1. "Joy in Christ drives out sinful pleasures by leaving less and less room for them. Joy changes your spiritual taste buds so that you want more of Jesus and nothing at all of anything that contradicts Him."

2. "None of us ever graduates from Christianity 101. We all need to be constantly reminded of the basics. Progress in the Christian faith is not so much about graduating to harder subjects as discovering the inexhaustible depths of the most basic teachings."

3. "There is no virtue in denouncing fellow Christians over hair-splitting disagreements. Beware of teachers who build platforms for themselves by using ever hotter language to torch fellow Christians. Always ask, does the strength of the language fit the size of the error?"

4. "To be a Christian is to boast in having nothing to boast in."

5. "Each Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier costs the U.S. Navy $13 billion. That is a costly and valuable asset. But it is possible for even so valuable an asset to become a liability. If one of those massive ships were to suffer irreparable damage, it would become a $13 billion liability. Write off."

6. "Stars stop shining in the morning not because they switch off but because the sun shines so brilliantly that they disappear. That is what Christ did to all Paul's former boasts."

7. "To become a Christian is to begin to value Christ more highly than anything in the world. To become a Christian is to begin to value Christ more highly than anything in yourself, anything in your past, anything in your religious achievements, and anything the world can possibly promise you."

8. "All true faith includes the willingness to give up everything for Christ and endure anything for Christ. Faith writes Christ a blank check. Only God determines the specific costs each of us will have to pay."

9. "Don't delude yourself that you've got to get righteous before you can come back to God. The only way you have of coming to him is the righteousness he himself has already given you."

10. "Suffering is not an accident. Suffering is not a sign that something has gone wrong. Suffering should not make you question your commitment to Christ or his commitment to you. Instead, suffering should confirm that you are being conformed to Christ."

Observation Questions

1. In Philippians 3:2-3, what three warning labels does Paul use to describe the false teachers, and what three characteristics does he say mark those who are the true "circumcision"?

2. According to Philippians 3:4-6, what four inherited privileges and three personal achievements does Paul list as reasons he could have confidence in the flesh?

3. In Philippians 3:7-8, what accounting language does Paul use to describe his changed perspective on his former credentials, and what single thing does he place in the "gain" column?

4. What specific kind of righteousness does Paul say he does not want to have, and what kind of righteousness does he say he desires instead, according to Philippians 3:9?

5. In Philippians 3:10-11, what four things does Paul say he wants to know or experience in relationship to Christ?

6. According to Philippians 3:1, what command does Paul give to the Philippians, and what two reasons does he offer for repeating this instruction?

Interpretation Questions

1. Why does Paul use such harsh language ("dogs," "evildoers," "mutilators of the flesh") against these particular false teachers when elsewhere he rejoices that Christ is preached even by those with impure motives (Philippians 1:15-18)? What makes this error so serious?

2. Paul says he was "blameless" as to righteousness under the law (v. 6), yet he counts this as "rubbish" (v. 8). How can something that seems morally excellent become worthless or even harmful in terms of one's standing before God?

3. What does Paul mean when he says he wants to "be found in him" (v. 9)? What event or situation is he anticipating, and why is being "in Christ" the only safe position?

4. How does Paul's desire to "share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death" (v. 10) connect to the pattern of Christ's humiliation and exaltation described earlier in Philippians 2:5-11?

5. Paul speaks of knowing Christ after 30 years of following him, yet he still expresses a deep longing "that I may know him" (v. 10). What does this suggest about the nature of knowing Christ and spiritual growth?

Application Questions

1. Paul identified specific things he was tempted to rely on for his standing before God (heritage, education, religious zeal). What credentials, achievements, or religious activities might you be tempted to trust in rather than Christ alone, and how can you recognize when this is happening?

2. The sermon mentioned that "status is one of the most overlooked idols." In what specific area of your life (work, parenting, social media, church involvement) are you most invested in gaining status, and what would it look like to hold that more loosely for Christ's sake?

3. Paul says joy in Christ is "safe" for believers because it protects against temptation and strengthens us in trials. What specific practice could you begin this week to cultivate joy in Christ rather than simply pursuing happiness directly?

4. The sermon challenged believers to ask whether they would give up a promotion or opportunity "in a heartbeat" if it required compromising their commitment to Christ. Is there a current pursuit or ambition in your life that you need to evaluate by this standard? What would faithfulness look like?

