Did you notice that? (Verse nine). The first thing he says is: “That I may win Him.” The second: ‘‘That I may be found in Him." Well, you say, isn’t that for everybody? Yes, that’s the trouble. It is for everybody. But here is the picture again of truth, possible truth, which I call “judicial”; it is subjective in its thought and anange ment, but it has not become objective; it has not become reality. Now we can sit and bless ourselves to death by saying, oh, I am hidden in Jesus and Jesus is hidden in me. Now that is absolutely true, that’s absolutely true, but if you still retain that purely as a bit of truth which is a judicial statement, declaring a fact, that is not going to get you too far. It can’t, it can’t. That truth cannot help you until it is personalized, and you bring it from its brackets where it is a judicial statement. “Ye are com plete in Him.” Sure, that is wonderful. How complete am I? Just as far as your faith will make that good, by personalizing the truth which He says there, and making it objective here. How many can get that, or don’t you get it? I want you to get that, because there are people today blessed to death, purely under an objective statement of truth. Now truth is never yours; it is never mine until it is personalized; that is, it has been incor porated in me and has become a part of me. And when that truth has become a part of me, how many know that is mine? Nothing can take it away from me, because it is part of me. What has happened? You say: “I have seen the truth and I have rejoiced.
And when I saw that it was really mine in Christ. and He had died to make it possible for me, Oh, I just got blessed to death and said, Hallelujah it’s mine! Glory to God, glory to God. The Word says right here: I am complete in Him.” How many know that is purely judicial, that is purely judicial? What is going to happen? The Holy Spirit has to operate in you and in me, and what faith I have has to be united with the power of the Spirit, and the power of the Spirit with my faith, reaches up like this and I say, come on truth, I want you as mine. God says you can have it. And I pull that down into my heart and life. How many know truth has a way of doing strange things in us? Of course, it begins its mysterious work. I have invited it. Well then if I don’t want its consequences I have no business to invite it. But you see, “I caught a flash of truth one day; how daring ig norance can be!” (Friday night I’ll read the entire poem, ‘‘The Poet’s Price," from my book of poetry). How many know ig norance can be very daring? Well, I caught it in ignorance, not because I knew the profundity of it. No, I just knew that it was a marvelous thing. We say, “Oh, I want the truth too Oh, let’s all have truth, and so I just put out my hand and say, Oh Lord! I want You, Oh I want God terribly.” He says, “You can have Me.” Have you found it did some terrifying things inside of you when He got in, or haven’t you discovered that? If not, you haven’t gone far. Or did He come in and say, “Oh, isn’t it sweet in here,” and you said, “Yes,” and you both sat down and had a nice time! No, you didn’t. He got in there and didn’t He have something to do! Well what was the matter? He was bringing the adjustment which was necessary to make that which you had invited, objective, realistic, a living reality, a part of you. And by and by you know you can have truth that is a part of you, just like your arms and legs. Yes you can. It is just a part of you; it
25
becomes a part of you, and that’s what He wants. But we must never feel nor think that it is an easy thing. Truth is one of the most devastating and disastrous things that ever got loose in me. The most devastating, most disastrous thing I ever got in me was the truth! But I am happy to have it. Aren’t you glad you have it? Hasn’t it done anything in you? Certainly! He wants it to. So Paul says: “I want to be found in Him.” Oh, you say, “The Scripture says, I am hidden with Him already.” Yes, that is what the Scripture says. But how much of that is a reality?! Have you found a way in Him? That is a mystery. It is a divine process to have the Holy Spirit take you in your trembling little life and say: “I am going to take you somewhere.” “Where?” “I am going to take you in Christ. I want you hidden away in Him.” You don’t get that in five minutes! That is what Paul was saying he saw in the vision. It was possible to win Him. It was possible to be found in Him, and “I am willing,’’ he says, “to have everything cancelled in life if I can find my way, and find in Him my correct spiritual habitat, that this strange thing in me will say at last I am home! I am home! I got back! I found my natural habitat!” Everyone of us who has walked at all with the Lord has found that, some perhaps less and some maybe in stronger degree. But how many know what I mean, when God will do something in your heart and life, such as taking you in Christ, you will find a strange realization of having struck the reality of the thing that you were made for and needed? Yes, sure. What is it? That is
your first intimation of what I call your homecoming. And when we are really in spirit there with Him, how many know you feel perfectly at home? That’s when you feel at home, because that is where we belong. Paul says, “I am willing to give and do anything if I can find my place in Him and be found in Him.” That is orientation, a fresh new orientation. We are ego-centric, we are filled and moved and motivated and directed by the things which are too local. Paul says that will never do. I need to be taken out of this and placed in that; in Him, so that my life will be hidden away in there, and what I find in there will be mine; the motives that are in the Christ, they will be in my heart, for we are one. I was thinking of it yesterday, the things that would be found in that heart, in Him, in Him, when you get in there. Well, you find all those things that were in the Christ. But we haven’t! The Lord spoke to me only yesterday about it, and I said, “Why Lord, in You there is a divine compassion, I haven’t that. I have a natural feeling for people; I have a natural sorrow for people; but I don’t know very much about divine compassion that consumed the heart of Jesus.” If I get in there, I will have to discover that divine compassion and let it be a part of me, His motives too. I thought, what a wonderful heart, what a wonderful place that is in the heart of Jesus. “To be found in Him.” Paul says it is possible to get in there. It is a part of the vision God has given (the second part) and Paul says he will do anything in the world to be found in Him. Well, if you do, how many of you sense right away there must be a profound devotion that we don’t have, a real devotion that’s Paul’s. The Lord doesn’t expect me to have it out here; He is not condemning me; He is only inviting me to come in to share with Him; that is all He is doing. He doesn’t say it’s impossible; He says
“That’s what I am inviting you into: all those characteristics of that inner heart, devotion, surrender, obedience, compassion, tenderness, love, self-giving.” Paul says, “All that is possible if I can find it - I am searching for it.” We have covered two points:
- “That I may win Him.”
- “And be found in Him.”
Now here is a third point. It is found in the tenth verse of the third chapter of Philippians: