Upside-Down: Living Through Dying

Living Through Dying
Upside-Down
January 19/20, 2008
Digging Deeper (Questions are on the last page)
Upside-Down: Living Through Dying
(Robert Ismon Brown)

Background Notes
Key Scripture Texts: Matthew 16:21-27 and Philippians 3:3-11.
21 From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. 22 Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. "Never, Lord!" he said. "This shall never happen to you!" 23 Jesus turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." 24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. 26 What good will it be for a man if he gains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? 27 For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father's glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done (Matthew 16:21-27).

3 For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in the flesh-- 4 though I myself have reasons for such confidence. If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless. 7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 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 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ-- the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. (Philippians 3:3-11).

Introduction
Perhaps the most profound of the upside-down ideas announced by Jesus' kingdom message is that "we live through dying". In a sense, this is the touchstone for the whole series. We are asked to embrace the very personal affirmation that our own "dying" leads to "living" at the highest level. Nothing is more personal than reminding us about death. And the connection of death and life is a paradox indeed. The Christian faith is rife with paradoxes, those statements which at first blush defy harmonization. When we are dealing with the things of God, much is mysterious, and if it weren't, we ought to be surprised. After all, it is not possible to reduce the ways of God to some purely logical and transparently explicable set of expressions. If we could do that, we would understand God, and, thereby, explain Him out of existence. No, God remains inscrutable, though wonderfully so. The kingdom of God, as Jesus preached it, invades the world so as to challenge our ordinary ways of thinking about it. None of the old categories work anymore, as Jesus calls on his follower to "Deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me" (Matthew 16:24). Augustine, the great 4th century C.E. philosopher, reminded his readers that paradoxes do two things: 1) cause wonder, and 2) seem to go against accepted opinion. Jesus' call to die, in order that we might live, certainly does both. Is this a call to instant martyrdom? Are we suppose to drink the cool-aide? Or does Jesus expect a deeper understanding of his words?

We can't deny the literal sense of Jesus' words, even if they have a paradoxical quality. Speakers in the ancient world often used "rhetorical paradox" (following Aristotle) to get the attention of their audience by saying something apparently contradictory or against plain sense to provoke thought or evoke strong emotion. For Jesus, dying meant living in the most concrete sense. After all, he set his face toward the cross, and then he proceeded to accept this brutal form of capital execution. Three days later, he rose from the dead and gave new meaning to the Greek word anastasis, "to rise again". He expected no less commitment from his followers. But critiques of the Christian faith often question how much value we place on human life if we invite people to give it up. For example, the school of ethics known as "ethical egoism" (popularized in the 20th century by Ayn Rand) accuses Christianity of emptying human life of importance by calling for its followers to become martyrs, and then elevating the martyr to sainthood. Have we turned human life into so much running water merely flowing downstream?

Jesus was never casual about his calls to "deny self" and "lose life". The German martyr of the 20th century, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote, "When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die". Not everyone in Bonhoeffer's time hung from the Nazi gallows for their faith. Many hung for other reasons. Many didn't hang at all. It turned out that Bonhoeffer paid the ultimate price, just days before the Allies liberated his prison camp. Nor did men like Bonhoeffer adopt the ideology of the Stoics that accepted life's outcomes, including death, as part of some grand scheme in which we must, invariably, play a bit part. It's not as if one life can be easily interchanged with another. Each life remains valuable to God, made as it is in His image. To give up my life is an enormously important act, and as such, is not the whole story. Jesus equally affirmed "if you give up…you will save…" (Matthew 16:25). We must admit, nothing in nature guarantees that statement. It's just as possible that we might give up, and that's the end of it. The demand Jesus makes on his followers remains coupled with his promise of salvation. And that is the only way to make sense out of the wondrous paradox he puts in front of us.

Some people decide to give up their life by taking it--in suicide. Such persons are not giving up something they value, in hope that the promise of life will finally arrive. More than likely they imagine nothing to live for, and see themselves in worthless ways, despairing of life, value and hope. That's quite a different scenario than the one Jesus requires. We "give up" that which we prize and value, our true essence, precious and holy. The Christ-follower dies in this way, not because life is unbearable, but because it belongs to God, a thing prized above all else. Our lives acquire their value through both creation and redemption. We are created in the image of God, and are thereby precious in His sight. We are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, and our lives are thereby invested with enormous importance. There can be nothing "cheap" about a life given in the service of Christ. Bonhoeffer wrote in his Cost of Discipleship:
Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our Church. We are fighting to-day for costly grace.
Cheap grace means grace sold on the market like cheapjacks' ware… Costly grace…is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life… Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son…, and what cost God much cannot be cheap for us… (pp. 43-45).

We give up our lives, not because we they are not valuable, but because they are, purchased as they have been by the blood of Christ:
18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect (1 Peter 1:18-19).
19 Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).
You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of men (1 Corinthians 7:23).
Dying as a Christian does not mean giving up something that belongs to us, but rather giving to God what belongs to Him by redemption. We are already His. Through Christ's death, He has acquired us, having set us free from sin and death--of the worst kind.

This means that in one significant way we have already died to the self-ownership of our lives.

The Teaching of Jesus: Lose Your Life (Matthew 16:21-27)
The command to "lose your life" originates with Jesus himself. It is spoken in the context of his announcement to the disciples that he is going to the cross. "He must go to Jerusalem", Matthew's account records, implying that Jesus has accepted the will of God, and that his decision is by no means coerced by his circumstances. Human beings will conspire together, Jesus tells his followers, causing him to suffer. But in the end, "he must be killed," Jesus confirms. The language of 16:21 is strong: Matthew uses the Greek word dei to communicate the idea "it is necessary". The infinitives, "to go", "to suffer", "to be killed", and "to be raised" all trace their force back to this one word. God's kingdom program requires the road to Calvary and death. But, Jesus concludes, it requires the resurrection as well. What Jesus forecasts is not his martyrdom but his victory in and through death. The first three infinitives acquire special importance only through the fourth, namely, "to be raised on the third day". Jesus does not die for death's sake; he does not endure suffering because suffering has intrinsic value, but because victory and vindication lie at the end of this painful journey.

