Tony Evans - Pursuing Your Heavenly Citizenship (05/27/2017)
Paul reminds the Philippians that their true citizenship is in heaven, not on earth. This eternal perspective motivates believers to press on toward spiritual maturity and God's purpose, leaving the past behind and living each day in light of Christ's imminent return.
You Are a Citizen of Heaven
I want to talk to you today about your true citizenship. Verse 20 says, "your citizenship is in heaven." Your citizenship is in heaven. God wants you to be reminded over and over and over again: this is not home. He wants you and me to be reminded over and over again that this short time you are on this planet is not your permanent location, and He doesn't want you to either view it or treat it that way.
Colossians chapter 1, verse 13, says that you and I have been transferred out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of His dear Son. You have been relocated. If you have come to faith in Jesus Christ, you are a citizen in heaven on temporary assignment on earth. If you missed that—as we will see in a moment—you missed something big, huge. If I can get you to switch it today, if I can get you and me and us to understand that we live up there, we merely work down here, a whole lot will change in your life and in mine.
The Mindset of Pressing On
Paul writes to these Philippian believers having established that they're citizens, and he wants them to know, "I have not already attained it or have become perfect" (verse 12). Paul says in everyday English, "I have not arrived." Now wait a minute. Here's the most spiritual, biblical, Holy Spirit-filled man in the New Testament. And the most spiritual, Spirit-filled, Holy Ghost-led man in the New Testament said, "I have not yet arrived." So if the most spiritual, most godly, most talented Christian man in the New Testament says he has not arrived, guess where you and I are.
What Paul is saying is, "I still have a ways to go. I still have not reached the point of spiritual maturity and accomplishing the divine purpose that I was put here for. I have not gotten there yet." So why is he telling us that? Notice what he says in verse 12, in the middle of the verse: "I press on." Notice what he says in verse 14: "I press on." The "press" means to push on. He wasn't gliding through the Christian life.
Let me explain something. Salvation is free. You get saved for free because the price has already been paid by the finished work of Jesus Christ, offering salvation free of charge to anyone who comes to Him by faith to receive it. Salvation is free. Spiritual development is not. You will never find your divine purpose. You will never grow up to be a spiritual adult by gliding. You must press. In other words, it must be a determined decision to prioritize your spiritual growth and experiencing God's purpose for your life. If you ever want to have it, it won't just happen. So he says, "I press on. I prioritize the spiritual."
Forgetting What Lies Behind
Why? Remember, Paul is a citizen of heaven. Now, in order for that to happen, notice what he tells you and me. Hold on to your seatbelt, because he says, "this one thing I do" (verse 13): "forgetting what lies behind, reaching forward to what lies ahead." He says if you're ever going to get to tomorrow, you've got to let yesterday go. Forgetting those things that are behind. Many a Christian is crippled by yesterday.
All of us have a yesterday, and there are three things in most of our yesterdays. One, they are the good things that we're proud of: the great accomplishments we've made, the things that we positively have done that benefit us and benefit others. We can look back and say, "That's some good stuff back there yesterday." But if you, like most of us, there's some stuff you are ashamed of back there yesterday. So yesterday involves the good, it involves the bad, and it involves the downright ugly.
But Paul said, "If I'm ever going to achieve the purpose for which God created and saved me, and if I'm ever going to achieve the purpose for my life for why He left me here, I have got to let yesterday go. You've got to press on to tomorrow." He says, "I forget those things which are behind, and the way I do that is my pursuit of what is in front of me." Yesterday doesn't have to define your tomorrow. Use your yesterday as a rear view mirror that you peek in every now and then, but live your life in the windshield of where you are going in your pursuit of Jesus Christ. And you must press on.
Why You Must Press On
Why? Because you are a citizen of heaven; you're not a slave of earth. Paul had some great things in yesterday because he sat at the feet of Gamaliel. He was a learned man. The Bible talks about his education, his knowledge, his achievements, the greatness of how he climbed the Pharisaic ladder. He had some things to be proud of from yesterday. Oh, but he had some things to be ashamed of from yesterday, because he used to kill Christians for a living. He used to murder. We're talking about a murderer, somebody who slew people who named the name of Jesus Christ. And he never forgot that that happened.
