For to Me to Live is Christ

Introduction: The Profound Questions of Life and Death

0:05 The following sermon was preached on Sunday morning, the 21st of December, 1980, while the Trinity Church was still meeting at the Grover Cleveland Junior High School in Caldwell, New Jersey.

0:31 Now will you follow, please, in your own Bibles as I read this morning from Philippians chapter 1.

0:40 Philippians chapter 1, again beginning our reading at verse 12. And although verse 21 will be the focal point of our concentration, I am reading the entire connection of thought in which the text comes, and I do this for two very simple reasons. Number one, just the constant reading of the context of a passage as we work through it should help to embed the words of the passage in our minds. But then secondly, it is my concern that you as a congregation continually remember that no text of Scripture is...

1:19 is to be viewed in isolation from its setting or its context. And it is the desire of those of us who teach you publicly not only to give you the substance of the meaning of any given passage, but also to teach you a method of Bible study. And any method that is worth the name of Bible study is one in which we never treat the words of God in isolation from the other words, that surround them as they are given to us by the Holy Spirit. Follow then, please, as I read Philippians 1, verses 12 through 26.

2:00 Now I would have you know, brethren, that the things which happened unto me have fallen out rather unto the progress of the gospel, so that my bonds became manifest in Christ throughout the whole Praetorian Guard and to all the rest, and that most of the brethren in the Lord, being confident through my bonds, are more abundantly bold to speak the word of God without fear. Some indeed preach Christ, even of envy and strife, and some also of goodwill. The one do it of love, knowing that I am set for the defense of the gospel, but the other proclaim Christ of faction, not sincerely, thinking to raise up affliction for me in my bonds. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed, and therein I rejoice. Yes, and I will continue to rejoice, for I know that this shall turn out to my salvation or my deliverance through your supplication and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing shall I be put to shame, but that with all boldness, as always, so also now Christ shall be magnified in my body,

3:30 whether by life or by death, for to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. But if to live in the flesh, if this shall bring fruit from my work, then what I shall choose I know not, but I am in a strait between the two. Having the desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is very far better, yet to abide in the flesh is more needful for your sake. And having this confidence, I know that I shall abide, yea, and abide with you all, for your progress and joy in the faith, that your glorying may abound in Christ Jesus in me, through my presence with you again. Amen.

4:22 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:22 Amen. Amen. Amen. The most profound questions ever entertained by the human mind are these.

4:29 Question number one, what is the meaning or the purpose of life? And question number two, what is the meaning and the result of death?

4:47 Now whether that first question is asked by a little boy who's out taking a walk with his daddy under the stars, asking all kinds of questions, questions that little boys can ask, who put the stars there, how far away are there, how many of them are there, and in the midst of such questions he says, Daddy, why am I here? What's the purpose of life? I say whether that question is asked in the innocence of the intimacy of a boy's relationship to his dad, taking a walk under the stars, or whether it's asked by the gray-haired philosopher bent over his large, books written in all the ancient languages who for years has been pursuing that question. What is the meaning? What is the purpose of life? I say there are few questions that the human mind has ever taken up that are more profound than the question, what is the meaning and the purpose of life?

5:48 And likewise with the second question, whether that question, what is the meaning and the result of death is asked by a broken, by a broken-hearted child who has just seen the earthly remains of a mom or dad lowered into the earth, and as he's taken away, sobbing from the graveside, says to his remaining parent, what has happened to mommy or daddy in death? Or again, whether it's asked by the mature adult who knows that he's in the twilight years of his life and death is fast approaching, and he contemplates that reality, I say, it is a profound question. What is the meaning? What is the result of death?

Paul's Terse Answer: Christ and Gain

6:32 Well, in a manner that is both striking in its simplicity and its brevity, and yet astounding in its profundity and clarity, the great apostle, in this warm, personal, intimate letter to his friends at Philippi, takes on both of those questions, in this warm, personal, intimate letter to his friends at Philippi, takes on both of those questions, in one verse. And it's an amazing feat because he dares to take on both of those questions and answers them in a terse, brief statement that does not even have a verb in it. It must be supplied. In fact, he is so amazing in his treatment of these great issues that he addresses the questions and answers the love, both of them with one word for to me to live what is the meaning of life to you Paul he answers it in one word Christ what is the meaning what is the significance of death and to die gain and to make smooth English out of the Greek we supply the verb the to be verb is to me to live is Christ and

