Alright brethren, let's go to
Philippians chapter 2. It says in verse 5, let this mine
be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. who being in the form
of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made
himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant,
and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion
as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly
exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that
at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, for things in heaven
and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Now, from verse 6, where he says
he was in the form of God, equal with God, to verse 7, where it
says, he made himself of no reputation and took the form of a servant
in the likeness of men. There is a great distance, a
great distance from that highest height to the low that he came
down to. That contrast shows us how highly
Our Lord esteemed God His Father and His righteousness and His
justice. How highly He esteemed Him. That great coming down from that great height. And it also shows how highly
He esteemed God's elect, His brethren who He came to save.
That's how highly He esteemed them. He was at the highest high
and came to that low. Beholding his glory as God. That's what we're talking about
in the form of God. And you see that glory of him
as God. You contrast that with how he
made himself of no reputation, how he emptied himself. That shows how perfectly our
Redeemer looked on the things of God. It shows how perfectly
he looked on the things of his people rather than himself. How he looked on the things of
God rather than himself. How he esteemed God better than
himself and looked on the things of God rather than himself. How
he esteemed his brethren better than himself and looked on their
need more than his own. good, his own self. Now that
really, brethren, is the fulfillment of the law. He highly esteemed
God and he highly esteemed his brethren and he loved them in
such perfection that he emptied himself unto the death of the
cross. in submission to God. This is
the perfect righteous love of the law that is the fulfillment
of the law. He preferred the glory of God
and the good of his brethren rather than his own. So much that he was willing to
bear the sin of his people and the curse from God that we deserve. for God and for his brethren. That's the fulfillment of the
law in righteous love. Christ is the only one that ever
did this. He's the only one that ever fulfilled that love of the
law, that righteousness of the law in perfection. And that's
what it is. Sin is due to pride. Scripture really settles it and
sums it up, only by pride cometh contention. We can make our excuses
and blame it on this or that. If I'm contentious, there's only
one reason, it's only by pride. That's so of all of us. Only by pride cometh contention. Pride is why the devil fell from
heaven. Pride is how sin entered the
world and death by sin. And pride is at the heart of
all sin. You think about this. We just
spoke about His perfect love and how He totally denied Himself,
esteeming God and His brethren better than Himself, looking
on the things of God and the things of His brethren rather
than Himself. That's the perfection of love
we see in Christ. And we see it manifest most on
the cross. Well, the very opposite of that
is sin. And pride is at the heart of
all sin. All our sin is this. esteeming
ourselves better than God. And esteeming ourselves better
than our brethren. No matter what it is, no matter
what the sin is, that's what it is. It's looking on our own
things rather than the things of God. Looking on our own things
rather than the things of our brethren. And that's pride. Not only is at the heart of sin,
pride makes us react to sin by sinning, doing the exact same
thing. The exact same thing. Rather than trusting God, esteeming
ourselves better than God, and rather than looking on the need
of of the fallen, esteeming ourselves better. It's often how we respond
to sin, in pride. It's just, it is what our sin
nature is, is pride. But Christ is perfect love. He
is perfect love. He's the righteousness of the
law who fulfilled all righteousness and made his people the righteousness
of God in him. The law has one table toward
God and one table toward man. Let's think about it this way.
In perfect love, Christ esteemed God better than himself. In everything
he did in coming down all the way to the death of the cross,
what we see in him is him fulfilling that first table of the law toward
God, esteeming God better than himself. And by the same token,
coming down and everything he did beginning to the end, we
see him esteeming his brethren better than himself. Referring
God to be glorified, looking on the things of God, and preferring
his brethren to be saved to the point of dying the cursed death
on the cross. That's the perfect love we're
talking about. And in that perfect love toward God and his brethren,
he left God, left his glory, veiled it, came down, veiled
it, lived under the law, and he did that, brethren, in perfect
absence of pride. perfect absence of pride, perfect
humility, perfect love toward God and men. And there you see
it on that bloody cross. Christ is love and he loved God
and he loved his people with the righteous love the law of
God requires for anybody to be able to say they have fulfilled
it. That's the righteous love it requires right there. If he didn't, he wouldn't have
sinned his son. That's what it requires. He fulfilled that righteous
requirement by being crucified. That's the love of that law,
him willing to, he loved God so and he loved his people so
he was willing to be crucified under the justice of God in place
of his people. And by doing that, he put away
all the sin of his people. He declared God just and justified
us. That is highly exalting God in
his name. And for that reason, God also
has highly exalted him and given him a name, above every name. But that's the fulfillment of
the law, and it's beholding him. It's the spirit of God making
us behold him and get a glimpse of him and what he did for us
and how he did it that humbles us. to confess to God that all
we are is a prideful sinner. When you see him doing what he
did, and that's what God requires, we have to put our hand on our
mouth. It humbles us to believe on him,
it humbles us to rest in his righteousness, and it humbles
us to love one another. It humbles us to love one another. Now I want to begin and I want
to see this great contrast. So we have to begin thinking
of who Christ is. Who is he? Where was he before
he came? How high and how rich was he?
