December 29, 2024

Transcript:

One thing that I love about God’s Word is that God gives us amazing, like, deep theological ideas, but he doesn’t just give them to us so that we can have the intellectual challenge of learning it. No, God often gives us, and he does here in Philippians 2, he gives us huge theological concepts that are actually just a foundation for something else that he’s telling us.

For example, here in, in Philippians two, he’s correcting within the church at Philippi. He’s correcting the fact that they have some divisions that comes as a shock to you if you’ve ever been around churches, I know, but they have some divisions. They have some fights. They have some relational and doctrinal struggles. They have pride, which tends to rear its ugly head, and they need humility. He’s about to remind them to strive towards spiritual growth. And to be excited about it, because God is working within them. He’s going to warn them against complaining, again. Something that you’d think we would never need to be warned against.

He says, don’t murmur, don’t complain, and instead, shine like lights in the world around you. And right in the middle of all of that, like, so if you were going to try and write to a church, and you were going to tell them, we need to correct some doctrinal division. some relational problems. We need you to be more inclined to strive for spiritual growth, to shine like lights, to not complain. If you were going to write all of that, what would you put in the middle of it?

Or, pretend you’re a parent. Some of you don’t have to pretend, but some of you do. Pretend you’re a parent. Pretend you’re trying to correct all those problems in your kids. And you want your kids to stop fighting amongst themselves.

Sounds familiar? You want them to be more humble? You want them to want to grow spiritually? You want them to stop complaining? You want them to shine like lights? If you were going to have that big conversation with your kids, what foundation would you put underneath it?

Perhaps you’d say, well, Jesus, and, and his love for them. And that’s good. That is a good foundation. But Paul doesn’t just give a vague idea about Jesus.

Right in the middle of saying all that, Paul says, By the way, you need to know the best description of the incarnation that you’ll find in Scripture. I’m going to take you all the way to Jesus being God and becoming fully man. And that’s how I’m going to ground what I’m telling you.

That’s the way that this works, and it’s why sometimes people in our world get things backwards. And they think, well, people disagree about all the theological ideas about who God is. So I’m not really sure what to think about that. But instead I’ll just try to live the right way.

That’s not how the Bible works. Over and over what the Bible does is it takes how you should live and roots it in truth about God. And that’s what Paul does here. In fact, when you aren’t living the way you should, when your conscience pricks you, and the spirit pours conviction in your heart, and you know there’s something that’s not quite right, a really great place to start is with the question, What lies am I believing about God? Or what truth about God am I failing to consider?

Because over and over, like we’re gonna see in Philippians 2, God takes his instructions for you and he roots them in theology, which just means truth about God. He roots them in, this is who I am, so this is how you should live. And that’s what we’ll see in Philippians 2.

Let’s read, beginning in verse 5. Paul says, have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form.

He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

We always need his help when we come to his word. So let’s pray one more time.

God I pray this morning that you would incline our hearts towards you. Wherever our hearts are tempted to run to today, would you direct us towards being delighted in who you are? Would you incline us away from our understanding and towards your truth? Would you open our eyes to see the beauty of what you have said here in your word? And would you satisfy our hungry and thirsting souls this morning? May you receive all the glory for it. In Jesus name. Amen.

Here’s our plan. We’re going to answer a series of simple questions about this text. Which all relate to the truth of the incarnation. What does it mean that Jesus took on flesh and dwelt among us? All these questions, they’re going to relate to that doctrine.

And then, at the end, we’re going to zero in on just a few specific ways that that truth should matter for you. So a couple simple questions, and then say, based on what this says, now how should I live?

Who was Jesus?

So the first question is, who was he? Who was Jesus? Who was the Son? He describes him beginning in verse 6.

Who though he was in the form of God. Now the word used for form here is a, it’s a specific word. It’s not a really common word and it might trip us up because we might say something like the moon has the form of a basketball. By which you all know what I mean is the moon has a shape that looks like a basketball, but the moon and the basketball are two very different things. Like we can use the word form that way.

That’s not this Greek word that’s behind that. That’s not the way it’s used here. Instead, this is something more like saying this piece of literature has the form of a poem. So you say it has the characteristics that make this piece of literature a poem. If I were to say that you don’t think, so he’s really saying this piece of literature is not a poem. Right? When we use form that way, we’re saying there’s a certain form. It’s one way we use that word that defines what we’re talking about. This literature is in the form of a poem means this literature has all the essential characteristics that make it a poem.

That’s what he’s saying here, when he says Jesus who, though he was in the form of God, he had everything that made him truly divine. All the way from eternity past and it says he was in the form like not just then not when Jesus came to earth but forever Further back than any of us can imagine because can we really imagine before there was a beginning? Forever Jesus had the form. He was God. He had divinity in every possible way.