Therefore, Jesus does not announce his martyrdom. However, Peter misses Jesus' point completely, and is unsettled by the decision to "go to Jerusalem" in the first place. He knows that there is choice in this scenario, and he knows that Jesus could hold back from his proposed visit to that dangerous city. Matthew's words capture Peter's passion: hileos soi, kurie. This word, normally translated as a negative in English, is actually from a classical root, meaning "propitious" or "merciful". From that it becomes an idiom, along with "to you", meaning "be it far from you", or perhaps, "be merciful to yourself". The Greek translation of the Old Testament uses this same word to translate halilah, "to be far from". Peter borders on a strong oath here. This tells us a great deal about his own view of Jesus' death. No doubt Peter and the other disciples rejected "living through dying" as an upside-down kingdom principle. He further declares: ou me estai soi touto, "this shall by no means be to you", using the double negative for extreme emphasis. Matthew classifies Peter's words as a "rebuke" (Greek: epitiman, "to fault, chide, rebuke, reprove, censure severely, charge with a wrong, sharply admonish"). Much is at stake for Jesus and for Peter, and this disciple whom Jesus had earlier commended for his faith, now rises in opposition to Jesus' intentions.

Hearing this, Jesus perceives the presence of the Tempter in and behind Peter's words, and he calls him out. "Get behind me, Satan (or Adversary, from the Greek Satana, "the opposing one"). You are a skandalon ("stumbling block") against me (the genitive case used in the Greek has the "adversative sense" in this context)." While Peter might be standing before Jesus, it is the personality of Satan who energizes his words and motivates his actions. The kingdom idea that we "live through dying" is upside-down by comparison to Satan's notion that "good guys finish last". When Matthew uses the word "stumbling block", skandalon, he adopts a familiar term from the Messianic prophecies. "The stumbling block will become the capstone" (see Isaiah 8:14, 28:16; Psalm 118:22, and 1 Peter 2:6-8). But in this case, Jesus turns the statement around and accuses Peter of being the stumbling block which, in his words, does not "have in mind the things of God, but the things of men". That is, Peter is not using kingdom thinking when he mounts his resistance to Jesus' intentions. It is Peter who "rejects" the mission of Jesus, and himself becomes the obstructionist.

Notice the contrast Jesus makes: 1) Things of God, 2) things of men. No clearer statement of the upside-down principle could be found than this. God's values stand in stark contrast to human values, tainted as they are by Satan's own purposes. "What God proposes, Satan opposes." "What man opposes God disposes." Those statement, taken from well-worn sermon rhetoric, correctly express the stark contrast between the ways of God and the ways of the adversary, whether human or demonic. For Peter to oppose the unambiguous intentions of Jesus to confront death, and to come out the other side victorious, was for Peter to stand in the place of God's ancient adversary and attempt to overturn the laws which govern the kingdom of God. Jesus' command, "Get behind me" (Greek: upage opiso mou) has a certain military ring to it, as if Jesus were commanding a deserter or even an opponent on the battle field to rejoin the ranks.

"If you are going to come after me, you must get behind me," Jesus now tells his disciples. But to do that, means two crucial things:
1. "deny himself" (Greek: aparneomai, "to deny", "to affirm that one has no acquaintance or connection with"). Ironically, this same word will be used later to describe Peter's three-fold denial of Christ! Peter will discover through this coming period of denial what "deny himself" truly means. Having denied any acquaintance or connection with Jesus, Peter will learn what must be true if he is to deny himself in the same way (see Matthew 26:31-35 and compare with Matthew 26:69-75).
2. "take up his cross" (Greek: stauros, "cross"). The mere mention of this word chilled the hearts of the Jewish people. Rome asserted its authority through this instrument of capital execution. The hillsides around Jerusalem exhibited crosses, Rome's reminder to its subject people, "We are in charge here". Today we look at the cross as an emotional symbol of Christian faith, often studded with jewels or gold-gilded and worn around our necks. But then, when Rome ruled the world, it represented torture, punishment and a sense of twisted justice. During the process of crucifixion, the convicted criminal was first made to carry the cross-beam (not the whole structure). For the journey to the place of execution, this cross-beam was his companion, the reminder of his coming death. Carried, dragged, sometimes with the assistance of a sympathetic friend or by the command of the Roman solider an unwilling bystander, the cross was hauled up to an upright post already fixed in the ground. This cross-beam was his cross.

Jesus and the disciples had no doubt witnessed many such crucifixions. But now Jesus applies the tortuous meaning of that horrific symbol to the Christian discipleship. Here is a deliberate decision to say about myself, "I don't know you, I don't obey you, I owe no loyalty to you". Here is my conscious choice to become the solider who places the cross-beam on my own shoulders, and make this instrument of death my own. Taking up the cross is not enduring some suffering that happens to come my way. Instead it is the intentional dying to myself, self-chosen, self-pursued. And it is done for a specific purpose:
3. "follow me". The Greek of our passage uses the aorist tense for "deny" and "take up", but in this case Matthew uses the present tense. Following Jesus is a continuing journey which must begin with a singular choice and a deliberate purpose. This is one of the several implications of the aorist in Greek: singular, decisive action, especially when used in the imperative ("a command") mood as it is here. Nigel Turner, Greek scholar, calls this a "once for all" action. Once for all we decide to deny self and take up our cross. But that is done so that we might continuously follow Jesus wherever he might lead us. Peter had not yet made his choice. He would deny Jesus before he came to the point where he would deny himself. But once he decided, his decision would lead him to places he otherwise would not have gone. Consider the way Jesus describes Peter's future:18 I tell you the truth, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." 19 Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, "Follow me!" (John 21:18-19).

In the next three verses (16:25-27), Jesus offers three reasons why his followers must "die to self". Matthew's language introduces each of these with the Greek conjunction gar, commonly translated "for" and presenting the explanation in what follows it.

1. Attempts to Save Life Doomed to Fail (16:25)l
All of this has enormous significance as Jesus now reveals. The disciples, as exemplified by Peter's resistance to Jesus, already have shown a willingness to "save life", specifically the life of Jesus, and also presumably their own thereby. Jesus accepts this determination on their part, but turns it upside-down. "I know you want to save your life," Jesus tells them, "but not in the way you propose." Any attempt to "save" one's own life will result in losing it (Greek: apolesei, "to destroy, perish, incur a loss"). Matthew's choice of words is startling. This is no ordinary loss, but the kind one would expect on the day of judgment. It is a perilous and eternal loss Jesus describes. "You cannot save yourselves", Jesus is explaining to them. "You must let go of this determination to engineer your own deliverance, or the consequence will be disastrous." Of course, the deliberate and decisive actions "to deny oneself" and "to take up one's cross" are the complete opposite of the idea "to save oneself".
Unable to save oneself, the Christ-followers are called upon to let themselves fall under God's judgment--that is, "to lose oneself" in His courtroom, accepting His verdict. The word "to lose" carries forward Jesus' argument with the same overtones, but this time, as the free choice of the disciple. I must place myself under the judgment of God in order that I might also experience the favorable verdict of God. The cross I take up is not the Roman cross, tarnished by the abuses of power, but rather the cross given me by Jesus, my Lord. This cross takes me into the courtroom of God where He may pass a righteous sentence on my life, and where I may, at the invitation of Jesus, also cast myself on His mercy. Only in this way can I be saved.

