Today our Warkworth Christian Meditation group was able to resume actual meetings within the Covid-19 restrictions.
Whatever gains I had, these I
have come to regard as loss because of Christ. More than that, I regard
everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my
Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard 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 one that comes through
faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. (Philippians 3:7-9)
Paul had thought it necessary to provide
these Philippians with his impeccable credentials as a Jew – there must have
been a number of Jewish Christians in Philippi -- so he wrote: Circumcised
the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a
Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law a pharisee; as to zeal a persecutor of
the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But then he selects the language of trade and
commerce, and we get: Whatever assets I had I have come to regard as loss
because of Christ. The balance sheet
accounting words are there in the Greek – profit/gains is kerdos ( κέρδος)
and loss is zēmia (ζημία)… and soon there is a third word
which accountants might use in fraught moments.
The point is that for Paul there came
a turnaround which can only be described as conversion. His meritorious life, with its credits and assets,
has been occupied now by Christ. A
takeover. The new owner, Christ, has
priority now over all Paul’s assets – indeed, some of them seem to Paul not assets
any more but loss. And this is where he
uses a third word, a Greek colloquialism, for these former assets, skubala
(σκύβαλα), which can mean either scraps you throw to the dogs, or what you have
to pick up when walking your dogs.
It’s hyperbole… It is not quite
the way we might word our relationship with Jesus, with God in Christ. We would be, I think, refined, conservative,
polite, and a little more respectful of our native gifts. Martin Luther said his heart was now captive…
he belonged to Christ as a slave belongs.
Paul says in another place[1],
It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
Yet for many of us such talk is a
bit of an embarrassment. But that is not
to deny the reality. Contemplative life
and prayer gently and steadily broadens and deepens the bond with Christ, until
it dawns on us that there is no going back.
The grace and love which are now occupying us is different in many ways
for each of us, but the common factor is our discovery that now we are captured
by the mystery and the adventure of faith, that there are aspects of faith
which move us to the core – can it be, we wonder, that Jesus has come and taken
residence, abiding in us as he said…? If
so, we spend the rest of our lives finding out what that means in practice,
what it is like to live in faith, hope and love… these three, as Paul
put it.
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