5. Paul intentionally chose to share in Christ's sufferings rather than viewing hardship as a sign that something had gone wrong. How does this perspective change the way you might respond to a current difficulty or opposition you are facing because of your faith?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Galatians 2:15-21 — Paul addresses the same controversy about righteousness through law versus faith in Christ, explaining why he "died to the law" in order to live for God.

2. Romans 10:1-13 — This passage expands on the contrast between pursuing a righteousness of one's own and submitting to the righteousness that comes from God through faith.

3. 2 Corinthians 11:21-33 — Paul provides another autobiographical list of his credentials and sufferings, showing what he endured after counting everything as loss for Christ.

4. Matthew 13:44-46 — Jesus tells the parables of the hidden treasure and the pearl of great price, illustrating the same truth that the kingdom is worth giving up everything to obtain.

5. Colossians 2:6-15 — Paul explains the fullness believers already have in Christ, warning against those who would add requirements beyond faith in Him.

Sermon Main Topics

I. Ben Gunn's Story: Finding Identity in Confinement

II. Rejoice in Him (Philippians 3:1)

III. Reject All Counterfeits (Philippians 3:2-3)

IV. Reverse Your Reckoning (Philippians 3:4-8)

V. Rely on Him Alone (Philippians 3:9-11)

VI. Finding the Treasure Worth Everything

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Detailed Sermon Outline

When he was 14 years old and living in a foster home in the United Kingdom, in order to protect a secret, Ben Gunn committed murder. He was sentenced to life with a minimum of 10 years. But when his parole hearing came up at year 10 and year 20 and year 25, somehow he never managed to get out. It was because he had always broken some rule, some little minor infraction that gave the prison system just enough of a reason not to let him out.

Why would he sabotage his own chance at freedom?

In prison, Ben had become someone. He styled himself a freedom fighter, standing up against abuses of power. He earned a degree in politics and history, then a master's in peace and reconciliation, and he began a PhD in criminology. He earned a reputation as the subversive, the political animal, the jailhouse lawyer. When he had been in prison for 27 years, Ben fell in love with a woman named Alex, who came to the prison to teach business courses.

They began a secret romance. Alex encouraged Ben to play by the rules and obtain release. She had a cottage in the country he could come live with her in. They could go for walks in the hills, enjoy the fireside in the winter. Ben was hesitant, but eventually Alex's plan prevailed.

At her encouragement, he started a blog. The blog started to get a wide readership. It was even nominated for a prestigious writing award. So those ties to the outside eventually proved attractive enough that he played by the rules and got out. But Ben didn't find freedom all that free and not at all fulfilling.

He outfitted a shed to look just like his prison cell and he stayed put there. He didn't go out much within a couple of years he left Alex. He began to drift, directionless.

Why? Alex explains Ben's release as a catastrophic loss of status. He was the person the prisoners would go to if they had a problem. He was someone in prison, but not outside. But Ben doesn't think status is the whole story.

He says, It's an identity thing. I'm completely lost. I'm imploding. In prison, Ben knew who he was. Now that he's out, he doesn't.

Looking at this life from the outside, you might think that in prison, Ben had nothing. And then when he got out, he didn't have everything, but at least he had something. But that's not how he saw it. For Ben Gunn, being released meant being expelled from the meaning he had spent his whole life making. He counted the status he had in prison as worth more than the freedom he gained by leaving.

What did he have? What did he gain? What did he lose?

Our passage for this morning is Philippians 3:1-11. It's on page 981 of the Pew Bibles. In this passage, we find that the apostle Paul started off having it all and then lost it all. In terms of what mattered most to him and what the entire culture around him most valued. The apostle Paul used to live at the very top of the heap.

But in verse 8 of this passage, he tells us that he has suffered the loss of all things.

And Paul's verdict on what he lost and what he gained is exactly the opposite of what you would think. If you're looking at it through normal human lenses. We saw last week that in chapter 2 verses 19 to 30, Paul holds up Timothy and Epaphroditus as models of what it means to embody the mind of Christ in order to fulfill the mission of Christ. In this passage, chapter 3 verses 1 to 11, in order to ward off a false teaching that corrupts the gospel, Paul holds up his own example of having it all and then losing it all in order to gain something infinitely more. So as you meet Paul in this passage, ask: what did he have?