It says in verse 6, he was in the form of God. Thought it not
robbery to be equal with God, it means he could not be higher.
He could not be richer, he couldn't be more glorious than being God. That's who he is. He's God, the
Son of God, equal with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit.
He's God. The same perfections that are
in God, the same names of God, the same works of God, the same
glory that belongs to God, that's His glory, that's His name, that's
His work, that's His perfection. That's who He is. He spoke of
that glory I had with you, Father, before the world was. It's His
glory as God. He's the Creator, by Him and
for Him were all things created. He's the Word, He's the Light,
He's the Life, He's God of very God. Scripture says He has to
look down to behold the heavens. We're talking about somebody
high, we're talking about somebody rich, we're talking about somebody
who needed nothing. Needed nothing. And look at this great contrast. This is his glory. This is the
glory. This shows us something about
who God is right here. What is God like? This is how
we see it right here. By looking to see how low the
son of God came. For his great name and for the
salvation of his people. Look how low he came. Verse seven,
but he made himself of no reputation. and took upon him the form of
a servant and was made in the likeness of men. When it says
here he made himself of no reputation. The words that are used here,
they go right along with the words that come before this passage. It's the same word up here as
being lowly of mind. He veiled who he is as God. The word reputation means to
empty, to make void, to make of no effect. He never ceased
being God, but he veiled who he is. He veiled his glory as
God. He made his glory void to the
eye of men, of no effect to men, by coming in the likeness of
men. He veiled his glory by coming as a man. He made himself of
no reputation. The one who ascended on high
first descended into the lowest parts of the earth as a babe,
a baby in the womb of a virgin, a sinless baby in the womb of
a sinful virgin. That's how low he came. Would
you have ever imagined That's how God would come to manifest
his glory, to save his people. If you didn't have the scripture,
is that how you would have ever imagined that God would come?
That's not how we'd have done it. Just not how we'd have done
it. He made himself of no reputation. We're so full of pride, and so
full of pride of face, and pride of place, and even the most foolish
thing, pride of grace. A proud look and a haughty spirit
and the plowing of the wicked is abomination to God. And he came forth into a poor
family in a little town, little among thousands of Judah. We
can be so proud about our town. He came in a little town that
was little among the thousands of towns in Judah. And then he
dwelt in a place that was completely despised by the people. They
said, can anything good come out of Nazareth? It's like our Lord came forth
and purposely did everything he did to make men just have
nothing attractive about him. And that's what he did. That's
exactly what he did. He's chosen things that are not
to confound the things that are. He was made in the likeness of
men. God really became a man. God
really came down and took flesh and became a sinless, spotless,
perfect man, the God-man. The Word was really made flesh
and dwelt among us. He who was in the beginning with
God and was God was made in the likeness of men. He who created
the angels and is greater than the angels came a little lower
than the angels. Do you see this great contrast?
Just take that contrast and see something of the perfection of
love that it took to save us to fulfill the righteousness
of the law. That's what we see in Christ. How low he came. And that's love. That's the righteousness
of the law. That's the righteousness we have
to have to come into God's presence. That's who God is. Adam was created
and given life as a full-grown man. In a perfect world, Christ
grew up from an infant to a man in a sinful world. And this is
what's amazing, he increased in wisdom and stature. And in
favor with God and man. That blows my mind. He was without sin and yet as
a man he had all the infirmities of human nature. Sorrow, grief,
anger, hunger, thirst, weariness. He so looked on the need of others.
He never bought a piece of ground to lay his head on. He was so poor he didn't have
any possessions to leave to his mother. You know what he did? He provided her with John to
take care of her. He didn't even have a tomb to
be buried in. You know the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ, though he was rich. We're talking about God who made
all things and owns all things and all things are his. God who
has no need of anything, rich. Yet for your sakes, he became
poor that through his poverty, you might be made rich. From
the riches of glory, he emptied himself and became poor to make
us bankrupt sinners rich. It's humility. Think about this
humility. The greatest person that ever
lived, that came to accomplish the greatest work that's ever
been accomplished on this earth, was unknown to everybody but
his immediate family. for 30 years until he entered
his public ministry. Think of how, if we get some
honor, how we want to make it known. You know, we just want
people to know about it. Pride. But this is perfect humility,
who had all this honor and all this glory, who is God in human
flesh, and yet made himself of no reputation, took the form,
the lowest form that man considers a servant, and went unknown for
30 years. He took the form of a servant
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to
God, perfect obedience to God, unto death. A servant is the
basis, the basis form to our natural understanding. A servant.
