At The Name Of Jesus

Philippians chapter 2 and reading from verse 9, verses 9 to 11. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, that is the Lord Jesus Christ, 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 of things in heaven and things in earth and things under the earth.

And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Amen. May the Lord bless this little reading to us. Well, the title of our sermon today is At the Name of Jesus. And it is this name of Jesus that is to the forefront of our attention and of the apostles writing today. The name of Jesus is precious to all believers.

The name of Jesus identifies that one who is God and who for love became man to save us from our sins. Jesus is the eternal majesty who left the delights of his father's presence, took our weak, frail flesh and came into this world as one of us. The name of Jesus speaks of that unique friend who seeing our distress and our need took pity upon us and willingly undertook to bear in himself our faults failures, shame, corruption, sin and guilt. Jesus, our God and our friend, represented us as our substitute, bore our punishment and condemnation in his own body on the cursed tree. that we might be released from every obligation and debt before his righteous father.

This is what our Lord has done. He brings peace where there is misery, gives joy where there is sorrow, grants freedom from bondage, contentment in trials, gives holiness instead of sin and guilt, and life instead of death. I believe that Jesus Christ is God and that he died for me. And this conviction, this divinely revealed and well-grounded hope is a comfort to me in life. And I believe it will be a comfort to me in death and to all eternity.

Jesus is a friend to us. He guides and provides for his children. He nourishes and protects his little ones. He is a brother whose friendship and companionship brightens our days. He watches over us, caring for us and encouraging our spiritual growth in this journey of life. He is a man. He is touched with the feeling of our infirmities.

And yet he is God who rules, reigns, governs, and exercises sovereignty over all the world that he has created. He rightly assumes many different names and titles in the scriptures. to describe his person, his character, his attributes. And yet he will always be Jesus to his own dear people.

Jesus is a suitable name for our Lord. Jesus signifies saviour in the Greek language in which the New Testament was written. In Hebrew, the name is Joshua, meaning he who shall save. Jesus is our saviour who shall save his people from their sins. That was what the angel said to Mary. Christ means anointed of God. Christ means sent by Jehovah. Anointed, appointed and sent by Jehovah. It also can mean sealed by the Father. And when we join Jesus and Christ together, when we join both of these names together, they carry this highest of descriptive meanings. Jesus Christ, the Saviour sent by God to save His people. Isn't that wonderful? We speak the name of Jesus. We call on the name of Jesus. We pray the name. We sing the name of Jesus. Hear what it means.

The Savior sent by God to save his people. And it is this Jesus that Paul is speaking of in our first verse today. Here we learn, here we learn that this Jesus, this Jesus, the saviour sent by God to save his people, having successfully accomplished the salvation of his people, of God's elect, by His death on the cross, the Lord Jesus, that same Jesus, has been highly exalted. God the Father has highly exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name. We're speaking about the God-Man, the Lord Jesus Christ, the man who walked The streets of Nazareth, the streets of Jerusalem, the land of Judea and Galilee. This is the one we are speaking of. God the Father has highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name.

Now what Paul does not mean here is that the Lord Jesus has been given a new name. or that a new name has been given to the Saviour. Nor does he mean that any particular name that is attributed to the Lord Jesus has been elevated above another name. Paul is simply telling us that our Jesus has been exalted by his Father.

Having finished the work that he had been given to do, having accomplished his purpose, the Lord Jesus returned to heaven as the conquering victor, as the risen glorified Christ. And I say to you today that we have much for which to thank Paul. Or maybe I should say we have much for which to thank God the Holy Spirit for revealing these truths to the church through the writings of the Apostle Paul. It is of great comfort, it is of immense joy to God's people that our precious Jesus, having been obedient to death for our sakes, is now raised up to glory and is forever highly exalted. That our Jesus, having humbled himself and made himself of no reputation, Our Jesus, having taken upon himself the form of a servant, having been made in the likeness of fallen man, though without sin, that Jesus is now highly exalted as a man, as the God-man, in the presence of angels and the ascended church. that our Jesus, following his humiliation by men, his pain and his suffering, his being made sin and forsaken by his father, is now everlastingly exalted on high and seated at the right hand of God. I say that that should cause us great comfort and joy.

Might it have been sufficient, might it have been enough to know that he was carried by angels into heaven? Maybe. Was it enough to know that he had been raised from the dead? Perhaps. But we know something else. We know that Jesus has returned to heaven there to be highly exalted by his father. Our saviour, our head, our brother, our friend, Jesus is highly exalted and all that is Christ's is ours in him. Isn't that something? Isn't that something to know? To believe? Isn't that worth thinking about when the troubles of the world come knocking? When hardships and sadnesses come into our life?

