Wednesday 12/18/13
Topic: He emptied Himself
Series – Christmas 2013:
Key Text:
For weeks now the Lord has been focusing my heart on the miracle of the Incarnation. Jesus Christ, God become man. Perhaps it is my years of loving the music and rhyme of Michael Card, but I believe the incarnation is something best framed by paradox.
- The infinite contained in the finite.
- The creator now created.
- The Owner, Himself now owned.
- The Cause, becoming the effect.
- The Life, becoming dependent upon an outside source for life.
There is simply no end to the paradoxical musings of the advent, but perhaps the most beautiful Name which is descriptive of all of them is Emmanuel – God with us!
Tonight I took it upon myself to share with the congregation my own musings on this most amazing of claims. That the Living Word, co-eternal with Abba & the Spirit, became a human baby boy.
What I hoped to reveal was not only the miracle of His birth but also that of His life.
The scriptures, if properly studied, do not allow us a view of Christ which reduces Him solely to being a man nor entirely that of His Deity.
In His humanness He was still fully God.
So far as we can see, that is to day so far as the scriptures reveal Him, He retained all the attributes of His former state, only it was veiled by the incarnation from the eyes of men.
If they were to see Him for Who He truly was, they had to see with more than natural human eyes and that is still true today.
After asking His disciples one day who people thought He was, they offered various answers in accordance with the rumors. Then He asked them point blank…“But who do you say that I am?”
Up to this point they were altogether uncertain, but Peter saw who He really was and was blessed as a result, for Abba Himself had revealed it to him…
“Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father Who is in heaven.” – Matt. 16:17
This is not to say that the disciples did not know Jesus was special, but up until this point He was still just a man. A prophet, yes even a great prophet, but to them He was just a man. This was even true in the face of miracles the likes of which they had never dreamed possible nor seen in all their holy writings. For when Jesus rebuked the waves and the wind on the sea, they marveled and said, “What manner of man is this that even the waves and the wind obey him?”
Notice the pronoun…“man”.
It wasn’t that they wondered if He were a mere human, they wondered at what, kind of a man He could be who carried such authority.
To them, Jesus was entirely enigmatic and unique, and now, some 2000 years later we are no less at odds to describe or comprehend the wonder of all He is.
We began our study in THE chapter concerning the incarnation found in Philippians 2:5-8.
Phil. 2: 5-8,
“(5) Make your own attitude that of Christ Jesus, (6) Who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be used for His own advantage. (7) Instead He emptied Himself by assuming the form of a slave, taking on the likeness of men. And when He had come as a man in His external form, (8) He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death–even to death on a cross.”
Lets look a little closer at some of the key words in this passage.
existing: This is from the ancient Greek verb huparchein, which “describes that which a man is in his very essence and which cannot be changed. It describes that part of a man which, in any circumstances, remains the same.” (Barclay)
Form: This translates the ancient Greek word morphe. It “always signifies a form which truly and fully expresses the being which underlies it . . . the words mean ‘the being on an equality with God.'” (Expositors)
come as a man: schema has to do with the outward appearance which is subject to change.
“Morphe is the essential form which never alters; schema is the outward form which changes from time to time and from circumstance to circumstance.” (Barclay)
Wuest explains that the ancient Greek word translated form is very difficult to translate. When we use the word form we think of the shape of something; but the ancient Greek word had none of that idea. It is more the idea of a mode or an essence.
So in this passage it represents the essential nature of God, without implying a physical shape or image. “Thus the Greek word for ‘form’ refers to that outward expression which a person gives of his inmost nature.”
It is the perfect expression of a perfect essence. It is not something imposed from without, but something which proceeds from the very depth of the perfect being, and into which that being unfolds, as light from fire.”
The Greek word for “form” refers to that outward expression which a person gives of his inmost nature. This expression is not assumed from the outside, but proceeds directly from within.
To illustrate: If we were to say, “I went to a tennis match yesterday. The winning player’s form was excellent.” We mean by that, that the outward expression he gave of his inward ability to play tennis, was excellent. The expression in this case took the form of the rhythmic, graceful, swift, and coordinated movements of his body and its members.
Our Lord was in the form of God. The word “God” is without the definite article in the Greek text, and therefore refers to the actual Divine essence. Thus, our Lord’s outward expression of His inmost being was as to its nature the expression of the divine essence of Deity.
Since that outward expression which this word “form” speaks of, comes from and is truly representative of the inward being, it follows that our Lord as to His nature is the possessor of the Divine essence of Deity, and being that, it also necessarily follows that He is absolute Deity Himself, a co-participant with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit in that Divine essence which constitutes God as God.
These are not small peripheral issues to the gospel but share center stage with His being born, being Lord and Savior. In fact, without His being deity, none of the rest would be possible or even matter.
The word Equal ísos means alike in quantity, quality, dignity.
Guzik says, “To be equal with God: It wasn’t that Jesus was trying to achieve equality with the Father. He had it, and chose not to cling to it. Jesus’ divine nature was not something He had to seek for or acquire, but it was His already.”
