elimChristianFellowship

Rom 1:1-4 1 Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, 2 which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3 concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh, 4 who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead… NASU

Christ made repetitive declarations that He was the Son of God…so many times, in fact, that it angered the religious Pharisees to the point of charging Jesus with blasphemy and pushing Pilate to crucify Christ! If Father God wanted to establish that Jesus was blaspheming by declaring Himself to be the Son of God, leaving Him in the tomb after the crucifixion and death and burial, would’ve been a great time for declaring Jesus to be a phony. It would’ve been an absolutely awesome time to distance Himself from this Jesus of Nazareth that declared Himself to be the Christ, the Messiah. On the other hand, it would be quite an affirmation that Jesus Christ WAS His only begotten Son, to raise His completely dead Son from the grave, 3 days later. Jesus said it well, when He said, “Into Your hands I commit My Spirit.” See, in that moment, Jesus is saying, “It’s all in Your hands, Dad…I’m putting My trust in You to raise Me, cause I can’t do that on My own.”

Phil 3:8-10 8 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of (1) knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, 9 and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, 10 (2) that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and (3) the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; NASU

Everything that Paul could count as things that he could possess in any form or fashion…material goods, status, relationships with family and friends, his past experiences, his destiny, his health…absolutely everything…he counted them all loss…because he valued knowing Christ and the power of His resurrection of greater importance…

1 Cor 15:12-19 12 Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13 But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised; 14 and if Christ has not been raised, (1) then our preaching is vain, (2) your faith also is vain. 15 Moreover (3) we are even found to be false witnesses of God, because we testified against God that He raised Christ, whom He did not raise, if in fact the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised; 17 and if Christ has not been raised, (4) your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins. 18 Then (5) those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. 19 If we have hoped in Christ in this life only, (6) we are of all men most to be pitied. NASU

Acts 4:32-34 32 And the congregation of those who believed were of one heart and soul; and not one of them claimed that anything belonging to him was his own, but all things were common property to them. 33 And with great power the apostles were giving testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and abundant grace was upon them all. NASU