7:58 to die is gain I find that one of the most amazing things about the scriptures and just as I've contemplated this verse throughout the past days and it felt something of the pressure of its own profundity upon my own mind so I trust you too will feel that we are coming to one of the most compacted dense statements in all of the word of God and because we are I dare not I dare not I dare not pass over its truth lightly but I will split up this brief text into two sermons dealing this morning God willing with the believers life Christ and next week God willing the believers death gain now as we attempt to open up the words of the apostle concerning the believers life who is Christ for to me to live is Christ let us first of all note the connection of these words with the immediate context then secondly I will set forth an attempt to explain the meaning of the words and then finally I will make three pointed application of the words to our own consciences first of all then the connection of these words with the

Connection to the Immediate Context (Philippians 1:20)

9:21 immediate context look at your Bibles and as you do you will notice that Philippians 121 begins with the word for and any verse in the Bible that begins with the word for immediately is screaming out I am connected don't separate me I am connected if you would understand me look before me or look after me but don't look simply at me I'm connected I'm joined to something else and this text beginning with the word for immediately points us back to that which the apostle has just asserted in the previous words those who were here last week I trust will remember the heart of what the apostle has already stated he has indicated that he has rejoiced up to the present hour in everything that has happened to him because everything that has happened to him in his Roman imprisonment has fallen out to the furtherance of the gospel then in the latter part of verse 18 he makes a prediction and he says in the future tense I shall rejoice my rejoicing will continue and we noted that there was a rational basis for that prophecy and the

10:43 rational basis was this he was confident that Christ would continue to be magnified in his body even though his earthly body might face death under the executioner's sword he says in verse 20 whether by life or by death Christ shall be magnified it is the confidence that Christ will be magnified in his physical life whether he continues to live or whether he dies that causes his prophecy of rejoicing to be a rational thing but now the question is raised why would a man rejoice at the thought that his body may be put to death by a violent execution how can he say I will rejoice because I'm confident Christ will be magnified whether by life or by death now he's going to explain that to us in verse 21 for to me to live is Christ and to die is gain in other words the apostle Paul did not pen these words thinking as he sat there in his Roman prison well I've got to give some kind of a terse little statement that will provide fuel for the Christian

12:09 plaque makers and poster makers to put something that would be very nice sitting on a living room wall or in a den somewhere to be to live is Christ here is a man who knows he's only a whim away from the executioner's sword the whim of a pagan emperor named Nero and now has a chain about his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm and his arm that binds him day and night to a roman soldier and yet this man says I will continue to rejoice and my rejoicing is rooted in the fact that through your prayer in the supply of the spirit my earnest expectation and hope that I will not be put to shame that I will not be left short-changed by the enablement of the spirit to glorify Christ in life or death I'm confident that will come to pass and you say but Paul what gives He gives you such an orientation to life. And he says, I'll give you the answer. For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain. And so the three dominant thoughts at the end of verse 20, look at them now.

13:17 Christ shall be magnified whether by life or by death. He picks up those three dominant thoughts and makes them the raw materials of verse 21. For to me to live, whether by life is Christ, Christ shall be magnified. Whether magnified in life or death, to die is gain.

Attempted Explanation: 'For to Me to Live is Christ'

13:41 So you see the intimate connection between verse 21 and verse 20. And it makes all the difference in the world in our accurate understanding of verse 21 when we recognize the entire setting out of which it flows. Now then, having said that, having shown at least briefly the connection of verse 21 with verse 20, now follow me as I give what I'm calling an attempted explanation of the meaning of the words. And that's all I can give you this morning, is an attempt to explain the meaning of the words.

14:19 And as I do, I'm greatly indebted for the basic track on which I will be moving with you to the commentary of Robert Johnstone on Philippians, whose treatment of the text I found most helpful, particularly in terms of the basic approach to it. And I gladly acknowledge my debt to him. Now the key to any understanding of the verse itself is to come to grips with those opening words, for to me to live is Christ. And in the original they are placed forward, and in so doing the apostle gives particular emphasis to them, for to me, whatever else life may be to someone else, to me to live is Christ. In other words, this is testimony. This is not a Christian philosopher who is giving his views on these great questions in abstraction. What is the meaning of life in general?

