But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss ... But I press on ... But this one thing I do ... (Philippians 3:7, 13).

If our true identity is in Christ, how do we actually live our way into that identity?  How does "in Christ" move from an idea in our heads to a reality we are living into?

Paul's buts in Philippians 3 point the way.  First he writes, "But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ ... I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things" (3:7-8).  "Profit/gain, " "loss" -- Paul's using the language of accounting.  We all have an internal bookkeeper who tracks our identity profit-and-loss profile: I see these aspects of myself as "profits/credits," and those as "losses/debits".  As long as I feel that my "profits" outweigh my "losses" in the identity department, I can "feel okay about myself." 

Nope, says Paul: the cross of Christ frees you to fire your bookkeeper and toss your accounting books into the rubbish. As long as we stay focused on our accounting--which keeps us focused on ourselves, on how we're doing (as evaluated by us!) --we will not focus on getting to know Jesus better and cooperating with him in his work of making us more like him.  "Whatever was to my profit" -- that currency holds no value in Christ's Kingdom. Clinging to it keeps us from clinging to him!

So by the grace of God we fire our internal Identity Accounting Department and chuck all our accounting records and software into the dumpster.  We're done?

Nope, says Paul again.  The height and depth and length and breadth of Christ--we have not yet begun to explore or experience the fullness of that!  "I haven't arrived," writes Paul, switching metaphors from accounting to marathoning.  "I haven't arrived, so I press on in my pursuit of knowing the Lord and becoming more and more like him."  We're no longer in a tiny office with a green eyeshade over our eyes, peering at our neat columns, absorbed and obsessed with adding and subtracting, calculating and comparing.  We've been set free from that tiny accounting office!  We're outside now, in the unimaginably large and beautiful world of God's grace and love in Christ!  What happened back there at Mile 2?  Forget about it!  Remember how great we looked at Mile 17?  Doesn't matter!  Can we possibly make it to Mile 26?  Wrong question!  Press on, press on, press on: into knowing him, more personally, more deeply, more intimately.  Into finding ourselves changing into his likeness: loving what he loves, dancing to his music, carrying our cross so that we are being made new by the power of his resurrection life.

At the finish line of our race, there is now a prize with each of our names already inscribed.  Because of our imagined identity as such terrific spiritual athletes?  Hardly.

Because we have been captured and set free by a gracious, saving love that never fails, never changes and never comes to an end, a love more than able to create what it requires?  Absolutely.

Get outside of the small dark accounting offices of our souls; get outside and stay outside, in the glorious love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Stay outside. Keep running.  Don't measure your speed, don't fuss about who seems faster, don't gloat about whom you appear to be passing.  Press on, keep running, into the knowledge and love of Christ.

What it would it look like for you to fire your entire Identity Accounting Department?  What one or two steps into your identity in Christ would be made possible if you did?