Thank you for that. I tell you,
those two hymns that we sang as a congregation, and then that
hymn, you just cannot improve upon the words of those three
outstanding hymns. Not too many songs like that
are written anymore. Most gospel, so-called gospel
songs, have to do with our experience and our feelings and our love
and our faith. I'd rather sing these songs that
magnify our Lord in salvation. I invite you to open to the book
of Philippians, the second chapter. Our subject this evening is Christ
humbled himself. Christ humbled himself. And then next Lord's Day evening,
God willing, I want to speak on Christ exalted. But I want
to deal this evening with his humbling of himself. I'm sure that you're somewhat
familiar with Philippians, the second chapter. And here the
apostle encourages the Philippian believers to unity and oneness
in purpose. That is to honor and glorify
God. That's what we seek to do. I
hope we're all agreed on that. This service that we have this
evening, the one we had this morning, one we'll have Wednesday
night, it's all about honoring God and the trinity of his persons. If that isn't our aim, then we've
missed the boat. We seek to exalt our master. And this is what Paul is doing.
He's encouraging them to unity. He's also encouraging them not
only in unity of purpose, but in unity of love. Love for Christ. Love Him with
all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And we know if we love
Him, it's because He first loved us. John wrote here in his love,
not that we love God, but that God loved us and gave His Son
to be the propitiation for our sins. Propitiation is a big word
which just means satisfaction of God's justice. That's why
God gave Him. That's why God sent Him. Let's
be united in love for the Master. Our Savior asked Simon. This is after Simon had denied
him three times. Then our Lord died for the sins
of Simon and all of his Simons and had been raised from the
dead because he justified all of his Simons. Our Lord met with
his disciples and then he asked Peter specifically. He said,
do you love me? He said, Simon, son of Jonas, you're a son of a sinful man,
and you're a sinful man yourself. Do you love me? Lovest thou me? And finally, Peter said, Lord,
thou knowest all things. Thou knowest that I love thee.
I'll tell you how serious this is. The scripture says, if any man
love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema, maranatha. That is, let him be
damned when Christ comes back. Do you love the Savior as he's
revealed in the scriptures? the way somebody told you Jesus
was years ago, but as you've had the Savior revealed to you,
at least through the preaching of the gospel, who he is, the
great prophet, priest, and king, the only Savior, the promised
Messiah, the surety of God's elect, do you love him as the
scriptures set him forth? Do you love him as the sovereign?
as the Savior. And by the witness of the Spirit,
I can say, yes, I do. I don't love Him like I ought
to. And I don't love Him like I'm going to. But I do love Him. Because the Holy Ghost has shared
His love for me. into my heart. And the Apostle Paul urges believers
here to humility and lowliness of mind. He says in verse 3,
you there, Philippians 2, 3? He says, let nothing be done
through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let
each esteem other better than themselves. Makes no difference who we are. The rich and the poor meet together. The Lord's the maker of them
all. Don't think of yourself as being higher or mightier or
more godly or more holy or more righteous than anybody else.
You're just a sinner saved by grace like I am. I know in Christ
Jesus, God made him to be our wisdom and righteousness and
sanctification and redemption, and sanctification's holy. That's
holiness. But he's our holiness. He's our
sanctification. He's our righteousness. We're
just sinners saved by his grace. saved by substitutionary works. So don't think of yourself as
being better than others. In fact, in lowliness, let each
one of us esteem other better than themselves. Don't think you're at the top.
Think of yourself being at the bottom. But it's thankful to be anywhere
at all in Christ Jesus. For actually in Him, we're the
children of God. In Him, we're the family of God.
But in ourselves, there's nothing, there's no good thing within
us. And we need to remember that. In fact, it goes on to say in
verse 4, look not every man on his own things, but every man
also on the things of others. Don't be so interested in yourself. I know that comes natural. And there has to be a kind of
interest in yourself to take care of the responsibilities
that God has laid upon you. There's no question about that. But think about others. That scripture says, love God
with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Love your neighbor
as yourself. Do you do that? I'll answer for you, no you don't.
And I don't either. I'm thankful there came into
this old world one who did love God with all his heart, mind,
soul, and strength. And he loved his neighbor as
himself. Who is his neighbor? I'm his
neighbor. You're his neighbor. You're his
neighbor. And he loved his neighbors so
much that he laid down his life for us. We don't even know our neighbors.
