Emulating Christ in the Joy of Unity

The speaker discusses the importance of emulating Christ's humility and unity. They explain that the passage in Philippians is not meant to provide theology, but rather to illustrate the attitude of humility and unity that believers should have. The speaker emphasizes the self-sacrifice, self-denial, and self-giving required for humility, as well as the importance of having the same love, being of one accord, and having the same mind for unity. They highlight Jesus Christ as the ultimate example of humility and unity, and encourage listeners to imitate Him. The speaker also discusses the attitude of love and the enormity of being chosen by God as the foundation for humility. And today we're going to be talking about emulating Christ in the joy of unity. And he says in v. 5 of Philippians chapter 2, he says, Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but made of himself of no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Notice here in this passage of Scripture that there's tons of tremendous theology. Theology is the study of God, and when you look at God and you look at Jesus Christ, there's so much in this passage of Scripture that we can talk about and that we could discuss in this passage, but I want us to understand something. And you hear me say this quite often about context, context, context. This passage of Scripture that we're looking at today is not written to give us theology. It's written in order that we might see the illustration of Jesus Christ, that we might have the proper attitude of humility and unity within the body of Jesus Christ. And so when you look at the context of this, and you look at what Paul is writing, Paul gives us the interpretation and the application to the point that is being made here. And the point is not to identify God, and not to identify that God became a man, which He did, but is to show us that in God, becoming a man, you have the supreme illustration of humility. An illustration which we, I might add, are commanded to follow. And so in this passage of Scripture, we see the self-sacrifice that it takes to have humility. In this passage of Scripture, we see the self-denial that it takes in order to have humility. We see the self-giving that is involved in this passage, and we also see the humble love it takes to have humility and unity. And the proper way to understand the key to look at this ethical nature of the passage is found in verse 5. And he sets this up and he says, Let this mind be in you. What mind is he talking about? Well, the mind that was in Jesus Christ. Well, I don't necessarily have ever sat down and been into the mind of Jesus Christ. So what is he referring to? You go back up to the two verses that we looked at last week. And Paul said, Let nothing be done through strife or vain glory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. In other words, he's saying have this attitude in yourself. But every man also, as he looks on these things of the others, what is this attitude that he's talking about? Well, it's broke down right there for us. We see this self-obliteration, this not getting what I want, this not lifting of me up, but this denial of self. You remember Jesus said in Luke 9, verse 23, if you want to be My disciple, you do what? You deny yourself. That's the first thing. And then you take up your cross and you follow Me. And so we see this self-obliteration. We see this self-sacrificing, this self-denying, self-giving, humble attitude. Why should we exhibit this attitude? Well, you back up to the next verse, verse 2. In verse 2 he said, Fulfill you my joy that you be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord and of one mind. Where is the motivation for this type of unity? Having the same love, being of one accord, and having the same mind. Where is the motivation found for that? Well, it's found in verse 1. If there be therefore any consolation in Jesus Christ. If you have been encouraged by Jesus Christ, if you have been comforted by the love of Jesus Christ, if you have fellowship with the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ gives you to walk with you, to talk with you, to give you a surety of your salvation, if you have any mercy and compassion that the Holy Spirit has given you, he said this ought to motivate us to humility and unity. And our passage today says, guess what? It's almost impossible to do that, isn't it? When you look around today, you do not see much humility in our world today. You don't see people that are not worried about their self, right? In our society, it's take care of yourself first, right? Then we'll worry about everybody else. You don't see much giving in our society. You don't see love like Jesus Christ loved. As a matter of fact, it tells us in 1 John 2 and verse 6, He that saith, He abideth in him also so to walk, even as he walked, that He is referring to Jesus Christ. If you are claiming to be a Christian, if you are claiming to be a follower of Jesus Christ, then guess what? You ought to be walking like Jesus Christ. And if you're walking like Jesus Christ, you're going to be talking like Jesus Christ. You're going to be living like Jesus Christ. And Jesus Christ was a man of humility and unity with the Father. And