Devotional: Philippians 2:3-4

"Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit,
but with humility of mind let each of you regard one another as more important than himself;
Do not merely look out for your own personal interests,
but also for the interests of others."
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Ouch! Anybody else's toes hurt? This is one of those passages that is not really hard to understand - it's hard to LIVE. Working on memorizing it this week, I've realized how weak I really am - how much I try to rationalize or justify or limit the breadth of what God intends a passage to mean. After the events of this week (see my latest Note if you don't already know) ... and then reading some very wise words tonight from a Christian author ... I'm ready to stretch the limits - to see just how much I can apply verses like these.

When I was studying to prepare this devotional and understand these verses more, I learned that all these phrases are part of one larger thought. Structurally, "being of the same mind" is the predominant thought in verses 2-4. Everything else is a subordinate thought. In modern terminology - "being of the same mind" is the key thought; everything else is a bullet point under it that describes what that thought looks like. Sort of like this:

Being of the same mind:
* Maintaining the same love
* United in Spirit
* Intent on one purpose
* Doing nothing from selfishness or empty conceit - This has a strong structure literally meaning "Don't even think any thoughts motivated by selfish ambition."
* Regarding others are more important than ourselves
* Looking out for the interests of others, not our own - Interestingly in the Greek, this word for "interests" means "different interests". We are to look out for the interests of others - especially those that differ from our own!

Talk about revival! Can you imagine a church full of people who lived this way? That could lead to a true church growth movement!

What I love about these verses is that Paul doesn't erase the individual; he simply addresses our motivations and the bent of our hearts. We don't fulfill this verse by assuming a martyr's pose, a stricken look, and, with Bible in hand, determine to never think of ourselves ever again. That's just another version of pride and self-centeredness, frankly.

Buddhism teaches an extreme self-denial. At the heart of Buddhism is the belief that desire is the root problem of the world and to eliminate desire is to eliminate suffering. So a Buddhist goal would be to truly have no interests, no desires or preferences. That's not what Paul is saying.

Instead, Paul says - don't be motivated by selfishness or personal ambition. That's what characterized the evangelists in chapter 1 that so concerned the Philippians - they were trying to capitalize on Paul's imprisonment by making a name for themselves. I love how Paul doesn't focus on them. He says, essentially - the Gospel is being preached, don't worry about it - and don't be motivated like that in your actions toward one another.

We're supposed to "prefer your brother", as YWAM teaches. But we are told to make others more important than ourselves - not that we are unimportant. We are told to look our for their interests too - not that we should have no interests. Satan would love for us to either ignore or imbalance this teaching. God just wants us to live it out.

The beautiful thing is that it all flows from love...from a heart filled with the Spirit, set on fire for Christ and His people, passionate for the glory of God. Will we have to make hard choices along the way? Sure! But we'll never fulfill this verse by waking up tomorrow morning and thinking of all the things about ourselves that we intend to subdue-all the passions, interests, desires, goals, and preferences that we will ignore today. Instead, we will fulfill this passage by loving without reservation - first God, then by extension others.