The journey of knowing Christ

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Over the years, I have had the opportunity to be the audience when celebrities spoke, or even shake hands with a few. I heard Anderson Cooper speak or Natalie Merchant sing.
Authors I have met include Robert Jordan the fantasy writer, David Baldacci the thriller writer, and C.J. Box the mystery writer. All interesting people in their own way. Perhaps the most famous person I have met is Henry Winkler.
I went to see him because he was the Fonz! Anybody remember that? I got a chance to introduce myself, shake his hand, and tell him that I enjoyed his work on Happy Days. He thanked me, and that was the end of our encounter. I can imagine he appreciated my words for a few seconds, then I was gone from his memory, even though I will remember those moments for the rest of my life. But I do not know him.
On Philippians 3:10-12, Paul speaks of knowing Christ. Not having met him at a convention, not shaking his hand at a Sunday meet-and-greet, but knowing him. Knowing Christ is important for Paul.
The idea of knowing is found other places as well. In John 17:3, Jesus desires for us to know him. 1 John 4:8: “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” And here in Philippians, just two verses earlier (3:8), Paul cries: “I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.” Then he builds up to verse 10. I want to gain Christ, verse 8. I want to be found in Christ, verse 9. I want to know Christ, verse 10. This knowing is a journey. Nothing around us is as important as beginning to know Christ and to grow more and more in the knowledge of Christ, and to have such an intimacy with Christ that he is at the center of my thoughts, my words, my life. Lofty goals, aren’t they? Can we like Paul, hope to meet them? Is it possible to know Christ, and if so, how? Paul lays it out for us.
Paul says he wants to know Christ through the power of his Resurrection. Paul believed with everything in him in the Resurrection of Christ. So we too must believe! But here in Philippians 3, he takes it even further. The power of his Resurrection. There is power in the risen Christ, there is power in finding and following him. We have power for daily living. I need this kind of power, and so do you. Paul needed that kind of power to survive the life he lived for Christ.

It was not Paul’s power that kept him going, it was the power of the Resurrection of Christ.
Paul wanted to know Christ by participating in his sufferings. Oh really? I can do without that. Be a part of the sufferings of Christ? There is an element here of both putting on the sufferings of Christ in an external sense - Paul was writing this from prison, after all - but there is also a push here to internally participate in the sufferings of Christ. Am I willing to know Christ in this way, to participate in his sufferings? To be conformed to the image of the Son of God (Romans 8:29)? What of Christ am I willing to take on myself? How would I participate in his sufferings? How can I bear the marks of Christ upon my flesh, how can I engrave them on my soul?
And Paul wants to know Christ by becoming like him in his death. Paul may be echoing here what he said in Romans 6:8: “Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.” We must learn what it means to die with Christ in order to live with Christ. As Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, “When Christ calls us, he bids us come and die” (The Cost of Discipleship).
One question we can ask ourselves as Christ-followers is, what can I accomplish for Christ? But here, Paul is asking, what can I give up for Christ? What of my ambition, my reputation, my ability, must go for me to know Christ?
As I consider what it means to know Christ, it appears from these verses that we can only know him by the means Paul lays out in verse 10. Thank God, we have time! Paul reminds us in verse 12 that he has not arrived, and neither have we. But the journey must have a beginning for it to have an ending. I encourage you, let’s be about the journey of knowing Christ.
Kevin Barron is the pastor of Perryville and Crossroads United Methodist churches. He can be reached by phone at 573-547-5200 or via email at kdbarron@gmail.com.