so He tells us in 1 Corinthians 11 and verse 1, Paul said, Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. In other words, I am walking, I am following Christ, I am trying to imitate Christ, so therefore, you imitate me. How many of you remember when your kids was real little? Or remember when you was a kid? You know, I can remember Dad working in the garden and everything, and Dad's stride was quite a bit different from my stride when I was a little bitty type, right? But what would I try to do? I would try to walk and step into his footprints, right? Everything that he did, I would do. And I'm watching Parker now, and if I'm watering the flowers, Parker wants to water the flowers. And if I water around the plant, guess what? He grabs the water hose and he does everything exactly the same way that I do it. And I did it, guess what, the same exact way that my father did it. And so it's just been passed down with this thing. And so Paul said, guess what? If we are claiming to be Christ, if we're claiming to be followers of Christ, we ought to be walking like Christ. We ought to be looking like Christ. In Matthew 11 and verse 29, Jesus said, take My yoke upon you and what? Learn of Me. Learn of Me. For I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest under your souls. And so Jesus Christ Himself even said, guess what? He said, come and take the yoke. What is a yoke? A yoke is not something for pleasure. A yoke is put upon an animal to make them work. To help them to pull a heavy load. And what does Jesus say? You know, we have too many Christians today that are trying to learn about Jesus Christ and learn about humility without wanting to serve Jesus Christ. He says, take My yoke upon you. Get ready to serve. Get ready to minister. And as you are doing that, as you are yoked up with Me, then guess what? I will teach you what to do. I will teach you how to behave. I will teach you when it's time to pull. When it's time to rest. When it's time to go left. When it's time to go right. And He said, guess what? Then you will find rest. Because if you've got a team of oxen, or a team of mules that is plowing and that is working together and that is in perfect harmony, guess what? They can do four times as much work as any one of them can do individually or together. Because they've learned of each other and they know how to handle each other. And so man, they can work and they can plow. That's what Jesus Christ wants us to do. To be servants, to be like Him. And therefore, Jesus Christ wouldn't have told us to do it and to learn of Him if it was not capable of doing it. So we go in this passage from Exhortation where Paul is telling us to be like-minded. To believe in one accord. To be of one mind. How do we do that? Not through strife and vainglory, but we do that through humility. We do that through lowliness of mind. And how do we do that? We esteem each other better than ourselves. We put others first. And so with that in mind, with that exhortation, now Paul gives us an illustration. He gives us the greatest, most possible illustration that anyone can give. And he points to Jesus Christ. And he says, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. So let's look into the mind of Christ today. And remember, there's a lot of theology here, but we're not going to deal with the theology today. We're going to deal with what is this illustration? What is the application of this Scripture? And what he's trying to show us is Jesus Christ exhibited humility. And he's saying, if Jesus did it, and you really want to be humble, and there's a lot of people today that are claiming humility that do not have humility, right? If you have to tell somebody that you're humble, you're probably not humble, okay? And so Jesus Christ is the greatest example that we can look at. And the first part that we see of having the mind of Christ is it starts with an attitude of love. Remember, all of the commandments that God gave us is what? In order that we might love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our might, with all our strength. And then, the second one is that we may love others as ourselves. And so he says love, this attitude of love. And notice the first thing that he mentions, because having an attitude of love is detecting the enormity of what you are and who you are. And this is really good, because how many of you remember me making this phrase over and over and over just about every single Sunday when we were going through the book of Philippians, that you as a Christian are blessed with all spiritual blessings? You remember me saying that? God has given you everything. You have been adopted into His family. You were chosen by God. He has blessed us. And so, love starts with detecting the enormity in my life. Look at what he says in verse 6. How did Jesus Christ, first of all, detect the enormity in His life and apply it to love? He says, who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God? This is where the humility and unity of Christ begins. How do you begin to have humility? How do we as a church begin to have unity within our congregation? Number one, is we begin... notice this word, form. Being in the form of God. What is a form? You carpenters out there, right? You ever