Dennis Tuuri

# Complete My Joy: Harmony and Humility

Harmony is important to remember as we read today’s text, as is the opportunity you have at the conclusion of the next two songs to have prayer requests brought to the elders of the church and to the church to be prayed for in the context of the formal worship service of the church. These expressions of body life really are the essence of today’s text. The sermon is going to be on Philippians 2:1-4.

So we’re going a little retrograde. We spent four weeks looking at Philippians 2:5-11. But really from one perspective, that text, as glorious and magnificent as it was, is really an example in the Lord Jesus Christ as well as containing great doctrinal truth to buttress Paul’s exhortation found in verses 1 to 4. Now to put it in context, I’m going to read beginning at verse 27 of chapter 1. So I’ll read Philippians 1:27 through 2:4, and then we’ll look specifically at chapter 2, verses 1 to 4.

Please stand for the reading of God’s word. Philippians 1, beginning at verse 27:

Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ. So that whether I come and see you or am absent I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel and not frightened in anything by your opponents. This is a clear sign to them of their destruction, but of your salvation and that from God.

For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ, you should not only believe in him, but also suffer for his sake. Engaged in the same conflict that you saw I had and now here that I still have. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

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

Let’s pray. Lord God, as we open up this year, as we walk into it, bless us, Father, that the truth of this scripture might come down into our hearts by your Holy Spirit. Transform us. And may we walk into this new year in the spirit and in the manner in which we’re instructed by your gracious word. Thank you for the coming of Jesus to redeem mankind. In his name we pray. Amen.

Please be seated.

So, did Angie make a mistake with the picture on the order of worship? What’s the significance of that, do you suppose? Tower of Babel. Well, we’ll leave that in your minds for just a minute and I’ll answer it very shortly, but this is of course New Year’s Day. This is the eighth day if we reckon the day of Christ’s birth as well as New Year’s Day.

The eighth day the church has routinely celebrated for the last two thousand years this particular day as the Feast of the Circumcision, the circumcision of Jesus on the eighth day, which is certainly documented. Of course there’s wonderful material in that event for meditation as we walk into the new year. The prefigurement of the suffering of Christ to affect the new humanity is the central sign of what’s going on in the circumcision of our Savior.

He is a picture of the new man. The eighth day reminds us of the eighth day Sabbath of the Old Testament. Circumcision is explicitly tied to a new creation. The new creation is the beginning of the new week, the eighth day, the first of the second week of the new creation following the first week of the fallen creation. So it’s all about newness of life. It’s all about the new year.

I have decided not to quote from the poem that I routinely do at this time of year—”Lord, make a regular man out of me.” My children have heard it far too often and probably you have as well. But at the beginning of a year, this is a wonderful time to meditate upon this newness of life affected symbolically by the representation of the circumcision of our Savior and a desire to make new year resolutions about trying to become a regular guy. It’s old-fashioned words, a good man, a good woman. And today’s text is all about that.

It’s really about the significance of the events that we have joyously participated in over the last few weeks and months. The coming of the Savior was for this purpose: to affect the new humanity. He came to remove the sin of the world and to create a new humanity. And this new humanity is described for us in verses 1 to 4, which we’ll turn to shortly.

So what’s the importance of the picture? Well, the picture shows the unity of mankind in a task. And listen, listen to what God says happens when unity happens. We read in Genesis 11:6: “The Lord said, ‘Behold, they are one people. They all have one language.’” Not sure if language is right, maybe doctrine, but certainly one language as well. But they also have one doctrine. And this is only the beginning of what they will do. And this is God speaking: “Nothing that they propose to do will be impossible for them.”

So God looks at the unity of mankind in rebellion against him. But nevertheless, he looks at the impact of what unity can do. And he says that to a unified people, nothing will be impossible for them to do. An amazing sentence to come out of our Lord’s mouth. But there it is. And what does he do? He confuses their speech. He causes disunity because in their unity, tremendous things would be accomplished and they’d be tremendous things for ill.

Today’s text is about the importance of unity, harmony, the basis for harmony, which is humility. And that’s really the essential message of today’s text. But it’s said in the context in verses 27 and following of the propagation of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the exercise of dominion through the preaching of Christ’s word. The antithesis continues for us in verses 27 and following. So verses 1 to 4 can’t be thought of in some kind of unitarian sense of all mankind. Paul notes the antithesis. He talks about the destruction of the old humanity in opposition to the gospel of Christ and the settlement of those in the new humanity.

Jesus has come to remove the sin of the world, to take care of that, to bring about a new world with a new humanity who will inherit that world. And the gospel is the means whereby this is accomplished. And the gospel is only effective—we can say, or most effective—when the people of God are unified. So the unification, the humility and harmony that is talked about in verses 1 to 4 is seen as a method, the method for God being able to effectively—or not being able to, but God deciding that this is his way—to transform the world, which is what we see in verses 1 to 4.