But if he were to live with the fact that that is part of his yesterday, he would have never become the great apostle of God that he became. He had to overcome yesterday through his pursuit of Jesus Christ today. And so I want to challenge you today to not let the devil do a play-action on you. He wants to fake you out to make you think you are chained to yesterday, that you can't overcome yesterday, that yesterday owns you.
If he can get you to believe it enough, act on it enough, move on it enough, he will throw a pass downfield to cause you to miss out on God's purpose for your life because he played a play-action pass on you. He duped you into thinking that you're defined by your yesterday. He says, "forgetting those things which are behind, I press. I keep moving forward, I keep pursuing, I keep pushing forward because I want to become mature in Christ and I want to complete what God laid hold on me for."
Understanding Your Divine Purpose
What does he mean? He means the purpose. You have a purpose. If you're still here, God's not finished. Now if you're still here, that means He has a purpose for your life and He is not finished. That's why Paul wants you to know you're not citizens of time; you're citizens of eternity. He wants to give you, He wants to change your mindset. And if I can help you see how tiny time is compared to how long eternity is, it will change what you prioritize. Because the only reason we prioritize time is we make it longer than it really is.
God wants us to have the proper view of eternity so that we maximize time. Your view of eternity affects time. Your view of time affects eternity. So He does not want you to view yourself as a citizen of earth but as a visitor of earth, and to press in light of eternity. Press by making it the priority over time. And if you do that, everything changes in time.
You know why Israel never got to the Promised Land? They kept looking back. They lost sight of where God wanted to take them. They kept looking back and never went anywhere. Many of us today are being held hostage by yesterday because we won't press on through the wilderness until God breaks us through to the Promised Land of spiritual maturity and divine purpose. And you have to press because you've got an enemy out there that doesn't want you to experience it.
Choosing Your Company
You've got an enemy out there that doesn't want Christ to become real to you deep in you, to transform you and to take you to the purpose He has for you. Yes, learn from yesterday, but you can't live in yesterday if you're gonna move forward to tomorrow. So he says that your purpose must be secured; it must be fixed by moving forward in pursuit of your spiritual maturity and your divine purpose.
Well, how do you do that? How do you do that? Because it's hard to press when you have something pressing against you. You may have people pressing against you. You may have circumstances pressing against you, and you want to press through. Verse 15 says, "and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you." In other words, if you ain't getting this, God's gonna have to help you.
If you don't get this—that the eternal must be placed above the temporal because you are citizens of heaven—he says God has got to show you this. Because until you see it, you won't act on it. But if I can get you and me to see that eternity is more important than time, you will begin to maximize time and be ready for eternity.
He says in verse 17, "Brethren, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us. For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ, whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things."
He says if you want to pursue, you better watch out who you're hanging out with. Every parent here today should be concerned about your children's friends—who they are hanging out with. Well, God is a Father, and He's concerned about who His kids hang out with. Because a lot of us are messed up because of our posse. How are you gonna be trying to save your marriage and talking to your girlfriend who's trying to get a divorce from hers?
How are you going to try to grow and become a mature Christian, but your posse are carnal Christians all day and all the time? You can tell me you want to be a good parent all day long, but if you don't care who your kids hang out with, you're not that great a parent. Paul says, "follow my example and the rest of us who are walking this way."
If you don't have a spiritual group of people in your life who share your spiritual values, who are pursuing God... They just connect with you because of the career, they connect with you because of the money, they connect with you because of the prestige, but have no heart for God. He says, and you know them because here it is—you won't like it, but here it is—it says they "set their minds on earthly things."
Living in Light of Eternity
In other words, they don't see the spiritual side of things. They don't see God's point of view. Heaven is not their focus, so all they're going to give you is more earth. They're going to give you more time and more temporal things. They're not going to give you more eternal things. Why? Because they are earth-bound. And he's talking about earth-bound Christians who he calls "enemies of the cross." You can be a Christian and an enemy of the cross because you have diminished the citizenship up there for the temporal down here.
I'm trying to explain that if you make time more important than eternity, you lose out on both. But if you make eternity more important than this little teeny minute that you and I are here called "time," eternity exploses and time is improved. Because now you're living for the purpose for which you've been redeemed. It's amazing to me how many Christians are offended when spiritual people give them spiritual perspective, and they're just offended. But that's the only perspective God will honor.