formed up something for concrete? What does it do? The form takes and holds the concrete. It gives it its shape. It gives it where it's supposed to go and what it's supposed to do. When he talks about form here, we are talking about the nature, the essence, the being. Form, in this passage of Scripture, literally means equal. You see, that concrete is going to go to whatever dimensions you build that form. And so what this passage is saying that Jesus Christ, being in the form of God, in other words, being equal to God. Jesus Christ is God, right? They're one and the same. Jesus Christ said, if you've seen Me, you've seen the Father, right? And so, that's what He is saying here with this equality right there. Before the incarnation, before the birth of Jesus Christ by a virgin named Mary, Jesus Christ existed. He was. He is. That is the theological part of this passage of Scripture. But notice where he starts. From the highest of highest, he says, who being in the form of God, being equal to God. When Paul starts talking about Jesus' humility, he didn't automatically go to the dying of the cross. Where did he start? He started with his relationship with God. And he said Jesus was equal with God. And so when we think about humility, I think the first thing that we need to recognize and we need to understand is that Jesus Christ recognized that He was fully God. He was every bit of God. As a matter of fact, Colossians says that it was by Him, through Him, and for Him that all things were created. He is God. Immediately, when we think about humility, what's the first thing we want to say? I'm not God, right? Because none of us are God, right? We are not God. However, in greeting with that, I would say you are not God. You are absolutely correct. But remember, this is a pattern of humility as an illustration. So even though you and I are not God, we have to look at our relationship with God. What is our relationship with God after becoming a savior? We have been adopted into the family of God, right? God automatically calls us a son or a daughter of His. The Bible says that you and I are immediately upon salvation joint heirs of Jesus Christ. What is an heir? An heir is someone that stands in line for an inheritance, right? You get what they leave behind. And God says, guess what? You and I are joint heirs of Jesus Christ. Everything that God did for Jesus Christ, He's willing to do for you. Let that soak in just a minute. Do you see the enormity of salvation? Do you see what God has blessed you with and what God is going to give you? Are we not children of God? Are we not sons and daughters of God? Has not God blessed us with all A-L-L spiritual blessings? Are you not chosen by God? He chose us before the foundation of the world. Have you not been anointed with the Holy Spirit? Are you not a joint heir of Jesus Christ? See, our humility begins from a very lofty place. Our humility begins with understanding who I am. See, I'm not God, but guess what? I am the closest thing that there is to God. Because I'm a joint heir of His Son Jesus Christ. Not because of my work, but because why? He made me that way. He positioned me that way. And so we've been lifted up by the grace of God. However, listen, and this is the part of Christianity and humility that we don't get. That's where we start from. I am a child of God. We ought to get excited about that. You ought to praise God every single time in testimonial services for all of the grace and the mercy and the blessings that God has given you. Because He has given us a lot. But to have humility, it starts with knowing what you have. But then it goes to the next step. What is the next step? Look at what he says. "...who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God." "...thought it not robbery to be equal with God." So notice what happens here. First of all, you detect the enormity of who you are and what you are. And then, all of a sudden, you disregard all that equality. Everything that God has made you, that's not what you're putting on your resume. When you stand before Jesus Christ on the day of the judgment seat of Christ, God doesn't care with what all He has done for you. He cares what you've done for Him. And so we know where we're at. We know what's there, but we disregard the equity. Notice what he did. He said he made of himself no reputation. He did regard equality with God, but he didn't regard it as a thing to be grasped. You know, there's a lot of Christians today, and I think this is the problem with the church today, is we have grasped hold of salvation. And we have grasped hold of Christianity. And we hold on so tight to that and what we believe in our security of our salvation and our security of our destination with heaven that we have held on and grasped on to it to the disappointment of everything else that God has called us to do. Jesus was equal with God, but He didn't consider His equality with God as something to be held on to. In other words, how many times have you heard preachers say, Jesus didn't demand, I'm not going and dying for them people. Why don't you go and die? Right? Are Him and the Father equal? Well, I'm not going to die. I send the Holy Spirit to die, right? He could have demanded His deity, right? This is who I