Originally posted by Hand of HecateI doubt you could even begin to understand why he did it. I think your opinion is just a way to dismiss from you mind the truth you don't want to face.
Directly.
His letters caused significant change in policy throughout the budding Christian world.
I feel strongly that he was among the first Christians to use the Bible for personal and political gain. Sadly, while reflecting upon the upcoming US presidential elections, I realize that nothing has changed.
He wasn't doing this for the personal gain you think he was.
2 Corinthians 4:15-18
(15) For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God.
(16) For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.
(17) For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
(18) While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.
It is time for us to examine Paul's own words as to why he did the things that he did.
"But what things were gains to me, these I have counted as loss on account of Christ." (Phil.3.7)
He means the things about his life he counted as fortunes before he knew Jesus Christ he now counts as comparitively losses on account of his new relationship with Christ. Those things were enumerated in the previous passages:
A true Hebrew of Hebrews born of the tribe of Benjamin, a Pharisee, and so zealous for the religious traditions of Israel that he was a persecutor of the Christian church. These are the things which Paul considered his previous trophies of life.
"But moreover I also count all things to be loss on account of the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, on account of whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as refuse that I may gain Christ." (3:8)
Refuse, dogfood, dung. Now Paul counts these great things of his past to be in comparison to the knowledge of Jesus Christ His Lord as "refuse ... dung .... garbage"
He is saying "What are these things in comparison to the knowledge of Christ? There is no comparison in value, in worth, in preciousness to the knowledge of Jesus Christ the Lord."
" ... that I may gain Christ ..."
Paul is not talking about a one time experience of being saved. He is talking about gaining Christ. That means encreasing in Christ, growing in Christ, obtaining more and more and more of Jesus Christ in his life. " that I may GAIN CHRIST ...".
He hasn't time to waste. Everyday must be a day of gaining more and more experience of this living Christ.
This is what motivated Paul to be a laboring apostle. Christ was worth more than anything he had previously known. Christ was richer and more precious than anything he had ever known. He desired to gain more and more Christ in his life.
"And be found in Him, not having my own righteousness which is out of the law, but that which is is out of God based on faith."
Paul wanted to be right. WE ALL want to be right. Paul want to be righteous. His concept of righteousness of being right was to be found in Christ. He wanted people to find him in the sphere and realm of Christ.
The righteousness that Paul desired to express was not out of himself but out of his faith in Christ. That is his faith that Christ was alive and within him to be his life. He lived in the realm and sphere of a mysterious Person Jesus Christ who was one with Paul and lived in Paul. The two were one in a blended and mingled way. And for Paul to live out Christ and live unto Christ was to be right and to be righteous before man and God.
I think we all want to be right. To be one with Christ in and by faith was the rightness that Paul desired more than anything else.
This righteousness out of faith in Christ was more precious than anything else the world or religion had to offer. This is what motivated Paul to be the disciple and apostle he was.