Philippians 2 and beginning in
verse 5 through verse 11. Let this mind 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 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. May the Lord bless His word to
us. I feel like saying first of all
what God said to Moses. when he appeared unto him in
that burning bush. When we come to these words,
put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou
standest is holy ground. And I heartily agree with the
comments that I read this past week by Robert Hawker. He said,
and insensible indeed must be that man's soul that can hear
or read what Paul has here said of the Lord Jesus Christ and
can hear or read it unmoved. But I know by experience that
we can read this passage of Scripture and we can hear this passage
of Scripture expounded and be unmoved. God help us this morning
as we think of what is revealed to us here concerning the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now last week we looked at the
first four verses in this chapter. And we saw how it was that Paul
appealed to the believers to be of the same love. You notice
that in verse 2 where he said, having the same love. And when
we have the same love, then we will be like-minded, and we will
be of the same mind. You will turn back just a few
pages to the last chapter of 2 Corinthians, chapter 13. Notice these last
words that the apostle here wrote to the church at Corinth, beginning
with verse 11. Finally, brethren, farewell. Be perfect. Be sincere. That's what that word perfect
means. Be sincere. Be mature. Be of good conduct. Be of one mind. There it is. Be of the same love. If we are
of the same love, we will be like-minded. We will be of the
same mind. Live in peace. And the God of
love and peace shall be with you. Greet one another with an
holy kiss. All the saints salute you. Then
we have this inspired benediction of the apostle. And we see the
triunity of the God we worship. God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ,
and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost be
with you all. Amen. Now in this passage this
morning, we're looking at the Lord Jesus Christ as Paul presented
him to this church after exhorting them and appealing to them to
be of the same love, to be of the same mind, that he gives
the Lord Jesus Christ as an example. As an example to us to be of
the same love and then of the same mind. And this morning as
we look at this passage, we will consider first what he tells
us about Christ. what the apostle here tells us
about our Lord, about our Savior, what he tells us about Christ.
And then secondly, we will look at this as an exhortation, an
appeal to us to be like Christ, to be of the same mind. Let this
mind be in you. So first of all, let us consider
the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now this is, this
is a great mystery. In fact, he said great is the
mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh. It is a mystery, but it is a
mystery that is revealed unto us. And it is revealed unto us
in the Word of God. And it is revealed to us from
the Word of God by the power of the Holy Spirit. Not everyone
is enabled by God to see this. Many people read the Scriptures,
but they do not see this great mystery that God was manifest
in the flesh. And why He came in the flesh.
And what He accomplished and where He is today. We'll look at this under these
four headings. First of all, we began with His
Godhead. The Scripture here in verse 6
says, "...who being in the form of God thought it not robbery
to be equal with God." When we read that he was in the form
of God, we must be careful not to allow our minds to think of
a shape When we read that he was in the form of God, don't
think of God as being in any form, any shape. Because we know that God is a
Spirit. But the form of God means the
essence of God. He is Spirit and His name is
Jehovah. And as that name declares unto
us, He is I Am that I Am. To use the word form, let us
know that there is but one form of God, one essence or one nature. And this is common, this nature,
this essence, this form is common to all three persons in the Godhead. Now, I use that word Godhead
because we find it in the Bible, in Romans chapter 1, the Godhead. But what does that word mean?
Young people, now listen to me. What does the word Godhead mean?
