Emptying of Christ
Philippians 2:1 – 13
Friends we come today to Palm Sunday. It is, of course, a familiar story. Jesus arrives in Jerusalem, at the start of Passover, with the great expectation and in anticipation of him becoming a powerful King. He will be the Savior of the nation of Israel, a leader who will throw off the oppression of the mighty. Yet this would be king comes into Jerusalem riding on a colt, not on a majestic white stallion which would be expected of a Warrior King.
In hope of a mighty king, the crowds throw their cloaks on the ground ahead him as he rides through the city. They cry, “Hosanna to the Son of David and “blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!” They are expecting the messiah that they have waited for all those years, since the prophets of old foretold the coming of a savior.
They want the first real warrior king of Israel since King David; they want Jesus to be that ruler. The crowds go wild and wave palm branches, as much to celebrate the coming of someone to save them from evil, as it is to wave good riddance to the oppressing Romans now that their Messiah has arrived.
The people stand shoulder to shoulder, four and five rows deep in those narrow yet packed streets of Jerusalem to laud and embrace him. The king, the son of David, is coming! It is easy enough for us to grasp that emotion and the underlying desire for King Jesus to come to His people. We too want a Savior. We too want and need someone to overthrow our spiritual oppressor!
Today, we too wave our palm branches, we too sing Hosannas, you are welcome to throw your coats and cloaks into the aisle if you want. We too want Jesus to be our king, and to rule our world with love and justice as much as the Jews did. But the riding in on a colt? That seems at best to be understated and at worst disappointing. But that is the way that God has planned for the Savior of the World to come and save His people, understated yet powerful.
You see, the Palm Sunday story is not just about an anticipated earthly king on a colt, or a crowd and their cloaks, or the palm branches and the singing. It is about the willingness and faithfulness of the Son of God to become the Son of Man, to give away, or at least lay aside for a while, the power and authority that he had, in order to give us what we never could have if it wasn’t for him and his coming!
Today we come near to the end of our self-imposed journey of spiritual reflection, the 40 days of Lent, we have attempted to empty ourselves of all worldly influences, to walk in the footsteps that Jesus took during His Earthly journey. In our lesson today in the second chapter of the Book of Philippians, the apostle Paul calls upon the saints of the city of Philippi to imitate the attitude, willingness and faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ to submit to the will of the Holy Father and to embrace His purpose for the sending of Jesus into the World.
As we have been talking about over the past few weeks and months, not to mention through the years that we have been together, though they are different and separate events, we certainly we celebrate them months apart in different manners, yet first the incarnation of Jesus, the Son of God becoming flesh and blood as the Christ Child at Christmas and secondly, the resurrection of the self-sacrificing Jesus, the restoring to life that which was the earthly body of Christ, that we celebrate next Sunday these two events are in fact, inseparably linked. As I have told you, we can’t properly view, we can’t truly appreciate, we can’t fully understand one without the other, either is meaningless unless they both happen if they. Why is that?
We open our celebration of Christmas, on Christmas eve with John’s gospel telling us that heavenly Jesus is divine, that he was with God in the beginning, that he was God in the beginning. All things that became, were created by him. We also know that Jesus became incarnate, God in the flesh, because of his willingness to condescend, his desire and faithfulness to become like man it all ways, good and bad.
He came to live with and be like mankind, to live among us and minister to us. To change his divine attributes, at least for a time, to become like mankind, us, you and me. It is here that we have the juxtaposition of the divine and the mortal, found in the one being of Christ. It is in the incarnation of Christ that we see the Emptying of Christ for our benefit not His!
Paul writes about this Emptying of Christ in verses 6 – 8: Christ, being in very nature God, did not consider that equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing, empty, by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross! (NIV)
There is a theological term for this action of Jesus willingly emptying out the divine nature of Jesus Christ, which has its origins in this scripture, and it is known as the Kenosis. The Kenosis of Christ is His emptying Himself of certain divine privileges, to stand between God and mankind to become a servant for those He loves. Whether He is emptied of certain divine attributes or simply willingly sets them aside for mankind’s benefit and betterment is irrelevant, the result is the same either way.