What did he lose? What did he gain? That will be the outline of the sermon, just good questions to consider. What did he have? What did he lose?

What did he gain? Please follow along as I read.

Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you. Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh, for we are the circumcision who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh, though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law, a Pharisee, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and may share His sufferings, becoming like Him in His death, that by any means possible, I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

If you're not a believer in Jesus, I want you to see just how relevant this passage can be to you. This passage is about Paul talking about his life before and after he came to know Christ. And he's saying that according to the value system of his own culture, which he fully embraced, he had everything, heritage and accomplishment, achievements, a perfect resume and the highest achievements. But once he met Christ and gave himself to Christ, he saw that everything he previously valued was worthless by comparison.

It's not that his heritage and achievements were worthless in themselves, but that they were eclipsed by the infinitely greater worth of knowing Christ.

If you're not a Christian, can you imagine anything so valuable you'd give everything to get it? Can you imagine anything so satisfying that everything else would look worthless by comparison?

Paul's message to all of us this morning is simple: you: can. And you must find everything in Christ. You can and you must find everything in Christ. These 11 verses tell us how. We'll walk through the passage in four parts.

How to find everything in Christ. Point one, rejoice in Him. Rejoice in him. This is Paul's instruction for us in verse one. Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord.

To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you. First of all, what does Paul mean by finally? It might be that he intends to wrap things up but then finds he has much more to say. Perhaps you've sometime heard a preacher say, we should conclude. And then go on concluding for quite some time.

But the Greek word here can also mean furthermore or basically, here's what's next. So I think that's probably the sense here. And what's next is that Paul commands us to rejoice in Jesus. That's who he means when he says the Lord. But then what does Paul mean by the rest of the verse when he says, To write the same things you might be wondering, well, what's that pointing back to?

I think he's referring to his exhortation to rejoice. So in chapter 2, verse 18, and in chapter 2, verse 29, he's already told them twice to rejoice in the Lord. And he's about to do it again, two times in the same verse in chapter 4, verse 4. So I think Paul is acknowledging and underscoring this deliberate repetition. Paul makes two points about this repetition.

First, it's no trouble to him. Paul is here modeling the ministry of repetition. None of us ever graduates from Christianity 101. We all need to be constantly reminded of the basics. Progress in the Christian faith is not so much about graduating to harder subjects as discovering the inexhaustible depths of the most basic teachings.

How can that be? Because all of Christianity's most basic teachings are about Christ and he is himself unsearchable riches.

Second, what does Paul mean by saying this repetition is safe for you? How is it safe for Paul to exhort us to joy in Jesus five times in three chapters? I think Paul's telling us that joy in Christ is a safeguard. It's a stronghold. It's protection.

As Nehemiah 8:10 says, the joy of the Lord is your strength. Joy in Christ drives out sinful pleasures by leaving less and less room for them. Joy changes your spiritual taste buds so that you want more of Jesus and nothing at all of anything that contradicts Him. Joy in Christ stretches and strengthens your soul so that when trials come and put extra weight on you, you can bend and flex and not break under the pressure.

Contentment repels envy. Satisfaction secures devotion. Joy defeats temptation.

But how can you get this joy? You don't get it by aiming right for it. If you are not happy, it does no good to say, Self, Be happy. Get happy now. Self, if you don't get happy, I'm going to get real mad at you.

Be happy, please. Happy, why? No. What you need is a basis for happiness. What you need is a sure and stable ground of joy.

So you get more joy in Jesus by contemplating who he is, and all that he has done for you, which is what Paul goes on to do in the rest of the passage. Point 2, reject all counterfeits. Reject all counterfeits. This is Paul's exhortation in verses 2 and 3.

Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh. For we are the circumcision who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.

Here, Paul takes aim at a group of Jewish professing Christians who traveled around teaching Gentile believers that they needed to be circumcised and keep the law of Moses in order to become members of God's people and obtain a right standing before God. This is the same issue that Paul addresses at length in Galatians. So why does Paul pivot so quickly from rejoicing to warning? I'm not totally sure. It's possible he took a little break from writing after verse 1, somehow got news of these movements of these false teachers and decided he needed to address it.