It means deity. The Godhead just simply means
deity or God. There's one form, there's one
essence, one spirit, God. And yet He exists in a trinity
of persons. Let me read you a verse from
Isaiah chapter 54 and verse 5. Thy Maker is thine Husband. Now who is your Maker? Who is my Maker? Who is the One
who has created all things? The Eternal Word. That's what
the Apostle John tells us. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Without Him
was not anything made that is made. He made all things, thy
Maker. is thine husband. Now, when Paul
uses or speaks to husbands and wives in Ephesians chapter 5,
he says this is a mystery, but he's speaking of Christ as being
the husband of his church, of his elect people. of you this
morning. Thy Maker, if you are a child
of God, if you trust in Him today, if you know Him, thy Maker is
thine husband. The Lord of Hosts is His name. Who is my Maker? Who is my husband? His name is the Lord of Hosts,
who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be
equal with God. His Godhead, and Thy Redeemer. He's our Maker,
He's our Husband, and He is our Redeemer, Thy Redeemer, the Holy
One of Israel. Remember what the angel said
to Mary, that holy ones that shall be born of Thee shall be
called the Son of the Highest. The God of the whole earth shall
He be called. When we talk about the Lord Jesus
Christ, we begin with His Godhead, with His deity. And this phrase
that the apostle here uses, we should all recognize that when
he says, who being in the form of God, That phrase, the form
of God, and then he says to be equal with God, signify the same
truth. In the form of God means that
he is equal with God. Why? Because he is God. No one may be God's equal who
is not God. And the one phrase explains the
first phrase. Who being in the form of God,
thought it not robbery. Thought it not something to be
grasped. He didn't feel like, he didn't
think that to proclaim himself to be God Almighty, that he was
robbing God of His glory. Remember God in the book of Malachi
said, Thou hast robbed God. And when men rob God, not in
tithes and offerings, that's the way it's most commonly used
today, but many of those people who use that verse of Scripture
to browbeat people to give money, my friends, they themselves are
guilty of robbing God of His glory. Anyone who says that salvation
is partly the work of God and partly the work of man is guilty,
guilty as charged before God Almighty of robbing him of his
glory. He said, My glory I will not
share with another, and salvation is of the Lord. He thought it
not robbery to be equal with God. Not something to be grasped.
It was His by right because He is God Almighty. One with the
Father and one with the Holy Spirit. So we began in this passage
with His Godhead. But now let's continue with His
humiliation. He made Himself of no reputation. Verse 7. But made himself of
no reputation. Now, what does that mean? Well, this is what it literally
means. He emptied Himself. He emptied Himself. And notice,
He did that Himself. Often times we read in the economy
of God that God sent the Father. Yes. But my friends, He came
willingly. He emptied Himself. Now what did He empty Himself
of? He emptied Himself of His glory. He emptied Himself of His glory. The night before He died on the
cross, in His prayer, as it is recorded for us in John 17, He
said this, O Father, glorify Thou me with Thine own self,
with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was. He had always shared the glory,
whatever that is. And I find it difficult to define,
don't you? the glory of God. What is that? The Shekinah, the brightness. I don't think we have the words.
I certainly do not have the capacity to explain, to describe what
that word means. The glory of God is perfectness. And how that shines forth and
is manifested to all His creatures, so much so that the holy angels,
they cover their faces in His presence. He charges His angels
with folly, and even the heavens are not clean in His sight. But
He laid that glory aside. He veiled that glory with His
flesh. And He took into union with Himself
when He laid aside that glory, that nature that was prepared
Him by the Holy Spirit from the Virgin Mary. And this should
be recognized. In taking our nature, He lost
nothing of what He was, but He covered that glory of His divine
nature. And as you read through the Gospels,
you see how that glory sometimes just breaks through the flesh,
doesn't it? Shines forth. I think of him that day when
he took those few loaves of bread and a few fish and and lifted
his eyes to heaven and thanked the Father and blessed that bread
and then began to divide it and give it out. Five thousand men,
not counting women and children, were fed. What's that but His
glorious power, His creative power breaking forth, shining
forth. That day on the Mount of Transfiguration,
when His Son did His face to shine as the His glory is breaking
forth, isn't it? Yet the truth is, we know this
is so from the Word of God. And it's still so today. that
that glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,
was beheld by a very few people. Very few. The majority of men
saw the Lord Jesus Christ just like Isaiah had prophesied. No
form or comeliness in Him. The majority of mankind hid their
faces, as it were, from Him, considered Him even as a worm,
and no man. Yet we recognize, or we should
at least, that when He came into this world, the person of the
Lord Jesus Christ. There was such a worthiness about
Him when He came into this world that God the Father said, let
all the angels worship Him. And remember that night when
that one angel spoke to those shepherds. And then the heavens
were filled with a host of angels praising the Son of God. He was worthy even as a babe
when He first came into this world. So first we began with
His Godhead. We continue now with His humiliation,
and number three, we are staggered at his further condescension. Notice what the Apostle says,
ìBeing found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. I like the
