Text: Philippians 3:7–14
Topic: Freeing ourselves from the past to ready ourselves for the future

• In this passage Paul talks about what has become the most compelling, absorbing, and rewarding thing for which to live ("one thing I do").
• When I hear the apostle Paul say something like that, I want to know what that "one thing" is.
• There are two important things that we're going to learn from our text.
• The first thing that Paul teaches us is to get free.
• The second thing is to be focused.

• "Remembering" is a key biblical word; "forgetting" is not.
• When Paul speaks of "forgetting what is behind," he cannot mean you should forget everything in the past; but what is it that you should forget—and why?
• We must forget the painful things of our past.
  • Illustration: Men in a remote part of the world test the strength of their horses by making them drag heavy carts whose wheels are locked.
• Too many people are harnessed to the past, struggling to move forward.
• Paul moved forward in spite of a painful past by loving his enemies.
• You demonstrate who your Father is by loving those who hurt you. Get free from the memory of what was done to you.

• Some of us are saying: "It isn't what was done to me that bothers me; there are things I want to forget with respect to what I've done."
• We need to get free from the memory of the bad we have done.
• We have an enemy, the Devil, who accuses us of these things.
• If you confessed your sin, why are you still hanging onto it?
• The real problem behind hanging onto guilt is that you say to yourself, "I don't believe my heart is as rotten as the Bible says."
• The apostle Paul knew what his heart was like, and he talks about the depth of sin that was in his heart.
• Clinging to the guilt of the past is saying, "I'm too good for that;" it's a much-too-high opinion of ourselves.
• You will free yourself of that by acknowledging what God's Word says.

• This sounds odd, but Paul even stresses that we must sometimes free ourselves from the memory of the good we have done.
• In this passage Paul has listed his pedigree, but he considers it all "rubbish."
• It's part of our new nature in Christ not to horde even the good things we've done.
• The effect of hording the good things we've done is complacency.
• If you're walking in the light of God's presence and you become aware of his glory, the other thing you're going to feel is your own darkness.
• I don't want to count my righteousness; I want to be found in Christ, having a righteousness that comes down, not a righteousness that I work up.

• My message is this: "Be free."
• You also must be focused.
• Every nerve, muscle, and all of Paul's being was disciplined to the race—to reach the goal and win the prize.
• The race is following Christ to the end of life. It's costly. It's time-consuming.
• Half-hearted Christianity is uncomfortable and useless; it's tepid.

• The goal is maturity, and its reward is a rich one.