Joy in Imitating Christ: Philippians 2:3-11 • Geoff Bradford

Before I get started tonight, I do want to give a thanks, a shout out, to Burton and Emily Morris who have worked really hard over the last weeks to provide this recording in such high quality and for Danny Yancey who's providing all the audio for this. I've never wanted to be a televangelist. This has surely cured me of any desires or thoughts about that, but I do want to thank them for the way that they have labored to make this such a great production for our church. And I want to encourage you to thank them as well.

I'm gonna read today from Philippians 2, verses 3 through 11.

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility, count others more significant than yourselves. Each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant. Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God has highly exalted Him and bestowed on Him the name that is above every name, So that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God, the father. — Philippians 2:3-11

This is the word of God. Thanks be to God.

You know, do you remember the first Cars movie? It's one of my favorite of the Pixar films, the one with Lightning McQueen and Sally and Mater. Maybe it's my favorite because of the relationship between Doc Hudson, the Hudson Hornet, and the young upstart arrogant race car, Lightning McQueen. And if you remember, in order to teach Lightning a lesson, Doc takes him out to a dirt track and challenges him to a race. And you remember what happens—Doc smokes Lightning over and over again. Lightning keeps doing what he normally does on a paved track and finds himself spinning out. He's not able even to turn left and complete a lap. And he's astonished he can't make a left turn.

And Doc explains to him that there's some logic to this that's gonna feel opposite. So this is how the conversation goes. Doc says it this way: "I'll put it simple. If you're gonna going hard enough left, you'll find yourself turning right."

And Lightning, in his sarcastic tone says, "Oh, right. That makes perfect sense. Turn right to go left. Oh, yes. Thank you. Or should I say, no. No. Thank you. Because in opposite world, maybe that really means thank you."

Now Doc is right. No pun intended, but Doc is right about this. What he's describing is a phenomenon called drifting and the action of a driver to counter steer. That is, when your car is sliding into a left turn, the front of the car—the right side of your car is leading—and you have to counter steer in order to make up for it. And so you turn right to go left.

And I think that Paul's words here in Philippians 2 have that same kind of upside down logic to them, that same feel of "turn right to go left," up is down, in is out. His logic in here feels absolutely backwards.

And here's his big point that we're going to look at today. Paul was saying, look at Jesus, and for those of us that want to follow Jesus, the way to be exalted is to be humbled. The way to be brought up is to go in descent.

You know, here's my outline for today. And it's gonna again feel like "turn right to go left." But here are the three Ps: a pattern, a promise, and a praise. Pattern, a promise, and a praise.

The Pattern

First, the pattern. Now the word pattern doesn't appear anywhere in this passage. And yet I think it's really helpful for us to think about this. When I was a kid, my mom used to take me with her to the mall and she would go to this fabric store where she would look through patterns. And she'd pick one out that she wanted to make and bring it home and she'd pull it out and inside were these paper cutouts. And if you arranged all the paper cutouts and then pinned them onto the fabric and then cut out the fabric and followed all the directions, that would make a piece of clothing. That would make a dress or a skirt or a shirt. If you follow the pattern and put it together the right way, it makes what you want.

And in this passage, Paul is directing us to look at Jesus. He's looking at the life of Jesus and Jesus as a pattern for us to imitate, for us to follow—to follow Christ in the pattern of his humility, particularly in his humble love. Now, the pattern he holds up for us is one that feels opposite. It's gonna feel in every way against what we like and what we desire, what we dream about. It's going to feel like "turn right to go left."

So look with me at verses 3 through 4.

Paul is describing here how we normally operate in this world, how we normally operate in our relationships. And you see the words he uses to describe this. He says rivalry and conceit. Another translation, the NIV says, selfish ambition and vain conceit. I like particularly how Eugene Peterson in his paraphrase, The Message puts it: "Obsessed with getting your own advantage." I mean, that perfectly describes life in this world—obsessed with getting your own advantage.

He goes on to talk about not looking to your own interests, but the interests of others. And again, Peterson says this is how life in this world looks: "Don't push your way to the top. Don't sweet talk your way to the front." Man, that is how life works, isn't it? That's life in this world.