way this is translated in the New American Standard Bible because
of the colons it uses. And each step, each phrase rather,
is a step the Lord Jesus Christ took down. He humbled himself
and became obedient under death, even the death of
the cross. Actually, his life in this world
was a life of continuously humbling himself. His life was marked both by his
humiliation and by his obedience. And He was obedient, the Apostle
Paul tells us here, even unto death. And that, the death of
the cross. From His birth in Bethlehem till
His giving His life on the cross, He was obedient unto the will
of the Father. Paul later, or Paul in another
letter in Galatians said, When the fullness of the time was
come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the
law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might
receive the adoption of sons. There are three things about
the death of the cross that shows his humiliation. Just by the
way he died, he died on the cross. The first thing about His death
on the cross we should recognize is that that was a cursed death. He was made a curse for us that
He might redeem us from the curse of the law. I was cursed. You were cursed. The law cursed
everyone who did not obey it completely. And the curse of
the law was death. How was he made a curse? He was
hanged on a tree. And the scripture, the law of
God had said years before, cursed is everyone that hangeth upon
a tree. And number two, it was a painful
death. It was a painful death. That's the reason Pilate was
so surprised when Joseph of Arimathea came in and begged the body of
Christ. Is he already dead? six hours on the cross, is he
already dead? That's unusual. Normally this
death would take many hours, more than one day before a person
finally succumbed to death. It's very painful that every
bone in the person's body was taken out of place. And the hands
and the feet and the head points of pain. It was a very
painful death. And number three, it was the
death of a criminal. It was a shameful death. Now listen folks, I'm talking
about the King of Glory. I'm not talking about some political
figure, some hero of past ages. I'm talking about God Almighty
who came into this world as a man. This death, the death of the
cross, was reserved for felons, for criminals. Remember in the psalm, he said,
I restored that which I took not away. You and I, we had stolen
from God. We had run away from God. But
he restored, he died the felon's death that we deserve. One very ignorant person one
time, but yet very wise because he knew Christ and knew the gospel. He said it like this, he died,
I live. That's it, isn't it? In a nutshell,
he died and I live. Because he took our place on
that tree. And number four, we are told
the purpose or the cause of all of this. Why he who is equal
with God would come into this world as a man and humble himself,
be obedient even unto death, the cause of all of this. If
you notice in verse 11, the very last words, to the glory of God
the Father. That was the purpose. To the
glory of God the Father. The Son of God lays aside His
glory for the glory of the Father. The Son of God empties Himself
of His honor for the honor of the Father. And in doing so, now remember
this, in doing this, in Him so emptying Himself and coming into
this world as a man and suffering in the place of sinners, in doing
this, He honored and He glorified the Father more than you and
I, those of us who trust in Him, more than we have dishonored
Him. And we've all dishonored Him,
God, a whole lot. Isn't that true? By our lives,
by our thoughts, By our words, by our actions, from the first
day we came into this world, we have dishonored God. We have
not glorified Him as He is worthy. But more than we have dishonored
Him, the Lord Jesus Christ, as the surety for His people, honored
God and glorified Him. So great are His merits, and
His obedience, and the sacrifice of Himself, that all who trust
in Him we may know with assurance, Our debt is paid. Our debt is paid. If you could
see the record there in heaven, and at the top of that page is
your name, and all those sins, line after line, column after
column, Paid in full. They're all blotted out by the
blood of Jesus Christ. Nothing more may be demanded. He has satisfied God. And He is worthy of such praise
that to Him every knee shall bow. And every tongue shall confess
that He is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Now, the second
part of the message. Let us look at this as an appeal
that is made to us. Let this mine be in you. That's what he says, isn't it?
Let this mine be in you, which was also in Christ. There are four words that I want
us to mark and think about the mind of Christ that is to be
in us. The first word is the word humbled. He humbled himself. The mind
that we are to have or the mind of Christ is one of humility. To say of any of us He, she is a proud Christian
is a contradiction. The word Christian, the title
Christian means to be like Christ, doesn't it? Christ-like. And
for any of us to be lifted up with pride, to be proud, is inconsistent
with our confession. Let this line be in you. And
the first thing we notice is that He humbled himself. The mind that we are to have
is one of humility. Remember in that passage in Matthew
when he said, Come unto me all you that labor and are heavy
laden. Are you laboring today under
a load of guilt and sin? Are you heavy laden? Are you beat down, pressed down
because of your sin? The Lord Jesus Christ said, Come
unto me, look unto me, trust in me, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn
of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart. And you shall find
rest unto your souls. There's two rests there, isn't
there? There's that rest when we come looking unto Christ the
very first time. But my friends, there is also
this rest that we have when we take His yoke upon us and learn
of Him. Learn of Him so as to become
like Him, meek and lowly in heart. As I grow older, my friends, I'm more concerned about what
we are than I am what we believe. It's very important what we believe.