Now last week, you know, we talked about this distinction between how the world sees power and how the scriptures present power. And this text follows up with that because what we see in verses 1 to 4, the key to dominion, the key to the meek inheriting the earth, is not military strength or great physical riches or money, and it’s not our great statecraft. It’s rather our humility and the resulting harmony and unity of the church of Jesus Christ.

So we’re going to look at this in some detail by looking at three particular aspects of it. But one more thing about it: as I said, I think this is really at the center of Philippians. I’ve given you again on today’s outline just the center part of the Bahnsen-Leithart outline of the book of Philippians. And the center, you’ll see, is G: “Having the ‘in Christ’ thinking” in verses 1 to 11.

So verses 1 to 11 are the center. And actually verses 5 to 11, as I just said, are sort of like an illustration of the central teaching of the center, which is found in verses 1 to 4. So it has that kind of significance. Okay, this isn’t just some part of the epistle. This is the center of the epistle and it seems to be quite important.

Now verses 1-4 set up what we’ve just looked at in verses 5 to 11 for the last month. On your outlines on your handouts today, I’ve got a series of verses from these two sections—1 to 4 or 1 to 3 actually, and 5 to 8—which opens up the second section. And you’ll see that in verse 1 we see the phrase “in Christ.” So this is bolded on your handout if you can look at that page of your outline.

Verse 1 says “in Christ.” Verse 5 has “this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus.” So it picks up the same theme. So verses 1 to 4 really is echoed in verses 5-11. Verse 2 talks about having the same mind—twice actually—being in full accord and of one mind. And verse 5 says “Have this mind.” So we have this one mind, which says it will have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus in verse 5.

Verse 3 says “in humility count others more significant than yourselves.” And verse 6 says that Jesus didn’t count equality with God a thing to be grasped. Now that’s a very important text in terms of what this text is and how it doesn’t—what we’re to put off as well as what we’re to put on. And we’ll talk about that in a couple of minutes. But this has to do again with this idea of rivalry and contention. And so Jesus, unlike Adam, doesn’t grasp after what would become his by submission to the Father. He doesn’t see Father as rival. He sees Father as faithful Father the whole way through.

And so unlike Adam, he doesn’t grasp in rivalry or rebellion. And we’re called to be the same in our relationships to one another. We’re not to see people in terms of rivalry. So this counting or reckoning is important.

Verse 3 goes on to say: “Don’t do anything from selfish ambition.” That’s that rivalry I was just speaking about. And Jesus didn’t see equality with God. Didn’t count it a thing to be grasped. So those two things match up. We’re being prepared for verses 5-8 by these first few verses of chapter 2.

“Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.” And Jesus didn’t. He emptied himself, right? He died. He poured himself out. Verse 3 says “in humility count others more important.” And Jesus, being found in human form, humbled himself. So humility is called for in the first section—the mindset in the first section—and that is seen in the work of Jesus Christ in the second section.

So unity, harmony, and humility in relationship and its importance is expounded in the first four verses of chapter 2, which we’ll be looking at in just a minute, and then it’s illustrated in verses 5 to 11. And we’ll see here that in today’s text there are these series of fours, 4-4-4. And it’s interesting because if we went through all of chapter 2, we’d see that the example of Jesus is followed up by the example of Paul, Timothy, and Epaphroditus. There are four specific examples, exemplars—right?—mentors, models that we’re to imitate—four men mentioned. And they’re all illustrative of what we see in verses 1 to 4.

And so this fourfold presentation is picked up in a fourfold presentation of models that we’re to imitate, of course beginning with and ultimately all encompassed in Jesus Christ. So that’s what’s happening. That’s the placement of these verses in its specific context.

And so what we want to do now is look at these particular verses, each of the specific phrases. And as you’ll see from your handout, I think there’s—I think now this is a text of great interest to people in terms of the structure of it. It’s very carefully constructed. Verses 5 to 11, or 6 to 11, are seen as probably a hymn, more likely than not. These verses also, though, are seen as some kind of—there’s something quite beautiful in terms of the structure of it—that have caused a lot of people to do a lot of thinking about it.

And what I present to you today is, I think, the best way of looking at it, but it’s not the last word. But it does give us a sense of how Paul builds this argument and these three sets of four things that he does. And so we’ll look first at these—the motivation or the grounds of Christian unity—and then we’ll continue on with that. We’ll build upon those grounds to then what we’re actually to accomplish, how we’re to accomplish Christian unity, by looking at the attitude that happens in the context of it.

So we’ll look at it in this threefold way, first beginning with verse 1.

So if you see there—and let’s just briefly go through the text. So the very first word is “so” or “therefore.” So it ties it back to the verses we just read. And so the idea is again that if this antithesis is to be worked out and if the meek are to inherit the earth, this is the way it will happen.