Do you remember the college acceptance scandal of 2019? That may feel like a really long time ago right now, but last year, one of the big news stories was the uncovering of this complex criminal conspiracy to influence undergraduate admissions at top-level schools. Particularly, what was uncovered was a plot to help students get into schools that had been out of reach. Over 50 people were charged with participating in this scheme. They included a couple of high-profile celebrities, some coaches, prominent companies, venture capital firms. A lot of people were indicted in this.

And I think what was funny about that was that while we were scandalized by that news, I'm not sure that anyone was actually all that surprised. Why? Because obsessed with getting your own advantage, talking your way to the front, pushing to the front of the line—that's life in this world. That's where we live.

I know some of you parents have been sequestered with kids for eight weeks now, and you probably have lots of examples of being obsessed with getting your own way, your own advantage. You may have some examples, current examples within your family of pushing to the front. You may have that just from this, because this is what we're like in our feral, naturalized state—every person.

And it's into this very situation that Paul speaks of this pattern of Jesus—the pattern of Jesus where ascending is actually really descending. Ascending, going, getting your own advantage is actually descending.

The Paradox of Descent and Ascent

In G.K. Chesterton's book The Ball and the Cross, there are two men having a conversation. Turnbull and Highlander are discussing the difference between Jesus and Satan. Here's how the conversation goes. Turnbull asks the question: "What's the difference between Christ and Satan?"

"It's quite simple," the highlander replied. "Christ descended into hell. Satan fell into it."

"Does it make much difference?" asked Turnbull.

"It makes all the difference in the world," said the highlander. "One of them wanted to ascend and instead descended. The other wanted to descend and by doing so ascended."

Now, what is he describing? He's describing the difference between Satan and Christ, really all of us in Christ. What we want in life is to get up above everybody else, to ascend. And what we do in doing so is we end up descending. We end up becoming more base and more primitive in the way we act, more foolish. But Jesus—we're going to see this in this passage—Jesus descended. And as a result, he ascended. This is sort of down is up, up is down.

This is what Paul vividly shows us in verses six through nine, the person of Christ. The whole problem is we want to elevate ourselves and we end up becoming less than what we're supposed to be. This is what humans have always wanted to do since the garden: put ourselves in the place of God, put ourselves above others. But Jesus, Jesus sought to humble himself. What kind of God does this? What kind of God humbles himself for his enemies, gives up his throne? What kind of God descends for the sake of humans who are trying to get above him? Only Jesus.

I mean, Jesus is like this. Listen to these words again. I'm going to read this again, verses six through nine. And I want you to picture like a staircase going down because with each line, it's like we're taking a step down, watching Jesus get lower and lower and lower down the staircase as he descends.

Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but he emptied himself taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, He humbled Himself becoming obedient to death, even death on the cross. — Philippians 2:6-8

Now you trace the stairway down. See, Paul first shows us that Jesus lowered Himself by becoming human. In the passage here, it says "emptied himself." That's actually a Greek phrase, kenosis. And it doesn't mean that Jesus ceased to be divine anymore, that he gave that up. It doesn't mean he divested himself somehow of his attributes. Rather, it's an idiom.

It means that he made himself nothing. He actively renounced his rights and his place and his privilege. The great preacher, Charles Spurgeon said it this way: Jesus's great glory is that he gave up his glory.

And then take another step down. Jesus, who was in the form of God, takes on the form of a servant. And a better translation for that is slave. No rights, no ability to choose for himself anything. Jesus makes himself a slave. He gives up all his rights.

Another famous preacher, B.B. Warfield, in a sermon called "Imitating the Incarnation" put it this way. He said, "Christ did not cultivate himself, even his divine self. He took no account of self. He became a person of no reputation. He was led by his love for others into the world, and he forgot himself and the needs of others to sacrifice himself on the altar of sympathy."

Why would Jesus do that? And the answer is this: it's only because there was something more precious to him, and that's you and that's me.

