Philippians 2: A Life Worthy of the Gospel
We had planned to begin our new series in 2 Samuel this week, but due to weather and cancellations, we’re moving that start date to next Sunday.
In the meantime, we invite you to be encouraged by a special message from Isaac Hill, recorded at Old Lexington Baptist Church in Leesville on January 18. We’re grateful for the opportunity to share this sermon with our church family.
This week’s group content will be standalone.
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
This morning we are going to be in Philippians chapter two. And so if you've got your Bibles, I would love for you to turn there with me. I'm going to read for us verses 1 through 11, and I'm going to pray and we'll dive in. This is what Paul says in Philippians chapter two.
So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every nation bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word in the way that it reveals who you are and what you are doing and who we are and what you are calling us into. And so we would ask this morning that you would use your word to teach and instruct us, and that it would not return void in Jesus name. Amen.
This morning, since we're jumping directly into the middle of a book, the Letter to the Philippians, I figured we could have a little bit of context. My Old Testament class professor always said, context is king. That was driven to my mind while I studied there. A little bit of context of the letter that Paul wrote. Paul was under house arrest when he wrote this letter to the Philippian Church. If you read the couple of chapters that are there, you find out that this is one of Paul's most encouraging letters that he has to write to the churches. We discover that he has a great and fond relationship of the church at Philippi. They mean much to him, both in his heart and then in his mission of declaring the gospel to those who have yet to hear. There's not a whole lot of correction in the letter, we do learn about some disagreements that show up between a couple members, but for the most part, Paul is really just encouraging this church to continue strong in the faith.
In chapter one, which is immediately before what we're looking at this morning, Paul writes to them to let them know about his imprisonment that he was under, but more specifically to write about how he has found joy in the middle of his circumstance. It turns out that the Lord has used it as an opportunity for the continuing advancement of the message of the Gospel, both to the prison guards that were keeping watch over him and then anybody who he also got to be around. After he shares this update at the end of Chapter one, I believe that there's a transitionary paragraph that leads into the rest of the letter, and I want to read the beginning phrase of that paragraph, because I think it's going to position us to correctly understand what Paul is talking about in the passage of chapter 2. This is what he says in Philippians 1:27.
Only let your manner of life be worthy of the Gospel of Christ.
Only let your manner of life be worthy of the Gospel of Christ.
There's a footnote in the ESV translation, which is what I like to use, and it writes that if you were to literally translate this phrase, it would read, only behave as citizens worthy of the Gospel of Christ, that what we're going to see today is Paul is going to show for us three aspects, three characteristics of a life that belongs to a citizen of the Gospel of Jesus, that Jesus is king, he is Lord, and for those that believe and trust in him, we exist inside his kingdom, and there's a way of life that is called for us to live in under the message of Jesus. With that, let's jump in to chapter two, verse. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.
He writes this language, if there is any. When he writes it that way, it's almost like when you and I would ask a rhetorical question. If you've ever been with your friend and you know somebody who did something totally outlandish, you might say, can you believe that? It's not really that you are asking. Can you show the proof and build out the reason as to why you believe that? No, you're just so confounded by what has taken place that it bursts out into question. In the same way Paul is saying, if there is any encouragement in Christ, there is. He's already written about it in chapter one, that there is encouragement in Christ as he's in prison. He writes, if there's any comfort from love, this letter is an encouraging letter, that the relationship that he has with the Philippian Church, there is comfort in love that he has from them. If there's any participation in the Spirit, he writes about their partnership with him in the Gospel. There's affection, there's sympathy. That's what Paul is seeing.
In verse two, what we see is he's saying, complete my joy. He's driving toward what he wants them to understand, what he wants to instruct them in. What we're going to see is what I believe is three categories that are important for us in understanding what it looks like, our life to look like it is worthy of the Gospel of Jesus. Verse two, he says, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. I think these are the three categories here. While we talk about them this morning as three distinct categories, because that's helpful for us in engaging it, they're actually interconnected with one another, as we'll see. But as we see here, Paul wants them to be of the same mind, Number one wants them to have the same love. It's number two, and he wants them to be of one in purpose. That word purpose is another way of translating the word accord. Those are the three categories that I think Paul is getting after and that we would do well to consider and study.
If you were to just read up to verse two here in the text, you would be asking some questions. What is the mind that we're supposed to be in? The same as what love are we supposed to be the same as what accord or purpose are we supposed to be full of? That's what I think verses 3 through 11 are going to help us this morning. Let's take these one at a time.
