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You might start reading from verse from verse 8 to get the connection.
They doubtless, and I count all things but lost for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but done, that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.
But I may know Him and the power of his resurrection.
And the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death, if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.
Not as though I had already attained either. We're already perfect. But I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended.
But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded.
And if in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you nevertheless.
Where do we have already attained? Let us walk by the same rule. Let us mind the same thing.
Brethren, be followers together of me, and mark them as walked, so as you have us for an example.
For many wars, of whom I've told you often, and I'll tell you even waiting, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.
Who then does destruction, whose God as their belly, and whose glory is in their shame, to mind earthly things?
Where our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Savior of the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our wild body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working, whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto himself.
The first two expressions of this verse and the first verse that we've read.
Our most important for importance for us to notice and I think it would be helpful perhaps.
To those who are younger to have just a word or two on this subject of righteousness, but.
First of all, the expression can be found.
In him, I believe that's the character of this.
Particular chapter to be found in him. Everything else is set aside to be found in him. That's in Christ. But he's now on high, and we learn elsewhere that our life is hid with Christ in God.
I know this is a wilderness epistle, but still the truth remains. Our life is his.
With Christ in God.
The.
Evil.
The disease that had gotten into.
This assembly.
Was true probably of all assemblies and is true today throughout the profession of Christianity, and that is attaching importance to the flesh.
Attaching importance to man.
And I believe that.
Here it isn't exactly a question of sins, but it's a question of righteousness.
Are we found in Him and in Him alone? Now this is a good subject, I believe, to consider for our dear young people, because.
Sometimes it takes years for the soul to get free and to see that they're found in Christ alone.
We're so used to attaching importance to self and to what we can do, and we apply it in the things of God.
In the 10th chapter of Romans we have the two righteousnesses mentioned.
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It might be well to notice these for a moment.
5th verse.
For Moses described with the righteousness which is of the law.
That the man that doeth those things shall live by them.
Now the righteousness which is of the law depends upon man.
This is not to be found in Him. As it says, you can't mix the two. They don't mix. If it's a question of righteousness, it either has to be that righteousness which depends on man.
Righteousness.
Or it has to be a righteousness that God himself gives us, a free gift, one of the two. We can't mix the two.
And so the apostle is putting it very plainly in our chapter when he says.
And be found in Him, in him not having our own righteousness.
Now if you'll notice that the man here, that the man that does these things shall live in them or by them. And so as long as a man lives and walks in righteousness before God, he would live.
But have you ever found a man like this?
And so the apostle outwardly manifested this.
I suppose as well as anybody ever could he kept all the ordinances.
But there was still something hidden inside of him that condemned him, and he knew it.
And that was that. His heart lusted. Men couldn't see that.
But still his righteousness would not be complete.
Unless.
This was eliminated.
And here we see a nature that's contrary to God, and there isn't any righteousness that can come from the first man. But now if you'll read the next verse in Romans 10. But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this wise.
Say not in thine heart who shall ascend into heaven, that is, to bring Christ down from above.
Or who shall descend into the deep, that is to bring up Christ again from the dead?
But what saith it? The Word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart. That is the Word of Faith which we preach. Let us thou shalt confess with thy mouth. The Lord Jesus shall believe in thine heart, that God has raised him from the dead. Thou shalt be saved for with the heart.
Man believeth unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
What the Scripture says, whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. So here we have then a righteousness in which we can be found in him. It's the righteousness of God.
It fits heaven, but we receive it through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, not through any works of the flesh.
Now in the 15th chapter of Genesis, you see Abraham, and God takes him out, as it were, on a starry night, and he tells him to look into the heavens.
And although Abraham had no child, God said to him as he looked at the stars. Can you count their number?
Well, of course he couldn't. So shall I seed be? It says he believed God and he counted it.
To him for righteousness.
Now we know later that he was tested in the 22nd chapter.
With the Son that God had given him, and he was told to offer him up.
And so he did.
That is he. He went about to do it.
And we have their substitution brought in. But still Abraham was willing to do what God said because he believed in the God of resurrection.
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And so he believed God, and that's the whole point here. We have here righteousness in which we can be found.
In Christ.
And it's entirely separate from any.
Human endeavor and we must never mix the two.
We might do well, beloved, to stress this word in a little farther.
The standing of the believer is in Christ now that cannot be touched.
For each one who belongs to Christ stands before God in all the perfection of his beloved Son.
There's not a stain there.
Nothing can be added to it nor taken from it that's outstanding.
Of course, our state varies according to chameleons and.
Keeping of short accounts before the law.
Well, this is a wonderful truth in him, found in him.
Our position.
And it's all based upon the work of another.
As we mentioned yesterday that the Lord Jesus has dealt, we might repeat that if you would permit it. The Lord Jesus has dealt definitely with the question of sin.
Definitely and eternally with the question of sin.
As its concerns, its root, and its principles belong, may we ever remember that it seems so very precious to my soul. But He has borne our sins in His own body on the tree.