15:23 What is the significance and meaning of death in general? No, no. Here is a man speaking out of the deep, the deepest inward personal conviction of his own heart, for to me to live is Christ, and to me to die is gain. And so there is all of that intensely personal, intimate quality to the words of the great apostle.

15:52 Now what do they mean? When a man writes and says, for to me to live is Christ, what does he mean? What do they mean by such terse words? Well, let me use an illustration in attempting to answer the proper approach to that question.

16:09 Suppose you were going through the remains of a man who had died some years ago, a man whom you never knew personally.

16:17 And for the sake of making him very innocuous, we will call him the proverbial John Smith,

16:24 or David Jones. Now as you go through his personal effects and belongings, you find a diary. And as you leaf through the pages, you find on a given day this entry, for to me to live is the violin.

16:44 And your eye is caught by the statement, you say, to me to live is the violin. Now what in the world did John Smith mean by those words? Was the violin the name of his yacht,

17:00 upon which he doted all of his spare time, all of his weekends, all of his evenings, what was the violin which meant life to him? I don't know. Was he a violin virtuoso, to whom learning all of the techniques of the masters was his great passion in life, so that he listened very carefully to all the recordings of the great violinist of the past, studied all of the techniques of the great violinist of the present? Well, that's a possibility.

17:32 Or could it be that he was a violin maker, and when he wrote to me to live, live is the violin, he meant mastering the techniques of all of the great violin makers of the past, so that he read all that was written and studied and traveled the world to find out all he could about making the violin that would give the purest, richest tone? Or did he mean that he was a connoisseur of the great violinist of the past in terms of being a record collector? So he had every record extent on anyone who has, any notoriety. Well, you say, I don't know.

18:08 Well, how in the world are you going to find out what he meant by, to me, to live is the violin? Well, what you do is you go scrounging around his personal effects for more diaries. And you go through to see if there is biographical material which tells you how he spent his time, how he spent his money, what he read. And then you go around and find if you can meet some witnesses who knew him, who observed him.

18:35 And then you collate all of that material and lo and behold, you know what happens? You begin to understand what he meant in that cryptic little entry. For to me, to live is the violin. You find out that he was indeed a violin maker.

18:49 And you go back into his personal effects and find that when he was a little school kid and he was given a chance to write an essay on any theme that he wanted to, you know what he always chose? Violin making. And they were very crude statements of violin making. But way back from the time he was a child, he had this passion beginning to burn in his breast to be the greatest violin maker who ever lived.

19:14 And then as you go through his diaries and you talk to living witnesses who knew him, you find that this man from morning to night, seven days a week, lived for one thing, to master the art of violin making. Now then, with the help of all of that biographical material from his own writings and all of the material from living witnesses who knew him, you can go back to his cryptic little statement, to me to live is the violin and you could go to the local musical society and give a lecture on what he meant. Not displaying your brilliance, but simply displaying that you did your homework to track down what he meant when he said, to me to live is the violin. You say, now pastor, what in the world are you doing with a silly illustration like that? Well, I'm trying to show you the framework within which I'm going to expound Paul's words. What did he mean? What did he mean when he said, to me to live is Christ?

20:10 Well, this is not a call for the preacher to use his imagination. This meant this, this, this, and the other. It's a call to the preacher to do his homework and to go through all the personal effects of this man, read his epistles, and see what he meant by the words. Then, go through the biographical materials of those who were his living companions, Timothy, Luke, and others whose record is in the Bible.

20:37 It is left in the book of Acts. And when you go through the materials of the Acts and the epistles, then you begin to have an understanding of what he meant when he said, for to me to live is Christ. And let me suggest, and this is only a suggestion, I hope it forms the framework for fruitful meditation on your own part for many months to come, that there are at least four ways in which Paul can assert, for to me, to live is Christ. And the first and most fundamental is this.

To Live is Faith in Christ

21:12 When Paul said, for to me to live is Christ, he meant, for me to live is faith in Christ. For to me to live is faith in Christ. And rather than give you a glut of text, I'm going to try to pick out just a key text or two for each of these headings. And under this heading, I direct your attention to Galatians 2, turn there if you will, please.

21:40 We're going through his other personal effects to unlock the mystery of what he meant when he said, for to me to live is Christ. And I say that this text, which is but a specimen text, indicates that for Paul to say, to me to live is Christ, meant, first of all, that to live was faith in Christ. Galatians 2.20 I have been crucified with Christ, and I have been crucified with Christ.