First, Paul is going to write about what it looks like being of the same mind. Pick back up in verse 3.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus.
Paul begins to explain what it looks like to have this mind. First of all, he categorizes it as being the mind of Christ. We'll get to talk about that in more detail here in a minute. In verse three and four, he practically is walking through what it looks like to have the same mind. Let's work back through just bit by bit of what he said. Do nothing from selfish ambition. Ambition is that idea of drive or motivation by which we do things. What he's saying is, don't—those a negative command. Don't be driven to terminate what you do on self. Do nothing from selfish ambition. Don't let your ambition, your motivation, your drive to accomplish things be for the end and the purpose of ending on yourself. Then he says, do nothing from conceit. Conceit is the idea of thinking more highly of yourself than you ought to. The important thing about conceit is it actually has to do with our relationship with other people. The way that I can think more highly of myself is by thinking more highly of me over you.
Then he goes on and starts to give the positive aspect of this, what it looks like in humility, count others as more significant than yourselves. That's the opposite side of the conceit that not only would I not think of myself as greater than you, but I would be thinking of you as greater than me. That's true humility of me bringing myself low and considering you as more than important. That's the mind he wants us to have. In verse 4 he says, look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Very practically what it looks like is not just me thinking about what I've got on my plate or whatever difficulties I'm facing or whatever wants I have thinking about you and what you're facing and what you're dealing with and what you want.
To flesh this out a little bit more, I just figured I'd share some of how this passage in this last week was hitting home for me. How the Spirit was working in my heart, convicting me and thinking this in verse 4. I really appreciate Paul's language of look because in life what happens is we've got our stuff that we're dealing with, whatever it is. Your alarm goes off, my alarm goes off. I wake up and I go to my job and I sit at my desk and do my work and tackle my problems. Then I come home and I've got my house and my family and I'm zoned in. It's something about us that we've got to take care of it. We're looking at the things we're doing, and we're just looking and we're doing and we're looking and we're doing and just locked in. What Paul wants us to see—this is why I found that language of look so helpful—is that if we take a moment to pause and look, I see there's more than me. I see there's more than what I'm facing and what I'm dealing with and what I'm working at. Now I'm beginning to see you. If I spend long enough looking, I'll start to see the else who has all the things that you're doing that you're working towards, that you're facing, that you're struggling with.
This is why it's convicting for me, is that I'm very driven by accomplishing, by getting stuff done, but I should slow down. I hope to consider and look and see other people. Another thing that was striking in this passage is Paul doesn't say, don't just look to your own needs, but look to the needs of others. He says, don't just look to your own interests, but look to the interests of others. I think we might find it a little easy to wrap our heads around. Well, yeah, they have a need, so I'll help them meet a need that makes sense. But he just says their interests, what they have want for. That's true humility coming all the way down low, that I would consider what you want above what I want. This is the mind that Paul is wanting us to have and to share.
As mentioned earlier, Paul has a lot of commendation for the church, but he really wants to push them to grow in this way. As I was trying to consider how we might be able to connect in our own context with what Paul is writing here, I was thinking about verse one, as he's writing about the encouragement that's there, the comfort that is there, the sympathy, the affection. I was beginning to think we might say something like, the Joneses, they're just good people. They're good people. Or you might say the Millers, they're just so nice, just decent people. We might use language like that. Genuinely, we're talking about good things. We're talking about them being respectful, cordial, nice, kind. They're genuinely wonderful good qualities about people and something that we should be. But Paul is trying to drive us into something deeper because remember, he's talking about a life that is worthy of belonging to the gospel of Jesus.
I don't think it's enough that we could just be good people. It's not enough for me to just be decent. Even this morning as I'm here and I'm walking and I'm getting to shake all of your hands and meet you, I said, you don't know me. Maybe after you've had an interaction with me, you might think, oh, he's a decent fella. I haven't rubbed the wrong way. I think that's a perfectly fine thing. But I can do that and still be driven as a person by selfish ambition, I can do that and still be a person that is driven by conceit, that I would think more highly of myself, or that I could be a person that is really just mainly concerned with my own interests. So it's not enough. A life worthy of the gospel of Jesus in our mind must go beyond what are good things. We have to drive deeper into the faith that we have been called into. I would be thinking of other people as more important than myself. This is the mind of Christ. This is the mind that Paul wants us to live in as people who belong to Jesus. That word humility there is the perfect summation of what he is getting at, that I would be humble. That's the first category that Paul has for us of living a life worthy of the gospel of Jesus: that we would be of one mind, the one mind of Christ that is humble.