The Driving Force: Love, Not Humility

See, this isn't about Jesus becoming humble for the sake of being humble. This is not an example for us of Jesus just becoming humility par excellence. A couple of years ago, I remember reading this quote by Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Now some of you don't know who that is. Mother Teresa was very famous for giving up a life of ease and comfort to serve among the poorest of the poor in Calcutta, India. And she had these words about how you become humble:

Speak as little as possible of yourself. Mind your own business. Not want to manage other people's affairs. Avoid curiosity. Accept contradictions and correction cheerfully. Pass over the mistakes of others. Accept insults and injuries. Accept being slighted, forgotten, and disliked. Be kind and gentle even under provocation. Never stand on one's dignity. Choose always the hardest place.

Now, yeah, that's humility. But that's not really what's in view here. Jesus is not choosing humility for the sake of humility. What is he after? What's driving Jesus down the staircase? It's his love. It's his love.

Philippians 2 is not about Jesus becoming humble. It's about Jesus emptying himself for love. Look at this: he humbles himself for love. He empties himself for love. He took on the form of a slave for love. He went to the cross for love. This is the pathway of love. Jesus walked the pathway of love for the rescue of sinners, for the rescue of lost people like me.

I mean, we can truly say that in humility, he counted others more significant than himself. We can honestly say that Jesus looked not only to his own interests, but to the interests of others. The final and ultimate act of looking out for my interests, looking out for your interests is the cross itself. He humbled himself by being obedient to the point of death. And I like how this phrase says, "even death on a cross." It's like Paul is saying, let me just stick it in your face. It's that low. It's that far down that Jesus emptied himself.

This is the stairway of love. This is Jesus's descent for love, and this is the calling for us. This is the pattern that Paul lays out and says, "This is what it means to follow him, to be a Christian, to imitate this in our relationships."

Simone Weil said that the one indispensable and often overlooked requirement for resurrection life, for the Jesus life, is death. That is a hard quote. That's something that each of us runs away from—dying to self. But it's the calling for all of us as Jesus followers: not just to know about Jesus, but to embody the story of Jesus in our lives. And in doing so, we begin to look like him.

In other words, we're called to walk down the same staircase for love for others. This is the Christian calling. In humility, count others more important than yourself. Look not only to your own interests, but to the interests of others.

And let's just be honest. This is counter-cultural, but it's way more than this. It's counter to my self-interest. It's counter to my desires. It's counter to my instincts. Everything about me wants life to be about me. And this calling of death, following the stairs, going down the stairs—it is as crazy as Duck Hudson saying, "Hey, you know what? Turn right to go left." It sounds just as backwards. But you only ascend if you descend. Resurrection only follows death.

Now we know what this feels like, don't we? This is the way of love, but it is so hard. Can I give you some scenarios to think about? What about apologizing? Do you like to apologize? I think I would rather have my arm cut off most of the time. I don't like to apologize. It is hard. It is difficult. You have to sit in it and lower yourself.

What about not being defensive? I mean, so difficult. Have you ever had somebody say, you're being defensive? And you're like, no. No. I'm not. And automatically, you're already there. And not being defensive is so difficult. It requires an inward lowering, an inward descent. What about serving other people, cleaning up after other people and not getting credit, not highlighting it, not calling attention to it in any way, not dropping a hint that somebody should have noticed? I mean, it feels like death to keep your mouth closed. What about overlooking an offense? What about offering forgiveness? These things call us into such a hard place for us. And yet this is the downward path.

I'll bet in your daily life, even in your COVID nineteen daily life, you have opportunities all the time to follow the Jesus path, to go down that staircase, to lay aside your rights and privileges for the sake of loving others. Again, here's how B. B. Warfield describes the high calling of self sacrifice. He says, self sacrificing love means not indifference to our times and our fellows, it means absorption in them. It means forgetfulness of self in others. It means entering into other people's hopes and fears, longings, and despairs. In other words, we take no account of ourselves. We freely give ourselves to others. And we shall find, when we do so, in turn the saying true of Jesus also, wherefore also God hath highly exalted Him. See, as Warfield says, the path to self sacrifice is actually the path to glory.

The Good News

Now, if you are choking at this point in the sermon, I understand. If you are struggling, I have good news for you. If you're saying, but I can't do that. I have good news for you. And this is so important. This is maybe the most important thing I'm going to say today. So please tune back in right now.

