The Value of Knowing Christ (Easter)

But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ. More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them as dung, so that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ—the righteousness from God based on faith. My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, assuming that I will somehow reach the resurrection from among the dead.

As we gather on this glorious Easter Sunday, we continue through the letter from Paul to the Philippians. Today, we will see the Apostle passionately reflect on the transformative power of knowing Christ, declaring that all his worldly gains pale in comparison to the surpassing value of a relationship with our Savior. In a world that often equates success with status, possessions, and accolades, Paul challenges us to reconsider our values and priorities. He invites us to examine whether we truly recognize Christ as the ultimate treasure worth any sacrifice.

Today, we will explore the depths of Paul's conviction—that all things, even those that seem valuable, become a loss when weighed against the knowledge of Christ. This Easter, as we celebrate the resurrection and the hope it brings, let us engage our hearts and minds in understanding what it means to desire Christ above all else.

Big Idea: We must value Christ above all else.

Our passage will encourage us to reflect on our commitments, our sacrifices, and ultimately, our understanding of what it means to live in the fullness of God's grace through faith in Jesus.

Let’s get into it!

Philippians 3:7

But everything that was a gain to me, I have considered to be a loss because of Christ.

Paul has just gone through this long list of reasons as to why he could have so much more confidence in his works bringing about his salvation, if that were actually what our righteousness depended on. However, he says that he now considers any possible gain that he had a loss because of Christ Jesus.

Paul is saying that all of the things that would have made him look like a righteous person on the outside- his nationality, his adherence to the law, his zeal for righteousness- those things mean nothing now that he has Christ.

Philippians 3:8

More than that, I also consider everything to be a loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Because of him I have suffered the loss of all things and consider them as dung, so that I may gain Christ…

Paul then pushes beyond considering the things that seemed like gains to him as loss, saying that he considers everything a loss compared to the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus as his Lord. This echoes what Jesus said in Matthew 16.

Matthew 16:24-26

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone wants to follow after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of me will find it. For what will it benefit someone if he gains the whole world yet loses his life? Or what will anyone give in exchange for his life?”

Jesus is demanding total commitment from his followers. They would have seen the agony of criminals carrying the means of their execution, the means of their death, on their shoulders, knowing that it would take them to the end of their life here on earth. Jesus is telling his listeners that to follow after him is the end of themselves. A few weeks ago I shared this quote:

Submission to Christ is where you go to die…to yourself

The person who wants to save the life that they have— the job, the cars, the lifestyle, the possessions, etc., that person who puts those things above submitting their life to Christ will lose their life. We can’t take any of those things with us when we die. Job himself said, “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will leave this life.” That is still true today.

Those who want to save their life will find themselves on the day of judgment being sent away from the joy of God’s eternal grace and love, and to the place of God’s anger and judgment against those who rebelled against him - hell.

Hell exists. And it is not a place run by Satan to torture those who do not make it to heaven, like you see in the comic books. Hell is the place of eternal punishment for those who actively choose not to submit their lives to the God of the universe. Which means Satan will be there suffering along with everyone else who refused to submit to God the Father as Lord. God is omnipresent, meaning he is everywhere. It is God and his anger and wrath against sin and rebellion that rule the place of eternal punishment.

But there is an alternative to that. Those who submit their lives to Christ, who take up their cross and endure the trials of this world, who lose their lives and possessions for the sake of following after Jesus, those are the ones who will find life in Christ. Jesus endured the suffering of God’s wrath and anger toward sin when he was on the cross. Jesus took that punishment for all those who put their trust and faith in him and they will experience joy that cannot be explained by human reasoning.

Paul goes on to say that because of his faith in Christ, he has lost all things. To this point, he has been beaten, stoned, whipped, jailed, shipwrecked, and put under house arrest in Rome. And yet, all worldly possessions in Paul’s eyes are worthless: refuse, garbage, and dung.

Does this mean that we should get rid of all earthly possessions? Should I just throw away your iPhone, get rid of my car, get rid of my house and live in a cardboard box? No! We can have possessions in this life, we just shouldn’t let them have us. Worldly possessions have no comparison in value to Christ. Paul would choose Jesus over his possessions or any other worldly thing in a heartbeat.