22:07 And it is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me. And that life which I now live in the flesh, I live in faith, the faith which is in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me. The life which I now live in the flesh, I live in faith. In other words, faith was the dominating, animating principle of his life.

22:44 So when this man says, for to me to live is Christ, he wants us to understand that he means by that that for him to live was faith in Christ. Now notice, not simply faith in faith or faith in anything, but notice how he describes the object of that faith. Faith which is in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me. In other words, it was faith directed to and rooted in Christ in the uniqueness of his personal identity, Son of God, and Christ in the sufficiency of his redemptive activity who loved me and gave himself for me. See how precise the Apostle is? For me to live is Christ. That is, for me to live is faith in Christ.

23:49 Faith in Christ in his specific identity as the Son of God. For Paul, Christ was not simply some elevated religious guru. He was not simply some vague nebulous embodiment of all that is noble and upright and good. He was nothing less than God the Son.

24:13 Nothing less than the incarnate Jehovah. Nothing less than that which he describes him in Romans 9, 5. God over all who is blessed forever. But it was not merely faith in Christ in the uniqueness of his personal identity, but faith in Christ in the sufficiency of his redemptive activity.

24:39 Notice what he says. Who loved me and in pursuit of that love gave himself up for me. And that's sacrificial language. That's the language of substitution.

24:55 That's the language which embodies the heart of the gospel that Christ stood in the room instead of guilty, hell-deserving sinners and bore the wrath against sin which they then themselves deserved. Now why? Why for Paul did the words for me to live is Christ of necessity involve living in this climate of faith in Christ? Well, for the simple reason that God showed him he was a sinner.

25:27 And you read the record of that in Romans chapter 7, particularly beginning with verse 7 and going through verse 12. At one time he thought all was well. He was a hot-shot, zealous young Pharisee. He was a young Pharisee.

25:39 Outstripping all of his peers in his zeal for the religion of his fathers. But he said there came a point in time when God by the Spirit, particularly through the application of the tenth commandment to his conscience, showed him he was a sinner. He was undone. He was deserving of the wrath and the judgment of God.

25:59 And he knew that the answer to the great question, how shall a guilty sinner find acceptance with God, was not to be found in doing more than he had been able to do. What he had been doing as a Pharisee, stepping up the measure of his activity as a zealot. No, no. The same Holy Spirit who through the law showed him the depths of his sin, pointed him to the Lamb of God who bears away the sin of the world.

26:26 And this is the apostle who then could write as he does in 1 Timothy 1.15. This is a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptance. Christ Jesus came into the world to give us what?

26:38 And then Holly and Santa Claus and Bells? Oh!

26:44 He came into the world to save sinners! That's why he came. And if there is any meaning to the incarnation, any meaning to the message of the angels, any meaning to that humble birthplace of the Son of God, any significance to the visit of the Magi approximately two years later, if there's any meaning, here's the meaning! Man are sinners and they cannot extricate themselves from the morass of their sin, both its bondage and its guilt.

27:20 But help has been laid upon one that is mighty. And by faith in Christ we enter into the benefit of all that he did when he died and rose for sinners. Well, you see, for Paul, life was living in faith. Not living in faith in vain.

To Live is Love for Christ

27:41 Fabulosity, undefined mystical experience. No, faith in a specific person whose identity is Son of God who accomplished a specific work he loved and gave himself for sinners. But then secondly, as we trace out the records of this man, we come to understand that when he wrote to me to live is Christ, he was not only asserting that to live was faith in Christ, but to live was love for Christ. To live was love for Christ.

28:22 You see, the great preoccupation of faith is Christ. Christ in his love to the sinner. Now follow me closely. The preoccupation of faith is always external.

28:36 It is Christ in his love to sinners.

28:46 It is Christ in his love to sinners. But never is there a believing reception of the love of God in Christ to sinners without the heart that thus receives that love responding in love to the object of its faith. And it's an interesting thing. I tried to scour the New Testament to see if I could find one explicit statement where Paul mentions anything about the love of God to measure of his own love to Christ.

