members of your bodies as instruments of righteousness to God." That's why in 1 Corinthians 6, he says, "your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit". These bodies are used to convey the life of Christ and to glorify God to the world.

Let me get practical. What that means is: whatever you do, whatever your occupation is, whatever your hobbies are, whatever your friendships and relationships are about, all of them could be used to point people to Christ. You could sit down and creatively think and ask, 'How could this hobby, this desire, this love, this passion, this occupation, be used to get the message out?' And pray about that and watch how God can creatively use all of that to point to Him.

Now before we move on, I want to share something about that. Bach, the composer, was a believer who believed that everything in life should point to glorify Christ. Even his music. This is what he said, "All music should have no other end and aim than the glory of God and the soul's refreshment." That's what he said and that's how he lived. At the beginning of every composition that he was writing musically, he wrote the initials J.J. -- Jesus Juve which means, 'Jesus help me'. At the end of all of his compositions, he wrote the initials S.D.G. Solo Dei Gratia, which translated means 'to God alone be the praise.' On everything he wrote -- it's all to God give glory.

And so that's Paul's main concern, is that his witness would be giving God the glory. By the way, notice the words and we skipped over them but we should notice them, "that Christ will be magnified". That's an interesting way to put it. 'Magnified'. Megaluno is the Greek word -- to make large or to make great. I want to make Christ great. How do you make the greatest person who has ever lived any greater? Especially in your body? How do you magnify Christ? Let me give you an example: the stars in the universe. They're huge, right? They're large. Some of them are a thousand million miles in diameter. That's 1200 times the size of our sun. Now, our sun, 93 million miles away from the earth, can crank out a lot of heat. So, imagine stars that big out there somewhere. Well, they're out there somewhere -- but we can't really see them unless we get a telescope, a lens that would bring them closer, that would magnify them. And that's how Jesus is to most people in the world. He's some misty, dusty historical figure that if he ever lived, lived 20 centuries ago. That's how people view Him. And they'll never see Him unless your life becomes the telescope, the lens.

As they watch you and I going through life, especially life's trials, life's prisons. Relational difficulties. Work difficulties. And they watch how you act, and what you say, and how you live -- Christ is suddenly seen, He's magnified. 'Oh, I get it! That's what it's supposed to be like!' That's how Christ can be magnified in our body -- He looks bigger. So, if you want to face the future with joyful confidence like Paul, first of all, be confident in the future deliverance. God has a plan, God's going to work it out. Make sure you've got that network of praying believers and you're tapped into the Holy Spirit's resources -- that will give you confidence.

The second, that you're concerned about your future witness. In other words, you're looking for ways to exalt Jesus Christ right now in your situation, making your body the lens, the telescope.

Third, Paul was committed to the future plan. Verse 21, there's the motto: "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain." Talk about a slogan! In fact, I wonder if Paul didn't say, 'Hey, Timothy! When I finally do croak, I'd like that put on my tombstone- for me to live is Christ, to die is gain.'

I heard about a dentist, and on his tombstone he had inscribed: 'Here lies Doctor John Smith, filling his last cavitiy.' Think about that. It's not true of just dentists, everyone of us in this room sitting here, if the Lord tarries, will be filling a last cavity somewhere on the earth's surface. Knowing then our own mortality, what one motto will you face the future with? How would you fill in these blanks? For me to live is ___ - what would you put there, honestly? Now don't say it out loud. But, I mean, if you were to be brutally honest -- what sums up your life, what do you think about when you've got alone time? For me to live is ____. Let's say you put wealth there; then you can't say to die is gain. It would have to be, "For me to live is wealth and to die is loss." Because you lose it all. If you say, "For me to live is fame or prestige or power of personal comfort or physique"... then it's a sad, sad end. It's not gain. The only thing that works to have the second part say 'gain' when I die, is Christ. And so Paul said, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain."

Now, Paul didn't know where he was going whether by life or by death. We live in a goal-oriented culture. Nothing wrong with that, but you know we have our goals and we put our little pictures on our refrigerators -- that's my goal, that's my dream, my five-year plan. What if you were to sit in a Roman prison and say, "Paul, what's your five-year plan?" He'd go, "What?!" "What're you gonna be in five years?" "I don't know if I'm going to be alive in five years, but as long as I do live, I'll tell you what, one thing sums it up- Jesus Christ." "What if you die?" "Better! Gain!"

