LETTER for MARCH 1993

Dear Friends,

Our life is filled with all sorts of experiences, needs, happenings, interests, desires and feelings which are all, in different ways, clamouring for our attention and pressing upon our consciousness. Together with these are responsibilities and obligations which we can't escape. The business of life is organising all these aspects of living in such a way that we live a full, right and satisfying life, without inner turmoil and unrest.

How difficult is this business of living! To get all these aspects of our personality into line we must have a goal in life, which is that factor that governs the selection we make from all these different pressures within. We all have such an aim in life even if we do not define it very precisely. To some it is only an inner desire to be happy and feel satisfied. Others have ambitions which are more directed, such as getting to the top of their profession.

The trouble is that as the years pass we come to realise that life is not so fulfilling or satisfying as we expected or desired. The goals we set our affections on do not bring the desired quality of life, nor do we find that we are so sure we know the right way to go.

Where can we find the security, purpose and fulfillment in living that we need and long for? The experience Paul relates in Philippians chapter three verses 1 to 12 is very helpful in answering this question.

Paul plainly grew up fairly pleased with life and sure of where he want to go. From verse 4 to 6 he describes his life as he had had it mapped out. He had come from good pedigree and family, and he saw the advantages this gave him, not least the acclaim of community and nation he belonged to. He found this exciting and he was determined to build on this and become more and more important and approved in his society.

But a radical change had taken place. We know what it was. It was when Jesus met him on that journey into Damascus and claimed him and his allegiance for the rest of his life.

Paul expresses this change in verses 7 and 8. He tells us in this powerful and startling way. "But whatsoever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ".

Paul then goes on in the next verses to express how he seeks to gain Christ. He speaks of desiring to be found in him and to know him.

The details of what Paul is saying here are too much for us to consider in this short letter. What I want to concentrate our attention on is the fact that the goal of Paul's life was Christ. To know more about him; to understand more of what he has done for him; to meet with him in spiritual communion; to find out his will and purpose and follow it; to experience more of his love and goodness.

Paul had found out that if Christ was the goal of his life and that living for him and with him was the priority, then all the other things in his human make up would arrange themselves in a proper fashion, and he would not only be free from the confusion within him, but find his life fulfilled with purpose. He would know peace in himself and with himself, as he realised true peace with God.

But notice that Paul does not expect that his experience on the Damascus Road, when Christ met with him for the first time, was all, and that by that event he had arrived. No! we find in this passage in Philippians that he nurtured his relationship with Christ and sought to deepen it every day. It was an on-going aim to put Christ first and seek his presence more, which required his determined action continually.

To do this he kept the desire to know Christ alive within his heart and affections, by remembering what he had come to know of Christ, and giving himself with determination to grow closer to him daily. He says in verse 12 - "not that I have already obtained all this .... but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me".

What I am trying to emphasise is that we must have this goal of the Apostle to gain Christ as our goal. We must keep it very much alive and we must pursue it with singleness of heart. This is the only way to find the blessing that is in knowing Jesus.

At the heart of this activity is to give time to be with Jesus in the means he has given us to meet with him; that is communing with him by spending time with him in reading and meditating on the Bible and in prayer. We know this, but it takes discipline and perseverance to keep at it. We need also to believe that it is the most important part of our life and needs to be given prime time in our day. We have to resist all that would keep us from communing with Jesus, and from any idea that we are too busy, or that time is being wasted while we spend time seeking Christ.

Most of us seem to have an in built brake inside us which pulls us away from seeking Christ, of raises barriers and hindrances from spending time with him. The devil is a master in the strategy of keeping us from Christ.

The reward of gaining Christ and becoming more intimate with him, is that he tunes our character to himself and we find that all the conflicting desires within us begin to find their proper place and proper proportions.

We would like to feel that there is some instant formula for success in living. Much Christian teaching tends to respond to this desire and speak of instant happiness, and instant holiness, and instant power. But it is not like this. If Paul's words in this chapter in Philippians reveal anything, they reveal that Paul worked at gaining Christ, and concentrated his energy to it all the time. It is hard, but it is in the end worthwhile and a blessing. In Christ is all the treasurers of godliness and we must receive these treasures by faith and can't earn them, but there is no substitute for the energy required to seek Christ and to know him.

Your servant for Christ's sake,