And so the apostle goes on to speak of that.
That we being dead indeed unto sin.
Might live unto righteousness.
By whose stripes we've been healed.
And the apostle goes on, For we were indeed a sheep going astray.
But are now returned unto the shepherd and Bishop.
Of our souls, this is our portion, beloved.
In him.
Isn't that lovely? Kill that before he speaks of our being in Christ.
So beautifully that he says this about Christ, the one in whom we are found. He fell for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.
May we just we that word excellencies.
What a volume that opens to our souls as we view that Blessed One from deathly owns Manger to the Cross.
And into the glory excellences of the knowledge of Christ.
That's what led the apostle to count all things in this thing. But lost. And now the amazing. The wonderful.
Blessed thing is that in that one in whom we see all those excellencies.
The one in whom God now sees us.
In his presence.
Not in the old man, not in the old standing at all. That's all the spoils of and gone. Think of God looking down upon 4 creatures like you and me and seeing us in his beloved Son. Excellencies of the knowledge of Christ Jesus. And he says.
Martin, Lord, My Lord.
Well, it's just what Brother Lambin bought before us in the 10th of Romans. Thou shall confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus is really Jesus as Lord.
All the apostle on that one as Lord, when he met him on the road to the masters, he said, Who art thou, Lord?
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But you know, he never ceased to own that one as his Lord.
Was not only in that way that he was saved, but throughout his whole life he was owning that one, the authority of that man in the glory. And that's really what keeps us along the way. What a wonderful thing it is to have one like the Lord Jesus Christ.
To our surrender, our whole lives and lives.
Our whole pathway down here.
Into his blessed hands Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord. And such was the effect of that knowledge of that blessed one, that things down here in this world became very cheap in the history. And his estimation He counted them, but lost all for the excellencies of that blessed one.
And to think then of what a standing now he possesses before God, and that righteousness in which he will be found in that coming day, that is hastening on. How, if Paul could have attained the perfect human righteousness down here, and he came the nearest to attaining it all over, our brother mentioned he had a covetous heart.
Condemned him that, for they could have attained a perfect human righteousness when he compared that righteousness.
That.
That he if he had a thing, when compared to the righteousness which he possessed in Christ.
Why it was nothing? Why he just looks upon it as the most compensable things that could be possibly considered. Couldn't think of any more contemptible way to speak.
Of his human righteousness He counted it, but done that he might win Christ.
I suppose.
In The Prodigal Son we have something that illustrates this.
The sun went out into the far country.
And he went because there was that insubmissive spirit on his part. Shout Will. And it's very leaving home was an expression of what was in his heart.
And he goes into the far country, and he serves the lust of the flesh. He lives for himself, and he comes back home in rags.
Well, I suppose those rags represent.
What he had to stand in before the father when he came home.
Well, he couldn't go into the Father's house in those rags.
And I'm sure he realized that by this time too, because he says I'm no more worthy to be called thy son.
Absolutely unworthy.
He must have felt for this time that he had.
No claim on any place in the Father's house or before the Father. But what does the Father do? He asked the servant to bring out the best rule and put it on him. And he's not fit to go into the Father's house until he has the best robe on. Well, what is that best robe? It's Christ.
And so we find the prodigal son he's found in that best role.
And he sits for the Father's house and he goes in there. But what about the rags? Will they all have to be left behind? They have to be completely judged. There's no value in them at all. He cannot stand before the Father. He cannot stand in the Father's house, in those rags. He must have the best robe on.
And so everyone who expects to stand in the glory, and this is what the apostle Paul is looking forward to, the glory.
This is what he has before him, reaching down to the goal, pressing down to the goal for the prize in resurrection, when he will be with the Lord Jesus Christ and be like him and have that standing in Christ.
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Well, are we standing or trying to stand at anything else but in Christ and the righteousness that is ours in Him? Well, if we're trying to gain merit or favor, standing before God in anything else but in Christ.
We are seeking the wrong thing.
Yes, I believe the way it's brought before us in this portion is in an objective way, because he doesn't say that he has found Christ or that he has been found in him. But it's in an objective way, and the truth of it should lay hold of our souls and so that all practical Christian life flows from them. I believe the great error of the early church was to bring in that afterwards.
In Galatians, for instance, they made the law a rule of life.
Not the way of salvation, but a rule of life after salvation, which was a practical denial of the fact that they already had righteousness in Christ. And I believe this is the great thing for us, brethren, and the point of this chapter. It's an objective side of things. God would have us lay hold of this standing into which we have been brought, and that the whole of Christian life flows from this.
So that we do it as something that we enjoy in our souls, as Paul did.
And anything that he did to please the Lord was not in any way to gain a righteousness. He already had that he desired that he might do it out of the knowledge that he already possessed this and the continual enjoyment, shall I say in his soul that he that he was found in him, and this was a constant thing. I believe that Christendom.