Secondly, being of the same love. Paul talks about, he wants them to be of the same love. Pick back up in verse five.
Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.
As mentioned already that this mind of humility belongs to Christ. Paul is about to explain here the depth of the humility of Jesus. Follow the journey of Christ as Paul has it outlined here. First we see that Jesus was in the form of God. Theologically, Jesus is God the Son, that our God exists as a triune God, he is three persons in one being, that he is God the Father, the Son and the Spirit, and Jesus is God the Son. We could have spent all morning just trying to talk about and tackle and understand what that means, and we still would just barely have scratched the surface of understanding it. But let's focus on what Paul is considering this morning along the lines of humility.
Jesus has a claim to be God the man. Jesus who lived 2,000 years ago, a real person like you and I. He has a claim to the name of God that includes all the power, includes all the authority. In other scriptures we see that he's accredited with creation. He's the Creator, he's the Almighty, he's powerful, he's the Name above all names. He has the authority. Yet he, verse seven did not count—sorry, verse six did not count—equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant being born in the likeness of men. This is the beginning of the path of humility that Jesus takes. It starts with the mind of Christ here, right? He says, do not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. He does not think of his claim to the name of God as that which should be grabbed with triumphal assertion. As one commentator put it.
I have a young son now. He's almost 10 months old and yesterday we got to play together and he has this little screwdriver chew toy thing to help him with teething or whatever. He was just holding on to it. He was just grasping onto it, super excited, super cute, and that's that idea of grasping onto it like it's the spoils of victory of war, that he's got this rubber little chew toy thing. When we think about the idea of Jesus having a claim to the name of God and that he didn't count it as something worth grasping to, what does he do? He put on the likeness of man that the Son of God eternal became like you and I. He had real skin, real bones. He had muscles that grew weary as the day went on. His mind grew hazy as tiredness began to set in, or maybe hunger, a stomach that growled when it was dinner time.
I want to be clear here so I don't get myself into trouble when talking about this aspect of Jesus being in two natures, fully God and fully man. When Jesus put on flesh, he didn't in any way lose his status as God. Remember, he has full claim to it. But he still did put on flesh. He still was like you and I, weak. We've gotten to talk with some of you that are much further along in the journey than I am now. I'm sure you understand that, do you not? Body begins to be weak, gets to be harder to do things. Jesus was man, with times experienced weakness. We could have spent all morning just talking about this aspect of Jesus, and still we would have just barely scratched the surface of what it means. Let's continue on along the purpose of what Paul is talking about, outlining the path of Christ's humility.
First, being found in human form. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. We have Jesus, who is the Son of God, eternal, creator, almighty, powerful. Then he takes on human frame like you and I, and he experiences life like you and I experience with weakness, with sadness, with tears, with difficulty. He also submits himself to obedience to the Father. We see this throughout the Gospel accounts that Jesus in his ministry submits to the will of God. See this most potently in the Gospel of John. Over and over again Jesus recounts, I do nothing of my own accord, but I do that which the Father has sent me to do. He lives in that way. Not only does he submit himself in obedience, he submits himself to death. Not only does he submit himself to death, but he submits himself to the most humiliating death. It was not honorable for him to hang on that tree. That was cursed man's death. That was the death that he went to go to.
Do you see this path of humility? God eternal, Creator, Almighty, and he steps down into human form, and then he steps down into obedience, and then he steps down into death and into the humiliating death on the cross. At this point you might be thinking, did we start off this category by Paul talking about being of the same love? What does this have to do with love? That he whom for God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. This is the giving of the Son, that in humility he comes. This is the kind of love that Paul is calling us to live in, the giving completely of oneself. Remember, it starts in the mind, the humility to consider for a moment that somebody might actually be more important than me. Then it shows up in real life and then I actually give of myself to that person, whatever it might be, whoever it might be, in whatever situation it might be. This is the kind of love that we are called into.
