"Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me."
Philippians. 3:12
One of the greatest joys in my life is when my first child, Natalie was born. As I stood in that delivery room holding Natalie for the first time, I realized I was finally a father. For the rest of Natalie’s life, she was going to call me Father or Dad, or Daddy. That could not be taken away, I was a father. At last, I could be called a father.
But did that make me a father? If Natalie could talk, she could have legitimately called me father. But was that enough to be a father? So, from that point on, the journey was for me to be her father. I want her to know me as her father, not just because I fathered her, but because I cared for her, loved her, nurtured her, cherished her as a father would. I wanted to move from just being called a father, to actually being her father to that little baby Natalie.
It’s the same way with God. Once we have accepted Christ in faith, He accepts us as His child, adopted into the family of God. There is nothing that God can do to take that away from us. That happens when we confess our faith in Christ. We can be called a Christian. Yet, that is just the beginning, for we are not to be satisfied with just being called a Christian. We should strive to become a Christian. We should strive to grow in Christ, mature, and become like Christ.
This is what Paul was writing about in this Scripture passage. I like the way Eugene Peterson translates these words and the surrounding verses in his translation of the Bible known as The Message. Listen to his words:
"I’m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching 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."
Paul is describing sanctification, in a way that John Wesley would have loved. As we grow, we are to use the grace that God has given us, the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives, the salvation of Jesus Christ that cleanses all the ugliness in our lives to renew us as new creations, to transform us, to restore us to health and to our original image, as the image of God. Being a United Methodist means putting on the cloak of Christianity and living the rest of our lives getting used to that cloak.
But it is striving toward the likeness of Christ, that transforms us and the world around us.
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