The more I read Paul's life, this guy had a one-track mind. I was counting up how many times he mentions Jesus Christ in Philippians -- tons! This guy is just monolithic -- Jesus Christ. It's like the kid who went to Sunday School. First time in this new church and afterwards, mom said, 'How was Sunday School? What'd you learn and what's the teacher like?' And he said, 'I can't remember the lesson but the teacher must have been Jesus' grandmother, 'cuz she couldn't talk about anybody else!" I'll tell you what, being around Paul -- that's all he wanted to talk about is Jesus Christ. Interesting, because he was one time the enemy of Jesus Christ until the Damascus road. So utterly changed was he, that Jesus was the object. So, I'm committed to God's future plan. If I live, I'm going to serve Christ. If I die, gain. Another translation: "It'll be better yet". We're puzzled by that. Our culture doesn't allow for that kind of thinking. In our culture, we view life and hold on to it so tenaciously that we say, 'Just one more year, one more month, one more day.' Because, for many of us, to live isn't just Christ.

It's like the three guys, they all died at the same time in an automobile accident and they were taken up to heaven immediately and first day it was orientation. And they're sitting there in orientation in heaven and they're asked a question by the angel in charge. He said, "OK, you guys, when your friends and family are all around you, you're lying in the casket, your body's there in the box, and your friends are crying and your family's crying, what one thing do you want people to say about you?"

So they thought about it and the first guy said, "I'd like them to say I was a terrific doctor and a great family man." Second guy said, "I think I'd like them to say I was a devoted husband and a great schoolteacher who influenced kids for the future." The third guy looked at both of his friends and said, "I'll tell you what. I think I'd like to hear them say -- 'Look, he's moving!'" That's because we don't understand death in the Christian sense. It's like the worst that can happen -- 'oh no! I want to still be alive!' But think about it, part of the work of God in your life is to give you a glorified body, a new body. That can't happen until you die. The work of God won't be finished until death. Death simply sweetens the pie for the believer. For the Christian who dies, though we do weep, and I'm not trying to minimize that -- I weep when my loved ones die. I don't weep for them if they're believers though -- I weep for me because I'll miss them. I never say, 'that's so sad, he's in heaven'. What? I think the most accurate thing to say about a believer isn't 'he died', but 'he moved, he graduated -- he got there first!' By the time you and I get there, they'll have the place wired -- they'll show you around! Paul said to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. To die is gain.

I've watched people die in hospitals, at home. I've watched believers and sadly, I've watched unbelievers die. I've heard them take their last breath. And I've looked at believers -- some of them have taken a real painful breath at the end. And I think, 'that's the last' because the next breath they take in eternity must be something like 'wow! Look at this place! Awesome!' Do you understand now why Paul when he faced the Ephesian elders in Acts chapter 20, he looked at them and he said, "Everywhere I go, the Holy Spirit testifies that chains and tribulation await me but none of these things move me neither do I count my own life dear to myself that I might finish my race with joy." He does it right here, looking to the future with joy. Why? Because for him to live is Christ and that's why death is gain. You know, if you don't love Jesus Christ, you can't say 'to die is gain'. In fact, why even think about going to heaven? If you don't want anything to do with Jesus Christ on earth right now why would you ever want to be forever with Him in heaven? If you want nothing to do with that One, it would be miserable to be with Him forever -- and He'll honor the request, if that's your choice. But for me to live is Christ, to die is gain. That's why we always give people a choice, many times at our services. Why? Because the choices we make now determine our eternity. That's just the way God did it. That's why we tell people, we compel them to come to Christ. Not to come to religion, not 'for me to live is church' or 'for me to live is Christianity' but 'for me to live is Jesus Christ personal.' How about it? Have you done that personally? Have you made Jesus more than just a Sunday morning experience? Is He real to you? Are you sure that if you were to die, you'd be in heaven? Don't you want to make sure?