Part 6 - He Emptied Himself   Php.2:7

Review 
When you see God face to face someday, and are given a glorified body so you are not consumed, you will be enabled to behold His glory, and you will be enthralled forever – but in a finite way.  For Him it was in an infinite way.  Heaven will be blessed beyond description for you, but nothing like what it is  like for God.
The pleasure of God, the pleasure Christ had throughout eternity past, is unfathomable, because there is no limit on His freedom to do that which brings Him pleasure.  And there is no pleasing thing that He does not do.  Ps 135:6  The LORD does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth 
6Who, being in the very form of God (who had all the riches of deity), did not consider that equality with God something to be grasped, 
His attitude was such that He was willing to let go His grip on that which was rightfully His.
That’s our example.  What are you rich in?  Make someone else rich in that.
Now Paul begins to describe the Long, Hard Journey of Christ From Heaven to the Manger
6 Who, being in the very form of God, did not consider that equality with God something to be grasped, 
7 but made himself nothing, taking the very form of a servant, 
made himself nothing evke,nwsen  This passage is named for this word.
to nullify, to make powerless or insignificant or empty
Ro.4:13  For if those who live by law are heirs, faith has no value (is nullified) and the promise is worthless,
1 Co.1:17  For Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel-not with words of human wisdom, lest the cross of Christ be emptied of its power. 
2 Co.9:2-3  But I am sending the brothers in order that our boasting about you in this matter should not prove hollow
It is a strong statement.  
He was in the form of God, 
   and he nullified Himself.  
He was in the form of God 
   and He made Himself nothing.  
He was in the form of God 
   and He became a big zero.
In what way did He nullify Himself?  
Did He empty Himself of His divine attributes, so that He wasn’t God anymore?  
Or did He put His divinity on hold for 33 years, so that His divine nature was dormant?  
No.  When Christ took on a human nature, His divine nature was unchanged.   
All the many claims He made to deity He made during His time on earth.  I and the Father are one.
He was referred to as God (with divine titles) 
Jer.23:5-6  "The days are coming," declares Yahweh, "when I will raise up to David a righteous Branch, a King who will reign wisely and do what is just and right in the land.  6 …This is the name by which he will be called: Yahweh Our Righteousness. 
“Son of God”
The Jews understood the term “Son of God” to mean that Jesus had the same nature as God.  In that culture, a claim to be the Son of God was a claim to be divine.
Jn.19:7  The Jews insisted, ..according to the law he must die, because he claimed to be the Son of God." 
 “I AM”
Ex.3:13,14   "I AM" (ego eimi) = God's name   
Jn.8:24 - if you do not believe that I AM (ego eimi), you will indeed die in your sins." 
Jn.8:58 -  Before Abraham was born, I AM (ego eimi)
Heb.1:6  when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says…8 "Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever…”  God the Father calls the baby Jesus “God”
Ro.9:5 …from [Israel] is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen. 
Isa.9:6  For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called …Mighty God
So we know he definitely did not set aside His deity while He was on earth. 
OK, so He was still God.  Maybe He just emptied Himself the independent use of His divine powers.
That doesn’t stack up either.  All those mighty works He did, He did in a much different way than the miracle workers in the OT.  All of them prayed to God and asked Him to do the miracle, and they all made it crystal clear that it was God, and not them.
But you don’t see Jesus praying, “Father, please let this person be raised from the dead”  Jesus had all the power of the Godhead available to Him at every moment, and could use it at will.  
He had the attributes of God. 
 He could command the wind and the waves, 
 He walked on water
 He could raise the dead, 
 He knew the future, 
 He lived a perfect, sinless life, 
 He created bread & fish & wine out of nothing,
 More than once God the Father spoke audibly from heaven, so those standing there clearly heard it, and God the Father said, “This is My Son – listen to Him.”
 He forgave sins
 He was worshipped, and He accepted that worship – even commanded it
He raised Himself from the dead
Every moment Jesus spent not exercising the prerogatives or power He possessed as deity was a conscious effort not to.  