In this body of flesh and rise against us? when we seem to be the whipping post for any who wish to trouble us. Our Jesus has been highly exalted and as his body we are highly exalted with him. The Apostle Paul has been encouraging believers to practice humility in our own lives. That's what provoked this passage. The apostle knows that pride and self-importance are the natural default of fallen man, and they are disruptive and destructive. But humility engenders care, and kindness and concern for our fellow saints. And he has been calling on us, believers, to emulate lowliness of mind towards our brethren in like-mindedness to Christ. And now in these verses before us today, he beautifully sets forth our motivation to do so. What it is that motivates believers to be Christ-minded, to be Christ-like.

And that's what we're going to think about. But just before we look at what Paul says concerning that, I want to mention what he doesn't say. Paul does not tell us to be humble and Christ-minded so that we can be exalted as well. Now you might think that that's the parallel. You might think that that's the contrast that could well be made here and logic might have led him there. And I'm sure Such logic leads many Christians to imagine that practicing Christian virtues will result in our praise, will gain God's approval for us and help us to store up so-called treasure in heaven. But that is not at all what the apostle says.

Our motivation to Christ-likeness is not personal gain, is not heavenly praise, is not earthly riches. Our motivation is praise, right enough. Not our praise, but Christ's praise. For a believer, imitation is adoration. emulating our Saviour's nature and character, exercising the qualities that He has placed in us, employing the transformed powers of the new creation is our delight. And it's the finest means that we have at our disposal of worshipping and praising our Lord. Believers are new creations made in Christ's image. We are converted into his likeness and filled with his spirit. Now it is true that sin continues in this body of flesh and as yet we see through a glass darkly. Oh, we aspire to be much better than we are.

Yet Christ's people delight to imitate their saviour out of gratitude for their great salvation. We want to reproduce the character of our saviour in our own lives and in the lives of those around us and in this world. Imitation is the highest form of praise.

To use a current analogy, we watch the children, small children and bigger children, sporting their favorite team's strip or their favorite team's colors. I'm linking into the fact that we've got so much sporting activity going on at the moment, but we see the children wearing their team strip and their colours. Why? Why do they do that? Why do they imitate their heroes? They're saying, we love this team. They're saying, we admire this team. We follow this team.

Well, Christians don't dress like Christ, outwardly at least. but we carry his character on our soul. We wear his likeness in our heart. And Paul calls us to make it evident in our lives, in our walk, and in our conversation. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. And how thankful we ought to be that God has granted us this way of saying thank you for all that he has done for us and how exercised we ought to be therefore for that reason.

It isn't our hymn singing that praises God. It isn't our talents and our offerings. It is us We are the praise. Our lives are our hymns, our prayers. We are enabled and do give praise to God, our Father, for his love and his mercy towards us in Jesus Christ. And even in these bodies, even in this world, it is our gift to worship God. We worship as trophies of grace. We worship when we live and walk in the Spirit and in truth.

I don't want to sound like a broken record here, but if the opportunity arises, I ought to speak. It isn't Moses' law that moderates or regulates our obedience, but our desire to be like Christ. When the Lord Jesus told the woman at the well in John chapter four, verse 23, but the hour cometh and now is when the true worshippers shall worship this father in spirit and in truth, This enabling, this enablement, this new birth was what he was speaking about. He goes on.

This is how God desires to be worshipped. This is how we truly, properly give God praise. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Paul will go on to say, next chapter, the beginning of the next chapter, Philippians chapter three and verse three, Paul will go on to say, for we, that is believers, are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. true worship, true obedience, isn't outward conformity to a set of rules. It is the practical exercise of our conversion. It is the outworking of faith. The outworking of our inward conformity to Christ.

Salvation is marvellous. and a glimpse of God's grace thrills our hearts, fuels our wonder, changes our values, and provokes our praise. And so it should. We live to glorify God. and our Saviour as we walk in spirit and in truth and we live our lives of faith. We are the praise. We are the hymns that glorify our God. And this ought not to be a surprise. It is what the Apostle is telling us here in this passage. It is what Paul is showing us that the glory of the Godhead is the great object of God's grace. Let me say that again. The glory of the Godhead is the great object of God's grace. Now note this, the purpose of grace is not the salvation of sinners. except insofar as the salvation of sinners contributes to the glory of God.

The glory of God the Son was the first cause of the Father's eternal love to the elect in the council of peace and in the covenant of grace. It was the glory of the Son that prompted the Father's love and choice of the elect in the Council of Peace and the Covenant of Grace. So too, the glory of God, his father, was the first cause of the son's assuming suretyship for the elect. Why did the Lord Jesus Christ stand forth for us in the eternal councils of the Godhead? For the glory of the father, just as God's love for the elect was for the glory of the son. Christ taking upon himself the form of a servant and coming into this world was for the glory of God his Father.