Lightfoot wrote that it was not “a prize which must not slip from His grasp, a treasure to be clutched and retained at all hazards.” Jesus was willing to let go of some of the prerogatives of Deity to become a man.
We now consider the words, “made himself of no reputation.”
Instead of asserting His rights to the expression of the essence of Deity, our Lord waived His rights to that expression, being willing to relinquish them. No words could ever capture what Jesus did here. What the Trinity conspired together to allow. God…the boundless and infinite Creator, became limited, incarcerated in flesh and therefore finite. It would be quite impossible for us to even imagine such sacrifice and this was only His birth. He still had to live a life, die and rise again. What an amazing Savior and God we have!
The words “made himself of no reputation” are the translation of two Greek words which literally translated mean, “emptied Himself.” Before we discuss the question as to what our Lord emptied Himself of, we must examine the words, “and took upon him the form of a servant.” Oh this is SUCH a rich passage!
The word “form” is from the same Greek word that we studied in verse six.
The word “servant” is the translation of the Greek word which Paul used in 1:1 to describe himself as a bondslave.
The word “took” is an aorist participle. A rule of Greek grammar says that the action of an aorist participle precedes the action of the leading verb. The leading verb here is “emptied.” That means that the act of taking preceded the act of emptying. That in turn means that the act of taking upon Himself the form of a servant preceded and was the cause of the emptying. Now this is VERY important in indirectly teaches us vast volumes about our Lord and Savior.
The translation so far could read, “emptied Himself, having taken the form of a bondslave.” or “by taking the form of a bondslave He emptied Himself.”
What do the words, “having taken the form of a bondslave” mean?
The word “form,” you remember, referred to the outward expression one gives of his inward being.
The words “form of a bondslave” therefore means that our Lord gave outward expression to His inmost nature, the outward expression of that being of a bondslave.
The words “having taken“ tell us that that expression was not true of Him before, although the desire to serve others was part of His nature as Deity.
While expressing Himself as a bondslave “come to serve”, He necessarily exchanged one form of expression for another.
The incarnation is the direct opposite of what took place at the Transfiguration. Let’s turn to Matt. 17:2.
There we have the same Word “form” used, but with a prefixed preposition signifying a change.
We could translate “And the mode of His outward expression was changed before them, and His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was white as the light”.
Our Lord’s usual mode of expression while on earth previous to His resurrection was that of a servant. He said, “The son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28).
But here at the mount of transfiguration, His outward expression as a servant ceased, and He gave outward expression of the glory of His true nature which was that of Deity.
In our Philippian passage that we are looking at, the change of expression is reversed.
Instead of giving outward expression of His deity, He gives outward expression of His humility in becoming the servant of mankind. The expression of His Diety was set aside so that the the expression of His humility could become a fact.
Vincent says in this connection: “This form, not being identical with the divine essence, but dependent upon it, and necessarily implying it, can be parted with or laid aside. Since Christ is one with God, and therefore a pure being, of absolute existence, He can exist without the external “form” of His Deity. This form of God, Christ laid aside BY TAKING on His incarnation.”
Both expressions came from our Lord’s nature, His act of glorifying Himself and His act of humbling Himself. Both are constituent elements of the essence possessed by the Triune God.
It is imperative that we realize that He did not empty Himself of His Deity, which fact was made clear when Paul said “Who being very nature God”.
He set aside the outward expression of His deity when expressing Himself as a bondslave.
It was the outward expression of the essence of His deity which our Lord emptied Himself of during the time when He was giving outward expression of Himself as a bondslave.
When our Lord set aside the expression of Deity in order that He might express Himself as a bondslave, He was setting aside His legitimate and state and prerogatives as Deity… one of the expressions of which is glory!
The pronoun “Himself” is in the accusative case. The action of the verb terminates in the thing expressed by that case. What this means in practical terms is that His act of emptying terminated the natural outward form which is the natural expression of the inward reality of His true nature.
Our Lord emptied Himself of the outward expression and form of “self” a.k.a. His Deity BY TAKING ON FLESH.
This agrees perfectly with the context which is an example of humility and self-abnegation for the benefit of others. This setting aside of Self by the Son of God was the example that Paul held before the saints at Philippi.
If each one would set self aside, then unity would prevail.
This is SO important because Jesus did not (and could not) become “less God” in the incarnation. No deity was subtracted from Him (though He did renounce some of the rights of deity and outward expressions of deity); rather humanity was added to His nature. This is not to make uncertain claims for we know that the prophet said of the Messiah,
“Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel. Curds and honey He shall eat, that He may know to refuse the evil and choose the good. For before the Child shall know to refuse the evil and choose the good, the land that you dread will be forsaken by both her kings.” ~ Isa. 7:14-16
However, this may have only been during His childhood and may have been something He had to actively resist relying upon as He grew in knowledge.
Regardless, we are not certain and will therefore make no certain claims, but other than the advantage of omniscience and former glory, we know of no verifiable attribute of His former state of which He was lacking throughout the incarnation.
As odd as it sounds to us – The Living Word did not become less by becoming man, in terms of the sum of His parts, he became more.
For before His incarnation He was God, after His incarnation He was BOTH God & man!
