Bible Gem 1931 – He Emptied Himself and Humbled Himself (Phil 2:7-8)

but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross.

Phil 2:7-8

Before we can move on to verse 8 I need to tidy up two elements:

taking the form of a servant

Christ did not just disguise Himself as a servant, Christ Jesus actually became a servant in reality.   

and being found in fashion as a man

This seemingly simple statement contains some deep concepts as I described in the last Gem. He came in the form of a servant, in the form of a human being, in the fashion, form, likeness of a human man with all that means from the last Gem. Again I won’t elaborate. But the words contain more significance than that. He was not just disguised as a servant as I said above. Why do I emphasise that? Because of the link to the word for fashion [schema]. The Greek word is [σχήματι] from schema which is a synonym for form, icon, likeness or even appearance. The word was used in an ancient Greek story of a king who exchanged his royal robes for a brief time in order to disguise himself as a beggar to make a point. His ruse or disguise was a scheme or a plan to teach his subjects to look after people no matter what station in life they may come from. Just like that ancient king, Jesus also took the form [schema] of a beggar, only Christ Jesus did it for the duration of His ministry. Are you getting the point? I hope so. But of course there is more. It is so hard to make these points while explaining the detail involved as some of you like, because in doing so it creates long Gems which some of you don’t like. I will ignore the protestations and press on in the interests of giving you the full story.

Now comes the time to add one more layer as Paul has done in the way he has constructed this sentence. Yes, that’s right this is still the first sentence of this Majestic Passage.

he humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross

This now is the second of two reflexive verbs:

• He emptied Himself
• He humbled Himself

Christ Jesus did this to Himself for you and me and all the others who have lived and will live on this planet. That is the enormity of it all. I hope you meditate on this for a long, long time. What Christ Jesus did for us was immense in every stretch of the imagination.

• From God to human,
• from God to a human man,
• from God to a man servant,
• from God to a so called criminal man wrongly accused
• to finally die the death of a criminal on a Roman cross.

Wow! I am speechless again. He humbled Himself refers to the entire time Christ was on earth walking around in his human man body. That alone for Him was humbling to the N^th degree, let alone adding all the other levels of humility to it. He was the one who instigated the actions by agreeing to act in obedience to the will of Father God. That is Mind Boggling. The obedience of Christ in order to achieve the redemption of mankind necessitated Him stooping so low as to become one of them in a man’s body with the ultimate goal in mind to be tried and found guilty as a sinful criminal human man and be put to death for His alleged sin. Whose sin? My sin. Your sin and the sins of all the people who have ever and will ever live on this earth. NO, it’s not mind boggling; it goes beyond mind boggling to a level for which I have no words.

Do you see what Paul has done to emphasize the kind of death Jesus Christ died? Despite all of the other emptying and humbling He did, he then humbled himself becoming obedient until death, even the death of a cross! I feel so inadequate to take the description on to the point where I tell all. I am going to simply refer you to the earlier Gems I have written on this in order to spell out the significance of what Paul has written here. For that you will need to go to the Gem Series Four Significant Words. That is what we are talking about. The horror of the Cross. The worst kind of death mankind has ever conceived. That was the death Christ emptied Himself and humbled Himself to endure. Again I am without suitable words. Several of you have asked about the significance of the reversal of Jesus Christ’s name to become Christ Jesus. What if I just translate it to Messiah Jesus. Does that explain the switch? Another past Gem worth a look at is Bible Gem 112.

Now Paul has finished his first sentence of this Majestic Passage. Take a breath, a long breath and suck on this sentence for a long while. I am simply suggesting to you the same thing I hear in my mind my late Greek Prof saying to us all. “Take every verse of Scripture and suck it like a sweetie.” I only wish he were still alive to see what I have come up with in my attempt to do justice to what Paul has written. I think I hear him say, “Well done Ian.” But it is not his praise I seek. I seek to hear from my LORD and Saviour the words “Well Done, good and faithful servant”. I can’t see the text now through my tears. My suggestion to you is to read back through the last nine Gems to capture the full significance of this one Greek sentence. It’s easier said than done. All you have to do is click on each one of the series which are listed at the foot of every Gem included in the Series That Majestic Passage. Then perhaps like me, memorise the whole passage so it is always with you and you can meditate on any part of it wherever you are and whenever you like. Even if they rip your Bible from you and throw you in the dungeon in Rome. Oh it might not be that you will be in prison in Rome. It could well be somewhere else. If you wear a Cross, take it off and hold it while you read and meditate on what Christ did for you.

I plan to give you time to do what I have suggested above by not giving you a Gem on Friday this week. I will skip it to give you time to do the above. We will start the second Greek sentence of That Majestic Passage when the Gems appear again. You can give me input as to how long you need. Do you need five days or do you need a full week? A month? Your choice! Talk to me.

All heaven is interested in the cross of Christ, all hell terribly afraid of it, while men are the only beings who more or less ignore its meaning.

Iowa Chambers

Hands that flung stars into space, to cruel nails surrendered.

Brian Kendrick (from the song The Servant King)

God is scanning the earth right now looking for those whose hearts will beat with His. Will that include you?

Ian Vail