In general, has.
Lost the sense of this, and I believe we too are in danger of losing the sense of it, so that we get occupied with external and outward things, as though this were going to produce something before God. I believe that if we lay hold of in our souls as wonderful as blessed truth, where we stand right now in Christ.
Not then the practical result will be as it was with Paul all he said, if I have been brought into this place.
Then my whole desire is that I might have him for my object, that I might have him for my gains, that I might be conformed to him because he had already enjoyed this and he desired it should be a continual thing in his soul. And unless we have the sense of this in our souls, and our Christian life is with the desire to please the Lord, it will just be even after we're saved.
Produce the righteousness of our own, and then we begin to perhaps even both before our brethren, like Joe, for instance. God said that Job was a perfect and an upright man. Well, why did the Lord deal with him? Because it was his own righteousness and he was proud of that. And he didn't realize how much there was himself, even though he was a man of faith.
And so with us, unless what we do flows from the knowledge of what the Lord has done for us.
Affection for him and having him as our object. It is only human righteousness and has no practical value before the Lord.
With further reference to the prodigal, if we may, it's interesting to notice the father did not tell the boys to take the filthy rags off.
No doubt he did. We wouldn't imagine the farmer putting the best Rover with a filthy rags, but he was not told to do that. There must be a reason for it, and I believe it's simply this, that the Father would not occupy an Oxford. Negative blessings, the things that we lose. But the positive blessings, the best room, the ring, the shoes and the flattered car. All the things we get when we come to Christ. Not the things we lose. The filthy rags, they're worthless. But what do we get?
Coming to him everything that the heart of God can give us.
Thinking too, brother Gladding that.
The The elder son had filthy rags too, but he didn't know it. That was the trouble. The prodigal had come to the realization that he had filthy rides, and when he did he was glad to receive the best rope. But the trouble with the elder son was that he had filthy rags and didn't know it, and thought he was perfectly acceptable in the father's house as he was, and he was hurt because his father had disturbed these robes upon the other.
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And yet he didn't feel his own need of it. And that was what Paul was before he was saved. He wasn't the prodigal, he was the elder son. But God brought him to the end of himself too. And he got the best role, didn't he? And the Chronicle had a little pride in his heart too. He says make me one of my hired servants, while he is no more fit to be a high servant than anything else. So he still had a little pride in his heart.
And that brings us to verse 10. But, brethren.
That I may know him.
What shall we say?
The Christians object is to know Christ.
The Christians object is to know Christ.
May I use a little illustration from Spanish history?
It's a simple one.
2 Kings Spanish kings went to war.
One of them had an only son.
The one who had the only son was defeated and the son was thrown into the dungeon.
And there he remained for two years.
His life Epping out, the victorious king suddenly thought upon him and ordered that he would be brought out.
And that he would come from the dungeon to his throne under one condition that he would carry through the streets of the city.
On a black tray, a glass of milk.
Is the object there was.
To arrive at the goal without spilling a drop of the milk behind him were his. As we say in Spanish, he's verdugos, those who would have executed him.
On both sides of him were the admiring throngs, and ahead of him the throne of the king, and to his great surprise.
He said how did you ever make it without spilling a drop? And then it was that, he said, Sire.
Behind me was death on both sides of me.
Distractions.
But ahead of Maine life, life there was the goal, beloved ahead of the poor man.
The distractions which must have been multiple on such an occasion as this.
Had no effect upon.
Neither the men behind him, with their swords drawn to chop him down if he'd spilled a drop of the mill. But before him, beloved, was life.
The object.
This is what we have.
The believers object is to know Christ. Be thou the object, bright and fair, to fill and satisfy the heart.
My hope to meet thee in the air, and never more from thee apart that I may undistracted be to follow.
Serve and wait for thee. Now there's one of the Greek philosophers gave a statement that the much used even today been handed down and it says know thyself.
Well, that is popular in the world. Know thyself.
That is, don't deceive, be deceived about yourself, know your weaknesses, know your abilities, and avoid your weaknesses and develop your abilities well. That's what the world takes for their standards and all thyself.
Love how very different in in the Christian life.
Instead of no thyself, as the apostle says, that I may know him to know Christ.
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That's our that's the way we learn our weaknesses instead of thinking we're something, the more we look into the ways of Christ.
The poor folks we have about ourselves. I'm thinking of a verse in the 15th chapter of First Corinthians.
Where the Apostle Paul is writing.
He says.
In the eighth verse, after Speaking of those who have seen the blessed Lord, this is First Corinthians 15.
He says. And last of all, he would have seen of me also as the one born out of due time.
I am least of the apostles.
That are not need to be called an apostle because I persecuted the Church of God, but by the grace of God I am what I am and His grace was bestowed upon me was not in vain.
Of the more he discovered the wonders of the grace of God, the lower he went down in his own estimation. Here he speaks of himself as the least of the apostles.
Why and why he felt that he was left than the least of all things. So the more we ignore Christ.
