Author: Lamar Austin

Last week we were looking at Philippians 2:9-11, where Paul expresses the explosive result of Christ humbling himself by taking on humanity and dying the cruel, shameful, painful death on the cross.

9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

The name that God bestowed on Jesus is “Lord,” but more fully is “Lord Jesus Christ.”

The clue lies in the fact that it is “above every name.”  It is greater than any other name  conferred on Jesus.  In fact, it is God’s own name kyrios (Lord), which was used in the Greek Old Testament to represent Yahweh, the personal name of the God of Israel.  The name given to Jesus that is above every name is indeed Yahweh, God’s name, which fills so much of the Old Testament.

How can we be sure?  Verse 11 identifies Jesus as “Lord” (kyrios), Yahweh —“every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”  Giving Jesus the name “Lord” (Yahweh) is the ultimate of all honors because he says in Isaiah 42:8, “I am the LORD [Yahweh]; that is my name.”  It is no one else’s name.  Yahweh is the name that trumps all other titles — the awesome covenant name of the God of Israel — “the name that is above every name.”

What a moment it must have been those 2,000 years ago when Jesus entered Heaven and Paradise — to super-exaltation and a new name!

That is the name we bow before and worship and adore.  We pray, “hallowed be Thy name” and we pray in the name of Jesus.

Notice that this name is “bestowed” upon Jesus by the Father.  It was not exactly earned through obedience and sacrifice, but was “freely given” as an act of grace from the Father.

It reminds us that even the rewards we get for our obedience are not earned, but rather given to us as gifts.  We can never earn or “pay back” God for the grace He has given us.

Now, look at vv. 10-11.  Here we find out why God has so highly exalted His Son Jesus Christ.

10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Notice that v. 10 begins with the words “so that,” indicating that these verses indicate the purpose for which God highly exalted Jesus.

First of all, God highly exalted Jesus and gave Him the name “Lord” to promote universal submission to His Son’s sovereign authority.  God wants “every knee to bow” to His Son’s authority.

The interesting thing about this statement in vv. 10 and 11 is that it is attributed to Yahweh in the Old Testament.  Isaiah 45:23 records Yahweh as saying, “

23 By myself I have sworn; from my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return: ‘To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.’

Of course, here in Philippians it is being applied to Jesus, another indication that God the Father and God the Son are equal in authority.

It is quite significant that this Old Testament quotation is taken from one of the Old Testament passages that emphasized so strongly the sole authority of Yahweh.  The verse immediately before this, verse 22, says, “I am God and there is no other.”

Kent Hughes emphasizes this:

As to how dynamic Paul’s application is, we must understand that the forty-fifth chapter of Isaiah is the Old Testament’s most forthright and forceful statement of God’s sovereign rule in history and salvation.  Four times in Isaiah 45 the Lord declares his absolute sovereignty.  Three times he says, “‘I am the LORD [Yahweh], and there is no other’” (vv. 5, 6, 18), and once he says, “‘For I am God ( El ), and there is no other’” (v. 22).  And it is with this fourth declaration of sovereignty that we have Yahweh’s call for utter allegiance: “‘Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth!  For I am God, and there is no other.  By myself I have sworn; from my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return: “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance”’” (vv. 22, 23).

In the earthly, millennial sense, this was promised the Son in Psalm 2

7 I will tell of the decree: The LORD said to me, “You are my Son; today I have begotten you. 8 Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. 9 You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” 10 Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. 11 Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. 12 Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled.  Blessed are all who take refuge in him.

But the universality of this “change in status” is that even now every knee bows, literally “pertaining to heaven, pertaining to earth, pertaining to the underworld.”  Thus, every single member of the angelic, human and demonic realms, will ultimately join together in worshipping the one true God—Jesus Christ our Lord!

This high regard for the authority of Jesus Christ was once expressed by Charles Lamb in conversation with some friends: “If Shakespeare was to come into this room, we would applaud him; if Abraham Lincoln entered this world, we should all rise to honor him; but if Jesus Christ was to come into it, we should all fall down upon our faces.”

Notice that even unbelievers will bow down before the authority of Jesus Christ at that time.  While the Lake of Fire is not yet inhabited and the spirits of deceased unbelievers go to Sheol-Hades, it was still considered part of the “underworld.”  So not only every believer and every good angel, but the demons and unbelievers will bow before Jesus Christ.

No knee in the universe is excluded, be it human, angelic, or demonic.  This means that some will bow with spontaneous ecstasy, and others with grudging mourning and shame.  But bow they will!

The certainty of this was sealed with Yahweh’s oath in Isaiah 45:23: “‘By myself I have sworn; from my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return: “To me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear allegiance.”’”  So, regardless of your spiritual state, regardless of your might and power, regardless of your will, however steely and proud it may be, you will bow your knee to Jesus.  The only question is, when?  How much better to do it now!

Brian Doerksen has captured this important choice in his song, “Come, Now is the Time to Worship.”  In one chorus we sing:

One day ev’ry tongue will confess You are God
One day ev’ry knee will bow
Still the greatest treasure remains for those,
Who gladly choose you now

Willingly we choose to surrender our lives
Willingly our knees will bow
With all our hearts, oh, mind and strength
We gladly choose you now

Don Richardson, who wrote Peace Child and Eternity in Their Hearts, a Canadian missionary to Western New Guinea, came to Citadel Bible College, where I went to school.

Don had an interesting theory about hell.

He said that often hell is pictured as the demons and the damned blaspheming and cursing God.  But, Don said, God isn’t going to allow that to go on throughout eternity.  Rather, those in hell will forever acknowledge the lordship of Jesus.

He explained by using the analogy of the threshold of pain.  Some people can endure only a small amount of pain before they will submit to anyone torturing them.  Others can endure much more pain before they are broken.  As a boy, you may have wrestled with a bigger boy who got you in a painful hold and increased your pain until you would agree to do or say what he wanted.  If he let up on the pain, you would defy him and say, “I’m not going to do it.”  So, he would increase your pain until you said, “Okay, I’ll do what you want!”

Don speculates that in hell, God is going to inflict on every person or demon the amount of pain necessary to bring that being into submission, where under duress he cries out, “Jesus is Lord.”  If God were to lessen the pain, the person would defy God.  So God increases the pain to the point where they submit and then holds them at that level throughout eternity.

I don’t know that you can prove his theory from Scripture, but it does make sense. However God does it, there isn’t a rebellious creature on earth or in hell who will not acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord. It will be a forced confession, but every knee shall bow before Jesus. (from the sermon “Every Knee Shall Bow” by Steve Coles)

There are many other passages in the NT that affirm Christ’s universal right to rule.  In Matthew 28:18 Jesus claims to have received all authority in heaven and earth.  In Ephesians 1:20-21 Paul says that Christ was seated in the heavenlies far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that can be named not only in the present age, but also in the age to come.

The early preaching of the church recognized that Christ was exalted to the status of Lord (Acts 2:33, 36) and upon the basis of his universal Lordship offered the gospel to all men (Acts 10:34-36).  Thus, Christ’s lordship is viewed as universal and eternal.  But he got there by humble obedience—that is the message proper of Philippians 2:6-11.

A second reason God has highly exalted Jesus and given him the name “Lord” is to promote personal acceptance of Christ’s sovereign authority.

Paul says that “every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord…”

Confession with the tongue is the spoken counterpart to bowing the knee.  The verb “confess” is exhomologeo.  The word homologeo is found in 1 John 1:9 where we “confess” our sins—we agree with God or say what He would say about our sins.

With the preposition attached, it means to “speak out fully, openly, loudly and joyfully” or to “speak out plainly and publicly in the presence of others.”

What the bended knee indicates, the open tongue now openly and clearly expresses.

Romans 10 teaches us that this is part of the response to the gospel.

9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

It is vital that the heart and mouth are working together for salvation.  There are those who speaks the words, but their heart has not believed.  That’s why Jesus uttered those chilling words at the end of the Sermon on the Mount…

Matthew 7:21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

The confession is that “Jesus Christ is Lord.”  This threefold confession was the earliest baptismal formula of the church (Acts 2:36; Romans 10:9; 1 Corinthians 12:3).

But this confession is not limited to the church, to true believers, but “every tongue will confess.”

Of course, this is not a call for universalism, the idea that everyone, in the end, is saved.  Rather, every one will confess this, but only those who do so before death are saved.  The others are compelled to do so, but it doesn’t save them.

To break it down: “Jesus ” (meaning “the Lord saves”), the name given to the Son of God at his incarnation, signifies that the Lord’s salvation came when Jesus was born.  This is why Simeon swept baby Jesus into his arms and declared, “Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation” (Luke 2:29, 30).

Second, the title “ Christ ” (meaning “the Anointed,” “the Messiah” in the Old Testament) speaks of his being the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy — “that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3, 4).

Third, “ Lord ” is here understood to represent the divine name Yahweh, which is a public declaration of his sovereignty — “I am the LORD, and there is no other” (Isaiah 45:5, 6, 18; cf. 45:14, 22).

“He has always (in Paul’s view) shared in the Divine nature.  But it is only as the result of His Incarnation, Atonement, Resurrection and Exaltation that He appears to men as on an equality with God, that He is worshipped by them in the way in which Jehovah is worshipped.” (Kennedy)

We also should not miss the significance that at a later time in the Roman Empire, all residents of the Empire were required to swear an oath of allegiance to the Emperor, declaring that Caesar is Lord, and burning a pinch of incense to an image of the emperor. Though the Roman state saw this only as a display of political allegiance, Christians rightly interpreted it as idolatry – and refused to participate, often paying with their lives.

Paul has no doubt who is really Lord – not the Caesar whom he will stand trial before; Caesar may be a high name, but it is not the name above all names, the name which belongs to Jesus Christ!

Ultimately, and thirdly, all of this is for one purpose—“for the glory of God the Father.”

The end-all of all of God’s plans and actions, and all of Christ’s work on earth and now in heaven, and the Spirit’s work here on earth, is that God would receive all the glory.

God created us for His glory.  Everything He has done has been for His glory.

But as George Lawlor says…

“It must not be thought that God has been selfish in arranging all things for His own glory.  When it is analyzed, we find that what might seem to superficial minds as a selfish arrangement really is absolute unselfishness.  God has all along looked upon the things and interests of others, and has laid himself out for their good.  This has characterized the plan of God throughout its entire history; and when eventually the universe recognizes, acknowledges and confesses the mighty self-forgetfulness of the eternal God, and this is hailed as the real glory, we cannot desire it otherwise.” (When God Became Man, pp. 138-139).

Jesus does not rival God, despite the exalted status He occupies.  Jesus’ authority, though great, was given to Him.

Therefore, whenever and by whomever the confession is made that “Jesus Christ is Lord,” God suffers no embarrassment; rather He is being glorified for what He planned and gave and worked out that it would be so.

Over the last two weeks we’ve been examining Paul’s illustration of extreme selflessness in Christ’s example in His seven steps downward in voluntary humiliation from the incarnation to the crucifixion.  That was in Philippians 2:6-8:

6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

And it was all his own doing.  No one humbled him!  Herod did not humble him.  Pilate did not humble him.  The high priest did not humble him.  The Romans did not humble him.  Jesus “humbled himself.”  The humblest man who ever lived is Christ himself, the God-man.  No other man or woman has even come close!

But at this point, there is a radical reversal in the hymn.  Kent Hughes asks us to picture it like this:

So the down, down, down of Christ’s humiliation is followed by his soaring exaltation.  To get the feel of this, picture the gears of a catapult being ratcheted down ever tighter with the three movements of his self-humiliation, so that the final groaning click of the gears creates an explosive tension, and then the gear is tripped, launching indescribable exaltation.

Whereas in these three verses Christ is the active subject, humbling himself; in the second part (vv. 9-11) it is God who acts and Christ is the object of the divine action.  Whereas the first “verse” of the hymn focuses on Christ’s self-humiliation, the second “verse” describes His super-exaltation by God.

9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

This part open with the double conjunctions dio kai, indicating that this act of God is the logical outcome of what Christ did in humbling himself…it is the direct result.  It was precisely Jesus’ humiliation that became the grounds for his exaltation. By humbling himself on the cross out of love, he demonstrated that he truly shared the divine nature of God, who is love (1 John 4:8).

Jesus had consistently taught His disciples that we must humble ourselves, and when we do God will exalt us.

In Matthew 23:12 we read:

12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

Luke 14:11 says the same.

When we get it all backwards and we exalt ourselves, then God is forced to step in and humble us.

Proverbs 18:12 says, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.”

You remember what happened to Nebuchadnezzar, right?  He was the mighty king of Babylon, and worse of all, He knew it.  He believed that it was His might and knowledge that had built Babylon into a worldwide power.

And because of that pride, God humbled him.

Jesus, of course, illustrates the principle of humility in John 13:13-17 and here in Philippians 2:5-8.

1 Peter 5:6 also says, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you,…”

God is committed to exalting those who humble themselves.  We just have to trust God for the “proper time.”

The exaltation of Jesus, which is now the theme of this second part of the Christ-hymn, is not described in stages as the descent into humiliation was.  Rather, it is presented as one dramatic act, lifting Christ from the depths of humiliation to the heights of glory.

“He humbled himself as no other could ever humble himself.  He is exalted as no other is exalted” (When God Became Man, George Lawlor, p. 120).

Hebrews 2:9 confirms this move:

9 But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned [now] with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.

2 Corinthians 8:9 also shows us the purpose of this move:

9 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich.

It was all for us.  All for you and me that He humbled Himself.

But now For this reason (“therefore”) God raised him to life and highly exalted him, entrusting him with the rule of the cosmos and giving him the name that is above every name.

This compound verb “highly exalted” is found only here in the New Testament and it means to “super-exalt,” to “raise something or someone to the very highest of heights.”

It is not comparative, that Jesus is just higher than any other being, or even higher than He was prior to the incarnation, but it is a superlative expression—He is the highest.  There can be no other higher.

He made Himself the lowliest of the low, now God make Him the highest of the high.  No one compares.

Interestingly, this verb is found in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament and it describes Yahweh as the one who is “exalted far above all gods” (Psalm 96:9; cf. Daniel 3:52, 53, 57-58).  So Jesus shares that with His Father as well.

Though Christ’s exaltation was a once-and-for-all event, it was the culmination of a process that began with the resurrection.  He had gone down, down, down through his incarnation and passion and death (which wrought such infinite spiritual compression), but then in a final, explosive upsurge the grave could no longer hold him.

Thus we have that brilliant moment on Sunday morning when Jesus came right through his grave clothes in the sacred body of his humiliation, glorious and radiant.

Rick Renner tells of coming across an old document in an antique shop in Russia.  It turned to be the birth announcement by a Russian Tsar.

The imperial insignia was still pressed into the broken wax seal, and on the back of the letter was an inscription with all the names and titles of this particular Russian Tsar. The beautiful handwriting described him as:

Emperor and Autocrat of all the Russias, of Moscow, Kiev, Vladimir, Novgorod, Tsar of Kazan, Tsar of Astrakhan, Tsar of Poland, Tsar of Siberia, Tsar of Tauric Chersonesos, Tsar of Georgia, Lord of Pskov, and Grand Duke of Smolensk, Lithuania, Volhynia, Podolia, Finland, Jerusalem, [and so forth, and so forth, and so forth].