But my friends, if what we believe doesn't make us like Christ,
We better check up on what we believe. He was meek and lowly. Let this
mind be in you, which was also in Christ. The first word is
humble, humility. Turn with me to Romans 12, just
a moment, Romans 12. You've all heard the old saying,
I'd rather see a sermon any day than hear one. There's a lot
of error in that, but there is some truth. Faith cometh by hearing,
and hearing by the Word of God. But James said, you show me your
faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my
works. Paul says, I beseech you therefore,
brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies
a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable
service. And then notice what he says
in verse 3. One of the things he says is,
not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think. Don't think of yourself more
highly than you ought to think. What do you have that you have
not received? Whether it's knowledge, no matter
what it is, if it's ability, if it's gifts, if it's your brain,
your understanding, if it is your appearance, your looks,
no matter what. Don't think of yourself more
highly than you ought to think, but think of yourself humbly. And then down also in that verse,
or that chapter in verse 16, he said, Be of the same mind,
one toward another. There it is again. Mind not high
things. Don't mind high things. but condescend to men of low
estate. And remember, you are not any
better than those men of low estate. We're all on the same
level before God. We may look different. Society,
the norms of society, they may judge and there may be different
stratus of society, but before God Almighty, my friends, we're
all on the same level. The second word in this passage
is the word servant. The mind we are to have, the
mind of Christ, is that of a servant. Our Lord, who is the King of
glory, He said, I am among you as He that serves. And in another
place He said, I did not come to be ministered unto, but to
minister. His disciples, they got in an
argument, didn't they? Who should be greatest in the
kingdom of heaven? And our Lord showed who was the
greatest in the kingdom of heaven that night when He took a towel
in a basin of water and washed the disciples' feet. He was among us as one who served. And it's not what this church
can do for me, but what can I do for this church? How may I serve? How may I be
a blessing to others? The third word is the word obedient. This is the mind of Christ, and
that is one of obedience. And this is one of the reasons
that we must study the Word of God, that we might be obedient
unto His Word. How do we know His will if we
do not, or how do we do His will, rather, if we do not know His
will? And how do we learn His will if we pay no attention to
His Word? And some of you here this morning,
now listen to me. Have you been obedient unto Christ? Is there some area in your life
where we are not obedient? Some here this morning, you trust
in Christ. You look to Him as your Savior
and yet you have not followed Him in baptism. You have not
been obedient unto His command to confess Him before men. Let this mind be in you, a mind
of obedience. It's not my will, but His will. That's what it means to be obedient,
doesn't it? Not my will, but Thy will be
done. And the fourth word is this word
exalted. The mind that was in Christ is
a mind that should consider how we have been exalted and how
we shall be exalted. You say, Preacher, have you been
exalted? I sure have. And so have you. In Hannah's song, in 1 Samuel,
she said, He takes the poor from the dust and the beggar from
the dunghill. That's where I was. But He lifts
us up to sit among princes. We've been adopted and made children
of God. Paul said in Ephesians 1, having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
Himself according to the good pleasure of His will. And some
people say, I don't like predestination. I don't like that word and I
don't like that teaching. Well, I do. I sure do. Having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children. We've been exalted from the dunghill
to be made sons and daughters of God. And then think of how we will
be exalted when He comes again. You know the Lord, or the Scripture
says this about our Lord. Who for the joy that was set
before Him endured the cross, despising the shame. The Lord
Jesus Christ, He endured that cross. He despised the shame
that came with it. But why? For the joy that was
set before Him. And that joy that is set before
us this morning, one day when He comes again, we too shall
be exalted. And as His face shined like the
sun that day on the Mount of Transfiguration, the Scripture
says that we too shall shine as the sun. So consider these
four words, humility, obedience, and exaltation, and being a servant.