In coming to earth, the Son of God did not cease to be God, and He did not become a “lesser god.” But as we have seen in Bible Study in the Gospel of John recently, earthly Jesus always deferred to the Father the actions, words and the will. Christ completely submitted himself, subordinated himself to the will of the Father.
Maybe it is easier to think of Christ’s “emptying” of Himself as a laying aside of the privileges that were His in heaven. Rather than stay on His throne in heaven, Jesus “made himself nothing” for our benefit and to be an example for us. When He came to earth, “he gave up his divine privileges”. He hid His Heavenly glory, and He chose to occupy the position of a slave rather than a master, much less a king. He also voluntarily refrained from using His divinity to make His way easier.
Graham Kendrick wrote that the two natures of the incarnated Son of God can be described by the dichotomy of meekness and majesty, manhood and deity in perfect harmony, a man who is also God. Today Paul writes to the Philippians (and to us), to tell them that it is important that they seek to understand what the willful and intentional Emptying of Jesus means for them and us and for our Christian maturity.
Paul says our attitude should be like Jesus’ attitude, a willingness to empty ourselves of all pride, hubris, and privilege in order to serve God and serve mankind. But to do that we must fully understand what it is that Christ has done for us. This God, Jesus Christ, deliberately and voluntarily set aside the entitlements that were rightfully his, in order that he could minister to mankind. He deliberately striped himself of all privileges. Paul tells us that Christ emptied himself that he made himself nothing, in order that he could assume the nature of a servant.
But in doing so Jesus didn’t diminish himself or diminish the qualities of deity when he emptied himself, rather he increased himself through the addition of the nature of mankind. He didn’t lose his divinity when he chose not to use it for his benefit but increased his already profound nature through the addition of humanity to his nature.
Hear the Good News my Friends……….
If we want to live in unity and harmony, we must do so with an attitude of humility like Christ himself, empty ourselves. Jesus was in nature God, but he didn’t rely on that to build relationships with mankind. He emptied himself of all trappings of divinity and power and he took on the very nature of a servant so that He could be close to His people.
Jesus became human and became a servant to all, even the lowliest, the sinners, the broken, the forgotten, the sick and the lonely. He was divine but emptied himself of all that in order to come to serve mankind. We came to Christ as lost and broken souls, with no hope of finding significance in our lives until we found the truth of Christ’s sacrifice that redeemed our souls and gave us new life and new meaning. Can’t we also find the courage and strength to love and serve others like He did?
He became what he had never been before, to make himself humble without ceasing and to be what he had always been. Jesus, the deity, was born as a man, suffered as an outcast and died as a criminal. He exchanged the homage of angels for the hatred of man in order to redeem lost man.
Our God the creator of the universe, doesn’t call down to humanity from some ethereal plain but rather he comes down to us with great humility to become man, to walk the dusty trail, to suffer the same agonies, to feel the same pains, to willingly give up His life on a Roman Cross later this week, for us. Leaving behind a remarkable attitude from which to learn and the promise of forgiveness and Eternal life.
Going back to the Palm Sunday, Jesus lowered himself to riding a simple colt to fulfill scriptures but also to ride into his kingdom as one of us, seated humbly on the back of a donkey. That was the lifestyle of man and he humbled himself by living a life like mankind. He lived a life of utter obedience to God which is to be our lives as well.
Would you pray with me “Help me empty myself, Lord, of things that resist your will? Like pride and selfishness, ego and worldly ambition. Help me empty myself, Lord, so that I can stumble my way into your plans for me. Help me to extend healing hands to the hurting, to speak words of comfort to those who mourn, and to keep watch with my eyes on behalf of the powerless and to cradle the forlorn in your love. (“Discipleship Ministries | Help Me Empty myself, Lord: 21st Century…”) Help me empty myself, Lord. You empty me so that You may be seen in my life. Amen