It's also possible that when he's writing about what is safe for them, that jogged his mind about a threat. In any case, the threat here is a real one, but it doesn't mean that these false teachers were already present or influential in Philippi. Instead, Paul was commending to the Philippians a general posture of being on guard against this and every other false teaching. And Paul's three terms for these teachers bitingly parody how they viewed themselves. This is a little bit of divinely sanctioned sarcasm.

These teachers prided themselves on maintaining ritual purity and requiring others to do the same. So Paul calls them dogs. Dogs tend to explore and sniff and eat just about anything. And so in ancient Judaism they became proverbial for impurity. Secondly, these teachers boasted in their works of the law, so Paul calls them evildoers or evil workers.

And third, these teachers insisted on circumcision, so Paul uses a Greek word play to accuse them of something that was more like a pagan religious ritual of cutting into flesh. It's important to note that Paul uses such extreme language here. In order to match the gravity of an extreme error. He does not handle every disagreement this way. Remember that back in chapter one, Paul talks about those who are preaching Christ from envy and selfish ambition and he rejoices simply that Christ is being preached.

But because here the gospel itself is at stake, Paul unloads rhetorical napalm. There is no virtue in denouncing fellow Christians over hair-splitting disagreements. Beware of teachers who build platforms for themselves by using ever hotter language to torch fellow Christians. Always ask, does the strength of the language fit the size of the error? And you evaluate that teacher and platform builder on that basis.

But at the same time, you should never be so nice that you won't denounce heresy when you see it.

In verse 3, Paul gives us a reason to reject such false teaching. For we are the circumcision. Who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh. So here Paul counters this false teaching by reminding the Philippian believers of what we already have in Christ. He's saying, we already possess what this false teaching claims to offer.

And so he offers a counterpoint to each of his three denunciations of these false teachers. First, by saying we are the circumcision, he's reminding us that we've received the promised reality that circumcision only pointed forward to, which is the circumcision of the heart. Having God's Spirit within you to renew you and cleanse you. By putting his Spirit within us, God has enabled us to love and serve him. And that's the substance of Paul's second point too.

He says, We worship by the Spirit of God. Because God's Spirit dwells within us, we're enabled to live our whole lives for his glory. When Paul says worship here, he's not talking about a couple of hours on a Sunday, he's talking about the whole the whole character of our lives. He's talking about how we're enabled to do all that we do for God's glory. And then third, Paul says we glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh.

He's saying you can either boast in human effort, human status, human achievement, or boast in Christ alone. The problem is not boasting. It's what you boast in. And to be a Christian is to boast in having nothing to boast in. That's Paul's point here and it's going to run right through the rest of the passage.

In the fullness of time, God the Father sent his Son to redeem us and his Spirit to renew us. If you trust in Christ, you're reconciled to the Father, united to the Son, and indwelt by the Spirit. And because of that, you belong to God's people, people and are an heir of all God's promises. You don't need anything else. The gospel plus anything is no gospel at all.

Imagine it's an hour and a half, two hours from now. You've just eaten a very pleasant and satisfying lunch. You are just as full as you want to be. And if someone then came and tried to urge you that you must buy more food because you're actually starving. No, no, no, you don't really know what's going on.

Trust me, you need to eat now or you're in serious trouble. What would you say to that person? You would just laugh. The person must have some very strange things going on in their life that, you know, you know because you just ate that you're full. And so Paul's saying here that a key to rejecting false teaching is to recognize and to itemize the fullness of what you already have in Christ.

How can you find everything in Christ? Reject all counterfeits. Refuse to listen to any teaching that diminishes the fullness of what you already have in Christ. Point three, and here comes the bulk of the passage. Reverse your reckoning.

Reverse your reckoning. That's what we see Paul doing in verses 4 through 8. Reckoning about what? About the worth of absolutely everything else in comparison with Christ.

We'll start by looking at verses 4 to 6. Paul's mention of putting no confidence in the flesh at the end of verse 3 prompts him to reflect in verse 4, though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. In other words, Paul's about to beat these false teachers at their own game. Continuing in verse 4, if anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more. Circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law a Pharisee, as to zeal a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

Here Paul sets out two sets of religious qualifications that he has. The first four items are what he inherited. The next three are what he achieved. If anyone wants to appeal to religious inheritance or religious accomplishments in order to establish their standing before God, no no one will be able to do it better than Paul. So we're going to walk through all seven of these briefly.

