What is the significance of Paul saying, "I press on" (Philippians 3:12)?

We desire to call attention to this scripture as an exemplification of entire oneness between the Lord and His servant as to the object of his calling. If we give the words of another translation this will be still more apparent: "Not that I have already obtained [the prize], or am already perfected; but I pursue, if also I may get possession [of it], seeing that also I have been taken possession of by Christ Jesus." Thus, as the simplest reader will perceive, the apostle's mind was energetically set upon the very end that Christ had in view in "taking possession" of His servant; and towards this goal he daily bent his diligent steps. It was, as we may say, his one business with which through grace he suffered no interference.

"Not as though I had already attained either were already perfect" — for there is no perfection of condition known in Scripture, short of reaching Christ in glory — "but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus." He is not speaking here of any mental apprehension of things. He is using a word that is only used, so far as I know, in modern English, in the language of the police court: we know what it means by a policeman apprehending a man. It is then: If that I may lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of me. What did He lay hold of you and me for? Nothing short of being with Himself and like Him in the glory of God for ever. Now, he says, that is what I am set for. "Brethren, I count not myself to have laid hold of it, but this one thing I do" — Not many things, as so often thought desirable. And what is it? "Forgetting the things that are behind" — that does not refer to the failures of the past: we were not meant to forget them — it is very profitable that we should remember the failures of the past, to be humbled by them. It means that he is not occupied with the milestones, the past points of progress or of victories won. He has no time to take account of the length of the way he has traversed. He views the race set before him with his whole mind on the end of it. "Reaching forth to the things that are before." He is using the most forcible words of the race-course: the attitude of a man in running, with his head and neck extended out beyond the rest of the body, in the earnestness of pressing on to the goal and the prize. "I press toward the goal for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus."

"That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death; if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection from the dead." Just as in the previous verse, so also in this, it was true already in one sense: Paul did know Christ and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made con-formable unto His death: this was a present, deep reality to his soul, wrought by the Spirit of God. But this viewpoint must not be confounded with that which he takes in penning this chapter. His desire here is to "know Him" by being in His very presence in Glory, to know literally "the power of His resurrection," that is, through having to pass through sufferings from men, as the Lord Jesus did, and actually experiencing death, as did his Lord, he might also actually experience the power of God in resurrection; thus knowing in literal experience, - not simply in spiritual power - that which his Lord and Master has known. "If by any means," he adds, "I might attain unto the resurrection from the dead." Let us mark here that he thus will consider nothing short of the coming of the Lord - the rapture of the saints - as any proper attainment. This is further confirmed by verses 20 and 21; but verses 12 to 16 show us the very real effects in the apostle's whole conduct and character that were produced by the fact that this present life on earth will never gain pure satisfaction for the soul.

"Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus." Whatever might be accomplished for the Lord on earth, this was not his objective: if those things were proper results, they were the results of a proper objective, which was far beyond anything in the way of present blessing. Paul took not the slightest pride in any of these "attainments", as men would call them: indeed he had not yet attained what he desired: he was not yet "perfect," but still following after, He arrested him on his downward course and saved his soul. Christ Jesus had apprehended him for eternal glory: how could he settle down content with some earthly attainment?

It may be remarked here that this is but one of three ways in which the apostle views the subject of perfection. Here the question is that of perfection in attainment, and no one can in this way be perfect until with Christ in Glory. However, in this same chapter, verse 15, Paul writes, "Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded." Here it is evident that he considers some believers to be perfect, and others not so. But the context shows this to be perfection in our present attitude of mind. That is, those who forget the things that are behind, and press toward the mark for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus, are "perfect" or "full grown" - that is mature in their attitude. But not all believers are perfect in this way. The third viewpoint is found in Heb.10:14: "For by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." Verse 10 shows that the "sanctified" refers to all who are redeemed by the blood of Christ - every true believer. This however has to do with perfection in our acceptance before God, an eternal perfection because dependent fully upon the one offering of Christ. Thus it will be noted that from the first point of view no believer is perfect; from the second, some believers are perfect; from the third, every believer is perfect.

