Sermon Tone Analysis

In the Form of God

(Philippians 2:5-11)

Introduction:

I am sure by now, most of us are familiar with Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code, and all the controversy surrounding the veiled claims made in his novel.

And I say veiled, because in truth Brown truly believes that on some level his claims that Jesus was neither God, nor the one come to earth to save man from his sins, are real.

That Dan Brown veiled these claims in the form a book of fiction doesn't mean that he, and a great many others, actually believe those claims to be true.

They do, indeed, believe them, and they are not ashamed to trumpet their claims to all the very gullible and Biblically illiterate folks out there in the world today.

They even make the very foolish assertion that Jesus never said He was God, and that the Bible doesn't really say that He did.

Our passage this evening, in no uncertain terms, though, gives lie to that false interpretation of Scripture.

Jesus tells us Himself that He is God in the flesh and the human authors tell us over and over again of the Deity of Jesus Christ.

That is the claim, right?

That is absolute foundational truth of the Christian faith Jesus Christ was, is and ever will be very God of very God

While we will concentrate on verses 5-8 in this section, the entire passage of 5-11 form the very core of Paul's thoughts on submission.

We will probably divide this section in two messages.

Unlike Dan Brown, and the other skeptics, the Apostle Paul is showing us clearly what the Incarnation of Christ is all about.

It is all about God, in the Person of the Son, becoming a man, right?

It is not about myth, it is about truth It is not about legend being added onto a germ of historical content, but it is all about the glory of the Gospel, the Gospel of Christ crucified, and Him resurrected What we are also going to see is that because of who Christ is, and what He sacrificed, how He humbled Himself in becoming a man, and submitted Himself unto death on the cross, He is our model; we are to have the same mind as He did

Let’s briefly refresh our memories on the four keys for living joyful Christian lives.

First, we are to have a single mind.

Our focus is to be on Jesus Christ.

He is to be at the very center of everything we do.

Everything in our lives must proceed from the Lord Jesus Christ and the Gospel.

Second, we are to have a submissive mind.

The formula is having God first, others second, right?

We are to have a spiritual mind, focused on eternity and not the very temporary things of this world.

Last, we are to have a secure mind, which will be ours if the preceding three are active in our lives.

And we will have joy The Joy of the Lord.

And what we want to see this evening, and the next week as well, is that our joy, the entire edifice of the Christian faith, hinges on whether Jesus is God If Dan Brown is right, our worship is an exercise in futility, isn’t it?

If Jesus isn’t really God, but mere man, all those atheists and philosophers are right when they say that we are just weak sisters using religion as a crutch to get us through this vale tears we call life.

But listen people, if Jesus really is God, then that puts a whole different spin on things, doesn’t it?

So, our study this evening will have three different, but related, points to it.

First, we are going to explore what the Bible tells us about the Deity of Jesus; and secondly, we are going to look at the stunning nature of the Son’s humility and submission.

Last?

We are going to look at how submission is so key for our having The Joy of the Lord

I.

The Humility of Christ (Phil.

2:5-8)

(1 Obviously, the cross of Christ is the ultimate picture of the submission of God, isn’t it?

Most of the myths of other cultures do not have anything approaching this masterpiece.

God, in the Person of the Son climbing up on the cross, dying for our sins, not His, humbling Himself to that horror, and then rising gloriously on the third day overcoming sin and death.

There is nothing quite like it anywhere else.

And Paul slipped a couple of thoughts in before this great affirmation on Christ’s Deity to set the stage for what may be an early hymn of the church.

He began his thoughts on Christ’s humility by informing us of our command for submission.

Before we go back and read Phil.

2:5-8, look at verses 3-4.

Then 5-8.

(2 We’ll break these words down as we go along, but look at the commands of Paul here.

Think about how Christ’s submission relates to our submission.

Paul is getting ready to tell us who Jesus is, and we are to look at His sacrifice and think the same way about it that he did, right?

How did He view His sacrifice and the humbling of Himself: He counted it joy, didn’t He? Hebrews 12:2 (KJV)

2 Looking unto Jesus the authora and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

What was the joy set before Him?