First, Paul tells us that he was circumcised on the eighth day as God commanded in Genesis 17:12. He says he is of the people of Israel, which means he was not a Gentile, he was not a proselyte, he was not a son of a proselyte, that is someone who converted to Judaism. He can even boast of membership in a prominent, illustrious tribe within Israel. He says he's of the tribe of Benjamin. The tribe of Benjamin produced Israel's first king, Saul, whom Paul is named after.

And only the tribe of Benjamin remained faithful to Judah and to the house of David after Solomon's death. When Paul says that he was a Hebrew of Hebrews, he means that he was raised in a household that spoke Hebrew, or Aramaic. In Paul's day, many Jews were living scattered throughout the whole Mediterranean and a number of them spoke Greek to the exclusion of Hebrew. Now, if your whole education is in Greek, if what you're learning, how to speak and your training is in Greek, there's a greater pressure to assimilate to Greek ways and culture, to lose what's distinctively Jewish and blend in. Paul is saying here, that he's a thoroughbred.

He's as Jewish as they come. He has platinum membership in the people of Israel. He then turns to his own achievements. First, as to the law, a Pharisee. Different sects with different perspectives on how to interpret the law competed for influence in first century Judaism and the Pharisees were one of those.

It's all too easy 2,000 years later to caricature the Pharisees as the villains of the New Testament. But that's not at all how contemporary rank and file Jews would have seen them. The Pharisees were a popular conservative renewal movement. They were particularly concerned to apply the law strictly across the board, including in matters of purity and how to relate to Gentiles. They were especially renowned in studying the Torah and they strove to restore Israel's fidelity to its founding traditions.

They zealously guarded against pagan secularizing trends. The Jewish historian Josephus tells us that in Paul's day, the Pharisees numbered about 6,000, but they were widely popular with the masses. Next, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church. Before Paul came to faith in Christ, he saw Christianity as a renegade sect. He thought this strange new sect was a threat to Israel's holiness, purity, worship, and obedience.

He thought Christians' worship of Jesus was blasphemy, so he tried to compel Christians to recant their faith in him. He even endorsed the execution of Christians, like Stephen, in Acts chapter 7. Now, zeal itself is not a bad thing. The question is, what are you zealous for and what's that zeal based on? And one proper application of zeal in Scripture is the rigorous pursuit of the purity of God's people.

One example of someone who's commended for zeal in Scripture is Phinehas in Numbers 25 when he judicially executed an Israelite who was committing idolatry and sexual immorality. The pre-Christian Paul likely saw himself as a worthy heir of Phineas. Now for Paul's third achievement. He says, as to righteousness under the law, blameless. Now this does not mean that Paul thought he was sinlessly perfect.

Instead, he means that as he understood the law as a Pharisee, he kept it. If he transgressed one of the law's commands, he offered the appropriate sacrifice, which was a remedy that the law itself provided. Remember that the word blameless refers to the ability of someone else to be able to identify a fault and charge you with it. So if Paul had flagrantly disobeyed any of the law's commands, someone could have called him on it. But evidently, no one could and no one did.

So in verses 4 to 6, Paul presents the most compelling possible religious resume. You cannot beat Paul for religious credentials. And as we'll see, even if you tried, that would be like running as hard as you can toward the wrong end zone. The better you are at it, the worse it becomes for you.

If you're not a believer in Jesus, what aspects of your heritage are you most proud of? I'm sure there are many good aspects of your heritage that are well worth celebrating. But have you ever seen pride in one's heritage turn into hatred of those who differ? If you have, what does that tell you about the condition of the human heart? And what achievements are you most proud of?

There are so many achievements in this life that are well worth celebrating. Maybe you're the first person in your family to go to college. But does achievement ever become a means of looking down on those who can't make it into the club? Our public schools and politicians all preach a gospel of achievement. There is a bipartisan consensus that achievement is what we need.

But does achievement ever take a personal toll on you? Have you ever found that striving for achievement can become a form of slavery? Where whenever you achieve the next thing you're striving for, all you get out of it is now five more achievements you must accomplish or else you will feel like a failure.

If you are a Christian, are you ever tempted by spiritual pride? What religious achievements might you be tempted to rely on, thinking they'll be what makes you right with God? Bible knowledge, church attendance, being a deacon or an elder, discipling other believers? Beware the temptation to replace confidence in Christ with confidence in what you do for Christ.

