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\u2026rather, [Jesus] made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.\xa0And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death\u2014even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:7-8)

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It strikes me that this hymn that Paul quotes doesn\u2019t really say that Jesus humbled himself for us.\xa0 It just says that Jesus humbled himself.\xa0 If his humbling was before or for anyone: it was for God the Father, the only other actor mentioned in this set of verses.\xa0 Jesus responded to the Father by giving up everything and making himself nothing.

There are a few downward steps that Jesus takes here in these first verses of the hymn.\xa0 In yesterday\u2019s verse, Jesus lets go of his divine right to use his divine status and power.\xa0 This is, as Pastor Michael noted yesterday, the very opposite move to that of Adam and Eve who grasped to achieve that status and power (\u201cyou\u2019ll be like God!\u201d the serpent said).\xa0

Having let go of his rights to exercise the role, status, and power of God, Jesus instead turns in humility and makes himself nothing\u2014a servant\u2014a human\u2014and eventually a crucified, humiliated, dead human.\xa0

He is born into this world a human.\xa0\xa0All of a sudden the face of God that no one can see and live becomes visible to all in the form of new, fragile, helpless human life.\xa0 Jesus lives and teaches, every day suffering among a suffering people as he bears their burdens and has compassion on their needs.\xa0 And then Jesus submits himself to death on a cross: he could have called a legion of angels to spare him from this fate, he could have crushed the Romans, he could have come down from the cross.\xa0 But he didn\u2019t do that.\xa0 He did not use the divine power and status that was his to use.\xa0 He gave it up.\xa0 He became nothing and humbled himself to death\u2014became obedient even to this death on a cross.

It strikes me that this action resonates in harmony with some other strings we\u2019ve been plucking over these past months.\xa0 Like in Deuteronomy where the first and second commandment, together with the Shema say the same thing: submit yourself firstly, lovingly, and exclusively to God.\xa0 Or in the Psalms where repeatedly, the action of the Psalmist is to submit themselves and their situation fully to God\u2014seeking no recourse of their own.\xa0 It is God who will have to vindicate their cause.\xa0 God whose justice, power, and praise will be shown and known.\xa0 Jesus does the same.\xa0

What might it mean for you to follow Jesus in this way of the cross in your relationships with one another?\xa0 What might it mean to make yourself nothing, to humble yourself, to make yourself a servant?\xa0 That is, to let go of all of your ability to control a situation, all of your roles and titles, all of your resources and assets, all of your relational capital in friends, family, and networks of acquaintances? \xa0

This is not the sort of humility that sheepishly denies having abilities, skills, relationships, or power that one does, in fact, have.\xa0 This is the sort of humility that looks with a very clear and calculating eye at exactly what rights, skills, relationships, and privileges one has and resolutely chooses not to use them for one\u2019s own self\u2014perhaps even chooses to give them up altogether.\xa0

It is someone who chooses not to seek another term.\xa0 Who chooses not to step in and unduly influence an important decision being made.\xa0 Who chooses not to purchase the expected property or possessions that one\u2019s social or economic peers might have.\xa0 Who chooses not to exact retribution from one who it is their right to get it from.\xa0 It is a person who chooses to forgive.

We face variations on any of these examples starting in grade school on, and given that, perhaps they sound much less radical than one might have expected from the lead up.\xa0 Yes, there are times that the call is to give up everything one has.\xa0 More often though I think, the invitation is to give these things up slowly across a lifetime in the seemingly smaller, daily decisions of life.\xa0 So: how might you take one step in this humble direction of Christ, today?

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