The point of these titles was clear: There was no higher name and no greater power than the Tsar of Russia in the realms of his rule.  But that is nothing compared to Jesus Christ.

His glory is now “21 far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come.22 And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church” (Ephesians 1:21-22).

There, in Ephesians 1, Paul says that Jesus is “far above.”  In the context of this verse, it means quite simply that no one in the universe has a higher rank, name, or position than Jesus Christ!

Furthermore, to affirm Jesus’ highest position, Paul added the word “all,” which is a translation of the Greek word pas, meaning anything and everything.  By using these two words together, huperano and pas, he left no room for misunderstanding or doubt regarding his message — that Jesus Christ holds the highest and most exalted position in the entire universe. He is literally “above all.”

Paul went on to describe the specific categories that Christ is above. First, he stated that Christ is “above all principalities….”  The word “principalities” is from the Greek word arche, and it denotes rulers of the highest level.  This encompassing term refers to all human rulers, including kings and politicians.

However, it must be noted that the word arche is also used in Scripture to refer to angelic beings.  This means Paul was declaring that Christ’s exalted rank is far above all human rulers and angelic beings.  The natural and the spiritual realms are both under the dominion of Jesus Christ, and there is absolutely no one in any realm more highly exalted than Him.

Paul then mentioned Christ’s superiority over “powers.”  The word “powers” is the Greek word exousias.  This word describes people who have received delegated power, and therefore is often translated authorities.

In the context of Ephesians 1:21, this word exousias refers to people who hold public office and wield authority entrusted to them by their superiors or through an election. Paul was teaching that although these individuals yield substantial power and influence in the affairs of the world, their authority pales in comparison to that of Jesus Christ.

At the time Paul penned these words in the First Century AD, this was a very dangerous and powerful statement to make, because Roman political powers were actively persecuting the Church and attempting to suppress the message of the Gospel.  However, Paul wanted his readers to know that no matter what authority a politician might try to exert over the Church, Jesus had a rank that was even higher than most powerful human authorities.

Next Paul wrote of “might,” which comes from the Greek word dunamis. The word dunamis denotes explosive power, but it also was regularly used to describe the full strength of a military force.  By using this word, Paul declared that Jesus is exalted in His authority and power even above all the military forces in the world today.

As if this list is not already complete enough, Paul added one more word.  He stated that Christ is supreme above all “dominions.”  This is the Greek word kuriotes, which means lordships.  It could refer to any world system, political, financial, or any system of any type.  There simply is no system more high-ranking that the Lord Jesus Christ!  Jesus is the Lord of lords.

Finally, to make sure he has included everyone and everything on his list, Paul added “…and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come….” In one sweeping statement, Paul declared that Jesus is Lord over all.  He is literally superior to rulers (arche), elected leaders (exousias), military powers (dunamis), and constitutional authorities (kuriotes).  He is literally Lord over all!

Christ is now in Heaven with myriads of angels singing, “‘Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!’” (Revelation 5:12)—and you could probably add a few hundred more attributes as well.

Now back to Philippians 2.

It is difficult to imagine here that Jesus could be actually moved to a higher place than “being in very nature God” and “equality with God” (v. 6).  So I think what Paul means here is that God is making Jesus’ great superiority more fully evident to all humanity and all angelic beings.

I find this similar to the meaning of Romans 1:4,

4 and was declared to be the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness by his resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord,

This doesn’t mean that Jesus wasn’t the Son of God until after the resurrection, but that the resurrection made it patently clear that Jesus was the Son of God.  It removed all doubt.  At least, it presented convincing evidence that He was the Son of God.

The resurrection did not “make” Jesus the Son of God.  That has been His nature since before time began; but it was the resurrection in particular that so powerfully demonstrated the reality of that divine nature.

Jesus’ place now is at God’s right hand, the place of supreme authority and honor.  Stephen saw “the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God” (Acts 7:56).  The writer of Hebrews makes a point of having Christ sitting at the right hand of God.

Hebrews 1:3 says, “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,”

And verse 13 says, “And to which of the angels has he ever said, ‘Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet’?” (Hebrews 1:13)

Sitting (cf. Hebrews 10:12) indicates that Christ’s atoning work is finished.  His humiliation is over and now He sits in glory.

And this act of “super-exaltation” is accompanied by the parallel statement that God “bestowed on him the name that is above every name.”

This is a little harder to picture than the idea of Christ being exalted far above all earthly and heavenly authorities.

What does it mean that He has a “name that is above every name” and what is that name?

In comparison with the Tsar of Russia, Jesus has these names:

King of kings, Lord of lords, The Blessed and Only Potentate, The King Eternal, Immortal, Invisible, The Anointed One, The Christ, The Messiah, The Chosen One, The Lamb of God, The Glory of God, The Word of God, The Only Begotten of the Father, Emmanuel, Son of Man, Son of God, Wonderful Counselor, Everlasting Father, The Power of God, The Wisdom of God, The Only Wise God, Prince of Peace, Redeemer, Chief Shepherd, Great Shepherd of the Sheep, Great High Priest, Universal and Supreme Head of the Church — God in the Flesh!

Those names are definitely superior to any earthly name.

But what is that name?  The option which seems to fit best is that it is “Lord Jesus.”  The name Jesus, of course, means Savior.  He is Lord and Savior.

The clue lies in the fact that it is “above every name.”  It is greater than any other name  conferred on Jesus.  In fact, it is God’s own name kyrios (Lord), which was used in the Greek Old Testament to represent Yahweh, the personal name of the God of Israel.  The name given to Jesus that is above every name is indeed Yahweh, God’s name, which fills so much of the Old Testament.

How can we be sure?  Verse 11 identifies Jesus as “Lord” (kyrios), Yahweh —“every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”  Giving Jesus the name “Lord” (Yahweh) is the ultimate of all honors because he says in Isaiah 42:8, “I am the LORD [Yahweh]; that is my name.”  It is no one else’s name.  Yahweh is the name that trumps all other titles — the awesome covenant name of the God of Israel — “the name that is above every name.”

What a moment it must have been those 2,000 years ago when Jesus entered Heaven and Paradise — to super-exaltation and a new name!

That is the name we bow before and worship and adore.  We pray, “hallowed be Thy name” and we pray in the name of Jesus.

Notice that this name is “bestowed” upon Jesus by the Father.  It was not exactly earned through obedience and sacrifice, but was “freely given” as an act of grace from the Father.

It reminds us that even the rewards we get for our obedience are not earned, but rather given to us as gifts.  We can never earn or “pay back” God for the grace He has given us.

Last week we began looking at this wonderful expression of the humiliation of Jesus Christ.  He has existed forever as God, but took on human flesh to serve and sacrifice His life for us.  That is expressed in Philippians 2:5-8 as a way of illustrating the kind of perspective, attitude, thought pattern, that Paul wanted the Philippians to adopt.

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Because we are “in Christ Jesus” we have the capacity to think like Jesus.  As illustrated in John 13, Jesus, though God most high and exalted, humbled Himself to serve others.  That was the pattern of His whole life, according to these verses before us today.

So let’s pick up with verse 6. We had noted last week that the first clause of verse 6 speaks loudly and clearly that Jesus existed with the same essence and character as God the Father.

Now, speaking of the incarnation, Paul says that Jesus “did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.”

Here again, Jesus’ full deity is affirmed in the word “equality.”  It indicates that Jesus was “exactly the same, in size, quality, quantity, character or number.”  We use words like isometric (equal in number) and isosceles triangle (a triangle with two equal sides).

This very claim is what got Jesus in trouble with the Pharisees.  In John 5:18 we read…

This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.

And in John 10:33 they also say…

33 The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.”

That’s all they saw Jesus as—a man.  But He was more than that.  He truly was God, it’s just that His humanity veiled that identity somewhat.

But in this first step downward.  Jesus refused to selfishly hold onto His equality with God (the rights and privileges of His deity).  Our verse says that He “considered” it, He gave careful thought to it.  He knew that He could not hold onto His full deity.  He couldn’t hang onto that full equality and become a man who would die, on a cross.  He thought it through and decided that “bringing many sons to glory” (Heb. 2:10) was worth the cost of letting go of the full rights and privileges of His glorious deity.

The word “grasp” is usually meant in an aggressive sense, to “take by force, to seize” or to “hang onto.”  You’ve maybe had to grasp onto something when you were falling, like from a ladder.

I was helping my brother-in-law, on Becky’s side of the family, re-roof her father’s house.  I was rolling out tar paper, backing up step by step, and suddenly I stepped off the roof.  I didn’t have time to grasp hold of anything.  Believe me, I would have if I could have.  Fortunately, the roof of the porch was just about 3 feet below the roof, so that is as far as I fell and didn’t hurt myself.

But in cases like that, you want to grasp hold of something to protect yourself.  Jesus didn’t do that.  Instead, He let go.

Unlike Adam, who senselessly sought to grasp after an equality with God he never had; the second Adam, Jesus Christ, although He had always enjoyed full and true equality with God the Father, refused to derive any advantage from it during His days on earth.

This is where it all starts—with a humility of mind that is willing to lay aside the true rights we have.

The New Living Translation reads, “Though he was God, he did not demand and cling to his rights as God.”

What normally causes disunity?  Two people asserting their rights, fighting to give their opinions and agendas top priority.

“Christ did not please himself” (Rom. 15:3).  In humility, he counted the interests of others as more significant than his own (Phil. 2:3–4).

This downward mobility is further explained by the contrast indicated by the word “but” in verse 7.  It is a strong contrast.  In contrast with hanging onto His full equality with God, Jesus “emptied himself.”

The ESV reads

7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

The words “made himself nothing” are literally “emptied himself,” but that begs the question, “What did He empty Himself of?”

William Barclay, mistakenly says, “He emptied himself of His deity to take upon Himself His humanity.”  In other words, He traded one for the other.  When he became man He ceased to be God.

There are those who think this means that Christ willingly gave up His divine attributes—omniscience, omnipresence, omnipotence, eternality…”

But there are four reasons why it could not be the case that Jesus gave up His deity…

• First, to give up any of His attributes—to actually lose one or not be able to fully use it—would destroy His deity, making Him no longer God.
• Second, it would effectively “annul” the Trinity, for there would be no more “Son” in the Godhead.
• Third, it would deny the attribute of immutability (James 1:17), the fact that God doesn’t change.
• Fourth, it would undermine the atoning work of Christ. If He was not God, then His work on the cross would lose its sufficiency in satisfying God’s wrath against sin.

Besides, Jesus did use His attributes at times.  He just fully submitted them to God’s will and plan.

Jesus did not stop being God, but something did change.

So, what did He empty Himself of?  Or, in what way should we understand this concept?

• First, he emptied Himself of His glory—the blazing splendor of His character (John 17:5). In the Old Testament men would die if they saw God’s glory face to face.  When Jesus came He veiled that glory, though a small portion was apparently revealed at the Mount of Transfiguration (Matthew 17; 1 Peter 1:15-18).
• Second, Jesus voluntarily limited the use of His divine powers, so that He didn’t always do the miraculous and even experienced needs Himself. Whereas He didn’t stop being omniscient, in His humanity He “grew in wisdom” and stated at one point that even the Son of Man did not know the time of a future event (Matthew 24:36).  Thus, He voluntarily limited His abilities.
• Third, He lived in total dependence upon the Holy Spirit in the miracles that He did (e.g. Matthew 12:28; Luke 4:14). In other words, when Jesus did do miracles and display His omnipotence, He did that in conscious dependence upon the power of the Holy Spirit instead of His own power.  He did this to model for us a Spirit-led, Spirit-empowered life.
• Fourth, He submitted to the will of the Father. He came to “do His will” (God’s will) rather than His own.  He submitted to God’s will in the Garden, even though He knew it would be excruciating.  In this sense he “learned obedience” through suffering (Hebrews 5:8).
• Lastly, he gave up a favorable relationship with God, choosing instead to suffer alienation as the sin bearer on the cross (“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

All this Jesus willingly did for you and me.  Am I willing to limit myself and place myself totally in submission to God?  How might that help you in your interpersonal struggles with your spouse or someone else?

But Jesus didn’t stop there.

He took the next step down.

There is a sense in which He didn’t simply empty Himself by giving up something, but He emptied Himself by taking on “the form of a bondservant” (v. 7).  He gave up the free expression of His glory and power and appeared to His kindred as a humble man, one who would serve.

The word “form” here (morphe) is the same word that we saw in verse 5.  Thus, just as “God very God was his form” then, now His form is a “bondservant.”

Of course, we know that in the Incarnation Jesus took on a second nature, a human nature.  From conception He was now not only God very God, but fully God and fully man.  And as a man, His form was that of a bondservant, a slave, a doulos.

We’ve seen this word before.  Paul claimed it in the beginning of the book, when he introduced he and Timothy as “servants of Christ Jesus.”

Jesus came “not to be served, but to serve, and give [His] life a ransom for many.”

But this word doulos goes beyond the mere activity of serving or helping someone.  It refers to the position of being a slave, or not having rights of your own.

Jesus, the most free and sovereign being in the universe, gave up that freedom to submit to the Father and even to men.

All along, Paul has been encouraging the Philippians to adopt this same attitude of seeing themselves in the serving position rather than in the power position, getting their way.

What about you, are you willing to position yourself as a slave, giving up your rights?  What about in your marriage?  Is there a strained relationship that would benefit from taking the stance of the servant, of yielding?

Then comes another step down in the latter part of verse 7, when it says He was “made in the likeness of men.”

Here, “being made” is from a verb that indicates—not continual existence (like huparcho, in v. 6)—but which indicates an existence that began at a certain point in time and continues now.

Thus, Jesus was (and is) eternally God, but He became man (adding a second nature) at a fixed point in space-time history.

At that point He was given the attributes of humanity.  He looked like a man and had a body like a man.  He wasn’t a ghost (as the Docetics claimed).  In every likeness or point of similarity Jesus was just like you and me.  He got tired, He had to sleep, He got hungry.

Just at it is important that Jesus remain God in the Incarnation, it is also important that He becomes man.

Colossians 1:21-22 says, And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him,

Jesus didn’t have that “body of flesh” in heaven before His incarnation.  In order to die for you, He had to become a man.  He had to become “flesh and blood” as Hebrews 2:14 tells us, in order to redeem those who are flesh and blood.  It is how He became a sympathetic high priest” (Heb. 2:17) for us.

He became flesh so he could “sympathize with our weaknesses” experiencing all our pains and struggles and loses and temptations, “yet without sin.”

Are you willing to find points of contact and identification with the people you’re in conflict with?  Follow the example of your Savior.

Then came the fourth step down.

When it says in verse 9 that Jesus “was found in appearance as a man,” it is saying something different than He became flesh and blood.  It’s not just a repeat of the end of verse 7.

Rather, when they saw his schema as looking human, that’s all that they saw him as.  This looks at the humiliation from the viewpoint of the people who saw him.  They looked at him and saw little to nothing that would make them think He was God.  Instead, they saw him as a man just like us.  Just a normal, everyday man-next-door.

This is likely what Paul is referring to in 2 Corinthians 5:16

16 From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer.

Prior to the resurrection, Paul says, it was normal for people to view Jesus as just a good-old-boy, a run-of-the-mill person.  Nothing special.

It was humbling enough for God to hide his glories and become a man, but another thing for men to see him as just another man.

How about you?  Are you willing to be seen as “nothing special,” to allow your weaknesses and vulnerabilities to show?  Are you willing to do that so that you can reach them?

