I want to study a little bit on Philippians chapter 2, verses 5
through 11 specifically on a couple of verses within that
group Philippians. I love Philippians is a just a
wonderful book very encouraging book that we can read from and
gained so much encouragement from the will spend little time
dealing with verses 5 through 11.
It says they're beginning. In verse 5 of Philippians 2,
will read that passage. It says, let this mind be in you
which was also in Christ. Jesus who being in the form of
God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made
himself of no reputation taking the form of a bondservant and
coming in the likeness of men and being found in appearance.
As a man, he humbled himself and became obedient To the point of
death, even the death of the Cross.
Therefore God also has highly exalted him and given him the
name, which is above every name that at the name of Jesus every
knee should bow of those in heaven and those on Earth and
those under the Earth and that every tongue should confess,
that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God, the Father You
know, in the past few maybe a couple three months ago we
talked about a little bit of the Trinity.
The godhead the mystery about it, the one God in three
persons, God, the Father God, the son, and God the Holy
Spirit, each of whom is fully God.
And we know that also too. When we talk about Jesus, we
realize that Jesus, you know, was part of that godhead and he
came here To be with us, even as a baby, a crying screaming, you
know, bed, waiting bedwetting, baby lying in a Manger that's
God With Us. And the fact that Jesus was
fully human is what separates actually Christianity from
Judaism or separates Christianity from Islam.
Those religions believe that there's no way in the world that
a holy infinite. God could come down to this
world and live among a sinful. World, they don't believe that.
And in verse 7, Is where we're going to.
It's going to tell us how and why that happened.
How wide Jesus came here. So at verse 7 with the leading
in from verse 6, it says but but made himself of no reputation
taking the form of a bondservant and coming in the likeness of
men. So what does that mean coming in
the likeness of man or or taking the form of a bond sir?
Jesus emptying himself, emptied himself is clearly something
that he chose to do. It was his on his terms.
Well, God, the father of course Institute, but Jesus came and
emptied himself. Instead of you know, it taking
all of what God had and all the powers that Jesus had Jesus
chose to come here and empty himself.
And we know that he that doesn't mean that he ceased to be God
because he was fully God and fully man.
So what does it mean to empty himself?
And verse 7 answers that force in a couple of ways, one, he
answers it by taking the form of a bondservant.
That's what it means for him to empty himself, he didn't take
off his divinity. He took off, he took on the form
of a servant in the same word that's used earlier.
The form of God, in the form of a certain being born, he's born
in the likeness of men and two. It says coming in the likeness
of men here as well. Jesus empties itself not by
losing something, but by taking on something.
And in these two verses we have a picture of Jesus as one person
with with tuner, two natures. Verse 6 is talking about his
divine nature, and verse 7 is talking about his human nature.
We've seen Jesus is fully, God. And is a, he's also fully man
and the word here in verse 7, for likeness this word here,
that means the same as. That's how it's defined out of
the old Greek, the same as. So, at a certain point in time
Jesus, who was fully God, he became human just like you and I
except with no sin, which is what we'll talk about in a
minute. So, when we think about it,
Jesus God the son took on a human body with flesh and blood
bones. And just like we have everything
like us and we have he was born a baby.
This is a picture of Lizzy and Ice children when they were
younger, wish, we could have him back to that age.
So precious. So little so small, Anthony,
Kylie and Emma. We're so proud of them.
But my point is that, when this is what Jesus was, this is who,
this is what Jesus would have been when he was a baby or a
child. He would have had all the needs,
he needs. What it needs to be fed, you
would need to be changed. He would have needed to be, you
know, he would have cried because he was hungry, whatever
it may have been, you know, things are so chaotic when you
have children when they're that age.
We decided to have three at a very young age, really close
together and we were dealing with all that in a very chaotic,
a lot going on. And this is kind of what I'm
talking about. But Jesus, emptying himself
means we need to make sure that we do not minimalize what Jesus
did when he came here. We can't, we can't miss the
point that he had needs, just like our babies do as well or
their human children do as well. He cried, he was hungry.
He needed the sleep, he needed, you know, maybe he cried when he
was thirsty. He also had a human mind.
