Philippians 1:21 – “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.”
I
love the book of Philippians. It’s few pages are filled with such joy, hope and
encouragement. The verse above is probably one of the more frequently quoted
verses in the book. I have often used it in my “Christian lingo” as applicable
to my life. It came as a surprise to me, then, the other day when I read this
verse and was struck with a conviction that I did not at all understand the
meaning or application of it.
Context. Paul is confessing in this
portion of Philippians 1 that he is very torn between two different desires,
one to live and the other to die (not in a morbid or suicidal way). On the one
hand, Paul knows that in living he will be able to accomplish work in
furthering the kingdom of God. On the other hand he strongly desires to be with
Christ, dwelling in his heavenly life. Both desires are good and admirable. From
his language we can see that Paul is deeply torn between these two different
paths. We could say that, for Paul, the struggle is real.
Application.
The
question is, is the struggle real for me? To be honest, I have to say no. I
have never been confronted with a life-or-death situation, but I could guess,
that if I was everything, in me would want to live and not die. If Jesus came
to me today and said, “Would you like to die today?” I would mostly likely say
no! We’ve all prayed those prayers before that go something like this, “God,
please don’t come until (fill in the blank) has happened.” I can’t even count
how many times I’ve thought those prayers. And while I want nothing more than
to spend eternity with Christ, often my love of life here overshadows that
desire. I’ve begun to realize that, unlike Paul, I don’t always view death as
gain. You see, in Paul’s mind, death was superior to life. Death was not the
end of life but the beginning or birth into a far superior life. Death meant
more of Jesus, and because Paul lived with the attitude that “to live is
Christ,” his death would only mean a greater continuation of the life he was
already living.
Paul didn’t love his
life more that Christ. He didn’t have to even make that choice because his life
was Christ. This concept is hard for me to understand. The wording is a little
odd. How does “to live is Christ” work? There are so many different
explanations that people want to give, but I heard one example that kind of
brought it to life for me. A man named Wayne Barber said:
“If
I took a fish (a hand puppet fish) and said 'Okay. Swim!' the fish would just
sit there because it does not have any life in it to enable it to swim. This
fish is like a person without the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul is saying that there
is someone inside of me that is my life. I draw my life from Him.”
Most days I feel far from a fish puppet being completely
filled and controlled by the hand of God in every aspect of my life. And it hit
me that maybe my lack of understanding of death and desire for heaven is
directly related to my lack of allowing my life to become Christ. If my life
consists of moving towards a place where Christ is living through my mind and
body then all my desires and affections become the same as Christ. I no longer
hold on to my life because all I can see when I look at my life is Christ. When
I look at the past, I see Christ. When I look at the present I see Christ. When
I look at the future, I see Christ. And when I look beyond the future I see
only a continuation of Christ living in me. Like Paul said in Romans 14:8,
“Whether we live we live to the Lord and if we die, we die to the Lord. So
whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord.”
It is not death to die if the death of Christ be but
the life of the soul.
– Spurgeon
I
live only to serve Him, only to commune with Him; I have no conception of life apart from Him.
– Lightfoot