No, Jesus did not empty Himself of His divinity nor His power, nor the independent use of His power.
In what way did Jesus make Himself empty?  We don’t have to figure it out – v.7 tells us!
7 but made himself nothing, taking the very form of a servant (slave), 
He emptied Himself in the sense that He went from being in the form of God (glory, blessedness) to being in the form of a slave.
You see, the word kenosis does need an object.  It is not that He emptied Himself of something.  The word means that He made Himself hollow.  He nullified Himself, reduced Himself to next to nothing.
He gave Himself away. That’s what humility is.  Humility is not thinking that you are lowly.  Humility is giving yourself away to meet a need.
Servant dou,lou  (slave)
Problem: Jesus was not a slave; He was a free man.
Answer: Maybe it means He was God’s servant?  I don’t think so.  There is nothing humiliating about that.  This is talking about Christ’s humiliation.  To say He was the servant of God would be to insert an exalted image in a passage describing the most profound humiliation.
Besides, It doesn’t say Jesus became a slave, it says He took on the form of a slave.
One who is subservient, controlled by His owner.  A slave is a person who has absolutely no rights of any kind.  He is not free.  He doesn’t even have the right to life.  He doesn’t have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
For the last million, billion years He had total freedom to do whatever He desired.  He had the right to anything and everything.  And then He came to earth and demanded no right to anything.
Another thing about slaves is they don’t own anything.
In heaven He was rich, and came to earth and gave it all up, and became poor – so poor He had to borrow everything.  He had to borrow a place to be born, often had to borrow a house to sleep in – other times just slept outside.
He had to borrow a boat to preach from, or to get across the lake.  
Even at His triumphal entry into Jerusalem as the Messiah He had to borrow an animal to ride.
The great act of putting an end to Passover, and transforming it to the Lord’s Supper He did in a borrowed upper room.
And after He died they laid Him in a borrowed tomb.
He wasn’t a slave, but He took the form of a slave. 
Jesus lived life with the attitude that His role was to be the personal assistant to whoever He happened to be around.
In Lk 22:27 Jesus said, who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.
This is a contrast with the form of God, which referred to God’s glory and blessedness.    
Everything we talked about last week – He stripped Himself of all that.  He canceled all the privileges, and waived all the freedoms and rights that we re rightfully His.  
This one before Whom the heavenly beings and angels had to cover their faces in His presence to protect themselves from His awesome glory descended into a realm in which he was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering. 
The degree of difficulty of any suffering is related to what you are used to.  If you have never had a garage door opener, or a microwave, it is no big deal to live without one.  But if you have always had one, going without is suddenly a hardship.  
If you have lived at the poverty level for the last ten years, then seeing something in a store and not being able to afford it is  no big deal to you.  But if your whole life you have lived as a millionaire, and then you are suddenly reduced to poverty, it would seem almost unbearable.
When Christ left the glories of heaven, in our wildest imagination we could never identify with the jolt that must have rattled His very being when He went from that to being a limited, dependent, needy human being.  
At the moment He left the eternal blessedness of heaven and entered the sin-cursed world of humanity, I’m sure there are no words to describe the agonizing, jarring shock to His whole being.
We can imagine, to some degree, the shock of a sudden painful reality.  We can imagine say waking up in the morning sick with the flu, rolling out of the warmth and comfort of your bed right into a pool of ice water.  (Although there is a limit on what we can feel – God made our bodies so we go into shock and are protected from things that would be too much).
You could picture embracing your most precious loved ones, and then suddenly having them ripped from your arms and killed in front of you, so you knew you would never enjoy them again in this life.
As human beings, we can fathom something like having everything that is precious to you suddenly torn away, and having most of it replaced by all the things you despise.
In our worst night terrors we might be able to conceive of some of that kind of pain.  
But none of us – even in our most mind-bending, terrorizing nightmare, ever tasted even one grain of the sand of the infinite desert of loss that God the Son suffered in leaving heaven and coming to earth.
