Philippians 2:4-5: “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.”
ST. PAUL, in this passage, is making an urgent appeal for unity and co-operation. He is up against the old, old difficulty of getting people to work together. The Christians at Philippi had got divided into cliques and had started quarrelling. In this chapter St. Paul proceeds to deal with this situation, and so makes the impassioned appeal for unity with which this chapter opens. And you notice how he appeals to these Philippian Christians along three lines. First of all he appeals to them as Christian people to be consistent. Then he appeals to them, as a good leader always can do, in the name of his own friendship with them. Last of all, he appeals to them on the highest level of ally that of the mind that was in Christ Jesus. I am going to give you what he says in Moffatt’s translation “If there is such a thing as encouragement in Christ, if there is such a thing as the stimulus of love, if there is such a thing as sharing in the Spirit, if our friendship counts for anything at all, then make my cup of joy full to the brim, by being of the same mind, feeling the same love, with one heart and soul.” “If these things,” he seems to say, “if these things that I have just mentioned, the incentive of love and the stimulus of Christ — if these things you talk about are more than pious phrases, and really strike a chord in your hearts, then you will prove they are real by getting together and being of the same mind, feeling the same love, with one heart and soul.” “Let nothing that you do,” he adds, “be actuated by personal vanity or party spirit” (the two things that are always hindering the spread of God’s Kingdom), “but rather in humility consider each other the better man and have an eye to the interest; of others besides yourself.” And now comes the third and highest appeal that St. Paul makes. “Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus.” “Turn your thoughts away from self,” he says, “and fix your attention upon the mind of Christ. Let your thoughts fasten upon His mind until His mind begins to be part of the make-up of your own character — becomes not merely part of it, but gets right inside it, and becomes supreme and dominant from within the inmost recesses of your being. Let His mind be in you.”
It’s not a call merely to imitate Christ’s example. If the imitation of Christ was the sole content of the Christian Gospel, then that Gospel would have no message for such as we. As it is the Christian message is something far bigger — it’s not just a call to imitate Christ, it’s a call to let Christ come in and express Himself in and through us, which is quite a different thing. That is the message that St. Paul is giving to his followers: “Open your mind, open your heart to the Living Christ — as your thoughts are fixed on Him, so you will find that you get the mind of Christ.” And there you have something that is gloriously possible, thank God! But what is it going to mean, if we have the mind of Christ? St. Paul goes on to show us what it will mean, by giving us an inspired picture of Christ in action. “Let this mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus, Who, being in the form of God, thought it not a thing to be exploited to be on an equality with God, but emptied Himself, taking upon Him the form of a Servant.”
You remember that great passage in the Fourth Gospel: “Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His Hands, and that He was come from God, and went to God,” did what? —some mighty miracle, some exhibition of power? —this is what He did: “He riseth from supper and laid aside His garments and took a towel and girded Himself.” “Being in the form of God, He emptied Himself, taking upon Him the form of a Servant; and being found in fashion as a Man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross.” There we have the mind of Christ in action — we see that mind responding to the claims of self, the claims of others, the claims of God.
How does Christ react to the claims of self? We read that He emptied Himself. To the claims of other people? He humbled Himself in relation to the claims of God? He obeyed — to the death. Thus in the mind of Christ we see the supreme adjustment of personality in relation to the threefold claims of self, of our neighbor, and of our God. The mind of Christ is expressed in an utter emptying of self, in a humiliation that goes down to the very depths and in perfect obedience to the doing of the Father’s will, even though it means the Cross. “He became obedient unto death,” and that the most infamous of all deaths “even the death of the Cross” —which to the Jew was the symbol of the curse of God, and to the Roman the sign of the utmost degradation; the pain and shame of the Cross, which He bore without flinching for us and for our salvation.
But St. Paul does not stop with the Cross. The Gospel does, not stop with the Cross — the Gospel goes on, and St. Paul, too, has to go on. Because something stupendous has happened as the result of the Cross. The Universe has responded to that act of Christ — the Power behind the Universe has intervened. God has acted and shown that He is indeed Father.
In the fact of the Resurrection we see it affirmed once and for all that God is Love. He Who was the embodiment of all our fairest hopes and ideals has died the death of a common criminal — but that is not the end. “For God also hath highly exalted Him and hath conferred on Him a Name that is above every Name.” Not one humiliation was spared, not one glorification shall be missed — “until at the Name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of things in heaven and things in earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.” Let us then fix our thoughts afresh on this picture of Christ in all His utter humiliation, in His complete self-emptying and in His obedience to the death upon the Cross. For it is here that we have the only things that are ever going to create unity and co-operation. What is it that is always hindering us in our efforts after unity? Pride in one form or another is the obstacle that is always getting in our way. Pride of class or caste, pride of race or nation—it’s pride that divides us and causes all our endless antagonisms. And how are-we going to get rid of pride? I know of only one thing that can smash pride up — and that is the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.... It’s the vision of the Cross that knocks the bottom out of all our pride and self-assertiveness. When Godfrey led the Crusaders in triumph into Jerusalem and was offered a crown, you remember his magnificent answer: “I will not wear the crown of gold where Jesus wore the crown of thorns.” The Cross alters all our values, “When I survey the wondrous Cross” — I have to do something, “I pour contempt on all my pride.” It’s the Cross that shows up the utter hollowness of all our pride and all our sham humility. Sham humility — in the Cross we see what the real thing looks like.
The meek man is not the weak man. There is no particular virtue in being humble and civil to those over us when we are more or less compelled to be civil to them. The man who is truly meek is the man, who, when he has it in his power to lord it over others, deliberately refrains, and chooses rather to spend himself in the service of his fellows. There you have the true humility — that humility which springs from an utter emptying of self. Humility is not thinking badly of yourself — that only leads to an inferiority complex. Humility is simply thinking nothing of yourself, forgetting all about yourself. It is a very elusive thing rather like charm — and you know what they say about charm, that if you think you have got it you can be quite sure that you have not. It’s as self goes, that you begin to get the genuine thing, that true humility which Christ was the first to bring into the world and which has always been one of Christianity’s most distinctive virtues. Then it is that you understand why you find it is that our greatest men, the leaders in science and thought and action, are so often the humblest. One thinks of Huxley’s famous advice to his pupils “Sit down before the facts as a little child.” “Except ye be converted,” said Christ, “and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.” There is nothing greater than such humility as the key to all real progress. The saints of all ages have found that the Valley of Humiliation has always to be traversed before they can begin the ascent of the Hill of the Lord. It’s only as they have gone down that they have been able to ascend in heart and mind. God help us so to follow the example of His patience that we may be partakers of His resurrection.
(By permission, Northern Nigeria.)