We must, Jesus urges, allow God to pass judgment on our life, and we must relinquish our own prerogative to do so. And we do not "lose our life" on our own or for ourselves. Jesus clarifies his instruction with the caveat "for my sake" (Greek: heneken mou, "on account of me" or "for me" or "for the sake of me"). What Jesus tells his disciples is that, in the act of "denying self", "taking up one's cross", and "losing one's life", they are not acting alone. The power to save life by losing it does not reside in the act of losing it, but in the act of losing it heneken mou, "on account of me". This could mean a couple of things. Does Jesus suggest that 1) if we lose our lives in Jesus' cause, standing by him, supporting him, and fighting beside him we are assured of this salvation? Or rather does Jesus mean that 2) we have this assurance because we trust in Jesus, and how it will turn out for him when he goes to Jerusalem, suffers, dies and rises again? At first glance, it would seem that #1 has problems, especially for the first disciples? When Jesus went to the cross, they were nowhere to be found, having forsaken him. That leaves #2 for our consideration.

The principle, "we live through dying", derives its power, not from some innate principle of nature or from some heroic courage we show, but from the unique and solitary action of Jesus who chooses the cross for our sake, dying in our place, and then proving himself victorious by rising from the dead. Any hope we have to "live through dying" rests with our connection to Jesus in his dying and living again. The upside-down kingdom rises when Jesus rises. And our salvation comes from losing only when our life is united with Jesus in his death and resurrection. Something profound must happen to Jesus in order for something profound to happen for us.

2. No Comparison between the "Soul" with the "Whole World" (16:26)
Whereupon, Jesus develops a further reason for obeying his original instruction. The decision to "die" as a Christ-follower requires that we place greater importance on our "soul" than on gaining the whole world. Matthew uses the Greek word psuche, often translated as "soul", throughout this passage to refer to human life. We are most familiar with the term when it appears in words like psychology and psychic. However, in those cases, the meaning is limited to only mental functions or to the mind. The word can take on the theological sense of "soul", that part of us which survives death, although that is not a uniquely Christian idea at all, since the ancient Greeks held to some form of life after death. Socrates and Plato elevated psuche above the body, the physical aspect of humanity, and taught that the body was the prison of the soul. This dualism, unfortunately, afflicted Christian thought at some point after the first century. More accurately, Jesus taught resurrection of the whole person, as did Paul and the apostles. Offering life for the soul after death would not have been a particularly advantageous selling point for early Christian preachers, since the pagans could offer the same thing. But to offer the restoration of the whole person, body and soul, would have been a remarkable philosophical development (see N.T. Wright's Resurrection of the Son of God for a comprehensive treatment of this topic). Of course Jesus is working from a Jewish framework, and would have had no difficulty uniting the whole person under the single idea of psuche, better translated "life", as in, "whole life". A few other linguistic notes might be helpful here:
Psuche originally came from "to breath, to blow" (psucho), and so literally meant "breath" like the Latin anima, or "the breath of life", that vital force which animates the body and shows itself in breathing. In this sense, also applies to animals. From this notion it becomes "life" in the biological sense. The New Testament focuses the meaning on life lived on earth versus life lived eternally. Persons born into God's kingdom are living beings in a new sense. We also see the use of the word for "person" where the whole individual is in view. There still remains shades of meaning with "psychological" overtones, such as, the seat of feelings, desires, affections, aversions, much like the Greek word for "heart", kardia. From this idea we also arrive at seat of moral choice, the will. Additional meanings include, looking at the true essence of human beings as psuche, along with the permanence of life that is not limited to physical existence.
Ultimately, we are driven back to Hebrew meanings which flow from nephesh, the usual Hebrew word for human life. The best example of this appears in Genesis 2:7 where human creation is described in this way: "Yahweh God formed Adam from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (Hebrew: chayah), and Adam became a living nephesh (usually translated as "soul"). Notice, Adam did not have a soul, but rather, he became a living soul, that is he acquired the principle of animation from God's act of forming him. Although the word "soul" often appears in our English translations of nephesh, it is best to see this idea as different from the Greek one which places the whole emphasis on a distinct part of human nature called the "soul". We don't so much "have a soul" as "we are our soul".

When Jesus asks, "What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world (kosmos) but loses his soul (psuche)? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul (psuche)?", he is affirming the supreme importance of human life looked at in ways other than "material" ones, that is, earth-bound ones. Jesus is not driving a sharp wedge between a spiritual soul and a material body when he speaks this way. Instead, he makes clear that human beings are, in their essence, more than what they "gain" by acquiring things from the world around them. Perhaps we see this expressed most clearly in Luke's account (12:15) where Jesus declares, "Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions". We are especially interested in the word "consist" which is really the verb "to be". That is, life is not equivalent to what that life acquires. We are not defined in terms of what we attract to ourselves. We are something before we acquire anything! However, if we fail to accept that idea, Jesus' words rub abrasively against our material storehouse. It is because we confuse the true self with what the self acquires that we balk at letting the true self go.

What the true self represents is worth much more than what the true self "gains". House, clothing, wealth, fame, power are all things belonging to the kosmos which may, from time to time, get added to our inventory. But they do not really become part of our true self. There is an enormous different between "myself" and "my stuff". Failing to make that distinction, we may very well hold back and refuse to "deny self", "take up the cross", and "follow" Jesus. But once we see our true self as psuche, we at once realize that we are a living unity, a person with intentions, purposes, goals, and pointed toward the future. Our true worth is endowed on us by God, His image, His likeness, thrust into the world to direct and shape it for His purposes. The world does not define us, but we are certainly called upon by God to give meaning to the world. And when we do, we let go of our self as something that we can save, or that we must save, and allow Jesus to lead us to the cross where our true worth becomes clear in light of his supreme sacrifice. As Bonhoeffer so eloquently put it, "that which cost God the life of His Son, cannot be cheap for us".

