I suffer loss gladly because….

There was a time when I counted things as gain. I measured my life by what I could hold, what I could build, what I could claim as mine. But I have seen something greater. Those things I once held so tightly, I now count as loss for Christ.

Not reluctantly. Not with hesitation. But with a burning passion that drives me forward. The fire is His, He lit it inside of me, but I have been called to fuel the fire. To diligently seek Him is fuel. To forgive is fuel. To love and to show mercy is fuel. All of these things, exercised, inflames the passionate fire of our heart.

Yes, I count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord.

There is nothing that compares to knowing Him. Not knowing about Him but knowing Him. This is not head knowledge. This is not mere doctrine. This is an intimate knowing. A living union. A relationship that deepens as everything else falls away.

I suffer loss……. that I may gain Christ.

And what a gain that is.

To be found in Him not standing in my own righteousness, not clinging to anything I have produced but clothed in a righteousness that is not my own, given by God through faith in Christ.

I lose what is mine, and I receive what is His and there is no comparison.

There is nothing I could ever lose that could measure up to what I have gained. I have gained Christ. And in gaining Him, I have gained everything.

I suffer loss that I may know Him……

To know Him not from a distance, not as an observer but to walk with Him, to be known by Him, to live in Him. And in that knowing, there is life. Real life. Abundant life.

I suffer loss…… that I may know the power of His resurrection.

Because it is in the dying of my flesh that His life rises within me. The more I let go, the more He lives. The more I die, the more He is revealed. When I am weak then He is strong in me.

This is not some theory. This is life out of death. This is the light that God has commanded to shine forth from darkness. When I surrender, surrender to God and tge life He has called me to, then light and life bursts forth. It may be on a mountaintop, but its more likely to be in the depths of the valley.

I suffer loss……. that I may enter into the fellowship of His sufferings.

This is “the way,” He walked.

He left the glory of heaven. He took on the form of a servant. He walked this earth as a man of sorrows. He was rejected. He was despised. He suffered loss at every step not because He had to but because He chose to fulfill the will of the Father. This was our Lords ministry.

And this is our calling, to walk that same narrow way.

Not chasing comfort. Not seeking ease. But entering into that same fellowship that same life that same surrender.

Because it leads us back to God.

I suffer loss …….that I may be conformed to Him.

That His image would be formed in me. That my life would reflect His. That the old man would be crucified, and Christ would be seen.And in this, I learn something.

It no longer matters what state I am in.

We have been called to learn to be content. Its the burning force of Christ in our hearts that steadies the ship. Its His passion in us that is our anchor in the storm. This immovable foundation, the anchor of our soul

In Him I know how to be brought low. I know how to abound. I know what it is to be full, and I know what it is to be hungry. I know what it is to have, and I know what it is to lack.

And in Him, none of it moves me.

Because I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

This is what I have been given strength for not to avoid loss, but to endure it. Not to cling to life, but to lay it down.

To suffer loss until loss itself has no hold on me. Until whether I have or have not, whether I am full or empty, clothed or stripped bare it makes no difference.

Because when I have come into the place where Christ walked, then this is how I walk.

And in that place, that place of loss, thst place of suffering I have found great gain. Whether dancing on the tops of mountains or in the depths of the sea, the only thing that matters is that He is with me. This is why we are called to count it “pure joy,” when we face trials of many kinds. For in the midst of those trials He is never closer to us, and proximity to the Lord leads us in the path of holibess

And in finding Him in the midst of life, I have found everything.