So there’s this connective of “so” or “if.” “If there is any encouragement in Christ”—now this is a word and on your handouts I note this word “if.” It occurs hundreds of times in the New Testament and about a third of those times or more it actually has the implication or sense. It can be translated “since,” and I think that’s what it is here. He’s not saying he doesn’t mean there might or might not be some encouragement in Christ, some consolation of love, some fellowship in the Holy Spirit. He’s not saying, well, if there’s any of that in there, and maybe there is, maybe there isn’t. That’s not what he’s saying.

What he’s saying is “since,” really is the implication of the rhetorical device that he’s using here. So he’s giving us the basis for a further maturation of the church at Philippi, right? And that’s what he’s doing. He’s addressing a particular church with particular members and he’s exhorting them to have particular unity, harmony through humility in the context of that church and as a result be effective in the spread of the gospel in their region.

So what he’s saying is here you’ve got some of this stuff going. So he takes the common ground that they’re already experiencing, and I think that’s the correct way to translate this. So since there is encouragement in Christ—well, the “in Christ” is the significant thing here. And as we said in the next section, you know, “have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” All this stuff is true because we’re in Christ. This is not true for people outside of Christ.

We don’t want to take people outside of Christ and make them nice, humble, harmonious people. Then we’re back at Babel, right? Then we’re back at Babel. And that’s kind of what the intent of a lot of modern-day sociology and political action is. Is just that, the Babel state, where people are unified by some kind of common humanism as opposed to unification in Christ. So it’s very important that we see that all these things are predicated on being in Christ.

So is there any encouragement? The word can mean consolation as well as encouragement. Have you personally—think about this—have you experienced any encouragement in your life, and particularly in the context of the body of Christ here, for any of the problems that you have in them? Any encouragement whatsoever? Well, of course you have. Of course we all have the common experience of the comfort of Jesus—sometimes directly through his word or through his Holy Spirit, and sometimes through other people.

So there is that. Is there any comfort from love? So encouragement from Christ, the comfort of God’s love for us, recognizing the love of God for us—and that really is the beginning and end of everything. Do we have any comfort from that? And of course the implication is of course we do. There is some element of that, right? It’s there. And then: any participation in the Spirit, any fellowship?

Now when we think of fellowship here, I think it’s important—and this is true of what will follow in the next few verses—you know, again, there’s a distinction between fellowship in the Spirit and fellowship in the world. And all too often, I think in churches as well as other places, our fellowship in the world is cast as fellowship in the Spirit. But it’s different.

One of the primary differences is that fellowship in the world is on the basis of commonalities that we have in external conditions—economic conditions, interests. “I like football, you like baseball.” “I like to talk to you because you’re intellectual. The other person isn’t. I don’t like to talk to you because you’re intellectual and I’m not that intellectual.” You know, back when I was in high school, you were a greaser or you’re a jock, you know, or you were a nerd or whatever it was. I don’t remember what the term was now. So you know, there are these groupings of commonalities.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with that, right? I mean, that’s not a bad thing in and of itself, but that’s not what he’s talking about here. That’s not fellowship in the Spirit. Fellowship in the Spirit is fellowship that the Spirit creates in a whole body of people who are quite diverse from one another. Okay? That’s what’s being talked about here. And that’s what he’s going to go on to stress by way of application.

But it opens up here. This koinonia that’s going on here, this fellowship, is not the way the world fellowships. I would encourage you to think about that in your gatherings—gatherings last night, gatherings today, probably gatherings for a football game tomorrow. It’s okay to be with your group, you know, with your buds or whatever it is. But that’s not what’s being talked about here. How much fellowship is there? Any fellowship you have with people who are unlike you, but are like you because the Spirit has bound you together in this body? That’s what he’s talking about.

And of course there is some of that going on. And that’s the implication—”since” these things are true. Any affection and sympathy? Now I’ve got that in bold because I think that in each of these four things there’s kind of a building to the fourth line. Now if you look at what I’ve got here for you, there’s encouragement in Christ, comfort from love. It doesn’t say the Father, but then it says participation in the Spirit. I think that’s the best translation.

So we’ve got Christ and the Spirit and love in the middle. Well, one of the benedictions we commonly use at this church, or I commonly use at the end of our service, is found in 2 Corinthians 13, which I have somewhere here, hopefully. 2 Corinthians 13 says: “All the saints greet you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.”

Now that phrase “communion of the Holy Spirit” is a little different because it’s got “Holy” in there, but it’s the communion, the koinonia, the same word, and “love” is the same word as well. So there we have a Trinitarian benediction of Christ and specifically the grace of Christ—which is related to the encouragement or consolation of being in Christ—the love of God (and in this sense we, it means God the Father), and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

Paul. So I think that what we’ve got here is again a Trinitarian emphasis from Paul. This was a common way he had of speaking in this threefold designation of the Trinity. So if the Trinity has done anything for you, okay? If the Trinity’s done anything for you, then go on to make Paul’s joy complete.

