Scripture: "Yea, verily, and I count all things to be loss for the excell¬ency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord,"—PHIL, iii. 8.
In studying the promises Jesus gave to His disciples in the last night, the question comes, What was it that made just these men fit and worthy of the high honour of being baptized with the Holy Ghost from heaven? The answer is simple. When Christ called them, they forsook all and followed Him. They denied themselves, even to the hating of their own life, and gave themselves to obey His commands. They followed Him to Calvary, and amid its suffering and death their hearts clung to Him alone. It was this that prepared them for receiving a share in His resurrection life, and so becoming fitted here on earth to be filled with that Spirit, even as He received the fulness of the Spirit from the Father in glory.
Just as Jesus Christ had to sacrifice all to be wholly an offering to God, so all His people, from Abraham and Jacob, and Joseph downward to His twelve disciples, have had to be men who had given up all to follow the Divine leading, and lived separated unto God, ere the Divine power could fulfil His purposes through them.
It was thus with Paul too. To count all things but loss for Christ was the keynote of His life, as it must be that of ours, if we are to share fully in the power of His resurrection. But how little the Church understands that we have -been entirely redeemed from the world, to live wholly and only for God and His love. As the merchantman who found the treasure in the field had to sell all he had to purchase it, Christ claims the whole heart and the whole life and the whole strength, if we are indeed to share with Him in the victory through the power of the Holy Spirit. The law of the kingdom is unchangeable; all things loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.
The disciples had to spend years with Christ to be prepared for Pentecost. Christ calls us to walk every day in the closest union with Himself, to abide in Him without ceasing, and so to live as those who are not their own, but wholly His. It is in this we shall find the path to the fulness of the Spirit.
Let our faith boldly believe that such a life is meant for us. Let our heart's fervent desire reach out after nothing less than this. Let us love the lord our God and Christ our Saviour with our whole heart. We shall be more than conquerors through Him that loved us.
