A Christ-Centered Mind-set

[We believe] in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.

Indeed, there have been many alternative positions through the years. Ebionism denied the divine nature of Christ. Arianism denied the fullness of the deity of Christ. Docetism denied the humanity of Jesus. Apollinarianism denied the full humanity of Jesus. Nestorianism denied the unity of the natures in one person. Eutychianism denied the distinction of the natures. In AD 451, leaders in Chalcedon wrote a creed affirming both Jesus’ full humanity and His full deity, united in one person. In so doing, they rejected all six of these Christological heresies.

In every generation, we must contend for the biblical view of the person and work of Christ. We still hear things like “He was a prophet,” “He was a good man,” “He was a fine example,” “The idea of Jesus is what matters.” Like Athanasius, we must boldly defend the glory of Christ. We must also teach these things to our children, who are growing up in a world that is fine with a phantom Christ, Christ as a mere man, or Christ as a funny, religious sage. In the spirit of Deuteronomy 6, as you sit down, walk, and lie down, teach your kids about the person and work of Jesus.

“[He] did not consider equality with God as something to be used for His own advantage” (v. 6b). This phrase highlights the astonishing giving nature of Jesus. He did not consider being God grounds for getting but for giving. “The Messiah did not please Himself,” Paul says to the Romans (Rom 15:3). In that context, like Philippians, he encourages the church to follow the example of Jesus’ service in their relationships with one another. I like the translations that use the phrase, “a thing to be grasped.” He could have clutched His rights, His blessings, and His benefits as King of glory. But He lived open-handedly, showing us what benevolent generosity and service look like. Do you have a hard time letting go of your possessions? Do you find it hard to relinquish your rights to be mad at someone for the good of preserving a relationship? If we applied Jesus’ mind-set to marriage and other relationships, imagine what our lives would be like. Here, Jesus shows us the way to live.

Our fallen nature wants to snatch, not offer. Stop and think about the differences between Adam and Christ:

Adam

Jesus

was made in God’s image.

was and is the very essence of God.

wanted to be like God.

took on the likeness of man.

wanted to exalt himself.

emptied Himself.

was discontent being God’s servant.

assumed the form of a slave.

arrogantly rejected God’s word in sinful disobedience.

humbly submitted to God’s word in perfect obedience.

succumbed to temptation.

overcame temptation; crushed the tempter.

brought the curse on the world.

took the curse for the world.

was condemned and disgraced.

was exalted by the Father.

How can you go from being a grasper to a giver? How can you adopt a mentality of downward mobility instead of upward mobility? You need the gospel. You need the second Adam, Jesus. Through His perfect life and atoning death, He gives Adam’s race forgiveness and new life, empowering us to live like Him.

His Humble Incarnation (2:7)

Paul speaks of Jesus’ coming in the flesh. “Instead He emptied Himself” (v. 7a). Some render this, “he made himself nothing” (NIV). Christ refused to hold onto His divine rights and prerogatives. He veiled His deity, but He did not void His deity (Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy, 22). Sometimes we say, “remaining all that He was, He became what He was not.” He added humanity; He didn’t surrender deity. The wedding of the two natures was permanent. “Jesus will remain fully God and fully man, yet one person, forever” (Grudem, Systematic Theology, 543).

O’Brien says that four of the five New Testament occurrences of the verb kenoo¯ (“emptied”) bear a metaphorical sense; the balance of probability lies in favor of a figurative connotation at Philippians 2:7 as well (Epistle, 217). Here is a good comparison: “For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to evangelize—not with clever words, so that the cross of Christ will not be emptied of its effect” (1 Cor 1:17; emphasis added). Christ didn’t empty Himself literally of His deity, but figuratively. Some translate the text this way to convey the idea: “He made Himself nothing.” So, our beloved hymn “And Can It Be” should be tweaked. The phrase “He emptied Himself of all but love” presents some problems. It seems to imply that Jesus emptied Himself of other attributes. If He did, He wouldn’t be God. Perhaps we should sing, “He emptied Himself in humble love.” Jesus didn’t relinquish His deity; He surrendered His rights and prerogatives.

Bryan Chapell illustrates the idea of Jesus “emptying Himself” by relaying a story from an African missionary. Let me paraphrase it. In this particular part of Africa the chief is the strongest man in the village. As the chief, he also wears a very large headdress and ceremonial robes. One day a man carrying water out of the shaft of a deep well fell and broke his leg, and lay helpless at the bottom of the well. To get down to the bottom, one would have to climb down, using the alternating slits that go all the way down the deep well, and then climb back up. Because no one could carry the helpless man up like this, the chief was summoned. When he saw the plight of the man, he laid aside his headdress and his robe, climbed all the way to the bottom, put the injured man on himself, and brought him to safety. He did what no other man could do. That’s what Jesus has done for us. He came to rescue us. And He laid aside His heavenly glory, like the chief did with his headdress, in order to save us. Now, did the chief cease being the chief when he laid aside his headdress? Of course not. Did Jesus cease being God when He came to rescue us? Of course not (Chapell, Using Illustrations, 11–12).

