We are called to have certain feelings and characteristics as living and walking in the Spirit, but we can only get them as they come from God. We are to walk in love as Christ walked; to be “of one accord, of one mind.” So, “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” There may be purpose of heart, but not the mind of Christ in carrying it out; we want the power that has done with everything here below, in living for and to Christ: but we must have done with self to have the mind that was in Him. He was in the form of God and thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of man, and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. In Him we see the very opposite of Adam in every particular. He was in the form of a man, and sought to be God. He kept not his first estate, as the creature should have done. The angels too fell by this: they kept not the place God had given them. He was God, and He alone could do this without sinning, and so He emptied Himself and took the form of a servant. Do we always take the form of a servant? Do we humble ourselves that we—may serve? That is what love always does. Love delights to serve—self to be served. We have in Him here the first great example of “He that humbleth himself shall be exalted;” as in Adam, of “He that exalteth himself shall be abased.” It was the total surrender of self in Him. Where was self to be found in that lowly man? His delight was to do the Father’s will. We have to judge ourselves and condemn ourselves—to try to be like Him—to walk in the path in which
He walked. A Christian who is thus walking with Christ, in the power of the Spirit, sees Christ in his brother, but sees the workings of the flesh in himself, and judges it. He can esteem others better than himself when he thinks of Christ. Self is forgotten and God is there, enabling us to forget it. The power of good in the midst of evil was in Christ coming down from the glory of God to the cross. In Him there was perfect love and perfect obedience. There is nothing so humble as obedience, as it is having no will at all. This is the character of the new man in us—always dependent, always obedient. The new man lives by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God: that is, the Scriptures. There is no truth elsewhere; many things true, but no truth in the world but the Word of God. Christ is the living Word. People may say, “there is no harm in this or that,” but if you have no word of God for it, it is harm. Christian obedience is not my being stopped when I have a wrong will; but it is the new man who has no will at all, and who takes the will of. God and lives obediently to His word. Christ never had a will. He was the only one who could say, “I do always those things that please Him.”
“Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” The contrast was between Paul’s working when present with them and their own working in his absence. Work out your own salvation. You have not lost God if you have lost Paul. No deprivation of apostolic power can hinder obedience to the Word of God. It saves me from all the machinations of the enemy. Paul was gone, but they could count upon God. “It is God which worketh in you.” There is nothing to hinder the path of faith. If you think faith could be hindered by circumstances, it is saying something could hinder God.
Are we thus carrying Christ’s character through the world? Satan is always trying to get us out of this path, but is that the path you hold to? Is that the path you have before your mind Is your whole desire that people should see Christ in you? Is that your only thought? Is there one thing that shines out in us CHRIST?
It is a beautiful thing to see the unselfishness that marked the path of Christ. When He was born in the manger, the angels and the heavenly host praised God, saying, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth, peace, good pleasure in men.” (Luke 2) But to the eye of man His path was only going down lower and lower till it ended in the cross. A babe, lying in a manger, no place for Him to he found, no room in the inn. He could not take a place in and of the world. What place could He have taken? He had a path of His own. He walked alone. He could not take a place of honor here: it would be owning the world as it is, to seek such from it. Christ had a path, and that path is taking no place on this earth, but being the expression of divine love in the midst of its evil. That is the path in which we have to walk. Mary had a heart associated with Christ’s place, which no one else had. She had no home without Him.
Would you like, as a fact, a place in this world; or to be like Christ as He was on that downward path? Would you like to be looked at with honor by the world, or to have Christ’s place? If we were near to Christ the soul would get the habit of Christ’s thoughts. Look at His graciousness. His thoughtfulness for others. We see Him at one time with no leisure so much as to eat, again seated on the well wearied with His journey. Oh, may we be like Christ! Thoughtfulness for others characterized Him. It is very blessed to see Him. Graciousness in Himself which thinks of others, not of Himself at all. It is wonderful! This comes out in measure in Epaphroditus; He was so occupied with others that he was full of heaviness because the Philippian saints had heard he had been sick. He does not think of himself but of them. “They will sorrow” was his thought.
My brethren, let us abide in the path of faith, apparently the most difficult one, yet the place where Christ is found, and where grace—the only precious thing in this world—flourishes, and binds the heart to God by a thousand links of affection and gratitude, as to one who has known us, and who has stooped to meet our need and the desires of our hearts. Faith gives energy; faith gives patience; and it is often, thus that the most precious affections are developed; affections which, if the energy of faith makes us servants on earth, render heaven itself happy because He who is the object of faith is there, and fills it in the presence of the Father.