Now there’s one last phrase, though, and it kind of builds to this. Any affection and sympathy? These are plurals. Affection means guts, bowels, and it means sympathy. It means empathetic feelings for one another. So in the Bible, kind of the base of feelings is found in your viscera. You have visceral reactions to people’s suffering. We say the viscera were the intestines. Okay. So that’s what this word means: If there are any bowels of compassion, okay? Have you experienced anybody saying, “Man, I really feel bad that you’re sick” or that you’re this, that, or the other thing? Has there been any of that?

And then any mercies? I think “mercies,” and it’s in the plural here. Some of these words are only used here in the New Testament. This is kind of an unusual set of words—again, it’s kind of a poetic, or at least beautifully written, highly structured prose from Paul. But this word “mercies” is only used, I think, five times in the plural in this way. I think the implication is that “bowels” stresses the interior attitude we have for each other, and “mercies” is a demonstration of the actions we do with each other—whether it’s speaking to one another in encouragement, consoling one another. You know, the “encouragement in Christ” is kind of coming alongside of, and then the word “the consolation of love”—that word “consolation” means to speak to. It means to have words. So it’s like you know, you have encouragement—you’re in ranks—and then you have consolation where people, you know, sidle up next to you and encourage you in love. They have sympathy and empathy. They have bowels of compassion for you.

But those bowels of compassion are only biblically—must be demonstrated in mercies, in things that they do for you in a particularly merciful way.

Now the question is: I’ve identified the love here as the Father’s love, but the question is “any comfort from love.” Well, whose love? What’s he talking about? And we could say God the Father. We could say in each of these things, it’s the Trinity that’s ministering this stuff to us. But Paul leaves this deliberately not specified for a reason as well. And I think that’s because in Paul’s mind, this distinction that we make between a personal relationship with Jesus and God doing those things to us individually and the ministry of other people, that really isn’t at play here.

The idea is that God is ministering his encouragement, his consolation, and his fellowship through the body—that is the church at Philippi—through this particular body in your life. Now he does it in other ways as well, all kinds of other people, other Christians. There’s a church in Oregon City that we could talk about as well, you know, the extended body, but he’s talking to a particular group of people. And I think what he’s reminding us of is that these blessings—these Trinitarian blessings—are ministered normally in the context of community.

Community. That’s why I read verse 13 before I read verses 13 and 14 in 2 Corinthians 13. I read the benediction: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, love of God, the communion of the Holy Spirit with you all.” But just before that he says, “All the saints greet you.” I think that’s significant. “All the saints greet you.” May that blessing and encouragement and love and fellowship of the saints greeting you. May that be our common experience in the body of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So this is kind of the culmination then—is these feelings of compassion and empathy for one another, sympathy, which yield then to merciful actions to each other. Are there any of these things going on in your life as a result of the church you’re a member of? There aren’t? Might be time to look for another church. But if there is any of these things going on, that’s what Paul’s implication is. Since—and actually the implication is, “of course, since there are some of these things that you’ve experienced”—he then asks them to go on to a particular thing.

He wants them to move on to complete his joy. So these first things—so he says since you’ve got this base of reality going on in some at least small extent in the church at Philippi, now I want you to move on, and I want you to move toward something that will bring my joy to its completion. Okay.

So now we move to the marks, the expression, the results we could say, of Christian unity. Verse 2: Complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

So again, there’s this fourfold kind of thing that’s happening. And what’s interesting is this is really, you know, this is kind of the center of these three stanzas. And so Paul says he wants you to complete his joy. Now, this you could look at as an imperative, as a command, but it’s not. Of course, Paul is a good pastor to these people, and he’s appealing to them, right? He’s making an appeal.

“Look what blessings God has given you. Look at the blessings that other people in the church have ministered to you. Look at the blessings that you’ve gotten in your family”—is a good application of this as well. “And now please,” Paul says, “make my joy full.” That means Paul’s joy is dependent upon the church at Philippi, by the way, which is interesting. But this is how they’re going to make his joy full.

Another fourfold thing: same mind, same love, same soul, same one-mindedness. And so this, you know, the first stanza had a series of the same four words at the beginning of the four lines. This one has a beginning and end talking about the mind and then it has the center talking about love and the soul. So it seems like it’s a little more chiastic perhaps—this middle stanza—beginning and ending with not quite the same thing, but talking about the same thing—the mind—and then the difference is the preposition, the prefix rather, that he attaches to the mind in the first phrase and the fourth phrase.