am. This is what I am. I'm not doing that. I'm not stooping to them humans. But what did He do? He didn't grasp a hold on the fact that He was God. Do you get what I'm saying? Yes, we need to be proud that we're Christians. We need to be proud that we're saved by the grace of God, that we are kept in salvation until the coming of Jesus Christ, that we have a place for Him. But we don't need to grasp hold of that above everything else. Your salvation... listen to me very, very carefully, because I want you to make sure when you quote me on this, you quote me correctly. Your salvation is not loftier than others. Your salvation is not any more greater or any more important than anybody else's. Do you get that? And that's what he is saying here. This was not the attitude of Jesus Christ. Here He was God, but guess what? He didn't hang on to the fact that He was God. He had all the rights and privileges of God. He deserved them. He could not ever lose the qualities and the things that He had, but He did not selfishly grasp His privileges. This is the beginning of humility. Recognize your greatness. Recognize your privileges. Recognize your possessions in Jesus Christ. Go ahead and recognize your rights as a Christian, right? What you deserve and what you have. Recognize all of your blessings, but do not hold on to them above the sake of others. That's humility. Now notice what happens in verse 7. This activity. Attitude always leads to activity. Your attitude. If you're in a bad attitude, what's going to happen? Parker told me the other day when I was fixing to take him somewhere, he said, Papa, I don't know if I want to go with you. You haven't had a nap yet. I said, what does that have to do with anything? He said, sometimes when you don't take a nap, you're grumpy. Right? What was he saying? My attitude, right? If I don't have a nap, or I don't have a meal, or I don't have what I need, guess what? It affects my actions. Right? And so he's picked that up at three years old. And so your attitude, if it's what it's supposed to be, positive, then it's going to produce positive results. And so look at what Jesus, this activity of lowliness. It says in verse 7, but, you remember what but is? It's a contrast. He was God, but He didn't grasp, He didn't hold on to the fact that He was God, but in contrast to that, He made Himself of no reputation. In other words, in this making Himself of no reputation, this is a determined emptying of yourself. You've got to make up your mind that it is not about you. That's where humility starts. Your attitude will reflect your action. You are enormously blessed. You're special. You're a child of God. That needs to be shouted. That needs to be said and told to everybody. But your attitude is not to grasp that or hold on to these things, these gifts of grace, that you're willing to let them all go on behalf of others. You remember the attitude of Paul? I didn't put the slide up there, but you remember what Paul said? Paul said, I wish I could die so that every one of you could be saved. You see the attitude of Paul? He said, man, I love you guys, and you're my family, and you're his Jews just like I am, and I would give up my life if he would believe. But guess what? You've got to make that choice. I can't die so that you can have it. But yet what? That was that determined emptiness. And so what did Paul do? Paul gave his entire life to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul didn't say, well, I'm an apostle of Jesus Christ, yet you can't hold me here in prison. You can't do this. No, what did he do? He humbled himself to the situation, and while he was there, he led guards to the salvation. He preached wherever he was at to whoever he was at. He was not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. So what does this determined emptiness look like? Number one, it's a life of poverty. It's a life of poverty. You realize, guess what? You're not going to have everything. Look what he said. "...but made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant." Notice something very important here. Jesus Christ did not cease to become God. Another theological study that we can do right here. Jesus Christ, the minute that He became man, did not cease from being God. He was fully God and He was fully man. From the time that He stepped on this earth till the time that He left this earth. He was fully God and He was fully man. He could not stop being God. Because that's who He was. However, He could stop the manifestations of God. He didn't call upon His power as God. He didn't call on His abilities as God. Jesus professed this in the New Testament. He said, I and My Father are one. We're one. You remember He said in 2 Corinthians 8-9, that you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, that you through His poverty might be rich. Why did Jesus Christ give up everything? So that you could have everything. See the attitude and the illustration of humility? When was the last time you gave up everything so that the other person could have everything? Now that gets a little personal there, don't it? But that's the illustration of Jesus Christ. Are you willing to accept the mind of Christ? To become poor in order that other people might be enriched? You may not have a