A servant. Serving God and serving his people.
Our pride is to want to have the chief seat. Our pride is
to want to be esteemed greater rather than being A servant? A menial servant? What prideful, natural mind esteems
and loves God hates. God has no pride. God has an absence of pride and
Christ had no pride. No sinful pride. They were arguing
over who should be the greatest, and he said, which is greater,
he that sits at meat or he that serves? Is not he that sitteth
at meat, but I'm among you is he that serveth. As God's righteous
servant obeying God, he was without sin. And yet he was made under
the law and obeyed God under that law. He was circumcised
the eighth day. That was submission to God, obedience
to God. He served God in that obscurity
for 30 years. And then when he came to enter
his public ministry, he walked miles and miles and miles and
submitted to be baptized by John and came there to be baptized.
And he told John, thus it behooves us to fulfill all righteousness. He's the one fulfilling all righteousness
for us. And look at the humility, it
behooves us to fulfill all righteousness. Perfect service, perfect obedience,
perfect humility, submitting all along to the reproach of
proud sinners. Everything he was not and is
not, That's sinners he was coming to save. That's the sin he was
coming to bear and suffer the curse for and put away because
of what our pride caused. He was despised and he was rejected.
He said reproaches toward God and toward his people all fell
on him. And they broke his heart, scripture
said. He was insulted because of the
poverty of his family. He had a lack of, they said he
had a lack of education. Insulted him with that. The disciples
that he taught, that he had following him, that he had taught, they
insulted them as being illiterate. They accused him of being a sinner.
They accused him of breaking the Sabbath. They accused him
of being a glutton and a winebibber. They accused him of encouraging
men to sinful practices, of destroying the law. They accused him of
doing miracles by the devil, even of having a devil, even
of being a devil. They charged him as a deceiver
of the people, of preaching false doctrine, hard sayings. Accused
him of sedition, of teaching men not to pay their taxes to
Caesar. and charged him with blasphemy, being a man making
himself to be God, they despised and rejected the Messiah with
the greatest contempt and hatred. And in those who despised and
rejected him, we see an example of all God's elect who he came
to save. Who he came to save. For whom he served and for whom
he suffered. We were not like-minded with
him. We were not of the same love with him. We had no love
for him on the enmity. Only enmity. We were not of one
accord with him or with each other. We were sowers of discord
by nature. Doing everything through strife
and vainglory in our pride. Everything. Not in loneliness
of mind, in the height of pride. Not esteeming others better,
esteeming self to be the greatest. You gotta look out for number
one. Isn't that the world's word? Gotta look out for number one.
Not looking on the things of others, only on the things of
self. And yet, in the face of all of that that he received,
all of that that came at him, this is what's going to make
us thankful right here. In the face of all of that, total absence of pride. Not even
a trace of sin. Not any response to that. in
any way sinful. Perfect love, perfect humility,
perfect service, perfect obedience required by the law with no sin. And he became obedient as death,
even the death of the cross. In perfect obedience, he presented
himself, the spotless Lamb of God, the just one, the sinless
one. And he made him sin for us who
knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him. He took all the sin of our pride, all those things that
he endured, that men threw at him, that where we see our pride,
That's the sin that he became, that was laid on him, where he
stood as being the one deserving of all the curse. And then he
bore the curse it deserved. Suffered being forsaken of God,
suffered the hell we deserve. Did it for proud sinners. who
can't even stay awake to hear Him preached. Proud sinners who didn't want Him, who didn't want
to have Him do anything for us. Proud sinners. And He became
the perfection of humility to save us from our pride. And beginning to end, he highly
exalted God, he highly exalted God's name. He did it because
he depended on God perfectly, and he walked in the faith in
all the promises of God. He didn't try to save himself
out of the hands of men. He did nothing like that. He
trusted the Father, even to the point of yielding up his spirit,
going into the tomb, Perfect obedience, perfectly
justifying his people, perfectly declaring God just, perfectly
honoring God. That's the perfect esteem of
God and his people more than himself. Perfect esteem. And now where is he? Verse nine
says, wherefore God also, he highly exalted God's name, wherefore
God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which
is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee
shall bow of things in heaven, things in earth, things under
the earth, that every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ
is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Christ Jesus is the righteousness
of God. Saying that and saying he's the
righteousness of the law is the same thing. He is the righteousness
God's provided for his people. And as the head right now of
his church, he is ruling. Listen now, he's ruling. He is
the shepherd, the bishop and shepherd of his church. He is
ruling in his church. He is filling all and in all,
and he is the one to whom we bow and trust. We preach his
word and we trust him to work this this word in his people
and work grace in his people. And all who bow the knee to him
and believe him shall be saved by him, by him. If you believe on him, you shall
be saved. If you believe on him, you shall be saved. If just one
person can say something to you and criticize you, and there's
just a glimmer in your heart of pride that wants to say something
or just says it under your breath, you need him. Because he never
had that. And he put that away in all his
people. Put it away in all his people.