These prefixes are interesting. For instance, when it says “in full accord,” it really says “to be co-souled,” so he takes the word “soul”—is sort of like our lives—and puts the prefix “co” in front of it. I don’t think this is used any other place in Greek that I know of, and it wasn’t—I think this is the only occurrence in the New Testament. But this is what this text is about. He does these kind of made-up words to make a particular point and to make it in a literarily beautiful way by these prefixes added to these words.

Now, so on the basis of what God has done for us already, Paul says then we’re to aim toward something that will bring increased joy for him. Now the implication is that’ll be the source of our joy as well. If it’s going to make Paul joyful, it’s going to increase our joy as well.

So how are we joyful? And this is, you know, how does the new man live out his life? Well, this is the way it is. We’re to complete joy by being of the same mind. So the idea is to try to—and again, this word “mind” we think of it as just intellectual endeavor, but really it’s a lot more holistic than that. It means our intentions. It involves our emotions. It involves what we think. It involves kind of our worldview, we could say, or how we—what our lives are all about. Okay. So we have a mind.

Now twice he says—and he changes the prefix from the beginning to the end. But twice he says we’re to have some kind of commonality of mind. And he says at the beginning, you know, “mind the same thing,” and another way to then, at the end, he says “mind the thing”—is a one way to translate this. So to have “minding the same thing” and then an emphasis upon the particular thing you’re supposed to mind.

Well, that calls into question: what is it? What is this mind? And we already know the answer. We know that we’ve already expounded. We’ve looked at verses 5 to 11. “Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” And then that mind is described as being a mind that isn’t engaged in mimetic rivalry, that doesn’t see God as enemy, that doesn’t exalt himself, but is the mind of humble service toward a particular goal—the salvation of the world.

They’re to have as their intent the gospel. That is the mind. That’s the thing. And the results of that—the gospel is the good news that the world is being saved, that Jesus has come to remove the sin of the world, to take away the sin of the world, and to create a meek humanity, a new humanity, who in humble reliance upon Christ and who in unity and love for each other will then be given the world. So that’s what is being accomplished. That’s the thing.

Now this has two problems for us. The first problem is this our mind? I mean, honestly, ask yourself as you get up tomorrow morning: what runs your life? Because for a lot of Christians, what runs your life is the typical kind of self thing—the party, you know, their own friends and typical sorts of people, not the body of Christ necessarily. It’s their job, which they do so they can get money and provide for their family and do all that stuff—that’s good—but if that’s the mind, then somehow that ain’t going to work. That’s again the mind that’s not of Christ. That’s a mind of the world.

So the question is, or the challenge is rather, that the gospel is not something added onto a life where you’ve got your own mind, your own view, your own thing going on. If you’re doing it your way and you think the gospel is a convenient way to get what you want, or it’s, you know, we all have to have this religious thing going on or yeah, I know at the end of the day or something—but if your mind is not the mind of Christ as you go about engaging the world, well, there’s no way you’re going to be able to fulfill Paul’s joy or your own. And there’s no way you’re going to increase the joy of the church. There’s no way you’re going to have joy because you’re not created to do that.

You’re created to serve your Creator. You’ve been brought to faith in Jesus Christ not so that it becomes a second story or a side room you go off and visit occasionally—some obligation you do on the Lord’s day or with your money or whatever it is—no. So that your whole world will be the thing, the one thing, the same thing as other Christians: the propagation of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the exercise of dominion in every action we take for the kingdom of Christ, making manifest his kingdom in the world.

That’s the thing. And Paul says that the way to make his joy complete, the way to be a regular man this year, is to get up tomorrow morning and walk into 2012 with the thing, the thing on your mind: serving Jesus, doing what he wants you to do in the world, and then doing it well, doing it in a way that has humility and harmony with the body of Christ. That’s the thing. That’s the thing.

Now, to do this, we have to have the same love for each other. Again, see, the love—this love is distinguished from the world’s love. The love we’re to have in common is the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. And again, I now I said that, you know, there were two difficulties with these things. One is: is it true of us as individuals? And then: can we accomplish that kind of unity of the thing as a body? Can we really have the same kind of love for one another, the same mind? Can we have that kind of unity? Can we be co-souled? That’s the third term. The soul is like the life. It’s like having one heartbeat. Can we be part of a church that has a single heartbeat?

Well, that’s that’s the challenge, my friends. I think we can because Paul says we can. He says he doesn’t tell us to do something that we can’t do. He says to the extent that we are that thing, joy increases. Now, he also says that we probably don’t have it now, right? The Philippians didn’t have it. They had it to some extent. Our church has it to some extent. But as we walk into the new year, what we are as new men is to put on that kind of desire to have a single heartbeat as a congregation, to have a particular one thing that we’re trying to accomplish as a church and each of us are trying to accomplish in our own individual pursuit as well.