The joy of seeing countless men and women escaping the fury of the Father’s wrath for sin, and for the joy of simply submitting in obedience and love to His Father The same Father He was equal in essence to, wasn’t He?

And you know there is another shocking example of submission that Jesus performed back in the Gospel of John, isn’t there?

Most of us are familiar with the story of Jesus kneeling down and washing His disciples feet, aren’t we? Let’s turn there and look a it briefly.

John 13:1-5.

(3 There are a great many things we won’t touch on from this passage, theological truths that aren’t germane to our discussion on submission, so we will kind of telescope this event, focusing tightly on the very act of Jesus, God in the flesh, humbling Himself to perform what was really a slave’s function.

Look at your Bibles, verses 1-5.

(4 It is the time of the Passover Feast.

The very last one Jesus would celebrate.

He is now at the end stages of His earthly ministry, the horror of the cross looms darkly on His horizon.

The devil is beginning to work on Judas Iscariot’s heart, there is no one else but the disciples and perhaps the angels there with Jesus in the Upper Room.

It is a dark time.

The disciples are beginning to get confused.

Things are not going as they envisioned them going.

Their memory of the glory of Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem has faded; the same crowds, the ones who joyfully shouted Hosanna to the King, will soon turn on Jesus, crying out for His death One of His own, Judas, will soon betray Jesus for thirty pieces of silver.

And yet, what do we have?

Jesus, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, knelt down in the darkness of that hour, and continued teaching His beloved disciples, didn’t He? Performing what was a slave’s job, God knelt down and washed the grime off His disciple’s dirty feet What a demonstration of submission The teaching and proclamation of the Gospel, the very foundation of the church of Christ that these disciples, soon to be apostles, were to lay the foundations of, were to be accomplished not with might and warfare, not with arrogance and spite, but with submission, humility, and love And a bold and sacrificial stand for truth Even at the expense of their lives Lives that they did indeed lose for the sake of their Savior and the Gospel Where are we in this great drama?

Not just where are you?

But where am I?

Where are all of us?

(5 And as I said there are many doctrinal truths packed into this episode in Jesus’ life, but what I want us to see is the humility and gentleness of God the Son.

Jesus is God, people Our passage in Philippians clearly tells us so, doesn’t it?

Another powerful example of the Deity of Jesus is found in the very beginning of the Gospel of John.

Let’s go to John 1:1-5, 14.

This passage is just one more powerful example of the affirmation of the Deity of Christ in the Bible.

The serious student of John's Gospel will find an amazing thing happening: each time he returns to the Gospel, Christ will be a little bigger—something like Lucy’s experience with the lion Aslan (the Christ symbol in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia) as she again gazed into his large, wise face.

“Welcome, child,” Aslan said.

“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you're bigger.”

“That is because you are older, little one,” he answered.

“Not because you are?” “I am not But every year you grow, you will find me bigger ”

(6 Listen , you will never exhaust the infinite wonder of a study of Jesus Christ, will you?

Look at your Bibles, John 1:1-5, 14.

This passage from John tells us so many things, doesn't it?

It tells us that there was never a time when Jesus did not exist.

It tells us that the Father and the Son were eternally face to face.

The words with God literally means “the Word was continually toward God.”

The preposition “with” bears the idea of nearness, along with a sense of movement toward God.

That is to say, there has always existed the deepest equality and intimacy in the Holy Trinity.

And Jesus is the Creator of the universe.

Colossians 1:16-17 (KJV) 16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: 17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.

Not only were the worlds created throught the Word of Christ, but the entire universe consists, or is held together, by Him as well.

And this universe is, by anyone's reckoning, a nearly unfathomable creation.

There are about 100 billion stars in the average galaxy, and there are at least one hundred million galaxies in known space.

Einstein believed that we have scanned with our largest telescopes only one billionth of theoretical space.

This means that there are probably something like 10 octillion stars in space.

Ten octillion is a 10 with twenty-seven zeros behind it.

And Jesus created them all Not only is he the Creator of the macrocosm of the universe, but also of the microcosm in the inner universe of the atom.

The text in Colossians explains that he holds the atom and its inner and outer universe together (“in him all things hold together”).

Hughes, R. K. (1999).

John : That you may believe.