whole lot of wealth to give, but you can sacrifice your time, your talents, your energy. You can pray. You can visit. The Bible says you can even give a cup of water in the name of Jesus Christ. All of us can do that, right? Give up what we have in order to enrich the life of someone else. But not only is this emptying a life of poverty, but it's also a life of slavery. Look at what he says in verse 7. He goes on and he says, "...and He took upon Him the form of a servant." That word servant is literally a bond slave. He did not put on the garment of a slave. He didn't dress up and look like a slave. No, it says He became a slave. We've got Christians that every once in a while want to put on the garment of humility, right? Oh, I'm going to get down on their level so that I can reach them, right? We're going to go into this poor community and we're going to feed them some hot dogs and give them some lemonade because we're humble and we love them and we want to hear the Gospel, right? And then all of a sudden, we step out and they want to come to church, but you need to get cleaned up. You need to do this. You need... right? And so our humility was just put on as a garment. He didn't say Jesus Christ put on the garment of a slave. It says He became a slave. He became a slave. That form that he mentions there is the same exact word that he used in the last verse. Remember what we said it was in the last verse? He was equal to God? Well, guess what? He was equal to a slave. He was every bit of a slave. It was essential to His character. Matthew 20, verse 28, He says, even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give His life a ransom for many. Or ministry is the same exact word as serve. To serve. Jesus weighed the exercise of all of His rights. He set aside what everything that God had given Him and God had declared and did only what God asked Him to do. He left heaven. He came down to earth. And He emptied Himself of everything that He has and who He was. And then what did He do? He became a slave. He became a slave. The most visual example of this idea of Jesus Christ in lowliness is seen in the upper room. Remember the upper room at what we call the Last Supper right before His crucifixion? Do you remember He had sent His disciples to do what? To go to Jerusalem and to get your room ready? Because He was fixing the host of supper. And when they got there, Jesus Christ is the host. He told the disciples to go where to find the horses. He told the disciples where to find to open up the house. He told them everything about to get ready for it. And then He is seated there with His disciples and they're all inside and you have to go and understand culture and everything, but there's one thing that all of these disciples nobody did that they were supposed to do. See, in the Middle Eastern culture and the Jewish culture, before you go into a house to eat, you washed your feet. And typically, the lowest person there or the slave of the house would wash the people's feet when they came in before they sat down. If you go back and you read that story, you remember Jesus Christ is sitting there with His... they're already in the room. Nobody has washed their feet. They're sitting there at the table fixing to eat supper. And you remember what Jesus Christ did? He rose up. He wrapped a towel around them. And He began to bow down and wash the disciples' feet. He was the host. This wasn't His job. It wasn't His job. It wasn't His responsibility. But what did He do? He was a slave. He said, you know what? I'm Jesus. I'm fixing to go die for y'all tomorrow, right? But I ain't worried about all of that. Right now we need to clean your feet. And you remember what Peter... and that's what makes it so important to what Peter said. You remember Peter? He said, you ain't washing my feet, Lord! Right? There was a little bit of guilt on Peter's side. Peter, when you look at the floor and the layout of where they were at, Peter was on the far end. Peter should have been the one that washed everybody's feet. But now Jesus Christ, the One that as I read in our Scripture reading this morning, the One that has declaimed that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God, is now stooped down fixing to wash His feet. He said, Lord, You ain't washing my feet. And Jesus said, if you don't let Me wash your feet, you have no part of Me. So then Peter gets all bab-de-costal, right? He says, wash me all over, Lord! Get me a bath, Lord! And missed the whole thing of the humility that Jesus Christ... because what were they doing at that supper? Jesus was dismissing Judas. There was a conversation going along with the disciples before He washed the feet. You know what they were arguing about? Jesus was fixing to die. They know He came to Jerusalem to die. You know what they were arguing about? Which one of us is going to be the greatest when Jesus establishes His kingdom? Which one of me is going to be the greatest? Am I the greatest pastor? Am I the greatest deacon? Am I the greatest church member? And we argue and we argue over who is the greatest. And the greatest, sitting in the room, God Himself picks up a towel and He starts washing the feet of the disciples. That's the illustration of humility that we have. Isaiah 53 and