"Paul's Letter to the Philippians — The Witness of the Apostle Paul — Losing All but Gaining Christ, Part 2”

The apostle continues in the verses before us to write concerning his heart’s desire, which is, he writes, to “win Christ”.  He describes this is to summarize, not having his own righteousness which would be “of the law” and therefore of the “flesh”.  But then he adds that gaining this goal will necessarily require great suffering in this life.  The details of this are found in verse 10 and we will consider that today, introducing his emphasis there (unexpectantly, perhaps?) on the sufferings of Christ. Next time we will consider this co-suffering more in detail, but to introduce that, Paul in these verses identifies “knowledge” of Christ with “the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death.  This is a most profound subject indeed as we shall see.