3. Life's True Value Only Made Clear on Judgment Day
Finally, Jesus throws the spotlight on his own vocation. But whereas he introduced this section with predictions about his coming death, in the present verse he throws the emphasis on his coming "in his Father's glory" (Greek: doxa), surrounded with angels. Jewish readers instantly recognize such language as referring to the day of Yahweh, and the coming judgment of the world. However, Jesus has one particular purpose for his coming in mind: "he will reward each person according to what he has done". This is similar to passages such as 2 Corinthians 11:15, 2 Timothy 4:14, 1 Peter 1:17, and numerous references in the book of Revelation (2:23, 18:6, 20:12-13, 22:12). All of these echo the Old Testament in texts like Proverbs 24:12, Jeremiah 17:10, and Psalm 62:12. These passages frequently mention God's role as the One who "weighs" the hearts of His people in order that He might justly reward them. Why does Jesus draw on this concept in Matthew 16:27? He is making a rather simple statement: Human beings are unable to properly access the value of their own lives, as witnessed by the temptation to gain the whole world and lose one's soul in the bargain. They suppose that the world, the kosmos, is able to add additional value to who they are. But in that assessment, human beings are wrong. Instead, Jesus counters, human beings must let go of the valuation of their own lives and give it to God when He will pass fair judgment by the merciful hand of the Son of Man. "Then" (Greek: tote), not "now", he will "give" to each "according to what he has done".

We must pass through death before we can face the coming judgment, Jesus tells his followers. We must let go of self, and of the attempts to confer value on ourselves, and allow God at last, in His coming glory, to bring to light our true worth, our true value as seen in the eyes of the dying and rising Son of Man. Jesus seems to be intentionally contrasting the word "gains", in 16:26, with the word "reward" in 16:27. The value of our life lies not in what it "gains", but how it will one day be rewarded by God. And so, in the interim, Christ's followers are called upon to "deny self", "take up the cross", and "follow" him. Only on the day of judgment will the truth of the paradox be clear at last, that through dying, we live (see 2 Corinthians 5:10, Acts 10:42, Romans 2:16, 14:10, Ephesians 6:8, and Colossians 3:24 for further teaching on this topic).

Jesus now tantalizers his followers with a puzzling promise. As he often did when introducing a statement of profound importance and authority, Jesus begins "amen" in 16:28. What momentous hope does he offer his disciples? It is the expectation that "some" who stand before him will not die until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. Much speculation surrounds this prediction. Did Jesus intend to say that his "second coming" would happen in their lifetime? Or was he referring to chapter 17 where he appears in "transfiguration" glory? Or did he foresee the coming fall of Jerusalem some forty years hence? Scholars are not agreed on a single interpretation of the what. However, we should not miss Jesus' purpose for speaking these words after exhorting them to "self-denial" and "cross-bearing". Having promised "reward" for laying down one's life, Jesus clearly now offers encouragement that his followers will not wait forever, but will, even during their own lifetimes, experience something of the kingdom blessings that will one day arrive when "the Son of Man comes in his kingdom". That is, Jesus offers future blessings to his disciples before they die. The reader of the New Testament would need to be blind not to see how those blessings came: resurrection of Jesus, coming of the Holy Spirit, and an empowered Church. As one prime example, consider Stephen, the first martyr:
55 But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. 56 "Look," he said, "I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God." (Acts 7:55-56).

Jim Elliot, missionary to Ecuador, and martyr for the cause of Christ, knew a great deal about "giving up" his life in order to save it. His story has recently been retold in the film, The End of the Spear, based on the book of the same title. Years ago, many of us read Through Gates of Splendor, and recall the same account in which Elliot and others encountered hostility from the Auca nationals and died as a result. Among the many things he left behind, was his concise and utterly wise statement which summarizes the text of Matthew 16 better than the meager commentary offered above. We closed this section with Elliot's words:
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."

The Teaching of Paul: Put No Confidence in Yourself (Philippians 3:3-11)
Had the earthly Jesus encountered Saul of Tarsus, he no doubt would have sparred with him over many things. Some scholars have raised the possibility that Saul actually did meet Jesus as one of the unnamed critics during Jesus' ministry. Nothing in Scripture confirms that, and it is idle speculation at best. Yet, in spirit, Saul was, at one time, hostile to the Jesus message as witnessed by his persecution of the early Christians, including Stephen. Occasionally in his letters, Paul (his Roman name) would wax biographical, and disclose bits and pieces of his pre-Christian past. One such text is the one we will now examine, and its theme parallels the teaching of Jesus about dying to self. And Paul had a great deal of "self" requiring such death! A few preliminary phrases from this passage reveal Paul's previous frame of mind:
"confidence in the flesh" (3 times) (3:3-5)
"to my profit" (3:7)
"all things", "everything" (3:7-8)
"my own righteousness by law-keeping" (3:9)

The sort of theology Paul advocated before he met Jesus on the road to Damascus (see Acts 9 for the details) was grounded in impressing God and other people. Like so many in Second Temple Judaism, Paul knew that something was terribly wrong with the people of God. And, as a right-wing adherent to the Shammai Pharisees, his remedy was demanding and severe. He applied this remedy to his own life, piling up the accomplishments and, for a time, leading the movement to stomp out what he considered to be the Jesus heresy. His presence at the stoning of Stephen, consenting to his death, is ample proof that Paul would spare no effort for this cause (see Acts 8:1). [Historian Jack Finegan places the conversion of Paul somewhere around 36 C.E.] So what does the list above indicate about Paul's perspective as a Jew? Perhaps a few simple questions summarize it: What can I do? What can I gain? What can I prove?--the emphasis falling on the "I".

By contrast, once Paul "found Christ" (or better, once Christ found Paul) the outcome was dramatic. As Paul phrases it in this passage, "What was to my profit, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ" (3:7). Those words remarkably parallel what we have heard from Jesus in Matthew 16. It is as if we are hearing from a disciple (and we are!), fresh from the feet of Jesus who has just spoken the words, "What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world and lose his soul?" "Yes," Paul, tells us in Philippians 3:7, "all of this was once considered by me as 'profit'. But no longer." That is why, earlier in this text, Paul writes about himself as a "genuine Jew" ("we who are the circumcision") who has discovered his greatest worship is "by the Spirit of God", and his greatest glory is "in Christ Jesus" A person who makes such wonderful discoveries no longer has room for "confidence in the flesh", that is, the self-dependent life.