So he was in the form of God. And we could ask well, what kind of essential characteristics would those be? Well, they’re the infinite attributes that God has.

So we could list many. We could talk about his infinite power Or his infinite knowledge or his infinite wisdom or his infinite independence He doesn’t need anything else to exist. We say Jesus the Eternal Son had all of that. Everything that made him fully and truly God, the essence of what it was to be divine, the son had that because he was God.

So that’s the first statement about who he was.

What Did Jesus Think?

The next question. What did he think? What was his mindset? And this is really important for the flow of Philippians 2 because he starts in verse 5 and says, Have this mind in you. That’s good. He’s not telling us to be infinite because none of us could do it.

He’s not saying, Be divine like Jesus. He’s saying, Jesus was divine. You need to think like Jesus thought. You need to have the mindset that Jesus had.

So how does he describe that? The second half of verse 6 says, He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. He didn’t think equality with God was something to hang on to and cling to.

Now he, notice it implies he was equal with the Father. And he was, because he was God. He was divine. But he didn’t cling to the expression of all of that glory that he truly deserved. He didn’t take the posture that said, I am going to hold on to this at all costs and everyone is going to see how great I am. He didn’t count it as something to be grasped.

We could say it like this. As God, though he deserved the highest glory, he was not self oriented and grasping, demanding, or self centeredly entitled. That’s not what it is to be God. Jesus didn’t think like that.

Now, just for a second, let’s pause and think about how do humans tend to act? when they have power and glory. I’m not saying every human all the time. But how do humans tend to act?

I need more and more. I need to grasp this and hold on to it. And no one’s taking my respect from me because I’m successful. I have a good family. I’ve had a good career. Whatever it might be. When we achieve something and have something we think should give us glory, we tend to say, I’m going to grasp that and nobody’s taking it from me.

Jesus was the opposite. Though he rightly deserved all glory, he wasn’t grasping and holding. That’s not what he considered was the essence of divinity, of being God. Instead, what did he do? Verse seven, he emptied himself, This is a really fascinating contrast that’s a little bit hard to catch, depending on how it’s translated.

Because if you were to go back to verse 3, you’re gonna see a command that says, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit. Your translation may say something slightly differently. Older translations said instead of conceit, vain glory. Now they changed that word because we don’t use vain glory, but literally it’s just two words together that mean empty glory.

That could mean don’t do anything to try to get glories that are empty. Could mean that, but I think because he says don’t do anything from it. He’s talking about this is a motive. Something about empty glory is a motive. Don’t do anything from this motive. And I think what he points us to is this. We all are motivated often from an emptiness inside ourselves.

We are starving for approval, for success, for respect, for self esteem, depending on which language you want to use. We have an emptiness and we’re hungry and we’re starving for it. And so what comes from that? The kind of divisions he was correcting. The kind of fighting. That happens within all of our relationships. Our inner emptiness leads us to self promotion and selfish actions.

Now here’s the interesting thing. Interesting thing. Here’s why I bring it up. I said that word conceit, it’s vain glory. It means empty glories. The first part of that word is the same root word as when it says Jesus emptied himself.

The contrast is, we, from our emptiness, we try to grasp our own glory, and our own success, and our own respect, and we don’t serve others, we serve ourselves. But the mind of Christ, he was not empty, he was perfectly full. Like we said a couple weeks ago, John 1 says from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace. Colossians says the fullness of God dwelled in him bodily. Jesus had all of the glory and all of the success. He was perfectly full and yet being perfectly full he didn’t try to grasp and hang on. We’ll see in a minute. He served others. He emptied himself. He poured himself out to serve others.

This text gives us a beautiful contrast and it stretches our brains, it really does, to understand what we can’t understand about what Jesus did at Christmas.

But we find ourselves naturally feeling emptiness. And often serving ourselves or hurting others. Jesus was perfectly full and his mindset was he’s full. He doesn’t need to grasp. He’s going to pour out to serve you.

Jesus Didn’t Pretend to be a Servant

When he says he’s emptying himself page after page, after page, after page have been spilt on what that means. And sometimes I think we missed the point. This text doesn’t tell us he empties himself by losing something. Even though that’s the way we normally use empty. It says actually he emptied himself by taking something. By taking on himself the form of a servant.

That’s the same word for form there and that’s going to be really important in a minute. Jesus didn’t pretend to be a servant.

There’s one big point I want to communicate this morning And this is the the first bit of it You Jesus did not pretend to be a servant.

