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In Philippians 3:5-6 the apostle Paul speaks of his inborn strength and natural merit and also of the accomplishments that were the result of his effort. Paul says that he was “circumcised the eighth day; of the race of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, persecuting the church; as to the righteousness which is in the law, become blameless.”
In verse 7 he continues, “But what things were gains to me, these I have counted as loss on account of Christ.” What things were gains to me refers to that which was in the natural realm, including his inborn strength, natural merit, and accomplishments, including being born a Hebrew, being blameless in the law, and serving God and keeping the law. He counted all these things, which once were gains to him, as loss on account of Christ. This means that he no longer cared whether these things were gains to him; they were no longer important to him. These things could not coexist with Christ. If he kept these things, relying upon his inborn strength, natural merit, and accomplishments, he could not know Christ.
Verse 8 says, “Moreover I also count all things to be loss.” Verse 7 is limited to inborn strength, natural merit, and accomplishments by human effort, but the scope in verse 8 is broader. In this verse he counts “all things” as loss on account of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus. Paul realized that these things kept him from a knowledge of Christ. Because he desired the knowledge of Christ, he counted all things as loss, saying that he “suffered the loss of all things” and counted them “as refuse” that he could gain Christ (v. 8). Christ could not exist simultaneously with Paul’s inborn strength, natural merit, and accomplishments, nor could Christ exist simultaneously with anything else. Nothing has a place in the presence of Christ. Christ is envious and jealous — He desires nothing besides Himself. God desires only Himself to be our God — He does not want anything other than Himself to be our God. Christ allows only Himself to have a place in us and does not desire any matter or thing to have a place. If we have Christ, we cannot have all things.
Verse 9 continues, “And be found in Him, not having my own righteousness which is out of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is out of God and based on faith.” Paul did not have a righteousness that was worked out by his own effort but the righteousness that is through faith in Christ, that is, the righteousness Christ lives out of us. Verse 10 says, “To know Him.” This righteousness caused Paul to know Christ. The righteousness that we work out by our own effort does not cause us to know Christ. The more we do by our own effort, the less we know Christ; the more we love others by our own effort, the less we know Christ; the more zealous we are by our own effort, the less we know Christ. Instead, through faith Christ can live out righteousness from within us, and this righteousness causes us to know Christ.
Please pay attention to the word to in verse 10: To know Christ. Verse 10 is not the cause but the result. Our knowledge is not without a basis; however, there is only one thing that causes us to know Christ. What causes us to know Christ? Verse 9 says clearly that relying on our own effort to keep the law, to be zealous, to do good, to serve God, and to love others will not cause us to know Christ. We need to stop our effort, stop our work, and stop all our doing good, being zealous, serving God, and loving others. We will know Christ only when we cease all our efforts and simply have faith. Our faith is in God, in Christ living in us, and in righteousness being lived out from us. This is what causes us to know Christ.
Having the righteousness that is through faith in Christ, which is the righteousness through faith in God, causes us to know Christ. This righteousness is the righteousness in 1 Corinthians 1:30: “Who became wisdom to us from God: both righteousness and sanctification and redemption.” God made Christ our righteousness. When we stop ourselves and believe in God and in Christ, God causes Christ to become our righteousness. In the first step this righteousness causes us to be justified before God, that is, to be saved. In the second step this righteousness causes us to live a righteous life, to live out righteousness, which is to live out Christ, and to live an overcoming life. Both salvation and overcoming are included. Our salvation is not through the righteousness that we work out but through Christ being our righteousness. Similarly, after being saved, our overcoming is not through the righteousness we work out but through allowing Christ to live out of us as our righteousness.