He will never honor an earth view that contradicts a heaven view, no matter how educated, how rich, how fancy the person is giving you the data. We've been duped by earth, so we think earth folk must know because they got a little something behind their name or something in the bank. But when it comes to living your life, unless it is God's point of view, there will be no God-assistance to you, even if you pray about it. He says, "follow our example and not those who are earth-bound who are working against the plan of God." Attach yourself to a person pursuing maturity and purpose.
Awaiting Your Savior
And then he comes and he tells you again in verse 20: "For our citizenship is in heaven." Ah, your citizenship—that is the country to which you belong. It's not here. It's not here. You were not redeemed for here. You were redeemed while here, but you weren't redeemed *for* here. You were redeemed *for* there while being here. And God expects you to bring heaven's point of view into earth's decisions, into earth's priorities. And you can't change why you didn't do it yesterday, last week, last month, last year. So, forgetting those things which are behind, it's time to get going now. Because tick-tock, tick-tock, the clock is moving. He says you are citizens of heaven, folks.
Your 80, 90, 75 years here is temporary. You are citizens of heaven. Your future is not here; this is not your future. And then he tells you about your perspective, because he says, "from which we also eagerly await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ." This is called the imminent return of Christ. Two thousand years ago—2000 years ago—Paul was looking for the return of Jesus. See, this is 2000 years old now, over 2000 years. He says, "we are looking for eagerly... I'm excited, I'm anticipating, I can't wait for the return of Jesus Christ."
It's called the imminent return of Christ, meaning He can come at any moment. Now that's good news and bad news. Good news is He's coming. Bad news is we don't know when. So he wants us to live our lives as though it could be any time. So he says, "I'm eagerly looking for the return of Christ." Why? Because he's a heavenly citizen. Now we are to live in anticipation that He could come at any moment.
First John 3, verse 2, says that we are purified by anticipating His coming. But He might decide to bring you to Him first, to transition you from earth to heaven, from time to eternity. But either way, a meeting is going to occur. Whether He comes to you or brings you to Him to the big house, He says, "I want you to be ready for the time we connect, and I want you to live each day in light of that reality because it could be today."
The Final Motivation
So let me ask you a question: if Jesus Christ called you today or if He returned today, would you be excited? Or would you say, "I wish I had more time. I wish I had another day, week, month, year"? I don't know when He's coming. All I know is you have today. You've got now, and the nows add up. And he says if I can get you to focus on heaven and make heaven bigger than time—because your citizenship is up there, you're not a citizen down here—it will change everything.
As Titus chapter 2, verse 13, says: "looking for the blessed hope." And the blessed hope, he says, will conform your body with His glory. He's going to change you. Second Corinthians 5, verses 1 to 5, says since we have this treasure in earthen vessels, He's going to change you. You'll still be you, but He's going to remake your frame, your body. That's why He makes this body break down when it's time to transition to heaven, so He makes it break down so bad that we want to transition to heaven so that He can change it into the glorified body.
Now I'm not being morbid. God wants us to live. He wants us to maximize our life. He wants us to live each day, but as a citizen of heaven, not as a duped person on earth.
Knowing Your Father is Watching
There was a goof-off on a football field. He was a goof-off. He didn't really play hard; he was just kind of on the team. But he didn't do much, just kind of there. So he hardly got to play because he wasn't really committed. Then they came to the last game of the season. He was a running back, like the third or fourth guy down, so he never got to play because he never practiced hard, he never worked hard.
But on this particular day, all the other guys in front of him got hurt. So the coach had no choice but to put him in the game. They put him in the game, and the boy ran like a wild man. He was running around people, jumping over people, overpowering people. The boy put on a show. At the end of the game, the coach called him to the office and said, "Now you've been playing around all year long. You've been fooling around, just messing up and doing a little bit here, a little bit there, but not really taking this thing seriously. And today we put you out on the field and you showed off. What got into you today?"
Tears welled up in the little boy's eyes and began to flow down his cheeks. He said, "Coach, two days ago my father died. Coach, my father was blind. So this is the first time he's ever gotten to see me play." See, when you know Daddy is watching, when you know your Heavenly Father is looking, when you know God up there is staring to see how you perform, it takes you off of living a little bit here and a little bit there, shucking and jiving and playing around. Now you want to get serious because you know Daddy is looking.
Your Heavenly Father is watching to give you a glorious entrance into heaven and to give you purpose and meaning on earth. And the good news is, He's willing to start you from where you are today. Forgetting those things which are behind, press on.