He was a servant in the exact same way with the same terminology as he was God. He was in the form of God. He had all the essential characteristics that made him God. And so then he came and he took on himself all the essential characteristics that made him a servant.

He’s not pretending. He is a servant.

This is really the opposite of Adam. Adam You remember in the Garden of Eden? What’s Satan’s temptation? Eat this and you’ll be like God. Adam wasn’t like God. And Satan said, Don’t you want to grasp this and try to be more like God? Don’t you feel an emptiness that you want to fill up? And Adam did. And we know how that ended.

But instead, Jesus was perfectly full and poured himself out. He took on himself the form of a servant.

Here is, this is the big thing that I’ve, I’ve been just blown away thinking about this. It’s so easy to think that what happened is, Jesus, when he took on flesh, he did something that wasn’t like God.

It’s easy for us to think that way. That’s wrong. But it’s easy to think, well, what’s like God is sitting on the throne in heaven receiving praise and all of these things. And it’s so amazing that Jesus did something that was unlike God to come and be a servant. That’s not Paul’s point at all. But it’s easy for us to think that way because if I were God, I would want to grasp and sit on my throne and not come be a servant.

The point isn’t that Jesus is unlike God. The point is that Jesus is unlike what we would be if we were God. But instead, the point of this text is to say, and really the power of this theology, the whole reason that Paul puts this in the middle of all of that other stuff is that in coming, humbly, to take the essential characteristics of a servant, Jesus was acting exactly like the father.

That’s the God we praise. We don’t praise a God who sits on his throne and then says, well, I guess I’d better serve and try to help these people out because they can’t do it on their own.

No, the character of the God we worship is the one who, though he deserves the throne, he pours himself out as a servant.

How would your approach to God maybe be different If you came to him not thinking just He’s distant on his throne, and that’s who he is He did something for me so that he can sit on his throne That’s the essence of who God is how different would your view of God be if instead you say no the essence of who God is is that he is so full That he pours himself out in love for people.

That’s what Paul is driving us to. He’s driving us to the fact that Jesus was truly God and Jesus was truly human.

And he taught himself the limitations of being human. He was tired. He was hungry. He struggled with sadness. He felt wounds of betrayal. He felt wounds of actual wounds, physical wounds. He took on himself human nature so that he could die.

And to take all of that on himself, he was so infinite and full before that, that to take all of that can only be described as emptying.

This doctrine, which we call the incarnation, is one of the true hearts of what happened at Christmas. Jesus humbly came and took on flesh, not because that was out of character for God, but because it was exactly in character for God.

God Almighty is so high and lifted up. And yet God Almighty pours himself out to love and serve.

As God he humbled himself by not grasping and clinging to the display of his glory. But he continues, and as man, says he was born in the likeness of men and being found in human form. By the way, that word form there is not the same word for form, interestingly enough. It’s more like appearance. He came, was found in human form, and he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

It’s right. We say this often at Christmas, but it’s right to look at the manger and see that Jesus’s service didn’t stop there. It was aimed all the way at the cross. Yes, Jesus served in many ways. Jesus turned the water into wine so that people had a great time at a wedding that was an act of service.

Jesus healed a blind man. He was serving him. Jesus told truth to people who did not know it. That was service. Jesus did many, many things that were service, but the ultimate and permanent service Jesus came to give was to come all the way and be obedient all the way to death, even the death of a cross.

And again, that is not out of character for God. That is exactly who our God is.

Service is the Essence of Who God Is

When we say God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him would not perish, but have everlasting life, John 3, 16, when we say that, we’re not saying God sits off over there, but he did something so different from himself to come and love us. No, we’re saying that is the essence of who God is.

Now, you might, you could reasonably, if you only had this text and we were talking about it this way, you could say, wait a minute though, is the father like that or is it just the son? Now, I hope your brains go, wait, they’re the, they’re the same. They share the same character. You can’t have their character be different.

I hope you’d say that. But let’s ask the question for a minute. Is that just what the son’s like or is the father like that too? Notice verse nine starts with the word. Therefore, therefore, such a huge word here, God has highly exalted him. Because he did this, the Father has exalted him and given him the name that is above every name.

Name includes so much, wisdom, reputation, glory, fame, honor.

In other words, get this picture. Jesus comes, humbly, pouring himself out as a servant, and the, the father puts his stamp of approval and says, that’s exactly what I’m like. And I’m gonna give him the highest name so everybody knows it. Say, is that really what he’s doing? Well, notice the end of verse 11. That’s why when every tongue confesses Jesus Christ is Lord, it’s not just to the glory of Jesus Christ. It’s to the glory of God the Father. Because Jesus is perfectly displaying, here is what divinity is like. Yes, high and lifted up, but not grasping, pouring out instead. And the father puts his stamp on that and says, yes, that’s exactly what I’m like.