That's the way we are today. Have very little contact with
our neighbors. Be interested in others. Be interested
in their salvation. Be interested in them knowing
God. Give somebody a bulletin that
blesses you, some article that blesses you, give it to them.
If you find a little tract or a pamphlet Or maybe a message
that was a particular blessing to you. Give that to somebody
and say, hey, listen to this. I'm not going to ask you questions
as to whether you liked it or not. I'm not going to quiz you
on it. It blessed me. Maybe it'll bless
you. Think about others. And then
he says in verse five, he says, let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus. Now he's urging the Philippians
to humility and lowliness of mind. And as he always does in
dealing with practical things, he takes it right back to the
Savior. He always does, and that's the
way we must do. We do have duties toward one
another, duties in the gospel church, duties in the world that
we are to take care of and be responsible for. But as we take
care of our responsibilities, we must be mindful of the fact
that our Lord Jesus came into this world to take care of His
responsibilities. And his responsibilities was,
number one, to honor God, and number two, to honor God by saving
the people that he covenanted to him in electing grace before
the world began. And in order to carry this mission
of salvation out, he had to humble himself. If you want to know about humility,
The Bible says, humble yourself under the mighty hand of God. You want to know something about
humbling yourself? A broken, a humble, and a contrite
heart, God will not despise. If you want to know something
about humility, study our Lord Jesus Christ. Who, though He was rich, became
poor. that we through his poverty might
be rich. Study our Lord's humility. He says here in verse five, let
this mind, let this humble spirit be in you, which was also in
Christ Jesus. He had once set before us the
true pattern An example of humility. Want to know something about
humbling yourself? See, we're a proud people. And Solomon says, of the things
that God hates, here's the very first one, a proud look. What
do you have to be proud of? You've sinned against God. You're filthy. You're very much
defiled before him himself. What do you have to be proud
of? We hated God, despised his gospel, weren't interested in
grace, weren't interested in his salvation. What do you got
to be proud of? We say, I'm proud of my intellect. Who gave you that intelligence? I'm proud of my gifts. Who gave
you those gifts? Those gifts are on loan from
the giver of all gifts, God himself. What do you have to be proud
of? You have never produced anything. I have never produced anything. that we ought to ever be proud
about. We're to be thankful for the
blessings, the mercies that God has given us. We're to be a humble people.
And if you want to know about humility, look at our Lord Jesus. Look how far he stooped. And I'll tell you, quite honestly, We have no idea how far he stooped
down. We can't even imagine. For an angel of God created in
perfection with immortality, for an angel of God to come down
here and clean a toilet, that's nothing compared to the Son of
God who sat upon his throne of glory and ruled over all things,
he who was rich, he who had all authority, stooped down to be
made lower than the angels." Lower than the angels. The angels have a rank above
us in that they know nothing about mortality. They know nothing about death.
They can't die. But our Lord Jesus, to save us,
He had to die. So He had to stoop down. How
far down? Lower than the angels that He
created. Lower than the angels who observed
His every command and carried them out faithfully ever since
He was created. and he was made lower than the
angels. You wanna learn something about humility? You study our
Lord Jesus Christ. I give you two things in this
message. Number one, consider the very height of his eternal existence. Look what it says in verse six.
Speaking of our Lord Jesus, here again in Philippians 2.6, who
being in the form of God, He thought it not robbery to be
equal with God, but made himself of no reputation and took upon
him the form of a servant. He was in the form of God, the
essence of God, the reality of God, the oneness of God, the
great I am. but he stooped down to take upon
himself the form of a servant, the essence of a servant. Just
as he was really God, he was really made a servant. It says he thought it not robbery
to be equal with God. You know, in the Old Testament,
you read about Lucifer, approximately two-thirds of the
angels, according to John's writings in the book of Revelation, two-third
of the angels identified with Lucifer, and each one of them
fell from that high station with which they were created. And the reason was this. They
wanted to be God. And they would have usurped,
that is taken hold of, stolen, the very throne of God. That's
what Lucifer wanted to do. The throne that was promised
to the Son of God, who had become man, and by his faithfulness
unto death. would be raised again and then
ascend and take hold of the throne of God, the scepter of sovereignty. Lucifer didn't like that. The
two-thirds of the angels that fell with him didn't like that.