29:23 And my investigation is not yet complete, but I haven't found it. He says, Cursed be everyone who does not have a fondness for the Lord Jesus, 1 Corinthians 16, 22. But in a very marked way, the Apostle Paul didn't go around running off at the mouth of the pen about his love to Christ. But in the language of another Apostle, he manifested his love in deed and in truth.

29:49 And there is no explanation for the record of the life of the Apostle Paul than this explanation for Paul to live with Christ. That is, not only faith in Christ, but love for Christ. For Peter tells us in 1 Peter 1.8, Whom having not seen ye love, in whom believing ye rejoice, wherever there is faith in Christ, there is love to him.

30:17 Paul says in Galatians 5.6 that, Faith works through love. But apart from those incidental references, what we see in the Apostle is not poetic flights of expression of the depth of his love, but concrete, undeniable manifestations of that love in the specific patterns of his life. His love delights to please its object, and so what do we see in the Apostle but a man whose great and burning passion was to please the Lord Jesus?

30:52 He could say in 2 Corinthians 5.9, We are ambitious, whether home or absent, from this body to be well-pleasing unto him. He could say, The love of Christ has cast its rope of holy constraint around me. 2 Corinthians 5.14 If love delights to please its object, then surely Paul deeply loved the Savior. If love, is willing to bear all things for its object, and according to 1 Corinthians 13, that's one of its qualities, love beareth all things, then surely the great Apostle dearly loved his Lord. He could say, I'm willing to bear affliction for Christ's sake. And again and again we see in the concrete details of his life, whether it's bearing, stoning, shipwreck, being ostracized from his fellow countrymen, coming under the frown and under the judgment even of professing Christians whom he calls false brethren.

31:56 He bears all of this and bears it willingly and joyfully. Why? Because in his heart there beat this supreme love to Jesus Christ. His love manifested in its desire for knowledge of its object.

32:11 Then surely one of the things the Apostle constantly panted after, and he pants after it for his converts, is that they shall grow in their knowledge of Christ and of all that he is and of his love to his people. Read the prayers of Ephesians 1, Ephesians 3, Colossians 1, Philippians 1, this great emphasis upon knowledge. It's not knowledge as some kind of sterile academic thing. No, it is knowledge that touches the deepest springs of the heart.

To Live is Communion with Christ

32:43 For he knows that true love does not feed upon ignorance. But the more he knows of the glory of his Savior, the more he will be he loves him. But then there is more. For Paul, the words to me to live is Christ did not only mean to live is faith in Christ, to live is love to Christ, but thirdly, to live was communion with Christ.

33:08 To live was communion with Christ. As surely as faith in Christ always begets love to Christ, so love always gives birth to a desire for and a delight in communion with its object.

33:29 Those of you who are parents who've lived long enough to see your children come to maturity and enter into marriage, you can think back and long before your son or daughter told you that they had found an object of their love, you already saw all the evidences glued to the telephone every spare minute, communing with the object of their affection. If the telephone was not a medium of communication, then they were glued to their pen. That same girl or boy that would not write anything but the minimum amount in an essay and all the rest, suddenly they had the pen of a ready writer. Why?

34:09 Because the heart has been pulsing with a new affection which affects the pen.

34:19 And of course, if possible, for face-to-face communion, it's as though they completely forgot that you existed. And some of you who are parents can remember how your nose was bent all the way over around the side of your face. It's as though mom and dad no longer existed. Son or daughter had fallen in love or was growing into love.

34:37 Some of you will feel more comfortable if I use that terminology, so in accommodation to you I will use it. Someone was growing into love. And as they grew into love, you found that for a while it seemed as though they had very little delight in you, very little time for you. Why?

34:55 Because they had an object of their affection and inseparably bound up with that was this pulsing, driving concern for communion with the object of that affection. Well, surely that is true of the great Apostle Paul. He uses such language as this, Christ who is our life, Colossians 3 and verse 4. He uses the language of Philippians chapter 3.

35:22 He said, Think of it now. Here is a man who is looked upon throughout the entire Roman Empire as perhaps the outstanding Christian, the greatest of the Apostles, and yet he says as he is about to die, I have a great passion that I may know him. Think of it. He says, My knowledge is not all that I want it to be.

35:45 I want to know him more in the fellowship of his sufferings. I want to press more deeply into true heart communion with my blessed Lord. When Paul said, For to me to live is Christ, surely he meant that life to him was made up of communion with Christ, a communion fostered by meditation and prayer and reflection, a communion nurtured by the reality of his own mystical union with Christ. And that's why it comes out in all of his epistles when he writes to the church at Philippi.