As a child, Jesus had to learn just like we learn to eat to
walk to talk read and write he had emotions just like our
emotions. Loneliness sorrow, you troubled
in spirit, you know, Jesus experienced all of these
emotions, the full depth of humanity, just like us.
And I think that he still does feel those sometimes, this is
truly amazing, that Jesus with one as one person with two
distinct Nature's as human nature, and has a divine nature.
Regarding Jesus birth, the angel said to Joseph, Mary will give
birth to a son. That's his Humanity side.
And his name will be called Emmanuel, that's his, which
means god with us. That's his divinity.
There, that's his, that's his deity.
Even, the Virgin birth as fully human on full display, being
born from a human mother and his and his, you know, his birth,
his DD being on full explore display because of the Virgin
birth as well. We think about these Nature's
throughout the Bible in his human nature.
We could say that at this point, maybe, when he was 5 or 10 or
1330, whatever may have been his divine nature exists eternally,
And in his human nature, they were times when he was weak and
tired and his divine nature. He, you know, he at the same
time, experienced omnipotent power and we can see this in
Mark for where Jesus was, you know, sleeping in a boat.
That's his human side. But then, as he woke, he told
the Seas to calm and stop and they did.
That's his divine nature. The not Dynamic, you know, is
sometimes mind-boggling when, when you think about it, how
this could be, you know, it's life-changing.
It takes us back to another phrase in verse 7.
You know, when we see, you know, we've seen what it means for
Jesus to empty himself by becoming fully Human, like us.
But but why? Why did you know why did he do
that? And this is where the Wonder,
you know and the Mystery kind of goes to a whole another level.
As I was putting this together, Jesus, emptying himself by
taking on the form. Of a servant.
Okay, that word that word in the Greek doulos, that's the
original word there. And it's the Greek word for
slave. And if we're reading this, in
the first century, you know, the word immediately pops into our
mind. That, you know, if you're a
slave you don't have, you know, you don't have any rights, you
don't have your freedom, you're working for somebody all the
time, your existence is to serve somebody else.
Jesus still in the form of God took on the form of a slave and
that's not the only time the Bible talks about that.
In fact, Jesus himself identifies himself as that way
as well and Mark. 1045 Jesus, talking to his disciples,
talking to them about serving, kind of like the context in
Philippians 2 but it's about serving each other in, you know,
within the church Mark 10:45 says the son of man came not to
be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many
Jesus is telling us why here why he came and I want to look at
three different reasons of why Jesus became human specifically.
He came to this world became human.
Why did Jesus become human? Number one, Jesus came to
suffer, like you. When Jesus calls himself.
The son of man. That's a title that we see
throughout the Bible throughout the New Testament, it emphasizes
his humanity and specifically in.
Mark it emphasizes the hardships and sufferings that accompany,
you know, human nature. Jesus is saying here that I came
to experience what you experience in your Human Nature
And if we're not careful, we can we can create a picture of
Jesus, that he's nothing like us.
You know, we can create that picture but in reality All of
who he is on this Humana, Human Side is everything up like us.
He's like I said, most ways will picture him as different ways
that that really take us away from the reality.
That Jesus specifically came like, came to be like us and
experience what we experience. Are we tired?
Jesus knows what it's like to be tired.
Are you exhausted or worried or burned-out Beatdown?
Jesus experienced all those things.
What about emotional distress, so did Jesus?
What about physical pain? Absolutely.
Jesus experienced that. Do we experience relational her?
So did Jesus. He was alienated betrayed
criticize denied and ultimately condemned.
You ever feel broken? Jesus was broken.
Do we grieve Jesus Graves? It was sometimes cry out to God
because we don't know what else to do.
All were sitting doing. Just crying out to God, please,
what, we can't take it anymore. Jesus was full of Sorrows crying
out to God the father, and Desperation even asking the
question of why? And whatever physical emotional,
relational or weariness that we may have.
We do not have a god that is distant from us and to help us
with those matters. We have a God, Jesus who is
familiar with what we're walking through and Jesus came to this
world as a man to suffer like you.
And I the language in Hebrews. Four verse 15.
