A Life Worthy

…but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. (Philippians 3:12).

He saved you for a purpose.

Don’t get me wrong.  He saved you because he loves you.  If you never did a single useful thing after accepting his grace, you would still be Heaven-bound.

But where’s the adventure in that?

The God of the Universe has a job for you.  He has taken hold of you for a reason.  

What reason?

Life.  Abundant, fulfilling, valuable, useful, tremendous life.

Before Christ, you existed.  Your heart beat, the breath came and went, your organs squelched and gushed and performed various internal activities.

But you weren’t alive.

Then Jesus took hold of you.  You died, and you rose.

And you live.  For him.

What will living for him look like today?  I have no idea–that’s between you and your Lord.  Some of you will live for him today by swinging a hammer, teaching a child, closing a deal, mopping a floor, driving a car, writing a blog, fighting disease from the inside. You will live for him in a supermarket, or a car dealership, or a theater, or a hospital bed.

But you will live for him.  And that life will matter.  That is why Christ Jesus took hold of you.

Press on, Beloved.

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection of the dead. (Philippians 3:11).

I can’t understand it.

I certainly can’t explain it.

But I know it.

One day we will be…finished.

Complete

Whole

Free

The chains will fall away

and we will rise.

I don’t know when.

I don’t know how.

But I know.

Walk in that knowledge, Beloved of God.

I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings… (Philippians 3:10).

Frankly, I know very little about sharing in Christ’s sufferings.  Up to this point, my walk with God has been relatively smooth, and my pain has been confined to the internal struggle-with-sin-and-try-to-live-for-God-while-living-in-a-broken-world variety.  I have not suffered for my Lord; I have certainly not suffered like my Lord.

I’m not sure I can say that I want to.  

Sorry…did that disappoint you?

I mean, I want to be a man of God, but the cost…is…sobering.  If the day comes that I’m called upon to share in His sufferings, I hope I’m up to the task.

That’s not to say I don’t know a little bit about the fellowship of suffering.  I have shared tears and pain and death and heartache and loss and I hate it.  I hate death.  I hate pain.  I hate loss.  I hate the powerless feeling that comes with sitting at the bedside of a dear friend and watching him struggle with the knowledge that his body doesn’t work right and might never work right again.  I hate asking how he’s feeling after having his veins scorched with chemo and his cells fried with radiation.

And yet (Thank God, there’s an “And yet”)

And yet…I have never been closer to my friend than I have been these last weeks.  I have never seen him stronger, or more vulnerable, or more real.

I have never seen him reflect Christ more clearly than he does right now.

What about you, Beloved?  Have you known the fellowship of suffering? IF you haven’t, you will.  I’m sorry for you.

And glad.

Happy Wednesday, Beloved.

I want to know Christ… (Philippians 3:10).

Because he’s a person, you know.  

Not an idea

a philosophy

a religion

an icon

a subject

a set of writings to study and memorize.

He’s a person, like you and me.

OK…not like you and me…but he is a person.

The perfect model of all personage.

And like any person, he wants to know and be known.

To love and be loved.

He wants relationship.

With you.

I know, right?  But make no mistake, he does.

Because you are his Beloved.

Happy Monday.

…that I may gain Christ and be found in him… (Philippians 3:8-9).

To be found in him…

I’m not entirely sure what that means.

In Colossians, Paul says that our lives are now hidden with Christ in God.  Here he says that we may be found in Christ.  How does that work?  Is Paul simply being poetic, when he really means that we will be with him?

Maybe…but I doubt it.

We often say that Christ is in us, that we have “asked Jesus into our hearts.”  And yet we are also in him.  Frankly, that’s more than this little brain of mine can manage.  Perhaps you can explain it to me, Beloved.

I think I will spend the rest of my life wondering what that line means.

And the rest of eternity finding out.