Think about First Corinthians 13, a very popular passage on love. It's patient, it's kind, doesn't envy, it doesn't boast, it's not proud, it's not arrogant. Selfishness and pride are the opposite side of this kind of love of bringing myself low and considering other people and loving and giving myself for them. This is what it looks like to live as citizens worthy of the gospel of Jesus, that I would love in a way that is giving of myself. Real love takes real sacrifice. It takes real giving. I love my wife and if I were to stand here and tell you not once have I ever had to give anything up for her, I hope you would look at me and say, you don't love your wife because it takes giving of myself—humility—to come low and to consider her interests above my own. If we never give up anything for the sake of our brothers and sisters in Christ, do we love them? Are we of this same love that Paul is talking about here, this love of Christ that gives himself up for the sake of others? This is what it looks like to be people of the same mind and the same love as Jesus, to live as somebody that's worthy of belonging to the gospel.
That brings us to our third and final point being one in purpose. Continue on in verse nine.
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The path of Christ's humility did not end in the grave, but Jesus rose victorious over death and over hell. Now at his name, because of his willingness to be humble and to submit himself to the Father and to submit himself to death, he now is risen and exalted above all things, risen and exalted above all names. So that at his name, every knee—your knee, my knee, the knees of all those who live around you in this area here, the knee of everybody who lives in my area—across the whole globe, across all time, in the grave, living and breathing in the spiritual realm, every knee will bow to the name of Jesus, our King. He is the King of the kingdom of the Gospel, and all will bow to him, and all glory will be due his name.
This has everything to do with being of one purpose. This is the one purpose of our God, that all glory would be ascribed to him. Our purpose is to bring glory to him. When we are citizens of the gospel of Jesus, who we are and what we do is to be of that singular purpose and none other. Your glory, not my glory, not the glory of a city, not the glory of this country, of this world. The glory is to him because we are his people. What it looks like for us to live in that way is that we get to follow the same journey and trajectory as Jesus who humbled himself, that when we belong to him, we're called into the same life of coming low.
Surely you all have experienced tumbling in your time. In those moments where you have been brought low, maybe it's for a purpose. Maybe it's not just random. Maybe it's not just bad luck. Maybe it's the Father trying to help us participate and join with Jesus so that our life could be worthy of the gospel of Christ. In those moments of weakness and being brought low, there is an opportunity for us to live in this way, to be people who would see others as more important than ourselves, just like Jesus did, to work and to live and to act for the interests of others, to love and to give of ourselves completely, and then ultimately and fully the same exact end result takes place. Glory to Jesus and not to ourselves.
I think that the greatest danger for us who live in the time and the space that we do is that we would try to be comfortable and follow Jesus at the same time. We've been called into more than that; we belong to a different kingdom. While our cultural moment is pulling on every thread for us to terminate all things on ourselves, Jesus is calling us into something different and greater. If this morning you belong to him, that is the life that we are called into. A life of surrender to the gospel of Jesus.
Maybe this morning you're thinking, yes, absolutely, that's what I want, live in that kind of life. If you think that what it's going to take is for you to walk out the doors and white-knuckle it, you're going to figure it out, you're going to change your mind, you're going to change the way you love, you're going to change the way you live, I would encourage you to look to Christ. The gospel is not about you doing and earning it. You can't. This life that Paul is talking about is not about earning anything. It's about living in what already is true, that Jesus in his humility really has rescued us and set us free from a life of selfishness. Do you know how destructive a life of selfishness is? It's so broken. But we can live into more. The gospel doesn't start at just us being set free, but his Spirit, the Spirit of the Almighty, the Spirit of the humble, comes to live within us and indwell us and empower us to live in this way. This is what it looks like for us to participate in this. As we sang earlier, how sweet it is to trust in Jesus, to trust him in this. Not to trust in our ability to execute this perfectly, but to trust in him and to come low into living this way.
Let's pray, Father. We confess that we are too often drawn into a life of selfish ambition, where the things that flood our minds are the things that terminate on us. There's a possibility that we could live this life by just trying to be respectful or cordial or nice, decent. But you're calling us into something more and we want to participate in that. Father, would you fill us with your Spirit to live as people that are worthy of the gospel of Jesus and that our minds would be changed, we would look up and see other people and consider their interests, that we would think of them as more important than ourselves. Then that would call us even deeper into loving them, giving ourselves up for those that are around us, those that are sitting in this room, and that ultimately that would draw us into the purpose, the ultimate purpose of all glory being given to Jesus, of our life bowing down our knees coming low to worship Christ as king of the kingdom to which we belong. In Jesus name, amen.