The apostle has already led us up to the blessed Object before him. What he has been just enlarging upon is the example of the Lord's humiliation, but he is now going to enlarge upon the glory which is his strength for such a path as this; the light which now shines for us upon the path, and shines more and more unto the perfect day. It is beautiful to realize that the very thing that is wanting to him now, as we look at him here, is the very thing which makes him a pilgrim and a racer, — an Object outside himself, something which he has not yet attained, but to which, because of its glory for him, he gives his whole energy to pressing on for its attainment. This is what characterizes all that we have here. His look is forward only. A racer does not look at the road on each side. He looks at what is before him; and so it is that in everything here, the principle is "forgetting that which is behind, and pressing on to that which is before." This is true of all attainment and experiences by the way, as it is of other things. It is not merely the world which is left behind, — that surely; but he himself, whatever up to the present he might be, is still left behind. It is Christ before him that gives oneness of purpose and character to his present life.

What did Paul set before himself? He says, "Brethren, I count not myself yet to have apprehended: but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on towards the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." He was undoubtedly a great apostle, but there was a greater attainment than the apostolate, and that was the "prize of the high calling of God." There was something before his soul which he valued above his service; he desired that he, the chief of sinners, might arrive at the knowledge of Christ. "That I might know Him," he cried, "and the power of His resurrection." He could not rest satisfied short of this attainment. It was poor wretched stuff within him that he had to work with, but he was nevertheless pressing forward. His words are, "Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, if so be that I may apprehend that for which also I was apprehended by Christ Jesus."

Verses 12 to 14 show us that the thought of a race was present to the Apostle's mind in writing. The word, "attained" in verse 12 is really "obtained" or "received" as a prize. He wished no one to think that he had already received the prize, or that he was perfected. The position rather was that he was still pursuing it. Christ Jesus had laid hold of him, but he had not yet laid hold of it. Still he was ardently in pursuit of it, stretching out like an eager athlete towards the prize of God's calling on high in Christ Jesus.

The word "high" simply means "above." The same word is used in Colossians 3:1, where we are bidden to "seek those things which are above." The prize, of the calling to the things above, is surely that full and perfect knowledge of Christ Himself, which will be possible for us when our bodies are changed and fashioned like to His body of glory at His coming.

Paul thirsted to know Him yet more deeply, as we have seen, while still he ran the race with the prize of a full knowledge of Him at the end. His desire was so intense that it made him a man of one thing. He was marked by concentration and intensity of purpose, suffering nothing to divert him from his aim. This feature, of course, goes far to explain the amazing power and fruitfulness that characterized his life and ministry. The weakness and lack of fruit that so often marks our lives and ministry may be very largely traced to exactly opposite features in ourselves — lack of purpose and concentration. Time and energy are frittered away on a hundred and one things of no particular value or moment, instead of the one thing commanding us. Is it not so? Then let us seek mercy from the Lord that in an increasing measure we may be able to say, "One thing I do."

The words which follow show that this is the true meaning of the desire he expressed. "Not as though I had already attained (obtained), or am already made perfect, but I press on if so be that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not count myself yet to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press towards the goal for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus." The goal had not yet been reached, he was still on the way and had not yet obtained nor was he made perfect. He constantly presses on towards the goal, Christ in glory. He knew that he had been apprehended, taken possession of, by Christ Jesus and for Christ and therefore he also wants to take possession, to apprehend it. He forgets what is behind and even stretches forward to the things which are before, the blessed goal. This was his constant attitude, ever occupied with the Lord Jesus Christ to be like Him and with Him in glory.