“Yeah, but it was only for 30 some years that Jesus had to endure it.”  Does that make it no loss?  Tell that to the mother whose baby gets sick and suddenly dies – “Don’t sweat it.  30 some years and you will die and this pain will be all over.”  That may be some comfort, but the pain of the loss is still just as sharp.
When we read about the sufferings of Christ in Scripture, we need to understand that that goes way beyond just the cross.  It was the entire incarnation.
You may be thinking, “Being a human and living on earth isn’t so bad – I don’t mind it.”
My guess is the average fly doesn’t mind being a fly.  But if you had to go from being a human being with a job & family & all your relationships & work, and become a fly – and live the life of a fly, buzzing around looking for some manure to land in…all the time aware in your little fly-brain of what it was like to be a human, you would probably be one sad little bug.
The decent from being a human to becoming a fly would be a finite decent – which makes it nothing compared to the infinite loss Christ suffered in coming into this world – that infinite free fall from heaven to the manger.
People: “I don’t want to go on the mission field – there are bugs and snakes…”  or “I don’t want my kids to go into pastoral ministry – no job security, little $, so much heartbreak…”
I’m glad Jesus didn’t think that way.  “I don’t want to go down there…”
And even if you forget about everything Jesus gave up in heaven – think about what His life was like.  
The thing that gives you the strength to keep going in life is the hope that something good will come of your life.  We all have hopes and aspirations – maybe you dream of something for your future or maybe you dream of something for your kids’ future…
What was Jesus’ life like?  How would you like to live a whole life knowing that the only thing you have to look forward to in life is to eventually, in the prime of your life, come to a violent, bloody end.
Worse than that – to live your whole life with the gnawing pain in the pit of your stomach knowing that at that time you will suffer the full fury of the wrath of God for every sin ever committed by all of humanity.  That you would endure a punishment equal to the suffering of all people in hell for all eternity – 
and that you would suffer that at the hands of God the Father, with whom you have enjoyed nothing but unbroken perfect intimacy forever.
What was it like to live a whole life with nothing but that to look forward to, and in the mean time living in poverty and being soundly rejected by the very people for whom you are doing all this.
I think it is interesting that this term, kenosis is used here.  Who in the world could possibly know what that was like for Christ?  Who could ever put it into words?  If you were in charge of writing Php.2, how could you ever select a term to describe that?
Let me ask – who authored this text?  Where did these thoughts originate?  
Every thought in the entire Bible originated and was communicated by God the Holy Spirit through men who wrote.  
You see, God the Holy Spirit was with Jesus in the incarnation.  He knew what it was like for Jesus.  He was there – both in heaven in eternity past, and on earth, in the heart of Jesus.  Only God could possible know what that was like.
And God the Holy Spirit, when He got to Php.2, and He begins to describe to mere human beings exactly what it was that Jesus did in the incarnation, searched His infinite mind and came up with the best word to describe it – He made Himself empty.  If there is one word that describes Jesus condition in His humiliation compared with His condition in heaven, it was empty.
This is our example.  This is how we attain unity and harmony in the church.
You say, “Sure would be nice to have unity in the church.”  The price is high.  It doesn’t come cheap.  
We will have unity when we have humility, and humility is painful, & costly, & difficult, and unfair.  
If you are concerned about everything being fair, you can forget this.  If you insist on getting your fair share, being treated fair – you can forget about ever having peace in the church or in your home or at work or having success in any relationship.
When a proud, selfish, easily offended person comes into the church that person is like a bull in a china shop, and will destroy any chance of peace and unity.
There must be a willingness to give up our rights.  
When you have some privilege or right you refuse to give up for others’ benefit, you are saying that that right belongs to you even more than being in the form of God belonged to Christ.
The incredible thing about all this was that it was voluntary.  
Usually the only people who are in the form of a slave are people who have been enslaved by someone else.  Usually the only people who are stripped of all their rights and freedoms and privileges are people who have been stripped of those things by someone else.