“By assuming the form of a slave” (v. 7b). The slave in the Greco-Roman world was deprived of most basic rights. Jesus gave up His sovereign rights and became a slave. The sovereign Creator made Himself nothing. He identified Himself with the lowest of society. Christ “did not come to be served, but to serve” (Mark 10:45). In John 13 we have a powerful illustration of Jesus’ servant mentality:

Jesus knew that the Father had given everything into His hands, that He had come from God, and that He was going back to God. So He got up from supper, laid aside His robe, took a towel, and tied it around Himself. Next, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet and to dry them with the towel tied around Him. (John 13:3-5)

While the disciples jockeyed for positions in the coming kingdom, comparing themselves to one another in rivalry, the One with all authority began to wash their feet. You can imagine what the disciples would have said if asked to do this task (which was reserved for slaves). “I’m not washing Peter’s feet. Look at those feet!” “I’m not washing John’s feet; he never washed my feet.” “I’m not washing any of their feet; whenever we buy the fish sandwiches, I always pay for them. I’ll let someone else wash feet.” “I’m not washing Philip’s feet. I’m so sick of Philip and all his dumb questions.” But Jesus, in the very nature of God, begins to wash the feet that He made, with the water that He made. He humbled Himself, taking the form of a slave. Let this attitude be in you!

Imagine what would happen to the Philippian church if Euodia and Syntyche were to empty themselves and give up their rights and preferences for the good of the church. Imagine what would happen if we all took this posture in the church—if each person sought not to be elevated to higher positions but to humbly serve others as Jesus did.

“Taking on the likeness of men. And when He had come as a man in His external form” (v. 7c). This phrase, “taking on the likeness of men,” doesn’t mean that He merely became like a human being. Rather He, who always was God, became what He was not, a human being. The simple point in this hymn is that when people saw Jesus they saw a man. People recognized Him as a human. Jesus was not some alien. In fact, if not for the testimony of Scripture, His own words, and His works, few would have believed that He was God. He didn’t have some silly halo over His head or a glow about Him. He was like us, yet without sin (Heb 4:15). With that said, regarding the language, “He had come as a man in His external form” (v. 7c HCSB; emphasis added), Paul uses schema here instead of morphe as in 6-7a. It’s rendered in the ESV, “and being born in the likeness of men” (v. 7 ESV). It may be intended to leave some room for the idea that there was more to the story than Jesus’ humanity. Jesus often left people asking questions like, “What kind of man is this?” (Matt 8:27).

His Humble Crucifixion (2:8)

Paul now takes us all the way down in this text.

“He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death” (v. 8a). Christ’s whole life was marked by humility. Look at His birth. He wasn’t born in an influential city like Alexandria, Rome, Athens, or Jerusalem. He was born near a feeding trough in Bethlehem. He lived for 30 years in relative obscurity. Then, in His earthly ministry, He was known for loving unlovable people and humbly serving others. At His death, He was nailed to a cross alongside two criminals.

Christ humbled Himself voluntarily. Neither Herod, Pilate, nor the Romans humbled Him; no one can humble Jesus. Jesus humbles us. He chose to empty Himself. Therefore, don’t look at this passage and feel sorry for Jesus, as if He were to be pitied. Jesus stands over you; you don’t stand over Jesus. He humbled Himself. We must humble ourselves now before Him. We, too, must choose humility. In the New Testament the act of “humbling yourself” is active (Matt 18:4; 23:12 [twice]; Luke 3:5; 14:11 [twice]; 18:14 [twice]; 2 Cor 11:7; 12:21; Phil 2:8; 4:12; Jas 4:10; 1 Pet 5:6). This is the way of the kingdom.

“Even death on a cross” (v. 8b). Paul adds that He demonstrated this humility by becoming obedient to the point of death, and that death was the most vile of all—crucifixion. This phrase serves as the rock bottom of Christ’s humility and the most gripping part of His obedience. Roman citizens couldn’t be executed, and Jews believed a person was cursed if he died by crucifixion (Gal 3:13). For some, the cross was a total embarrassment. Paul goes on to say that some live as “enemies of the cross” (3:18). Yet here is Jesus, the preexistent One, the Lord of glory, dying on the cross for sinners. He endured the physical agony of the cross, the abandonment, the shame, and He received the wrath of God in the place of sinners.