The less we think of ourselves and the more our thoughts and hearts are filled with the delight and wonders of the blessed Person of God's beloved Son. What a word for us if that was the controlling.
Influence in the apostles life to know Christ. We couldn't raise a higher standard for ourselves, for what are we compared to a man with the gifts of the apostle Paul? And if that was his standard, surely we can take the same standard for ourselves.
To know him loyal to lovers, that requires self judgment, doesn't it?
Not allowing the things to go on in our lives that in their communion and and disturb our enjoyment of Christ and it requires diligence, the reading of the word that going over in these precious life of the Lord Jesus. Well, we go from the whole range of Scripture right from the Garden of Eden.
Till we have find the marriage of the Lamb, it's all Christ, isn't it? And not only reading his blessed life.
I believe that that is especially when manner for our souls, but all to discover in all those wonderful types in the Old Testament, those shadows, those wonderful height of our blessed Lord. May that be more and more the occupation of our lives.
And I was interested Brother Barry and reading as a young man a statement made by Mr. Darby.
He said it so impressed me, I memorized him. Men taught of God go forth to a place of service.
Knowing their own nothingness.
It was a comment here on this portion. I hope I've quoted it correctly. Men thought of God go forth to a place of service.
Knowing, realizing that's the word. Realizing their own nothing.
Well, that's what he says and he I think it's a hundred of the 332nd him that we are nothingness may know, and ever to thy glory be walking in faith while here below. That's one of the last hymns that Mister Darby wrote during the end of his journey.
I suppose someone might have asked the Apostle Paul the question.
You say that I might, I may know him.
Paul, I thought you knew the Lord Jesus Christ already.
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Well, of course you did, but that isn't the point here. The Lord Jesus Christ is before him as an object, and he wants to know him better.
Now I say this because sometimes when a soul is saved, he says, well now I know the Lord Jesus Christ is my Savior, and he stops right there and he sort of settles back on his oars, as it were.
And he sort of floats along.
He rests back and takes it easy.
As though knowing the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior is always the ultimate.
No, the Apostle Paul has the Lord Jesus Christ before him here now.
As His object, He had him before himself all the time, and not only as before himself. Hear this scene, but he sees him up in the glory, and the Lord Jesus Christ is, as it were, ahead of him or before him continually, and he's reaching forth onto that state.
In resurrection, when he will be with the Lord Jesus Christ.
And he's thinking about growth growing in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
He wants to know him better. I wonder if we're sufficiently exercised about this. We think, well, we're saved now and we look upon the Lord Jesus Christ as a sort of a fire escape from hell and judgment, and we're satisfied with that. The apostle Paul was not satisfied with that.
In that department, go ahead. It's nice to see that he doesn't say the truth of his resurrection, but the power of his resurrection. And that's what we need. We know a certain truth, but does it have its power over our lives? And so I was thinking of the three words in this verse, the power of his resurrection, the fellowship of his sufferings, and conformable unto his death.
The power of His resurrection that I believe is laying hold of the fact that we have died with Christ.
Now the death of Christ is not merely the putting away of our sins, but at the end of all that we were before God.
And saw the power of his resurrection brings in a new life. We possess a new life. We're associated with the one who rose and Christ himself is our life. But then it says the fellowship of his sufferings and realizing that we have that new life now. What kind of a life did the Lord Jesus live here below?
Why He lived a life that fully glorified his Father as man. Here we possess that life.
As the truth of that lays hold of our souls, then, as we have here, there's the fellowship of his sufferings.
As seeking to walk in the power of that new life down here as He did, there is that happy communion. For communion and fellowship are the same word. And suffering to us then becomes a joy, because walking in His company we have that joy in which the Lord Jesus himself walked. And where did that path lead? Well, it led to death.
This world rejected that testimony, and Paul desired as the object of his soul.
And that he might lay hold of these three things, and I believe they are the great thing for our Christian life. And let me say them again, the the power of his resurrection, that we have died and risen with Christ and possess a new life in him. But then as we walk here in this world, we seek to walk in the path and he in which he walked. And then there is the fellowship, the communion, walking in his company.
Suffering as he did because he was rejected here and then, it may lead to death. It may lead to as as it did to Paul, suffering even to death for Christ sake. But that was only a joy to his soul, because he would be more like the one who was his object. And that was the whole desire of his heart. Pardon me, brother.
This is all very interesting that you and Brother Anderson have been bringing before us.
I was thinking in connection with it though, the remark of our brother Barry about.
The lovely pictures we have in the Old Testament.
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And how applicable they are?
Although types never fully set forth these things, yet they do give us clues when they help us.
Now in the second chapter of Second Kings, we won't take the time to look at it, but I'll just recall a few thoughts. We see Elijah, who is about to go up, who no doubt is a little picture to us there of the Lord Jesus. He goes with Elijah.
I believe it definitely states he goes with Elisha because it was the experience of Elisha that was.
