{"id":10097,"date":"2022-03-24T05:37:09","date_gmt":"2022-03-24T10:37:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-philippians-2\/"},"modified":"2022-03-23T10:54:03","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T15:54:03","slug":"devotional-on-philippians-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/devotional-on-philippians-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Devotional on Philippians"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_16157\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-16157\" style=\"width: 960px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-16157\" src=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" srcset=\"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641-1024x768.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641-768x576.jpg 768w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/11\/P7259641.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-16157\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">2014 &#8211; dunes south of Florence, OR<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Thank God for spiritual heroes<\/p>\n<p>Philippians 2: Give him a grand welcome, a joyful embrace!<\/p>\n<p>When the church at Philippi heard about Paul\u2019s imprisonment they wanted to do something tangible to help him. They decided to send one of their own, a man named Epaphroditus, to Paul, likely carrying an offering for him. The arrival of this good man warmed Paul\u2019s heart, greatly encouraging him. Then, to his dismay Epaphroditus became ill, sick enough to die. Although it was touch and go for a while Epaphroditus recovered completely. Now, Paul&#8217;s writing a letter to the Philippian church and he intends to have Epaphroditus deliver it, returning home. The Apostle tells them that Epaphroditus is a real hero, a great man of God. He urges them to give him a hero\u2019s welcome, telling them \u201cpeople like him deserve the best you can give.\u201d As I read about Epaphroditus today I\u2019m reminded of some spiritual giants I\u2019ve known in my life. A few of them are well known, at least in some circles. They\u2019ve received a fair amount of deserved recognition. Several, though, never made it to the big stage. In my case, they&#8217;re some pastors I\u2019ve known, either during my growing up years or as co-workers in the Kingdom. Some of these good people never pastored large churches and as far as I know never received any denominational rewards. Still, they\u2019ve encouraged me and I\u2019ve seen in them the heart of Jesus for their people. Today I remember a pastor who took time to sit down with a boy to explain sanctification in a way he could begin to grasp. I also remember a pastor who always had a smile on his face and a kind word to say to others even though he was going through some hard times. These are spiritual heroes who deserve a \u201cgrand welcome, a joyful embrace!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Take Away: Thank God for the spiritual heroes who have influenced your life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thank God for spiritual heroes Philippians 2: Give him a grand welcome, a joyful embrace! When the church at Philippi heard about Paul\u2019s imprisonment they wanted to do something tangible to help him. They decided to send one of their own, a man named Epaphroditus, to Paul, likely carrying an offering for him. The arrival [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1525,1428],"tags":[53,1329,308,546],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10097"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10097"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10097\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16182,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10097\/revisions\/16182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/localhost\/pastorscott\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}