Philippians 2:5-11

Philippians 2:5-11

Where’s the Beef?!

I.                    Living a full life means having the attitude of Christ; so we must model the humility of Christ (Vv. 5-8)

a.       This passage of Scripture is a hymn that is super-packed with some of the Bible’s richest theology. Through it, Paul outlines the attitude and actions of Christ and exhorts those who belong to Him to be humbled and motivated by who He is, what He did, and walk after Him. Jesus is, always has been, and always will be God, and deserves all the glory, honor, and praise due God, but “did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped”. So even as God, who has everything and deserves all things, He never considered that to be grounds to take or hold onto what is rightfully His, but willingly released His rights and “emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men”. He voluntarily laid aside all the privileges rightly belonging to Him, never reducing His deity but adding flesh to it, and took on the lowest existence as a voluntary slave to humbly serve others. His humble service culminated as He “humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” as a falsely convicted criminal who was abandoned, despised, tortured, and put to death by the most shameful means. This is the humility of Christ; He condescended from the highest possible glory to the lowest possible humanity, all so that He might receive the full the penalty of sin which belongs to us. He also added flesh to His deity so that while we walk this earth, we know that He understands our challenges, fears, frustrations, distress, grief, isolation, and pain. Is there anything which we can rightfully hold onto or which we must not lay aside for Him and His purposes? The world calls us to live fully by grasping tightly what’s rightfully ours and being upwardly mobile, even if we have to step on others on the way. But if we believe Christ, and live fully in what He’s purchased for us, then we must turn that model on its head. We only regard others as more important than ourselves by modeling the humility of Christ. The fulness of life which nourishes us, sustains us, and is valuable enough to give up everything else for, is only found in humbly serving Christ and others. (Vv. 5-8; Isa. 53; Matt. 4:1-11; 18:4; 23:12; Mark 10:42-45; John 1:1-3, 14; 3:16; 5:18; 8:58; 10:30; 13:1-17; 14:9; 17:5; Rom. 15:1-3; Gal. 2:20; 3:13; Col. 1:15-20; 2:6-7; Heb. 2:14-18; 4:14-15; 1 Pet. 2:21-24) 

II.                 Living a full life means having the attitude of Christ; so we must serve others humbly and obediently, and trust God to exalt us (Vv. 9-11)

a.       But Jesus’ self-humbling and self-sacrificial service isn’t the end of the story. Because of His humble and obedient service, God has “highly exalted” Him, which is literally to say God “super exalted” Christ. Jesus is in a class all by Himself, exalted to the highest place. He has also been given the name which is above all names. Jesus is an important name which affirms the Personhood of Christ, and it’s the only name under heaven, given to humanity, by which we must be saved, but the name Paul is referring to in this context is “Lord”. Jesus was never any less than God or any less Lord, but because His humble submission and obedient self-sacrificing service God affirmed His authority over all things by exalting Him to highest place. Every being who has ever existed, both spiritually and physically, will acknowledge that Jesus is Lord and bow in humble submission to Him to the glory of God the Father. Further, all will acknowledge Jesus’ Deity and Lordship either in eternal judgement or eternal celebration, so it’s imperative that if you haven’t confessed Him and submitted to Him, you do so now. Those of us who belong to Christ now, mustn’t settle for the self-exaltation or the exaltation of the world. We must continually confess Christ and submit to Him in service  to avoid holding areas of our lives back from Him. Are you holding back your career, your family, your personal relationships, your finances, places in your mind, or your service within the church? It all belongs to Him and He’ll claim it all one day. We must also be encouraged in the results of our humble and obedient service to Christ and others for His glory. We can look to the example of Christ and see that we can trust God to exalt us in His will and at the proper time when we submit humbly and obediently to Him in life. We only live full lives when we submit all things to Jesus’ Lordship, humbly model His attitude, and are willing to lose all things for His glory. We must trust Him above ourselves, anyone else, or any mechanism of the world to complete us and exalt us at the proper time, and in a way that’s only possible in and through Him! (Vv. 9-11; Ps. 2:1-12; 110:1-7; Isa. 45:22-23; Matt. 17:1-6; 25:31-46; Mark 8:35; Luke 5:8; John 20:27; Acts 2:32-36; 4:12; Rom. 10:8-13; 11:33-12:2; 1 Cor. 15:20-28; 2 Cor. 4:5-6; Eph. 1:18-23; 3:20; Heb. 1:1-4; Jas. 4:10; 1 Pet. 5:6-11; Rev. 1:17-18; 20:11-21:8)