Philippians 2

Having an Attitude of Christ
a.k.a Attitude Adjustment Time

This is the continuation of our study on the book of Philippians. This post is chapter 2 in Philippians which is equally important to chapter 1. If you missed the last post or haven't read it yet then here is some basic info. The Church of Phillipi was the very first church established in Europe by the apostle Paul. Since the churches were so far away from where Paul was, he would send carriers out. For this particular book Paul used Epaphroditus (who I call E-dawg for short). E-dawg would stay with this group of people and encourage them, support them, and love on them until it was time for him to bring letters back from the churches to Paul. Now what also is significant is that at the time Phillipi was very high on the social status scale (say that three times fast). Phillipi was very affluent and very in-fluent so it was a very important place. Phillipi was like modern day Hollywood or West Palm Beach, pretty much everybody was wealthy there. Now the people there almost always felt the need to have/get more stuff. Phillipi had lots of possibilities and so Paul is writing to them to encourage them and change their attitude on life. This sets us up for this blog. So let's get started.

Paul is going to talk to them today about having an attitude adjustment. The truth is it's very for us to become more focused on ourselves than others and "what really matters" (refer to "the start of Philippians"). I mean don't think you have a defect or anything its in our human nature to be this way. Unfortunately that attitude is not supported in the bible (bummer right??).

Verse 5 reads:
"You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had." In chapter 2 Paul gives us 3 keys to allowing the attitude of Christ to live in our life's. So lets go back to the beginning.

Verses 1-2 read:
"Is there any encouragement from belonging to Christ? Any comfort from his love? Any fellowship together in the Spirit? Are your hearts tender and compassionate? Then make me truly happy by agreeing wholeheartedly with each other, loving one another, and working together with one mind and purpose." So Paul starts off with if you have any encouragement any love. It's important to note here that the word "if" really doesn't mean if like questioning, in this case it actually means since. It's like my dad saying "if your my son your going to hang Christmas lights" no its more like "since your my son your going to hang Christmas lights" (and have a blast doing it too). So Paul is saying that since you belong to Christ, since you have love, since your together in the Spirit, then work together, love one another, and agree wholeheartedly.

Verses 3-4 read:
"Don't be selfish; don't try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don't look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too." Do NOTHING out of selfish ambition. Nothing in your life should be based on your own self ambition. Now don't get me wrong, ambition is a good thing to have. It drives people to become something or do something. Selfish ambition is when it all comes back to what I want or what I need to be fulfilled and so I'm only going to be concerned about myself. Paul's saying don't do anything for yourself. It's amazing at how many people are more worried about the way people view them, then the way God views them. Paul's saying don't try to impress others but be humble and think of others as better than ourselves. I once heard that "egotism" is the only disease that you can get that makes other people sick. Humility is not thinking less of yourself its thinking less ABOUT yourself. So Paul gives us some ways to achieve these goals.

Verses 5-7 read:
"You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.Though he was God,* he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges*; he took the humble position of a slave* and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form,*" We're supposed to have that attitude in our heart and life. I've come up with 3 keys to help us gain this attitude because I believe that we all want this in our hearts, otherwise you wouldn't of read this post this far.

Key #1 Concern for others.
Don't be consumed with yourself. Paul wants us not to only have a concern for the people we like but the people we dislike as well. Jesus modeled that for us. You could say his whole life was focused on others. He even gave his life up so that EVERYBODY not just one group of people could get into heaven. Talk about having a concern for others.

Key #2 We must have GENUINE HUMILITY.
In versus 5-7 the bible explains that the Creator became a Creature. It takes confidence to be humble. See God could've just stayed up in Heaven and never sent his son down to save us. It takes confidence to be humble. We have to know who we are to life a very genuine life of humility. Now beware there is a huge difference between being cocky and being confident. Confidence says I'm secure with who I am, I know who God made me to be, and I know that he has a great plan for me. Arrogance says I'm insecure with who I am, I'm not OK with who God made me to be, and I don't want to know all that he has planned for me. So what I am going to do is tell you how great I am so you think I'm actually thinking that I'm better then what I really think I am. Unfortunately we all know people like this.

Key #3 Commitment to OBEDIENCE
Verse 8 reads:
"he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal's death on a cross." This verse is so important because as I read it I can't help but think how Jesus could've called it all off. He could've called 10,000 angels and just stopped his death. But he was fully committed to God and OBEYED him. We cannot walk with Jesus if we are not fully committed of obedience to God. That doesn't mean that we're going to be perfect at it, but what it does mean is down deep their is a commitment saying I want to obey God as best as I can. So let me ask you this how fay does your obedience go? Are you fully committed to obeying God?

That's all I have remember to keep reading the rest of the chapters in Philippians. Also remember there is only 1Way2Live and that's for God.