Philippians 2:1-11 (Solus Christus)

Introduction

During the 1400s and early 1500s in Europe, it seemed that no one had any assurance they would be with Christ when they died… at least the Roman Catholic Church gave no such assurance. From birth to death, and even after death, the Christian experience was full of fear, condemnation, rote religious ceremonies, and prescribed efforts to make amends for failures and transgressions. Even if a person diligently participated in all ofthe sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church, he or she could still expect (after death) to spend hundreds or even thousands of years in purgatory in order to be purged of sin and unrighteousness.

This lack of assurance and the constant threat of God’s judgment and wrath made the message of the reformers a sweet song in the ears of many who heard it. The Protestant Reformation had many concerns and emphases – we’ve talked about a few of the main ones already (in the last few Sundays), that the Scriptures are our highest authority, and that the Bible teaches a salvation that is by grace alone through faith alone– but all of the doctrinal and practical recoveries of the Reformation have one central focus… that Christ alone is our Priest-King, our Mediator and Lord, our Redeemer and our Sovereign.

When the reformers began to sprout up all over Europe, they were pointing people to a sufficient Savior… One quite different than the priests of Rome. The reformers preached of a Savior who could actually (not just potentially) save sinners… One who could forgive sin once and for all… One who could give sinners a real righteousness and genuine adoption into God’s family… and One who would not fail to save them all the way through to the end.

Friends, this morning we are focusing our attention on that same Savior.

Now, it’s true that we (at least in some sense) focus on Christ every Sunday, but today we are making an effort to contrast a Roman Catholic understanding of salvation with a Protestant view… in order to center our special attention on the uniqueness and the sufficiency of Christ.

As I’ve said several times during this topical series on the Reformation, my point today is not to degrade or bash Roman Catholics. No, I don’t have any hostility toward your Roman Catholic friends or family, and I’m not trying to get you riled up against them either.

Rather, I’m using the occasion of this time of the year to highlight debates in Church history that are still relevant today. As many of you know, it was on October 31 of 1517 that Martin Luther nailed his infamous 95 theses to the chapel door in Wittenburg, and 500 years later the main concerns he raised (as did other reformers)… those main concerns are stillpoints of disagreement between Rome and Protestants today… And the issues at hand pertain to the very heart of the gospel message, the natureof Christian discipleship, and whether or not one can have any real assurance of salvation.

My purpose today is to do what Protestants (and all Bible-believing Christians) have been doing for a long time… my purpose is to point us all to the one and only Savior, who is able to truly and completely save sinners.

In a moment, we will read a passage together that speaks of the person and work of Jesus Christ (who He is and what He did and does). But it’s important to note that our passage is primarily a command for Christians to follow Christ’s example (of humility and selfless love). It’s not primarily a passage about the uniqueness or sufficiency of Christ as Savior. But I’ve chosen it as our starting point today because it emphasizes both the person of Christ as well as His workon behalf of sinners… and the two go hand in hand.

There are many other passages in the Bible that speak to Christ’s person and His work, and I will draw on some of them for this topical sermon today, but let’s begin here.

Would you stand with me as I read our passage today? Philippians 2:1-11.

Scripture Reading

Philippians 2:1–11 (ESV)

1 So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

3 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Main Idea:

Jesus Christ is the unique and sufficient Savior for sinners; therefore, we must look to Him and nothing else for our salvation.

Sermon

1. Reformation Reality

As I’ve done before in this series, let’s begin our consideration of this topic with a bit of history.

What did Rome teach about where to look for salvation?

And what did the reformers teach in protest over against the Roman Catholic Church?