verse 6 says, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned every one to his own way. And the Lord hath laid on him Jesus Christ, the iniquity of us all. We are prideful, sinful people. We want what we want, when we want it, and how we want it, don't we? We're not worried about anybody else or what's going on. We want it right now. And guess what? That's a sinful attitude. And that sin was laid upon Jesus Christ. The man who did know sin said, you know what? Your selfishness, your pride, I'll take that. I'll take that. Talk about guilty in their self. From poverty. It's a life of poverty. It's a life of slavery. But it's also a life of tragedy. It's also a life of tragedy. Look at the next phrase that he says there. Not only was he made in the form of a servant equal to a servant, but he was made in the likeness of man. It gets worse and worse, don't it? Did you realize he put men lower than a slave? Why would he do that? Is man lower than slaves? What he's talking about here is a man, what's happened to mankind in the Garden? You remember man's sin? And by the one man's sin, sin was passed what? To every man? Because of that sin, what happened to us? Do you realize because of the fall of man, now we hunger? You're thinking about lunch right now. What am I going to eat? Where am I going to go eat? I'm getting hungry, right? Is the preacher going to rip this thing up? But before, did they have to eat? Scripture just says to go out and enjoy. It wasn't something that they had to do. It wasn't something they got to do. Go with me. Taste everything. Try everything. What about all of our aches and pains and our moans and groans, right? I've got to set the alarm now at least 45 minutes before I want to get up just to have the 45 minutes to get my body to get up. Right? My mind's going. I know where I need to be, but it takes me 45 minutes to get my body to respond, right? Jesus asked me the other day, He said, what are you doing? I said, I'm just sitting on the side of the bed. I said, I'm up, but my legs and my feet aren't working yet. I'm giving them time, right? It just takes time. Did you know that's because of the fall of sin? Death is because of sin. Cancer. Tumors. All these problems that we have and experience is the result of sin. You know, Job put it this way, a man that is born a woman is a few days and full of trouble. Trouble. You know, I look back at my life, and you know, really and truly, growing up and going to school in the 80's, I thought was a horrible, but you know, it really wasn't that bad compared to what kids are being involved with in school today and the pressures and stuff that they have. And I think my poor little Parker and Peyton, if Jesus Christ hears this coming, what's it going to be like for them in 10 years? 15 years? Because you know what? Things don't get better, do they? They get worse. They get bad. Job understood this. And it says that Jesus became a man. What it's saying is that He felt pain when the carpenter shopped, when He grabbed a piece of wood in His father's shop and the wood went into His hand as a splinter. Guess what? He felt that. He felt pain. He felt sorrow. He cried. He had emotions just like you and I. He got hungry. He got thirsty. Jesus Christ even got tired. You know, sometimes we just get tired and we just need to rest. Jesus Christ even died. See, He was God. God has always been and always will be. But He set all that aside and He became a man. He now was able to experience everything. And that makes it more important when He went out into the wilderness and fasted for 40 days. Has any of you ever gone without food and water for 40 days? I've barely done 40 minutes on occasions. Right? I'm like a cow. I graze constantly. If I walk into the kitchen, I've got to grab something to eat and I've got to go. Forty days and forty nights. And when He was at His lowest, the first time He had ever experienced true... I mean, after 40 days, if Daniel goes 40 days without food and drink and he tells me I'm going to die from hunger, if he's gone 40 days, I'm going to believe him. Right? When they say they ate lunch at 1 o'clock and they come in there at 4 o'clock, what's for supper? I'm about to die. No, you're not going to die. You're just hungry. Jesus Christ knew what it was like to be hungry. To be thirsty. And it was at His lowest point that He was tempted. But yet the Bible said He never wants sin. It says, for we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the fillings of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted as like we are, yet without sin. He never sinned, but felt the results of the fall. He became one of us. He experienced everything that we experience. So you know what that means? As our high priest, Jesus Christ can sympathize and empathize with us. He can say I've been there, done that. I have my t-shirt for it. Right? He can sympathize. Which immediately asks me the question is when we see other people hungry, tired, hurting, do we sympathize and empathize with them? Jesus Christ became man. He took on all of these things. But then look at v. 8. We're going to wrap it up. And being found in fashion as a man. You see what it changes now. Paul is talking about the first part of that in v. 6 and v. 7. Paul is given an experience from Jesus Christ's point of view. He was God. He emptied Himself out. He became a slave. He took on all of the sin results and effects of sin as a man. But then in v. 8, He changes the perception. Now He's not talking from Jesus' perspective, but now He starts talking about from man's perspective. Look at what He says. He says, "...in being found in fashion as a man." That shows how man saw Him. See, when people looked at Jesus Christ, how did they see Jesus Christ? They saw Jesus Christ as just another man. You remember Nathanael? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Right? This is a carpenter's son when he claimed to be God. This is just a carpenter's son. He's just a man just like you and I, right? He's hungry. He's tired. He does just like we do. But people saw Jesus Christ as different from them. What a compliment. What a compliment. To be God, but those that you are ministering to see you not as God, but see you as a servant, a slave. When the world looks at us as Christians and looks at Kentucky Missionary Baptist Church, do they see us as holy, blessed with all spiritual blessings? Or do they see us as a sinner just like them, saved by the grace of God? They didn't have any feeling that there was one condescending thing about Jesus Christ. They didn't think that Jesus Christ... you know, I have to stoop down and get dirty, right? I'm condescending. And people see that. They feel that attitude. When they looked at Jesus Christ, they didn't feel like, man, look at what all He gave up to come and do this. They looked at the fact that He was serving them, that He was loving them, that He was a part of them. John 15 and verse 19 says, greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Romans 5 and verse 12 says, Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men that all have sinned. You see, because of the sin nature, and I want you to get this, because of the sin nature, God required a sacrifice. Somebody had to die. Somebody had to reverse this curse that we have where we're all born sinners. And so God demanded that this be reversed. And in order to overcome this first tragedy, there had to be committed the greatest tragedy that has ever played out. The death of Jesus Christ. Because He was totally innocent. He didn't deserve to die. When He got hungry, He didn't sin. You know, how many of you have even coined a term about hungry sin, right? It's called angry. Any of you ever been angry? I'm angry. Why? Why am I angry? Because I'm hungry. No, anger is a sin. You're angry because your attitude's wrong and your action is wrong, right? Jesus never got hangry. He got hungry. But it didn't affect His attitude. And while the atoning death of our Savior is infinitely beyond our comprehension, our imitation, we can, in a sense, share His sufferings. Humility goes as far as it has to go in order to meet the needs of others. What a model of humility and unity. Peter said this in 2 Peter 2, verse 21, For even hereunto were you called because Christ also suffered for us. Look at this next phrase. Leaving us an example that we, you and I, those that have accepted Jesus Christ as our personal Savior, should what? Follow in His steps. Do you see the pattern for humility and unity? And you see why true humility and true unity is so hard to come about? To be involved in God's redemptive work. To be a disciple of Jesus Christ and to win other people to Jesus Christ, you have to share in the tragedy of Jesus Christ. One of these days, we're going to have all of an eternity to celebrate who we are. We're going to look at that next week. One of these days, we're going to have all of an eternity to grasp everything that we are as adopted children, as Jesus Christ. But right now, guess what? We're here for others. Jesus came for a purpose. He came for a reason. 1 Corinthians 6.20 says, for you were bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are whose? God's. Listen, when it comes to humility and it comes to the unity of the church, there are no quick fixes. There's no easy round. There's no easy job to make it done. We have true unity when each and every one of us possess true humility. It's not about us. It's not about us. So let me leave you with one question as we get ready to sing our hymn. How do you measure up? See, the standard is not me. Don't look at me to find that you're a humble person. The standard is Jesus Christ. And when you compare your humility to Jesus Christ, how do you measure up? How do you measure up? That's the standard. And anything short of that is what? Sin, because it's missing the mark. And what do we do if we have sin? We confess our sins because He's what? Faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and what? Cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And so as we walk out of here today, yes, be proud of who you are. Be proud of your salvation. Be proud of all of your blessings and everything else. But don't grasp hold of that and your relationship with Kentucky Missionary Baptist Church and look down on people that have not saved and that are not out there. Instead, put on a towel. Put on a smile on your face. And wash their feet. Serve them. That's the humility that Jesus gave us. As we stand, have a verse of invitation.