To Live Is Christ

Paul's famous line, "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain," is really an accountant's sentence, and the same letter shows you the accounts it came from.

Two chapters later, Paul writes out his own list, item by item: "Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, an Hebrew of the Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee." Then he adds, "Concerning zeal, persecuting the church; touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless." There are seven entries there: his birth, his people, his tribe, his upbringing, his party, his zeal and his record. In his world, every one of those lines was an asset, and several of them were things no amount of effort could ever earn.

Then he does the sum in public: "But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ." He never calls those things worthless in themselves. He moves them into the other column. Then he goes further: "Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss." And further still: "and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ."

So when Paul says that to live is Christ, he means it exactly. He has already cleared every other item out of the gain column. That is why the possibility of death hanging over him in chapter one cannot cost him anything. He wrote that line while his case was still open, when it could still go either way: "whether it be by life, or by death."

Now read the verse again as a total. Death is gain, because there is nothing left in the other column for death to take. That is not mere courage. It is careful bookkeeping. And the same account is open to you, whatever your own list turns out to be worth.

Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 177 is Until I Have Shewed (Psalm 71:18).

All 365 readings in Daily Manna