He's the wisdom of God to save sinners and the wisdom in those
whom he saves. He's the righteousness of his
believing people. He's the holiness by which we're
made pure and accepted of God. He's the redeemer who purchased
his people and frees us and keeps us until the day he redeems us
into glory. Now, why is Paul telling the
church at Philippi this? This is so important. There was
strife and contention at Philippi. You know what? There was in every
church in the scripture. Every one of them. Every one
of them. And there is today and there
always will be. Because God saves believing sinners. And God has chosen to put us
together with believing sinners to teach us by the experience
of His power and His grace what grace is. And He's handling it. He's taking
care of His church, and He's working in His church. And the
reason for the contention is quite simple. Only by pride cometh
contention. That's it. And pride is the most baseless
thing we could ever be. We have no basis for being prideful. What do we have to be proud of? Nothing. I mean, nothing. Everything we have, from the
ground we stand on, to anything we possess, to the breath we
breathe, to any grace we've received, God gave it all to us. We don't
have anything that we didn't receive from God and we have
nothing therefore to be proud about. Nothing. So what does he teach his people
and what does he work in his people when he brings us, you
know this, We have to be brought down from
our pride all the time. How does he do that? He makes
you see him and how low he came. This is what I was saying, I
was talking to some brethren about, and I don't mean just
talking about, you know, yeah, we're full of pride and we're
sinners. No, I mean like, I mean, we were weeping of how,
that's, It's just, we just can't express how good God is to save us in
spite of us. And you know, we know it, we
know it, we confess it, but sometimes we really get to see it by his
grace. And when he says you're strong
when you're weak, That's so simple, and it's so difficult for us
to understand. When you cannot look at anything about you or
anybody else, there's nothing you can do to just get you through
this next hour, but look to Him. You're as strong as you'll ever
be right there in that moment. Because He really is the only
strength we have. The only strength. And He makes
you know that in your weakness. And when we're proud and we're
not in that total weakness, we're as weak as we can possibly be.
Because we're not trusting Him. It's a gracious, gracious thing
when God makes us so weak Makes us see what we are and makes
us see Him so that all we can do is believe Him. Believe He's going to work out
your salvation today. Get you through today. He'll
take care of tomorrow. He's going to get you through
today and you need Him to get you. You just need Him to keep
you. And when He makes you do that, here's what He works in
His people. Back up in verse 1. He says, if there be therefore
any consolation, any comfort in Christ, just any, if there's
just any comfort in Christ, if you have any comfort of love,
any fellowship of the Spirit, any bowels and mercies, any constraining
of His mercy within, fulfill you my joy that you be like-minded,
having the same love, Being of one accord, of one mind, let
nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness
of mind. Let each esteem other better
than themselves. Look not every man on his own
things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this
mind be in you. which was also in Christ Jesus. You've heard me say this many
times. What we see here and what Christ did for us, the way up
with God is down. Everything that we by nature
want to do is just the opposite of how God does it. The greatest is Christ who became
the least. He teaches us to be strong. He
teaches us that to be strong is to be weak in ourselves. He
teaches us that true greatness in His kingdom is to be a servant,
the least. That's what God regards as being
great. Esteem another better. looking
on the things of other rather than self. That's what Christ
did. That's what he's still doing. And you know, he goes on there
and he says that we're lights in the world, in a perverse and
crooked world, shining as lights in the world, holding forth the
word of life. I'm gonna tell you what this light's gonna be.
One thing it is, it's only Christ the light. But one thing that
shines forth as light is that proud sinners like we are can
go through this wilderness with every, with the pride we have
in us and the sin we have and all the things trying to divide
God's people and continue in humility and in unity. You know why? We're feeding on
that word of life He's given us to hold forth. That's the
light. That's light shining. Because
that can only be done by Christ the light shining. We're just
a reflector. He's the light. And that's only
by Him. Only by Him. All right, Brother
Greg.