This is a great concession of Paul's part. He is admitting that at one time his worship and his glory rested not with God, but with himself. His religion was rooted in trying to prove something about himself. And his credentials were impressive (3:5-6):
"circumcised the eighth day". Literally, "with respect to circumcision, an 8th day guy", focusing on the original nature of his entrance into Judaism. He was no convert, that is, no proselyte)
"people of 'Israel'". His racial distinctiveness as an Israelite meant he was a genuine descendent of the covenant people, and as such, better than someone who became part of Israel in some other way. All the rights and privileges of Judaism were his. Recall that Yahweh changed Jacob's name to "Israel" in conjunction with his "wrestling with the angel" as recorded in Genesis 32:22-32, a name which means "the one who prevails with God". It is a "mighty name". Paul saw himself belonging to a people with a "mighty name".!
"tribe of Benjamin". This tribe had prominence in Israel's history, named after Joseph's brother and only other son of Rachel, wife of Jacob (Israel). The first king, Saul (our writer's namesake!), came from this tribe. Benjamin, as a tribe, was valiant in battle, loyal to the house of David, participated in the return from Babylonian Exile, and joined with Judah in forming the new kingdom of Israel. Technically, Jerusalem and the Temple lay within Benjamin's boundaries (see Judges 1:21). Paul took great delight in his tribal membership, no doubt seeing himself as strong, courageous, pure and loyal, as were his ancestors.
"Hebrew of the Hebrews". Although Paul was born in Tarsus, outside the borders of Israel, he claimed pure Hebrew ancestry, traceable to many previous generations,as this phrase implies. No Gentile blood in these veins, he seems to be saying! And while he spoke and wrote Greek, he did not adopt the Hellenistic culture of the Roman Empire, but was educated in Hebrew ways (see Acts 21:40, 22:2-3, 23:6, 26:4-5 for Paul's thorough Hebrew orientation), and resisted the encroachment of pagans and paganism.Items 1-4 above were obviously due to the providence of God, and not to Paul's own choices. Still, Paul sees divine favor in each one. He might easily have said, "I was privileged…" But now Paul writes of his own accomplishments. So what did I, a good Jew, with solid pedigree, do with my endowments?
"a Pharisee in his interpretation of Torah". Although Paul was educated by Gamaliel (see Acts 23:6, 5:34, 22:3, Galatians 1:14), the more liberal of the Pharisee rabbis, his inclination was clearly toward Shammai who meticulously interpreted Torah according to the strictest oral traditions. Such Pharisees were not leaders of the official thought police who simply wanted to control people's lives for their own pleasure. Instead, they understood the reasons for Israel's present bad condition as due to a failure to keep Torah perfectly. If Israel would turn in purity (that is, Torah-purity) back to Yahweh, forgiveness and deliverance would eventually come. But it depended on what they, Torah-aware Israel, could accomplish. Paul gladly put himself in this camp.
"zealous in persecuting the church". And to be in this camp meant opposing any movement which might undermine it. The Jesus movement was perceived as such a threat. Paul, along with his peers, would have know what Jesus taught and did, and how tax collectors, harlots, and "other sinners" sat at his table. Good Pharisees in Paul's tradition could not tolerate such contamination of "pure Judaism". And when the deacon, Stephen, offered his sermon (recorded in Acts 7), Paul could not have missed the fact that Stephen was a proselyte to Judaism who had turned to the Jesus movement. "That's what happens," Paul no doubt thought, "when you make compromises with paganism. You end up with people like Stephen who go even farther in their hob-knobbing with these Nazarenes." And so Paul swears himself to the rooting out of Jesus-followers (Acts 8:1), culminating in his visionary encounter with the risen Jesus, which changed the course of his life. "I am Jesus whom you are persecuting," the voice from heaven replies to Paul's inquiry (Acts 9:5). "Zeal" is, by all accounts, a tricky business. Directed for the greater purposes of God, it is a mark of commitment. But inflamed by hatred and fueled by self-interest, zeal becomes a deadly weapon in the religious arsenal. Witness the movement which in later Judaism took up the name "Zealot", and led Israel to its terrifying defeat in 70, 73, and 135 C.E. See Paul's further remarks in 1 Corinthians 15:9, Acts 22:2-5, 26:9-11; 1 Timothy 1:13. Also, the Old Testament recognized a positive spin on "zeal", as seen in Numbers 25:1-18, Psalm 106:30, 1 Kings 19:10-14, Psalm 69:9). Perhaps the most famous "men of zeal" were the Maccabees who defeated the Syrians and restored the Hasmonean Kingdom of Judah for nearly one hundred years before the Romans stepped in. The Pharisees saw these valiant "freedom fighters" as their true forebears.
"faultless in Torah-righteousness as interpreted by his tradition". Pride and diligence led Paul to claim that he was "blameless" (Greek: amemptos) vis-à-vis Torah. Paul's assertion finds parallels in the rich young ruler met by Jesus in Luke 18:21. He qualified as "righteousness achiever" insofar as his own tradition saw him. The "great rabbis" had distilled Torah instruction down to the 613 mitzvot (commandments). (The readers are encouraged to access the following link where one version of this list can be found: http://www.jewfaq.org/613.htm). To be "righteous" in relationship to such a list simply meant you can check off the items you have obeyed. Is Torah more than such a list? For Jesus, the answer was clearly, yes! For Paul, before he met Jesus, the list was a source of comfort that he had met the requirements for "righteousness" (Hebrew: tzedaqah, "righteousness", "blameless behavior", "justice", "what is reliable", "godliness", "salvation"; Greek: dikaiosune). Righteousness, on these terms, was an "achievement" which, under the right circumstances, could bring the kingdom of God near to Israel. As a "righteousness achiever" Paul saw himself as contributing to that end.

But now comes Paul's great reversal, the moment when his world was turned upside-down. Paul begins 3:7 with the words, "But whatever was to my profit", literally, "but whatever was to me a gain (Greek: kerde, "gain", "advantage", "a win"). All of the things that belonged to Paul's "confidence in the flesh", the things that gave him such certainty as a righteous Jew, are swept away. They became, not assets, but liabilities in the accounting book of the kingdom. What once made Paul proud and self-reliant, he takes as a catastrophic loss. The language of this passage is overwhelmingly from the world of accounting as Rabbis would have seen it. Even the word hegeisthai, translated "count" or "consider" is consistent with this meaning. Whatever Paul "accounted" as enhancing his own value to God and to the nation, he even now decisively regards as bringing no value whatever to either. Though the list Paul gave us had many items on it, Paul uses the singular form of the noun, zemia, to consign them to the trash bin. In fact, the noun used here comes from the verb, zemioo, meaning "to affect with damage, do damage to, suffer loss, sustain damage, receive injury". Had Paul used our vernacular, he might have written, "Whatever I thought enhanced my life took a real blow one day." No doubt, Paul had in mind his own encounter with the risen Jesus who "called him out" that day (Acts 9) as a persecutor, not merely of his followers, but of himself. None of what Paul thought he was accomplishing actually amounted to anything, he now recognizes.