In verses 7 and 8, Paul announces his verdict on his perfect religious resume. Look again at verses 7 and 8. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.

Here Paul borrows his terms from accounting. He draws up a balance sheet and he tallies up profits and losses. In the loss column is every single thing he just mentioned. And in the profit column is only one entry with only one word: Christ.

Each Gerald R. Ford-class aircraft carrier costs the U.S. Navy $12.998 $13 billion.

That is a costly and valuable asset. But it is possible for even so valuable an asset to become a liability. If one of those massive ships were to suffer irreparable damage, it would become a $13 billion liability. Write off.

Something extremely valuable in itself or something that would have been valuable in other circumstances can be totally transferred to the lost column. And that is what Paul says about his whole religious resume. That's what he says about the whole way he used to look at his life. That's what he says about everything he inherited as a religious privilege and everything he did with it to excel as he puts it in Judaism beyond his his contemporaries. That's what he says in Galatians 1.

Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. In verse 8, Paul expands his verdict to cover literally everything. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. This is why Charles has named our church's youth group Project 38, this verse, counting everything as loss in view of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Teens in the congregation, what are you tempted to value more than Christ?

What are you tempted to put more worth in than Christ? This in one verse is our church's whole message to you. Find your supreme worth in Christ and in nothing else. We have to ask then, why is it so surpassingly valuable to know Jesus Christ as your Lord? Paul's fundamental answer is that Jesus is your only means of being made right with God.

God is your creator and ruler and in order to be right with him, you need not an impressive religious resume, but a perfect moral record. Otherwise, what you deserve from him and what he promises to give you is not acceptance but eternal condemnation.

No matter how many inherited religious privileges you have, no matter how hard you work at religious attainments, your sinful nature makes it impossible for you to obtain that perfect moral record. At best, you'll get a record that looks good to you but in God's sight is worthless.

So, in order to deliver us, God sent his son into the world in order to take on all our staggering liabilities and give us his infinite assets. In his death on the cross, Jesus paid the full debt that our sins deserved and he obtained an eternal inheritance for those who trust in him. He rose on the third day, triumphing over death and ascending in power and glory to God's right hand. Now he commands all people to turn from sin and trust in him. If you've been thinking that the way to get right with God is to scrub up your religious resume, burn that thing.

Turn to Christ. Don't bring any other boast. Don't bring any other confidence in the flesh. Paul is saying, None, none of it, none of it will do you any good. None of it will count.

Trust only in him.

Don't try to earn your way to God. It's impossible. Don't rely on your own good record before God. It'll never hold up. Don't presume that because your parents are Christian, you must be a Christian or that because you went through the effort of coming to church today or coming to church every Sunday that there's Therefore, that means you must be a Christian.

Instead, rely on Christ alone to save you.

Later in verse 8, Paul goes even one step further. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ. So Paul is speaking about what he values, what's gained, what's lost, not from theory, but from experience. He has lost it all for Christ's sake. He lost his standing within his religious community.

He went from being an agent of the authorities to being regarded as an enemy of the authorities. He went from prestige to to prison and all of it for Christ. Did Paul regret these losses? Did he have any second thoughts? No, not at all.

Instead, he counts everything he lost as rubbish, excrement, refuse, stuff you throw out and sweep away so nobody has to see it or smell it. That's his whole previous life compared to the surpassing worth of knowing Christ.

Stars stop shining in the morning not because they switch off but because the sun shines so brilliantly that they disappear. That is what Christ did to all Paul's former boasts. Paul reversed his reckoning. What he used to value came to have no value at all. But that didn't leave him broke.

Instead, it left him unutterably rich. Paul reckoned up all his losses as nothing next to the gain he had in Christ. And friends, that re-reckoning, that reversal of values, is exactly what it means to become a Christian. To become a Christian is to begin to value Christ more highly than anything in the world. To become a Christian is to begin to value Christ more highly than anything in yourself, anything in your past, anything in your religious achievements, and anything the world can possibly promise you.

If you haven't undergone that reversal of values, you haven't yet become a Christian. But once you do become a Christian, that's only the beginning of a lifelong process of continually reversing your reckoning. Sometimes, especially for those who come to faith well into adulthood, conversion feels like a car crash. You were totally unprepared for it. And you have to pick up the pieces for a long time afterward.