But this isn’t all.  Not only do they treat the majestic King of the Universe as a mere man, but in this next step down they treat him like the worst of all, like a criminal.

But when Jesus was reviled, spit upon and flogged, did He fight back?  No, He did not.

Instead, He humbled Himself under the punishment, shame and ridicule, the false charges, mock trials, betrayal and abandonment.

It was humiliating enough to leave the glories of heaven, but now to submit to utter humiliation…that is love indeed.

And He did humble Himself, for it was His choice!  He wasn’t humiliated because He was at the whim of other’s choices.  He made the choice to endure this shame and humiliation.

Again, what about you?  Are you willing to stand silent when accused?  Are you willing to utter a blessing when you’ve been cursed?  Are you willing to entrust your reputation to God?

The sixth step downward in Christ’s humiliation, is found in the words “obedient to the point of death…”

We might say, “Stop, that’s enough.  I can’t take anymore.”  But not Jesus.  Jesus goes further, all the way to sacrificing His life.

Instead of, in the last moment, finally revealing Himself as He truly was and saving Himself from a cruel, shameful death, He obeys God’s will to the point of death.

And finally, this was no normal death.  No, it was the most cruel, most shameful kind of death that could happen in those days.  The word “even” introduces us to the shock and horror that this was “death on a cross.”

We’ve cleaned up and pasteurized the cross today so that we can wear it around our necks and feel nothing of the searing shame and terrible torture of that instrument of death.  I mean, imagine someone today wearing an electric chair or a syringe around their necks!

No one would have worn a cross like that in the first century.

This is the very bottom, the end of the line.  To be crucified on a cross was the most excruciating, more embarrassing, most degrading, most painful form of torture ever devised.

Yet Jesus freely and willingly chose it to bring reconciliation to us!

This form of torture was so demeaning and degrading that the Romans wouldn’t even use it on their own citizens.

The Jews themselves believed that a person being crucified must be under the curse of God (Deut. 21:22; Gal. 3).

There He is, stark naked, hanging wounded and vulnerable before the watching world, an object of mocking and derision.  This is your God!  The God who created the universe, who made the very wood and iron which was used to nail Him to the cross.

Somewhere along the line you’d think He’d say to himself. “You know, these people are just not worth all that.  That is too degrading, too humiliating to put myself through for them.”

But that’s what He did.  The One who is above all powers, all wisdom, all riches, before time began to the moment He was hanging on that cross—thought of us “above all.”

You can see Lenny LeBlanc’s Above All music video

Above all the searing pain, the jeering laughs, the betrayal by a friend, being abandoned by His disciples, but most of all having the Father turn His back on Him for the first time in all of time—beyond all that Jesus “endured the cross and despised the shame” (why?)…”for the joy that was set before him.”

What was that joy that drove Christ to offer His body to be tortured this way?  What was the joy that caused Christ to forfeit His harmony with His Father?

It was the joy of “bringing many sons to glory” (Heb. 2:10), of seeing that you and I would be reconciled to the Father by gladly and willingly embracing Jesus Christ as our Savior and Lord.

Let me remind you:  Paul didn’t write this simply as a keen theological exercise.  He is using the example of Jesus’ humiliation to teach us that sometimes it takes great personal sacrifice to resolve conflicts and reconcile relationships.  Are you willing to follow in the footsteps of your Savior?

This morning we’re going to be looking at a passage of Scripture that many consider to be one of the most beautiful in all of the New Testament and was thought to be an early Christian hymn.

Although this passage has deep theological content, let’s remember that Paul is using it primarily as an illustration for the practical instructions he had given the Philippians in vv. 3-4:

3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

So Paul points to several people that the Philippians were familiar with that illustrated these very attitudes and habits—first Jesus in vv. 5-11, then Paul in vv. 17-18, then Timothy in vv. 19-24 and finally Epaphroditus in vv. 25-30.

Several commentators and pastors also find a close relationship between this passage and the passage in John 13 where Jesus washed His disciples’ feet.

(Gerald Hawthorne, “Philippians” in Word Biblical Commentary, p. 78)

Remember that a big part of why Paul was writing this letter to the Philippian believers was to help them deal with an interpersonal conflict that had arisen and was in danger of spreading (4:2-3) among them and dividing them.

One of the problems Paul had identified in vv. 3-4 that disrupts and ultimately can destroy community within a church, an office or a family, is the problem of “vain glory” (kenodoxia), or “thinking more highly of oneself” without good reason.

But whereas Paul counsels against us having “vain glory” he shows us in this passage today how Jesus emptied himself of his very real and deserved glory, humbling himself to serve us and even sacrifice himself for our good.

That is the example they were to follow.

There is an interesting verse in Psalm 18:35b where David says of Yahweh, “You stooped down to make me great.”  That is quite an amazing verse for the Old Testament, or even for the whole Bible for that matter.

The highly exalted God stoops down to make such a worm as I great!  That is quite astounding.  But that is exactly what Paul pictures here as he presents the example of Jesus Christ and encourages us to follow.

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Again, many think that this was an early Christian hymn, that it was sung in their worship services.  In Latin it is called the Carmen Christi.  Whether or not it was actually sung, Paul crafts it as a concise theological statement about the humiliation and exaltation of Jesus Christ.

In this passage we see Jesus Christ taking several steps down from his exalted glory in heaven, being incarnated as a human, becoming a servant and eventually dying in disgrace and shame, and agony, on the cross, as separated from that previous glory as one can be.

But then, in a couple of weeks, we will get to His reward, when He is exalted and proclaimed for the exalted King He is.

Moises Silva’s outline in his commentary on Philippians discerns the structure of the hymn and helps us see the main points of the passage.

Here is his line-by-line explanation:

In this arrangement, the first stanza begins and ends with the noun form (morphe), whereas the second stanza begins and ends with the participle ‘having become’ (genomenos).  This feature can easily be interpreted as [an] inclusio . . . and may suggest that indeed these lines begin and end discrete units.

Moreover, each line of the first stanza finds some parallelism in the corresponding line of the second stanza.  In both stanzas the first line contains a participle, and the participle rules a prepositional phrase.

The contrast between God and man in that [first] line is repeated in the second line. The third line of each stanza describes Christ’s voluntary act (‘he emptied himself/humbled himself’).

Finally, both stanzas puts us in touch with the original structure of the hymn, it is certainly suggestive and may have a bearing on exegesis. (Moises Silva, Philippians [BECNT; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005], 99)

The usefulness of this structure is evident in how it helps us see the contrast between God and man, the two main action verbs, and the act of becoming human and dying on the cross in the place of men.

Theologically, this structure coheres with the two main movements of Christ’s life—his incarnation and crucifixion.  Likewise, it stresses the two natures of Christ—he is both God and man, and in his humanity his human form has hidden his divine form without replacing it, reducing it, or rejecting it.

Last, Jesus’ primary actions of making himself nothing (i.e., emptying himself) and humbling himself relate in time to his incarnation and crucifixion.  Yet, neither action is separated from the other.  Christ’s humiliation on the cross came about because of his kenosis, and his incarnation also involved a significant step of humility.

All in all, Silva’s structure helps clarify our exegesis and theology in this key passage for biblical Christology.

So here in Philippians 2:5 we see Paul tying this passage back to his previous exhortations to unity.

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,

This word phroneo refers to the disposition of the mind or heart towards something.  It speaks of perspective, a way of thinking and says that our way of thinking should be like Jesus’ way of thinking.

Paul is saying that what we think about, our attitude, is very important.  Instead of having a mind that imitates the world, we should aim for a mind that imitates Christ.

What was Jesus’ perspective on life?  We see it here in this upside-down mentality, this “downward mobility” that is so foreign to our own thinking about life.

First, of all, we see that Jesus Christ began “in very nature God.”  His eternal, pre-incarnate nature was full divinity.

who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,

In asking what Jesus Christ was like prior to the incarnation, Paul expresses it with the noun morphe (translated “form,” or “very nature” in the NIV) and the participle huparcho, which expresses the continuing existence of something, in this case the “form of God” in Jesus.

Jesus thus “existed,” or “continued to exist” during all the ages before the Incarnation “in the form of God.”

Now, the word morphe is defined of the “essential character of something.”  That which it is in its very nature.

Another word which Paul will use later, in v. 8 is schema (“found in appearance as a man”).  The difference between morphe and schema is that morphe speaks of the essential form that never changes; while schema speaks of the outward form which changes over time.

Thus, my morphe is that I am a man; but my schema has changed throughout the years from baby, to child, to pre-teen, to teenager, to adult (although some would debate I’ve gotten that far!).

Thus, what Paul is saying in verse 6 is that he has always existed in the unchangeable essence of being God.  He has always existed as God.

This is expressed in a variety of verses:

John 1:1-3 and verse 14 says…

1 In the beginning was the Word [we know from v. 14 that the Word is Jesus], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

So Jesus “was in the beginning,” and the tense of the verb means he “already was in the beginning.”  He was “with God” and most importantly this verse says that Jesus “was God.”  Again, the tense of the verb means that He didn’t become God, He always was God.

Now Jehovah witnesses will say, “But there is no article in front of the word God at the end of verse 1, so that means Jesus was ‘a god,’ a lesser god, a created god.”

While it is true that there is no article in front of the final word “God” in verse 1, this doesn’t mean that John was indicating that Jesus was any lesser deity.  After all, “everything that was made” was made by Him, according to verse 3.

A Greek grammarian by the name of Colwell said that an “anarthrous predicate noun is only indefinite if the context dictates.”  That’s just a fancy way to shut the mouths of those who argue that Jesus was less than God.

The reality is, if John had put an article in front of “God” it would have created a worse misunderstanding, for then it would mean that God was only “the Word.”  In reality, what John is doing here is not pointing so much to Jesus as God, but Jesus as divine, having the same nature as God.  It amounts to the same thing.

God, in this verse, is the Father, except in the final part of the verse when “God” stands for the nature or essence of who the Word has always been—totally, irrevocably divine.  Fully God.

Colossians 1:15-17, is another potential Christ hymn.

15 He is the image [the outward visible manifestation] of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation [in position, not time.  Remember, He created all things that were created.]. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities–all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

I really like Colossians 2:9

For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,

That was Jesus’ exalted position.  He was, and still is, God very God.  Fully God.  He is not part God, or partially God.  The “whole fullness of deity” dwells in Him.  Richard Trench, commenting on this word “deity,” says…

Paul is declaring that in the Son there dwells all the fullness of absolute Godhead; they were no mere rays of divine glory which gilded Him, lighting up his person for a season and with a splendour not his own; but He was, and is, absolute and perfect God; and the Apostle “uses theotes to express this essential and personal Godhead of the Son;…

Kenneth Wuest adds…

One could translate, “For in Him corporeally there is permanently at home all the fulness of the Godhead.” That is, in our Lord Jesus in His incarnation and in the permanent possession of His human body now glorified, there resides by nature and permanently the fullness of the Godhead. The word “Godhead” is from our second word theotes. The word expresses Godhead in the absolute sense. It is not merely divine attributes that are in mind now, but the possession of the essence of deity in an absolute sense.

The simplest way to put it…is that Jesus is God in the flesh.

That is Christ in His glory.  In His essence He is fully God, deserving of worship and service.

But now the humiliation of Christ, in particular the incarnation and crucifixion, are depicted theologically in these steps downward.

And we will pick back up with the second part of verse 6 next week.

This morning we’re going to be looking at a passage of Scripture that many consider to be one of the most beautiful in all of the New Testament and was thought to be an early Christian hymn.

Although this passage has deep theological content, let’s remember that Paul is using it primarily as an illustration for the practical instructions he had given the Philippians in vv. 3-4:

3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

So Paul points to several people that the Philippians were familiar with that illustrated these very attitudes and habits—first Jesus in vv. 5-11, then Paul in vv. 17-18, then Timothy in vv. 19-24 and finally Epaphroditus in vv. 25-30.

Several commentators and pastors also find a close relationship between this passage and the passage in John 13 where Jesus washed His disciples’ feet.

(Gerald Hawthorne, “Philippians” in Word Biblical Commentary, p. 78)

Remember that a big part of why Paul was writing this letter to the Philippian believers was to help them deal with an interpersonal conflict that had arisen and was in danger of spreading (4:2-3) among them and dividing them.

One of the problems Paul had identified in vv. 3-4 that disrupts and ultimately can destroy community within a church, an office or a family, is the problem of “vain glory” (kenodoxia), or “thinking more highly of oneself” without good reason.

But whereas Paul counsels against us having “vain glory” he shows us in this passage today how Jesus emptied himself of his very real and deserved glory, humbling himself to serve us and even sacrifice himself for our good.

That is the example they were to follow.

There is an interesting verse in Psalm 18:35b where David says of Yahweh, “You stooped down to make me great.”  That is quite an amazing verse for the Old Testament, or even for the whole Bible for that matter.

The highly exalted God stoops down to make such a worm as I great!  That is quite astounding.  But that is exactly what Paul pictures here as he presents the example of Jesus Christ and encourages us to follow.

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Again, many think that this was an early Christian hymn, that it was sung in their worship services.  In Latin it is called the Carmen Christi.  Whether or not it was actually sung, Paul crafts it as a concise theological statement about the humiliation and exaltation of Jesus Christ.

In this passage we see Jesus Christ taking several steps down from his exalted glory in heaven, being incarnated as a human, becoming a servant and eventually dying in disgrace and shame, and agony, on the cross, as separated from that previous glory as one can be.

But then, in a couple of weeks, we will get to His reward, when He is exalted and proclaimed for the exalted King He is.

Moises Silva’s outline in his commentary on Philippians discerns the structure of the hymn and helps us see the main points of the passage.

Here is his line-by-line explanation:

In this arrangement, the first stanza begins and ends with the noun form (morphe), whereas the second stanza begins and ends with the participle ‘having become’ (genomenos).  This feature can easily be interpreted as [an] inclusio . . . and may suggest that indeed these lines begin and end discrete units.

Moreover, each line of the first stanza finds some parallelism in the corresponding line of the second stanza.  In both stanzas the first line contains a participle, and the participle rules a prepositional phrase.

The contrast between God and man in that [first] line is repeated in the second line. The third line of each stanza describes Christ’s voluntary act (‘he emptied himself/humbled himself’).

Finally, both stanzas puts us in touch with the original structure of the hymn, it is certainly suggestive and may have a bearing on exegesis. (Moises Silva, Philippians [BECNT; Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005], 99)

The usefulness of this structure is evident in how it helps us see the contrast between God and man, the two main action verbs, and the act of becoming human and dying on the cross in the place of men.

Theologically, this structure coheres with the two main movements of Christ’s life—his incarnation and crucifixion.  Likewise, it stresses the two natures of Christ—he is both God and man, and in his humanity his human form has hidden his divine form without replacing it, reducing it, or rejecting it.

Last, Jesus’ primary actions of making himself nothing (i.e., emptying himself) and humbling himself relate in time to his incarnation and crucifixion.  Yet, neither action is separated from the other.  Christ’s humiliation on the cross came about because of his kenosis, and his incarnation also involved a significant step of humility.

All in all, Silva’s structure helps clarify our exegesis and theology in this key passage for biblical Christology.

So here in Philippians 2:5 we see Paul tying this passage back to his previous exhortations to unity.

