God cannot be mocked.
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He understands the human tendency to "deal." He knows that some will choose to attempt to follow their course in the world and plan to make a "deathbed confession." This might work if salvation were obtained by following a set of rules. Unfortunately for the scheming individual, we are not dealing with rules but with a Judge who knows every detail of our thoughts, words, and actions.
Christ showed plainly in the twenty-fifth chapter of the Book of Matthew that the servant who does not use the talent that has been given him will be cast into outer darkness.
In the Kingdom of God, much is required of those to whom much has been entrusted. In the Kingdom we are judged not only in terms of universal laws but also in terms of our individual calling, gifts, and the light we have been given.
The Lord Jesus Christ is a knowledgeable Person. As our Judge He is at once far more compassionate than any human judge and far more severe than any human judge. He can save and He also can assign to eternal torment—that which no human judge has the authority to do.
Let no human being presume on the goodness of Christ!
Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the son, lest he be angry, and ye perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. (Psalms 2:10-12)
There are people, such as the thief on the cross, whom Jesus brings to Paradise apart from their having any opportunity to grow in eternal life. It is not for us to compare ourselves with the thief on the cross, to attempt to outwit God by living a careless life with the intention of calling out to Jesus at the time of our death. God will not permit this. We have no knowledge of the background of the thief on the cross or what was in the mind of the Lord when He forgave him at his last moment on the earth.
Also, it is true that the character of each of God’s rulers is formed under "heat and pressure." It is unlikely that ruling character can be formed in the spirit Paradise to which the thief was invited. It may be true that those who are destined to rule in the Kingdom of God are given the opportunity to experience on earth the necessary pressures and other opportunities to come to maturity in obedience, wisdom, and knowledge. It is those who suffer who will rule. God is building His Kingdom according to His foreknowledge.
The Lord Jesus taught us that some people will reap eternal life to a thirtyfold extent, some sixtyfold, and some a hundredfold. These differences are in the degree to which Christ is brought forth in our personality.
It is possible for any person to become a hundredfold believer. Such a supplanting of what we are with the Person of God and Christ requires discipline on our part. Command upon command the Person of God invades our person. We must hold steady in faith during this transmutation of our substance and nature. The hundredfold are the highest rulers because their life is the Life of God.
The subject of this booklet is Philippians 3:11. We are attempting to show that the full resurrection of spirit and soul is necessary if we expect to participate in the first resurrection from the dead, in the resurrection that will take place when the Lord Jesus returns. The first resurrection is the resurrection of God’s royal priesthood.
Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years. (Revelation 20:6)
The royal priesthood, the hundredfold believers, will regain their dead bodies in advance of the remainder of mankind.
But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. (Revelation 20:5)
The hundredfold sit on thrones and govern the works of God’s hands. They were "beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God" and did not bow down to and serve the economic world system of Antichrist (Revelation 20:4).
That they were "beheaded" signifies they have set aside their own thinking and put on the mind, the head, of Christ. The hundredfold cast off their own life, their own crown, under the supervision of the Spirit of God. They are transformed by the renewing of their mind. Every day they put on the mind of Christ and obey the Word of God, both written and revealed personally to them. They surrender to God the plans, imaginations, desires, and ambitions of their mind.
They do not remain part of the present world system. They come out of the world and live unto the Lord. They are foolishness to the world and the world is foolishness to them. They are crucified to the world and the world is crucified to them.
They are God’s hundredfold. They arrive at the first resurrection from the dead by laying aside their life and entering the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, let us examine the context of Philippians 3:11 and see if we have adhered to the thinking of the Apostle as we are attempting to interpret this extraordinary verse.
Paul begins the third chapter of the Book of Philippians by speaking of his accomplishments in the religion of Judaism. Paul was blameless in terms of the Law and ordinances of Moses.
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