Questions to ask yourself:

Is Christ valuable enough to lose everything for him and still be content?

What things do we tend to value more than Christ?

I am not asking you to consider these questions because I have it figured out. I have to ask myself these questions all the time. I had to ask myself these questions as I was writing this sermon. I need the Lord to realign my heart towards him every day.

The Baptist preacher from the 1800s, Charles Spurgeon, when talking about this particular verse had this to say:

“The Savior held the same place in Paul’s esteem as the crown did in the esteem of the runner at the Olympic games. To gain that crown, the competitor strained every nerve and sinew, feeling as though he were content to drop down dead at the goal in order to win it. Paul felt that if he were to run with all his might, straining soul and body to gain Christ, it would be well worth the effort. Christ would be well worth dying to gain.”

Like in the modern Olympics where you can see the veins in a sprinter’s neck and arms and legs bulging as they strain every muscle to win the gold medal, that is how Spurgeon describes Paul’s vigor to gain Christ.

Is that how you feel about Jesus? Are you so focused on your relationship with Christ that you would strain to the point of death to follow after him? Do you value your relationship with God as more important than your job? Or your family? Or even your spouse?

That’s a lot of questions, I know. But, as I said earlier, these are questions that I have to ask myself every day. There are days when I do not want to strain with all my might to follow after Jesus. As a pastor, I can put my job of trying to teach and shepherd this congregation ahead of my own relationship with Jesus. Not that I do it on purpose, but because I let my own ideas and desires for this congregation to be at the front of my mind instead of what Christ may want. I pray that my desires align with his, but also know that my own pride can take over.

So I have a next step for all of us.

Next Step: I will ask God to rearrange my priorities.

This needs to be a daily process for every, single one of us. Just because I am the pastor of this church, does not mean that my priorities are always aligned with God’s. Each of us must day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute, and even second by second surrender our hearts and minds to Jesus. When we are fully surrendered to Christ, we will love and serve our families, friends, and the people around us with the love, peace, and grace of God.

Philippians 3:9

…and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own from the law, but one that is through faith in Christ—the righteousness from God based on faith.

Paul knew that giving up all the world has to offer to serve Christ fully would provide him a righteousness that is not his own or earned through the law. Paul has already stated in 3:3 that Christians put their hope, or boasting, in Christ for their salvation, and they put no confidence in the flesh, or their own works of the law.

The only thing we bring to our salvation is the sin that made it necessary.

The only righteousness that Christians have is through faith in Christ. This righteousness is what Christ earned through his life, death, and resurrection. God then gives that righteousness to us when we understand that we can do nothing to earn our salvation, but instead trust in Christ, who paid the penalty for our sin in our place. That is the righteousness based on faith that Paul is talking about.

Romans 4:1-5

What then will we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found? If Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about—but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him for righteousness. Now to the one who works, pay is not credited as a gift, but as something owed. But to the one who does not work, but believes on him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited for righteousness.

Here in Romans, we see Paul say again that the righteousness Abraham received was not from his actions, but because of his faith in God. Paul uses Abraham, whom the “Jews of Jesus’ day considered…the primary example of justification by works” according to one NT scholar, Paul is about to flip the tables on them and use Abraham as the ultimate example of justification by faith.

Paul says that if Abraham were justified by works instead of faith, he would have had something to boast about. But as we saw in Philippians 3:3, those who follow after God do not have anything to boast about concerning their standing before God. Abraham and other followers of God in the OT, just like Christians today, could only be declared righteous in the sight of God based on the grace of God and belief in him.

We then see Paul use the example of employment. When you go to work for a company or another person, you make a contract, whether verbal or written, that you will get paid for the work that you do. You get a paycheck at the end of the pay period because of the time and effort you have put in. You are not gifted those wages, you earned them.

However, that is not how the spiritual realm works. We cannot do enough work, we cannot obey enough of God’s law to guarantee our own salvation. We do earn wages, though.