He doesn’t say “to think the same thing” in the sense of “have each idea the same as the other.” That’s not what it’s about. For the example of the song we sang earlier—the fuguing tune, the four-part harmonies that we sing. That’s what it’s about. There’s a unity. The one thing for singing is the praise of God for the world that he has created for us and for the new world opening up in this year. But that’s accomplished by people singing differently. We’re individuals. And some of those individuals have particular parts they sing, and they’re sort of like the other person—but even then their voice is distinct.

We don’t lose individuality in this process. That’s the point. But we have a singleness of purpose, intent, goal—what we’re trying to accomplish—to have unity in terms of that. So the word “mind” is a kind of extensive term here that refers to all kinds of things. It refers, actually, to the one thing: the serving of Christ in humility and harmony, and as a result the propagation of the gospel.

Remember, that’s the context for this. Verses 27 and following is the antithesis in the new humanity and how we go about seeing the new world replace the old world, the new humanity replace the old humanity. The way we do that is the singleness of purpose. I guess we could say a singleness of purpose that’s evident, the same love, a co-souled, a beating one beating heartbeat in particular.

Now the another movement of this is by the fourth line it goes from having the same mind to the mind to mind the one thing. And now it gets down to particular intentions or purposes. So there’s a sense in which the movement of this stanza is from having a common purpose—the propagation of the gospel, which finds itself, which finds itself then focused together in a common specific thing you’re to do.

So for instance, later in the epistle he’ll tell two people to get along together. That was the one thing for them to do—the particular thing that their sameness of mind had to focus upon. So I guess you could look at this as having kind of a vision—the same vision—and then engaging in a specific series of these initiatives or particular things to do to accomplish that particular vision.

So Paul is asking for a total inward attitude of mind or disposition of will—as one commentator puts it—that strives after the one thing, going from the same thing to the one thing, that is greater than any human idea or purpose. So we’re to have the same love. Christ’s love. We’re to be co-souled. And this is to affect the totality of our lives.

Now the third stanza gives us then specifically the means of accomplishing this. Okay, so we’ve got the motivation and then kind of like the goal, this unity, and the means of doing that is reserved to the third stanza, which we turn to now. Verse 3: Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

So you’ll see—I on your handout, I lay this out in what’s what you could call antithetical parallelism. So you’ve got two parallel ideas, but they’re antithetical. They’re opposites to one another. Not this, but this. Not this, but this. So this is the third literary structure that Paul’s used in this song, we could think of it as with three verses.

And so there’s diversity and unity—the same thing. And of course, that’s a picture of the body of Christ: diversity and unity. But this is key because this tells us what to put off and what to put on. What things will destroy this unity of purpose and soul and compassions and mercies and thinking the same things and focusing on the right things, living our lives that way? And on the other hand, what will accomplish those things? So now it gets down to where the rubber meets the road here, and these verses talk to us about that. Okay.

Verse 3: Do nothing from selfish ambition. Now, “nothing” is a comprehensive term. So he’s saying in everything that you do, don’t be engaged in selfish ambition. Now, this word “selfish ambition” is an interesting one. Some translators translate it as “rivalry,” and that’s a good translation. It was used in the Greek. And this is political season. The Iowa caucuses are this week. Perfect timing, because this was a word that was used in Greek politics by politicians who would climb their way to the top by doing bad things to other people, by, you know, negative ads, whatever you want to think of it as.

So that’s what it was. It was this rivalry. It was a partisanship. It was a party spirit, you see. And so it was this idea that to get to the top, you’ve got to go over other people. Now, it’s not just a political term. It’s certainly true in the business corporate world, right? You kind of claw your way to the top. Corporate politics like civil politics. You make use of people in particular ways. You treat them particular ways. You can get on top of them. You see yourselves in rivalous action to other people, whether they’re in government or business or in the church.

Now, this is a very significant thing that when it gets around to saying, “Put this off,” he’s telling us to put off the very thing that when it gets around to the next section, in Philippians, retelling the story of Adam—the first Adam, the second Adam—that’s what he is. When he succumbs to the temptation of the devil to see himself in rivalous action with God, he ends up in rivalous action with other people. He blames his wife when God comes to talk to him. So this is what we are like. You have to—this is who we are. Don’t pretend it isn’t. You. Our fallen nature. We think God is out to get us, and so we interpret things that way, and we’re always kind of fighting.

We’re fighting every little detail because God is in control of it all. We think God does not have our best interest at heart. We don’t so much doubt his sovereignty. We doubt his love. And as a result of that, we think that the only way to succeed is to beat the other guy. Right? “Lord, make a regular man out of me.”

One of the verses was about willing to help every man in the game. The whole point was putting off selfish ambition, rivalry, and putting on the mind of Jesus Christ of humble service. So the thing that gets in the way of harmony is this rivalry. The thing that gets in the way of your joy, okay? Of my joy, of our joy in each other, the joy of this church. But think of yourselves. The thing that gets in the way of your joy is seeing God as a rival or seeing your fellow Christian in the context of this church or your fellow man we could say as a rival, and as a result of that acting in a way that’s got to look out for number one. Okay.