If I just preached this sermon and said, hey, Jesus is your example. Strive to be like him. Walk down the pathway. Hope you do well. How is that going to leave you today? I think it's going to leave you crushed, not encouraged. But I have better news to share with you. I have better news from this passage. We're going to look at it here right in verse five.

You know, our family has been watching the documentary on Michael Jordan and the 1998 Chicago Bulls in their sixth time up for winning the NBA finals. And it's called The Last Dance. And the series reminded me of a famous Gatorade commercial that took place during that time. They actually show it as part of the documentary. And it was called Be Like Mike. And it featured all these kids and they're sort of skipping down the street and they all have basketballs and they're with Michael Jordan. And then they're all drinking Gatorade with Michael Jordan. And the ad had this catchy little tune to it, If I Could Be Like Mike. But the ad was a little weird if you think about it. I mean, the whole series, The Last Dance, highlights the fact that Jordan was the greatest person to ever play the game of basketball. Greatest player to ever play the game. And so the whole premise of that commercial kind of falls apart if you think about it for more than a second. I mean, is it really true that this overweight middle aged man could really be like Mike? And that's what this passage can feel like, can't it? Like, I can't do that. You know, you can never just be like Jesus. You could never just do it with regard to Philippians two.

Instead, this passage gives us this incredible promise. This incredible place of hope, this incredible well to draw from or vault to draw upon of good news and resource for people like me and like you. People who, as I walk through what is the downward pathway, you're like, I can never do that. And yet this is the thing I want you to see. Verse five, verse five. What does Paul say here in verse five?

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus. — Philippians 2:5

Which is yours in Christ Jesus. This is really key. The mind to which you must conform the pattern of life to, you have it. You already have it. You already have it if you're in Christ. You have what it takes in Jesus in the mind of Christ already given to you to be able to walk on this road, to be able to walk down the stairs. Look at verse five. See, the mindset is ours. We already have it by virtue of our union with Jesus.

Union with Jesus is something I've hit on every time we've walked through this. In this book about union with Christ means all that Christ did, his perfect obedience for the father, his perfect love for his neighbor, his dying and rising from the dead because of faith, because of our trust in Jesus becomes ours just as much as if you had accomplished it yourself. And this is what Paul is saying. This is what you already have in Christ. You have the mind of Christ. And this is a promise that we ought to take great comfort in.

I can't look at this pattern without seeing all my failures, all the places where I'm condemned for not being able to do this. Paul says, no, no, no—look, the mind that you have, it's already yours in Christ. He is at work in you to will and to do for his good pleasure. You are in the process of being transformed by that mind. You are being transformed from glory to glory into his image by the Lord, who is the spirit that is at work in you now.

See, this is the renovation of your life that happens because you are in Christ. It is impossible for you over time to remain just the same as you always are if you are in Christ. His spirit is at work in you and on you.

But I have to say this: there is no Christianity, there is no godliness, there is no obedience to Christ that pleases God outside of being in Christ. You can't look at Philippians 2 and say, "This is the way I'm finally going to get in with the Father." That is not how this works. Your religion, your morality, your goodness is as damnable to you as your sin if it's apart from Christ, if it's not a fruit of your faith in Jesus, if it doesn't come out of your resting and trusting in him.

So let me call you: If you have never trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ, the primary calling for you is to be in him, rest in him, find yourself in him. You access union with the Savior by simple faith, by trusting in him as your substitute who died in your place, who fulfilled all that God requires. He obeyed for you. He paid for everything for you. And so you can rest in him.

See, the mind of Christ, though, for the believer is the promise of power to be able to walk the way of Jesus in self-sacrificial love. So how do you access it?

Accessing the Mind of Christ

Well, James is not preaching this week, so I'm going to give a Star Wars reference for him. The last two Star Wars films—The Rise of Skywalker and The Last Jedi—focus on the relationship between two main characters, Kylo Ren and Rey. Kylo Ren is like the bad Jedi kind of going over to the dark side, and Rey is following the path of the good Jedis. The thing is, though, that there's a deep connection between them. Somehow the two are joined by their minds. I'm not going to spoil all the movies for you, but I do want to highlight this—it's pretty obvious in all the commercials even. They're connected in some way. What gets revealed over the course of the films is that they're connected by their lineage. They have the same storyline, the same background, and somehow then they're able to access one another's minds, even see what the other person is seeing, even participate in what the other person is doing.

