As great of a man as Paul was after his conversion, before knowing Christ, he (Saul, his name before knowing Jesus) was a lawyer, known for dissecting the Scriptures apart and being a religious extremist. He was determined to eradicate Christians and was a religious terrorist thinking he was acting in the name of the Lord. The Bible says he was dragging Christians out of their homes and throwing them in prison…killing innocent people. He even held the garments of those who were stoning Stephen to death. Now, after his encounter with Jesus, things changed. He immediately went into preaching in the synagogues and proclaiming Jesus as the Son of God! Now, it would have been easy for Paul to say, “I have arrived.” and be prideful…maybe “toot his own horn” so to speak. But, he didn’t. He always preached Jesus and in Philippians 3:7-14, we can read about Paul being so yielded to Jesus that nothing else matters. I like the way the Message Bible translates these verses:
7-9 The very credentials these people are waving around as something special, I’m tearing up and throwing out with the trash—along with everything else I used to take credit for. And why? Because of Christ. Yes, all the things I once thought were so important are gone from my life. Compared to the high privilege of knowing Christ Jesus as my Master, firsthand, everything I once thought I had going for me is insignificant—dog dung. I’ve dumped it all in the trash so that I could embrace Christ and be embraced by him. I didn’t want some petty, inferior brand of righteousness that comes from keeping a list of rules when I could get the robust kind that comes from trusting Christ—God’s righteousness.
10-11 I gave up all that inferior stuff so I could know Christ personally, experience his resurrection power, be a partner in his suffering, and go all the way with him to death itself. If there was any way to get in on the resurrection from the dead, I wanted to do it.
12-14 I’m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don’t get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I’ve got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I’m off and running, and I’m not turning back.
In my head, I couldn’t help but picture a toilet. Yeah, I know…sounds crazy, but until we are able to flush our self-righteousness down the toilet. We must count everything as dung (poop), compared to knowing a Jesus! When we rid ourselves of everything that we think we have done and allow it to be flushed down the drain of our lives, we can embrace Christ and all He has for us! We can experience a relationship that is full of the resurrection power of Jesus.
You want to know Christ personally? You must get yourself out of the way. Paul didn’t say he had it all figured out, but he kept his eyes fixed on Jesus and he refused to turn back. That’s what we are called to do. Use Paul’s life as an example and learn that God can take someone who murdered innocent people to make them the greatest preacher in the world. He is no respecter of persons. We can surrender completely to God as Paul, but we must remember to give up the “inferior stuff” in our lives (my stuff may be different from yours) to know Jesus personally. When we know Him in that way, self is no longer important. Trusting God for everything and living a life surrendered to His will becomes superior to everything else.