The meaning of Philippians 3:9 is that we must stop doing not only evil things but also good things. We need to stop not only our opposition to God but also our service to God. In verses 4 through 6, we can see that Paul was a man who zealously served and who was zealous in doing good. He was full of energy and exceedingly active in serving God and being a good person, but he acted in himself. At that time he did not have any relationship with Christ. When he relied on his own effort to do good and serve God, he had no way to know Christ. In verse 9, however, he stopped his efforts to do good, stopped his zealous service, and had “faith in Christ.” This meant that he lived in Christ, put himself in Christ, let Christ be his everything, and no longer strived, struggled, and acted by himself. He stopped himself, he believed in Christ, he let Christ live, and he lived by Christ. His stopping enabled him to know Christ. This is a basic principle: if we desire to know Christ, we must stop ourselves.
The phrase not having my own righteousness which is out of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ means that Paul no longer relied on himself to do good in order to have some kind of righteousness; rather, he let Christ live Himself out as righteousness. This is the same as saying, it is no longer I, but Christ (Gal. 2:20); in other words, we need to stop and let Christ live. We should not rely on our own effort to do good and to serve God zealously; instead, Christ in us, who has clothed Himself with us, is the One who should do good and serve God. In matters related to our service to God and in our daily living, we do not need to rely on ourselves; rather, we should stop ourselves and let Christ live out of us. This will enable us to know Christ.
When we rely on ourselves to do things, we have no way to know Christ. We can know Christ only when we stop and let Christ live. The more we do in ourselves, the less we will know Christ. We may speak about Christ every day, but Christ may only be a doctrine to us and not our living. Many who work for the Lord, serve in the church, and manage the affairs of the church seem to be doing many things for the Lord, yet I must ask, how much do we know Christ? If we do not have much knowledge of Christ, our service is merely an activity in which we rely on ourselves. We must see the light that we need to stop ourselves. Our stopping must extend beyond the matter of no longer opposing God to the matter of serving God.
Many saints have the virtue of humility but do not know Christ at all, and they love God and others but do not know Christ. They continue to preach the gospel zealously, but the more they are zealous, the less they know Christ. When they love others, their love does not cause them to experience Christ, because their love comes out of themselves. When they preach the gospel and serve God, their preaching and serving do not cause them to experience Christ, because their preaching comes out from themselves. Without the experience of Christ, there is no knowledge of Christ. If we have a little meekness and a little humility, it should be the result of our experience of Christ. In other words, it should come from Christ being expressed through us. When we are meek, Christ must be expressed through us; when we are humble, Christ must be expressed through us; when we give a message, Christ must be expressed through us; and when we go out to preach the gospel, Christ must be expressed through us. If this is our situation, we will have a deeper knowledge of Christ. In loving others, preaching the gospel, and serving God, we must stop. We do not need to work out these things; instead, Christ should live out of us.
Those who are unable to stop, that is, not to work for God, are unable to work for God. Those who do not have the capacity not to work for God are also unable to work for God. If we desire to work for God, stopping our work for Him is a prerequisite. Only when we are able not to love others will we genuinely be able to love others; those who are unable not to love others are also unable to love others. Those who always desire to work and who are unable to stop cannot work for God. Only those who are able not to love others for God are able to love others for God. Only those who are able not to speak and give messages for God are able to speak and give messages for God. If we cannot stop speaking, Christ can never speak. If we are unwilling to come to an end, God can never have a beginning. If we do not stop ourselves, we can never know Christ.
Seven or eight years ago, after the War of Resistance had been won, we were in Shanghai, and a zealous man who was quite famous came among the saints. He was very humble, expressing a willingness to receive help and leading from us. As a person who served the Lord and who expressed a willingness to fellowship with us and receive help from us, we felt that his words were honest and humble, so we had fellowship with him. We testified to him how the Lord had opened our eyes to see that much of our zealousness and activities had come out of ourselves, not the Lord. We told him that even though it was done for the Lord, it was not the Lord working out from us. Then we told him of how God opened our eyes to see that we were the most pitiful people. We had done much, yet we still did not have much Christ, and we had run much, yet we only knew Christ a little. But when we saw our pitiful situation, we stopped. Strictly speaking, it was not we who stopped; rather, God’s light shined upon us to such an extent that we could not move, we had no strength, and we stopped.
