Scripture: Philippians 2:1-13
When we consider the final verse of our passage from last week, we discover that Jesus, in a way, answered our question for today – who will be first, or honored, when the day of the kingdom of God arrives, and who will be left wanting? The LORD told us, in Luke 13:30, that “Indeed there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.” In essence, he is saying that a lot of people are going to be surprised on that day. It’s about what each person accepts as Godly, and what they reject as false teaching. Remember that Israel, Jesus’ primary audience, believed that since they had been called “the chosen people” that they were on the “in” with Jehovah, and everyone else was “out”.
The point of Jesus’ words is this – don’t second guess God, and never think you have a better plan than he does, because you will be wrong at every turn, and one day, you will discover that the truth has been right in front of you all the time, and you missed it. You thought that you would be “first” in the kingdom, but guess what! You won’t be!
But the “problem” for today isn’t so much about who will, one day, be honored, and who, on that same day, will be rejected, but rather why our way isn’t going to help us one little bit when we stand before the throne of God.
And so we begin.
Read Philippians 2:1-4
In the conclusion to Jesus’ parable of the Workers in the Vineyard (Matthew 20:1-16), in which some workers worked for the master all day, and others only part of the day, including some who only worked for an hour or so, there were complaints that every worker received the same pay, regardless of how much they worked, and that just wasn’t right. And in verse 15, the “master” replies to the complainers “ 15 Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?’ 16 “So the last will be first, and the first will be last.”
It would seem that God’s generosity has nothing to do with our definition of that term! Later in that chapter (Matthew20:24-28), he gives an example of what “generosity” signifies in his kingdom. He says that the extent of our generosity depends on, not how much of our resources we may give to others, but on how generous we are with our life, with our self. He says that the test of our greatness rests on how great our servanthood is.
In our passage
for today, Paul reminds us that our “servanthood” must be based in humility, not
in personal pride, that it is has nothing to do with what we will gain
from it, but rather in what others will receive from our efforts! And where does our desire to serve others begin? He says that it is based in our relationship
with Jesus and his example for our lives, that we must be united with
Christ. Union with Christ goes beyond
following, or discipleship, or even faithfulness. It means that we must be one with him in
mind, in spirit, and in heart. Our surrender
to his ways must be complete and total, but in return, what do we receive?
Paul writes
that we will be encouraged in our good times to grow even greater in our faith
and trust; that we will be comforted in our times of difficulty through the
love that God shows to us; that fellowship through the Spirit will bring us a
union with others who believe and unite with the LORD; we will gain in tenderness and
compassion to use in our ministry to the people of this world.
And we are told
that in all that we receive through Christ, we are to live in a union with the
Church that mimics the life that Jesus lived.
Like-minded, loving, and Spirit filled with one purpose – that is what
the Church of Jesus Christ demands of us.
And it all hinges on doing it all – not for our benefit, but to the glory
of God and the betterment of others!
Do you think we
are there yet? Hardly! And if we’re honest, we must admit that we
aren’t even close! And yet, it doesn’t
mean that we shouldn’t see the way of Jesus Christ as both the goal for our
personal lives, as well as for our church’s direction and mission. Perhaps
we’ll talk about how we go about this radical change from striving to be first
in the world to accepting the lower position here (Luke 14:11), so that
we might be first in the heart of God. But
for now, back to our passage.
Read
Philippians 2:5-8
In Colossians1:15-17, we read that Jesus is “the image of the invisible God”. Before Christ left heaven and came into the
world, he was the Second Person of the Triune God. Not in second place to the Father, but on a
par. But when he left Glory to become our
Savior, he had to give up his presence as God before he could take on the
appearance of a man. After all, the sin
of mankind required the sacrifice of humanity, but only God can forgive
sin. Therefore God had to take on the
attributes and life of his own creation, while forgoing the adoration and majesty
of the divine, in order to become the required sacrifice on their behalf. His sacrifice had to be as one of us before
we could receive the forgiveness of God.
And in that
change, he could not accomplish his mission while also taking on the power and
authority that humanity had created – so instead, he became the lowest
of mankind, a servant to the very ones he had once created. Talk about becoming humble in the
extreme! But that was what would be
required if created humanity could ever have a chance of living in eternity
with their Creator!
And we are
being asked to take on that same level of humility so that we, too, can achieve
“lastness” in this life with Christ.
Read Philippians2:9-13
And here is the
greatness, the “firstness” of God at work.
The humbleness of Jesus, his servanthood to the people of earth, his acceptance
of being the sacrifice that could achieve forgiveness for their sins, the eagerness
of God to free the ones who had demeaned him, denied him, rejected him, and who
had worked so hard to overturn his truth, were now being told how to give God
pleasure and joy once again, and what is required to receive the LORD’s blessings once more.
And where Jesus
once took on the lowly estate of a man, and gave himself for their salvation, he
has now been lifted up to his former glory, and would finally, on the day that
is yet to come, be honored and acknowledged by everyone as the One he had been
forever. The problem, though, is in the timing
of everyone’s confession. Will we
confess Jesus Christ as LORD,
Redeemer, and Savior while we are still able to make that decision and choice,
or will we wait until the day of Christ’s return when there will no longer be a
choice to make? Will we choose Jesus because
we know that we are “least and last”, or feel that we are already “first and
best” and have no need of him?
Jesus, in his
greatness, chose to become humble in order to accept servanthood and “leastness”
as a human being. Are we willing to
acknowledge our inability to become righteous in this life, to choose humility
over greatness, and to turn to Jesus as our one and only hope for eternity? Now some believe that this choice is all that
we need to do – that afterward, we can just sit back and relax, and they forget
Paul’s admonition in the final verses of this passage.
“Continue to
work out your salvation with fear and trembling”. They also forget the first few verses of this
passage, that pride, personal satisfaction, and arrogance have no place in the
life of a Christian. The truth is that
we must now work to remain united with Christ, to be like-minded in him and
in the Church, to love others – all of them - as Jesus loved us, to walk in
spirit and common purpose, with each other, in service, and to always take the
lower position so that others may be honored with the higher one.
The question
for today has been “Who’s First?” It would
appear that our answer should be “others”, but that is easier said than done! Verse three of our passage for today must be the focus that all Christians should claim, so here it is one more time - “3 Do nothing out of
selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility value others better than
yourselves.” Isn’t this exactly what
Jesus did? If we are to be “like-minded”
with our LORD, shouldn’t we
live in the same manner as he did?
May we always
take the knee to give honor to our Savior, and may we always confess Jesus
Christ as the LORD of our life,
not just in words and appearance, but in everything that we think and do. That is the life that will, one day, gain us
glory and honor at the place of our Almighty God.
But that day
has yet to come, and the day that we live now is one of working in our
salvation with “fear and trembling” over just what God had to do to ensure that
his way could be ours. That was never a
problem for God, so why should it be one for us.
