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Lesson 19: Joy’s ultimate goal

Philippians 3:1-21 www.bible.com/bible/59/php.3 
¹² Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.
¹³ Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead,
¹⁴ I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

In a previous lesson we looked at where we seek riches, what we place our focus on in this life on earth. In this lesson we look at the goal of our life.

In sports a goal as an easy thing to identify. We score points and we win when we have more points than our opponents. In our earthly life with Jesus, however, we are not engaged in a battle for final victory, for the final victory has already been won by Jesus Christ when He rose from the dead. So our battle is about endurance and faithfulness.

Look again at the first verse of today’s Scripture; even Paul had not yet achieved his goal. Our goal for this life cannot be perfection; we will never reach it here since our bodies are still mortal and subject to sin. But we can follow Paul’s example and forget what is in the past – all we have confessed to God as sin has been forgiven and forgotten by Him.

*Read the following verses and write down what God has done with all your confessed sin:
Psalm 103:12
1 John 1:9
Micah 7:19

 

All our past, covered by His blood, is forgotten by God. We have no reason at all to remember it. But Satan, our accuser, will try to make us remember it so he can keep us from being filled with joy. Remember, our joy in the midst of trial is the greatest testimony we can be to people around us. They also face trials and hard times, but they have no joy to carry them through. Joy should be our constant companion…something we cannot do in our own power or determination. But allowing Jesus’ joy to shine through us comes from straining forward into the future – into the things Jesus still has for us.

Straining forward is what Jesus talked about when He talked about faithfulness (see Matthew 25:31-46) and persistence. We will not understand all He is asking of us at any given time, just as the people in this Matthew story did not realize they had been serving Jesus with the little things they had done for others. Jesus had rewarded them in this small moment with joy; and at the judgment they will be rewarded with much, much more.