Philippians 3:13-14

Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 3:13-14)

 

Paul called his personal achievements  as valuable as dung, rejecting his own righteousness. Now he is focused on reaching the "high calling of God in Christ Jesus." He is well aware that he has not already attained God's ultimate design for him, nor is he perfect in any sense of what he will become, but he intends to follow after and be "apprehended" of the Lord Jesus.

 

To begin with, Paul knows that he must forget "those things which are behind." Not only his rather stellar reputation and achievements, but especially the awful conditions of being "without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world"