1. The Roman Catholic system of sacraments

a. At birth, a child was baptized as a Christian, washed clean of original sin, and brought into union with Christ and His people.

b. When a child grew to adolescence (usually somewhere between 11 and 16), he or she was confirmed, increasing the grace of baptism and granting access to the Eucharist.

c. Eucharist is a transliteration of a Greek word that simply means “thanksgiving,” but Rome took this word to label what they define as an “unbloody sacrifice,” where the literal body of Christ is broken and Christ’s literal blood is poured out in the Mass.

i. Baptized and confirmed Roman Catholics participated regularly in the Eucharist (or Mass) in order to experience forgiveness and atonement for sin throughout their lives.

d. In addition to the Eucharist, Roman Catholics practiced the sacrament of penance, where they confessed their sin to a priest and then followed the priestly prescription of various prayers, financial contributions, and good works that would ensure one’s absolution (or forgiveness).

e. Another sacrament is that of the anointing of the sick, which was and is most commonly performed as a last rite… a priestly prayer and blessing of forgiveness to prepare one for death.

f. All these (and marriage or matrimony as well) were (and still are) sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church to be performed under the authority of Rome’s official clergy – holy orders (which is the seventh sacrament).

i. The entire structure of Christian life centered on one’s relationship to a Bishop or Priest who could administer these sacraments and provide forgiveness along the way.

ii. On a side note:

1. It’s not the word “sacrament” that is necessarily bad.

2. It comes from the Latin, sacramentum, which mean “solemn oath” or “holy oath.”

3. All Protestants agree that Christ has given us signs of His “holy oath” or sacred promise in the gospel (namely baptism and the Lord’s Supper), and many Protestants use the word sacrament to label them.

4. But this is not all Rome means by the word.

a. “the mysteries of Christ’s life are… dispensed in the sacraments, through the ministers [i.e., priests] of his Church.”[i]

b. “The ordained priesthood guarantees that it really is Christ who acts in the sacraments.”[ii]

c. “The ordained minister [or priest] is the sacramental bond that ties the liturgical action… to the words and actions of Christ.”[iii]

5. In other words, for Rome, the sacraments are the means by which a sinner receives the grace of God and the person and work of Christ, and it is through the properly recognized priest (i.e., a Roman Catholic priest) that these sacraments are effective.

2. Holy Orders – acting as Christ

a. Council of Trent (1545 to 1563)

i. On the institution of the Priesthood

1. “The sacred Scriptures show, and the tradition of the Catholic Church has always taught, that this priesthood was instituted by [Christ], and that to the apostles, and their successors in the priesthood, was the power delivered of consecrating, offering, and administering [Christ’s] Body and Blood, [and] also of forgiving and of retaining sins”[iv]

ii. On the sacrament of order

1. Canon 1: “If any one saith… that there is not any power… of forgiving and retaining sins [in priests]; but only an office and… ministry of preaching the Gospel… let him be anathema.”[v]

b. Rome still teaches this today – Roman Catholic Catechism

i. 1548 – “In the ecclesial service of the ordained minister [or priest], it is Christ himself who is present to his Church… This is what the Church means by saying that the priest… acts in persona Christi” (or “in the person of Christ”).[vi]

ii. The priest, “by reason of the sacerdotal consecration… is truly made like to the high priest and possesses the authority to act in the power and place of the person of Christ himself,” (both offering sacrifice and forgiving sin).

c. This is why (in Roman Catholic teaching) priests are sometimes called an alter Christus (another Christ).[vii]

3. Protestants against Rome’s sacramental system and priestly order

a. Ulrich Zwingli was a Swiss reformer who died on the battlefield on October 11, 1531.[viii]

i. As a younger man, Zwingli was soldier-for-hire (a mercenary), but he was well-educated, and he was able to read the Greek NT when Erasmus published it in 1516.

ii. Upon reading the New Testament for himself, he believed that Rome was not preaching the gospel but obscuring it.

iii. Zwingli trusted in Christ as Savior, and soon after he became pastor of the city church in Zurich.

iv. He is most remembered for his method of preaching, systematically through the NT, applying it to all of life.

v. Zwingli became chaplain of the Zurich army, and he went out with his townsmen when a Roman Catholic force came to make war against Protestant Zurich.