It says therefore we do not have a high priest who is unable to
sympathize with our weaknesses but one who is in every respect
has been tempted, as we are yet without sin.
Sympathize with us in our weakness.
He understands. Jesus, you know, he's able to
identify, he suffered in all the way to the point of death would
bring this to a second reason why Jesus came Jesus, came to
sacrifice his fac rifice his life for you.
And I want to point out with this point that, you know, Jesus
is full. Humanity is absolutely
necessary. For Jesus to give his life for
us. mark, 10:45 for even the son of man came not to be served,
but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many, and
the word for here in Mark 10:45 literally means instead of Or in
place of and in order for Jesus to die for us as his people.
You know, he had to become like us as a person.
The Bible makes this clear in Hebrews 2 verse 17 and talking
about Jesus. It says therefore he had to be
made like his brothers. Basically like every man in
humanity man and woman in every respect that so that he might
become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of
God to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
In other words of Jesus was not fully human.
Like this, like us. He could not have paid the
penalty due to us as humans. He had the experience temptation
just like we do, overcoming those Temptations and then dying
in our place. And I don't know, a full crowd,
maybe we have visitors, maybe we don't, but if you're not a
Christian, you know, or even if we are Christians, you know,
it's always good to hear the good news of the Bible.
The good news and the center core truth of the Bible.
We have all been created by God. To have a relationship with him,
but we have all sinned and been separated from God.
And the Bible uses the word for how everybody has turned aside,
and that's called sin. It looks different from
everybody. In this building, you know, how
we have separated ourselves because of sin.
We've all turned aside from God and his ways to our own selfish
ways. And our sin has separated us
from God in a way that if we die in this state will be lost
eternally. Separated from God, and will be,
will spend eternity experience, he judgement do our sin.
However, the good news of the Bible is that God loves us so
much, that he provided a way for us to get that relationship back
with him. God In the Flesh, came and
manual. Jesus came.
And he lived the perfect life that you.
And I cannot live a life without seeing that is what he lived.
And even though he had no sin to die, he died for our sin.
He paid the price that we couldn't pay instead of you and
me, he died the death that we deserve. and, After that after
he died after the third day, he rose.
He didn't stay dead for long. Three days later, he rose from
the great, Conquering the enemy of death that we cannot conquer
on our own and that's who Jesus is.
He came to redeem us to God no matter what we've done in our
relationships or in our past or whatever.
Maybe if we believe the gospel of Jesus Christ and Obey what he
is laid out for us, we can have that relationship and be with
him for eternity as long. As we abide by the guidelines
written in the scriptures. So the first true points are
pretty awesome, but this next point that I want to make a
really kind of I kind of struggled with honestly and the
language I'm going to use is strong language. but it almost
feels wrong to say, but I'm going to say it because Jesus
said, And he's saying it, Philippians 2 verse 7.
Why did Jesus come to take on human flesh?
Why was he born in the likeness of men?
Jesus came to be your servant. And let me explain that.
He came the actual word here in Philippians 2 verse 7, that word
is actually translated slave in the original Greek. and Mark
10:45 it says even the son of man is talking about himself, I
do not, I did not come to be served but I came to serve And
this word in Mark 10:45 actually is translated it's not
translated slave it's translated as waiting on tables.
So when Jesus look forward to describe why he came to you and
me, he chose this word, he said I came to wait on you and when
we think about waiting on somebody, you know, think about
going to a restaurant, the waiter coming waiting on us.
You know, what can I get you? Kai refill, your glass.
How was dinner on? And on waiting on.
You bringing you what you need, what you asked for Jesus.
Is this is why I came, how can I help you?
What can I do for you? What can I get you?
I'm your servant. This is Jesus, the God In the
Flesh saying that to you and I know religious teacher of any
other religion. Talks like this.
You know, we're supposed to, I'm, we supposed to serve deity,
you know. This is deeding the fleshing,
I'm here to serve you and it sounds crazy until we realize,
you know, it's not crazy. It's really kind of a
foundational thought of what Christianity is.
Jesus did not come as a self-serving individual, who,
you know, whose personal whims are to be catered to by his
lowly servants. That's not why he came, that's
not who he is, Jesus came to be the lowly servant for you.
