A Jesus Mindset, Again 09/25/11
Philippians 2:1-13
Margaret Scott
Children’s Message
Mirror; photos of my kids
Who do you look like?
My children don’t look like me because they’re adopted.
But Jess sometimes sounds like me because she grew up listening to me and talking to me
God wants us to grow up with Jesus so we sound like and act like him, not just our family
When you look in a mirror, don’t just see someone who’s like mom or dad, but say, I want to be like Jesus.
Sermon
What’s your favourite hymn? Why? Think about a phrase from it that sticks with you….
What hymns say and what they mean can be two different things; the words they say
The meaning we give to them – very individual
This text is most likely a quote from a favourite hymn in the first century!
Paul is in dire circumstances – imprisoned, under death sentence (we’ve heard a lot about that this week), very concerned with the state of the faith community, the church – yet he writes a letter that’s laced, not with doom and gloom, but with joy and thanksgiving —how is this possible?
Perhaps because he’s reflecting on a favourite hymn and hears “let this mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus” -- has set his own mind on being like Jesus – and wants all who call themselves Christian to do the same.
The Greek word is phonein, to set one’s mind on, to have an attitude of
And from reading the hymn itself we find that the Jesus mindset includes
Humility
laying aside privilege
Selflessness
Obedience to God’s call on his life
and
Commitment
Let’s take a brief look at some of these attributes of Jesus, and then we’ll take a moment of quiet reflection to ask ourselves a wonder question: I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced?
Humility: not a Roman virtue in Paul’s day, and a carelessly considered one even today. This attitude
· recognizes one’s smallness in the God’s cosmic picture without losing an understanding of one’s importance to God
· ignores cultural concern about status and value…
· it doesn’t act on the basis of social distinctions….who’s in your group, who’s out, who wears what kind of clothes, or has which kind of job
· it is open to God’s direction as more significant than its own
I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced? (silence)
Another mindset attribute from this hymn is
Laying aside privilege: there is a pattern in this hymn that Paul sees in Jesus life, and has adopted as his own: privilege to servanthood to exaltation.
Jesus set aside his place as part of the Divine to become the full human, and not just any old human, the lowest of the low human, a servant, or slave, to others for God.
This isn’t an easy one for us. Emily last week got us thinking about the alternative value system of the kin-dom – and it wasn’t too comfortable This isn’t any more comfortable for me either, in fact it goes further….it goes against the grain of western culture and self-image to not only THINK that God sees us all equally, but to actively put oneself in a servant position. In the church we sometimes think of ourselves as recipients of service—the church is here to meet my needs. Yet if we are to be a truly Christian church, we must take our servant role seriously. We are citizens of the kin-dom, not the culture.
Jesus laid aside the rights and privileges of Godhood, says the hymn.
I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced? (silence)
Selflessness: again, not a common virtue. It’s a mindset that shows in two components, internally spiritual and externally other-focussed.
Internally: The hymn says Jesus emptied himself—
he put himself aside for a larger cause,
made room inside himself for God to fill,
quieted his own inner noise enough to hear
the voice of God guiding him
left room in his soul for what life alone does not have to offer
Externally: became a full human being, warts and all. When SLB talked about aspects of the Jesus mindset, this was the first on almost all our minds: he paid attention to others…I mean really paid attention to others.
I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced?
Obedience: to God’s call upon our lives. I was reminded this week that the word obedience comes from a root that means listening….listening for what God is calling us to be, to do, and acting upon it…even to go as far as to die for that cause.
Let me be clear: I do not believe that God intended for Jesus to die a horrible death on a cross and Jesus obeyed THAT will. I do believe that Jesus obeyed (listened, heard and followed) the call of God that ended up that way because of human refusal to listen and obey. Had it gone differently, Jesus would still have been obedient as far as death, it just might have been a more natural death. Men and women of faith still listen to God no matter what, and some of them die for it, but most of us will go to our deaths more naturally—will we go as obedient (listening, hearing, following)?
I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced? (silence)
The last attribute of the Jesus mindset I see in this hymn is intimately connected to obedience, because it’s how obedience is displayed:
Commitment: time and again in the gospels, we read that “Jesus set his face to go to Jerusalem”….his was a determined mindset committed to the cause of bringing people to God’s love and healing power,
Committed to transforming the world through non-violent but prophetic action,
Committed to healing the hurting, comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable
I wonder if I have this mindset? If not, why not; if so, how is it practiced? (silence)
Like Paul before us, like those first Christians in a Roman culture, we need to re-order our values and mindset, as individuals and as a church….the mindset that has been subtly shaped by the success-oriented society around us.
Can we change our mindset? Can we make new priorities in light of God values,
Priorities in our choices of activities – ones that nourish the soul instead of idolize the sport
Priorities in our attitude toward church – to serve or be served, or something of both
Priorities for prayer and listening time or busy noise?
Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, the hymn begins, and the sermon ends
This mindset of love and humility is a way of life, it takes persistence, dedication, and a listening commitment for the call of God on our lives
So that we can be taken out of ourselves into the mind of God for humanity (Chittister)
Let the same mind be in you, and me, that was in Christ Jesus
Amen
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