All the things Paul had thought to be valuable, he gave up for the pearl of “knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.” He saw this knowing as a quest tied to the circumstances of his life. Paul preached Him, but yet wanted to know Him in the highest, purest sense of an intimate knowing not hereto experienced. It seems odd to us that Paul’s desire was to know His suffering. There is a knowledge of Christ that we get through suffering that we get in no other way.
“That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” Philippians 3:10-11 (NASB)
(You are reading from the book “The Master’s Table”, by H. Lamar Smith.)