Be seen there and they start from Gilgal. Now that's the Gilgal up in the plains and the mountains. They make their way down to Bethel and it says the two went together.
The two went together. There were others there, the sons of the prophets, but they don't seem to benefit by it. But the two went together and they go down to Jericho and then they go down to Jordan. Well, that's what we have here because the path is set before us if we're going to follow Christ.
Is going down to this point death? It's it's.
To be occupied with the Lord Jesus in the path that he took.
But it's lovely to see that once Elijah goes into the heavens.
That Elisha begins to follow this path in the reverse order, and that's the way we now discover these things. First of all, he starts at Jordan, and as he crosses Jordan, he crosses it in the power of his master.
That's the power of the new life and.
His pathway from then on as he passes on to Jericho.
To Bethel and then to Gilgal and the 6th chapter, I think it is the 4th chapter we find this pathway is strewn with blessing.
Yet no doubt the doubt is the type of Christ himself in a way, but still it's a picture of the believer who has this object before him. He said that marvelous vision, as it were, remaining with him of one who had gone up, and that's what the apostle has before him here. He had never seen Christ except as the glorified Christ.
And that remains with him, and this is what governs his pathway.
He's he has before him this object, and he wants to be so much like him, even conformed unto death, so that he'd be like his master.
Oh, there are two ways.
In connection with the sufferings that the apostle speaks of in his writings.
One is suffering for Christ and the other is suffering with Christ.
Now when the Lord took up Saul of Parsons, he told Ananias he.
He would give him to to see how much he could suffer for it. And so we find that the character, the sufferings of Christ were experienced by the apostle and his ministry, and his going out with the gospel. The Lord was scourge. What foe was scour was scourge and beaten if they took up stones to cast?
Paul was stoned and oh anyway, he suffered.
All the long course that he took in his pathway of service, he was suffering for Christ. But he does have another character of suffering that he speaks of and we can all share in that character of suffering. It's been the 8th of Romans, he says in the 17th verse.
Of Romans 8. And if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ, if so be, that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together. For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in earth.
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Oh, there is a character of suffering.
It isn't just the same as martyrdom or imprisonment and so on. That's very definitely suffering for Christ. But suffering with Christ is sharing the feelings, the compassions of the blessed Lord in the very scene through which he passed in such.
Devotion to his Father's will.
Well, we could think of it in many ways. On one occasion the apostles fell through and Speaking of all the persecution that he passed through, and he said as and also that which cometh upon me daily, the care for all the churches that was rather suffering with Christ, to have the feelings of Christ.
About that which he loved and gave himself for the churches.
Bribe. Well, if we have that, if we are going on with that character of sufferings, we feel the state of things amongst our dear people when we see them being robbed and cheated out of their hire of lifting. Does it paint our heart when we see God's children turn the side of the distress?
Us. And then when we think of this poor perishing world, do we get hardened in our thoughts as to the state of things in this lost world?
Or do our hearts go out in pity and longing for the perishing about us and even the inanimate creation? Do we? Do we feel the misery? What a world of suffering and and misery this poor world is in? Will God feel that?
Intensely. And if we are?
That suffering with Him we have the feelings of Christ and connection with all we pass through.
In this bad world that we're soon to leave and join our Blessed Lord and the glory He has gone before to prepare. Such has produced brethren some of our most notable hymns.
Suffering with Christ. I'd like to quote you one portion written by one who suffered most of her life. He knows the bitter, weary way, the endless strivings day by day, The heart that weeps, the soul that prays. He noted all He knows. Your heart so full of bliss.
That whilst on earth, our joys we miss, we still can bear it.
Feeling this, he noted all. There may be someone here passing through times of suffering.
Vicariously beloved, we never can do that. There's only one who's done this one, the Lord Jesus, but there is the suffering through with him. Some of us, some of we old missionaries have been through some of those trials. But after all, someone was mentioning to me, Brother Smith, you've been through quite a number of experiences.
Yes, and suffering, he said. Well, I said, brother, they're not worth mentioning. When you think of his love, they're not worth mentioning.
But there was a beautiful thought, wasn't it, from a poor suffering St. I believe we have in in David in his rejection and his mighty men that were associated with him in his rejection. Perhaps an illustration of this, of the suffering with Christ.
Now it's true that these people of Israel, these mighty men and others who went down to be with David in The Cave of a Taliban, companied with him all through the wilderness when he was fleeing from Saul.
They knew something about David. They knew about David killing Goliath and putting the army of the enemies to flight. They knew this. They knew David in a certain way, and perhaps they even knew in their hearts, in a secret way, that someday he would be king. Because even Jonathan knew that. He said, I know that you're going to be king.
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And then he speaks of himself as being next to him. But one thing about Jonathan, he never associated himself with David in his rejection. He went out to see him, but he went back to his home. He went back to his city.