This is then the One he wants to know. He knows Him, but does not count this knowledge yet as the knowledge that he seeks. He cannot, of course, set aside this, as he has set aside other things. He would not mean to undervalue it; it was all of Christ that for the present he had; but what, nevertheless, would it be in that day when Christ Himself would be at last before his eyes, the goal of the race he had been running? He wanted to know Him after this manner, to know the power of His resurrection not, as many think, a present power, therefore of resurrection in his soul, — that he already knew. He was risen with Christ and knew it; but it is not a condition to be attained down here, still less a condition that he had attained, that he was thinking of, but that which will put him in the place in which he seeks to be; and as a prisoner of Christ in the Roman dungeon, he is entitled to think here of the sufferings attendant, and of the death which might so easily be before him. What then? That would be his way through to the resurrection from among the dead. Thus, the sufferings themselves, the manner of death, whatever it were, if it were complete conformity to Christ's crucifixion, he would take it as that which only the more assimilated him to Christ for the present, while it was the way which led on to the apprehension of the power of that resurrection which would at last bring him to Christ in glory. As already said we have to realize, for the apprehension of what is here, that it is Christ Himself before his eyes, an Object outside the world, that is filling them. It is this and not any intervening thing that he is pressing after. It is no spiritual condition apart from this. He wants no halting place, no place to loiter in by the way, no present satisfaction, as it were, except that indeed which is derived from the blessed Object ever drawing nearer, and which is gaining upon his soul with every step he takes.

But he insists upon it that he has not attained, he is not already perfected. It is this that makes him pursue, with such stedfastness of aim and purpose, that which is before him. He wants to apprehend, that is, to lay hold of, that for which Christ has already laid hold of him. He is doing one thing, therefore, — how all our lives are spoilt by the desire to do more things than one! He is "forgetting the things behind, stretching out to the things before," pressing ever to the goal "for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus;" not simply the high calling, but the "calling above," the calling to a place outside the earth altogether. This is what gave him the stedfastness which was manifestly his. This is what made him the man he was, and this attitude is what indeed he calls "perfection." If men would be perfect, let them be thus minded; and then, as to the details, whatever other minds they might have, God would make all plain to them. Is not this that which we need so much, — not to seek, as it were, to be of the same mind with one another? As to the details of the path, the perseverance in the path is that which only aright can make all details plain. It is manifest that as we press along a road, (one of many roads, let us say, all tending to the same point at last,) we cannot see things where we are just as others see them from their own points of view. We see things from where we are. As we get on further, each one of us, we find of necessity that our view of things is growing to be the same; not exactly because we have sought to have this so, but rather that it is the necessary result of all pressing on together to the one place in which we shall at last see absolutely together, eye to eye. Here it is that the prize awaits us. Christ is both goal and prize at the same time. What a perfect solution it will be of all the difficulties of the way! How the light of the glory of God will make everything absolutely plain, and not merely plain, but bright also!

Third, the apostle says, "that I may know Him." For thirty years the apostle had known the Lord, but still he says, "that I may know Him." He is looking on to the time when he will be "face to face." Now, says he, "I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known." Then, too, he will realize the power of His resurrection. The power that was put forth in raising Christ from the dead, and setting Him at God's right hand in the heavenly places, is the exceeding greatness of the power that will set the believer with Christ in glory. To reach this end, Paul, who was in prison, might have to go through sufferings and death. Even so, for the apostle, suffering and death would be lightened by the knowledge that it would be fellowship with Christ in His sufferings, and conformity to His death. In the apostle's estimate, suffering, and a death of shame, were well worth the while if in any way he might arrive at the resurrection of the dead.

Fourth, the apostle says, "that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus." Paul had before him complete likeness to Christ in glory. This great blessing he did not yet possess, but he longed to "get possession of it" (N.T.). This was the perfection he had before him, and so owns that he is not "already perfect," but he pursued his path having the prize in view.

Christ had laid hold of Paul for the express purpose of having the Apostle like Him and with Him in the glory, and Paul says, "The one thing I desire is to lay hold of Christ in glory — the prize that awaits me at the end of the journey."