Phillipines 3:9 "and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--- the righteousness that comes from  God and is by faith."

Paul had plenty to boast in. He had everything as far as the righteousness of the law was concerned. He was a circumcised Hebrew of the tribe of Benjamin. He was a Pharisee. He had so much zeal for the law that he aided in persecuting the church. He kept the law perfectly. But he gave up all of these statuses willingly to be found in him, to claim his righteousness. He came to the place of seeing these things as nothing that he could bring before God, nothing that he could put his confidence in. And in bringing nothing, he gained everything.

As a human, I long to be of worth, to have something to offer. So, I look around me and in me for something to cling to for identity, hardly being able to fathom that God loves me enough to take from my nothingness and give me something far greater. When I look for something to credit myself with, something to put my confidence in, it is often in disbelief of his goodness and personal love. But no, my righteousness is as filthy rags. There is nothing in my flesh that God looks at with favor. Like Paul, I must come to the place of bringing nothing, counting these things as loss. It is then that he will take my broken emptiness and fill it with his righteousness.

As Jesus said to Paul, so it applies to us, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Then Paul said, "Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." (1 Corinthians 12:9-10).

God can use nothing. He made us out of nothing. When all we bring is nothing, God's power is so evidently seen and glory is brought to him because of our nothingness. It is a trade, counting all things as loss and finding his righteousness, that only is gained when in coming out of faith bringing nothing of ourselves.