Sermon for Palm Sunday, April 10, 2022
Grace and peace be multiplied to
you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. Amen.
Philippians 2:5-11 5Indeed,
let this attitude be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. 6Though he was by nature God, he
did not consider equality with God as a prize to be displayed, 7but
he emptied himself by taking the nature of a servant. When he was born in human likeness, and his
appearance was like that of any other man, 8he humbled himself and
became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross. 9Therefore
God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, 10so
that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under
the earth, 11and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (EHV)
God exalted the Son who
humbled Himself to save.
Dear beloved ones in Christ,
Everyone
would like to be Superman. At least,
that is what one might suppose considering the success of the comic strips,
television programs, and movies that have portrayed superheroes of one form or
another for the last eighty-five years or so.
Now, maybe we don’t all want to be superheroes, but we likely all
secretly desire to have some sort of superpower, some way to change reality to
suit our desires. In fact, we all
secretly desire is to be equal to God.
Now, that might be a
shocking way to confront our human nature.
Yet, when you analyze our natural condition, it is the truth. We desire to rule over God, and I can prove
it. Consider any sin against any
commandment—no matter what sin we commit, we are breaking the chief and
greatest commandment which is “Love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind.” (Luke
10:27) Any time we break any commandment
we also break the First Commandment because we have overruled God’s intention
for our lives.
The inherited sin
that makes us want to be God, or at least His equal, means that every thought,
word, and deed of our lives has been corrupted, and no matter how hard we try,
we can never make ourselves holy, and nothing we do can save us. Without someone to rescue us from the end we
deserve, we can have no hope of a future and no hope of pleasing God.
There is a verse in
this sermon text that may sometimes be overlooked. St. Paul is writing to tell us how to live
godly, sanctified lives as Christian believers.
However, on our own we can only fail.
Yet, one verse changes the picture:
“Though he was by nature God, he did
not consider equality with God as a prize to be displayed, but he emptied
himself by taking the nature of a servant.”
This is where we see how Jesus became our Savior. Of all people who have ever lived, only Jesus
rejected the temptation to take God’s authority to Himself. Unlike us, the Man Christ Jesus never once desired
to put Himself in God’s place. Even
though He is also by nature true God, Jesus submitted Himself, as a Man,
perfectly and completely to God’s holy will.
Jesus did not
consider equality with God as something He should seize. In that, He humbled Himself to live perfectly
in accord with the First Commandment.
Unlike Adam and Eve who were created in the holy image of God yet were deceived
into wanting more and thus fell from perfection, Jesus, who is the divine Son
of God, came down to earth to inhabit the form, or flesh, of man, so that He
could obey the first and every other commandment, perfectly, for us.
Paul wrote, “He
emptied himself by taking the nature of a servant.” As you read through the Bible, you discover
that whenever God allowed His glory to be witnessed in even an indirect way, it
terrified people. It should terrify
sinners, because we cannot stand in God’s presence lest we face
destruction. Therefore, to come dwell
among men, Jesus laid aside that glory and power while living as a Man for
us. How this can be, is ultimately
beyond our ability to understand in our corrupted condition. Still, in doing so, Jesus experienced every
trial, temptation, sorrow, and hardship we will ever endure, yet He remained
without sin. As Jesus said, “The Son
of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a
ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45)
Thus, when Paul
writes, “Indeed, let this attitude be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus,”
what he means is that we submit to God’s authority in everything without fail,
and that we live to serve others without seeking any reward for ourselves. It requires a completely unselfish attitude
and humble servitude to God and our neighbor.
For all of us, this is the time we start trembling in our boots, because
not only have we not lived that way previously; we never could. Our inherited sin will always trip us up. One of Christ’s greatest apostles explained
how our flesh frustrates our good intentions when he wrote, “Indeed, I know
that good does not live in me, that is, in my sinful flesh. The desire to do good is present with me, but
I am not able to carry it out. So I fail
to do the good I want to do. Instead,
the evil I do not want to do, that is what I keep doing.” (Romans 7:18-19)
Given this explanation,
one would expect all mankind to be hopeless, and that is our natural
state. Yet, that isn’t what God intended
for anyone, especially for those He calls to faith in Jesus. You see, Jesus came into this world to end
our hopelessness. He willingly left the
throne room of heaven to live for us, but He didn’t stop there. “When he was born in human likeness, and
his appearance was like that of any other man, he humbled himself and became
obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.” Jesus admitted to His friends, "Greater
love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends.” (John
15:13 NKJ) Because He loves us, the Son
of God came into this world to die. He
came to suffer the worst this world could do yet He remained holy and
completely without fault, stain, or guilt, so that His death could take away
the sum total of our failures.
