One Thing

Philippians 3:12-16

John MacArthur grandfather said to him, "Just do one thing right in your life and you'll be way ahead of most people." That's right.

Just one thing, don't criticize that one dimensional person who is eminently successful at what they do. In the spiritual dimension it is equally true.

When your life has one driving compulsion and that is to be like Christ, you're moving in the right direction.

Soren Kierkegaard, the great Danish philosopher, wrote a book with an interesting title, the title of it Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing..

Purity of heart, he said, is to will one thing. And, of course, the powerful motif of that book just booms in every chapter is that Christians are only pure when they renounce all other things and pursue one thing. And what is it? The truth of God.

As you pursue the truth of God, you narrow to one thing. Purity of heart is to will one thing.

He has a prayer in the book in which he prays, "So may Thou give to the intellect wisdom to comprehend that one thing. To the heart, sincerity to receive this understanding. To the will, purity that wills one thing. In prosperity, may Thou grant perseverance to will one thing. Amid distractions, collectedness to will one thing. In suffering, patience to will one thing."

One thing.

Now such focused concentration is the result of a negative and a positive.

Notice the negative in verse 13, in order to will that one thing Paul says, "Forgetting what lies behind," that's the negative. And then he says, "And reaching forward to what lies ahead," that's the positive.

Don't look back. We've all watched a runner look back over one's shoulder and get passed on the other side. Don't look back. It is irrelevant. Nothing happening back there is relevant. You've heart runners interview...being interviewed and they say, "Did you feel the pressure of the persons coming up?" "No, I run my own race. It is not relevant to me what is going on around me, it is only relevant that I make the maximum effort. I worry only about my own effort."

Don't look back. Make a break with the past. This is such good advice. O my, so important. Perfectionists? Ha, they're always looking at the past, reminding everybody of their past achievements. Legalists always looking at the past, it's the basis on which they have their present quote/unquote spiritual status.

The Judaizers in Galatia wanted to dig up the past and push it off on the Galatian church. And Paul says, "Don't you dare let them entangle you in the yoke of bondage from which you've already been liberated."

Now what does he mean by the past? He means the past...forgetting those things that are behind. What things?

Everything.

Good things and bad things, achievements, virtuous deeds, great accomplishments, spiritual ministries, as well as bad things...sins, iniquities, failures, disasters. All of it.

You say, "Forget it all?" That's right. Why? Because it has nothing to do with the future. Did you understand that? It has nothing to do with what you're doing right now, absolutely nothing to do with it.

You cannot live on past victories. You cannot celebrate your value by your past.

You should never be debilitated by your past sins, iniquities and burdens of guilt.

And yet most people are so much distracted by the past that they never get around to running the future.

From a positive standpoint...Well, you know, I used to teach and I used to study the Bible and I used to be in a Bible study and I had...I remember when I led a guy to the Lord, it's all back there...and you can't move forward that way, you're anchored to the past.

Or it's all, "You know, my life was so bad and I so wretched and I was so immoral, how can God ever forgive me?...and they're all hung up on the guilt of the past. Forget it all...forget it all.

The clearest vision is given to the one who forgets the past. You hear people in the church say, "Well, it's just not like it used to be. I remember the good old days and we were all involved doing this, and we were all involved doing that, and we were doing this, and it was like this, and this is how it was. And it was all so great."

It's absolutely irrelevant. It means absolutely nothing to the moment except it will paralyze you. I mean, the runner doesn't go to the blocks in a sprint and sit there and getting ready for the race say to the guys around him, "You know, I just want you to know I've won a lot of races in the past. Boy, I've run fast in the past. I remember when I ran fast over here, and I remember when I ran..." Who cares, man? Get in the blocks. This is another race. We're really not interested in that. It doesn't matter because if you don't look good today, you're not going to win, that's all. Forget that stuff.

And they don't want to hear some guy get in the blocks and say, "Oh, you know, I have so many sins in my past and oh, last night I late a hot fudge sundae, I know it will weigh me down, I'll never be able to run this race. I will never be able to succeed. I know I'm not going to win. And then I got the worst lane in the draw and this is not going to work out."

I mean, shut up and run the race. Nobody's interested in all of that stuff out of your past. Nobody's interested,

I'll tell you right now, nobody's interested in what you did in the past, nobody's interested in what I did in the past.

What God is interested in is what are we going to do now and where we going in the future?

Churches are full of people who are holding all kinds of grudges, bitternesses, perspectives and junk from the past and they're paralyzed by it.

The recollection of what you were in your former unconverted state shouldn't paralyze you and it shouldn't discourage you. Disappointments and temptations of the past must not depress you. Put your hand to the plow, don't look back and move, pursue the prize.

There is a country song that says: Yesterday is dead and gone.....tomorrow is out of sight.

Tomorrow for the believer is in sight, but the past is DEAD and GONE!

And that takes us to the positive in verse 13, forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead. Let's go, let's move. The word here, "reaching forward," I love it, epekteinomi, ektenes, means to stretch a muscle to its limit, epek is double prepositions added to it, it means to...I don't know what...stretch stretch, out after would be ek out, ep after...out after. I mean, your extreme effort is in view here. This is a runner stretching every muscle to reach what is in front of him, the prize. Focused concentration, nothing with the past, just looking at the goal, moving as fast as possible.

Now ask yourself a question...do you have that kind of focused concentration? What are you focused on?

Even as a minister of Jesus Christ, my goal in life is not to build a big church, my goal in life is not to succeed in the church, my goal in life is not to develop programs, my focused goal in life must be to be like Jesus Christ and in the pursuit of being like Jesus Christ, out of that's going to flow an impactful life. That's the pursuit. That's the one thing I do, that's the one thing Paul did.

Perfection in Christ, the only goal, the only legitimate perspective. Paul said it. We want to present every man perfect in Christ, Colossians 1. We want men to come to the fullness of the stature of Christ, Ephesians 4. We want Christ to be fully formed in you, Galatians. And I have birth pains until I see it happen. So what he said to the Corinthians, he says, "Be perfect, that's my prayer." What's Epaphras doing? He's praying for your perfection in all the will of God, Colossians 4:12. That's the issue. This one thing I do.

Romans 8:29 “For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.”

2 Peter 1:3 “According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:”