December 26 2013
Conclusion:
MY FAVORITE CHRISTMAS TEXT
My favorite Christmas text puts humility at the heart of Christmas.
So this Christmas I am marveling at Jesus’s humility and wanting more of it
myself. I’ll quote the text in a moment. But first there are two problems. Tim
Keller helps us to see one of them when he says, “Humility is so shy. If you
begin talking about it, it leaves.” So a meditation on humility (like this one)
is self-defeating, it seems. But even shy people peek out sometimes if they are
treated well. The other problem is that Jesus wasn’t humble for the same
reasons we are (or should be). So how can looking at Jesus’s Christmas humility
help us? Our humility, if there is any at all, is based on our finiteness, our
fallibility, and our sinfulness. But the eternal Son of God was not finite. He
was not fallible. And he was not sinful. So, unlike our humility, Jesus’
humility originated some other way. Here is my favorite Christmas text. Look
for Jesus’s humility.
Though he was in the form of God, [Jesus] did
not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing,
taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being
found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of
death, even death on a cross. (Philippians 2:6–8)
What defines Jesus’s humility is the fact that it is mainly
a conscious act of putting himself in a lowly, servant role for the good of
others. His humility is defined by phrases like ›
“he emptied himself
[of his divine rights to be free from abuse and suffering]”› “he took the form
of a servant”›
“he became obedient to the point of death, even death on a
cross”
So Jesus’s humility was not a heart disposition of being finite
or fallible or sinful. It was a heart of infinite perfection and infallible
truthfulness and freedom from all sin, which for that very reason did not need
to be served. He was free and full to overflow in serving. Another Christmas
text that says this would be Mark 10:45: “The Son of Man came not to be served but
to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Jesus’s humility was not a
sense of defect in himself, but a sense of fullness in himself put at the
disposal of others for their good. It was a voluntary lowering of himself to
make the height of his glory available for sinners to enjoy. Jesus makes the
connection between his Christmas
lowliness and the good news for
us: “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and
lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For
my yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28–30). His lowliness
makes our relief from burdens possible. If he were not lowly, he would not have
been “obedient unto death, even death on a cross.” And if he had not been obedient
to die for us, we would be crushed under the weight of our sins. He lowers
himself to take our condemnation
(Roma ns 8:3). Now we have more reason to be humble than
before. We are finite, fallible, sinful, and therefore have no ground for
boasting at all. But now we see other humbling things: Our salvation is not
owing to our work, but his grace. So
boasting is excluded (Ephesians 2:8–9). And the way he accomplished
that gracious salvation was through voluntary, conscious self-lowering in
servant-like obedience to the point of death. So in addition to finiteness,
fallibility, and sinfulness, we now have two other huge impulses at work to
humble us: free and undeserved grace underneath all our blessings and a model
of self-denying, sacrificial, servanthood that willingly takes the form of a
servant. So we are called to join Jesus in this conscious self-humbling and
servanthood. “Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles
himself will be exalted” (Matthew 23:12). “Have this mind among yourselves, which
is yours in Christ Jesus...” (Philippians 2:5). Let’s pray that this “shy
virtue”—this massive ground of our salvation and our servanthood—would peek out
from
her quiet place and grant us the garments of lowliness this
Advent. “Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for
‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to
the humble’” (1 Peter