They wanted to be as gods themselves. They would have usurped, stolen,
seized, grabbed hold of the title of God. and I got kicked out. But our Lord Jesus, He didn't
usurp or go after or covet to be God. He was God. He's already God. That wasn't
a position that He desired. He's always been God. And of
course, this was the temptation to Eve by the serpent. You shall
be as God. You won't need God anymore. You'll
be God. You'll be in charge. You control
your own destiny. And somehow or another, Adam
got involved in that. And sin has got to do with defiance
against the sovereign authority of God. Sin's got something to
do with that. And Eve and Adam would have usurped
that right, ye shall be as gods. The same word used in Genesis
1, one in the beginning, God, the creator. You shall be as
gods, knowing good and evil. But our Lord Jesus, He didn't
usurp that title of God. He's already God. From everlasting
to everlasting, thou art God. That's what the scripture says. He was in the form of God. The
divine essence of God. You want to see the divine essence
of God? Our Lord said to Philip, Philip
who had said to the Savior, show us the Father and we'll better
understand, we'll believe. And our Savior said, have I been
with you all this long? And you don't understand he that
hath seen me has seen the Father. You've seen God. He is God. He was God manifest in the flesh. He was in the form of God, the
essence of God. Our Lord Jesus, the Son of God
from old eternity, He possessed all of the attributes of God. He possessed all of the names
of God. He performed all the works of
God. Creation is attributed to Him. All things were made by Him.
Without Him was not anything made that was made. Divine providence
is attributed to Him. He holds all things together.
He's directing all things to the end that He has purposed
and designed Himself. Creation belonged to Him. The
government of the nations belonged to Him. Providential authority
belongs to Him. Salvation belongs to Him. Everything
belongs to Him. All of the angelic hosts knew
that He was in the form of God, that He possessed true deity
and glory and honor. He was adorned with all the powers
of the Godhead, the Son of God. And he stooped down. For just as he was really and
truly God, he really and truly became man,
the servant of God. He came to earth and possessed
all of the typical attributes of a man without sin. And I'll deal with that humiliation
a little bit more in just a few minutes, but let me set before
you the very height, the very height of His eternal existence
that will better enable us to estimate the greatness of his
humiliation. He thought it not robbery to
be equal with God. He wasn't robbing God of anything. Not like Lucifer did, not like
two-thirds of the angels did, but he didn't do that. He was
God eternally over all. The Creator, the originator of
all things, along with the Father and the Spirit. He was all glorious
as the Son of God. I say consider the height of
His eternal existence. But secondly, consider the depth
of His humiliation. He humbled Himself. Look at verse seven. He made
himself of no reputation. Tell you what, he appeared before
Herod and they put him to naught. They
thought nothing of him. In fact, in the role of all the
Jewish people, Herod would say, he's on the very bottom. They thought nothing of him. He had no reputation among men. They said he's a friend of sinners. They said he's a gluttonous man.
He's a wine-bibber. And who are they talking about? They're talking about the Son
of God who existed in the form of God and now had taken into
existence a new form. Without giving up what He was
before and all He was before, He took upon Himself the form
of a man and the lowest of men in the eyes of men, a gluttonous
man, a winebibber. But it was a voluntary act. That's
the thing. See, he wasn't kicked out of
heaven like Lucifer was or like two-thirds of the angels were. He wasn't kicked out. He came
down. He came down of His own free
volition, and He came down to save us.
What about that? And like I said this morning,
His death, as far as the eyes of the world was concerned, was
not an honorable death. It was the death of a felon.
It was the death of a criminal. It was a death of someone that
Pilate and Herod and all the Jews gathered together to kill
Him. They said, He's not worthy to
go on living. He's a despicable, lowly creature. Kill Him. Crucify Him. Let Him die the worst kind of
death. And who are they talking about?
They're talking about the Son of God. You want to learn humility? Right
here it is. And he was sent from heaven. He told the Jews in John chapter
6, for the bread of God is he which came down from heaven and
giveth life to the world. Turn to Isaiah 48. This is a
passage I I've been looking at for a little while, Isaiah chapter
48. Actually, this entire chapter,
in fact, a couple of chapters even before this, would be kind
of a parallel to our study of the book of Zechariah, because
this is hundreds of years before Israel was taken into captivity
by the Babylonians. And the Lord informs Isaiah. Isaiah prophesies, therefore,
that Israel will be taken into captivity, into bondage by the
Babylonians, but the Lord's going to raise up a man. In fact, hold
your place there in 48. Look back at 44. He's going to raise up a man,
chapter 44 of Isaiah, verse 28, by the name of Cyrus. And you'll notice, those of you
who were here this morning, who listened to the message from
Zechariah chapter 13, verse 7, God says, Awake against My shepherd. Watch this. The Lord saith of
Cyrus, He's My shepherd. Boy, is he a picture of our Lord
Jesus or not? "...and shall perform all my
pleasure, even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built." The city
of God will be built, and I'm talking about a spiritual city.