But Paul can't be faulted for trying. His efforts were zealous and in accordance with the most devout tenants of Judaism. Yet, it was all he knew; he knew nothing more; he didn't know anything better. Until… Much like the first disciples who heard Jesus' words: "deny yourself", "take up your cross"--there's something so much better "to follow"! The "whole world" cannot enhance the soul, Jesus said. And Paul discovered as much when he writes here, "Whatever was to my profit…" Paul's rejection of his former way of life came at the insistence of the Lord Jesus Christ. As he writes in 3:8, by "comparing" the old "gains" with the new ones, namely with "knowing Christ", the decision to let go of the old is, to use our slang, "a no-brainer". The Greek words are powerful: huperechon tes gnoseos Christos Iesou tou kuriou mou, literally, "the superiority of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord…" While Paul "knew" Torah through the lens of rabbinic interpretation, and oral tradition, and while he "knew" a kind of righteousness which qualified itself in self-approving ways, all of that pales in the presence of the "superior knowledge" (Greek: gnosis) found in having the Messiah Jesus as his Lord. Given the choice, so keenly set out for him that day on the road to Damascus, Paul came to choose the knowledge of a person to the knowledge of a tradition. So much so, that Paul will call his previous "benefits" skubala, "manure, dung, excrement".

On the road to Damascus that day, Paul died to himself, though at first he knew little of what that actually meant. His eyes covered with blindness, and his mind disoriented, others had to lead him to shelter and provisions. For once, he would be dependent on others for the blessings of God--such as his sight! And in this Philippians passage, Paul reflects on the meaning of all that and then makes clear his newly embraced vocation: "that I may gain Christ" (3:8b). Did he lose his life that day? Absolutely, letting go of the only life he knew, the life in Judaism with all of its assured benefits and grand dreams. This was no small scuttling of baggage, but the accumulated achievement of a lifetime. The whole world looked different to Paul. Even the Scriptures looked different. They ceased to be proof-texts for his dearly-held doctrine and became living words pointing to God's Messiah who had finally arrived. Paul might well have accepted Luther's assessment, made centuries later, "The Old Testament is the manger where the Christ-child is laid". Manger indeed! The Pharisee who once found solace in his chosen-ness, now finds a new identity in the words "gain Christ", and "be found in him, not having my own righteousness, the one derived from law-in-itself, but the one derived from God, righteousness [standing] on faith" (3:9).

What does it mean to "be found in" Christ? The Greek word, heurisko, translated here as "found", has meanings which include: "to find, to find out, discover, devise, intent, make, get, gain, procure, bring, fetch". Paul uses the word in its passive sense, "to be found", along with the preposition en, "in". Whereas, Paul earlier wrote about letting go of everything "for the sake of Christ" (3:7), to "know Christ" (3:8a), to "gain Christ" (8b), in this instance, he wants to be "found in Christ" (3:9). New Testament scholar, Preisker, in his lexical entry on this word, comments:
…its reference is predominantly to the surprising discovery and mysterious understanding of human existence and historical occurrence in their hidden relationships as seen from the standpoint of and with an ultimate view to the kingdom of God [Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, II, p.769]
In other words, Paul made a startling discovery that all attempts to save himself were doomed to fail, but without warning, God showed up one day and turned his world upside-down, and changed the way he thought about things, especially, about himself. In Jesus, God's Messiah, Lord of all things, the kingdom of God had arrived at last, and, wonder of wonders, Paul woke up one day living inside that kingdom! It was all so unexpected and unplanned from Paul's perspective. Everything he had attempted had to be thrown out. Christ was Paul's great and magnificent discovery! And having "found Christ", Paul at last had found himself. Not the old self, rooted as it was in religious piety, well-intentioned though it was, but in real righteousness. This, then, is the rich meaning of heurisko--the discovery of the unexpected: the discovery of Christ, not as Paul imagined him, but as God revealed him. Not arriving in power and majesty, but hanging on a cross.

But Paul is not yet finished telling his readers about his upside-down discovery, his holy heuriskon. Paul's self has changed residence. He is no longer living in his own neighborhood but in the kingdom of Christ instead. "Righteousness" is no longer something that he trots out to show off his achievements, but rather is God's declaration, in Christ, of his acceptance as one of God's people. Righteousness is not something "I possess", rather it is something with which I am blessed by God in Christ. Two kinds of righteousness are contrasted: "my own" as an achievement, attracting the favor of God; and "on faith" as the gift of the faithful God. When Paul speaks about "faith" (Greek: pistis), he is not so much naming yet one more thing that he does, but rather, what God is faithful in doing for him. This is a righteousness growing from the new-found relationship Paul has with Christ, a relationship described earlier, as the "knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord".

By all accounts Paul has died to his old way of being righteous, that is, of being accepted as one of the people of God. It's not about circumcision or birthright or separation from the pagan world or achievement under Torah. Quite the opposite (or, as we would put it, quite upside-down from all of that!), in place of this, Paul discovers a new kind of identity, the sort given to him by Christ himself. Recall his conversation with the risen, exalted Jesus on the road to Damascus [Note: There are four accounts of Paul’s conversion: Galatians 1:15-17 (from Paul himself); Acts 9:1-19 (Luke relating Paul's experience); Acts 22:2b-16 (Luke relating Paul's telling of his conversion to the crowd in Jerusalem); Acts 26:9-18 (Luke relating Paul's telling of his conversion to Agrippa). There are also allusions to Paul's conversion in Galatians 1:11-12; 1 Corinthians 9:1; 15:8. You are encouraged to reader each of these and think about the implications for our study here]. During that exchange with Jesus, Paul gets a new commission: to bring the Gospel to the pagan world, that is, to Gentiles, the hated goyim. Nothing could have been more off the beaten path for this set-in-his-ways Pharisee, bent on purifying Judaism of its paganism. With his fresh vocation, Paul had to let go of all of that. "You are," Jesus was telling Paul, "my servant and witness to the Gentiles. Everything else amounts to nothing compared to this vocation." An undiscovered life lay before him, and the old life was laid in its grave at the cross of the risen Christ. Life would not be the same for Paul ever again.

But now we move to the finale of our present passage, 4:10-11. Paul ended 4:9 with the words, "the from-God-righteousness on the faith" (my literal rendering of the Greek). He has just contrasted "his own" version of this righteousness with the "from-God-on-the-faith" version. But the sentence does not end there, and, unfortunately, our translators give the impression that Paul picks up a new thought with 4:10. He does not, but, instead, continues this one. The Greek of 4:10 begins with the genitive form of the article "the", followed by the infinitive "to know". This roughly translates as "of (or for) the knowing of", implying purpose, a common grammatical form in the New Testament. In addition, the form of the verb "to know" is in the aorist tense, likely the variety of aorist which "sums up the action" at the point it begins, a sort of "crisis event". What is Paul trying to tell us by this maze of linguistic twists?