And I and Jesus is said, said to his father's in and, you know,
we could take it and apply it to our lives today.
And I did not come to be served by you and my relationship with
you. I am your servant, I serve you I
work for you. I can wait, I wait on you.
Doesn't that sound kind of wrong to say?
But it's what, you know, I want to be clear, what I'm not
saying. The Bible does not mean when
it's calling Jesus. Our servant the Bible, does it
mean that we tell Jesus to do whatever, we ask him to do and
he does it because he's our servant.
That's not what I'm talking about.
That's not what the Bible teaches.
We do not have authority over Jesus.
And it doesn't discount all the time that the Bible calls
followers of Jesus Servants of him.
We could, you know, there's a whole another lesson that can be
given on on that as well. But the sense of, you know, when
we think about it we can miss it that what Jesus actually does
for us, what we ask him to do for us.
The Christian Life Begins when we realize that we have sinned
and we're separated from God and God, you know, there's no men of
good that we can do. You know, to get that
relationship back. We can't do enough.
It's not, it's not a check list of things to do, you know, pray,
this amount of times go to church, read the Bible, do all
these things anywhere, in your way back to God, that misses the
whole point. That's not what it's about.
We can't cover our own sin, we need God to serve Us in some
way, we need. Jesus sacrifice to cover over
the stain of sin in our life. And Jesus says, I came to serve
you. And when we, when we trust him
to service in that way, That's when we start to understand
exactly what all he can do for us.
We then do the things that he asks of us to become a
Christian. We Believe repent confess who
were baptized for the remission of our sins but once we are a
Christian once we do take that path and and take those steps
into the church, you know we don't move on from that if you
know like we just don't need him to service anymore.
You know. Jesus didn't come to service
just once he you know to save us from the penalty of sin, you
know. Then we then it's all on our own
from there on out. That's not the point.
A lot of people actually look at the Christian like that way and
experience it. He came to service every single
day. so I want to put all this kind of together, you know, just
as You know, Jesus existed in the form of God, Jesus exists in
the form of human. And also how he served us.
The whole reason one of the reasons why he came to be like,
you and I, in order to serve you in my you and me.
So when we're tired, weak burned out or beat down or discouraged
depressed, we need to listen to what Jesus is saying to us.
Jesus is saying, I'm here to serve you I'm here to wait on
you was helping with the strength to get you throughout
the day with all the peace that passes, all understanding with
joy that supersedes all your circumstances.
Jesus says, I'm here to serve you.
That is why I came as a human. That's one of the reasons why we
think about it. You know what is prayer.
What's the purpose of prayer, right?
We're saying God, thank you for all these things but also got.
I need your help. I need, I'm asking for this.
I'm asking for that. I'm praying for this person, I'm
praying for that person and praying for this circumstance,
you know, we're asking for God's service every single day.
All the time, we pray, And he's told us to do that and God
actually Delights in us doing at that he says, ask you know, he
wants us, he wants us to pray to him.
He tells us to pray to him and ask for things.
If it is according to his will you know, even our family life
you know, when Lizzy and I pray we always pray for wisdom and
guidance for raising our kids up because we need it.
We cannot do it on our own. If we didn't have the guidance
of God in Jesus, we We be off and right field.
Who knows where we cannot do it without and some people think,
you know? Yeah, that's Christianity, you
know, Christianity is for weak people because they can't do it
on their own. There's actually a thought
process in a thought out there that people think that way.
Christianity is for those who need a crutch, they can't do it
on their own. Some people.
You think, you know, I don't need God to serve me.
I get up every morning. I work hard, I provide for my
family. I do all these things.
I make all kinds of decisions. I do all these good things.
And maybe that's the case. But the people who think that we
need to understand, you know who who gave them that ability to
work hard, who gave them the ability to breathe and to get up
every morning and have a ride. Who made that possible?
There is not one person in this Gathering today, who was
self-sufficient. None of us are every person is
ultimately God depending you know, even people who say they
hate God. You know every breath that they
take is given from God, they don't realize how they depend on
me. You know, I think about some of
the struggles that we have experienced here in the
congregation recently, just in the past few years.