vi. One contemporary report described Zwingli’s death: “Three times Zwingli was thrown to the ground by the advancing forces but in each case he stood up again. On the fourth occasion a spear reached his chin and he fell to his knees saying, ‘They can kill the body but not the soul.’ And after these words, he fell asleep in the Lord.”[ix]

b. Zwingli on the uniqueness and sufficiency of Christ

i. “We know from the Old and New Testaments of God that our only comforter, redeemer, savior and mediator with God is Jesus Christ, in whom and through whom alone we can obtain grace, help and salvation, and besides [Him] from no other being in heaven or on earth.”[x]

ii. “Christ, having sacrificed himself once and for all, is for all eternity a perpetual and acceptable offering for the sins of all believers, from which it follows that the [Lord’s Supper] is not a sacrifice, but is a commemoration of the sacrifice and assurance of the salvation which Christ has given us.”[xi]

iii. “As Christ alone died for us, so he is also to be adored as the only Mediator and Advocate between God the Father and the believers. Therefore it is contrary to the Word of God to propose and invoke other mediators [or priests].”[xii]

4. Summary

a. Rome – Christ is the savior, but sinners have access to Christ through the priestly order and sacramental system of the Roman Catholic Church.

i. To deny priestly authority or sacramental necessity is damnable.

b. Reformers – Christ is the unique and sufficient savior, and sinners have direct access to Him by/through faith.

i. To set anything (earthly priest or sacrament) as a representative or alternative mediator is against Scripture and damnable.

2. Reformation Recovery

How do we know which way to go? What does the Bible say?

I want to highlight three things our passage indicates about Christ: (1) He needs no earthly representative; (2) He is the one – the only one – who lived and died for sinners; and (3) He is the exalted Priest-King right now.

1. Christ needs no earthly representative, since He became a man.

a. Context

i. As I said earlier, our main passage is a command for Christians to follow Christ’s example of humility and love.

1. “if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy,” Paul says to the saints and overseers and deacons in Philippi (Phil. 1:1), “complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love…” (Phil. 2:1-2).

2. “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who…” (Phil. 2:5).

b. But verses 6-7 tell us something of what it means that God the Son became a man.

i. “though he was in the form of God, [He] did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but [He] emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Phil. 2:6-7).

ii. These verses are more profound than we can explore today, but we can see that the Scriptures are teaching us here:

1. before Jesus was in human “form,” He was already “in the form of God” and “equal with God” (v6).

2. when God the Son became a man, there was an “emptying” or setting aside of His glory as deity (v7).

3. Christ Himself is God’s ownearthly representative.

a. John says in his Gospel, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us…No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known” (Jn. 1:1, 14, 18).

c. Christ needs no earthly representative, for He Himself has become man and made God known to us.

2. Christ is the one who obeyed unto death for sinners.

a. Verse 8 tells us that Christ (in His human form) “humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death” (Phil. 2:8).

i. The author of Hebrews makes it clear that Christ was acting as a “high priest” between God and sinners by offering Himself on the cross (Heb. 5:9-10).

ii. Jesus (and not any earthly priest) is “the guarantor” of all the promises of the New Covenant (Heb. 7:22).

iii. In Christ, sinners have “a high priest, holy, innocent, [and] unstained” (Heb. 7:26).

iv. And Christ “has no need” to “offer” ongoing “sacrifices,” like the OT priests, “since he did this once for all when he offered up himself” (Heb. 7:27).

v. Hebrews 9 says, “when Christ [came the first time] as a high priest… he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption… [to] purify our conscience from dead works [so that we might] serve the living God” (Heb. 9:11-14).

b. Friends, Christ is the only one who has obeyed unto death for sinners; and His priestly sacrifice was and is sufficient to secure real and lasting redemption for all who look to Him.

3. Christ is the exalted Priest-King right now.

a. Verses 9-11 tell us that Christ is now “exalted” or glorified as the risen “Lord” (Phil. 2:9-11); which means that He is both reigning as King and continuing as Priest on behalf of those He loves.

i. The author of Hebrews says, “we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, a [priestly] minister in the holy places” (Heb. 8:1-2).

ii. The Apostle Paul says, in Romans, “Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is it to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died – more than that, who was raised – who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us” (Rom. 8:33-34).

b. Brothers and sisters, for those of us who believe or trust in Christ, we have an exalted Priest-King, who reigns as Lord and who is presently interceding on our behalf.