36:23 He addresses them as the saints that are in Christ Jesus. And when he opens up such vast themes as the necessity of sanctification in relationship to justification in Romans chapter 6, he does so in terms of this whole concept of the believer's union and communion with Christ. Why did he do that? Because that was the climate in which he himself lived.

To Live is Devotion to the Service of Christ

36:48 And he was, as it were, exegeting the theology of union with Christ. Out of the crucible of his own living fellowship with the Son of God. For him to live was faith in Christ, love to Christ, communion with Christ, and perhaps most predominantly in this context, for him to live was devotion to the service of Christ. When Paul said to me to live is Christ, surely he meant to live is devotion to the service of Christ.

37:23 From the moment of his conversion recorded in Acts chapter 22, this was the disposition and the language of his heart. And I said, once the heavenly visitor identified himself as Jesus, and I said, what shall I do, Lord? And from that moment onward, though he was no stranger to the wrestlings of indwelling, though he was no perfected glorified saint, the great passion that beat within his breast was that of devotedness to the service of Christ. What will you have me to do, Lord?

38:09 And so when you break down into his own biographical statement such as you have in Acts 20, he can stand before the elders at Ephesus and say, look, I don't count my life dear to myself. I have one great passion. I count not my life, as dear to myself. I'm not always hedging it up and guarding it and equivocating on this point and that.

38:32 He said, no, I have one passion that I may complete my course to testify the gospel of the grace of God. He could say to Timothy in 2 Timothy 2, 10-12, wherefore, I endure all things for the elect's sake that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. He can, he can say as he does in Colossians 1-24, I rejoice in the privilege of filling up on my part that which is lacking of the sufferings of Christ for his body's sake which is the church. And whatever those words mean, certainly it means this much.

39:10 He counted it a privilege to suffer in pursuit of his devotion to the service of the Lord Jesus. No task was too difficult to undertake for the service of his Master. No burden too heavy to be borne for the sake of his Master. No trial too pressing to undergo for the service of Christ.

39:35 No pain too severe to bear for the service of Christ. And you see, this is the key that unlocks those mysterious words of 1 Corinthians 7. When he says, I wish that all men were as I am, that is a single man, this is the explanation. He found such joy in undisputed distracted service to Christ that he yearned that all men and all women would know the same joy.

40:01 He wasn't laying down a rule that marriage is bad or unspiritual. The man who wrote Ephesians 5 could never have any such notions in his head. But what he was doing was sharing something of his sanctified longings. He that is married is careful how he may please his wife.

40:20 He shall have cares in this life. He that is unmarried is undistracted that he may serve the Lord without distraction. You see, that's the explanation. Not a sour man who was down on marriage, but a man who so gloved with this devotion to the service of Christ that he longed that all others could know the same abandonment to that service which he himself knew.

Application 1: An Incisive Indication of the State of the Church

40:44 Well, my dear brothers and sisters, I suggest that this is at least an attempt to explain what he meant when he said to the Philippians, for to me, to live is Christ. Paul, give us your philosophy of life. Give us your insights as to the true meaning of life. We all wait breathlessly with tablets that have 40 pages prepared to get writers cramped and he says, look, you'll only need to write one word and you have my answer in full.

41:20 To me, to live is Christ. That is, to me, to live is faith in Christ. To me, to live is love to Christ. To me, to live is communion with Christ.

41:35 To me, to live is devotion to the service of Christ. And now, very quickly, let me conclude this morning with pressing by way of application this text upon your conscience. And I would set before you the fact that these words form an incisive indication of the state of the church. Of our own hearts.

41:58 Listen carefully as I ask you a very simple question. As I have read and sought to expound the words to me to live is Christ, have you found in your own heart an honest, albeit perhaps very faint, but an honest echo of those words and their meaning?

42:25 You follow my question? Have you heard an echo from your own heart?

42:39 George! Has there been an echo in your own breast? To me, to live is Christ.

42:50 Life is for me. Faith in Christ. As a needy, helpless sinner, my only ground of confidence that I can have access to God is in the reality of that person who is the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. I live in faith.

