This morning, we turn again to the book of Philippians, Philippians chapter 2, the text for our consideration being verses 5 through 11 this morning. And again, as you know, this section really begins at verse 27 of chapter 1, as we made clear last Sunday morning, where Paul says, whatever happens, conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He's concerned about Christian conduct. Christian conduct as God's people suffer for the faith. Christian conduct when God's people aren't suffering for the faith, but even as they live together as a congregation in this world. And then he goes on in our text for this morning to explain that Gospel that we are called to conduct ourselves in a manner worthy of. It's kind of an interesting portion of Scripture. It is a beautiful, beautiful passage of Scripture in which Paul clearly lays out before us the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And these words are the good news of what Jesus Christ has done. If you notice, it resembles the Apostles' Creed. No doubt the authors of the Apostles' Creed looked to this passage as we have the steps of Christ's humiliation outlined and then the steps of Christ's exaltation outlined even as we recite them in the Apostles' Creed. So it's interesting to me that Paul calls us for a particular type of conduct in the Christian life. And then he explains exactly what that conduct is to be like, what it's to be patterned after. We're going to read verses 1-11, the text again being verses 5-11. Hear now the Word of God. if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interest of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus, who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness, and being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross. Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place and gave Him the name that is above every name, 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. Beloved in Christ the Lord, Why can't you be more like? Boys and girls, do you ever hear that phrase? Why can't you be more like? Parents, do you ever say that phrase? You see, when it comes to imitating, imitation and following the example of others, imitating is a bigger part of our lives than you and I might think. Sometimes we use that phrase, So we might use it in a softer, kinder way and we use that phrase as an encouragement for someone to better themselves. Why don't you consider doing it like so-and-so? It might be better that way. But at other times we might be tempted to use this phrase exactly as I said it and it comes off as a chastisement for someone to stop doing what they are doing or the way they are doing it and instead to do something else. Why don't you be more like and do it that way? Boys and girls, you know that even young children sometimes, maybe some of you have been tempted. You desired to imitate your older brothers and sisters. You idolized them in a sense. You wanted to be like them because you thought so much of them. And at times, boys and girls, I know that you like to imitate. You like to be like your favorite sports players. You want to be as good as them. Or you want to be like your favorite musician. You want to imitate them. And even adults tend to engage in this activity of imitation from time to time. For example, in the business world, adults like to imitate successful business models. But you know, the Bible commands imitation, doesn't it? God says, be holy. Why? Because I am holy. But you see, the kind of imitation that the Bible calls for is out of the ordinary when it comes to the way that the world thinks and the way that the world acts. We live in a world that promotes self-help and self-improvement and self-esteem and every man for himself at the expense of others. And if you can do it, by the way, by imitating someone, well, that's okay. But you see, God commands again in verses 3 and 4 of chapter 2, Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Man in this world pushes for power and for position and for prestige. And society says, be all that you can be. Yet Paul says, for the believer, being all that you can be means humility. Being humble. Humility is the standard that is to govern the Christian life. And then here, in this portion of Scripture, He gives us the perfect, unfailing example for you and me to imitate. Even Jesus Christ. And it's as if Paul could say after he wrote these words, do you need any other reason? Look at what Jesus Christ did. the very one whose selfless humility secured our eternal hope and our eternal life, he says, your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. And therefore, we have here the call to imitate Christ. And in this text, we see that Paul gives this call with encouragement from Christ's example. And he also gives this call with confidence from Christ's exaltation. First of all, with encouragement from Christ's example. Now, I trust that not one of us here would debate the point that our Lord Jesus Christ is the perfect Savior. I hope not one of us would argue that point. But He's even more than that. He's a perfect example who demonstrated love for God above all and the neighbor as ourself perfectly. And He left His people an example of Christian living. how you and I are to put into practice that new life that we have in Christ Jesus. He left us an example and we are to be encouraged by His example. And as Paul lays it out here, there are two details that we are to consider with regard to Christ's example. First of