Our sermon theme this
morning declares, God exalted the Son who humbled Himself to save. As Paul wrote this
letter from a prison cell, he rejoiced in the knowledge of what Jesus has done
for us. You and I rejoice likewise every
time we remember that Jesus has lifted our guilt and we never have to pay. As we celebrate Jesus riding into Jerusalem on
a donkey as a King, we need to remember the humility of His entrance. Yes, the people welcomed Him that day like a
conquering Prince, but a few days later, many of those same people called for
His crucifixion. They didn’t yet see
that Jesus entered the city that week to bring peace—peace between God and
mankind. That peace would not be won by
earthly warfare as the crowds expected, but only by perfect submission to the
law and to God’s will to save sinners.
Several times throughout His earthly days,
Jesus allowed a glimpse of His divine glory and power: His transfiguration on
the mountain being, perhaps, the most glorious, but His many miracles also
testifying to His divine nature and power.
Still, the greatest display of Jesus’ love and faithfulness, and indeed
His holiness, is seen on the cross. For
sins He didn’t commit, Jesus allowed Himself to be nailed to a cross like the
worst of criminals and traitors. He did
so without complaint, with no cry of injustice, and no plea for His followers to
help, but only this prayer on His lips, that the Father forgive those who
caused His suffering and pain. Jesus did
everything to satisfy the law in our place, and in so doing, He destroyed the
devil’s power over us.
God has a reward for
the One who sacrificed all to gain salvation for all who believe in Him. “Therefore God also highly exalted him and
gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every
knee will bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue
will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” For the life He lived, and the sacrifice He
made, God raised Jesus from the dead, delivering Him from the grave never to
die again, and God restored Jesus to His rightful place at His right hand. His Father put all authority under Jesus’
control, so that we now have a human Brother ruling all creation for our
everlasting good, whose name, Jesus, means The LORD saves.
When Jesus entered
this world to save, He laid aside His glory and power to appear and live as a
Man just like all of us. Many didn’t recognize
Jesus then. In fact, many mocked, jeered,
and plotted against Him instead.
However, that is not the end. The
end will come when Jesus next returns to earth.
However, this time, no one will miss it, and no one will miss the glory
and power of the One God-Man when He returns in glory to judge the living and
the dead. Paul reminds us, every knee
will bow. The saints and angels in
heaven will worship Him for His triumph.
The believers on earth will join them to do the same, but ahh how
terrible it will be for those who reject Jesus and for the wicked angels that
rebelled against God. Even in hell,
every being will know that Jesus is Lord and He is God.
Now, the command for
us is to be like Jesus, and we all know we fail, but that is the beauty of
God’s love for us. What Jesus did to
accomplish our salvation is transferred to us who are now connected with Him
through faith. His perfect obedience is
credited to us. His glory now covers
us. Our record of wrongs, our sins,
failures, and weaknesses have all been wiped away by the blood of the Lamb who
was slain. At our baptisms, we were
cleansed of all guilt, and God claimed us as His own. The resurrection guarantees that we will live,
also, for in Christ we are one. With the
Lord living in us, we too can strive for the holiness God desires to see in His
people. His love empowers ours. More than that, Jesus’ holiness covers our
shortcomings and keeps us acceptable to His Father in heaven, and God is
glorified by His Son’s triumph over sin, death, and Satan.
Dear friends, we no
longer need to fear punishment for sin, because Jesus has taken away our sins
and guilt. That is our motivation to
live the life of love and faithfulness God intends for us eternally. Because of what Jesus has done for us, God
has placed our future in Jesus’ hands. Jesus
promises that He knows those who are His.
Because God has made us His own beloved children by the purchase price
of Jesus’ blood, we can humbly and joyfully approach the judgment throne of our
God in peace, because there we will see that God exalted the Son who humbled
Himself to save us. Amen.
Now to him who is able to
keep you from stumbling and to present you faultless in the presence of his
glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, be glory, majesty, power,
and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all time, now, and to all
eternity. Amen.
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