43:12 Faith in the Son of God who loved me. and gave himself for me. Would you have to say that your faith is in your church membership? Your faith is in your good life.

43:24 Your faith is in your upright moral walk. Your faith is in your decision. Your faith is in something else. Oh, my friend, this text forms an incisive index of the state of your own heart.

43:38 Can you say to me to live is not only faith in Christ, but to me to live is love to Christ. Do you love him? I don't ask you do you love him as much as you know you should or as much as you desire that you could or as much as one day you shall love him. But I'm asking you do you love him?

44:04 Any of the indications of love? Delight in his fellowship? Go back to that young man. He comes home, bursts through the door and says, Mom, I'm in love.

44:16 What's her name? And he tells her. They watch one day go by, two, three, four, six weeks. Never gives her a telephone call, never writes a letter, never spends any time with her, but every day, after a while the parents are going to say, crazy kind of love this kid's got.

44:34 Doesn't call her, doesn't see her, doesn't write her.

44:38 Crazy kind of love some of you have for your Savior.

44:42 Crazy kind of love! You find no delight in fellowship with him. You find more delight in your dumb, inane, boob-tube favorite specials than you do in communion with Christ. Find more delight in reading the stock market page in the New York Times than meditating upon Philippians 1.

45:04 And yet you say you love him? No delight in him? No time to commune with him? No reading his love letters to his people?

45:13 Be not deceived, my friend, this is an index of where you really are. What about this matter of communion with him? What about the matter of devotion to his service? If some of you are honest, you would have to say, to me, to live is the accumulation of things, the lust of the eyes.

45:34 To me, to live is to enjoy things, the lust of the flesh. For me, to live is to be somebody, the pride of life. Some of you would have to write the text, for me, to live is sports, for me, to live is popularity, for me, to live is girls, to me, to live is boys, to me, to live is self-pity. I want the whole world having a pity party at my feet.

45:57 It makes me feel so good.

46:00 My friend, if that's so, you're an unconverted man or woman, boy or girl, and you need to be born of the Spirit of God. You need Christ revealed to your heart. If you cannot say, for to me, to live is Christ, listen to me. You're a loser now and death will be the culmination of your loss.

46:20 No one can say death is gain unless he can first of all say to me, to live is Christ.

46:28 You will not die the death of the righteous unless you live the life of the righteous and that life is Christ.

Application 2: A Glorious Proclamation of the Excellence of Christ

46:37 But then secondly, these words not only form an incisive indication of the state of our hearts, but they form a glorious proclamation of the excellence of Christ. A glorious proclamation of the excellence of Christ.

46:53 Who was the man who wrote these words? To me, to live is Christ. Was he a man with an IQ of about 75? Narrow mind?

47:01 The energies of one who was sitting in a rocking chair about to die who could only put out about one tenth of an average man's work in any given day? Did he have a narrow, shriveled heart that didn't see beyond his checkerboard and his three little friends in his old folks' home? No, no. He was a man with a massive mind.

47:20 You and I try to follow the track of that mind in some of his epistles and we say, man, the guy's cruising in the ionosphere.

47:28 That's the way I feel. I read and meditate upon some of the passages and I say, Lord, you're going to have to give me a few afterburners and give me a different kind of fuel before I can ever get up into the realm where some of those things are. When I study a passage like Colossians 1, I feel like my head is either going to burst or just shrivel up before the blazing light of such concepts. In him all things hold together.

47:54 He is before all things the firstborn of all creation. Magnificent, sweeping concepts. Here is a man with a mind that is a massive mind, a broad, keen mind. A man with a large, pulsing, pulsing heart who can take in the concerns of his fellow Jews, who can take in the concerns of the Gentile world, who can be a passionate evangelist and a tender pastor, who can be a flaming herald of the gospel, who can be at times, if necessary, a stern disciplinarian as he fathers his children in the faith when they need the rod of correction.

48:33 Here is a man of great largeness of heart, vastness of mind, and yet, he says, when I say that to me to live is Christ, I find nothing to constrict me. In Christ is an infinite ocean of knowledge that stretches my mind to its fullest, and I have no fears that I will ever find the shores or reach the bottom, for in him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge in the very one in whom dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Oh, how he is bragging on Christ when he says to me to live is Christ. All that that mind would ever thirst for in terms of knowledge that would challenge, that would battle, that would drive back by its blazing light, he says, I have found it in Christ, not in an empty creed stripped of my Savior, but in a creed that is but the framework within which my Savior pulses with his own life and the light of his glory. When he thinks of his heart, he does not fear that somehow that large heart will have a corner that will never be filled if it takes Christ for its supreme object. He knows there's much more of Christ than his poor heart can ever contain.