all, as God, He emptied Himself. That's the first part of the example. As God, He emptied Himself. And then Paul places before us what we might call the incomprehensible exchange. Incomprehensible because you and I can't even begin to fathom this. And Paul knew that you and I and his readers and this would have no impression on us unless we first understood exactly what it is that Jesus gave up. And therefore, that's what he points to. He points, first of all, to Christ's majestic position before He came to earth. In verse 6, he begins, Who? Being in very nature God. He goes right to the identity of this Jesus for whom He is in chains. And He gives proof that Jesus existed even before He came to this earth. And even more than that, He existed because He is God Himself. His very essence, His nature, as we confess in the Nicene Creed, is that He is very God of very God. And our Lord Jesus Christ enjoyed this exalted position from eternity. That's what He prayed in John 17, verse 5, when He said, And now, O Father, glorify Me together with Yourself with the glory which I had with You before the world was. And you see, boys and girls, as God, even before Jesus was born as a baby and laid in a manger, as God, He already possessed all the attributes of God. Everything that God is. That's what Jesus was. He was omnipresent. Present everywhere. He was all-powerful. All-knowing. Holy. Sinless. Sovereign. Good. Love. All that God is. That's what Jesus was even before He came. And even before He came to this earth, Jesus Christ possessed the majesty and the glory and the perfection of heaven. His home was heaven. You and I can't even begin to imagine that. We have what the Bible says, but yet we live here. We live in what we call the most beautiful part of the country. And indeed, it is gorgeous here. But it doesn't even compare with the majesty and the glory of heaven. That was the home of our Savior even before He came. Everything that can be said about God could be said about the Son. Yet, Paul says, he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped. Even though all of that was his, yet Paul points to his selfless attitude. Our Savior did not cling to equality with God for selfish reasons. He did not use His divinity for His own personal advantage and thereby refuse His people of the salvation that only He could accomplish for us. He did not use His status as God to get and get and get a little more as many kings of this earth would do, but instead He used the fact that His divinity He chose to give and to give and to give completely for you and me. Now we can't help but notice the antithesis here. Our Lord always had what man has been selfishly trying to grasp, get his hands on from the dawn of history. You remember the first Adam in the Garden of Eden? He tried to selfishly grasp God-ness, if you will, through disobedience, by eating of the fruit of the tree, which Satan said would make him like God. But the second Adam, Jesus Christ, who always possessed and continues to possess what man has always wanted. He did not selfishly hold on to what he had for his own advantage. But as Paul says in the beginning of verse 7, he made himself nothing. He made himself nothing. Now many Bible translations, versions translate those words as he emptied himself. He emptied himself. Now boys and girls, that's a strange way to say it. What does that mean? That he emptied himself. That's something that biblical scholars have debated for many, many, many years. And many think that what that means is that He emptied Himself of something. That something was subtracted from Him. Something was removed from Him. For example, if I take this glass of water and drink half of it, I have removed half of the water. But not only have I removed it, I've gotten rid of it. And what they say is that He got rid of something and what they say is that He got rid of part of His deity. He got rid of part of His God-ness. But that's simply not true. Because when Paul says, who being in very nature God, he is talking about a present, continuing, ongoing state or condition. And that means that Jesus' nature was, it is, and it forever will be God. He did not stop being God. Not even in the least. as He was on this earth. But yet, Paul says, He emptied Himself. He made Himself nothing. And the text tells us exactly how He did that in verse 7 again, taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness. He emptied Himself by taking on the human nature. He emptied Himself, beloved, by adding something to Himself that He was not before. He did not exchange His deity for humanity like we might exchange a shirt when you take a shirt back to the department store and you leave that shirt there and you exchange it for a completely different shirt. He did not give off His deity in exchange for His humanity. He did not give up the nature of God for the nature of a servant. Instead, He became the God-man. He became one person, two natures. And as the God-man, He concealed His Godhead. He concealed His divinity under the weakness of the flesh for a time. As the God-man, He laid aside His glory in the sight of men, not by lessening His glory, not by getting rid of some of His glory, but by hiding it. By hiding it. He was God manifested in the flesh, yet His flesh was as a veil that hid His divine majesty, that hid the brightness of His glory. You see, beloved, when our Lord made this earth His home again, He did not exchange His divinity for His humanity. That's not the incomprehensible