It seems like you know, we have the loss of That Brent
experience with, with his son, the recent deaths of runnels
mother Brenda son, Bob Duncan Cindy's, husband, Mercy
Camarillo. We think about the struggles of
sister Bobbie the pain that she goes through every single day
all day long. What she deals with the the
daily infirmities that Virgil and Janet son go through on and
on and on and on there is so many things that this
congregation has gone through recently.
I showed a picture of my kids but I want to show you one more.
Some of you may recognize this picture, some of you may not
this is Tyler brancato. Frank and Tina's, first child.
Frank was kind enough to send me this picture last night and I
talked to him for a few minutes last night and so thankful that
he did about Tyler situation, he told me that Tyler Situation was
because of lack of oxygen prior to birth.
And this lack of oxygen. Eventually damaged his spinal
cord to a point to where it caused his body, not to be able
to Metabolize. The food intake that he was
having that correct? And because of that condition.
The care that it took for him to remain alive was far and above
what, Frank and Tina or any other parent would ever expect.
He lived just less than a few than four weeks.
I'm sorry for months before his passing and during those
precious weeks I can remember Frank and Tina constantly day
and night, caring for that. Little boy taking shifts.
Okay, you got him for three, four hours, whatever, whatever
they agreed upon to care. For this young man, who could
not care for himself. Taking care of his needs.
I remember one time we were sitting in worship and all of a
sudden Frank popped up and just left, and I believe you got a
page on his pager of 9/11, he just up and left, we knew all
knew what was going on it. What he needed to take care of,
he went home to be with Tina because something was going on.
Because that boy needs to be cared for in some way.
I don't pretend to understand or no. all of the emotions that go
along with that, or with any other Problem that somebody may
be having in their life at that time.
We live in a fallen weary and painful world with all kinds of
questions that we don't have answers to.
But we do know that we have a God who serves us in a way in
the middle of hurt and pain and all the questions, you know.
God was Tyler servant. You know, the Bible clearly
teaches that when that little baby boy, breathe his last
breath, God himself, was there to serve that little boy's body
in a way that in the next. Instant, he woke up to Glory
with him in that beautiful. God serves Us in so many
different ways. And so it is with others who may
have passed as well, that we just mentioned.
Even those who are not Christians experience the same
painful circumstances, but I think all of us know, can they
can agree that it is far easier to get through something?
When we know that we got Jesus on our side that we can go to
him, we can pray to him, we can ask him for Comfort asking for
strength, that's God, for strength, whatever it may be.
We know that he is serving us. The good news of the Bible that
Jesus came to service to wait on us and to be are serving.
He knows he that he he knows and he's able to sympathize as well.
There's coming a day, you know, when will breathe our last
breath. We don't know when to be today,
tomorrow years from now, whatever the Lord decides.
But whenever that moments come when you know that all of us who
are in Jesus or you know, in that moment when our hearts fail
or lungs fail or whatever it may be, The fully Divine Son of God
who conquered death will be there to serve us at that point.
That's great. All glory be to Christ who being
in the very form of God did not consider equality with God,
something to be grasped, but emptied himself taking the form
of a servant being born in the likeness of men.
Therefore God has also got also has highly exalted him and given
him the name which is above every name that at the name of
Jesus every knee should bow of those in heaven and those on
Earth and those under the Earth. And that every tongue should
confess that Jesus Christ. Is the Lord?
To the glory of God, the Father. Pray that something's been said,
the Gospel of Jesus includes hearing the good news that Jesus
came and died for our sins has made a way for us to be redeemed
to God. Within believe that Jesus is the
son of God, and believing is a loaded word.
But leaving, you know, changes our current lifestyle.
You know, we turn to Jesus and follow the model that he has set
before us. That's repentance.
We confess his name as being the Son of God and were baptized for
the remission of sin. And then, and only then Jesus
adds us to his church. If there's one here who would
like to take those steps or there's one here who needs to
make any sort of public confession or just needs the
prayers of church that Jesus can help us with.
We ask you to please do that while we stand while we see.
We thank you for listening to our podcast, put on by the
Church of Christ at 22:15 plans. Road in Bakersfield, if you
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