“What goes up, must come down”
Philippians 2:1-11
One of the truths of Scripture that we often struggle with even though it is absolutely true, is that Jesus was both God and man at the same time. It is not a matter of which one He was; He was both. 100% God. 100% man. So when the four gospel writers set out to write down a brief story of his life, you will find that each one of them tends to focus on a different aspect. For instance:
• John focuses on Jesus as God
• Matthew focuses on Jesus the Messiah. Prophecy.
• Mark focuses on Jesus the servant.
• Luke the doctor focuses on Jesus the man. His humanity.
It has been observed that at the end of someone’s life, they are seen in different ways…
• A preacher sees them at their best
• a lawyer sees them at their worst
• a doctor sees them as they truly are
Luke was a doctor. And he focuses on Jesus the man. And when we read the gospel of Luke, we start asking, how could any man possess the qualities that Jesus did? Under constant fire, yet he was always patient... Ridiculed on so many occasions but constantly showed grace. Trapped on so many occasions but he always kept his cool. How does this happen? It’s called humility. Which leads us to one more question—of all the characteristics Jesus possessed, which one was the most Christ-like? What is the most Christ-like characteristic we can have?
• Somewhat immediately say it is love
• others might say it was patience
• I would tend to say it was his grace under fire
But as important as all of these are, when I read Matthew 11 and look at this verse I come to a different conclusion. Matthew 11:28-30. Do you see it? He says I am gentle and humble. In other words Jesus was unselfish. No pride whatsoever. Never bragging. He set I came to serve. He even washed the disciple’s feet. Probably the most unselfish act anyone could ever do.
• When a husband is unselfish, he puts aside his own desires and puts the needs of his family first.
• When a mother is unselfish she will often completely set her own agenda aside for the sake of her children.
• When an athlete is unselfish, he’s not concerned about what medals he might win; he’s concerned about the team.
• When a believer is unselfish, others are more important than we are. And pride simply does not exist.
Psychologists say be confident, assert yourself.
Materialism says, be selfish, please yourself.
Pride says, be superior, promote yourself.
Christ says be unselfish, humble yourself.
Now we know this, maybe not at first, but deep down inside we know that but you may be asking this question …..How in the world can I do that? I know I need to be unselfish but I’m just being honest because basically I’m kind of a selfish person. I mean if you asked me who the person is in life that matters the most to us many of us would say-hey you’re looking at him. It’s me.
So if you’re like me and you need to have it completely spelled out, Paul is about to do that.... Paul starts here in verse 2 with a plea for unity. Listen to what he says. Make my joy complete by being of the same mind. Paul is speaking of unity. Being of one heart. One mind. One purpose. And it is as though Paul is telling us, I am already really full of happiness but if you want to make it complete, if you want to really polish it off, then practice unity.
So what is unity? Well it does not mean that everyone has to agree on everything. Everyone in the church. Everyone in the family. Everyone in the workplace. Because not everyone is going to always agree. There will be disagreements. So there is a difference here in unity and uniformity. Uniformity usually means that someone has been pressured to feel a certain way or has been pressured to do a certain thing. Look at the word uniformity. It has in it the word uniform. In this case, when things are uniform we expect that people will dress alike, look-alike, sound alike, think alike and also act alike. It sounds great for a moment but is not healthy nor is it biblical. Unity does not come from the outside. Unity certainly does not come from outside pressure. Unity comes from within. From deep within.
Even though we are believers we will never see eye to eye on everything. We come from different families, we have different habits, different backgrounds; different education. Turn to the person next you and tell them hey, you’re different. Because we are. And that’s a good thing. But here’s this question again. How do we find unity when we are surrounded by so much difference? The key to this is finding harmony. Write this down. Harmony does not exist because everyone is the same. Harmony actually exists because everyone is different. Stay with me. You see we think of harmony means sameness. When three singers get together and they sing in harmony did you know they don’t all sing the same note? They sing three different notes. They sing the three notes of a chord. All different. But beautiful together. Let me show you what I mean.
PIANO
Play 3 notes that are the same ….this is unity
Play 3 notes in a chord…they are different, but they blend
So how do we do this? Here are three thoughts. Really three principles. (1) Never let selfishness or conceit be your motive. Important word there... Never. Paul says do nothing from selfishness or conceit. Nothing. That means that we must become as unselfish as possible. You know what a selfie is? If you use Facebook or some other form of social media you know it is when you post a picture of yourself. You can purchase what is called a selfie the stick which holds the camera steady and you can take it with you and basically film your whole life for everyone. Then you can put it on the Internet for everyone to see so that all your friends can tell you how attractive you are. What a great job you’re doing. You see it’s all about us. But let me tell you they are basically selfish. It’s like we’re saying, hey look at me! We want life to be all about us. And why? Because we carry around the mistaken idea that it’s all about us, we will somehow be happy. But that is not the case. Selfish people are some of the most unhappy people on earth. There is an interesting statistic I read this week. More people died in 2015 from taking selfies of themselves (while they were in dangerous situations) than (from shark) attacks. Never let selfishness or conceit be your motive.