Well, poor Jonathan, what happened to him? He never reigned with David. He never was associated with David in his Kingdom, because he was taken out of this sea before that time came. But these mighty men who went down to be associated with David and his rejection shared in that suffering.
David didn't forget them, He gave them a place in the Kingdom. They reigned with David, and some of them had special places.
Why? I've meant so much to David to have them associated with him in his suffering. He wasn't there alone and all. I don't believe we even begin to realize how much it means to the Lord Jesus Christ to have us associated with him in his suffering, to know something of the fellowship of his suffering.
Going forth unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach.
Lord has great value to the Lord Jesus Christ and I believe it's going to affect.
The place, the enjoyment we'll have in reigning with the Lord Jesus Christ, Paul says to Timothy, If we suffer, we shall reign with him. Are we shunning the suffering, the fellowship of his suffering? Do we shun that?
We're going to miss out on the joy of reigning with him, not miss being with him, no.
Not miss being with him in the Kingdom, not miss being associated with him. But I believe we'll miss out on the full enjoyment of being associated with him then.
One has said that, the devil said to Paul, why, if you follow the court that you're following, why, why, they'll kill you.
Both of the apostle in reply, Well, just be that much more like Christ, for they flew him, they put him to ignominious death, and if he put me through an ignominious death, I'll just be that much more conformed.
To conform to Christ? So what? No matter what the devil suggested, or whatever he made to hinder the apostle, while they were all absolutely defeated by the fact that trait was the sole object that he might be like him and might have him.
For the goal at the end of the race, he was delivered unto death for Jesus sake, wasn't he?
That's connected with his ministry too, in the 4th chapter of the 2nd Corinthians. And so in Colossians there's a positive statement made of the believer, Ye are dead.
But the exercise in Romans is to reckon ourselves to be dead.
But then Paul could say also, I die daily, and that's an exercise for one who's serving Christ.
But it's as though God says to Paul, well, if you've taken this path now you can go all the way, and you're going to be delivered unto death for Jesus sake, so that the life also of Jesus might be manifest in your mortal body. Well, dear brethren.
What a wonderful place to be in that the apostle was in that Christ might be manifested in that in that mortal body.
A brother was telling me once of a certain kind of vessel that was made in China, the only place that was made of a certain kind of clay that was transparent and after the vessel was made.
They would put a light inside to see whether there were any dark places in it.
And then they would take in sandpaper the dark places, so that the light might be even all the way through that vessel. Well, I believe there's two ways to look at this. There is one side of it where the vessel is completely broken, but the other is that the life of Christ might be manifested in the vessel.
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And in all that evenness, now we know it isn't true with us. But I believe that the Spirit of God doesn't work with the believer.
That the dark places might be erased, that the light might shine evenly and clearly through the vessel, so that Christ himself might be magnified in these bodies of ours.
And the glorious it's nice to see what it says about the heavenly city, that when it comes down, says her life was like unto a Jasper stone, clear as crystal. There all the redeemed glorified with Christ. And there is nothing that hinders the outlaw of that light which illuminates the whole earth, and it flows out when he is glorified in His Saints.
Well, He's seeking to produce that now in our lives. It requires the breaking down of the vessel, because we have the old nature within us, and there's always something of the ways of God necessary with every one of us so that the light might shine out. But it will not be necessary up there, will it? Because then we'll be fully like Him and the hindrances will be removed.
Three occasions where he says I am ready.
1St chapter of Romans, he says I'm ready to preach the gospel, ready for service.
In the 21St chapter of the Acts, verse 13 he said, I am ready not to be bound only, but also to die of Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus. And in Second Timothy 4.
In verse six, he said, Brian now ready to be offered, ready for service, ready for suffering, ready for sacrifice in spite of all the opposition of Satan against him. In connection with what we were just saying here too, I believe that it's the thought in this 26th, in this 12Th verse of our chapter, not as though I had already attained either. We're already praying. The word used, I believe, is different from the word.
Used in the 15th verse. In the 15th verse it's the thought of full grown. But in the new translation here it's either we're already perfect. That is, when we get home to glory, we'll be perfected. The spirits of just man made perfect. When we get to glory, then we'll have bodies of glory. There'll be old, no old nature within them.
Paul said. I haven't come to that state yet, and none of us will ever come to that state. As long as we're down here, we'll always have that old nature within us.
But that is what is before us, so that's what we look forward to. But He hadn't come to that yet. But that was His desire. And that's the thing for each one of us to apply to our hearts in a practical way. We know when we get home, brethren, we're going to have bodies of glory like Him. And the best of it all is that the old nature will be gone forever.
They'll just be the new life and we'll have that full enjoyment of him.
But if we look forward to that time, do we desire that down here there might be the practical manifestation that this is our desire, so that anything that is of the flesh has it in truth would be put aside all that wasn't yet perfected, but this was His desire. So any of us might say, well, I'm not perfect, but is it our desire?
So that in our life, through this world, we would desire that when the flesh does appear.