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,

This word phroneo refers to the disposition of the mind or heart towards something.  It speaks of perspective, a way of thinking and says that our way of thinking should be like Jesus’ way of thinking.

Paul is saying that what we think about, our attitude, is very important.  Instead of having a mind that imitates the world, we should aim for a mind that imitates Christ.

What was Jesus’ perspective on life?  We see it here in this upside-down mentality, this “downward mobility” that is so foreign to our own thinking about life.

First, of all, we see that Jesus Christ began “in very nature God.”  His eternal, pre-incarnate nature was full divinity.

who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,

In asking what Jesus Christ was like prior to the incarnation, Paul expresses it with the noun morphe (translated “form,” or “very nature” in the NIV) and the participle huparcho, which expresses the continuing existence of something, in this case the “form of God” in Jesus.

Jesus thus “existed,” or “continued to exist” during all the ages before the Incarnation “in the form of God.”

Now, the word morphe is defined of the “essential character of something.”  That which it is in its very nature.

Another word which Paul will use later, in v. 8 is schema (“found in appearance as a man”).  The difference between morphe and schema is that morphe speaks of the essential form that never changes; while schema speaks of the outward form which changes over time.

Thus, my morphe is that I am a man; but my schema has changed throughout the years from baby, to child, to pre-teen, to teenager, to adult (although some would debate I’ve gotten that far!).

Thus, what Paul is saying in verse 6 is that he has always existed in the unchangeable essence of being God.  He has always existed as God.

This is expressed in a variety of verses:

John 1:1-3 and verse 14 says…

1 In the beginning was the Word [we know from v. 14 that the Word is Jesus], and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

So Jesus “was in the beginning,” and the tense of the verb means he “already was in the beginning.”  He was “with God” and most importantly this verse says that Jesus “was God.”  Again, the tense of the verb means that He didn’t become God, He always was God.

Now Jehovah witnesses will say, “But there is no article in front of the word God at the end of verse 1, so that means Jesus was ‘a god,’ a lesser god, a created god.”

While it is true that there is no article in front of the final word “God” in verse 1, this doesn’t mean that John was indicating that Jesus was any lesser deity.  After all, “everything that was made” was made by Him, according to verse 3.

A Greek grammarian by the name of Colwell said that an “anarthrous predicate noun is only indefinite if the context dictates.”  That’s just a fancy way to shut the mouths of those who argue that Jesus was less than God.

The reality is, if John had put an article in front of “God” it would have created a worse misunderstanding, for then it would mean that God was only “the Word.”  In reality, what John is doing here is not pointing so much to Jesus as God, but Jesus as divine, having the same nature as God.  It amounts to the same thing.

God, in this verse, is the Father, except in the final part of the verse when “God” stands for the nature or essence of who the Word has always been—totally, irrevocably divine.  Fully God.

Colossians 1:15-17, is another potential Christ hymn.

15 He is the image [the outward visible manifestation] of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation [in position, not time.  Remember, He created all things that were created.]. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities–all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

I really like Colossians 2:9

For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily,

That was Jesus’ exalted position.  He was, and still is, God very God.  Fully God.  He is not part God, or partially God.  The “whole fullness of deity” dwells in Him.  Richard Trench, commenting on this word “deity,” says…

Paul is declaring that in the Son there dwells all the fullness of absolute Godhead; they were no mere rays of divine glory which gilded Him, lighting up his person for a season and with a splendour not his own; but He was, and is, absolute and perfect God; and the Apostle “uses theotes to express this essential and personal Godhead of the Son;…⁴

Kenneth Wuest adds

One could translate, “For in Him corporeally there is permanently at home all the fulness of the Godhead.” That is, in our Lord Jesus in His incarnation and in the permanent possession of His human body now glorified, there resides by nature and permanently the fullness of the Godhead. The word “Godhead” is from our second word theotes. The word expresses Godhead in the absolute sense. It is not merely divine attributes that are in mind now, but the possession of the essence of deity in an absolute sense.

The simplest way to put it…is that Jesus is God in the flesh.

That is Christ in His glory.  In His essence He is fully God, deserving of worship and service.

But now the humiliation of Christ, in particular the incarnation and crucifixion, are depicted theologically in these steps downward.

And we will pick back up with the second part of verse 6 next week.

Last week we began looking at Paul’s encouragement to unity found in the opening verses of Philippians 2.  We found that Paul reminded them of all they had experienced through Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit in being united to Christ.  These experienced realities will form the basis for Paul’s commands in vv. 2-4…

1 So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

You’ve heard the old ditty, I’m sure:

To live above, with saints we love, oh that will be glory.

But to live below, with saints we know, now that’s another story!

Unity is a precious commodity and we must pursue it.  Paul had explained all that God has done for them to be unified.

So the second step in maintaining unity in the body of Christ is to identify the end in mind.

Verse 2 describes what unity looks like.

Stephen Covey, in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, says that the #1 habit of an effective leader or person is that they begin with the end in mind.  So Paul, after having given the Philippians four motivations, now presents a picture to their mind—a picture of a preferred and shared future.

So what is our goal?  What are the marks of true unity?

First, we are to have the “same mind.”  Literally, to “think the same.”  This same phrase is used in Romans 12:16; 15:5; 2 Corinthians 13:11 and Philippians 4:2.

I don’t think that Paul is pleading here for uniformity of thinking, as if everyone has to have the same opinion, but rather for an inward disposition of mind that strives to find common ground.

It is not easy to think alike.  We have to put our own agendas aside and be willing to listen to one another and identify common ground, rather than focus on what divides us.

It’s hard to think alike.  Consider how many different denominations there are, many of which have formed because they emphasized a difference rather than common ground.

One researcher found 70 different groups just within the Baptist family!

Nor, is Paul indicating that we must sacrifice the gospel to get along with others.  As we saw in 1:27, we must stand firm for the faith of the gospel.

We are all different.  We have different opinions, different experiences, different backgrounds, different personalities.  Yet, with all that, God wants us to have the “same mind.”

The key is that we are all seeking to have the “mind of Christ.”  We are pursuing a Word-saturated, God-dominated way of thinking that allows us to look at the bigger picture, value the more important truths, seek common ground, and even be willing to yield (as we will see in 4:3).

As believers grow in their understanding of Scripture, they share a common way of approaching problems.  The world offers all sorts of conflict resolution techniques to help people work through differences, but they’re all built on self.  They teach you how to get what you’re after.  But God’s way is to teach us to deny self as we seek to please God and love others.  If two people have this same mind, there is a basis for working through conflicts.

The second picture of unity that Paul asks them to strive for is to pursue “the same love.”

Now what does that mean?

Well, it could be taken in two ways.  First, he could mean that we are to love everyone with the “same measure of love.”  In other words, play no favorites, take no sides.  Certainly this would eliminate factions and a party spirit.

But another way Paul could mean it is that we have the same love that Jesus had when He sacrificed Himself for the good of sinners (1 John 3:16).

Obviously, love is a major factor in keeping unity.  When we begin to devalue people and champion our own causes, we run the danger of breaking unity.

Several years ago I was listening to a series of CD’s by Pastor Dee Duke about prayer.  At one point he discussed the importance of unity, I believe in connection with corporate prayer.  He said that in a dairy community the farmers would milk their cows on Sunday morning and then clean up as best they could and come to church.  Invariably, they would bring some of the stink of the farm with them.  Of course, they were used to it and didn’t smell it anymore.

However, when a new person came into the church, they immediately noticed, “Something doesn’t smell right here.”

He said that disunity is the same.  We might get used to it and sweep it under the rug, but newcomers can sense that “something’s not right here.”  They can sense disunity.

“The same love” is a love that yields its rights for the sake of others.  Christians must have that love in mind in every encounter with one another.

Jesus said that we should be known for our love to one another, not our positions on moral issues, being anti-this or against that.

Third, Paul pictures our goal as “being one in spirit and purpose.”  “Being one” is literally “souls together” souls knit, “soul brothers.”  And our souls are linked together by “spirit” and “purpose.”

Although we exist separately in body, we are linked together “in spirit.”  We have a common spiritual bond.  United to Christ we are united to one another.

We are also “one…in purpose.”  Our ultimate goal is the same.  Whatever may distinguish us, we are intent upon one goal overall and that is to “glory God and enjoy Him forever.”  That is the goal of all creation, the charter of the church and it should be our personal ambition as well.

Now, as defined here in Philippians, the ultimate goal or purpose is to “advance the gospel,” whatever advances the gospel, that is what Paul was concerned about.

That is why he didn’t get his undies in a bunch when people were preaching the gospel but downing Paul.  He didn’t care if they attacked him, as long as they were preaching the gospel.

If we could start from an “it’s not about me” attitude, that would eliminate a lot of conflict, wouldn’t it?

Paul wants us to achieve that tremendous synergy and productivity that happens when a church is of one mind, the same love, linked together in spirit and intent on one purpose.

By the way, Paul encourages them to manifest this type of unity to “complete my joy.”  I believe that not only Paul’s joy, but Christ’s joy, is full when we live together in unity.

The third way to pursue unity is to employ some very practical strategies.  We find these in verses 3 and 4.

Just in case Paul’s motivations and manifestations of unity in vv. 1-2 were somewhat unclear or ambiguous, Paul gets very practical and very specific here.

3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

What Paul has shared so far has been rich, but if that is all we had we might be left scratching our heads at how to possibly turn those motivations and manifestations of unity into reality.  Thankfully Paul wrote vv. 3-4.

But…verses 3 and 4 are such a challenge!  This is a high standard to reach for!

“Do nothing, absolutely nothing” for the purpose of pursuing selfish goals or ego promoting plans.  “Nothing!”  Not a hint, not a whiff of self.

The primary enemy of unity is self—demanding that others see it my way or pursue my way.

How many conflicts between husbands and wives, between bosses and their employees, between siblings, and yes, between church members…is started because of big egos and self-driven motives?

The word “rivalry” was used back in chapter 1, verse 17 and describes a party spirit that wanted to get its own way, even at the expense of community.

A politician, for example, tries to build a following for himself by building himself up and, if need be, by putting his opponents down.

In Galatians 5:20 it is a deed of the flesh, “disputes.”  Many churches suffer because some of the leaders view their position as a way of promoting self.  Some husbands misuse their authority in marriage in the same way.  But, Christians are not to do ANYTHING from this self-seeking motive.

“Conceit” comes from a very picturesque Greek word meaning an “empty opinion.”  A person who has kenodoxia is a person with strong opinions that are, in fact, erroneous.  And, of course, they are more than willing to fight to prove they are right!

Kent Hughes remarks:

Conventional wisdom has it that you can’t get anywhere without it [conceit, that is]. And there is some truth in that.  But it is an abomination in the church.

You might advance in the world with conceit, but it will ruin relationships.

This conceit is what motivated the disciples to want to be first, to sit at Christ’s right hand in glory, thus to receive glory themselves.

But Christ taught that…

But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.  For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:43b-45)

A third negative practice is found in verse 4, where Paul identifies a selfish preoccupation with one’s own personal (or those in one’s group, hekastoi) interests without regard for others.  This selfish mindset is contrary to the very nature of God (1 Cor. 13:5; 1 John 4:7-8).

Unity cannot co-exist where the primary value is placed on individualism (my rights and ideas) or partisanship (our rights and ideas) in opposition to others.

So Paul gives them a positive alternative, countering “rivalry,” “conceit” and looking out for one’s own interests, with “humbly consider others better than yourselves.

The lowliness that was utterly despised by the Greeks and makes such little sense today has become the highest virtue for the child of God. Markus Bockmuehl writes:

“Instead of pursuing their own prestige, that strangely addictive and debasing cocktail of vanity and public opinion, the Philippians are called to humility (tapeinophrosune), the ‘lowliness of heart’ which agrees to treat and think of others preferentially. . . . The biblical view of humility is precisely not feigned or groveling, nor a sanctimonious or pathetic lack of self-esteem, but rather a mark of moral strength and integrity. It involves an unadorned acknowledgement of one’s own creaturely inadequacies, and entrusting one’s fortunes to God rather than to one’s own abilities or resources” (Markus Bockmuehl, The Epistle to the Philippians, Black’s New Testament Commentary (London: A & C Black Limited, 1998), p. 110-111)

If we wonder how a person of superior abilities can regard others as more significant than himself or herself, the answer is to use those abilities for self-assessment by the light of the Scriptures and, in particular, to compare ourselves with Christ (who humbled himself as great as He is).

Then take to heart the words of the surpassing genius and Christian Blaise Pascal, who concluded after much thought, “what amazes me most is to see that everyone is not amazed at his weakness” (quoted in Marvin R. O’Connell, Blaise Pascal: Reasons of the Heart [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1997] p. xii).

In the words of St. Chrysostom, “There is nothing so foreign to a Christian as arrogance” (quoted in Bockmuehl, The Epistle to the Philippians, p. 114).  When we actually see ourselves for what we are, our conceit and vainglory will recede, and we will begin to count others more significant than ourselves.

We will honor others above ourselves, putting them and their interests ahead of our own.

I remember coming across this idea while we were trying to start a multi-cultural church in Little Rock.  At one time we had a young African-American man named Carl coming to our church.  Carl seemed to have a chip on his shoulder about race issues because he had been treated with prejudice while growing up in Little Rock.  Although he had become a Christian, he still struggled with insecurities and inadequacies.  He argued with me that he wanted to be treated as an equal.

I didn’t think of it at that moment, but later it came to me that in reality, genuine reconciliation between the races will not occur, and neither will real unity, until we began treating one another—not as equals, but as “more important” than us, as “better than” ourselves.  In other words, like Paul says in Romans 12, we need to “outdo one another in honor.”

One practical way we can do this is by being willing to shut our mouths and listen, really listen, to someone else stating their opinion, rather than being argumentative.

Humility is the quality that allows us to do this.  Humility is the ability to see ourselves as we really are (cf. Romans 12:3).  We are not to think too highly of ourselves, neither are we to think too lowly of ourselves, rather we are to think rightly about ourselves.

That takes a Bible-saturated mind, one that looks at life and ourselves from God’s perspective.

In comparison with God, we are exceedingly wicked and also exceedingly small and weak and totally dependent.

In comparison to others, we have a combination of strengths and weaknesses.  Humility is both admitting my weaknesses and offering my strengths to help you (not to dominate you).

If I am humble I will recognize first that I need you (because I have limitations) and second that you have real strengths that I need.  I can value you.  Then I can humbly offer you my strengths to help you.

According to C. S. Lewis, humility is nothing thinking less of ourselves, but thinking of ourselves less.  In other words, we rarely think about ourselves and instead focus upon others and how we can love them and meet their needs.

Someone asked the great preacher Martyn Lloyd-Jones this very question. His answer:

A friend was asking me the other day, “How can I be humble?” He felt there was pride in him, and he wanted to know how to get rid of it. He seemed to think that I had some patent remedy and could tell him, “Do this, that, and the other and you will be humble.” I said, “I have no method or technique. I can’t tell you to get down on your knees and believe in prayer because I know you will soon be proud of that. There’s only one way to be humble, and that is to look into the face of Jesus Christ; you cannot be anything else when you see him.” That is the only way. Humility is not something you can create within yourself; rather, you look at him, you realize who he is and what he has done, and you are humbled (Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Living Waters, [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2009], p. 710).

That is exactly what Paul does next.  He says, “Look at Jesus, look at His willingness to lay aside His glory and die for us; realize who he is and what he has done, and you will be humbled.”

