Philippians 3:12-16
Last week we discussed Paul’s famous statement in Philippians 3, “what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ.” There is an exchange that is essential for transformation; those things that were important, that made up my identity, my pride, my hope and strength, those things must become unimportant in comparison to my desire to know Jesus in all of His greatness. We have to lay down our righteousness to gain His, to lay down our plans to fulfill His, to acknowledge everything else in life as lesser so that He can be supreme as our “One Thing”. There is a divine discontent that we need to pray for. It is not enough to say that Jesus satisfies my soul, I have to also desire for nothing else to give me satisfaction so that I don’t drift from Him and become entangled by things that fade when I have been given the unfading love of God. I believe that this exchange is the secret to rejoicing; when Jesus is my everything, since He is unchanging, then He is my constant source of joy. I rejoice in being loved, rejoice in being chosen, rejoice in being saved; I rejoice in being transformed by His blood rather than my effort. It is not enough to attempt to add Jesus to life; we must exchange life as we know it for Jesus and trust Him to give us life in Him that is abundant. Today we are going to continue to look at Paul’s statements in Philippians 3, as we go further into letter I believe that he reveals to us the one reality that has made all of this possible. There is one truth that Paul believes and that he chases after with all of his heart. The race to attain that one truth means that everything else has to fall into place behind him; it’s not that he cuts everything else out of his life; it is that nothing in his life is allowed to compete with him for the prize or to become an obstacle on the track. He has made his exchange not because of what He hopes that Jesus will do for him but because he has come to see what Jesus has already done. I pray today that you and I will exchange everything in this life, not for future hope but to partake in the present reality of being fully loved by God.