That we would judge it, but if there's something that the hindrance that we haven't yet seen, that the Lord would reveal it to us. This is, I believe, what he develops as he goes on here, and it touches each one of our hearts as we look forward to that day. How much is it our present desire now, as Paul says in 2nd Corinthians 5, Wherefore we labor that whether present or absent, we may be agreeable to him.
Go ahead, brother. In the 11Th first he said that by any means I might attain under the resurrection of the dead, there's a great deal of.
Said in this day and age about obtaining to something to gain certain position, Christian honors which results in life.
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Well.
We wouldn't condemn one who is picking up studies for a certain job mechanic. You have to know who there is job well to succeed and to make a living in that way. Or if it's a student, if it's one who is a studying accounting, he has to apply himself to that. But when it comes to divine things and that's.
Really the what should be mostly for us the other is just passing and something to take up and to lay aside and just like one when his day's work is over and he can really enter into what is what the apostle speaks of and what is really like. Well, now what the apostles.
Speaks of desiring to attain to was the resurrection of the dead.
He doesn't say here the coming of the Lord in the air, but doubtless He had before him that great and marvelous event when the power of death would have it made this world with all its morals and with all its deep sorrows.
Followed up in victory.
And that mighty company that have lain in the dust of the earth for centuries rise. And that glorious moment when the Lord comes and gives a shout. Now He had that day, that time before Him was that had more importance than any other consideration.
That's why he says if by any means, no matter what it costs and what trials it's required, if he could obtain the last.
And have a reward. If that time that was before him, well, that's what he considered more important than anything else.
I believe that the thought of attainment here in this verse is not the thought of of doing something to merit that position. That wasn't it. But the thought was he was looking forward to that time when he would arrive at the resurrection and it might be translated.
That I might arrive at the resurrection, that one out from among the dead. Now this is a special resurrection. It's not Speaking of general resurrection.
But the resurrection of the Saints, the believers, they will be raised out from among the dead. Well, it was a special resurrection.
And to a person like the Apostle Paul, this of course was a new thing. The Jews generally.
Believe in a resurrection, a general resurrection of the last day, like Martha speaks of in connection with the death of Lazarus.
But the apostle Paul had learned by special revelation that there was to be a resurrection out from among the dead. And this is what he was looking forward to because he knew then that he would be with the Lord Jesus Christ, meaning knew he was going to be martyred. I suppose that was true, wasn't it? And but it wasn't only that that.
His thought was that he would be like his.
His Master in everything, and that was what filled his heart at the moment, that there was so much that grace had wrought in him that he would even go this far, that he would be like his master to rise out from among the dead. That brings us to the 12Th verse again. Our brother Hale was commenting on not as though I had already obtained.
Either were already perfect, but I follow after that I'm a.
Apprehend, I believe it's lay hold of that for which I am laid hold out of Christ Jesus. He hadn't gained the reach, the end of the way. He hadn't gained the goal yet.
Now in Ephesians, an entirely different line of things.
That caught us there, for the believer is viewed as already raised up with Christ and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. But all through the book of Philippians, it's the wilderness that's in view and one running the race.
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The the the fame and glory is is future.
That before him and what is gained at the end of the wave?
Don't you get a feeling as you read this and we're meditating upon it, that there's something there that we certainly have to stretch to reach it?
All we feel, how far short we come.
And in laying hold upon that for which the Lord Jesus Christ has laid hold upon us, and certainly ought to exercise our hearts.
And we ought to feel how much we need to judge ourselves.
And be in the Lord's presence, and go on in communion with him, that we might learn more of Christ.
Learn more of this that the Apostle Paul is Speaking of. I believe it's good for us to have these things before us in this way because.
In exercise of soul, it makes us feel like we want to reach out and know the Lord Jesus Christ better and the things concerning him. I trust that these meetings, these readings will have that effect upon our soul, have that effect on my soul, each one of us individually when Peter was in the presence of the Lord Jesus.
In the 5th chapter.
Of blue.
The result was.
Of being in that presence.
He said, depart from me, for I am a sinful man. O Lord, he was so overwhelmed.
With grace and the difference between his own life and the one whom he stood before that he was through with Peter. He saw that that he was a sinful man. It wasn't just that he had sinned, but the whole thing was bad.
I believe there was a tremendous lesson for Peter that he learned that time later he had to learn there was no confidence in the flesh. But but here he just learns that the whole thing is bad. And I believe that's.
What we need and we get from this chapter, the whole thing is bad. We were found in him and Peter was through with Peter on the basis of any righteousness there, and so now the Lord can use him in service. Isn't it lovely there, Brother Lundeen, that Wendy was staying depart from me? So I just can't remain here where a poor Sinner is in this boat.
And yet he was getting just as near as possible.
To the blessed Lord at the same time, because he fell at his feet, He was right there at the feet of Jesus, as near as he could come to him, and yet telling him to depart from Him and let us always the way grace works in the heart of the Sinner, isn't it? It makes him realize that he is a poor, unworthy, lost and guilty.