Or, as Robert Murray McCheyne reminds us…

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Jer. 17:9.  Learn much of the Lord Jesus.  For every look at yourself, take ten looks at Christ.  He is altogether lovely.  Such infinite majesty, and yet such meekness and grace, and all for sinners, even the chief!  Live much in the smiles of God.  Bask in his beams.  Feel his all-seeing eye settled on you in love, and repose in his almighty arms. . . . (Memoir and Remains of the Rev. Robert Murray McCheyne, Edinburgh 1894, p. 293).

Welcome back to our study of Paul’s letter to the Philippians.  In this section today we continue the primary reason for which Paul is writing this letter—to encourage the Philippians to pursue unity and harmony.  That theme was begun in the last four verses of Philippians 1.  When we see the word “therefore” at the beginning of chapter 2, verse 1, we understand that this chapter is built upon the foundation of what Paul said back in chapter 1.

The difference is this:  Whereas 1:27-30 identifies the danger to Christian community to be enemies from the outside; 2:1-4 indicates that there is another danger to Christianity community, and this one is on the inside.  In fact, Paul indicates that the greatest enemy to Christian community and unity is all the way inside us—our very own hearts.

As Pogo observed, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”  The source of quarrels and conflicts is our own desires (James 4:1-3).  The cause of divorce, according to Jesus, is our own hardness of heart (Matt. 19:8).  And, before you say, “Yes, my ex-mate really did have a hard heart,” Jesus says, “You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye” (Matt. 7:5).  Alexander Maclaren put it, “To live to self is the real root of every sin as it is of all loveless life” (Expositions of Holy Scripture [Baker], 14:252).  If we want harmonious relationships, each of us must confront self, put self to death, and live to build up others.

You might remember the Peanuts cartoon in which Lucy demanded that Linus change TV channels so she could watch what she wanted to watch.  He retorted, “What makes you think that you can just walk right in here and get what you want?”  Lucy said, “These five fingers.  Individually they are nothing, but when I curl them together like THIS [and she shows him her fist] into a single unit, they form a weapon that is terrible to behold.”  Sheepishly, Linus says, “Well, what channel do you want?”  Then he turned, looked at his hand and said to his fingers, “Why can’t you guys get organized like that?”

We must work as a team, right?

That is what Paul was saying back in 1:27-30 that he wanted them to be “standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel.”  The emphasis on unity was begun there.  Now Paul will expand upon it.

If you read the book of Acts, you can see the power of unity, where time and time again you read “one heart, one accord, one voice” and “one mind” and when that happened there would be a spurt of growth and the gospel would be advanced.  Whenever they encountered an obstacle—whether persecution from without or some grumbling within—they would work together towards “one mind” and there would be another spurt of growth.

On the other hand, there can be nothing more discouraging that disunity and church conflict.  When criticism and grumbling abound, it saps our morale and stops our momentum, it sours our love and stains our testimony.  Satan would rather stop the church through internal strife than external opposition.

Leslie Flynn in his book with the dubious title Great Church Fights quotes a story from a Welsh newspaper about a church that was looking for a new pastor.

Yesterday the two opposition groups both sent ministers to the pulpit. Both spoke simultaneously, each trying to shout above the other. Both called for hymns, and the congregation sang two — each side trying to drown out the other. Then the groups began shouting at each other. Bibles were raised in anger. The Sunday morning service turned into a bedlam.

Through it all, the two preachers continued to outshout each other with their sermons. Eventually a deacon called a policeman. Two came in and began shouting for the congregation to be quiet. They advised the 40 persons in the church to return home. The rivals filed out, still arguing. Last night one of the group called a “let’s-be-friends” meeting. It broke up in argument.

The newspaper article was headlined, “Hallelujah! Two Jacks in One Pulpit.”

Many of us have been affected by church conflict.  Some people have been so deeply hurt that they have vowed never to step foot in a church again.  I hope and pray that you will find healing because now, more than ever, we all need a Christian family.

Before we get into Philippians 2, let’s affirm three important facts about unity that reflect God’s heart for us:

First, unity means a great deal to the Father and to Jesus Christ.  In John 17:20-23, Jesus prays to the Father…

20 “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.

The Trinity itself expresses a perfect unity, with each member of the Trinity fulfilling their role, but with the intent of glorifying, celebrating, loving and enjoying each other.  There is no selfishness or jockeying for position in the Trinity.

And Jesus asks that we “may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you.”  Why this emphasis on the importance of unity?  That unity is needed “so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”  Disunity destroys our witness to the world and stymies Christ’s mission to save.  Jesus wants us to “become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.”

It is through unity that we experience the same love that exists between the Father and the Son!

Earlier, Jesus had told his disciples that unity is a key part of our witness to the world.  In John 13:34-35, Jesus said,

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

Although the word “unity” does not occur here, Jesus is telling them to love one another just as Jesus loved them.  That kind of love produces unity.  Jesus’ kind of love is totally unselfish and un-self-promoting.  It results in unity and that unity would reveal to the world that they really were disciples of Jesus.

Thirdly, God has already done everything needed for us to have unity.  So, if you are united to Christ through faith in the gospel, you are united with the body of Christ.  So, in Ephesians 4, Paul tells the Ephesians not to attain to unity, but to maintain that unity.  Look at vv. 1-3…

1 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

This unity is already in place, because we are united with Jesus by faith and enjoy the life and benefits of the Trinity.  But we are to be “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit” and Paul tells us that the fundamental attitudes that help us do that are “humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love.”  So be “eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.”

Back in Philippians 2, Paul gives us a formula for unity.  So what is our formula for unity?

First, start with the proper motivation (2:1)

So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy,

What do you think Paul means here?

Well, first we have to understand that Paul introduces the four clauses with the Greek preposition ei (“if” in English) containing two nouns in each one, but not verbs at all.  That is what makes these verses somewhat difficult to interpret.

The first interpretive issue relates to the use of the world “if,” which makes it almost sound like these motivational factors are all “iffy,” up in the air, undetermined.

Greek conditional sentences are made up of a protasis and an apodosis, what we call the “If” clause and the “then” clause.

The Greek language had four ways to express conditional ideas.  The first class conditional sentences affirmed the positive.  They express the idea, “If (and it is so, or and it is true_)…” and could often be translated “since.:  “If the sun rises, we will work.”

The second class conditional sentence affirms the negative.  If expresses “If (and it is not so, or could not be so).  “If you are Superman, then jump off this building and fly.”  The Greek would indicate that you are not Superman.  Any arguments there?

The third class conditional sentence is what we are most familiar with—it leaves the outcome up in the air.  “If it stops raining, we’ll go fishing.”  Maybe it will and we will or maybe it won’t and we won’t.”

The fourth class conditional sentence is rarely used in the New Testament.  It expresses a more probable condition, though not quite as certain as the first class conditional sentence.

OK, so what does this have to do with our passage?  Well, it means that, since Paul is using the first class conditional sentence, then he is not leaving any of these attitudes as mere possibilities, but rather certain realities.

Perhaps this can best be seen as a conversation:

1. Paul: “Is there any encouragement in Christ?” The Philippians: “Yes.”
2. Paul: “Is there any comfort from love?” The Philippians: “Yes.”
3. Paul: “Is there any participation in the Spirit?” The Philippians: “Yes.”
4. Paul: “Is there any affection?” The Philippians: “Yes.”
5. Paul: “Is there any sympathy?” The Philippians: “Yes.”

Paul is building his case for the command in verse 2.

There IS encouragement from being united to Christ; there IS comfort from His love, there IS fellowship with the Spirit. There IS tenderness and compassion.  So these are not just intellectual possibilities, but experiential realities.  If you are a believer, YOU HAVE experienced these things.

So, by identifying what each of these attitudes or motivations are, they provide us with the first piece of our formula for unity—four great motivations for unity.

Right motivations are important in the Christian faith, for right motivations provide a certain power that allows us to successfully and consistently obey God’s commands.

Is there “encouragement in Christ”?  There certainly is.  All of us who are “in Christ” have His encouragements.  That word can mean encouragement or exhortations—cheerleading and challenge.

So what Paul is likely referring to here are the promises and word of encouragement that Jesus had shared with His disciples that help us now.

David Guzik notes:

Luke 2:25 says that one of the titles for Jesus as the Messiah is the Consolation of Israel.  Paul could say in 2 Corinthians 1:5, For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds through Christ.  In 2 Thessalonians 2:16, Paul says that God has loved us and given us everlasting consolation and good hope by grace.  Of course there is consolation in Christ!

We are encouraged simply be being “in Christ,” but we are also encouraged by all the promises and challenges He gave to us in the Gospels.

What sets us apart as Christians in times of conflict is that we can depend upon receiving encouragement from God, either directly or through the Word.

“Any comfort from love” is the next clause, and it speaks of the reality that we receive comfort from being loved.  Most of the time we have conflicts with others because of insecurities we feel—whether we feel we’re being attacked, or whether we feel like something precious to us will be lost, or whether we feel like we are not being heard.

But the fact is, we are loved, and greatly loved, by God and Jesus Christ.

Since we’ve received this love and been comforted by it, we need to love and comfort others.  We don’t have to be concerned about ourselves when we feel such love and comfort.

What is unclear here is whether Paul is speaking about God’s love for the Philippians or Paul’s own love for them.  Either way, they should experience that love and that should give them confidence to risk, rather than insecurity which chooses to keep things for ourselves.

Because God, or Paul, loved them, they could bring comfort to others rather than compete with others.

In Romans 5:5 Paul tells us that one of the benefits of being justified by faith is that

God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.

The idea here is that God’s love has flooded into our hearts.  Not just a trickle, but an overwhelming food.  This is an experiential love, the kind of love that Paul prayed that the Ephesians would “get” when he prays that they…

18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

When we are overwhelmed with love from God, them we can love others.  When we are comforted by God, then we can comfort others.

The idea behind this word for “comfort” in the New Testament is always more than soothing sympathy.  It has the idea of strengthening, of helping, of making strong.  Even the Latin “comfort” has the idea of fortifying or strengthening one’s spirit.

“Any participation in the Spirit” hearkens back to Paul’s words in Ephesians 4:2 in the words “unity of the Spirit.”  The Greek behind “participation” is koinonia, which we often translate “fellowship.”  Our fellowship, our community, is created by the Spirit.

God took the initiative to create fellowship with us, to overcome the rift caused by sin, and placed us into a body which unites Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female.  We are all part of one body now, so we should maintain that unity.

This fellowship in the Spirit came when, as Paul explained, “in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body —Jews or Greeks, slaves or free — and all were made to drink of one Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12:13). And now it rests as the lingering, final word of the sublime Trinitarian benediction that we repeatedly invoke: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Corinthians 13:14). This is the enduring reality of our lives — fellowship in the Spirit.

The final motivations are “any affection and sympathy” refers to what we have received through Christ.  His great affection and sympathy were expressed to us through the cross.  He entered our pain and suffering because of His great love and His desire to sympathize with us.

The writer of Hebrews says…

15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Jesus died on the cross, not only to fully pay the penalty for our sins (that is great affection) but also to sympathize with our weaknesses, pains and sufferings.

Paul is so emotionally compelling here.  He has taken the Philippians back to the graced memories of the supernatural work of Christ in their souls at salvation.  They all had experienced encouragement and comfort in Christ.  They remembered the consolation of Christ’s love when they became his.  They, through Christ, had found fellowship in the Spirit.  And the compassion and sympathy of Christ had not only graced their souls but had flowed from them to others.

Maybe you saw the title to my sermon and thought, “Why is he being a Debbie Downer, we need some hope and encouragement.”

Well, our faith and hope are really nothing if it cannot stand up under the pressure of our current situation, with all its dangers and fears and confusion.

So I DO want to offer you hope and encouragement, but by facing the realities of life.

Tragedy is hard to understand, hard to explain, and hard on our faith.  Some people lay the blame at the feet of God and become bitter and cynical toward Him.  They may ask for an explanation, but get silence.  They ask for understanding, and are baffled.

It takes faith—a deep, robust faith–to trust God when unexplained tragedies are happening.

Perhaps the greatest expression of undaunted faith ever penned came from the Old Testament spokesman, Habakkuk.  Most prophets spoke to the people for God.  Habakkuk spoke to God for the people.

He lived in times that were hard on faith.  He saw the righteous suffering and the wicked prospering.  He asked God the two questions we often ask: “Why?” and “How long?”

Why are these things happening?  How long will it be before things will change for the better?

Aren’t those the questions we are asking today, in light of the coronavirus?

God revealed to Habakkuk that the Babylonians, the epitome of everything Habakkuk (and God for that matter) detested, would become God’s instrument of judgment on Judah.  Habakkuk did not understand.  He could not explain it.

For a time, evil would win over righteousness, and hatred would win out over love, and bad things would happen to good people.

God’s hand would not move.  His face would not be seen.

Yet throughout this time of punishment, God reminded Habakkuk of correct living: “The righteous will live by his faith” (Hab. 2:4).  “The righteous will live by his faith.”

Turn to the book of Habakkuk.  Habakkuk is one of the Minor Prophets, tucked in there between Nahum and Zephaniah.  Habakkuk was a prophet to the southern kingdom, the tribes of Judah and Benjamin.

The Northern ten tribes had already been taken into captivity by Sennacharib in 722 B.C. because of their idolatry, immorality and injustice.  And Judah hadn’t learned a thing.  They were following in the footsteps of their brothers.

So God revealed to Habakkuk that his country was about to be invaded, pillaged and ransacked. Habakkuk and his people would lose everything that they had built up over the years, everything they had worked for. It would all be gone.

In this book we can trace Habakkuk’s own personal journey from a place of questioning, doubt and confusion at the beginning of the book to a place of faith, hope and confidence by the end of the book.  And I hope that you and I will take that same journey this morning.

As J. Vernon McGee says, Habakkuk “begins with a question mark and closes with an exclamation point.”

The key verse of the whole book is found in Habakkuk 2:4 “The righteous shall live by faith.”

Three different writers of the New Testament realized that this quality was central to the life of a Christian. Each focus on a different part of the life.

• Romans – The JUST shall live by faith.
• James — The just SHALL LIVE by faith.
• Hebrews – The just shall live by FAITH.

Habakkuk realized that though he did not understand God’s ways or timing, he could not doubt God’s wisdom, love, or reliability.  Then Habakkuk wrote his great affirmation of faith.

In this closing passage Habakkuk makes one of the strongest statements of faith you will find in all of Scripture.  It makes a fitting climax to the book and a strong encouragement to us today.

16 I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us. 17 Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. 19 GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places.

To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments.

That last verse, along with the first verse of chapter 3 and the presence of “selah” after verses 3, 9 and 13 indicate that this was a song intended to be sung with a triumphal tone.

If Habakkuk were speaking today, he would say, “Though my health is endangered, though my retirement accounts are all but wiped out, though I can’t see my friends or finish my senior year, though my daughter is pregnant out of wedlock, yet I will rejoice in the LORD.”

Habakkuk shares with us three things that he did, even when he was facing the worst calamity of his lifetime.  Let’s look at these closing verses together and see what we can learn for the strengthening of our own faith.

1. Wait patiently for God even when you are afraid (v. 16)

In verse 16 Habakkuk reveals his initial reaction to the bad news.  He said…

16 I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me.

Essentially here Habakkuk recognizes that he was receiving a “no” to his prayers for his people.  Yet his faith-filled response is to wait upon God to fulfill His long-range promises for Israel.

You see, God had just told Habakkuk about the coming invasion by the Babylonians.  God had described to him the arrogance, violence and extreme cruelty of these invaders in chilling detail.

Of course, God had also told him about the great and awesome judgments he would bring upon Babylon and indeed upon all the nations of the earth that refuse to submit to God.

He may have seen all of this in a vision.

So initially, having heard of the horrible judgments to come, he is overcome by fear.  It hits him both emotionally and physically.  When Habakkuk says “my body trembles,” he uses a word which describes violent earthquakes.  He is shaken, falling apart.

His lips “quiver” and he is unable to form the words to express his dread.  He is in such shock that his feet are unable to move (something that will be changed in v. 19!)

Maybe the same thing has happened to you when you first hear news of some tragedy that hits close to home.  You are overcome by dread and sorrow and you feel drained physically.

Habakkuk was not just dealing with the possibility of an attack on his country that would wipe out everything, but with the certainty that it would happen.

You remember the first line of Dicken’s The Tale of Two Cities, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”?  Well, this was the worst of times, and the worst of times.  It was the worst news you could possibly get.

It is quite possible that Habakkuk was still alive when the devastation of Jerusalem happened.  We do know that Jeremiah was, and expressed this devastation in the book of Lamentations.  Listen to these words…

Lamentations 2:1-6

1 How the Lord in his anger has set the daughter of Zion under a cloud! He has cast down from heaven to earth the splendor of Israel; he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger. 2 The Lord has swallowed up without mercy all the habitations of Jacob; in his wrath he has broken down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; he has brought down to the ground in dishonor the kingdom and its rulers. 3 He has cut down in fierce anger all the might of Israel; he has withdrawn from them his right hand in the face of the enemy; he has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob, consuming all around. 4 He has bent his bow like an enemy, with his right hand set like a foe; and he has killed all who were delightful in our eyes in the tent of the daughter of Zion; he has poured out his fury like fire. 5 The Lord has become like an enemy; he has swallowed up Israel; he has swallowed up all its palaces; he has laid in ruins its strongholds, and he has multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation. 6 He has laid waste his booth like a garden, laid in ruins his meeting place;

20-22

20 Look, O LORD, and see! With whom have you dealt thus? Should women eat the fruit of their womb, the children of their tender care? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord? 21 In the dust of the streets lie the young and the old; my young women and my young men have fallen by the sword; you have killed them in the day of your anger, slaughtering without pity. 22 You summoned as if to a festival day my terrors on every side, and on the day of the anger of the LORD no one escaped or survived; those whom I held and raised my enemy destroyed.

Even if Habbakuk didn’t experience this first-hand, he had seen it in a vision—starvation of young and old, cannibalism of children, the destruction of Solomon’s temple, the apparent end of his country.

How do you exercise faith in God during the worst of times?

Habakkuk says to wait patiently for God, even when you are afraid.  Did you notice the second half of verse 16?

Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us.

There is no hoping that the invasion will be stopped and tragedy won’t strike.  But God had promised that He would eventually judge the Babylonians for their sin and would ultimately deliver His people.

That wouldn’t happen in Habakkuk’s lifetime, but he believed it.

This is the way some promises are.  They don’t always get fulfilled immediately, or in the next few months, in fact, sometimes not until after we die.

Are we willing to trust God that far?

The phrase “wait patiently” comes from the Hebrew word meaning “to rest, or to settle down and remain.”  It is what David expressed in Psalm 62:1 when he says, “my soul finds rest in God.”

Instead of allowing his heart to continue to be shaken by fear and anxiety, he chose to settle his heart on God’s promises.

Yes, a terrible reality was about to happen, but an even greater reality was coming too!

Last week we looked at the peace that God can give us when we turn our anxieties over to Him:

Philippians 4:6-7 says: “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7)

Rest in God and in His promises.  That is where peace comes from.

Here is the second thing you can do

2. Choose to rejoice in God even when everything else goes wrong (vv. 17-18)

17 Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.

Here Habakkuk is depicting a series of escalating problems.  We could summarize these verses:  “I’ve lost everything, but I will still rejoice in God.”

Israel was an agricultural society.  What these verses describe is not merely utter financial ruin, but the impossibility of continued survival.  It spells famine and death.  It spells hopeless doom.

Now, agriculture would be divided into permanent crops, annual crops and livestock.  Notice that all three are obliterated here.

Figs, grapes and olives—permanent crops—they’re gone!

Annual crops like wheat and barley, the source of most of their calories—gone!

Their livestock—all dead.

The first scenario is:

Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines,

Here Habakkuk is saying that not only is there nothing today, but the future has nothing either.

There were not only no figs on the tree, but no blossoms as well.  The blossoms on the fig tree and grapes starting to form on the vine refer to things that might benefit us in the future.  But there is no hope for the future!

Not only is today terrible, but tomorrow just gets worse!

Today stinks and tomorrow doesn’t look any better!

There are no visible signs that tomorrow will hold any promise.

Sometimes, don’t we just want a sign that things will get better?

David, in Psalm 86:17, asks, “Show me a sign of your favor…”

We all crave something that will give us hope that tomorrow will be better.  Habakkuk saw none.

Our problem is that we live in a quick fix society.  We want to relieve the pain right away so we go looking for a band aid when surgery is what is needed.  God alone can satisfy our hearts when everything in this world is taken away.

The second scenario is presented like this: “the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food…”

This refers to those things you are trusting right now.  They symbolize your present means.  But in this scenario what you are trusting has let you down.

The olive crop fails.  The fields produce no fruit.  All there is, is disappointment.

You’ve worked hard, blood, sweat and tears.  You’ve done everything humanly possible, but it all comes to nothing.

You get laid off after years of faithful service to the company.  You lose your job and have no current source of income.  Or, you invest all your money in a “sure deal” and the market goes bust.  You put years into a relationship with another person and it all falls apart.

Now, we will talk next week about a simple prayer that Jesus taught His disciples how to pray: “Give us today our daily bread.”  God understands our needs and wants us to depend upon Him to meet all our physical needs.

The third scenario is this: though “the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls.”

You know, the Bible is so honest.  It reminds us over and over again of the reality that we live in a fallen, sin-cursed world.  Bad things will happen to good people.

The sheep and cattle refer to those things you are trusting from the past.  This symbolizes your reserves, your savings account.

How many of you have watched your retirement slip away?  I refuse to even look!

In this scenario you have no reserves to fall back on.  Your credit cards are maxed and there is no money in the bank.  Your physical strength is tapped, you are emotionally empty and spiritually drained.

It’s easy to trust God when the fig tree is budding and grapes are on the vines, when the olive crop succeeds and the fields are productive, when sheep and cattle keep reproducing.  But are you really trusting God at those times?  Or are you just trusting in the things you have and would potentially have?

This is exactly the question Satan asked about Job.  “Does Job trust you because he really believe in you, or because you have blessed him so much?”

But Job showed his true colors when God removed the blessing and Job continued to trust, saying “The Lord gives, the Lord takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord.”

So do you just trust God when He gives, or do you trust Him when He takes away as well?

Here’s another way of putting that question:  Which would make you feel more financially secure—having a million dollars in the bank or having a God who promises to meet your daily needs?

Be honest.  If you answer having a million dollars, then you are not really trusting God.

And you are not really more secure, are you?

So what do you do when everything, and I mean everything, that you have been counting on is taken away from you?  What do you do when all you have been depending upon is gone and there is no prospect of recovery?

Habakkuk says, “Trust in God no matter what.”

Habakkuk says, “Even if everything is taken away from me…18 yet, yet, YET I will rejoice in the LORD; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.

The pronoun is emphatic, “Nevertheless I will rejoice in the Lord.”  It is a strong assertion of faith.

Friday night Becky and I watched I Still Believe, the story of Jeremy Camp and his wife Melissa, who had an aggressive cancer that took her life four months into their marriage.  During her sickness they prayed, and got thousands of people to pray, for her healing.  A couple of times she appeared to be healed, but then cancer would return with a vengeance.

In the wake of her death Jeremy Camp had a crisis of faith.  He struggled with what he believed and wondered how God could let him down like this.

Yet a note from his now-deceased wife reminded him that God was good even in this.

Likewise Randy Alcorn, researching If God Is Good, I interviewed Scott and Janet Willis.

An unskilled truck driver who obtained his license through bribery allowed a large object to drop onto a Milwaukee freeway in front of their van.  Their gas tank exploded, killing six of their children.

Scott Willis said,

The depth of our pain is indescribable.  However, the Bible expresses our feelings that we sorrow, but not as those without hope.  What gives us our firm foundation for hope are the words of God found in Scripture…. Ben, Joe, Sam, Hank, Elizabeth and Peter are all with Jesus Christ.  We know where they are.  Our strength rests in God’s Word.

Now the Willis family’s story is exactly the kind that atheists feature as overwhelming evidence for God’s nonexistence.  Yet, when I interviewed this couple fourteen years after the tragic event, Janet said, “Today I have a far greater understanding of the goodness of God than I did before the accident.”  This might have taken my breath away, had I not already heard it from others who’ve also endured unspeakable suffering.

At the end of our two-hour conversation, Scott Willis said, “I have a stronger view of God’s sovereignty than ever before.”

Scott and Janet did not say that the accident itself strengthened their view of God’s sovereignty.  Indeed, Scott’s overwhelming sense of loss initially prompted suicidal thoughts.  Rather, their faith grew as they threw themselves upon God for grace to live each day.  “I turned to God for strength,” Janet said, “because I had no strength.”  She went to the Bible with a hunger for God’s presence, and he met her.  “I learned about Him.  He made sense when nothing else made sense.  If it weren’t for the Lord, I would have lost my sanity.”

I asked Scott and Janet, “What would you say to those who reject the Christian faith because they say no plan of God—nothing at all—could possibly be worth the suffering of your children, and your suffering over all these years?”

“Eternity is a long time,” Janet replied.  “It will be worth it.  Our children’s suffering was brief, and they have the eternal joy of being with God.  We and their grandparents have suffered since.  But our suffering has been small compared to our children’s joy.  Fourteen years is a short time compared to eternity.  We’ll be with them there, forever.”

French philosopher La Rochefoucauld may have best captured the difference between lost faith and the deepened faith of those like Scott and Janet Willis and Vaneetha Rendall Risner: “A great storm puts out a little fire, but it feeds a strong one.”

“Nevertheless I will rejoice in the Lord.”  I sincerely hope that you and I can say that, or come to have, that depth of faith.

Notice one more thing.  Habakkuk’s fear in v. 16 has now given way to faith in v. 18.  Fear is normal, we will all experience it–but it is something we can move through.  David expressed fear; so did Paul.  The key is to move through fear into faith.

Note here three reactions Habakkuk avoids:

(a)    He does NOT lash out at God in anger: He does not say, “God, you have no right to destroy your people! You are a faithless God!”

(b)   He does NOT pretend that the evil won’t happen. He doesn’t withdraw into a fantasy world, saying, “That’s too terrible to think about. I will close my eyes and think of something else. I’ll sit in front of the TV so I won’t have to think about it.”

(c)    And, note carefully, he does not even say, “Despite all this, I will endure!  I will keep a stiff upper lip and stick it out!  I will still wait for the Lord!  I will remain faithful!”

These are NOT the right ways to deal with our fears.

Habakkuk determined (notice the “I will”s) to rejoice in God despite visible circumstances, even if he did not see any visible signs of God’s presence or favor.

F.F. Bruce writes: “It is right and proper to voice appreciation of God’s goodness when he bestows all that is necessary for life, health and prosperity.  But when these things are lacking, to rejoice in God for his own sake is evidence of pure faith.”

You know, even when we don’t feel like it, we can will ourselves to rejoice in God and take our joy in Him.  We can remind ourselves that He made us to find our deepest joy in Him and is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied with Him.

This is a real mark of maturity in Habakkuk’s life.  Earlier in the book, Habakkuk had complained about God using a wicked nation to bring judgment on Judah.  He wants God to do his will; he wants to manipulate God.

But here he is allowing God to be God, and rejoices in Him.

Now, let me just say something here about joy.  The way you get to joy is by rejoicing, by verbalizing your delight in God—Who He is and what He has done for you so far, and His promises of what He will do for you.

You can’t just screw up the emotion of joy, or the attitude of joy.  You get to joy by rejoicing.

I’ve told my congregation at Grace that there are three words in the Greek New Testament that share the same root (char).  Grace is charis, joy is chara and I give thanks is eucharisteo.

And that helps us understand how to get to joy—by giving thanks for the graces God has given us.

Nothing has changed on the outside—Jerusalem would still be destroyed.

But Habakkuk has changed on the inside.

The only joy in the universe that cannot be taken from you is your joy in Jesus Christ.

When all else disappears, find your joy in the only thing that never fails…in God Himself.

Why? Because He is “the God of your salvation.”  He will save; He will deliver.

In His time and in His way, He will deliver you.

When Jesus is not our greatest joy, then we will not view loss correctly.  We will not view our suffering correctly unless Jesus is our greatest delight.

How do you exercise faith during the worst of times? Choose to rejoice in God even when everything in life goes wrong.

And that leads to a third believing approach to take…

3. Find strength in God to scale the heights even when you are down (v. 19)

Look at verse 19

19 GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like the deer’s; he makes me tread on my high places.

Habakkuk had learned to find his strength in God, not in his own resources or ability.  This is another mark of spiritual maturity—refusing to place our confidence in ourselves.

Remember how Habakkuk said that initially, the tragic news of Jerusalem’s destruction had caused rottenness to enter his bones and his legs tremble beneath him? (v. 16)

Like Paul, Habakkuk was learning that in his weakness he could be strong in the Lord.

What does Habakkuk mean when he says, “he makes my feet like the deer’s”?

Most likely he is referring to what we would call a “bighorn sheep.”  I don’t know if you’ve ever seen one at a National Park or on the Nature Channel, but these sheep are very sure footed and seem to be able to climb the highest rocks and run easily over mountain ridges.

Why are bighorn sheep able to do this?  Because of their feet – their tough, cloven hooves. These hooves aren’t hurt by sharp rocks, but are able to grip even small outcrops.  God designed their feet for climbing.  They don’t slip.  They don’t fall.

Note that the point is not the power of the sheep, but the design of the sheep’s foot.  Habakkuk uses the word for the female deer, not the male, to make this point.  The female deer, too, is able to climb to the highest heights, to run over rocky fields, because of the God-given design of her special feet.  These deer are steady and surefooted, uninhibited and unafraid, full of freedom and confidence as she scales the heights.

So Habakkuk rejoices that his feet are made like deer’s feet, like the feet of bighorn sheep – designed by God to travel over even the most difficult ground.

And what does Habakkuk mean by “treading on high places”?

We use the phrase “walking on high places” to refer to recreational rock climbing.  Most of us are quite amazed and wouldn’t be caught dead trying to climb a rock face.

But in that culture “high places” connotes a difficult, challenging place.  A place one would not want to go unless it is absolutely necessary.  You might climb to a high place to gain defensible ground in a battle, but you only go there if you can’t avoid it.  So “high places” here means a difficult, challenging place.

And yet Habakkuk says that God “makes me tread on my high places.”

The idea of the Hebrew verb is that God causes me to walk in difficult places that I normally would rather not go.

He strengthens me to go places or do things I wouldn’t normally be able to do.

Obviously, this means that I only do this by the strength He gives.

So let’s just notice what Habakkuk is saying.  There are some places that I would rather not go, places that are fearsome, yet God can especially equip me to go there, to a new place, a higher place.

Do you want to move on to the higher place in your life?

It may be that God needs to strip your life of the things you love and depend upon so that He is your only joy and delight.

It may be that God needs to take you places you would rather not go, but He will lead you and strengthen you if you let him.

The just shall live by faith.

Habakkuk is not talking about a pleasant afternoon of rock climbing.  He dreads what God has in store for him, he knows the path is very challenging, very dangerous.  In that sense, God is leading him to a place he does not want to go.

Yet God is his strength, and Habakkuk is confident that God will enable him to do what he could never do on his own.

And that is why he is joyful!  God led him to this very spot.  And though there is pain and difficulty here, he knows that God will either rescue him from the danger or allow him to die.  But even death is controlled by God, and only will come about if God so directs.

There is an old devotional book called Hind’s Feet in High Places by Hannah Hurnard.  Some of you may have read it.  It is an allegory like Pilgrim’s Progress.

It tells the story of a girl named Much-Afraid and her own journey from doubt to faith.  Her story begins as she leaves the Valley of Fear.  It is all she has ever known, but in faith she embarks on a new journey.  Her path is marked by much sorrow and suffering along the way, but through it all she learns to depend on God and to find her strength in him alone.  And as she learns to trust God no matter what, he leads her to the higher places of fellowship with him that she has always longed for.

Faith believes that…

• God is too wise to make a mistake.
• God is too kind to be cruel.
• God is always in control.
• God always knows the best and the best timing.

When we try to impose our timetable on God, we get into trouble.

For example, a man found a cocoon on a tree in his yard.  He was intrigued by it and decided to watch it change.  One day, he saw a tiny butterfly inside the delicate covering and he watched it struggling, trying its best to break out of its captivity.  Finally, the man became so frustrated that he decided to use a razor blade to make a tiny slit in the side of the cocoon, in order to free the struggling butterfly.  Soon afterward, the butterfly was free, but it could not fly and finally died prematurely.

There are times of trials, when we want to short circuit the maturation process.  We want to “bug out” or “beg off”, while God wants to prepare us for a great work or a new phase of life.  Like the butterfly, it is in struggles that we obtain strength.

So when you can’t trace his hand, trust His heart.

Too many Christians have a God of the good times.  They serve God and love him and praise him when all is going well.  But what will you do when hard times come? If all you have is a God of the good times, you don’t have the God of the Bible.  Your god is too small.

Sometimes the fig tree does not bud.

Sometimes there are no grapes on the vine.

Sometimes the olive crop fails.

Sometimes the fields produce no food.

Sometimes there are no sheep in the pen.

Sometimes there are no cattle in the stalls.

What do you do then? You can get angry with God or you can give up on God altogether.

Or you can choose to rejoice that you have God and in Him, everything you need.

Are you willing to trust God, no matter what?

We too can rejoice in our trials, have surefooted confidence in God, and live on the heights of His sovereignty.

Martin Rinkhart was a Lutheran pastor in Eilenburg, Germany from 1617 to 1649.  During thirty of those thirty-two years the Thirty Years War was raging all over central Europe, with Germany receiving the worst of it.

This war has been called one of the most brutal and devastating wars in all history.  Before the war, Germany had a population of 16 million.  After the war, the population was 6 million.  Ten million of 16 million Germans died in those 30 years.

If they did not die as soldiers in battle, they were as civilians hacked to death by invading armies, or, they died in famines caused by war’s the ongoing disruption of farming, or, they died by the disease that spread among fleeing refugees crowded into the towns.

Eilenburg, where Martin Rinkhart was the pastor, was a small city, but it had a wall around it, so many people fled there for safety from the armies.  Too many people and very little food led to ongoing hunger and starvation.  People would be seen in the streets fighting over a dead cat or crow.

Overcrowding led to disease, and then to plagues.  A high percentage of people died, only to be replaced by more refugees streaming in; and then many of them died.

One of the town’s pastors fled, two other pastors died, so Rinkhart was the only pastor left in Eilenburg.  At times, he was doing 50-60 funerals a day– 5,000 in all before the war ended, including that of his own wife.

Twice, he saved the city from even worse destruction by risking his life to go out and negotiate with the threatening army outside the city walls.

Finally the war ended, and one year later an exhausted Martin Rinkhart died at the age of 63.

In the midst of that war, around 1636, Martin Rinkhart wrote what has been called “the greatest hymn of thanksgiving ever written.”  He wrote these words…

Now thank we all our God, with heart and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done, in Whom this world rejoices;
Who from our mothers’ arms has blessed us on our way
With countless gifts of love, and still is ours today.

O may this bounteous God through all our life be near us,
With ever joyful hearts and blessed peace to cheer us;
And keep us in His grace, and guide us when perplexed;
And free us from all ills, in this world and the next!

All praise and thanks to God the Father now be given;
The Son and Him Who reigns with Them in highest Heaven;
The one eternal God, whom earth and Heaven adore;
For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore.

One commentator, O. Palmer Robertson, calls these last three verses (3:17–19) “the most beautiful spirit of submission found anywhere in Scripture” (The Christ of the Prophets, 260).  He embraces the coming exile and its utter destruction and famine.  Because his trust is renewed in God, he can face the worst temporal pains and losses, knowing that God will rescue him eternally in the end.

He began disoriented and devastated, fearful and faithless.  And he took it to God, and God in his mercy showed himself to Habakkuk.  Now, Habakkuk walks in faith and patience, and perhaps most amazingly: joy. “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”  Joy!  Not begrudging submission, but delighting submission.

On this side of the cross, how much more than Habakkuk can we say in our most trying of times — without minimizing the agony or repressing the pain — “Yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation.”

Last week we focused on what most commentators call the heart of the letter to the Philippians.  Here in Philippians 1:27 Paul gives his first command…

27 Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel, 28 and not frightened in anything by your opponents. This is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation, and that from God. 29 For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake, 30 engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now hear that I still have.

Paul was calling them to live “worthy of the gospel of Christ.”  It doesn’t mean we have to “live up” to it or repay Christ for dying for us, but simply that we are to live our lives in sync with the gospel and strive “for the faith of the gospel.”

The context in which Paul was writing is that the Philippians were facing opponents.  We know from other passages that those in Macedonia were facing “a severe test of affliction . . . extreme poverty” (2 Corinthians 8:2), “in much affliction” (1 Thessalonians 1:6), “your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring” (2 Thessalonians 1:4).

Paul wanted them to stand firm by uniting themselves in spirit and mind and fighting side by side.  As we’ve already noticed, unity is a primary theme of this letter.

They were being attacked by their opponents.  Nero-madness was just beginning.  Christians were being forced to bow down to Nero, or else.  Claiming Jesus as Lord was sedition against the empire.

Paul encourages them to “not [be] frightened in anything” by these opponents.  This is the negative counterpart to the more positive “striving side by side for the faith of the gospel” as a way to stand firm—by striving, not being frightened.

Fear, when others attack us, is quite natural.  The word “frightened” or “alarmed” is a word used of startled horses about to bolt.  It describes a panic reaction.  Don’t panic, advises Paul. Keep your head. You’re a citizen of Heaven. God is in control. Don’t be intimidated.  You are to stand firm instead of falling away.

You know many athletes put on a brave front, and even trash talk, but the proof is in their abilities.  The stakes at Philippi, however, were much higher than any game.

Unlike the bravado and posturing at the onset of an athletic event, this will be “a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation, and that from God” (v. 28b).  This doesn’t mean that their adversaries would recognize their own doom, though they might have a dim awareness of it, but that it is nevertheless a sign of their destruction, their judgment.  Of course, believers see it all, including their own salvation. D.A. Carson explains:

Your change in character, your united stand in defense of the gospel, your ability to withstand with meekness and without fear the opposition that you must endure, constitutes a sign.  That sign speaks volumes, both to the outside world and the Christian community.  It is a sign of judgment against the world that is mounting the opposition; it is a sign of assurance that these believers really are the people of God and will be saved on the last day.

When opponents do their worst, and we’re still standing for Christ, that is “a clear sign,” a prophetic warning, that God is with us.  For example, when the Empress Eudoxia, in the fourth century, threatened John Chrysostom with banishment, he told her, “You cannot banish me, for this world is my Father’s house.”  “But I will kill you,” she said.  “No, you cannot, for my life is hidden with Christ in God.”  “Then I will take away your treasures.”  “No, you cannot, for my treasure is in heaven, and my heart is there.”  “But I will drive you away from your friends, and you will have no one left.”  “No, you cannot, for I have a friend in heaven from whom you cannot separate me.  I defy you, for there is nothing you can do to harm me.”

John Chrysostom’s courage made him a clear sign of the weakness of her power and of the power of his weakness.  The tactics of this world are weak, though they appear powerful.  The truth of the gospel is strong, though it appears weak.  Jesus is Lord.  He just is.  And the world is stuck with him, because they can’t impeach him, and he isn’t going to resign.

But how is our generation going to see his glory?  Through our courage.

Jesus spoke of opponents in the Olivet discourse in Luke’s gospel, urging his disciples not to worry about how they might defend themselves when Jerusalem is overrun by an army, referring ultimately to events preceding the second coming. They will be given words, Jesus says, which none of their adversaries will be able to resist or contradict.

Paul also used the term to refer to those who opposed him and his message, including those who were violent in their opposition. In 1 Corinthians 16:9 he says that his work was not yet completed in Ephesus because there was a great door (cf. “door” in Acts 14:27; 2 Cor 2;12; Col 4:13) of opportunity open for him there.

These opponents seem to be Jewish antagonists who often dogged Paul’s steps and caused trouble in the churches he founded.

Paul’s discussion in 3:2-3 seem to indicate that indeed Jews were involved, in one way or another. He refers to Christians as the “true circumcision” which seems to indicate that his opponents were of Jewish origin, though he regards them as the “false circumcision.”  Also, when he says that he “puts no confidence in the flesh,” this makes more sense if Jews who do put confidence in the flesh were behind at least some of the problems in Philippi.

However, Fee suggests that the persecutors were the Romans themselves, noting Paul’s emphasis on Christ as “lord” and “savior,” claims that would raise the ire of loyal Romans.

The proofs that the Philippians’ courageous stand was a sign of their salvation were the twin facts that they were graced with salvation and with suffering: “For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake” (v. 29).

John Piper reminds us…

God graciously gives suffering and faith to his people so that they might enjoy making much of Christ to their adversaries through fearless faith and humble love.

The verb “granted” can be literally rendered “graced” because it means “to give freely or graciously as a favor.”  And the passive voice means that the twin gifts are from God.

By the way, there are two Greek words for “give,” the word didomi and the word charizomai.

You can didomi a punch in the nose.  You can give somebody a punch in the nose. You cannot charizomai a person a punch in the nose.  This is love.  This is all grace, all good, all kindness, all undeserving, all blessing.

God graciously gives you faith to believe.  It is a gift.  I think that is what Ephesians 2:8-9 are saying as well, that faith is graciously given to us—that the Holy Spirit according to the sovereign will of God regenerates our spirit so that our spiritual ears can hear the gospel and our spiritual eyes can see the beauty and supremacy and superiority of Jesus Christ and move toward trusting His work in our behalf.

The gracious gift of believing in Christ is a magnificent blessing. It is the grand evidence that God looks on you with favor. “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12, 13).

But notice that God also graciously gives us suffering.  Suffering is a gracious gift from God, a result of His undeserved kindness to us!

But with this there is also another magnificent boon, as Karl Barth explains: “The grace of being permitted to believe in Christ is surpassed by the grace of being permitted to suffer for him, of being permitted to walk the way of Christ with Christ himself to the perfection of fellowship with him” (Karl Barth, Epistle to the Philippians , trans. James W. Leitch (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002), p. 49).  The fellowship of Christ’s sufferings moves the believer beyond the role of beneficiary of Christ’s death to a sharer in his sufferings (cf. Colossians 1:24).

Note here that the verb is in the passive voice, referring to God’s activity and that it is past tense (aorist in Greek).  Thus the “granting” of the suffering occurred at the time they believed. Therefore, God has a plan for the life of his children worked out from the very beginning of our salvation. Obviously the Lord has a plan for us from before all eternity (Eph 1:4), but Paul’s specific focus here is from the time of our initial conversion/belief forward.

The pleasure of God in persecution is a startling concept, but a biblical one.

John Piper goes on…

Surely, Paul wants us to feel the tension in that.  He graciously, mercifully, lovingly gives this wonderful gift, not only of faith.  The accent falls on suffering.  Free gift, here it is.  I love you.  It has been granted to you for the sake of Christ, for the glory of Christ, for magnifying Christ, that you should not only believe but also suffer.  That’s a gift.  So, two gifts.  Now think with me:  How did those two gifts produce the sign of fearlessness in particular?

In order to create a sign, a big bright unmistakable, irrefutable sign of fearlessness, what do you need?  You need something to be afraid of, and you need faith so that you won’t be afraid of it…

To say I want to erect a sign of fearlessness means I’m putting enemies in your face, and I’m giving you faith.  The two gifts of verse 29 create the sign of verse 27–28.  That’s what the ground clause is for.

So we suffer.  From Satan’s side, suffering comes to us as a way of tempting us towards sin, as a stumbling stone.  From God’s viewpoint, suffering comes to us as a way of proving and improving our faith, as a stepping stone.

This attitude wasn’t Paul’s alone because we read in Acts that after the apostles had been beaten in the presence of the council of Israel, “they left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name” (Acts 5:41).

So we should reject the fear of suffering and receive the favor of suffering.  That is a completely different mindset!

This generation of professing Christians seeks to run from shame as far and as fast as possible, as if it were a pure, unmixed evil! The apostles’ generation rejoiced that they had been considered worthy to receive the divine favor of suffering shame for the matchless name of the Lord Jesus Christ. May God grant that we see the glory that they saw—that we would be so satisfied by Christ that we would count it a privilege to meet the world’s shame if it means that we can put His glory on display.

Years after being flogged that day, Peter would write, “To the degree that you share the sufferings of Christ, keep on rejoicing,” and, “if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but to glorify God in this name” (1 Peter 4:13, 16).

We note too that “the believing” and “the suffering” were granted on behalf of Christ (to huper christou).  What Paul is saying is that just as Christ suffered at the hands of sinful men in order to procure their salvation (cf. 2:6-11), so also the Philippians now have an opportunity to suffer for their Lord.  A disciple is not above his master.  It is not that the Philippians are suffering simply because they are allied with the name of Christ.  It is much more intimate than that idea will allow (cf. Phil 3:10-11).  They are suffering for the one whom they now love and for the one whom they are waiting to return from heaven (3:20).

Here, as a further word of encouragement and motivation to live as citizens “worthy of the gospel,” Paul indicated that the Philippians share in the same sufferings with him — “engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now hear that I still have” (v. 30).  They and Paul together made up the heroic fellowship of the gospel (cf. 1:5), which meant that they shared in the same “conflict” ( agôn ) with Pa’ul.  Their conflict, whether in Philippi or Rome, was one.  What they saw Paul endure in Philippi (and what they themselves were enduring in Philippi) along with what they heard he was enduring in Rome was all part of the apostolic agôn.

Paul’s point was that he and the Philippians were all recipients of grace as they had been given the gifts of salvation and suffering.  Their mutual agôn (from which we get “agony”) was a testimony to the grace of God.  Listen to John Calvin’s passionate application:

Oh, if this conviction were fixed in our minds, that persecutions are to be reckoned among God’s benefits, what progress would be made in the doctrine of godliness!  And yet, what is more certain than that it is the highest honour of the Divine grace, that we suffer for His name either reproach, or imprisonment, or miseries, or tortures, or even death, for in that case He decorates us with His insignia.  But more will be found who will order God and His gifts to be gone, rather than embrace the cross readily when it is offered to them.  Woe, then, to our stupidity! (John Calvin, The Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians, Calvin’s Commentaries, trans. T. H. L. Parker (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1965), p. 243) .

The understanding that suffering and salvation are both gifts of grace is essential to discipleship and perseverance.

Faith and persecution are often a package gift; when the flame of faith shines in a dark place, the darkness will try to douse that faith and snuff it out.  God writes a persecution story for his church so that mankind will be pointed back to the greatest story: the death and resurrection of Christ.  Persecution is a parable that puts the death and resurrection of Christ on display again and again and again and again.  Persecutors try to kill the faith of believers like they tried to kill Jesus, but faith rises just like Jesus did.  When persecutors try everything in their power to kill faith, but faith refuses to die, resurrection power is on display.  Opponents should fear, because they are actually fighting God, and they will lose.

God’s power preserves our faith.  He who began the good work in us will bring it to completion at the day of Christ (Phil. 1:6), and nothing in all creation will be able to separate believers from his almighty grip of grace.

See, suffering for Christ’s sake provides us a wonderful opportunity to put the worth and sufficiency of Christ on display.  It gives us an opportunity to magnify Him by being more satisfied in Him than by all that this world can offer and by all that death can take.

To illustrate, the third verse of that great hymn, On Christ the Solid Rock I Stand, says, “His oath, His covenant, His blood / support me in the whelming flood. / When all around my soul gives way, / He then is all my hope and stay.”

Commenting on that line, John Piper writes, “If we hold fast to Him ‘when all around our soul gives way,’ then we show that He is more to be desired than all we have lost” (Desiring God, 266).  And magnifying Christ—showing that He is more to be desired than all that we could lose—is the very thing that we were created to do (Isa 43:7; Phil 1:20–21).  If we understand this, it’s clear to see that it’s a divine gift to suffer on behalf of Christ.  It is a gracious gift of unmerited favor to be given the privilege of being prisms to reflect the glory and sufficiency of Jesus to the world.

Another great hymn says, “Heav’nly peace, divinest comfort / Here by faith in Him to dwell / For I know whate’er befall me / Jesus doeth all things well.”  Where do heavenly peace and divine comfort come from?  From the knowledge that whatever happens, Jesus the sovereign Lord is doing it, and He doeth all things well.

So when suffering comes—and it’s coming, if it’s not already here—don’t try to save God from His sovereignty, and in the same breath steal your heavenly peace and divinest comfort. Instead, count that suffering as a gracious gift, direct from the loving hand of your Father, of the opportunity to magnify the worth of Christ in your response to it. Then, you would suffer in a manner worthy of the Gospel.

Those of us who grew up here in the south may not be aware of our southern drawl.  Back in college mine was still quite pronounced, as words like Bible were (properly) pronounced “biiiible.”  It was quite obvious, when we would travel up north, that I was “not from around here.”  I didn’t quite fit in.

Paul expressed this very idea, although on a deeper and more significant level, to the Philippians, where he said…

27 Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel, 28 and not frightened in anything by your opponents. This is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation, and that from God. 29 For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake, 30 engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now hear that I still have.

Compare this to Philippians 3:20 where Paul says “But our citizenship is in heaven…”

Verse 27 starts out with a command…

“Only let your manner of life as citizens be worthy of the gospel of Christ.”  The Greek verb is politeuesthai , which shares its root with the cognate noun polis or “city” as well as with another noun, politeuma , which is translated “citizenship” in 3:20 (“But our citizenship is in heaven”).  So here in verse 27 it means “live as citizens.”

Paul is telling the Philippians that, in the words of Jesus, we are “in the world, but not of the world.”  We are citizens, but we are citizens of another land, a heavenly kingdom…and we are to live like it.

Philippi prided itself on being a Roman colony, offering the honor and privilege of Roman citizenship.  A colony was a body of people living in new territory but retaining ties to a parent state.  As a Roman colony, they were to reflect and expand the values and culture of Rome.

Remember, Philippi was a Roman colony, and the people there took pride in their Roman citizenship. They lived in accordance with Roman customs. Even though they were about 800 miles from Rome, they were not under any regional authority, but answered directly to Rome, governed by Roman laws. They were a Roman outpost. These colonists lived differently than the barbarians surrounding them because they were citizens of a different country.

But Paul tells the Philippians that they have a different citizenship.  They belong to a different kingdom.

Paul reminds the congregation that they should look to Christ, not Caesar, for their model of behavior, since their primary allegiance is to God and his kingdom.

Gordon Fee adds, “As Philippi was a colony of Rome in Macedonia, so the church was a ‘colony of heaven’ in Philippi, whose members were to live as its citizens in Philippi” (Gordon D. Fee, Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995), p. 162).

Paul could not have more carefully chosen and crafted his words to impress and encourage his Philippian brothers and sisters as they struggled in that self-consciously prideful, elitist little Roman colony that was so preoccupied with the coveted citizenship of Rome. Here Paul challenges his beloved Philippians with a “counter-citizenship whose capital and seat of power are not earthly but heavenly, whose guarantor is not Nero but Christ” (Markus Bockmuehl, The Epistle to the Philippians , Black’s New Testament Commentary (London: A & C Black Limited, 1998), p. 98).

The town of Philippi was enjoying the personal patronage and benefactions of Lord (Kyrios) Caesar, but the Philippians were subjects of the one who alone is Kyrios and to whom every knee (including “Lord” Nero’s) will bow. (Fee, Paul’s Letter to the Philippians , p. 157)

The evidence of living well as citizens of Heaven is a life “worthy of the gospel of Christ.” Paul’s emphasis on worthiness can be heard in the original’s word order: “Only worthy of the gospel of Christ live as citizens.”

The phrase “worthy of the gospel” requires some explanation.  “Worthy” signifies something that fits with the weight and worth of its standard of reference.  Paul elsewhere speaks of living worthy of the Christian “calling” (Eph. 4:1), of “the Lord” (Col. 1:10), or of “God” (1 Thess. 2:12).

In this passage, the standard of reference or measuring rod is the gospel.  In this sense, the closest parallel is Galatians 2:14 and its reference to “conduct” that is or is not “in step with the truth of the gospel.”  The gospel is the “gold standard” for the Christian life, and as such its worth and weight govern the Christian life.  The gospel becomes the shared story that unites all Christians and provides a reference point for all of their thinking and living. D. A. Carson says it well: “Conduct worthy of the gospel is above all conduct that promotes the gospel” (Carson, Basics for Believers, 55).

For Paul, the gospel was primary.  He rejoiced in their partnership in the gospel (1:4, 5) and that it was preached, even from not-entirely-altruistic motives (1:14-15).  Paul’s heart was for gospel progress, no matter the cost to himself.

The gospel is the indicative, it tells us what Christ has done for us.  That is followed by the imperative, be His colony and live out His values, in Philippi, in Mena, wherever you live.

The first implication of this text is that sanctification is the necessary fruit of justification. The one who has been justified by grace through faith in Christ alone—the one who has been declared righteous in his position before God—will grow and progress with respect to practical righteousness in his life.

But the second implication of this text (as with many other NT texts) is that the indicative must precede the imperative—justification must precede sanctification.  Paul doesn’t just jump into practical application, or a 12-step program.  Rather, our right behavior flows out of being graciously saved by Jesus Christ.

The Scottish Puritan Henry Scougal, in his book, The Life of God in the Soul of Man, articulated this reality very well. He wrote,

“The love which a pious man bears to God and goodness is not so much by virtue of a command enjoining him so to do, as by a new nature instructing and prompting him to do it; nor doth he pay his devotions as an unavoidable tribute, only to appease the Divine justice, or quiet his clamorous conscience; but those religious exercises are the proper emanations of the Divine life, the natural employments of the new-born soul.” (38–39)

You see, if the Divine life has been sown within you by the Spirit’s regeneration of your heart, the fight for obedience is simply acting in line with your new nature. So when Paul commands us to live our lives in a manner worthy of the Gospel, he is showing us that our efforts in sanctification are fueled by Gospel grace.

There is a wonderful little rhyme that masterfully captures the beauty of divine grace in sanctification. We’re unsure of the author but it’s often attributed to John Bunyan:

‘Run, John, run!’ the Law demands,
But gives me neither feet nor hands.
Far better news the Gospel brings,
For it bids me fly, and gives me wings!”

Now, as Kent Hughes reminds us:

This gospel-first ethic was what Paul enjoined of the Philippians.  There had never ever been a congenial environment for the gospel in Philippi.  The little Roman polis declared war on Paul and his converts from day one when the Roman lictors beat him and Silas (cf. Acts 16:22).

The battle was cosmic.  Those believers, as citizens of Heaven and subjects of the Lord of lords, were engaged in mortal combat.  And their weapons were the good news — the preaching of Christ — and lives that proved “worthy of the gospel.”

Now, the language of these verses indicates that we are to live our lives as if we are in a battle—standing firm, striving side by side, not frightened, suffering, engaged in conflict.

For far too long the American church has acted like life is a playground instead of a battleground.  God has not saved us so that we can live comfortably, happily, and self-centeredly in suburbia.  He has conscripted us into His army.  We have a mission given to us by our Commander-in-Chief, to take the message of His salvation and Lordship into enemy territory, to win captives from the forces of darkness.

As in every war, our mission requires us to be combat ready and to struggle to win.  If we forget our mission and get caught up with our own comfort, we will be quick to desert the cause when the enemy attacks.

These verses are calling the Philippians, and you and me, to recognize that we are part of another kingdom, with loyalties and allegiances to another king, and that is going to put us at odds with this world.

Many commentators believe that verse 27 is the theme verse of this epistle, expressing the idea that we are to live our lives worthy of the gospel.  The rest of the epistle spells this idea out.

This verse is the thesis statement of the entire letter; it is the first imperative of the letter, and all subsequent imperatives serve to flesh out what it means to behave as citizens worthy of the gospel.  The adverb “only” adds a note of sharp singularity so that the command is even more of a focal point.

This is the message that Paul has been working toward and will support throughout the remainder of this letter.

This little phrase is the very heart of Paul’s letter to the Philippians. Paul’s preeminent concern in his letter to the church of Philippi is that they would bring the practice of their lives into conformity with the position they enjoy as sharers in the Gospel of Christ.

When we determine to be loyal to Christ as King and the good news of His victory over sin and death, it will bring us into conflict with the world around us.

Paul wanted to be confident that they would stand firm and strive together…

so that whether I come and see you or am absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel,

The reality is, we will have troubles in this world; the world will hate us because of our love for Christ.  Jesus said in John 15

18 “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.

And in John 16:33 Jesus tells us

In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”

Kent Hughes explains the cultural context:

The Philippians’ commitment to Jesus Christ as Lord was a threat to the civic-minded patriotic Romans who ran Philippi.  The Philippians’ allegiance to another “Lord” than Caesar bordered on treason as it challenged the political establishment.  At times Christians were tarred with the (amazing to us!) opprobrium “atheist” because their loyalty to Christ challenged the divinity of Caesar.

The Roman citizens of Philippi, who customarily honored the emperor at every public gathering, pressured the church to conform.  Christians were a political embarrassment with their Kyrios Jesus.  And more, Christians who had the temerity to declare with Paul that their citizenship was in Heaven (cf. 3:20) were thought to be “un-Roman” and thus enemies to public order.

Because of this there was widespread persecution in Philippi and throughout the other churches of Macedonia, about whom we have these sound bites: “a severe test of affliction . . . extreme poverty” (2 Corinthians 8:2), “in much affliction” (1 Thessalonians 1:6), “your steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring” (2 Thessalonians 1:4).  Heavenly citizenship worthy of the gospel was costly and demanding.

1:27b–28 Paul follows the command of verse 27a with a purpose clause signified in the ESV by “so that” (hina). The previous command serves as a defining purpose for any situation in which the Philippian believers find themselves. Regardless of whether Paul comes to see them or remains absent, this command to behave as worthy citizens will not change.

Our responsibility is to “stand firm.”  Actually, “standing firm” is a in a purpose clause, defining why we are to live our lives as citizens worthy of the gospel.  We are in a war.  We have to stand our ground, like Paul told the Ephesians, “Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm” (Eph. 6:13).

The opposite of standing is “falling away,” which is why Jesus told his disciples about the opposition they would be facing (John 16:1).  Like a good soldier, we are to hold our ground at all costs.

We are to do this “in one spirit, with one mind.”  These two phrases modify both the action of standing and the action of striving side by side later in verse 27.  Likely they are both referring to the deep sense of community they had experienced together (although Gordon Fee makes a strong case for “spirit” as Holy Spirit).  We stand and strive best when we do it alongside our brothers and sisters in Christ.  The reality is, we need each other.

We stand in God’s strength, yes; but we also need to stand arm in arm with our fellow believers.

“Striving side by side” is the teamwork vocabulary of athletes or soldiers.  It is a participle defining how we stand firm.  We cannot stand firm without our brothers.

It is at the heart of winning teams.  Stephen Ambrose in his book Comrades , which includes the story of Lewis and Clark, describes this as the secret of their epic accomplishments: “What Lewis and Clark had done, first of all, was to demonstrate that there is nothing that men cannot do if they get themselves together and act as a team” (Stephen E. Ambrose, Comrades (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999), pp. 105, 106) .

A bad example was the U.S. Olympic basketball team in the 2004 Olympics.  There were plenty of individual stars, but they did not play together as a team.

The importance of working together is also illustrated in nature.

“One of the largest, strongest horses in the world is the Belgian draft horse. Competitions are held to see which horse can pull the most and one Belgian can pull 8,000 pounds.  The weird thing is if you put two Belgian horses in the harness who are strangers to each other, together they can pull 20,000 – 24,000 pounds.  Two can pull not twice as much as one but three times as much as one. This example represents the power of synergy.  However, if the two horses are raised and trained together they learn to pull and think as one.  The trained, and therefore unified, pair can pull 30,000 – 32,000 pounds, almost four times as much as a single horse” (https://jtweav.com/synergy-belgian-draft-horse/)

Notice that it is not just the fact of being yoked together that makes the difference, but when they are “raised and trained together they learn to pull and think as one.”

Paul will continue to emphasize this “same mindedness” into Philippians 2, where he says…

2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

The imagery of striving side by side calls to mind Roman soldiers marching forward in lock-step for the advancement of the empire.  Teamwork makes us powerful.

The only other place in the NT where the rare verb “strive side by side” occurs is Philippians 4:3, where Paul’s coworkers have labored side by side in the gospel. They are striving for the progress of the gospel, expressed as faith originating with or produced by the gospel.

So, live worthy of the gospel so that you can stand firm for the gospel, by locking arms with your brothers and sisters in Christ, fighting against the enemy and not each other.