50:02 I say these words form a glorious proclamation of the excellence of Christ. My friend, do you have that estimation of Christ? Can you say to me to live is Christ and I have found him to be an exhaustless fountain of life, a shoreless, bottomless ocean of the knowledge that satisfies, for it is the very knowledge of God and eternal life. John 17, 3, this is life eternal that they may know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.

Application 3: An Amazing Demonstration of the Power of the Gospel

50:42 Well then, finally, this text forms an amazing demonstration of the power of the gospel. An amazing demonstration of the power of the gospel. Think of it now. This man says, my whole life is summed up in one word, Christ.

51:02 There was a time when his whole life was summed up in two words, no Christ. He was committed to the obliteration of the name of Christ from the existing generation in which he found himself. The book of Acts says he was breathing out threatenings and slaughters against the people of God. He wasn't content simply to carry on in his own synagogue back home at Tarsus and have an anti-Christ attitude.

51:32 He became an aggressive zealot and when the Lord arrested him he had papers of authority from the high priest to go into towns and find anyone who named the name of Christ and tell them recant or we'll put you in bonds and imprisonment and he says in another place to his own shame that he caused people to blaspheme and then he says who before himself was a blasphemer and a murderer.

52:03 Now how in the world does a man committed to obliterating the very name of Christ come to the place where he says for me to live is Christ. Well he certainly didn't perform a con job on himself and he certainly isn't because he had an epileptic fit as some of the liberals tried to explain what happened. He tells us what happened 2 Corinthians 4 6 he says God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. He said God sovereignly dispelled the darkness of my heart and as surely as he brought light into the primitive creation so he brought light into my heart and when that light was brought it illuminated the very glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ and in Christ and his glorious gospel the apostle found that which transformed him and it was that transformation that lay at the basis of his words for to me to live is Christ and my friend there is nothing but the power of the gospel that will do that in our day. Back in medieval Romanism some of you have read of this

53:32 in the terrible superstition of that system that had moved so far from biblical religion they would have a practice of taking a crucifix and when someone was ill or when someone supposedly was demon possessed they would lay the crucifix upon the poor distressed soul hoping that somehow by virtue of this instrument something of healing and deliverance would come well that's sheer pagan superstition and it's to be abominated but there's a lovely object lesson in it there was the apostle Saul of Tarsus with a heart that we might say was filled with demonic hate to the son of God hate to his name hate to his claims hate to his people hate to his cause and you know what God did God came and laid the cross upon that heart not an icon not some kind of a relic but he laid the cross in terms of the truth as it is in Jesus and the demons of ignorance and hate and animosity were cast out and in its place Christ was enshrined as his Lord and as his God there he sits in a prison at Rome

55:00 chained to a soldier writing a letter to his beloved friends at Philippi and he says I will continue to rejoice Christ shall be magnified in my body whether I continue to live in this body or whether I die it matters not Christ shall be magnified I shall rejoice why Paul my answer is simple for me to live is Christ and to die is gain you can't hurt a man like that may God grant that something of that reality will be found in our hearts by the same grace that worked in him let us pray our Father as we have drawn near to the heart of that great servant of yours from a bygone generation we confess that we have seen and felt to our shame the fickleness the narrowness of our own hearts but we praise you

56:29 that many of us can say in your presence not with the same degree of strength or consistency as your servant Paul but nonetheless really and truly for us to live is Christ oh God strengthen that reality in each heart in which it exists and for those hearts all clogged up with things unworthy of the human heart the pursuit of personal gain the pursuit of sensual pleasure the pursuit of any other object that is the supreme focal point of desire beside your son the pursuit of any other object that is the supreme focal point of desire beside your son oh Lord Jesus as you came to that temple in your own day and drove out everything that was foreign to its intended use come to the temple of our hearts and drive out all that is unworthy of you oh Lord seal the word to our hearts may there be profit for those who are strangers to your grace and for those of us who by grace know you make this word fruitful to our edification and for these mercies we will praise you through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen