Philippians 2:3-4 | Selfless by Design

This sermon was recorded at Faith Evangelical Free Church in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Please take your Bible with me this morning to Philippians chapter 2.

Philippians 2 · chapter mention

Philippians chapter 2.

Philippians 2 · chapter mention

We are going to be working our way this morning to participating together in communion, what we often call the Lord's table.

That is a fellowship that we have together.

Participation in the Bible is the same word as fellowship, being together and participating together.

We're going to be doing that a little bit later, so have that in the back of your mind as we work through a few verses this morning in the book of Philippians.

Last week we considered verses 1 and 2 of Philippians chapter 2.

Philippians 2 · chapter mention

This morning we're going to spend a few moments in verses 3 and 4, but they all go together.

They were originally one whole sentence, so I'll read that whole section there.

Philippians 2, verses 1 through 4, if you have your Bible or your device and would like to follow along.

Philippians 2:1–4

That first word in the English Standard Version, so if we need to understand that as there is, right?

There is encouragement in Christ.

There is comfort from love.

There is participation in the Spirit.

There is affection and sympathy.

And so the Apostle Paul says, Complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Amen.

We'll stop there for this morning.

We'll go from God's word to a science lesson.

Colobopsis explodens, also known as the exploding ant, is a remarkable insect native to Southeast Asia.

These ants are truly extraordinary creatures that challenge our understanding of evolution.

They occupy the lowest level of their colony's social structure, and they serve as guardians and protectors of the colony.

And they do that in a very unique way.

When these ants sense danger, they raise their gasters.

That's the prominent rear section of their body.

They raise that in the air, and then as the muscles in that area contract, that section of the insect bursts open, releasing a sticky yellow liquid.

Strangely, scientists say it smells like curry.

Don't know if it tastes like curry, but I'm just repeating information.

This liquid, though, is harmful to attackers and it injures them or even kills them.

But this defensive trait causes the ant to die instantly.

And that sticky, dangerous liquid also has antimicrobial agents.

So while the ant sacrifices itself to protect the colony, it also secretes a substance that helps eliminate any potentially infectious agents in the colony.

Now it would be really fun to share an ant collection of Colobopsis explodins this morning for show and tell.

But that would distract us from the point.

I don't want us to become so fascinated by these ants that we forget the purpose of the illustration.

The reason that I want to tell you about these incredible exploding ants is that they teach us about selflessness.

They teach us about selflessness.

God created them to serve others and to protect their colony even to the point of sacrificing themselves.

They see their colony's well-being as more important than their own lives.

God made them to embody selflessness.

Here's my point from our passage of scripture this morning.

In Christ, we are designed to be selfless.

Every son and daughter of God is designed to be selfless.

Philippians chapter 1, verse 6 says that God has begun a good work in us, and that work will be completed.

Philippians 1:6

So God is forming us into the likeness and the image of Jesus.

Last Sunday in verses 1 and 2 of chapter 2, we were challenged to be like Christ and how we think and how we love, especially as a local church.

That challenge stems from who Jesus is.

As we become more like Christ, we become more united in like-mindedness.

And as we look at verses 3 and 4 this morning, we will be challenged to be like Christ in our selflessness.

This section of chapter 2 calls us to reconsider our point of view.

How we look and think about life.

It really puts Romans 12, 1 and 2 into action, encouraging us to be transformed through the renewal of our minds.

We are called to be thoughtful people, with our thinking reshaped by Scripture as we imitate the Lord Jesus Christ.

So if you look at verse 5 of chapter 2, have this mind among yourselves, which is also in Christ Jesus.

We might interpret those words or rephrase them in our own words as think just like this, as Jesus did.

Now, as we look specifically here, the idea is that Scripture renews our minds, helping us think like the Lord.

We begin to live and act selflessly as our minds are renewed and we act like Christ.

It's that kind of selfless life and thinking that supports the unity of the body, which we've been looking at since chapter 1, verse 27.

The opposite of that, of course, is that selfishness undermines, it undercuts the unity of the Lord's church.

Looking specifically at verse three of chapter two, most of our English translations begin that verse with a new sentence.

To do that, they usually add a verb, often do.

Do nothing from selfish ambition.

But verse three really continues the sentence in verses one and two.

So verses one and two remind us to have the same mind, the same love, the same thinking, to serve the Lord with unity because of encouragement, comfort, affection, and sympathy that all comes from the Trinity.

Verse 3 continues that same idea by saying, Do all of that not at all with selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility.

Our unity as a local church should not be spoiled by selfish ambition or conceit.

Have you ever taken a jug of milk or half and half of cream or maybe a jar of mayonnaise out of your refrigerator that's been in there just a little bit too long?

And you unscrew the cap, and the inside rim is greenish black.

You know what I'm talking about.

Enough of you are responding to you know what I'm talking about.

Maybe you don't want to admit that that actually exists in your refrigerator.

That greenish-black mold on the inside of the top rim spoils the whole container.

That's what selfish ambition and conceit do in the church.

Okay, now, now we're ready to examine how believers ought to think and therefore to live.

We start with thinking here because the Apostle Paul used a word for mind or thinking four times in four verses.

It appears twice in verse 2, once in verse 3, and again in verse 5.

And then there's a different word used in the middle in verse 4 that has a similar sense.

So there are four consecutive verses urging us to renew our minds by thinking like Christ thinks.

In Christ, we are made to be selfless through the renewal of our minds and the transformation of our lives so that we live and think like Jesus.

In verse 3, in the middle of the verse, you'll see that word count, or maybe your Bible has the word consider.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but count.

Consider.

It's a word that reflects thinking, processing, pondering.

Christians are called to adopt a specific way of life rooted in sound consideration.

This isn't a one-time act, but a recurring pattern of life, one that revolves around how we think.

To count means to consider or to reflect on something in a particular way.

So a clear example of this is James chapter one, verse two, where it says, count it all joy when you face trials of many kinds.

Consider it, think about it, reflect, act as though in your world, it is a joyful thing to face trials.

So counting it all joy represents a mindset, a specific way of thinking and perceiving life.

When we are told then in Philippians 2, verse 3, to count others, it doesn't mean tallying up a list of people who are in attendance, right?

Philippians 2:3

Instead, it involves renewing our minds to consider others in a meaningful way.

And it presents a very stark contrast.

We are instructed not to think in terms of rivalry or arrogance or selfishness, but rather to reflect Christ-like humility and love.

Let's begin by thinking about the living aspect.

So we look at verse three, we are to live selflessly because Christ lives selflessly.

We are to live selflessly because Christ lives selflessly.

Living selflessly in a Christ-like way means, in verse three, we don't allow selfish ambition to motivate our thinking.

Your translation may have rivalry there, or selfishness instead of selfish ambition.

It's the same word that the apostle Paul used for the Roman Christians who were proclaiming Christ out of wrong motives in verse 17 of chapter one.

He says, the former proclaimed Christ out of rivalry, selfish ambition, selfishness.

So the Apostle Paul rejoiced that Christ was proclaimed in Rome, even from a kind of selfish self-centeredness.

But he told the Philippians that the type of thinking that puts our own desires out front has no place in the Lord's church.

In fact, James says it even more starkly, perhaps, in James chapter 3, verse 16.

James 3:16

He says that the church should not have jealousy and selfish ambition because there will be disorder in every vile practice where those things exist.

Now the Apostle Paul didn't judge or retaliate when others acted selfishly or rivalrous toward him.

However, he had no issue asserting that believers should be selfless, not selfish, because that is not the mind of Christ.

See, when God begins a new work in us, he will continue to remove the selfishness within us.

Sometimes in painful ways.

He does that because his people are called to live selflessly, just as their Savior lived selflessly.

Now remember that this applies within the context of the local church.

Insisting on our own way is not Christ-like.

It is selfish ambition to be angry, to pout, or to refuse to participate in the fellowship of believers out of frustration, anger, or bitterness, especially if you believe your way is the only right way and you don't get to have your way.

Not with self-centeredness or selfishness.

It also means that we refuse to let empty pride grab hold in our lives.

He says in verse 3, do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.

Your Bible might have empty conceit or vain conceit, as the second negative trait listed there.

It's a compound word combining two different words, one meaning empty and the other meaning glory.

Empty glory.

Glory means to be full, to be heavy, to be magnificent and awesome because of who you are and what you've done.

Empty is kind of the opposite of that.

There's nothing there.

It's baseless.

Pride is a kind of thinking that elevates the self to a place of glory.

We think highly of ourselves, as though we have great value.

And others should obviously see that value and honor it, right?

However, human pride and arrogance are baseless.

They're empty.

It's like a brand new car without an engine.

It's like celebrating a diploma when someone else did all the work.

Maybe the best illustration is it's like multiplying by zero.

Glory times zero is zero.

So we get this sense that you add empty to glory, and you get it's worthless.

There's nothing there.

So you're all puffed up.

You're showing off and you're making something out of yourself, but it's worthless, it's empty.

All pride and arrogance are unfounded because we are insignificant compared to the glory of our God.

You don't have to look far to see this.

Chapter two, down in verse nine, ten, and eleven.

Jesus is the highly exalted and glorified one.

Every knee will bow before Him, not before you or me.

We are empty shells in comparison to the divine glory.

So a Christ-formed mind recognizes that emptiness and rejects it.

We should not allow pride, arrogance, or empty glory to take hold in our minds.

Now, in the context of Philippians, this points to living selflessly as part of the Lord's church.

The Roman Christians back in chapter 1, verse 17, some of those Roman Christians were living out their faith with hollow and empty selfishness.

There was no genuine glory.

They wanted Paul to think they were something when they were not.

Competing with one another in selfishness and empty glory.

Yes, beloved brothers and sisters in Christ, we Christians can pursue Christ with selfish ambition and empty glory.

It is possible.

But we shouldn't.

Because that kind of character is fleshly, worldly, and it tears the oneness of Christ's body apart.

That's not the way we learned Christ.

For our Lord, though he is God, did not hold on to his deity with selfishness or out of an impure desire for glory.

Instead, he emptied himself of the expression of all the rights, privileges, and honors that were rightly his to own so that he could bear the shame of the cross and death.

Our pursuit, then, must not be for empty glory, but for our self-empting for the benefit of others.

We imitate our Lord most closely when we empty ourselves of our own desires and of the personal pursuit of honors for ourselves to elevate and serve Christ and others.

It seems that the church in Philippi had some folks who were building themselves up instead of emptying themselves for the good of others.

But Jesus emptied himself to take on flesh and die.

And he still lives today selflessly.

Because the scriptures tell us he lives to make intercession for us.

He lives for you, he lives for me, standing between us and God the Father in His righteousness.

He lives for others, he lives selflessly, and God has designed his people, whom he has.

Transforming to live as Christ did.

That selfless living is grounded in selfless thinking.

So we, secondly, ought to think selflessly because Christ thinks selflessly.

Mentioned that word count before in verse three.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others.

We find it again in verse six.

Jesus did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped.

We find it in chapter 3, verse 7.

I counted whatever I had as gain, as loss for the sake of Christ.

Chapter 3, verse 8.

I count everything as loss for the sake of Christ.

That word count is another term pointing to a way of thinking.

We use the mental faculties God has given us to think, to consider, to ponder matters from a particular perspective.

We are encouraged to be transformed through the renewing of our minds.

Now that renewal is a wonderful blend of both active and passive elements, active and passive elements.

It happens passively, that happens to us as the Holy Spirit gently renews our minds through Scripture.

That's why it's important to read it, to take it in.

He fills us with His presence.

He uses His word to transform us without us even realizing it.

At the same time, it's active because we are personally called to make a conscious decision to engage our minds in a Christ-like, selfless way.

Rather than a selfish one.

God beautifully designs each Christian to grow into a selfless mindset.

A selfless mindset focuses on others.

Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit.

But there's a very strong contrast there.

But in humility, count others more significant than yourselves.

Transformed minds think differently.

They give greater value to others over themselves.

They imitate Christ by being patient and kind.

They imitate Christ by not envying or boasting, by eliminating arrogance and rudeness, by not insisting on their own way, by not responding with irritation, by not keeping track of a list of things that we think are wrong or disagreeable, by bearing up under all things, by believing the best possible outcome in another, by hoping for the best possible outcome, by enduring everything for the sake of someone else.

Now, place that into the context of a local church like Philippi.

Most of the Christians there had been believers in Jesus for maybe no more than ten years.

So they had a lot of growing up to do.

They still had some maturing in Christ ahead of them.

And one of the most significant transformations they must undertake is a transformation of thought, of how we think.

The Philippians are called to take a scalpel to the thought processes of their minds and the attitudes of their hearts to cut out all of the things that point to me.

Imagine what it would feel like.

Imagine what church would feel like.

Without any sense of what others expected of you.

Imagine being able to come to church without feeling any kind of expectation, even without feeling an expectation of how you ought to dress, or having your hair all done, or having taken a shower in the morning, or how you ought to talk or act.

Imagine how church would feel without the need to live up to somebody else's values or the burden of selfish judgment.

Imagine what church would feel like if everyone cared about making others feel more valuable, more significant, and more honored than having their opinion known about something.

Imagine what church would feel like if we demanded the rights and honors of others instead of our own.

Elsewhere, the Apostle Paul said to the church in Rome, outdo one another in showing honor.

It's like we're going to have a contest in humility.

We're going to lower ourselves so that we can honor everybody else.

Friends, a selfless mindset is value-oriented.

It considers or counts others as more valuable than my thoughts, than my feelings, than my preferences, and it elevates them in status while I die away.

I spoke with one of our missionaries last week, and he commented to me on the current state of the church, just kind of the current state of the worldwide church.

He said there are obvious things that we rightly labor hard to keep from entering the church.

So there are worldly philosophies like the LGBTQ agenda.

He said, we labor to keep those at bay outside of the church, but we have failed to keep out an even more insidious agenda.

He says, we have failed to keep out the insidious agenda that we cannot disagree in the church and remain united.

Because we insist on our own ways of thinking.

And when we insist on our own ways of thinking, disorder and disharmony enters in and begins to fracture what the Spirit has created.

It's a form of selfishness.

It is of utmost importance that we ground this selflessness then, not in ourselves, not in who we are, but in the unmeasurable self-emptying of God the Son.

Any humbling of our minds and attitudes is difficult and often painful.

But none of our emptying of ourselves, of self-focused thought, of selfish attitudes or actions, none of that can compare to the self-emptying of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Verse 7, he emptied himself.

The eternal, omnipotent, sovereign Lord of the universe, who sits enthroned between the magnificent cherubim, the all-knowing, all-powerful, all-glorious God of creation, condescended to become like one of his creatures, and not merely like one of his creatures, but the lowest strata of human creatures, a slave.

And then he gave up himself over to those whom he had made to be hung upon a cross to rescue his own.

There is no amount of humbling, no amount of emptying of ourselves of self-focused thought, attitude, or action for the benefit of others that can ever compare, much less surpass, that selfless mindset of the Lord Jesus Christ.

He who is gentle and lowly has called us to be lowly like him, humbly considering others more significant, of greater value than ourselves.

Now imagine how that truth might have hit Yodia and Syntichy as they're sitting in church that Sunday when Paul's letter was read and they heard it being read.

And they were sitting there thinking, he's talking about me, isn't he?

He's talking about me.

Then they get to chapter 4 and it's, yep, he's talking about me.

Now we're we're putting some things together and saying, what's going on in the book of Philippians, and why does he mention these two ladies and needing help in working things out in chapter 4?

It seems that that's part of what's going on here.

All of our thoughts must be taken captive for the sake of Christ and others.

We must consider our thoughts and our mindset so that others receive value and that our opinions, desires, and directions and attitudes take a backseat.

Now, lest we misunderstand, that doesn't mean that we are relegated as individuals to nothings.

We see that in verse four, where we are challenged to think selflessly by thinking of others.

Just as Christ does.

We see in verse four that God assumes that you will consider yourself and your own interests.

That's natural human nature.

We will think about ourselves.

We will consider what's important to us, what's significant to us.

He says, look, let each of you look not only to his own interests.

Do you see the assumption there?

He assumes you're going to look for your own interests.

I'm going to look out for my interests.

That's what we do by nature.

We are each image bearers, sons and daughters of the living God.

But we need less encouragement in that direction, not more.

We are to take all of that and to set aside all selfishness and empty glory.

We are to humble ourselves by considering the value of others as greater than our own.

God knows we're going to value ourselves highly, more highly than we ought to, generally.

It's how we work.

We tend to prioritize our own feelings, our own desires.

But if we prioritize our own feelings and our own desires, we might forget about others' needs, won't we?

We might think we don't have time for the needs of others.

We might devalue them by forgetting who they are in Christ.

God doesn't expect us to not care about ourselves.

He assumes we will.

We are significant individuals.

After all, God thinks about his own glory.

He does everything for his own glory.

He does all things for the glory and praise of his own name, but he can do that without sin.

You and I cannot.

He can do that without sin because he is a perfect being who is worthy of all praise, all honor, and all glory.

And yet, in the fullness of time, in the fullness of his divine glory, he thought of us even while we were still sinners.

The only begotten Son perfectly displayed the Father's selfless design for his sons and daughters.

We put that design on display when our perception of our own value diminishes while we elevate the value of others to the glory of God the Father.

Some Christians in Rome were apparently thinking about themselves as they proclaimed Christ out of selfishness, rivalry, envy, even probably with a desire to hurt Paul.

Apparently, that kind of thinking was beginning to gain traction in Philippi.

And it can gain traction in any church.

Because it is the predominant way of thinking in sinful people.

And when we allow that to go unchecked in ourselves, it undermines relationships between believers and it undermines the unity of God's church.

So the pursuit of standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving side by side for the faith of the gospel in verse 27 of chapter 1, that can only come as we embody the encouragement that exists in Christ, the comfort that comes from the love of God for us, and the fellowship that exists because of the Spirit.

It's then that we begin to experience the divine work of having the same mind, the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.

And that kind of church is comprised of people who do nothing from rivalry or empty conceit, but who humbly count others more significant than themselves.

What a church.

God has designed his people to be selfless.

And that's what he's working at.

In you and in me.

Maybe not until the day of Jesus Christ.

But we're all works in progress, aren't we?

God has designed his people to be selfless.

And the more selfishness we possess, the more God needs to chip away.

One reason for that is the Lord Jesus loves his bride, the church.

And he has designed his people to give themselves selflessly for the good of the church.

That's why he will go on to say in verse 5, have this mind among yourselves.

Because it's the way that Christ thinks.

Live this way because it's the way that Jesus lives even today.

Let's pray together.

Lord Jesus, may you bring this to fruition in us.

Work in us that you would continue to mold us and make us to be like Jesus.

Oh Lord, it's so painful sometimes to recognize when we are thinking selfishly, acting selfishly.

Lord, sometimes we're even blind to it.

Remove the blinders, humble us.

If necessary, even crush us to make us more like Jesus.

Enable us to have that heart of the apostle that we consider the loss of all things to be good and helpful if we are to be made to be like Jesus.

Lord Jesus, in all things, we want you to be preeminent.

We want to be examples of who you are so that people are drawn to you because of who we are.

Mold our minds by your word.

Transform our minds and our lives so that others will see you and us.

May we decrease and you increase so that all may see and know you.

Amen.

That concludes this sermon from Faith Evangelical Free Church.

Our mission is to declare the Word of God and disciple believers into mature, devoted followers of Jesus.

You can learn more by visiting our website at faithfree.com.