exchange that I'm talking about, but He did exchange something that we would not even begin to think about. If you had everything you could ever want in this world, There's not one more thing that you could think of. You had it all. You had all the money. You had all the toys. You had all the friends. You had everything you could ever want and life was seemingly perfect for you. Who of us would exchange that and give it up to go be a beggar living in the street? I suspect not one of us. But you see, our Lord Jesus Christ exchanged the heavenly environment of glory and His majesty for this. This earth. And as He did so, He gave up His rights. He prayed to His Father, not My will, but Thine be done. Because boys and girls, we know that a servant in a sense doesn't have rights. A servant doesn't make the rules or make the laws, but a servant is subject to the rules. The servant must obey the laws. But this lawgiver himself was born under the law as the Bible says. In heaven there was no burden of guilt upon Him, but at His incarnation when He became human flesh, He took the burden of sin and guilt upon Himself and He began to carry it away as Isaiah 53 says, the Lord laid on Him the iniquity of us all. And as Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5, verse 21, for He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Again, beloved, this is an incomprehensible thing for you and me, but we have to think about what He had. What it is that He possessed. And what it is He gave it up for. You and me. He gave up the environment of perfection and sinlessness and eternal delight. And He became surrounded by the misery of sinful men and this sinful world which groans, as Paul says. As Paul also says, though he was rich, yet he became poor. And that means in reality that humanly speaking, as our Lord walked this earth, the owner of the universe, the very one who had the whole world in his hands, as he walked this earth, he constantly borrowed. He borrowed a place for his birth. He borrowed a house to sleep in. He borrowed a boat to preach from. He borrowed an animal to ride. He borrowed a room to have the Lord's Supper in. He borrowed a tomb to be buried in. He emptied Himself. He humbled Himself and He was found in appearance as a man. As God, beloved, He emptied Himself. He did not consider equality with God in all that He possessed a thing to be grasped, a thing to be held on to for His own selfish purposes, but He gave it up because of your need and because of my need. But there's another aspect of His example and that is as man then, He humbled Himself. He was not only humbled as He became man, but also as a man, He humbled Himself. And His humility included the fact that He was not recognized. This owner of the universe, this one who had it all, was not recognized as he walked this earth. He did not look any different than any other ordinary man. And that was true his whole life long from the moment that he was born as a tiny baby, an ordinary little baby-looking baby. Born in poverty, wrapped in strips of cloth, laid in a manger. His family looked ordinary. He had a mom and dad. He had brothers and sisters. He learned a trade. He became hungry and thirsty and tired. He had emotions, the Bible teaches us, for example, grief and anger. He followed the same dress and the same customs and the same manners of the day. He was an ordinary looking man. But he was also ordinary in another way, and that was that he was destined to die to this life like all other men. You see, beloved, his humility shone through, although it wasn't recognized, His humility shone through us. He was like you and me in every single way. Except one. He was sinless. He was perfect. Boys and girls, he never, ever committed one sin. Yet he was rejected. His humility also includes that he was rejected. We know that his humanity was no excuse for man's rejection, especially as His mighty works and wonders which He performed on earth all pointed to the truth of who He is. But this One before whom the seraphim covered their faces and cried out, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts. He voluntarily emptied Himself and He was despised, He was rejected, and He was hated all the more. As His humility included the fact that He took on death, Paul says He became obedient unto death. And we know that in his act of obedience, he perfectly obeyed the law of God. He was perfectly righteous. And that righteousness, his perfect obedience to the law of God is freely credited to your account and mine so that God sees us in Christ as perfectly righteous. But in his passive obedience, he suffered all the way to death. He became obedient unto the death of a cross. You see, beloved, he had to suffer death to this life in order to conquer death for you and me. And the very fact that he had to suffer death was bad enough. But he suffered it, Paul says, by way of the cross. You see, that cross shaped the character of his death. That cross was a painful death. It was a shameful death. It was reserved for the worst of the worst. It was reserved for the lowest of the low. you and I can be sure that the cross at that time was not a symbol for the believer's faith. We can be sure that they would never have taken a little image of a cross and put it on a necklace and worn it around their neck or put it in their ears or put it in any other place, maybe not even up in a church. Because the cross was a scandal. The cross was and still is an emblem of suffering and shame. And you and I must never forget that. Our Lord of glory took on the most scandalous form of death. An emblem of suffering and shame. And that's because as He hung on the cross, He took on the death of sin. As Deuteronomy 21 says, anyone who is hung on a tree is under God's curse. And that means, beloved, that the cross is a symbol of the reality that He gave up His throne in glory all the way to being separated from and being forsaken by God the Father. From one extreme completely to the other. He took on the death of sin as He took on the punishment and the wrath of God against the sin of the world and paid for your sin and mine in order that He might redeem you and me from the curse of the law. That's what we have because of what He did. And as a redeemed people, Paul calls us to imitate Him. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. He willingly humbled Himself to the lowest of low so that we who by nature are the lowest of the low might be raised to an exalted position. The position of sons and daughters of the Most High God. And therefore we are called to strive to be like our elder brother. Why can't you be more like Jesus? Only Paul says it in an encouraging way, doesn't it? Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. Be like Him in humility. We are called to humble ourselves. We know that we cannot humble ourselves as Jesus did. We can't do what He did. We cannot perform His redeeming work. And thank God we don't need to. But we are called to humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord. But even at that, our humility is not and cannot, will never be quite like our Lord's humility. He humbled Himself from the highest pinnacle of glory to the lowest dishonor of hell, the very opposite of selfish ambition and vain conceit that Paul makes clear is natural for you and me. But our humiliation is to include the fact that we are to keep from exalting ourselves by selfishness and thinking too highly of ourselves. he humbled himself as he gave up his right to continue in glory so that you and I might share in his glory but our humiliation is to include the fact that we are not to take more to ourselves than we ought to but instead we are to regard one another as more important than ourselves he humbled himself in that he became what he was not but our humiliation is to include the fact that we are to recognize and we are to be who we truly are and that is sinners saved by grace because of Christ's selflessness. Beloved, we are to recognize that our hope and our salvation is not only a possibility. It's not just a possibility. But it is a reality. Because Jesus Christ humbled Himself. He took our place. He did for us what we couldn't begin to do for ourselves. He did for us what we wouldn't even think of doing for each other. And His example of selfless humility is to be an encouragement for you and me as we are called to imitate Him. And therefore, beloved, we are able to imitate Him by new life through the Holy Spirit. And we are to do so in the second place with confidence from Christ's exaltation. Paul says, beginning in verse 9, Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place and gave Him the name that is above every name, 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. What a picture that Paul gives us. He gives us the entire story. And our confidence, beloved, is that the One whom we are called to imitate, though He looks completely defeated on this earth, He is triumphant. And that is to be our confidence. And again, His exaltation, Paul makes clear, includes two main things. He has been given something and He will be given something. He has been given the ultimate name, the name Lord. The Father has given Him that name and that name belongs to Him forever. And that name, beloved, reflects His lofty position. That name reveals His royal dignity and His sovereign authority. That name, Lord, implies His power and position. That name declares that He is the Redeemer, that He is the Deliverer who paid for His people and that He is the Master who owns His people. And therefore, that name means that He deserves our honor and our respect and our worship and our obedience. That name, Lord, points to what He achieved and it acknowledges who He is. And that name, beloved, is not insignificant. It's very significant. In Isaiah 42, verse 8, God says, I am the Lord, that is my name, my glory I will not give to another, nor my praise to carved images. He will not give His name to another. He has given it to Jesus Christ. And that means, beloved, that the name of the Lord is a confirmation of His deity. Our Lord Jesus Christ has been vindicated by God. Giving him the name Lord was God's amen and his yes to the fact that indeed he was equal with God. It is proof of the truth that he is God. And beloved, so great is his glory that Paul says all will feel driven to render homage to him. That's what he will be given. He will be given. He has been given the ultimate name and he will be given the ultimate praise. And that ultimate praise will be demonstrated in worship of him. Now we know that bowing the knee is an expression of adoration and worship that only God deserves. And you know what? This is prophesied in the Old Testament in Isaiah chapter 45. You can read that for yourself at verse 22 and following. But there God says, every knee will bow before me. And now Paul applies these words to the Lord Jesus Christ, pointing to the fact that He is the fulfillment of prophecy. Jesus is God. And Paul even