phasis was on unity in love. It is based on forgetfulness of self. These first four verses form the fa miliar key to the solution. Christ lived and died for others. He knew absolutely nothing about selfish ness. Our natural tendency is to be charitable to ourselves, and harsh to others. We see an unruly child of a neighbor, and we call him a brat. If it happens to be our child, we say that he is overly tired. Do you get the point? Paul is urging us to live together in harmony and love as though we had only one mind. We should learn to see things from the other person's point of view. Christians will never see eye- to-eye on all points. We are large ly influenced by habits, environ ment, and education. But we are to have “ the mind of Christ." We must hold modest thoughts of our selves while having a proper eval uation of others. This may be a tall order, but through the power of the Holy Spirit it is what can and should happen. We should desire blessings and good for the other person. We are to rejoice in anoth er's prosperity. This is not the eas iest thing in the world. How envi ous we can become! Do we sym pathize in another's misery? Little do we know what a day may bring forth. We should not overlook the fact that we are called to contrib ute to one another's necessities. By so doing we are fulfilling Christ's commandment to love one anoth er. We are to let Christ have the pre-eminence in our lives. Self-Humiliation of Christ There is perhaps no greater portion of Scripture dealing with Christ's incarnation than Philippi- ans 2:5-11. This shows his volun tary self-humiliation. It is known as Page 20
the Kenosis passage, which refers to the Saviour's action in leaving heaven's glory to become a ser vant in giving His life to redeem mankind. No human mind can be gin to comprehend the tremen dous price that had to be paid for our Salvation. It would be well for a moment to look back to Christ's pre-exis tent glory. He had said, "I and my Father are one" (John 10:30). And in His high priestly prayer He pe titioned, "Father, glorify thou me with Thine own self, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was" (John 17:5). In this sec tion Paul tells us that He was in the form of Cod. These testimon ies are shown to be true as Cod vows, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Other verses which would be well for us to study and to memorize on this subject are II Corinthians 8:9 and Hebrews 1:1-3. As we consider further His vol untary self-humiliation there are two aspects to be considered, the theological and the practical. The ologically, since Jesus was Cod, a part of the Trinity, He did not have to grasp His title as though He might possibly lose His equality with Cod. "He made himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant." There are those who would have us believe that in that moment the Lord laid aside His deity and ceased to be Cod. Nothing could be further from the truth. He gave up neither His di vine nature nor His perfect attri butes. He simply stripped Himself of the insignia of majesty, His glory, or His visible manifestation of the Godhead. The Son of God set aside His royal prerogatives. Here on
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