DAY 677 - Christ All, Everything Rubbish (請按此處收聼廣東話Cantonese podcast click here)

Want to know why I have been writing and recording my blogs and podcast daily since August 10, 2009? Click these three links:

Confirmation from John Stott in 2009: 
http://bishopsilas.blogspot.com/2009_07_01_archive.html
My MicroMacro Discipleship, A missing DNA in Discipleship Development: http://bishopsilas.blogspot.com/2009/07/introduction-micromacro-discipleship.html
Subject Shifting Devotion Method(Inspired by John Stott in 1991: http://bishopsilas.blogspot.com/2009/08/count-down-5-subject-shifting-devotion.html

                               Today's Reading: Philippians 3:7-11

** If you would like to learn a simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please read my “Count Down 5” from my Devotion on Fire blog:

http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/2009/08/count-down-5-subject-shifting-devotion.html

To use this simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please click this link:

 .Subject Shifting Devotion.pdf

Please click this link to read Philippians 3:7-11

English(ESV): http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Philippians 3&version=ESV

Chinese: http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=腓 立 比 書 3&version=CUV

Bible Study

     Today's passage, especially verse 8, is one of the most favourite one for a lot of Christians. 

Bishop N.T. Wright says ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._T._Wright ) :
     Paul doesn't regard the huge privileges he had, which he listed in verses 4 & 5, as something to take advantage of; rather, he discovered in Jesus that the true dealing of membership in God's people lay in suffering and death, with the hope of resurrection out beyond.
     This, it seems, is what he means by having the Messiah as his 'profit'.  Jesus, as Israel's Messiah, has at last done what Israel had not and could not.  He has been, in himself, the light of the world, the means of salvation, the doorway to the age to come.  Israel, meanwhile including Paul himself before his conversion - had been struggling to be God's people according to the Torah, and the main result had been to set up that law as a barrier of privilege between Jew and Gentile.  That's why Paul now sees, and says that what he wants in none of those privileges, but rather to gain the Messiah, to know the Messiah, to be found 'in' the Messiah, to be defined by the Messiah's faithfulness, to know the power of his resurrection , which lies along the road of his suffering and death.   

N.T. Wright. Paul for Everyone:The Prison Letters. Louisville,KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2004, p.119-120.

     Do you have any kind of privilege you cling on so that Jesus is not so important as those things? Are you willing to see those things you previously treasured as rubbish so that Jesus can be your all? 
     

Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through the passage we have just read. Offer this time up to Jesus as you listen to him, while listening to "Gabriel's Oboe":  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmax47l2hLU

Spiritual Journal

    The title I heard from Jesus today is: Christ all, everything rubbish

    The message I got from Jesus today is a reminder of the reality of our true relationship with Jesus. Take a deep breath now and then read verse 8  carefully and see what Jesus wants to tell you:

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ.

    How important to your faith that you need to live out verse 8? What does that really means? How can you live out verse 8?

    How much are you willing to give, sacrifice rather than take and gain. What do you want to gain, is it really Christ? 

Dear Lord Jesus,
Lead us to be able not only to say "Christ all, everything rubbish" but really to live it out.  In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Please click this link to worship with us -

從心合一

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJWZQyLzDRQ

10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord) Matt Redman

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXDGE_lRI0E

You may choose to follow my other daily blog: 

Daily Devotion on Fire 2(2 years plan -One year New Testament, one year Old Testament): 

http://bishopsilas2.blogspot.ca/

Daily Devotion on Fire (3 years and 3 months plan, one chapter a day to finish reading the whole Bible): 

http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/

Break.Build (40 days daily devotion- For Renewal or First Step for new Christians): http://www.breakbuild.blogspot.ca/

Emmanuel330 (40 weeks First Step Bible Study): 

http://emmanuel330.blogspot.ca/

This blog:

Discipler 123 (Daily devotion using N.T. Wright's NT for Everyone as source)

http://discipler123.blogspot.ca/