Press On: Choosing the Right Finish Line

``The last thing is this, we waste our lives by quitting too soon. Look at verse 21. Hang on with me. Verse 21, here's where we'll wrap up. It says, Jesus will bring everything under his control. He will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body. Remember the language Paul used to talk about himself, not that I've already obtained. Hey. Yeah. I haven't taken ahold of this yet. That's how he talked about himself. That's how he talks about us. How does he talk about Jesus? He will. He will bring everything under his control. He will transform our lowly bodies. It's a statement of prophetic fact. It will happen. [01:11:58] (45 seconds)  #HeWillTransformUs

I heard one guy say it this way, for the Christian, because of Jesus Christ, if you don't quit, you win. If you don't quit, you win. You cross that finish line. If you don't quit. Why? Because you're so great? Because you've checked all the boxes off? No. Because Jesus did that, and he will do that with all things. We're gonna sing a song called holy forever, and it talks about the name of Jesus and the person of Jesus being above all thrones and positions and dominions over everything. Did you know this is the finish line? This is the reality that Jesus has already secured the victory. [01:12:56] (46 seconds)  #DontQuitYouWin

And if we're gonna win this race, if we're gonna get to the finish line, we can't look back, we can't look around. We have to have our eyes fixated forward. And we strain. We press on like we're on a hunt for that. Listen, friends, this will take work. We've said it many times, this kind of language, press on, work out your own salvation, we're like, I thought it was grace. And and the reality is the Christian life and this Christian race that we're all running in, it's not opposed to effort. It's just opposed to earning. So this will require effort to focus forward in your life. What are you looking back on? [01:06:41] (39 seconds)  #EyesForwardPressOn

He memorized the first five books of the Old Testament. If anybody could claim spiritual arrival, it was Paul. And yet even Paul says, hey. Not that I have already obtained this. I have not arrived, which just brief sidebar, be leery of any spiritual leader who acts like who proclaims that they have arrived. I I don't just mean pastors. Like, people around you who claim to be spiritually mature people, if they act as if they've already arrived, maybe don't just be leery, maybe run away from those people. [00:58:07] (38 seconds)  #DontClaimSpiritualArrival

And without vision, people don't just perish, they cherish. And Paul's saying, hey, don't live stuck, controlled by past failures or successes. Christ is ahead. Heaven is ahead. Move forward to what is ahead. And that's the language specifically uses this to press on, to strain forward. That that language specifically in the original language is this idea of going on a hunt. I think sometimes we say like, press hey, I'm pressing on. We're just like, hey, I'm surviving. I'm hoping for good vibes. That's not the language of pressing on that Paul uses twice in this passage. That's not the language of straining forward. It's a language of I'm on a hunt. I have intense focus forward movement. [01:04:56] (49 seconds)  #OnTheHuntForChrist

And the reality is Paul is saying, hey, no, there's our citizenship in heaven. That Revelation says there will be every tribe, every tongue, every nation wrapped around the glory of Christ. And you want to start running with people now who will be there with you then. Paul says, hey, there's examples to imitate, and there's enemies of the cross of Christ. He contrasts those two things. He says, enemies of the cross of Christ, their god is their belly. Their mind is set, their finish line is set on earthly things. Tim, don't we wanna reach those people? Amen, hallelujah. Paul says, I cry for those people. When was the last time you cried for your lost neighbor? [01:09:28] (46 seconds)  #RunWithEternalFamily

Finish and you'll win. Stay faithful and you win. Can I just tell you as a pastor, there's so many distracting things? There's so many ways I can look back and look around at what this church is doing and what this guy's doing over here and how this pastors and his subscriptions on YouTube and what he said and and who's following who. And as a there's a lot of pressure as we plan a budget, as we prepare sermons, as we counsel married couples, as we as we navigate. I have to put on six different hats a day. And sometimes and there's been seasons in my life where I go home and I'm like, maybe working a regular job at Costco and coming home and having a beer and watching SportsCenter is not that bad of a gig. Can I be honest in church today? [01:16:22] (53 seconds)  #FinishFaithfully

I have not arrived. And if that guy you watch on YouTube is saying the opposite, turn it off. Turn it off. That's not spiritual maturity. So Paul says, hey. How do you waste your life? You act as if you have already arrived. I I love this Mark Twain quote. This is a paraphrase, but he says, like, 14, my dad didn't know anything. At 21, I found out he learned a lot in seven years. There there's this idea, like, all know, like, immaturity is to think you know everything. [00:59:16] (38 seconds)  #IHaveNotArrived

And they said, hey. We we so appreciate, pastor. You're talking about having a healthy marriage and how so many I mean, the divorce rate in the Christian church is almost as high as the culture. And we got in this whole conversation about marriage, and they're in their seventies, and they're like, you know, we we've had our own fair share of struggles in our marriage, but we didn't give up and we didn't quit. And we kept going, and here we are today. And I was just like, that's that's amazing. Praise god. Thank you for sharing that with me. And they said, no. Tim, you don't understand. Like, we we wanted to quit. In fact, we we actually got a divorce, and we were divorced for nineteen years. But then God brought us back together. And praise God, they've been married for like a twenty year period after that. Amen? [01:14:26] (50 seconds)  #MarriageSecondChance

And you're you're running with the wrong people. You're not running with God's people. For some of you, you're not running with anybody. You're running alone. And we talk about getting a community and serving on a team and serving the city and getting with some other people and and hopping in a class at nine or 10:30, and you're just like, the all those things sound great. I met somebody the the other week. They've been coming to our church for three years, and and and they they don't know anybody. Now praise God, they were at a coffee shop getting to know somebody because they were aware that they hadn't arrived and they were taking those steps. But who are you running this race with? And are they pushing you towards Jesus, or are they pushing you to the past? [01:10:45] (40 seconds)  #WhoAreYouRunningWith

I I don't know if it's marriage for you. I don't know if it's a relationship. I don't know if it's the church of Jesus Christ for you and something called church hurt and deconstruction, and you're thinking about hopping out of this thing. I don't know if it's just your your personal relationship with with Jesus or your with your kids because they just don't ever seem to grasp it. I don't know what it is for you, but some of you today, I believe, are thinking about quitting. Now you would never say that out loud, but you're thinking about it. And it goes through your mind, and you're just kinda coasting in life. And this idea of on the hunt, pressing forward for Jesus Christ in his name, and love, live, and lead. You're like, Tim, can we just go to lunch? And you're just drifting, and you're thinking about hopping off the track. And Paul wants to say to you, hey. Don't give up. Jesus has already secured the victory. Just finish. [01:15:25] (57 seconds)  #DontQuitFinishTheRace

See, I think many pictures that I see painted and many imagery, many movies about heaven is this idea that's just me and Jesus running that race. Me and like, I'm sitting in Jesus' lap, like, can you tell me about the dinosaurs? I still don't get it. And that's how we picture heaven. It's just me and Jesus. And you know how, like, on your phone, it has that, like, neat little feature where you can, like, smudge out the people you don't want in the picture? Anybody with me? Yeah. You don't wanna raise your hand because you did that to some other people across the aisle, alright? that's how you picture heaven, you just smudge out all the annoying Christians that you don't like. [01:08:49] (40 seconds)  #HeavenIsCommunity

And I'm like, man, I just sometime you know, sometimes it's just like, is this working? Are we doing anything? Is this all for and and yet I had people come around me like, yes. Press on. Let's drive on together. Let me pick you up. Let's lock arms together. And AC Caswell picked me up. I don't think he did. But, yeah, praise God. Praise you. Yeah. But he did pick me up spiritually. Who do you have in your life who does that? [01:17:37] (41 seconds)  #LockArmsTogether

I actually don't stay up at night worrying that you will fail in 2026. What keeps me up at night as your pastor is worrying that you will succeed at things that will not matter in the end. It is worrying specifically in Phoenix, the fifth largest city in the country. You all most of you are living in the the heart of it all because you want the action. You're upwardly mobile. You're driven to succeed in life and to succeed in your career and your achievements and maybe to succeed in your friendships and your kids and your profile on social media, [00:42:11] (36 seconds)  #SuccessThatMatters

As I see the past redemptively, I'm letting it lead me forward to Christ, I'm pressing on. And I'm not getting distracted looking around next to me in comparison or looking back in pride or guilt and shame. Again, another great Olympic imagery is in the British Empire games in 1954, there was a guy named Roger Bannister and John Landy, they ran in what's known today as the Miracle Mile. And they were the first two guys to break the four minute mile barrier, and they were racing against one another. And what has become one of the most famous sports photographs in all of history is this photo of Landy who was leading looking back. [01:05:45] (45 seconds)  #RunForwardNotBack

Some of you, we talk about every single week in sermons, we talk about, like, sins. Right? We we name them like lust, anger, greed, gossip, even self righteousness. Right? And as a pastor, I mean, I try to invent new ways to talk about sin and and new lists and just thinking about you and, like, where are you struggling? And what do you where your background. Like, you grew up in church. Like, what's what's your struggle? What's your sin? And we tend to talk about all these these sins that we we struggle with. And yet, what about just distraction? What about success? [00:51:09] (42 seconds)  #GuardAgainstDistraction

our text today is telling us how we can waste our lives. Here's the first way you and I can waste our lives in this race called the Christian life. It is to pick the wrong finish line. To pick the wrong finish line. Look back at verse 12 with me. It Paul says, not that I have already obtained this. Verse 13, I do not consider that I've made it my own. What's he talking about? What's the this? What's the it? Well, remember last week, we left off this idea of the righteousness of Christ. [00:45:59] (35 seconds)  #PickTheRightFinishLine

If I if I just had what is that for you? What's your false summit? If I just had this in my career, if I just had this amount of money in my bank account, if we just paid off this debt, if we just got this car, if we just elevated to this stage of life, if we just had kids, if I just got married, what is that for you? Let me just tell you, that is a false finish line, a false summit. You will get there and still realize it is not enough. And as a pastor, I get to see people on their last day, on their deathbed literally, [00:56:01] (29 seconds)  #BewareFalseSummits

Because without a vision of that finish line, you can't go forward. I heard another guy say it this way, without vision, people cherish. People cherish the past if they don't know where they're going in the future. That some of us, our biggest problem is not looking back at our past failures, it's looking back at the glory days. For some of you, that's the way you view church. I remember this day when there's a 100 baptisms. I remember back in the day, we used to do things like this. I remember back in the day, this church planted so many churches. [01:04:20] (36 seconds)  #VisionLeadsForward

Some of you need counseling for that because every time you do remember your past, your past trauma, your past sins, your past failures, it devastates you. It prevents you from ever pressing on forward and straining for the goal in Christ Jesus in Christ Jesus. And so some of you need to remember redemptively, and yet you don't need to to wallow in that place. Some of us, it's remembering our past failures. I think that's typically how we view this. I forgetting what lies behind all my shame, all my sin, all my guilt. I'm gonna put that back here, and I'm gonna move on to bigger and better things. But for some of us, it's not remembering our past past failures. It's remembering our past achievements. [01:03:18] (42 seconds)  #RememberRedemptively