Romans 6:23a

For the wages of sin is death…

We are sinful creatures who cannot obey the law of God. We are filled with pride and selfishness, wanting everything our own way and falling for the same trap that Adam and Eve did in the garden when Satan told them, “God didn’t really say that. He is just trying to hold you back.”

But, since we cannot earn our salvation, since we cannot do enough to put ourselves on the good side of God’s grace, the Father sent Christ. Jesus completely and sinlessly obeyed the law and then gave his own life on the cross, fulfilling the law, and taking your place and my place by experiencing the punishment of the wrath of God for every sin of every person who has and will put their hope and faith in him.

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Salvation is a gift that cannot be earned. It is given by God to all who put their faith in Christ, believing that his death paid the debt they owed. It is by faith in Christ, and Christ alone, that we can be saved. That should not only lift a massive weight off our shoulders, but should give us joy in knowing that we do not have to work to earn our salvation! It is a gift that is freely given to those who submit their lives to Christ!

Let's continue through to our last couple of verses in our passage today.

Philippians 3:10-11

My goal is to know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, assuming that I will somehow reach the resurrection from among the dead.

Paul’s ultimate goal was to know three things:

Christ

The power of his resurrection

The fellowship of his sufferings

It is interesting seeing Paul say that he wants to know Christ. Paul was God’s apostle to the Gentiles. He had seen the risen Jesus on the road to Damascus. He talks in all of his letters about how he was constantly praying for his readers. You would think that Paul would know Christ pretty well, but it was not enough for him. The Greek word for “knowing” Christ that Paul uses here is “γινώσκω,” which is more than just head knowledge. This is experiential knowledge.

You can know that a roller coaster is going to go fast, that the tight turns are probably going to jar your body a bit, and that there will be a fair amount of G-forces on your body from the speed and movement of the coaster. But until you get strapped into that roller coaster and take the turns and loops and feel the G-forces on your body and the straining of your muscles to keep your body from flopping all over, you don’t have a deep knowledge of what a roller coaster can do to your body.

You can accept the premise that Jesus is real, read about him in the Bible, and believe that he has done the things that the Bible tells us he did. But that is still just head knowledge. Until you experience the love of Christ, until you know his forgiveness and grace, feeling the weight of your sins lifted from your shoulders, and see God work things out in your life that you had no hope of any good coming from them, do you really know Jesus?

Paul knew and experienced all of this and still wanted to know Christ in an even deeper and more intimate way!

Paul wanted to know the power of Christ’s resurrection more deeply. I believe there is a reason Paul listed knowing the power of Jesus’ resurrection before the power of his suffering. Though Christ’s suffering came first, his resurrection showed that he was God. It showed that God the Father had accepted Jesus’ substitution in our place for our sins. And it served as a promise to those who submit themselves to Christ, to the will of God the Father, that they will one day be resurrected themselves.

The resurrection of Christ is what provides hope for us, that death is not the end for those who put their faith in Christ Jesus.

The resurrection, though, would not have been possible were it not for the suffering that Christ endured. Paul knew the fellowship of suffering as Christ did. He faced so much persecution for preaching Christ. As we listed earlier, he was beaten, stoned, whipped, and jailed for his proclamation of Jesus Christ.

This series that we have been doing in the book of Philippians is titled, “Joy Through Humility.” As we have been reading this letter, we have seen how “JOY” does not necessarily come from happy circumstances, but is a feeling of gladness and gratitude, often in spite of our circumstances.

Happiness depends on circumstances. Joy does not.

Paul also lived for Christ because he died to himself. Paul took up his cross and followed Jesus, considering everything else in this world as useless compared to knowing Christ. All of the things that Paul could have taken pride in in this world he considered garbage compared to knowing Christ. Paul had joy even though he was in prison, had been beaten, whipped, and stoned because Paul understood that his life was not about himself.

Paul suffered for the sake of Christ, but suffering for Christ is more than just being persecuted.

Last year, I got to meet a missionary named Anne. Her and her husband, Stan, along with their two children, followed the call of God on their lives to the mountain regions of the Islamic country of Turkey around 2005. After years of serving the people, praying for people, and seeing people healed of blindness and disease from their prayers, they still had not seen one convert to Christianity.