And Paul says that’s what you got to put off. That’s it right there. And then the second thing he adds to that is vain glory, conceit, translated in this translation we’re using. But “vain glory” is an old word, but it really fits what this particular Greek word is. It’s a combination of emptiness—kenos, which is like the kenotic, the emptying thing, kenosis, kenos—and then glory. So empty glory.

You see, because we do this to accomplish our own glory. We’re going to get to number one. We’re going to win the political campaign. We’re going to climb the corporate ladder. We’re going to have people think better of us at church. We’re going to get to be, you know, an officer or the head of some team. Whatever it is, we’re going to get that glory. You see, and Paul says that when you try to accomplish it through rivalry, it’s empty glory. There’s no glory there. It’s false glory.

One of the huge themes of the book of Proverbs is the desire for men to accomplish false glory. False glory. And so that’s what’s going on here. So we put off rivalry and we put off false glory. But we have to put on something. And what we put on is humility.

Now this was a word—you know, that you’ve heard this probably a number of times—and hopefully you understand this: that in Greek, in Greek culture, in the Roman world, “humble” was a derogatory term. It was a term that was not good. If you were called a humble person it meant you were a slave to somebody else. It was the opposite of what you were supposed to be. But humility is the thing that Paul says we’re to put on to accomplish the kind of unity and harmony. Harmony happens through humility, through humility.

And so we embrace that, you know, core virtue of humility as opposed to pride. And then it tells us what this humility does. This humility reckons others more significant than you. That’s real simple. Simply said, hard to accomplish. But that’s what we’re called to do today.

We enter the new world, a world that Jesus says is inhabited by his people and will increasingly be. So we enter into this battle against the opponents of the gospel. We enter into warfare, and what we’re clothed with in that warfare is humility. This little babe, so few days old, fled not from this baby boy, right? Don’t move away from humility thinking that you’re going to fight this battle the way the world does, through rivalry, which is ultimately vain glory. No, we’re in humility to count. That’s an accounting term—to reckon—others as more significant than yourselves.

Now again, here we have our friends and we try to put them on a par with us. That’s what the world does, and that’s what we do all too often. That’s what we call fellowship. But that’s not what’s going on here.

Go through your directory this afternoon. Your church directory. If you don’t have one, get one. Go through it. Think of every person in it. Reckon those people—each one of them is more significant than you, and reckon particularly the ones that you think are less significant than you.

Now Paul’s talking about the totality of this church at Philippi, and you go through your list. I’m telling you, this is it. This is it. You want to be a regular man? You want to win in the new year? You want to have joy? This is how you do it. You go through your directory, your church directory. You take the people that you think are less significant than you and you reckon them, you count them, you ascribe to them more significance than you. I didn’t write it, but that’s what it says. That’s now.

In a way, that’s a very simple thing to do. Paul doesn’t say feel about it a particular way. He says reckon it so. Right? I’ve given you a lot of references there for “reckon.” We’re not going to turn to them, but you know, count these things so that they’re more significant than you. Do that. Do it today. Do it this week. Do it regularly. Pray through the directory and pray for those people that you think are less significant than you.

We, you know, little groups of friends are fine. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that. But what Paul says is the key to joy and proper service and harmony is this humility of mind that reckons people who, because of their very weakness, you should reckon as more significant than yourself. I reckon those people more significant than you. And then he goes on to say, “Let each of you look not to his own interests.”

I know it says “look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” Now, there’s two “buts” there in this antithetical parallelism, right? Don’t do this, but do this. Don’t do this, but do this. And so, I’m sure that the proper way to translate verse 4 is “Don’t look for your own interests.” And people like to insert that “don’t look only for your own interests.” They want to soften the flow of it.

Now, clearly, you know, Paul says you’ve got to take care of your business and your business involves lots of other people and things you’re doing. But the point of emphasis here is blunted if we add that interpretive term that is not in the text. And if we let this “but this,” this “not this, but this,” take its full force: Don’t look for your own interests, but rather look out for the interests of others.

Look out for the interest of those people that you have reckoned less significant than you, incorrectly, and not to be on your to-do list. Make them number one. Make everybody else number one on your list instead of yourself. That’s what it says. That’s what it says. Simple to state, not so easy to do. Actually, it is easy to do, isn’t it? Do we want to do it is the big thing. Do we believe in God? Is he our rival? Is he trying to trick us? Is he going to give us these things in the Bible that are going to make our lives miserable? Reckoning that person is more significant than me? Putting his interests, her interests, above my interests?