See, in the same way, if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are connected to the mind of Christ. Why? Because if you're in Christ, you have the same storyline. All that is his is yours by virtue of faith. You have the same lineage. You've been adopted by God into his family, and nothing can change that. All of that is yours, and therefore, you are able to participate with Christ. You're able to, in some ways, see what he sees, and he is able to work through you to do different things than you were able to do before.

If you are in him, here's the question: Are you accessing him? Are you taking time personally and privately and regularly to nurture this connection that you have with the Lord Jesus Christ? You have the mind of Christ. It's yours by union. And yet Paul has to call them to access it. He tells them, "Have this mind, which is yours." You have to do something to develop this in your life.

This is the power for self-sacrificial love. So do you want to grow and be a person who loves well? Do you want to grow in being other-centered and being less self-centered?

Meditating on the Jesus Path

Here's how I'm going to call you to do this: Meditate on the Jesus path. I want to encourage you to come and sit in this passage. Maybe memorize this passage. Sit with this. Really sit with it. Do you know that verses 5 through 11 are regarded by most scholars as a song? Paul wrote this hymn. He was so taken with the downward pathway of Jesus, the descent of Jesus, that he was inspired to create art out of this—poetry, music. And I think that's really noteworthy for us because singing is a form of meditation.

Maybe you don't know what I'm talking about when I talk about meditation. In the Hebrew, the word for meditate is the same word that's used for an animal gnawing on a bone. You know how an animal gnaws on a bone? It's not a bite and you're done. It's chewing and chewing and chewing to get every last little morsel, every last little ounce out of that.

This is what it means for us to meditate, to sit in this passage and to gnaw on this—the descent of Jesus down in love for us that will bear fruit in your life. You want traction in this area of your life? Lean into the mind of Christ, meditate on what he's done for you. Sit in this passage so that this may lead you to love.

So tonight we've talked about the pattern. We've talked about the promise, and finally a praise. A praise to shout. This is verses 10 through 11. The song ends with praise, and it's no accident.

All this, every knee shall bow and every tongue confesses—that is not just Paul getting carried away. That's not Paul just waxing eloquent. No, Jesus' descent in love results in glory and praise and worship for Jesus.

And you know what? That is true in our lives as well. Our following Jesus down the staircase of love, down the pathway of love for other people, also can result in worship and glory and praise for King Jesus.

At the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess to the glory of God the Father.

Living Out Descending Love

Here's some ways I want you to think about this by way of application. What would it look like if the descending love of Jesus really got inside of us? We would be better apologizers. We can apologize and not be defensive because we're free. And Jesus—he would get the praise.

What would it look like if the descending love of Jesus really got inside of us? We wouldn't have to play this PR advertising game with people all the time to get their approval. We would be able just to be with them and to think about them. And Jesus would get the praise.

What would it look like if the descending love of Jesus really got inside of us, really got ahold of us? We would pursue people who are actually draining for us and maybe at times hard to be with because we're so focused on others and not self. And Jesus would get the praise, the glory.

What would it look like if the descending love of God really got inside of us? We could give generously to other people without keeping a mental calculation of how much we're getting back in the relationship. And Jesus would get the praise.

What would it look like if the descending love of Jesus really got inside of us? We could welcome input and correction into our lives. We could go to a spouse or a best friend and say, "I need you to tell me about me. What's it like to be with me?" You know what? Jesus would get the praise.

What would it look like if the descending love of Jesus really got inside of us? We can laugh at ourselves—at our pride, at our arrogance, at all the ways we're so sensitive and so touchy. Guess what? Jesus would get the praise.

And every opportunity to be defensive, to be touchy, to be argumentative, to have to ask for forgiveness, to offer forgiveness, to relate to people that we don't always like—in each of those moments we have a choice. People of God, you have a choice.

And just like Doc Hudson says to Lightning McQueen, "Turn left to go right." In the gospel, it's the same. Turn left to go right. Turn left to go right. And Jesus will get the praise.

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.