Study Questions - Series in Philippians [10]

Date: September 4, 2005
Passage: Philippians 3: 4-11
Message: Trash and Treasure
Series in Philippians [10]

Many testimonies emphasise how bad we were before we became a Christian and how Christ changed us. Paul’s testimony was just the opposite. He tells us how good he was before he came to Christ. However he knew that even his best was worthless when it came to making him right with God.
Share something of your testimony? How similar or dis-similar is it to Paul?

“One of the hardest things in life is to be clear and focused about something. The second hardest thing is to stay clear and focused about it…… Within every one of us, there is a pull from CLARITY to FUZZINESS or CONFUSION.”
Discuss. Give example from your own life.

Erwin McManus has said, “Most places have lost the essence of what it means to be a church.”
The church has been given a mission. There’s really no confusion about what we should be doing. But over time, there is a drift in all of us from –
passion to apathy,
from sacrifice to comfort,
from service to selfishness.
Discuss.

Read v7
What sorts of things can be profitable for us, but loss for Christ?

Read v8-11
…..be found in him
Discuss what that means
See also Colossians 1:14-17

…..I want to know Christ
“The thing that is of surpassing worth is not becoming an EXPERT on God, but KNOWING God!
The Church is not dying from a lack of experts today, it is dying from a lack of people who KNOW God!”
Discuss

The reason Paul could live the way he lived, and challenge us to trust God with boldness and courage was because he knew Christ. Not in a distant, formal, ‘expert’ kind of way, but personally and intimately.
In a day of busy, professionalism how can we ‘know’ Jesus like that?