You know, this is really opposite to church growth these days. By the way, you know what church growth is about these days? It’s about niche marketing, right? So not only do we have groups of people within a church that we’re friends with, but the whole darn church is pretty much our demographic. That’s the way it works today. You know, long term, we got to have parishes, folks. We need to have people in this particular square mile go to this church. Otherwise, verses like this don’t make any sense.

If you go to a church with nothing but yuppies or nothing but old people, and you’re an old person, you don’t get this verse. This verse can only be understood when you’re part of a community of people that is not demographically targeted and aimed and directed, but that has all kinds of strange people in it—young, old, whatever, professionals, laborers, car guys, programmers. And if you can’t do it there, don’t think you’ll be living the Christian life by going to the cowboy church or going to, you know, the Young Rock Church. No. You won’t be experiencing what Paul is talking about here in terms of Christian fellowship. And you may enjoy it, but it’s not the joy that Paul says would make his joy complete, that would make other person’s joy complete. And your joy will be reduced.

Because this text tells us that we’re supposed to have a directory of people that we think, in our natural estimation of things, are less significant, that are way down in our to-do list. And God says, “Go through the directory. You want to be joyous? You want to win the world? You want to exercise dominion? You want to have this kind of thing? Reckon it this way.”

You know, that word “reckon” by the way is also used of rulers. Rulers are people that reckon. And God says when you reckon things this way—the ones that you think are less significant to be more significant than you—and not only reckon it that way, but then you add to it actions where you’re looking out for their interests and putting them number one on your to-do list, that is the key, Paul says here, to dominion. That’s being a king. That’s being a ruler under the Lord Jesus Christ.

That’s what he did. He reckoned you—miserable, undeserving sinner that you and I are—he reckoned us, our lives, more important than his life. He laid down his life for us. He made us number one on his to-do list, not his own glory, not self-exaltation, not his own self-interests. That’s the mind of Jesus Christ. That was the mind of Paul. That was the mind of Timothy. That was the mind of Epaphroditus. That’s the mind of godly men and women in Christ. And that’s the mind that we have to have in this church.

That kind of humility produces the kind of harmony that this text tells us will rule the world, will win the battle that’s described in verses 27 and following. The opponents of the gospel will be defeated by a church that is that united, a church of that kind of one-mindedness. What will be impossible for them to do? Nothing. Their task—the one thing—will be ruling the world correctly for Jesus, putting the world to right. And it starts with you.

Couple of closing thoughts. I’ve already said them, but let’s emphasize them again.

One: Put away rivalry. It’s at the bottom of who you are in Adam. You’ll fight it the rest of your life because you still have that Adamic nature to some extent. And I tell you: identify it. Put it out of your mind. Acknowledge you consider God and men as your rivals. That’s what you’ve inherited from Adam. Put it out. Get rid of it. It’s not safe. It’s not a place of protection for you. It produces empty glory. Nothingness is what it produces.

Number two: Paul says his joy is not complete unless this happens. Now that means—now Philippians is the epistle of joy, and we use it so often, right? I do. You give people these verses. “Well, you know, you got problems, you know, become joyful by praying to God and thinking about good things.” Well, that’s okay as a starting point, but it’s not what Paul says here. What he says here is: if you want to be joyful, engage in the community.

He says that his joy is dependent upon the working of the body of Christ at Philippi. And by implication, he tells us our joy is dependent upon that as well. It’s not me and Jesus. It’s not enough. Paul says it’s got to be me and Jesus and you acting in harmony through humility. This is what produces joy. We have an ultimate dependence upon one another. None of these things are things that can happen in isolation from community. All of these things happen in the context of the body of Jesus Christ.

As we open up this new year, may the Lord God grant us that kind of growth, in the single thing, the one thing—one beating heart, right? One love together, one sense of who we are in Christ, one purpose through a reckoning of others more significant than us and putting them at the number one of our list.

Please read your directories this week. By the way, one last comment. It’s a ritual that appears to be dying, but I mentioned cards before—these Christmas letters, you know, and I know they’ve come in for a lot of abuse and scorn over the last few years. There’s been very funny songs about them, but you know, we’ve got a few this year from some of you. We never have done one, I don’t think. It’s why I don’t know. It’s my own shame. I’m not that disciplined. But I love them when you do them for this very reason. It makes us think in an extended way about your family, your humor, your life, what God has done in your hearts and in your homes.

This is one place—one place among many others—to have this kind of mindset that we’re in a community and to have knowledge of one another in that way. God says this is the way to exercise dominion. If we’re going to be a church committed to the exercise of dominion, if we’re postmillennial, and we are, if we expect the victory of God, and we do—this kind of humility and harmony is what Paul says wins the day.

Let’s pray. Lord God, we thank you for today. We thank you for this wonderful picture of what we’re to put off, what we’re to put on, what we’re to aim for, and what the basis for that is—all the great things you’ve done in our lives through one another, primarily up to now. Bless us, Lord God, as we walk into this new year as new men and women. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.