If you've only recently become a Christian, what have you already given up for Christ? What might you still need to give up? Part of the process of growing as a Christian will be discovering still more things that count as loss, still more things you need to lose, still more things you used to value but that now account for nothing. Next to the worth of Christ.

And you will discover, as you reckon up those losses again and again, that Jesus more than makes up for every single one. Brothers and sisters, members of CHBC, any asset of yours that competes with Christ becomes a liability. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world if he forfeits his soul?

All true faith includes the willingness to give up everything for Christ and endure anything for Christ. Faith writes Christ a blank check.

Only God determines the specific costs each of us will have to pay. But if you know the worth of Christ, you'll part with anything in order to gain Him.

One of the prizes that the world dangles in front of us in a dazzling variety of forms is status. We don't often think or talk about status, Partly because to admit you're seeking status is to lose status. It's a tricky game. But despite our deflection, despite our hiding from ourselves, status is a current that runs under just about every ambition. The writer Will Storr catalogs many of the status games that we play.

He writes, In the developed world, we play political games, religious games, corporate games, hobby games, computer games, cult games, legal games, fashion games, charity games, social media games, racial, gender, and nationalist games. Within these groups, we strive for individual status, acclaim from our co-players. We become the games we play.

What status games are you most invested in? Beauty, fitness, money, politics, mother of all status games, climbing the ladder in your workplace? What about parenting? The so-called mommy wars are about bringing status disputes into the kitchen about who's the real mom?

How can you tell where you seek status? Easy. Ask these questions. First, who do you compare yourself favorably to? Who are you glad to be better than?

And better at what? That will tell you where you're seeking status. My point is not that status is a sin or that all status games are intrinsically evil. My point is that status is one of the most overlooked idols and therefore all the more deadly. One case study might be helpful here.

Does Paul's rejection of all status claims that could compete with Christ mean that it's wrong, for instance, to seek a promotion in the workplace? Not at all. The Bible holds up countless examples of people who wield status, people who wield power and authority for others' good. You can think of Joseph as Pharaoh's right-hand man in Egypt. You can think of Daniel in the court of Babylon.

There are all kinds of good reasons to seek greater responsibility and recognition in the workplace. But there are right and wrong ways to seek them. Here are some tests of whether you're seeking that promotion rightly or wrongly in a way that can be a means of glorifying Christ or in a way that would compete with your allegiance to Christ. A few questions. Would you be willing to give up that role in a heartbeat if obtaining that promotion or keeping it ever required you to compromise your commitment to Christ?

Do you treat those below you with as much care as you treat those above you? Or has your ambition birthed hypocrisy?

Do you exemplify selfless Christ-like service to all regardless of whether they have a prize to offer you? Are you faithful in all the other duties and demands God has placed on your life? Or are you willing to sacrifice some of them in order to obtain the all-important Has your involvement in church suffered because of the work you're putting in? Now, that's not to say it's never wise to pursue a role that will cost you more time. And that may well cut in in various ways into how you serve the church.

But it calls for prayerful, careful consideration. Is the trajectory of your life moving toward greater and greater devotion to work until there's no room left for anything else?

Or are you striving for a promotion that could be costly in terms of time and could lessen your church involvement and viewing it as a strategic move, a calculated risk, and one whose consequences you're willing to continually evaluate in light of your more fundamental commitments to Christ and to his people? That's just one application out of infinite. Possibilities? Where are you looking to climb up in a way that actually might be taking you farther from Christ?

What have you counted as loss for the sake of Christ? What have you had to lose for the sake of Christ? And can you say with joy and with no hesitation that every single loss was worth it? If not, you have to reverse your reckoning. That's the only way you'll find everything in Christ.

Point four, rely on him alone. How can you find everything in Christ? Rely on him alone.

We'll see what it looks like for Paul to rely on Christ alone and all of its glorious results in verses 9 9 to 11. Really, this thought picks up with the last phrase of verse 8. From that phrase through the end of verse 11, the passage is structured by two purpose statements that each contain two purposes side by side. So if we ask, why or in order to what goal does Paul count all things as rubbish? Start at the end of verse 8 and end of verse 9: In order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.