I'm talking about the kingdom of God. Christ said, I will build
my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
They put forth every effort to prevail against it, but they
can't. And to the temple thy foundation shall be built, and
it's built upon Jesus Christ and him crucified, buried, risen
again. So this is hundreds of years
before Zechariah prophesied. And of course, Zechariah prophesied
after the captivity when the Jews are coming back. He and
Haggai prophesied when the Jews are coming back from captivity
released by Cyrus. But go back to chapter 48. So
keeping that, filing that in your memory banks, look at verse
15. I, chapter 48, verse 15. I, even
I have spoken. Yea, I have called him. Who's
he talking about? Well, first of all, on the surface,
Cyrus. I called him, God said. And he shall make his way prosperous. He's not going to fail. On the
surface, this is about Cyrus. But there's someone a whole lot
bigger than Cyrus that comes into view. This is about the
Son of God. And he shall, the things of God,
the purpose of God always prospers in the hands of Christ. So look at verse 16. Our Lord Jesus says, He says,
Come ye near unto me and hear ye this. I have not spoken in
secret from the beginning, from the beginning of His ministry,
from the beginning of His public ministry. He preached in the
temple. He preached in the synagogues.
He preached in the open fields. He said, I haven't spoken secret
from the very beginning of my ministry. From the time that
it was, there am I. Mark says he began his ministry
by going forth and preaching the gospel. The gospel of the
kingdom of God. And watch this last statement
of verse 16. And now the Lord God and His
Spirit has sent me. There's the Trinity, right there. There's the Trinity. Who sent
Him? He came down from heaven. Who
sent Him? The Father, and actually He Himself. and the Spirit sent on a mission of mercy. Sent from the highest heaven
to be made the lowest of the low
on earth. And they even visit the heart
of the earth in a tomb. From the throne to the tomb,
that's humility. He who was way up here high,
came way down here, made sin for us. All of the sins, all
of the guilt, all of the iniquities, all of the transgressions of
all of God's people of all of the ages made to meet on Him,
Isaiah 53 verse 6. The Holy One, the pure one, the righteous one,
laden down with our sins. You're talking about going from
the top to the bottom. There it is. Look at verse 17. Thus saith
the Lord, Thy Redeemer. Who is our Redeemer? He's the
Lord. Tell you what, after our Lord's
resurrection, he appeared to the disciples and Brother Thomas
wasn't there. Tell you what, you never know
what you might miss if you miss the service. And Thomas wasn't there that
Lord's Day morning. And the other brethren said,
buddy, you missed it today. The greatest blessing. Well,
what happened? The master came. Walked right
through the walls. He showed us his wounds. Oh,
brother Thomas, he lives. He who died ever lives. He ever
lives! Thomas said, well, I don't believe
it. I'm not gonna take you guys' word for it. You forsook him
along with me. Next service, he was there. Boy,
I tell you, the Lord said, do you need to thrust your hands
in my wounds? You need to see my scar here,
where it pierced my heart and blood and water came out. He
said, my Lord and my God, that's who he is. That's who he is. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel. Our Redeemer is the Holy One
of Israel. It takes the Holy One of Israel
to make us sinners holy. And we're holy in Him. We're
righteous in Him. He is the Lord, our righteousness. Watch this, I am the Lord thy
God, I'm your God. Who hangs on that cross, suffering
and bleeding and dying? Thy God. That's who He is. That's Thy God right there. All
the jeering multitudes, people cursing Him. The Sanhedrin sitting
down to watch Him. He's their entertainment. They
love to see Him suffer. Who is this who suffers such
agony upon the cross of Calvary? He's thy God. As man, he can suffer, bleed,
and die, and satisfy justice as God. He's capable of dealing
with God's justice. You see, a transaction took place
at the cross. Our Lord Jesus rendered to divine
justice every bit of payment that we owed to justice. And Jesus paid it all. He says, I am the Lord thy God
which teacheth thee to profit. That is, I teach you profitable
things, things that will do you good. I believe from most pulpits this
morning, the stuff that went forth from pulpits didn't profit
anybody. But here and there, over at your
place, and here and other places as well, the word went forth
that really profits people. They find out who God is. Somebody
needs to tell them. And find out what they are. Somebody
needs to tell them. It'll profit you to know what
you are. And it'll profit you to know
who Christ the Lord is. He's God and man. The form of
God, the form of man. He teaches you profitable things,
things that'll do you good. Watch this, "...which leadeth
thee by the way that thou shalt go." What is that way? Well,
it's called the narrow way. It's called the way of grace.
