Make My Joy Complete Philippians 2:1-11 Good Morning, Friends. Last week Pastor Gary got a few things off his chest in a perfectly wonderful session of whining. He then went on to remind us that although the Apostle Paul had plenty of reason to whine he was after all in prison, unable to move freely about, unable to do as he pleased, perhaps in danger of losing his life and yet he was rejoicing. Despite his imprisonment, in fact perhaps because of his imprisonment, the gospel was continuing to spread, within the prison walls to those who might not have heard, and outside the prison walls by those given courage by Paul s circumstance and example. Today our reading continues in Paul s letter to the Philippians and we find a shift in focus. Paul moves from thinking about the present to thinking about the future. Paul, who could very well be facing the end of his life, is thinking about his legacy and urging the church to make his joy complete by becoming like Christ. Will you pray with me? Holy Living One, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be Holy and pleasing in your sight, O God our rock and our redeemer. Amen. Hamilton Whaley was a prosperous lawyer in Tampa, Florida. He was happily married, had five great kids, a big comfortable house in a pleasant community. He was active in church and making more money than he ever dreamed of. He was also a partner in one of the leading law firms in the state, a vast organization with nearly 70 lawyers. Then in September, 1976, he had a minor car accident. Fortunately he was injured only slightly and recovered quickly. When he returned home from the hospital his telephone began to ring. His wife took the calls. "Mrs. Whaley," the caller would say, "I just read in the Hillsborough County Bar Association Bulletin about your husband's death. I want to express my regrets." Betty, Whaley's wife, was taken aback at first, but the calls persisted. They finally discovered on the first page of the Bulletin under a bold, black headline--in Memoriam--was Whaley's name and his death notice! Whaley tried to joke about it but the thought stayed with him for weeks. He realized how close he could have been to being killed. He tried to imagine what the world would be like without Hamilton Whaley in it. He began to be bothered by it. Would there be anything left behind to show that his life had made a difference? Hamilton Whaley and his wife, Betty, finally decided through a series of providential events to become house parents at the oldest orphanage in America, the Bethesda Home for Boys in Savannah, Georgia. Betty and he and their teen-age son, David, were put in charge of one of seven cottages. They were responsible for the lives of 20 boys from 5 to 18 1
years of age. "Now," he says, "I'm where God wants me to be, in a life that began--instead of ending--with my obituary." (1) Have you ever found yourself in a position where you wondered If I died tomorrow would this world be a better place because I had been here?? It s a good question to ask ourselves in this world where everything seems to move faster than the speed of light. It s important to pause now and again, to take stock and make sure we are still on the path that leads where we intended to go back when we started our Christian journey. What a blessing a mistaken death notice turned out to be. Hamilton Whaley could have made an impact in the world as a lawyer I think of the difference made by lawyers like Liz Balck, our JFON attorney. Hamilton however, after reassessing his life obviously felt a call in a different direction. His job as an attorney had been about wealth and status his life as a house parent was about service. It s not really about what you do to serve the kingdom, it s that you serve the kingdom. Now that s a legacy worth leaving. Paul of course has some pretty specific thoughts on how the Philippians could make his joy complete. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus That s an interesting thought. What might it be like to have the same mind as Jesus? I recently read about a fascinating study done years ago by the University of Minnesota. Researchers there studied 402 pairs of twins who were separated at birth and reared apart. The research started in 1919 and continued for decades. The results were startling. Twins, reared in quite different circumstances, were still extraordinarily similar in many ways. The most celebrated example was a set of twins named Jim Lewis and Jim Springer. The two Jims were separated at birth and brought together at age forty. Here is what had happened with them over those four decades. Both had taken law enforcement training. Both had taken up blueprinting, drafting, and carpentry as hobbies. Lewis had been married three times, Springer twice. Both first wives were named Linda; both second wives, Betty. Each named his first son James Allen. Each had a dog named Toy. Of their first meeting, Lewis said, It was like looking in a mirror. These twins were found to have similar IQ s, personality scores, electroencephalograms, electrocardiograms, fingerprints, and handwriting. As Springer put it, All the tests we took looked like one person had taken them twice. (2) To me that is fascinating; reared apart but still almost identical not only in looks, but in behavior. Now imagine that you are a twin of Christ reared 2,000 years apart, but having the same personal attributes. Isn t that basically what Paul is asking for when he tells us to be likeminded with Christ? The King James Version uses these words, Let this mind be in you that 2