And everything in the plan of redemption works towards the glory of God. In redemption, God the Father glorifies his Son, And in redemption, God the Son glorifies his Father. And this is not to the exclusion of the Holy Spirit, but Paul is speaking here only of the Father and the Son. Had he been speaking about the Holy Spirit as well, it would have been all three that would have been clearly set before us. But when all is said and done, when all is said on this earth and all is done in heaven, Everything will be seen to be and to have been for the glory of God. And this is what we see here in these verses. Because the Lord Jesus humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, God the Father has highly exalted him and given his Son a name that is above every name. Christ came to do the will of his Father and because our Savior successfully accomplished with his own blood every requirement of God's eternal purpose, every tongue in heaven, on earth and in hell, will be compelled to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

I want to read a little paragraph to you from Robert Hawker, what he says on this passage. I do this from time to time. I'll read you a paragraph from, for example, Hawker. I guess he's the one that I usually do it to, principally because When I read it, I go, wow. These are wow paragraphs. And I think to myself, I'm not going to try and rephrase that. I'm not going to try and represent that. I'm just going to take that verbatim, and I am going to read that in my sermon. And I am going to let people think about the wow dimension of what is written. And this is what Hawker says on this passage.

The Son of God divests Himself of His glory for the Father's glory. He emptied Himself of His personal honor for the Father's honor. And by this process, He brings in a greater revenue, both of glory and honor, than sin in man had tarnished or could have tarnished by millions of beings and in millions of years. And thus we see how deep and sure the infinite designs of God have been laid for the revealing for revealing the Lord's glory and making known to the church what Paul calls the manifold wisdom of God. If you want, you can go back and listen to that again. But it is a wow thought to think that the Lord Jesus Christ, God the Son, did all these things in order to bring a greater glory to His Father than all the sin that all the men of all history could ever have tarnished the glory of God. And Christ did that by His death on the cross. This, it says Hawker, is what Paul calls the manifold wisdom of God.

We shall, this is me now, we shall never plumb the depths of the father's pleasure or discover how supremely precious was Christ's blood to him in that moment when our saviour became obedient unto death. His death, his blood means everything. answers everything for the glory of God. The cross of Christ stands forever as the heart and substance of the son's humble and loving obedience to his father. His blood has unlimited value in the currency of heaven. It has infinite importance and usefulness in the economy of God. And therefore, God also hath highly exalted him and given him a name which is above every name. Christ's death honoured God. So God honoured him.

In heaven, according to the Apostle John, John tells us in Revelation chapter 5 verse 6 and 13 verse 8, in heaven, in the midst of the throne, in the midst of the throne, stands a lamb as it had been slain and all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him. Every knee shall bow. in heaven, on earth, and under the earth. Christ's name is exalted above every name because the man, Christ Jesus, is exalted above every other. There is no other one in heaven or earth or under the earth whose glory, majesty, or honor exceeds that of the God-man, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

He alone is worthy, and it is His Father's will that He alone be worshipped. So agrees the angelic host, so declares the gathered church in heaven. He is worthy to receive all glory and honour and power. Our Lord Jesus was exalted when he was raised from the dead. He was exalted when he was carried into heaven by angels and set down in glory at the right hand of the majesty on high. He shall be endlessly exalted as he is worshipped and adored through eternal ages by angels and by the church. None will be excused from acknowledging the God-man's highest glory. Every knee shall bow. Angels will stoop to honor him. Men will cast themselves at his feet. Devils will crouch and cower at his sight.

And all will confess the merits of Christ's blood, the uniqueness of his salvation. the fitness of His honour and majesty. Paul has been leading the church to view the wonderful and exemplary humility of our Saviour, unveiling His glory and coming into the world. This is what prompted the apostles' comments to the Philippians. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ.

But, but, in doing so, he has also opened a window upon the infinite merit of the Saviour's death and the accomplishments of his blood. Why did he do that? Why has he linked these two things together? Because Paul knows that these are the things that motivate the Lord's people to love and to serve their God.

This is the ground of our faith and without faith we cannot please Him. This is also what Peter is talking about. This is not unique to Paul. This is the apostolic foundation. This is the message of the gospel. This is what Peter is speaking about when he writes of the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow. 1 Peter 1, verse 11.

You and I, brothers and sisters, have been conformed to Christ. we are believers, we have been conformed to Christ. And these are lessons that inspire us to live accordingly and to generate praise in the heart of every child of God. We are the happy beneficiaries of the son's obedience unto death for the glory of his father. and being united to Christ and the undeserving joint heirs of Christ, we are the beneficiaries also of the Father's glory given to his Son. And we delight, therefore, to live and to honour and to glory our God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. May the Lord bless these thoughts to us today. Amen.

At The Name Of Jesus

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At The Name Of Jesus

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