4. Summary

a. Christ needs no earthly representative.

i. He is His own representative, and He has made God known to anyone who will look to Him.

ii. Even now, Christ is with His people… not in the form of an earthly priesthood… but in the person of His Holy Spirit.

1. To have the Spirit of God in and with us is to have God with us – Father, Son, and Spirit.

b. Christ is the one – the only one – who lived and died for sinners.

i. He was and is both the high priest and the sacrifice.

ii. In His life, He obeyed unto righteousness; and in His death, He obeyed in humility – suffering the wrath of God for the unrighteous ones who would love and trust Him.

c. Christ is the exalted Priest-King right now.

i. On the third day, Christ was raised to life, and God has exalted Him as Lord and King over all.

ii. Christ no longer suffers, but He continues as Priest, standing at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for all His people.

3. Reformation Resolutions

I’ve said that my main point today is that Jesus Christ is the unique and sufficient Savior for sinners; therefore, we must look to Him and nothing else for our salvation. Let’s consider (with our last few minutes today) what it means to look to Christ and nothing else.

1. We must look to Christ alone, and not an earthly priest or ritual.

a. With all due respect to my Roman Catholic friends (and other nominally Christian groups with a priestly order, like Eastern Orthodox or Mormons), the very notion of an earthly priest of any kind is repugnant to me.

i. God has already condescended so low (in Christ) to meet me in my helpless estate, to be both my Priest and my sacrifice.

1. How dare I ever even consider the possibility that I might need an earthly priest to plead my case?

2. How dare I think of church rituals as the means by which I can cleanse my sin or add to my justification?

b. But this strikes against many Protestants too.

i. How many of us sometimes think of pastors or preachers as “closer to God” or “representatives of Christ” in our lives?

ii. And how many of us are prone to think of our church activities as something like salvation-timecards – “If I can only mark it up enough, then I’ll be alright on the last day.”

c. Friends, I’m so glad for good pastors, and we most definitely ought to be active and intentional in our church participation, but we must never look to anyone or anything but Christ as our mediator.

i. There is no one else like Him, and He is sufficient.

2. We must look to Christ alone, and not our good works.

a. It is true that we must expect Christians to do good – to turn away from sin, to strive for holiness, to demonstrate genuine love… as Christ has perfectly exemplified before us (Phil. 2:1-8).

i. But we must never look to our good works when we’re thinking about whether or not we are acceptable before God.

b. The story is told of a teenaged Charles Spurgeon wandering into a church service by accident in 1849.

i. A snowstorm had prevented the regular preacher from coming to the chapel that day, and a laymen stepped into the pulpit instead (Spurgeon thought he might have been a shoemaker or a tailor).

ii. The man read from Isaiah 45 – “Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth.” And then he went on with some jumbled comments.

iii. But some of what the preacher said struck home for Spurgeon. “Look,” the man said, “Now lookin’ don’t take a deal of pain. It ain’t liftin’ your foot or your finger; it’s just ‘Look.’”

iv. The uneducated and stammering preacher went on, “Well, a man needn’t go to college to learn to look. You may be the biggest fool, and yet you can look. A man needn’t be worth a thousand pounds a year to look [in other words, not wealthy]. Anyone can look; even a child can look.”

v. And then the preacher got personal. He said, “But then the text says, ‘Look unto Me.’ Ay! Many of ye are lookin’ to yourselves, but it’s no use lookin’ there. You’ll never find any comfort in yourselves… Jesus Christ says, ‘Look unto Me.’ …The text says, ‘Look unto Me.’”

vi. And he went on, as though speaking with Christ’s own voice, “Look unto Me, I am sweatin’ great drops of blood. Look unto Me; I am hangin’ on the cross. Look unto Me, I am dead and buried. Look unto Me; I rise again. Look unto Me; I ascend to Heaven. Look unto Me; I am sitting at the Father’s right hand… O poor sinner, look unto Me! Look unto Me!”

c. Friends, Christ welcomes us to look to Him today and every day.

i. May God help us to take our eyes off of ourselves and off of any foolish notion of our good works… and may God grant us eyes to see glory and grace in the face of Jesus Christ.