says that every knee will bow before Him. And he's not just talking about human knees, the knees of people, but he's talking in a figurative sense too. Everything will bow before Jesus, even the spirit world. The angels will bow before Him joyfully. Even Satan and his wicked hosts will bow before Him. They will not bow in faith. They will bow regretfully. They may bow remorsefully. They might bow scornfully, but they will not bow penitently but they will bow because Christ's glory demands it. And Paul also makes clear that on that day, the mouth will interpret what the knees are doing and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Beloved, every tongue will confess Him. And again, as we sit here, it's so easy to let this fly right over our heads. We live in a world where most tongues deny Him. Most tongues reject Him. Most tongues spit out scorn for Him. But the day is coming when every tongue will confess Him. This Jesus Christ who looked defeated in the eyes of the world, every tongue will confess that He is triumphant. That He is crowned King of kings and Lord of lords. That He rules over all things and that He is God. And that's the very same confession for which many lost their lives. Especially in Paul's day. Paul was very bold to say what he says here because in that day, the people said that Caesar is Lord. And for those who would not renounce saying Jesus is Lord, they were put to death. But Paul boldly says it's not Caesar, but it is this Jesus alone who is Lord. And one day even Caesar will confess to Jesus Lord. Beloved, Christ's exaltation is proof. It is a guarantee that His work is complete. It is sufficient. It is finished. And His work is guaranteed for you and me. His exaltation is proof that we have eternal life in glory because He humbled Himself. And beloved, as Paul lays these beautiful words of the Gospel before us, We might wonder why. We might wonder why does He tell us again what Jesus did. We know all this. But I believe Paul wants us, he calls us to recognize in these words just how undeserving we are. That Jesus Christ gave up everything and He became nothing for you and I who didn't even want Him. He calls us to recognize how undeserving we are, and He calls us then to respond in humility before God and man. And again, we can't imitate His redemptive work. That's only Christ's. Yet by the power of the Holy Spirit, we can and we must imitate and copy the spirit that was basic to His redemptive work, and that is the attitude of selfless humility. In a world that promotes selfishness to get ahead in life, we are called to imitate Christ, His humility. And as we do so, beloved, we are to be those that point others to the only selfless Savior who alone brings eternal life. You see, Christian humility is evidence that one is identified with the Lord of glory. Christian humility is evidence that one serves the only one who could save us. Christian humility demonstrates that the believer indeed understands the undeserved work of Christ on his or her behalf. And Christian humility understands that because of His selfless work, our confidence is as Paul says in chapter 3, verse 20, but our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who by the power that enables Him to bring everything under His control will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like His glorious body. Beloved, this Jesus is the King of kings and the Lord of lords and all will confess Him one day. All will confess Him. Either He will be confessed by grace through faith now in this life or He will be confessed in shame and terror on the last day. And those who confess Him by faith now will bow before Him in glory for eternity. But those who confess Him in shame and terror will bow before Him in the eternal fire. Where will you be as you eternally bow before the King of kings and the Lord of lords? Well, the Word of God is precious. The Word of God is true. Whoever believes on the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved. How great is salvation? It stretches from the highest point of the glory of heaven to the lowest depth of the curse of hell. That's what Jesus Christ did for you and for me. And therefore, is it any wonder that every knee will bow before Him? Let's pray together. Father, may our every response to Your Word be Amen and Amen. We must confess that so often, Lord, we fail to think about what it is Jesus Christ did on our behalf. How He humbled Himself. How He was selfless. How He was not conceited. How He did what He did not have to do. but how He did what we needed Him to do. Indeed, Lord, so often we look at the cross, whether the one up in front of our church building or we see crosses all over the place. And we fail to think about that emblem of suffering and shame. Yet, Father, may it be also for us an emblem of how deep the Father's love is for us. How vast beyond all measure. And may we rejoice in the perfect work of our Lord Jesus Christ who gave His all, that we might have all He had to give. And may it be too, Lord, that You would give to us the attitude of Christ our Savior, that we might be those who are humble, that we might recognize that we did not deserve Your saving grace at all, and therefore, that we would desire to be used of You to bring the gospel message to those who have never heard, that others who are equally as undeserving as we might also have the joy of salvation given to them by Your Holy Spirit. Father, hear our prayer for Jesus' sake and in His name alone. Amen.