We have already heard Paul tell us that Christ has turned out to be the greatest discovery of his life. That in Christ, he has had a major shakeup of his personal values. Nothing looks the same anymore. Nothing matters that once mattered. Paul has reached a crisis of knowledge with the result that coming to know Christ matters more than anything else. It's as if Paul has walked through a hidden door (like the one in C.S. Lewis' wardrobe!), and a whole new world suddenly comes into view on the other side. This world is ruled by a different kind of righteousness, a different kind of "order", than the one he left behind. In this new world, Christ Jesus is Lord--he is God ruling over all things, and Paul has met him face-to-face. What follows in Philippians 3:10-11 is a further explanation of what it means for Paul to be "found in Christ".

Paul gathers up everything he says in 3:10-11 in the word for "to know" or, as we have suggested, "to come to know", a crisis of knowing. This "knowledge of Christ is personal and relational", Gerald Hawthorne writes in his commentary on Philippians (Word Biblical Commentary, 43, p.143). The focus is on "understanding", coupled with experience and even intimacy. This is not mere intellectual knowledge of the sort Paul would have known in his rabbinic training. Much of that has been left behind as useless to his pursuit of this new righteousness. The current adage that it's not "what you know" but "whom you know" might be re-baptized in this context to mean that knowledge is not impersonal and entirely objective, but verges on the subjective and highly inter-personal. Some readers might cringe at this, thinking that Paul is advocating some form of relativistic truth. If by "relativistic" we mean "without proper grounding or confirmation", Paul certainly is not intending that. But if we mean "relative" in the sense that it pertains to a "relationship" with God through Christ--most certainly that is Paul's "understanding". Again, Hawthorne: "…he is thinking about a personal encounter with Christ that inaugurates a special intimacy with Christ that is life-changing and on-going" (p.143). The reader is invited to study these texts which shed more light on that idea of "knowing God": John 17:3, 1 Corinthians 2:8, 1 John 2:3-4, 4:8, 5:20.

What is the content of this "knowing"? Paul identifies a few key components:
"the power (Greek: dunamis) of the resurrection of him"
"the fellowship of his sufferings"
"conformed to his death"
"attaining the resurrection out from the dead"

Notice that Paul wants to know Christ in precisely these ways. And, also, that in knowing him in these ways, Paul comes to know himself in a way he has not known before. This knowing causes something to happen to Paul. Once again, the sort of knowledge Paul seeks is not something that he acquires and can neatly catalogue into his lists of "gains", as part of his repertoire of achievements. While Paul certainly believed in the Jesus of history, it was not merely the facts about Jesus that Paul wanted to input into his information store. Nor does he claim such knowledge as an advantage he now holds over other people, giving him a head-start on some newly discovered righteousness that will move him to the head of the line in the kingdom of God. Not at all. Paul wants to know Christ as the living One who is even now delivering him from his self-centeredness, converting him from the old way to the new way of life, gifting him to serve others by the Holy Spirit, and resurrecting him from death to life.

But having put the best foot forward in seeking the "power of Christ's resurrection", Paul honestly admits that the road to resurrection lies by the way of the cross. So then he speaks of the "fellowship" (from the Greek: koinonia, "the shared-ness"; notice the word "coin" embedded in that term--a thing stamped from the same mold) of Christ's sufferings (Greek: pathematon, from which comes our English "pathos", entailing intense feelings, in this case, pain). Such koinonia implies participation in something. Paul does not seek his own sufferings here, but those of Christ. He wants the divinely appointed suffering of Christ himself to become his own, that is, Paul wants to "die with Christ", a theme he develops elsewhere in his letters (see Colossians 1:24, Romans 8:17-18, 2 Corinthians 4:7-11, Romans 6:4-11; Galatians 2:19-20). This last passage warrants re-printing here:
19 For through the law I died to the law so that I might live for God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me (Galatians 2:19-20)
For Paul, the sufferings of Christ are not something he must imitate, but rather are realities he wants to experience. That is, these are not Paul's sufferings, but instead are Christ's sufferings being made real in his own life. The suffering Christ wields power in his sufferings, since through them he defeats sin and conquers the selfishness in human life. Paul wants that experience in his own life. In fact in writes elsewhere that he "dies daily" (1 Corinthians 15:31).

And not just the sufferings, but their outcome as well--namely, in death. "becoming like him in his death", the NIV translates this last phrase in 3:10. The Greek reads, summorphizomenois to thanto autou. The first word is unique in the New Testament and simply means, "to conform oneself, to make oneself like". Paul likes words beginning with sum- because they emphasize the idea of "together-ness", "oneness with", a thought he has already given us in the word koinonia. Classical Greek used the stem of this word, morphizo, to express, in one of its meanings, the idea of "give shape to", or "form by means of". What Paul seems to be saying here is that he wants the sufferings and death of Christ to be something he shares so that they together might give shape to his life. Imagine that! Until he met Christ, the thought of further suffering brought chills to the spiritual spines of Jewish people. They rejected the thought of a suffering Messiah as an indignity against the whole nation, an insult to its national pride. Lord knows, they thought, we've had our share of failed Messiahs. There is no way we want this one, this "suffering one". Paul's view of that was turned upside-down, and now he sees the suffering and dying Jesus as something that ought to shape his own life. Each life experience he encounters should be shaped by the suffering, dying Jesus. Each decision he makes; each thought he has; each response to his fellow human beings--should be shaped by this knowledge of the Jesus who suffered and died.

That being said, Paul does not end there, like a Stoic who simply accepts his painful lot in life. Beyond the suffering and death, Paul reaches, even as he began 3:10-11: "if, somehow, I might arrive (Greek: katantao, "to arrive, come to", perhaps of a place "opposite to" where one is now; forms of this exist in Classical Greek which mean "downhill", "right opposite") at the resurrection, the one out of the dead". What is Paul saying? Simply, that prior to discovering Christ, he was in a certain place, but once Christ entered his life, he was in another place. This new place was pregnant with possibilities, namely, the promise of new life, the kind Jewish people only spoke about when they mentioned the resurrection at the end of days. But things have changed. This resurrection is even now a real possibility, but to arrive at it, we must pass through Christ's sufferings and death. In fact, allowing those to shape our lives is the only way we can "arrive" at an entirely different place. Hence, the grand discovery of dying with Christ so that we might live with him also. Unless the dying Christ shapes our lives, the rising Christ cannot. This is the force of the "if" in 3:11, coupled with "somehow" (Greek: ei pos). Is there anyway for Paul to experience, to know Christ, the One who one day turned up in Paul's life? Surprisingly, yes, there is, Paul tells his readers, but it must be through allowing the sufferings and death of Christ to perform their work in our lives. Only then can the resurrection of Christ unleash its power for holy living, freedom from sin, and personal restoration.