And so the result, a text we’re familiar with, at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow. Doesn’t mean every knee is going to bow because they have genuine faith in Jesus Christ. It means that at the end of the day, when all is seen, no one will be able to deny the power and authority of our King. They might not like it, but every knee will bow before Jesus.

And that’s in heaven, on earth, under the earth, and every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. Everyone will recognize I am not worthy and everyone will recognize He is. Because Jesus, in what He did, perfectly displayed what God is like.

So that then, like Isaiah 45, Yahweh says, By myself I have sworn, the Father says this, For my mouth has gone out in righteousness, a word that shall not return. To me every knee shall bow. Amen. Every tongue shall swear allegiance. That’s only possible because Jesus is God.

So here in Philippians 2, just like in Romans 1 says something like this, it says Jesus was declared to be the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead. The resurrection was the Father declaring, yes, he has perfectly done what he should do and he has represented me perfectly. He’s my Son.

It was declared by that. Just like that here, the exaltation of Jesus is the father saying, that’s exactly who I am. If you want to know what kind of God the Bible describes, look at Jesus.

Everything you see about Jesus. There is no disconnect between who God is and what he did in Jesus. That’s really important to me because when Jesus comes and washes the feet of his disciples, That blows my mind because I think, no, that can’t be really what God’s like.

But Paul’s pointing to you and saying, yes, when Jesus is a servant, that’s exactly what God is like. When you come to God, you don’t come to a disapproving judge waiting to see if you measure up so that you can receive some kind of favor from him.

No, you come to the God Who pours himself out to serve others.

This is really unique to Christianity, by the way. There are other versions of the idea of God becoming human or God becoming, appearing human or coming for a while. This is unique to Christianity, the doctrine that the Son, the eternal Son of God, took on himself, humanity, permanently.

Because that’s who he is. And if you look at other religions, you’ll see when, when God shows up and appears like a human, it’s so that he can announce how distant God is. In Christianity, he shows up and says, I’m taking on humanity so that you see, this is who I am. One who pours out and serves.

What Does Christ’s Incarnation Do for Me?

Now, we just took however long, and said, well, there’s a whole lot of theology there that I don’t understand all of it. Join the club, first of all. But we should probably then say, well, what is this supposed to do for me? What’s it supposed to do in my life? Why do we need to know this? Paul, I get it. Stop fighting. Don’t complain. All of these things. Yes. Why did you put this whole, here’s the incarnation, right in the middle? Like Paul, shouldn’t this belong in a systematic theology textbook tucked away in the corner so that you tell me what to do? No. Because this is the kind of thing that has power to actually transform your life.

Think about your life with God. God is the kind of God that This is not just what he does, this is who he is. God is the kind of God who says, Take my yoke upon you, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

He doesn’t stay distant, figure it out and appease me, and then I’ll be kind and good to you. God is the kind of God who is not just what he does, he is the God who says, I’m coming to pour myself out for you.

Do you come to God? Expecting him to serve you.

Sounds really weird to say it that way, right? And it sounds weird partly because we think to serve you means we are going to have authority and he’s going to obey us. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about something more like, I’m a big Lord of the Rings fan. When Aragorn talks to the hobbits and Aragorn says, I’m He’s going to come with the fellowship of the ring. He says, if by my life or death, I can protect you, I will.

He is not saying you are going to give me orders and I will obey your beck and call. That’s not who God is. God’s not giving you the seat on the throne so that you can rule him. It’s not that kind of serving. But in that case, it’s one with far more power, far more wisdom saying, I’m going to use what I have to protect you, to serve you.

So though it sounds weird, yes, there’s one king, but the true king uses his perfect authority not to grasp for fullness and glory, but to pour himself out so you can come to God expecting God is the kind of God who serves, who serves you. That’s really what, when he, when he washed the feet of the disciples, that was Peter.

No, you’re not going to serve me. And Jesus is like, um, yes. I am. Or you’re not one of mine.

We could word it a different way. We could say, do we come to God with a sense of desperate need? God, I need what you can give me and only you can give me. That’s just another way of saying, I’m coming, saying, God, you have to help me. You have to serve.

And we come with confidence because that is exactly who He is. He is not a servant for you to command, but He is the infinitely high King who serves you. That’s what Jesus revealed at Christmas.

As I thought about this idea, I feel like in my life, to think about this, it’s like I’m, I’m scratching at the surface of something And I don’t understand all of where the power of that goes. I don’t.

