Philippians 2:1-11
Today, the Sunday before Easter Sunday is sometimes celebrated as Palm Sunday and sometimes as Passion Sunday. A Palm Sunday service focuses on Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. A Passon Sunday service focuses on what happened next – Jesus’ crucifixion by the Romans. Today we’re going to talk about Jesus’ death on the cross.
In today’s passage from Philippians the Apostle Paul tells us that Jesus “emptied himself” to become human. Jesus, who was the eternal Son of God, set aside his divine powers and privileges to live as a mortal human with all our weaknesses and limitations, except that unlike us, he was sinless.
When we read that Jesus “emptied himself” we should realize how amazing that was. For most of us, giving up power and privilege is very hard to do.
We might think of how difficult it is for American presidents — and other world leaders — to leave office and give up their exalted position. For some their self-centeredness is so immense that they will do anything to stay in power.
We humans hate to let go of our privileges. But that is what Jesus voluntarily chose to do. “Though in the form of God,” Paul writes, “Christ emptied himself, taking the form of a servant.” Jesus did that out of love, because he loves us and loves all people. Jesus’ incarnation shows us that self-giving love is at the heart of who God is.
Jesus’ self-emptying didn’t end with becoming human. Paul writes that Jesus humbled himself even further by dying on the cross.
What we see in Jesus’ life and death is the opposite of how many people try to live. Many of us are always trying to gain more power and privilege and prestige. But Jesus is constantly giving up those things. He keeps emptying himself, taking the lowest position, because of his love.
As we know, however, Jesus’ death is not the end of the story. Because Jesus laid aside his power and privilege to die on the cross, God exalted him. God raised him from the dead and made him ruler over all creation.
This is the pattern Paul wants us to see in Jesus’ life. Jesus empties and humbles himself, and God lifts him up. Paul tells us to embrace this pattern for our own lives. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,” he writes.
We’re called for the sake of love to let go of selfishly holding on to power and privilege. As we do that, God will exalt and empower us as he did Jesus. Not for worldly goals, but God will honor our lives and empower us in his service for the sake of others.
See the pattern? Dying and rising. Letting go of power and privilege, and being lifted up and empowered by God. This is what it means to have the mind of Christ.
Let’s talk for a few minutes about what emptying ourselves and putting others first looks like in everyday life. One basic and simple way to do this is to really listen to other people.
This has been a challenge for me. When someone shares an idea with me that is new and unfamiliar, too often my first reaction is to dismiss it. While they’re explaining their thoughts, my mind is filled with my own. I’m thinking about why I don’t agree. I’m not even trying to understand what the person is really saying.
I’ve had to learn to catch myself and put aside my own thoughts, dying to self, as it were. And to ask myself, what is this person getting at. What are they trying to say and how might I hear it with an open mind?
Careful listening is a spiritual discipline, like prayer or fasting. Disciplining ourselves to hear what others are saying, seeking to understand what they mean, and being open to consider their message. When we do this, we will find that their ideas often turn out to be very important and a blessing.
“Have the mind of Christ.” “Put the interests of others above your own interests.” Doing this is especially challenging when there’s great risk involved, when it might cost us a lot.
During the 2nd and 3rd centuries two great plagues devasted the Roman world, killing as many as a quarter to a third of the population. At the first sign of illness, many people were thrown out of their homes by their own family members. Many people fled infected cities.
The Christians acted differently. Instead of fleeing town or avoiding those sick with the plague, believers in Jesus helped take care of them. They cared for not only their own family members but strangers, people who had been abandoned by their families. They nursed people they didn’t know and provided them with food, drink and shelter at great risk to themselves and their own families.
This was a powerful testimony, an incredible witness that distinguished the Jesus-followers from almost everyone else. Here were a people who truly put the interests of others above their own.
In the 1930s and 40s when the Nazis dominated Europe and were systematically murdering millions of Jews, some Christians hid Jewish people in their homes and helped them escape to safe places. They did this at great risk, since those caught helping Jews were executed.
Trgically, most professing Christians in Germany and occupied countries remained passive, and many supported the Nazi regime. But some faithful Jesus-followers put the lives of others above their own safety. We look back in admiration for their faithfulness and courage, and can hope that by God’s grace, we would have done what they did.
Thankfully today in the U.S. helping people who are vulnerable is not usually as dangerous. Although some people have been killed by ICE agents while trying to protect immigrants. And conditions here could easily get worse.
Loving others can sometimes be hard and costly, as it was for Jesus. Each of us in our own lives and circumstances are sometimes called to express love for others by risking ourselves in dangerous situtions. “Putting the interests of others above our own interests” sometimes requires great trust in God, and great courage.
Let me close with a story – a parable picturing the difference between Heaven and Hell.
In Hell everyone is seated at a great banquet table with mounds of the most delicious foods. Each diner has a spoon with which to take the food. But the spoons are very long and are tied securely to the diners’ arms. Each person can fill their spoon with food from the bowls, but their spoon is so long that they can’t place it in their mouth, if you can imagine the scene. Everyone keeps trying to eat but can’t and are tormented by eternal hunger.
Now shift the scene to Heaven. Just like in Hell the table is filled with wonderful bowls of food. The diners have the same very long spoons tied to their arms so they they can’t put the food in their mouth. There’s no difference between Heaven and Hell, except for one:
In Heaven the diners use the long spoon to take the food from the bowls and reach across the table to feed each other. And so everyone eats their fill.
You see, the people in Hell could have done that too. No one was preventing them. They could have fed each other. But they were too self-centered to think of doing that.
The moral of the parable is really a lesson for this us in our lives now. The way to flourish as human beings and children of God is to let go of our selfishness and seek to humbly serve others in self-giving love. That’s what it means to have the mind of Christ. As we do that God will bless us and lift us up, forming in us the character of Christ as mature children.
By God’s grace, albeit with fits and starts, and with many mistakes and failures, we are learning to love as Jesus loves, as God loves.