We earnestly testified how God showed us that Christ lived in us and that we should let Christ live. This brother nodded his head, but before we could finish speaking, he asked, “How do you feel about my going to Putong to preach the gospel?” We said, “Brother, we have just testified that any activity that comes from ourselves does not enable us to experience Christ, nor does it have much place before God.” He still did not understand, and he asked further, “But a group of Christians is there; how should I lead them?” After a lengthy fellowship, we realized that he had no intention of fellowshipping with us concerning the inner knowledge of life; instead, he had come to study with us, hoping to get some strategies for expanding his work.
He asked us what we had done to gain so many people, because even the alley was full of people during our meetings. He had heard that we were having a revival and that the number of people was very large, and he therefore came to consult with us. He was like Nicodemus, who came to the Lord Jesus to consult about how to be a proper man. However, the Lord Jesus spoke to him straightforwardly, “Truly, truly, I say to you,...You must be born anew” (John 3:2-5, 7). This brother did not come for life, nor did he come for the way to be a proper man — he came to know how to work. We spoke earnestly for more than an hour of our need to stop ourselves in the work and to let Christ live out from us, but not a single word penetrated. In him there were many “buts.” Whenever he spoke, he would ask, “But what do you think we should do for the gospel?” “But there is still a group of believers in Southeast Asia; how should we lead them?” No matter what we said, nothing entered into him, because the only thing that occupied him was how to work; he could not stop himself.
Those who are unable not to work for God are unable to work for God; those who are unable to stop for God are unable to move for God. If we truly desire to know Christ, we must stop ourselves — stop our humility, stop our love, stop our zeal, and stop our so-called work for the Lord. We say this before the Lord: if we rely on our own effort to be good Christians and to serve God properly, we can never experience Christ or know Christ. The prerequisite for knowing the Christ who lives in us is that we must stop ourselves: stop our meekness, goodness, humility, love, zeal, diligence, service, work, and bearing of responsibility. Christ can have a beginning in us only when we stop ourselves.
Philippians 3 shows that we can know Christ when we stop ourselves in matters related to the service of God. We must stop ourselves in the good things. We must stop ourselves not only in committing sins, being cold toward God, and opposing God, but even more we need to stop ourselves in our zeal and service to God. God will never initiate anything in someone who has not stopped himself; everything he does, whether serving God or loving others, is initiated by himself and done by himself from the beginning to the end. Only those who stop themselves and let God initiate and work can know Christ.
If we have not stopped, Christ cannot initiate anything in us. We can preach Christ, but we cannot know Christ or experience Christ. We can speak of Christ constantly, but we will not know Christ at all. Christ will be in our mouth but not in our experience, and He will be spoken of in the messages we give but will not be in our living. We may have preached Christ for many years, but has Christ initiated any of our preaching? Is it “I” who is speaking about Christ, “I” who is preaching Christ, and “I” who is working for God? If this is so, then Christ is not working for God in us, Christ is not speaking of Himself through us, nor is Christ preaching Himself through us. Both kinds of preaching may be on the same subject, but the source and process are different. Paul preached Christ, but the source of his preaching was Christ. Not only were his word and subject Christ, but the source and process of his speaking were also Christ. In contrast, our word and subject may be Christ, but the source and process of our preaching are merely ourselves. We may go to a distant place to work for Christ, yet Christ is not in that work. We may work and be zealous, but if we never stop ourselves, Christ will not be present during the whole process.
Before being shined upon by the Lord’s great light on the way to Damascus, Saul was a zealous man. He was zealous for the God of his fathers and blameless in the law, but he had never stopped, and he did not know Christ (Acts 9:1-5). In Philippians, however, he could say that he counted as loss, as refuse, the things that were gains to him on account of Christ. He stopped himself, his zeal and effort ceased, and Christ could begin in him. Once a person stops, Christ can act, move, and reveal all His riches in him, allowing him to know Christ practically in experience.