In 2012, I believe, Stan was diagnosed with terminal cancer. They did not leave the mission field. Instead, Stan and his family stayed, enduring the pain and suffering of Stan dying of cancer. Stan was quoted as saying, “God whispered into our hearts, ‘Live this dying out loud.’” Stan continued to proclaim the goodness of Christ as his body became more and more frail. In the midst of suffering, Stan took joy in serving the God of the universe who had sent him to Turkey to proclaim Jesus to the Muslim world. In August of 2013, Stan went to be with the Lord.

The small Muslim community in the mountains of Turkey petitioned the government on behalf of Anne to allow Stan to be buried in Turkey on the silk road. This Muslim community hand-crafted a coffin for Stan, asking if the cross they had attached to it was good enough. At Stan’s funeral, Anne had a table full of Bibles printed in the Turkish language. People were taking multiple copies because they wanted to know about the God that Stan served.

Since Stan’s death almost 12 years ago, multiple Muslims in the mountains of Turkey have committed their lives to Christ, gotten baptized, and are telling their friends and family about the love of Jesus, in spite of the persecution they could face from the Muslim governement. Stone buildings that were used as churches hundreds of years ago and have been abandoned as ruins since then are now holding Christian church services again because Muslims have asked the government to allow Christians to hold services in those buildings. And all of this because a man chose to obey the call of God in his life, suffering through the pain of sickness and death with the joy of knowing he was obeying his Savior and continuing to be faithful to his calling. Anne still serves the Muslim people of Turkey to this day.

To know Christ and his sufferings would mean being conformed to the image of Christ in his death. And yet, when we are willing to be conformed to Christ in his sufferings, we have the hope of being conformed to Christ in his resurrection as well. In Hebrews 12 it says that Jesus endured the cross because of the joy that was set before him. Jesus knew what would come after the cross, he would be seated at the right hand of God the Father. We too should know that the suffering we may face in this life for Christ is nothing compared to the joy we will have together with him in heaven.

I pray for the strength to endure suffering for Christ that I may too may be a part of the final resurrection when Christ returns to take his people home and judge the world.

Paul took up his cross daily and followed Christ. Dying to himself, considering the things of this world as useless compared to knowing Christ, resulted in Paul’s spiritual resurrection.

Galatians 2:20

I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

As we celebrate and remember the resurrection of Christ, announcing his victory over sin and death, we are reminded of the surpassing value of knowing Christ. Like the Apostle Paul, we are called to consider everything a loss compared to the glory of knowing our Savior. Are there areas in your life where you cling to worldly gains—be it status, possessions, or relationships—that overshadow your relationship with Christ?

This moment invites you to examine your heart. Are you willing to surrender all for the sake of knowing Him more deeply? Remember, the abundant life Jesus offers is not found in material wealth or comfort but in a transformative relationship with Him.

If you have not yet placed your faith in Christ, I urge you to turn away from the empty pursuits of this world. Embrace the righteousness that comes through faith in Him alone. For it is only through Jesus, who bore our sins and conquered death, that we can hope for eternal life.

Next Step: I will submit my life to Christ.

Let today be the day you commit to following Him wholeheartedly, knowing that true fulfillment and peace are found in the arms of Christ. Seek Him, and let Him rearrange your priorities, bringing you into the fullness of His joy.

How Deep the Father’s Love For Us by Stuart Townend

How deep the Father’s love for us,

How vast beyond all measure,

That He should give His only Son

To make a wretch His treasure.

How great the pain of searing loss –

The Father turns His face away,

As wounds which mar the Chosen One

Bring many sons to glory.

Behold the man upon a cross,

My sin upon His shoulders;

Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice

Call out among the scoffers.

It was my sin that held Him there

Until it was accomplished;

His dying breath has brought me life –

I know that it is finished.

I will not boast in anything,

No gifts, no power, no wisdom;

But I will boast in Jesus Christ,

His death and resurrection.

Why should I gain from His reward?

I cannot give an answer;

But this I know with all my heart –

His wounds have paid my ransom.

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