Sinner, and yet he cannot do without the blessed Lord.
Who has won his heart? The point I think there is, is what our brother Anderson was bringing out, that if we are in the presence of the Lord and we have been seeking to live in the good of the truth He's given us, our ways will be cleansed. We get that in the 13th chapter, John. There we have the heavenly family and the Lord is washing.
Their feet there.
Each one. And then he told them what you've seen me do you do this too and so.
In the case of Peter, the Lord did not leave Peter.
Because in the first chapter of John, the Gospel of John, we find Andrew bringing his brother Peter to Jesus and there Peter learned to know the Lamb of God.
But in Luke 5, Peter learned to know Peter in the presence of God. And that's so important. And you know, brethren, we never will rightly know our God unless we discover something, the wretchedness of self. And we do that in His presence, don't we?
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I enjoy the way the new translation gives that 12Th verse, that I may, instead of apprehend, lay hold of that which I am laid hold of Jesus Christ.
That is, the Lord had laid hold upon that guilty, wretched persecutor on the way to the masters. Oh, what wonderful.
Mercy and grace had been extended to him, a blessed one, from the glory that laid hold of him. I says I want to lay hold of that one that has laid hold of me.
I suppose we might.
Linked to this something of the 13th verse with the illustration that our brother Smith gave us before of the man carrying the glass of milk.
Blind it says there one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth onto those things which are before I press towards the mark for the gold. With not only that this man and he carried that glass of milk.
Was not so much thinking of the years before, but I'm sure that that man was not even thinking of the steps that he just had finished taking. His eye was on the goal and he was going on. He was forgetting the things that were behind. Perhaps sometimes there is a little danger in our own heart.
Of kind of looking back in our own Christian life and.
Perhaps finding something that we think we can rest in a little bit and God wants us to forget it all, leave it all, have that one go before and that is pressing on to Christ at the end of the pathway. And it's only as we have this before that we will not become occupied with ourselves.
And even what we might consider to be the good thing that we have done.
God wants us to bring in all of that too and justice, keep our eyes on Christ and continue on with him like that man with that one goal before him, not even looking at the steps he had just taken, just looking ahead. Well, that's what God wants of our hearts do is because our brother was saying too, that the reason why the Lord took possession of us, the reason he laid hold of us, What was what was his purpose in that?
Well, it was that we would be fully conformed to him.
The Lord saved everyone of us in this room so that we might be fully conformed to Him, with Him, and like Him forever. And that's the thing for us to get hold of in our souls. And if so, our brother said, we won't be thinking of how much we have attained, but we will have Himself before us, pressing on to that glorious time when we'll be with Him and His desire will be fulfilled on our part, that we'll be with Him and like Him.
And our hearts will be satisfied because we are there and this is what we need. One brother said about how much of the truth have we laid hold of? And another brother said, well, he was more concerned than how much the truth had laid hold of him. And I believe that's what we need, brethren. How much is it laid hold of us, if it has laid hold of us?
By then I believe it will become real. The apostle could say I believe.
And therefore have I spoken, How much has this been made good in our souls? If so, when we speak of it, there will be a practical power, because it's been made our own. It was perfectly so with the Lord Jesus when he talked to Nicodemus. He said we speak, but we do know.
And testify that we have seen that blessed One who came from the glory above and knew all that was in the Father's heart. What did He come down for? He come down to reveal it. He came down so we know it. And He could speak of that which is was the place where He ever dwelled from all eternity. And speak of it so that others might know it, as a little hymn says, and came to earth to make it known that we might share.
Joy. Now the apostle is saying, I desire that this would be real in my soul too, and that I would take possession of that for which I've been taking possession of by Christ Jesus. Well, a lot of that makes him feel that he has not fully attained, but that's his desire.
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I suppose that's why the apostle is the 8th of Romans says, for I am persuaded that neither death nor life, our brother Gladden was Speaking of those things, those three things being ready, I am ready. But he also says I am persuaded. I think it's nice to notice in connection with that first, and also the one that was already quoted in Romans 8.
There's quite an unusual thing there. It says in the I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in US. He changes from the singular to the plural, I reckon the glory that shall be revealed in US.
And then in the other that you just quoted, I am persuaded and then he goes on that nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of God. It's true of every child of God that he's going to be in that glory. It's true of every child of God that nothing can separate us from his love. But rather than how much are we reckoning on it individually, how much are we persuaded of it in our own souls individually? And so Paul says.
I reckon. But he says it's true of all believers. But I want it to be.
A personal, practical thing in my life. And he said nothing can separate any I've said to those who don't see the truth of the security of the believer. Well, thank God, whether you see it or not, it's true. But it's nice when you can say I'm persuaded of it. What a blessed thing.
I always sing that little hymn. Thine Jesus, thine no more. This heart of mine shall seek its joys apart from thee.
The world is crucified to me, and I am thine.
#76 in the back of the book.