Jesus reduced Himself to that.  None of this was forced upon Him.  Though He wasn’t a slave, He took on the form of a slave.  As a free man, both the Roman govt. and the Jewish govt. guaranteed Him certain rights, but He refused to utilize those rights.  
As Almighty God He inherently possessed every right, but He would not cling to that.
The fact that Jesus wasn’t actually a slave is the whole point.  To be in the form of a slave if you have been enslaved by someone is one thing.  But to live like that when you don’t have to – that’s amazing.
For the slave of a household to dress like a lowly slave (with a towel wrapped around his waist), and to wash the guests’ feet is nothing unusual.  But to do that when you are not a slave is the greatest imaginable humility.
Remember - every moment Jesus spent not exercising the prerogatives or power He possessed as deity was a conscious effort not to.  
That requires a lot more selflessness and humility than if He had just given up that power, because it was a constant, 24-hour a day humbling of Himself.
Ladies can you imagine having the power to snap your fingers and have all your housework done and never using it?  
Can you imagine having the power to look down at your body and say, “I would like to shed a few pounds – Pounds, begone!” and never using it?
Can you imagine walking alone through a desert between here and Colorado Springs, and getting a terrible blister on your right foot, and a sore knee, and tired and thirsty – and having the power to blink your eyes and suddenly be at your destination…and never once using it?
Can you imagine being in the desert 40 days without food and at the end having the power to turn rocks into food (and never mind bread – Jesus, in His omniscience, knew even then about what would someday be known as the Cheescake factory.  Can you imagine being able to turn stones into chocolate turtle cheescake, and not using it every day?)
I can think of a lot of things at a number of restaurants that I wouldn’t mind being able to create ex nihilio – but Jesus had the memory of what the food was like in heaven.
Remember that next time you think it is costing you too much to serve someone.
How did He do that?  How does the exalted, Almighty Lord of glory we marveled at last week come to a point of having no rights like a slave?
being made in human likeness.
being made
The aorist ptc with en has an ingressive idea (entering into a state of being human) and stands in stark contrast to the static verbs of v.6.  This phrase refers to being born in Ga.4:4 and Ro.1:3
Jesus existed throughout eternity past.  He never began existing. He was eternal God, without beginning.
2000 years ago, however, He began existing as a human.  He was not human before that, but He is now.
born in human likeness
This word emphasizes appearance even more than form.  Form refers to the appearance that reflects the true nature of something.  This word just simply means outward appearance.
Ro.8:3  For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. 
The emphasis is on the appearance.  Does that imply that Jesus was not truly human?  
No.  He was totally human. 
Heb.4:15  He was tempted in every way, just as we are
He was flesh and bone, 
He got thirsty and hungry, 
He got tired and had to rest and sleep, 
He had to learn just like we do – He even had to learn obedience.  When they cut Him He bled.
He wasn’t just “God in a bod” (there is more to being human than just having a body).  This was not theatrical – it wasn’t a Halloween costume.
He became broken-hearted and wept.  He had human emotions, human weaknesses, human strength, human limitations, human cravings, human temptations…
Heb.2:17  he had to be made like his brothers in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest
What is the true meaning of Christmas?  Giving?  That’s close, but there is something much more essential.  Christmas is the celebration of the incarnation.  The humiliation of God, which Php.2 offers as an example for us.
The true meaning of Christmas is humility.  That’s worth knowing, because you can give gifts without humbling yourself, right.  You can give gifts out of pride.  You can even give them out of selfishness.  You can give them with resentment.
You can give without being humble.  But you cannot be humble without giving.
Why did Jesus come into this world? Mt.20:28 the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." 
Want to have a blessed Christmas?  We tell each other all the time, “Have a merry Christmas!”  I do hope your Christmas is merry, but frankly, if that’s all it is , it is n’t much of a Christmas.
With all we have learned this past month about the fact that the key to success in all relationships is humility, and since usually the thing that determines how well your Christmas goes is how well everyone gets along, I want to wish you a humble Christmas.