And maybe that’s where you are. Maybe you say, I can see, like, if I really could grasp that, there is such power for transformation there. And I’m not sure all that it means. And if that’s where you are, that’s okay. You don’t need every answer right now.

In fact, I think you’re sitting exactly where Paul wanted you to be because the next section, he says partway through verse 12, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling with wonder and amazement and excitement for it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

He’s saying, if you get the idea that there’s something huge here, that God is the kind of God who’s a king, who serves you. And I don’t know how all that should transform my life, but I know if I really grasp it, it will. That leads you exactly where Paul is going to go. So work out your salvation, lean into that. How does this power transform my life? That’s what we’re called to do.

So how would it affect your relationship with God? If you came to him believing he was that kind of king, not the kind of king who rolls his eyes and goes, Oh, Jed needs a little more help. I guess I got to help him out. It’s not really who I am, but I guess I’ll do it.

We’ve all been there. I ought to help this person. And so I want to sort of, but it’s a struggle. Jesus demonstrates that’s exactly who God is. He delights to pour himself out as king to serve his people.

It would change the way we come to God. And if you really understood, that’s the way that God treats you instead of feeling so empty and hungry and trying to grasp and grab my own glory. You look at it and say, the God I serve is the kind of God who serves and loves me. Even though I have a lisping and stammering tongue.

And if He loves me like that, and you feel that fullness of who Jesus is, and you feel the fullness of His love for you, you don’t have to grasp and try to claim all of your glory. Instead, you have the mind that is in Christ, and you say, I don’t need to grasp all of that. I have fullness in Him. So let me pour out for others.

That’s how we are supposed to imitate Jesus. The mission of Jesus was not just something he did, it was based on who he is. He didn’t begrudgingly come. That’s who God is. So when you serve others in your church, in your neighborhood, or around the world, it can’t be just something you do. It has to be based on something that you are. Otherwise, you’re going to wear out, or you’ll get proud,

or You’ll really just be pursuing your own glory instead of God’s. It has to be based on something you are. And the only way that’s going to work is if you’ve been transformed by seeing who he is.

So I want to take, there’s a lot of big thoughts. I want to try to draw as straight a line as I can from the theology of the incarnation to the way you should serve others.

The more you accurately see who your God is, a high king, the highest of kings, who delights to serve others, the more that can fill your souls. That’s what we call worship. We have a response that says, Wow, that is amazing. He would do that for me. He loves to do that for me. The more that fills your soul, The more you don’t have to grasp for emptiness, but instead you can serve based on who God has made you because of who he is.

That’s what Paul’s working at. He’s after way more than stop fighting. He says, be like Jesus, who was so full that he could pour himself out in service. And that was his joy. That’s what we have to be doing.

Every time we serve, every time we serve one another here, people in our community, people around the world, every time we support a missionary who’s somewhere else who’s doing this same work, every time, it can’t just be, here’s some good things we’re gonna try to do. It’s gotta be based on the fact that we have been transformed so that we no longer need to try and grasp to fill ourselves, but we can pour ourselves out in service to others.

Serving others costs something. It always does. It certainly cost Jesus, you notice he said, by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Serving others costs something and you will never willingly and eagerly do something that costs you if you are trying to get and grasp.

Think about it. If, if your whole focus is trying to accumulate money. Will you willingly and eagerly give it? No. If your whole focus is trying to get respect and service for yourself, will you willingly and eagerly serve others? No.

So instead, to serve, we must see that our God, and He showed it at Christmas, is not the kind of God who grasps selfishly after glory. He’s the kind of God who’s so full that as the infinite King, he pours himself out and we receive grace upon grace upon grace from his fullness. And so then we serve others together for the glory of Jesus Christ and for the glory of the Father.

I don’t know where exactly God wants to take this truth and have the power of this truth plug into your lives. I can think of some in my life. I imagine it’s different for different people in the room.

But if we can wrap our minds around the fact that God is not the kind of God who sat on a distant throne and begrudgingly came down. He’s not the kind of God who said, Oh, it’s all messed up. I guess I’d better fix it cause nobody else can. When Jesus took on flesh to be a servant. He was not being un God like. He was being exactly who your God is.

So when we sing, Oh, come all you unfaithful. Christ is born for you. We’re not saying, God, please overlook some of you, some of who you are and let me come. We’re saying, God, you have done this. This is who you are. You’re the one who served us.

I want to invite you just to take a moment. Ask God to work this truth into your life, ask Him to show you where this power should transform your service, where this power should transform your relationship with God, and then we’ll sing together.