(2) Always regard others as more important than yourself. When? Always. It is natural for us to put ourselves first. It is natural for us to look out for ourselves. In a situation where we are in danger and someone else is also we are probably going to win out. Paul is telling us that we must stop thinking less of others than we do ourselves. Stop comparing. Making constant comparisons only leads to further unhappiness. It is very unhealthy. Think about it. If, by comparison we think we are better than someone else…. If we think we
• look better
• dress better
• our time is more valuable
• what ever
Then we are basically setting ourselves up as the judge. As God. I get to decide. Because my opinion is the only one that really matters in life. On the other hand, if by comparison we think we’re not as good as someone else. For instance, we feel like…
• We are a lesser person
• we are not as smart
• we are not as attractive
• we are not as valuable
…. Then we are throwing away the idea of what it means to be created in the image of God. Because we are created in the image of God it means we can relate to him and he can relate to us. We are alike in that way. He can speak to us and we can speak to him.
Paul tells us here in verse five that we are to put on the very mind of Christ. Study the Scripture and learn how Jesus thinks and learn to think like he does. Learn to see people the way Jesus sees them. Learn to see through his eyes. Learn to serve like he serves. Paul said Jesus came and took on the form of a servant. He was the very nature of God. He is equal to God but he became the servant of God. In Matthew 20 Jesus called the disciples together and he said, verses 25-27. So if you want to go higher you have to first go lower if you want to rise up, you have to go down. You have to learn humility.
(3) Don’t limit your attention to your own personal interests. Include others.
Humility is not thinking less of yourself.
It is simply thinking of yourself less.
It does not mean that your needs, your goals, your life does not matter... It simply means that you put the needs of others ahead of yours. It’s called submission. It’s what Jesus did. Look again...He emptied himself. He took the form of a servant.
He was made in the likeness of humanity. He humbled himself by being obedient to death. He even accepted the fact that he would die a very painful death.
You think he realized all this ahead of time? Absolutely! Was he really aware of all that was being asked of him? Absolutely. But did he going with a negative attitude? Absolutely not. The hidden secret to a happy life here on earth is to develop an attitude of selflessness. Of complete being completely unselfish. People will tell you if you live like that people will take advantage of you. It may seem that people took advantage of Jesus but remember what the whole scripture tells us.
Hebrews 12:2 (HCSB)
2 keeping our eyes on Jesus, the source and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that lay before Him endured a cross and despised the shame and has sat down at the right hand of God’s throne.
Philippians 2:9-11
For this reason God highly exalted Him and gave Him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth—11 and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
You see there was reward waiting because of His faithfulness. One day every knee will bow, every tongue will confess. Who? Everybody. Even the atheist. Even the agnostic. Those who worship other gods will one day bow down.
When we were considering starting this church there were so many things we did not know…we simply knew that God was telling us to do it. But we had been through a trying situation and frankly felt a little beat up at the time if you know what I mean. Ever felt beat up? My most recent though was that maybe I was going to just throw in the towel and do something else. Just being honest.
A conference/retreat was being held here in Florida for pastors who were considering starting a new work. So I went. 3 days and it was excellent. It answered so many of my questions. On the final day of the meeting the leader said I need 3 volunteers for tonight’s worship service. There were about 100 of us there. He said I’ll take you, you and YOU. That last YOU was me. He said I need your help for tonight’s worship service. He asked us to stay for a moment and he told us all I need you to do is to bring a towel. I’m thinking are we going swimming? Did they forget to put towels in your room and you need one? What is this for? That night he taught on the topic of servanthood and humility. At the end of the service he said I need the 3 men I spoke to earlier. I want you to get down on your knees now and take your towel and I want you to crawl throughout the crowd and shine the shoes of every man here. So we did. It was humbling to see the least. But God spoke to me very clearly and said, “The next time you are thinking of throwing in the towel, instead pick up your towel and serve me.” And I did.
You may be thinking of doing the same today. God has not forgotten about you. He still cares about you. He loves you. He still Hs a plan. Follow it. Don’t drop it.