It's called the way of life. In fact, the Savior Himself is
identified as the way. He's the new and living way. And He's the only way to God. Oh, he humbled himself. Go back over to the text and
let me see if I can wind this up. This is a voluntary act. He was
sent from heaven, and his Godhead was veiled by
human flesh. Without controversy, great is
the mystery. of godliness. God was manifest
in the flesh. In the flesh. When Simeon saw
him in the temple, just a wee infant, he said, I've seen God's salvation. Well, he just saw a baby. He
looked in the face of the god man. He said, I've seen God's
salvation now, because that's where it's at. It's in Him. It's not back here in the baptismal
pool. It's not in a river. It's not
down here front. Salvation's not in the church.
It's not in morality. It's not in the law. It's in
Him who is life. Behold his humiliation. Let me read you this. You don't
have to go back. I'm going back to Isaiah for
just a minute, but you don't have to turn here. Listen to
how Isaiah described him. For unto us a child is born,
unto us a son is given. Did you notice he mentioned child
first? And then Son given second? Now He's been the Son forever,
so that's first, categorically. But Isaiah says, unto us a child
is born. This is what stood after Him.
Yes, He's been the Son of God forever, but He is born a child. Because that's the only way He
could save us. take part of our flesh. Of course, Isaiah there is elaborating
upon chapter 7, verse 14, Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear
a son, shall call his name Immanuel. Our Savior, you see, He took upon him human nature,
flesh, so he can be touched with the
feelings of our infirmities. I can't comprehend what all that
takes in. But I tell you what, it's never
anything you've endured, but he doesn't know every single
thing about it. And he somehow or another, he's
touched with it. because you're one of his little
ones. And he assumed a human nature
because his divine nature is incapable of suffering or bleeding
or dying because God is spirit. Spirit can't die. But the son of man surely died. And he is born not to redeem
angels, He took upon himself not the seed of angels and not
the seed of Adam, but the seed of Abraham. He took a position, hang with
me just a couple more minutes, he took a position in which as
man he was answerable to God. Did you know that when he was
talking to them in John chapter 7 at the Feast of Tabernacles,
they said, how does this man learn letters? How does he know
doctrine? Do you know what the Savior said?
My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. What do
you mean it wasn't his? Well, it was his as God, but
not as man, because he's made a servant. You know, when he was talking
to his disciples in the Gospel of Mark about his second coming,
Mark chapter 13, he said, when the end comes, the second coming
comes, the angels don't know when that's going to happen,
even the Son doesn't even know when that's going to happen,
but my Father only. What's he talking about? He's
speaking as the Son of Man. He took a lowly position. He said in Psalm 22, I'm a worm
and no man. That's a scarlet worm that they
mashed and then dyed wool red. Oh, think of the blood of our
Lord Jesus Christ. And everybody set him at naught.
Everybody, I heard Brother Mahan say this numerous times. Everybody
who was anybody turned thumbs down on him. But the greatest humiliation
was this. God forsook him. God forsook him. How can that
be? Martin Luther is said to have
been studying Christ being forsaken. He closed his Bible and he said,
God forsaken God. I can't comprehend that. I can't
either, but I know it's true. Because he bore the sins of all
of his people. And he is a poor man. Why did he stoop so low? Well,
for this reason, and I probably don't need to read it to you,
but I will. Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself
and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
I'll tell you why he stooped down. To save the likes of us. What grace is this? No wonder
there in 2 Corinthians 8, Paul says, you know the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ. You know it. All God does is
look about him who was rich and became poor. Why did he do that? That you through his poverty
might be rich. One writer said, our Lord Jesus
Christ became a nobody. He became a nobody. to make us
somebody. He was made the lowest to lift
us up. How high? To the very throne
of God. To make us kings and princes
with him in glory. That's a whole lot for my poor
heart to take in. And if that don't bless you,
you just can't be blessed, I'd say. Christ humbled Himself. I talk
about His exaltation, the Lord willing, next Sunday night. Let's
get those folders out again. Page 9.