was also in Christ Jesus. Wow! The same mind in us that was in Christ! Is that possible? Forget how presumptuous it sounds. This is the ideal that we should seek for, according to Paul, to be a spiritual twin of Jesus. So, in practical terms, what does that mean? What kind of mind, or attitude, did Christ have? Paul says, first of all, that Christ had an attitude of humility. Paul writes, Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves... Now we have to be careful when we consider what this means for us? Does it mean that we are to go around being a doormat and letting people walk all over us? One pastor encouraged his congregation to think about Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh! That poor guy suffered from an extremely bad case of low self-esteem. I think that perhaps it means something else. Paul expresses it in a more healthy way when he goes on to say, Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. In other words when you are humble, your attitude is Win/Win. That is, you not only look out for your interests, but also for the interests of others. It s as basic as You love your neighbor as you love yourself. Humility is not feeling bad about yourself. People who feel bad about themselves invariably try to make others feel even lower. Humility is focusing on others and desiring for them the same benefits as you enjoy. Humility is a win/win attitude. To be like-minded with Christ is to have a spirit of humility. It s also about having a spirit of service. Paul continues, Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in the very nature of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death even death on a cross! Now, obviously this is not win/win. This is lose/win. Christ deliberately lost himself that we might be saved. And there may be times when we will have to lay down our lives if not literally, then figuratively for others. In other words, there are times when we need to be MORE concerned about others than we are about ourselves. Think of parents going without so that their children might have more. Think of grown children caring for aging parents. Think of teachers spending their paychecks on supplies for the kids in their classrooms. Think of people shoveling sidewalks for their neighbors who can t. It is a call to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. But there s one thing more. To be like-minded with Christ is to know that you are a child of God. This is the conviction that allowed Christ to be humble, that allowed him to be a servant to others, even giving up his life in our behalf. He knew that he was God s child. 3
The Rev. King puts it this way: The reason so many people are so mean-spirited and so uncharitable to others is that they have no idea who they really are. You are a child of Almighty God. You were loved from the foundation of the universe. You don t have to tear down, to bring others down to your level. Your job is to lift others up to the level Christ has brought you. After all, Christ has called you brother or sister. Paul writes, And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. This same Jesus, whose name is above all names, calls us brother, sister. We re not Jesus twin, but we re on the way. In a certain sense Paul s imprisonment was a hidden blessing a blessing beyond spreading the gospel - it forced him to sit still and think about some pretty important things. It forced him to face the fact that he wouldn t always be around to guide the churches and one of the results is the letter to the Philippians where with laser sharp focus Paul gets to the heart of it all. He wants his life to have made a difference in this world and the difference he desires is a difference in others a Christ-like difference. Let me close with one final story. Quite a number of years ago a rather unusual announcement was heard repeated on the radio. The announcer gave several scenes in a progressive history of a certain person. Scene one was a crying baby and a proud father. The father was saying, "Oh, it's a boy. It's a boy. We're going to name him Stanley, and one day he will become the president of the United States." In scene two Stanley was getting married. At Stanley's wedding the father of the bride was saying to Stanley, "Oh, I know you would like to go to medical school, son, but you are going to join me in the purse manufacturing business." In the third scene, Stanley and his wife were on an expensive vacation. He obviously had been a successful manufacturer and had made a lot of money. The final scene was Stanley's minister preaching his funeral. The minister said, "Stanley was much beloved by all those who lived here at the Shady Nook Rest home. He was the best gin rummy player in Shady Nook, and a few people knew that he also had the lowest cholesterol count of anyone here." 4
Then the announcer on the radio said, "Isn't it sad to live your whole life and never make a ripple and never rock a boat? Join the Peace Corps." (3) Friends, if we today are living kingdom lives, then we are the continuation of the legacy Paul desired to leave behind. Christ-likeness, humility, and selfless servant-hood may seem odd to the rest of the world, but we know what Paul knew that our joy is only complete when we emulate Christ, for it is then that God s kingdom comes on earth as it is in heaven not only for us but for generations to come. Amen? Amen. 1. Guideposts (11-82). Cited in Church Management, May/June, 1983, p. 59. 2. Dallas, Texas: Word Publishing, 1991. 3. Bill G. Bruster and Robert Dale, How to Encourage Others (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1983). 5