It’s quite possible that the Servant Song of Isaiah 53 loomed in the background of this hymn. He came having no “impressive form or majesty that we should look at Him, no appearance that we should desire Him” (53:2). He went to the cross, taking our place, “and the Lord has punished Him for the iniquity of us all” (53:6). “He submitted Himself to death” (Isa 53:12). In this most degrading of all deaths, we find the hope of salvation. Peter says, “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that, having died to sins, we might live for righteousness; you have been healed by His wounds” (1 Pet 2:24).

C. S. Lewis writes in his book Miracles that the central miracle asserted by Christians is the incarnation (143). He explains the descent and ascent of Christ vividly:

In the Christian story God descends to re-ascend. He comes down; down from the heights of absolute being into time and space, down into humanity. . . . But He goes down to come up again and bring the whole ruined world up with Him. One has the picture of a strong man stooping lower and lower to get himself underneath some great complicated burden. He must stoop in order to lift, he must almost disappear under the load before he incredibly straightens his back and marches off with the whole mass swaying on his shoulders. Or one may think of a diver, first reducing himself to nakedness, then glancing in midair, then gone with a splash, vanished, rushing down through green and warm water into black and cold water, down through increasing pressure into the deathlike region of ooze and slime and old decay; then up again, back to color and light, his lungs almost bursting, till suddenly he breaks surface again, holding in his hand the dripping, precious thing that he went down to recover. (Miracles, 111–12)

Having considered Christ descending down, down, down, let’s consider how the Son ascends up to the highest place.

The Exaltation of Christ

Philippians 2:9-11

Christ’s humility follows the spiritual principle, “Whoever humbles himself will be exalted.” His incomparable self-humiliation leads to His super-exaltation. Let’s look at His exaltation in two parts: His exalted position and everyone’s adoration and confession.

His Exalted Position (2:9)

“For this reason God highly exalted Him and gave Him the name that is above every name” (v. 9). This verse begins by showing the results of Christ’s humility. Some translations begin with “Therefore” (NIV, ESV) or “For this reason” (HCSB, NASB) to show the link. As a consequence of Christ’s work, the Father “highly exalted Him.” The phrase “highly exalted” means to “super-elevate.” No one else is exalted like this. Jesus is in an exalted class by Himself. He reentered the glory that He enjoyed with the Father before the world existed (John 17:5). And for all eternity, we will join the millions in giving Him praise.

The phrase “and gave Him the name that is above every name” raises the question, What name? Some say it’s Jesus, but the majority of commentators say it refers to Lord (or Yahweh). The former say that Jesus fits the context better (see Silva, 110–11). The next verse begins, “so that at the name of Jesus” (v. 10). Some in this camp say that the name Jesus took on a new significance after His exaltation.

But others are unconvinced for a variety of reasons. Let me point out four reasons. First, the name Jesus doesn’t fit the upward shift of this passage, which climaxes in verse 11, where Christ is declared Lord. Second, Jesus was His name at birth, but this seems to be a new name. Hanson says, “At the incarnation, the name Jesus was given; when God exalted Jesus he then gave him the name Lord ” (Letter, 162). Gordon Fee points out that Jesus was “graced” with a name, which implies that He didn’t previously have it (Pauline Christology, 396). Third, there’s an apparent intertextual connection between Isaiah 42:8, “I am Yahweh, that is My name; I will not give My glory to another,” and Philippians 2:11, “Jesus Christ is Lord.” Some point out that God’s personal name Yahweh is in view in Philippians 2:11, which in the Greek version of the Old Testament is translated as “Lord.” They also point out the connection between Philippians 2:10-11 and Isaiah 45:23: “Every knee will bow to Me, every tongue will swear allegiance.” Finally, Lord carried deeper meaning to the Philippians. To hear that someone other than Caesar is Lord would be shocking (Hanson, Letter, 162–63).

If forced to pick, given the aforementioned reasons, and the following argument from John Piper, I would side with “Lord.” Piper says,

What name did Jesus receive after his resurrection that he did not have before? Not “Jesus.” Jesus is precisely the name of the humble Servant who went to Calvary. In Acts 2:36 Peter says, “Let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.” It was his lordship and Messiahship—his messianic lordship—that was bestowed on him at his exaltation. Not that he wasn’t Messiah and Lord before his resurrection. He was. But he had not fulfilled the mission of Messiah until he had died for our sin and risen again. And therefore, before his death and resurrection, the lordship of Christ over the world had not been brought to full actuality. The rebel forces were yet undefeated, and the power of darkness held the world in its grip. In order to be acclaimed Messiah and Lord, the Son of God had to come, defeat the enemy, and lead his people out of bondage in triumph over sin and Satan and death. And that he did on Good Friday and Easter. . . . The name that is above every name, therefore, is Lord—the Lord victorious over all his enemies; the Lord who has purchased a people from every tribe and tongue and nation. (“And All the Earth Shall Own Him Lord”; emphasis added)

Even if you aren’t persuaded to see the name as “Lord,” the point is the same essentially. Jesus has the same exalted lordship as the Father (v. 11). He went all the way down to the cross and all the way up as King of all. To the Ephesians, Paul says that Christ was exalted above “every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come” (1:21). In his Pentecost sermon Peter tells us that following Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension, Christ was “exalted to the right hand of God” (Acts 2:33). The fact that Jesus is exalted means that He rules and reigns over all (Heb 1:3). He has universal lordship. Jesus is Lord, not Caesar, and everyone must give an account to Him.

