The Incomparable Christ

 

Jesus — the Angel spoke His name. And within His name is a revelation of who He is — “his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor , The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” Isaiah 9:6, KJV.  The Angel said, “you shall call His name JESUS, for He will save His people from their sins.” Matthew 1:21, NKJV. In fact, Jesus’s name means, I Am the Lord, Your Salvation. That’s who Christ is. But He is more. The scriptures reveal that more; they reveal Him as the incomparable Christ. He is the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Holy One of Israel, the Rose of Sharon, and the Bright and Morningstar. Yet, He is more, more than human comprehension could possibly imagine. And that’s why He is who He is — the incomparable Christ. That’s what I’d like to talk about in this post.

Much of the Church focuses on many things, but rarely turn their attention towards Christ. For the Apostle Paul it was different, he said, “everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ”. Why could he say that? Because he had met the incomparable Christ on the road to Damascus. There, he realized his error; he realized he had been deceived; he had studied scripture, but did not see the Christ revealed in scripture. He studied the truth, but he couldn’t understand it; it was beyond him. The Apostle Paul, as many believers do today, were looking for something else in scripture and missing the primary purpose of scripture — to point us to the incomparable Christ.

‘That’s what scripture is meant to do in our lives — reveal Christ to us so Christ may abide in us.”—Scott Wallis

Jesus, speaking to the Jewish leaders (and us), said, “You pore over the Scriptures because you presume that by them you possess eternal life. These are the very words that testify about Me”. And that’s what scripture is meant to do in our lives — reveal Christ to us so Christ may abide in us. The incomparable Christ is the primary focus of scripture. If we make anything other than Him our primary focus as we search through scripture, we have missed the primary purpose of scripture. And that’s why the Church is where it’s at today — we have left the riches of knowing Christ for the dung of this world.

The best titles for much of what we seek could be something like this — Pursuing Dung! And rather than being offended by that title, we, like common house flies, would pursue after it. The Apostle Paul pursued Christ; Jesus’s Apostles left everything to follow Christ; the early Church focused on Christ. They had met the incomparable Christ. To them, Christ was their sufficiency. They understood their necessity of knowing Him. Rather than being distracted by dung of this world — the glitter, gold, and glamour of the world — they saw the riches of knowing the incomparable Christ. 

Speaking of titles of books, another title that would aptly describe our generation would be — The Reduction of Christ. We have reduced who Christ is to make Him palatable to the world. Yet, scripture never encourages us to do that. Rather, scripture encourages us to preach Christ and Him crucified. The offense of the cross to the human mind and heart still remains. How could something so brutal, so ghastly, be God’s plan for our salvation?! Yet, it was. Further, many think, Why do I need salvation? Salvation from what? And rather than recognizing the web of sin, which leads to death, the allure of sin draws us in to “enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin” for a season. If we succumb, we’ve sold ourselves to sin for an exceedingly small price.

Today, the simple fact that we’ve allowed our conversation to veer so far from Christ means that we still haven’t heard or seen Christ. When we see the incomparable Christ, everything else, and I do mean everything, becomes like dung. That’s what happened to the Apostle Paul and the Apostles of the Lamb, they saw and heard the incomparable Christ (except for Judas). Imagine being with the incomparable Christ, leaving all to follow Him, and yet leaving Him for thirty (30) pieces of silver (if a coin weighed one ounce, the total value would be roughly $1,500.00). How many, like Judas, have traded the incomparable Christ for thirty pieces of silver? Too many!

The choice set before us today, as it is with every generation: Will we pursue the incomparable Christ? Or will we pursue dung, reduce Christ, and sell our soul for such a low price? Unfortunately, with all our preaching today, I’m concerned that so few are preaching Christ — not just with their words, but with their lives. The Apostle Paul preached the gospel with his life. He said, “For me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.” Philippians 1:21, Christian Standard Bible. And he carried the scars to prove what he said was true. My question: Where are our scars? What do we have to show this world the faith that we have overcome hell itself? If we point to anything other than Christ, we have missed the entire point of Christianity.

Let us pray!

— Scott Wallis