All of this is quite exhilarating and mind-boggling. Scholars often write about Paul's "Christ mysticism", by which they mean Paul's belief that the Christ-follower can actually be joined with Christ in the whole sweep of his redemptive story, that we can participate with Christ in the very Gospel we proclaim. Did Paul ever "arrive" at this experience he longed for so much? The sequel to our text is Philippians 3:12-14 where Paul makes clear that he has not yet "obtained all this" (3:12), that he is "pressing on" and "reaching out" for the hand of Christ to take hold of him all through the process. "Not yet", Paul concedes (3:13), but, with single-heartedness he makes a solid commitment:
"This one thing I do"
"Forgetting what is behind"
"Straining toward what is ahead"
"I press on toward the goal, the prize, the calling of God, heavenward, in Christ Jesus".

When he "forgets what is behind", he clearly has in view the old way of looking at things, the one that he counted "loss" and treated as "rubbish". What we witness in this sequel to our main text is Paul's life shaped by the life of Christ. Whenever he uses the word "I", post-Christ, it acquires new meaning. Who is this "I" who "does but one thing", after having spent his whole life piling up many things? Who is this "I" who forgets what is behind, after having boasted about his "faultless righteousness"? Who is this "I" who looks forward with hope and expectancy for something more, after having convinced himself that he had achieved all that could be achieved? Why, this is the Paul who suffers with Christ, dies with Christ, and daily rises with Christ. And it is the same "I" whom Christ asked to "deny himself", "take up his cross", and "follow me". The message of Jesus and that of Paul are the same message. One spoken by the Master, the other by his servant-follower.

But this is also our message. For we are called by Jesus to value ourselves in entirely different ways, and to start by discovering ourselves "in Christ", and knowing him through his suffering and death. Whatever else we might think about ourselves, that thought must be taken to the cross where Christ Jesus our Lord must accomplish his serious work of crucifying our selfish selves and bringing every thought and ambition captive to his own (see 2 Corinthians 10:5). It is not we who crucify ourselves, mind you, but Christ who does this deep and difficult work. We cannot save ourselves, nor can we arrest our selfish egos. The whole world has convinced us that it can make us complete if we but gain it. But Jesus calls us to follow a New Way and surrender the center our lives to him instead. Nor is this work the task of a single day or month or year, but, as Paul assures us, the race of a whole lifetime in which we press on, take hold, and strain toward God's goal.

Are we willing to give up everything we hold dear to discover Christ in this way? That was Paul's burden and Jesus' imperative. J.H. Jowett, in his work The High Calling, summarizes Paul's attitude in this way:
Paul is abundantly willing to lose the thin and fading robe of reputation if only he can gain the splendid and incorruptible garment of a sanctified character. And that splendid garment is not the product of works, the fashion of human hands; it is the workmanship of God, the finished creation of His abounding grace" (p.131).
But perhaps the "heart of the matter" is best grasped from the words of Whigginton's hymn, written in the 19th century:

1 Not I, but Christ, be honored, loved, exalted;
Not I, but Christ, be seen, be known, be heard;
Not I, but Christ, in every look and action;
Not I, but Christ, in every thought and word.

2 Not I, but Christ, to gently soothe in sorrow;
Not I, but Christ, to wipe the falling tear;
Not I, but Christ, to lift the weary burden;
Not I, but Christ, to hush away all fear.

3 Not I, but Christ, in lowly, silent labor;
Not I, but Christ, in humble, earnest toil;
Christ, only Christ! no show, no ostentation;
Christ, none but Christ, the gatherer of the spoil.

4 Christ, only Christ, ere long will fill my vision;
Glory excelling, soon, full soon, I'll see ---
Christ, only Christ, my every wish fulfilling ---
Christ, only Christ, my All in all to be.

Finally, in Paul's dramatic fashion, he paints a portrait of this upside-down existence, putting in perspective the losses and the gain, the living and the dying, and why in the process me must not, after all, "lose heart":
7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. 8 We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. 10 We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. 11 For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. 12 So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you. 13 It is written: "I believed; therefore I have spoken." With that same spirit of faith we also believe and therefore speak, 14 because we know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence. 15 All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. 16 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. 17 For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. 18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal (2 Corinthians 4:7-18).

Glory to God! Amen.
Digger Deeper: Upside-Down: Living Through Dying
(Bob Brown)

To gain a deeper understanding of Upside-Down: Living Through Dying, carefully read the selected passages below. To aid you in your study, we invite you to visit the website http://notes.chicagofirstnaz.org, or pick up a copy of the notes at the Connect desk, or from your ABF leader. Now consider the following questions, as you ask the Lord to teach you.

Special Note: The Background Notes are especially useful in working through some of these questions. You are encouraged to secure a copy as you begin.

1. What announcement does Jesus make in Matthew 16:21 which prompts Peter's response and Jesus' teaching on living and dying?
2. Why did Peter object to Jesus' proposed journey to Jerusalem? How did Jesus respond to Peter's resistance, and how do you account for his harshness in addressing Peter? (16:22-23)
3. What principal command does Jesus give his disciples in 16:24?
4. Carefully read 16:25-27. List three reasons Jesus gives in support of his command in 16:24.
5. Define the different ways Jesus uses the words "save" and "lose" in this passage.
6. What promise does Jesus offer his followers in 16:27 and why is this appropriate in light of his teaching in this passage?
7. Carefully read Philippians 3:3-11. Construct a simple outline (main points only) of this passage.
8. Make two columns and label them: "life before Christ"; "life with Christ". Using the Philippians' passage, identify Paul's view of things in each case.
9. What is the biggest change in Paul's life because of Christ?
10. How does Paul look at his past? What main idea expresses his view of the "old life"?
11. List each reference to "Christ" in this passage. How does he describe Christ in each case?
12. What does Paul means when he writes that he wants to be "found in him", referring to Christ? "Found" in what sense (see the Background Notes for ideas)?
13. What do you think Paul means by the word "know" as he uses it here?
14. What does Paul want to "know" in his relationship to Christ?
15. Compare the teaching of Paul with that of Jesus. How are they the same? Different?