What’s astonishing for us who are believers is that we know Him! We know the King of glory. My friend Rodney recently did some work for the Charlotte Hornets NBA team. He was on a conference call with the upper management, which included Michael Jordan. At one point he heard the king of basketball say, “Hey Rodney, it’s M. J.” Rodney’s jaw dropped. He couldn’t help but marvel that M. J. knew him. That was astonishing because “M. J.” is in a class by himself. The wonder of it all is that Jesus, the Lord of glory, who is in a class by Himself, knows us, and He loves us. Fall on your face, Christian. Lift up your voice in praise and adoration to the King who has lavished you with astonishing grace and mercy.

Everyone’s Adoration and Confession (2:10-11)

“So that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth—and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord” (vv. 10-11a). In response to Christ’s universal lordship, everyone will bow and confess His lordship. As in Isaiah 45, all will bow to Yahweh, and here in Philippians, all will bow to Jesus and confess that He is Lord. By giving Jesus the name Lord, God declared the deity of Jesus. The phrase “Jesus Christ is Lord” is probably the earliest Christian confession, and it is shorthand for the gospel (cf. Rom 10:9; 2 Cor 4:5). Every week when we gather for worship and encourage one another in the gospel, we are uniting with Christians who have gone before us. And as we make our confession, we are anticipating the future, in which everyone affirms this declaration.

Paul says everyone will bow and confess His lordship, including those “in heaven and on earth and under the earth.” Melick says, “Thus the hymn includes every conceivable habitation of personal beings” (Philippians, 108). Some will confess Him as Lord with great joy and humility. Others will confess Him as Lord with despair and anguish. Pilate, Caiaphas, Stalin, Hitler, and every other evil dictator will confess Him as Lord. Everyone from every age will do the same. The hymn has this “already/not yet” dimension. We confess Him as Lord now, but we also look forward to the future day when all acknowledge the lordship of Jesus. History is not like a treadmill, going nowhere; rather, it’s all moving toward that day. Sadly, it will be too late for some. If you don’t acknowledge and confess that Jesus is Lord in this life, it will be too late after death. So, bow now! Confess Him as Lord now!

To confess Jesus as Lord in the first century meant that Caesar was not Lord. And as a result of such confessions, many were persecuted and killed. The same fate exists for many today around the world who claim that Jesus is their Lord and Savior. But those who confess Christ as Lord now will not regret it when they see Him. Contrastingly, those who refuse to bow to Him now will wish they had heeded the message.

“To the glory of God the Father” (v. 11b). Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, ascension, and exaltation bring glory to God the Father. Here we see that there’s no rivalry in the Godhead, only delight and honor. This text points out the remarkable fact that Christ doesn’t keep glory for Himself, and even in His exaltation He remains the model of humbly honoring the Father. Paul writes elsewhere,

And when everything is subject to Christ, then the Son Himself will also be subject to the One who subjected everything to Him, so that God may be all in all. (1 Cor 15:28)

The glory of God the Father is a fitting conclusion to this hymn, for this is what the heart was made to do: glorify God, not self. Humility involves following the pattern of Jesus for the glory of God.

Concluding Applications

Allow me to give a few final points of application regarding this amazing passage. It’s truly a Christological goldmine.

Memorize this passage. It’s a hymn. See the importance of poetry, music, and creeds. We are always in need of good writing of sound doctrine. When we write well, people can remember and rejoice in the truths of the gospel. Songs and creeds serve as portable theology. We get to take them with us. What a gift we have in Philippians 2! It’s memorable, and because it’s memorable, we can dwell on it regularly. And we should dwell on it regularly.

Believe this passage. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is Lord? You will—either now or later. Don’t wait until it’s too late. Say with the saints from all ages, “Jesus Christ is Lord.”

Follow the lifestyle presented in this passage. This is the attitude and the lifestyle that we should pursue. Philippians contains a good word about following various people, but no one gives us a better model than Jesus.

Tell the world about the message of this passage. Our mission is to tell the world that Jesus is Lord, and if they will confess and believe in Him as such, they will be saved (Rom 10:9,13). Let us adore Him. Let our minds be on Him. Let our attitude be like His. Let our actions reflect Him—all of this is to the glory of God the Father.

Reflect and Discuss