And then verse 10: that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and may share his sufferings. So picking up with verse 9: When Paul says that he wants to be found in Christ, he's naming Christ as his sole hope for the final judgment. The day of judgment is when everything will be revealed, all will be seen, all will be plain. And what is the only safe space on that day? It's to be found in Christ.

If you rely on Christ alone, then he is all the hope you need to face that final day fully confident. The rest of verse 9 tells us more about what it means to be found in Christ. Paul says, Not having a righteousness of of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith. You have to rely on Christ alone because his righteousness is the only one that can withstand God's final judgment. Note Paul's phrase, a righteousness of my own.

That's what he's saying. He doesn't have. That's what he's saying won't do him any good or anybody else any good, a righteousness of my own. And that righteousness of my own is in one sense what every other religion in the world would tell you to seek. It's even what some groups that claim the title Christian will tell you to rely on.

But Paul will have nothing to do with it. The righteousness he's counting on is one that has nothing to do with him. It has come to him from outside. It comes from God and you receive it by faith. If you're a believer in Jesus and you struggle to know that you're saved, you struggle to know that God loves you and accepts you, look to the righteousness he himself has given you.

He isn't staring down on you with disappointment. He knows all the ways you've failed him and he knows precisely how righteous you are. Because He's given you His own righteousness. There is no gap here between knowledge and reality. There's no slip where your sin could threaten your righteous standing before Him.

He has given you the only perfect record you could ever have. That is His free and full gift.

Don't delude yourself. That you've got to get righteous before you can come back to God. The only way you have of coming to him is the righteousness he himself has already given you. In verses 10 and 11, Paul tells us still more about why he counted everything as loss in order to gain Christ. He says that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

This knowledge of Christ is not abstraction but intimacy. Paul has known Christ for 30 years and what does he want? To know him, to know him better. What does that knowledge mean? It means experiencing amid all the sufferings of this present life the very power by which God raised Jesus from the dead and at work in you.

It means being renewed inwardly by God's own power, even when everything around you falls apart.

And suffering is no accident or catastrophe. Paul positively purposes, intends to share Christ's sufferings. Here Paul again traces in his own life that downward stroke we talked about from Philippians 2:5-11. The Christian life is a participation in Christ's own life. This participation involves being conformed to Christ's cross-shaped death, having that same shape traced out in your own life.

Life. And the ultimate goal is that you'd share in his resurrection too. Suffering is not an accident. Suffering is not a sign that something has gone wrong. Suffering should not make you question your commitment to Christ or his commitment to you.

Instead, suffering should confirm that you are being conformed to Christ. To suffer for the sake of Christ in particular is a choice privilege of God's chosen people. As Peter says in 1 Peter 4:14, if you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.

Looking at the last phrase of verse 11, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Paul's point here is not to call his own or your resurrection into question. Instead, as we'll see Lord willing next week, his point is that for every Christian there is still a race to be run and a prize to be one. We have to keep striving and straining forward in order to finally obtain it. So Paul's point in verses 9 through 11 is that in order to gain Christ, you have to rely on him alone.

And if you do, he will be everything for you. Christ is all the righteousness you need. Christ is all the security you need. Christ is all the power you need. Christ is all the life that you need.

Whatever price you have to pay now, the resurrection will infinitely compensate. Compared to the glory that is coming for you, any suffering you experience now flickers out like a star disappearing into the dawn. Unto the grave, what shall we sing? Christ, he lives. How can you find everything in Christ?

Rely on him alone. Think back to Ben Gunn, the released prisoner who found more life in prison than out of it. What would you say was wrong with his reckoning? How might you encourage him to value things differently? My question for you is, what about you?

Is there something keeping you in bondage that you are counting as worth more than your only path to freedom?

Jesus once told a very short story. To illustrate precisely the point Paul makes in our passage, Jesus himself tells us that he is infinitely worth any price we have to pay in order to obtain him. Matthew 13:44 the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then, in his joy, he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we pray that you would enable us by the power of your Spirit to count all things as loss for the sake of Christ. We pray that you'd enable us to count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Jesus Christ as our Lord. Father, we pray that you would enable us to give up sins we're wrongly gripping and wrongly valuing. We pray that you'd strengthen our faith so that we would perceive the infinite worth of Christ. And be enabled to hold fast to Him alone.

We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.