3. We must look to Christ alone, and not our sin.

a. In our culture, I think we are highly likely to presume upon God’s grace… expecting that God will forgive us no matter what we do or how we live.

i. For those of us with hard hearts and seared consciences, we would do well to consider the warning passages of the Bible… Jesus said that not everyone who calls Him “Lord” will “enter the kingdom of heaven” on the last day, but only those who “do the will of [the] Father” (Matt. 7:21-23).

ii. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, and those who “go on sinning deliberately” ought to expect “judgment” and “fury” on the last day (Heb. 10:26-31).

b. Still, there are (no doubt) some of us here this morning who carry (at least at times) a sense of unhealthy fear and hopelessness when we think about how God must look at us.

i. When we begin to pray, when things go wrong for us, when we imagine what it will be like to stand before God on the last day… we (maybe occasionally, maybe often) doubt that God would ever want to do us good, we think God must be punishing us through the circumstances of our lives, and we are terrified at the thought of what we will hear and feel on the last day (I confess, I feel this way sometimes myself).

ii. Friend, if this is you, then do not look to your sin; look to Christ!

1. Will only sinless people share in Christ’s salvation?

a. No, sinners are those for whom Christ died!

2. Is it only the righteous that God loves?

a. No, God showed His love for us by sending His Son to live and die for us while we were yet sinners!

iii. Let me close our time together with an excerpt from my favorite reformer – Martin Luther.

1. He wrote in the introduction to his commentary on Galatians, “Why, do we then nothing [for our justification]? Do we work nothing for the obtaining of [Christ’s] righteousness? I answer: Nothing at all.”

2. We “know” and “believe this only, that Christ is gone to the Father and is not now seen: that he sits in heaven at the right hand of his Father, not as a judge, but made unto us of God, wisdom, righteousness, holiness and redemption… that he is our high-priest entreating for us, and reigning over us and in us by grace.”

3. “Here [in and with Christ] no sin is perceived, no terror… of conscience is felt; for in this heavenly righteousness sin can have no place.”

4. “Although I am a sinner by the law… yet I despaired not, yet I die not, because Christ lives, who is both my righteousness and my everlasting and heavenly life. In that righteousness and life I have no sin, no sting of conscience, [not even a] care of death.”

Endnotes

[i] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1115. https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P30.HTM [ii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1120. https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P31.HTM [iii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1120. https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P31.HTM [iv] See DOCTRINE & CANONS, CHAPTER 1: http://www.thecounciloftrent.com/ch23.htm [v] See ON THE SACRAMENT OF ORDER: http://www.thecounciloftrent.com/ch23.htm [vi] See “In the person of Christ the Head” https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P4T.HTM#-1SK [vii] See “Alter Christus” described here: https://www.ncregister.com/news/the-church-s-alter-christi [viii] Here is a brief introduction to Zwingli: https://www.crossway.org/articles/a-brief-introduction-to-the-life-and-ministry-of-ulrich-zwingli/ [ix] See Myconius’s report here: https://christianhistoryinstitute.org/magazine/article/zwinglis-death-on-battlefield [x] See the citations from Zwingli on page 84. https://cf.sbts.edu/equip/uploads/2016/05/Solus-Christus-What-the-Reformers-Taught-and-Why-it-Still-Matters.pdf [xi] See number 18: https://christianhistoryinstitute.org/magazine/article/zwingli-archives-public-debates [xii] See Zwingli citation on page 85. https://cf.sbts.edu/equip/uploads/2016/05/Solus-Christus-What-the-Reformers-Taught-and-Why-it-Still-Matters.pdf