Tape Gems - The Knowledge of Him
/By Oscar M. Baker
“That I may know Him…” (Ph’p. 3:10). Did Paul know Him? Well here he wants to know Him as well as he can in this life. Can we say Ph’p. 3:8? “Yea doubtless I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord…”. Can we say that? We need to if we’re going to be able to say at the end of our lives, “…I know Whom I have believed…” (II Tim. 1:12). Note, no preposition between Paul and His Lord.
We must prepare for the entrance of deeper truth, which is increasing in the knowledge of Him. How do we do this? By “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ” (II Cor. 10:5). But even then there are limitations as to what we can know of Him in this lifetime. “For now we see through a glass darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known” (I Cor. 13:12).
Why should we want to get to know Him?
---The Bible exhorts us to.
---Because we love Him.
---And because we don’t want to be ashamed on that day when we stand before Him. “Study to show thyself approved unto God (God here being the righteous Judge, and Who is that but Christ. The Father has given all judgment over to the Son.) a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth (II Timothy 2:15).
[T.F.T. tape 4-5-83, Short Subjects Series.]
The Highest Ambition Of A Christian, Ph’p. 3:11
“If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.” Paul already had that assurance. But this is really an out-resurrection, out from among the dead, literally translated. When you consider the 6 steps leading up to it in Ph’p. 3:8-10, you begin to see he is looking for perfection. That he might become so intimately acquainted with Christ and identified with Him, that he might walk right here and now as if he were in resurrection life. Now can you think of any higher ambition for a Christian man here on earth than that? That he might become so perfect, I don’t mean just morally, but spiritually, mentally, and so on, that he could walk here on this earth as if he were already resurrected in heavenly places. Now that is, of course, an infinity goal. You folks that know something of mathematics know there’s a sign called infinity. It’s something you never quite attain to. It’s out there, and makes no difference how far you go, it’s still out ahead.
[T.F.T. tape 6-26-84]
