JoyFULL / Joy is found through humility // Philippians 2:1-8

Listen, we're continuing our series through the book of Philippians. It's entitled Joyful. In fact, let's say that together. Joyful. We spell that intentionally.

Some of you OCD people, as you're looking up at the screen, don't think that that was an accident. We're talking about how we can have fullness of joy. How we can have fullness of joy in your life. And that's what the entire book of Philippians is all about. In fact, we kind of, we finished chapter one last week and we were looking about the apostle Paul. He's writing this book to a church, the church at Philippi, and he's writing this from a prison cell. And in the midst of that, in the midst of being chained in prison, he's challenging them.

Remember, the prisoner to those that are free. And he's saying, hey, you can be joyful despite the circumstances around you. Now, how many of you would say from time to time and be honest today with me, how many of you would say that sometimes the circumstances around me dictate whether I'm joyful or not?

Okay, my hands raised and things like that. Some of you, I'm going to preach online next week, by the way, just random. And so, but no, we all struggle from time to time with that idea, allowing the things around us to dictate our joy. And so today from Philippians chapter two, we're going to look at this thought. This is what we're going to talk about.

I'm going to go ahead and give it to you. It's this, that joy is found through humility. Joy is found through humility. Can we say that?

This is the big idea today. Can we say that together? Joy is found through humility. Now, I want to talk about specifically that word today, humility, humility.

It's something that we all want, right? And many of us struggle with that. I'm going to show you, you know, there's a lot of things that you could probably have in common more with the Lord than anything. But here's one thing that he says in James chapter four, that all of us, every single person will agree with. It says this, that God resist the proud. And guess what? Here's what I want you to know.

You do as well. We don't like to be around prideful, arrogant people, do we? Right? How many of you love being around people like that? Anybody? No one?

What? And so like, we don't like to be around people. And when you think of this idea of prideful, here's what I want you to understand what the scripture is talking about. It's those that are never wrong. You know somebody like that? Don't nudge the person next to you. People that are never wrong, those people that it's always the boss's fault. It's always the coach's fault.

How about this one? It's always the teacher's fault. That doesn't happen with any of our kids, do it?

Is it? It's always the pastor's fault. It's always my spouse's fault. It's always. Amen.

That's good. Listen, it's always somebody else's fault. And here's what I want you to know is that the Bible is very clear. I mean, God says that he resists the proud. And usually when you're around prideful, arrogant people that believe that they're right no matter what, in all circumstances, all those things, what do we normally do? A lot of times we put guards around us and they're people that we kind of, just like God said, he resists the proud.

We put some of those same guardrails in front of us in between people like that. And just like God, here's what we like to do. He gives grace to the humble, doesn't he? He gives grace to the humble and so do we. We like to be around humble people. We all crave humility. We're drawn to people that are humble. Have you ever noticed that? That usually the ones that are humble are the ones that people want to be around.

You ever noticed that? But it's the arrogant ones over here that feel like, man, why does no one else want to be around us? Perhaps it could be the pride that you have in your life.

Now here's what I want you to understand because I kind of wanted to jump right into today's message with this. Anytime we talk about something like pride, we naturally put walls up, right? Some of you, the minute I started talking about humility versus pride, you immediately started to get defensive.

You started to think, you might have pulled out your phone and begin to kind of get your mind off of things because we do not want to be convicted or challenged because we fear what might be revealed in the innermost parts of our heart. And here's what I want you to know up front. It's me, it's everybody in here. We all struggle from time to time with self-centeredness, right?

How many of you struggle with being self-centered? Raise your hand. I asked you that. You can be honest. Some of you are like, I can't do this. Okay.

How many of you struggle with self-centeredness? Raise your hand. Okay.

And here's how you know that. You're wondering, you're like, man, I don't really struggle with that. Somebody else suggests where you're going for lunch today and see how that goes over if you wanted something else, right? Like we all struggle with what we want. We all struggle doing what we want to do.

We all struggle with the activities that we want to institute and the way that we want things to be done. The apostle Paul here in chapter two, here's his point, is that joy, eternal fullness, lasting joy, it's not found in being arrogant. It's not found in pride.

Here's what it's found in. Humility. It's found in humility. It's found in humility.

And that's what we're going to find here. You see it in Philippians chapter two, verses one through eight. Here's what Paul is saying.

Now remember, he is writing this from a prison cell. He's sitting in prison and he's writing with this idea that joy, he's telling the church, he's saying, hey, you want to be joyful? You want to be joyful despite what everything, everything around you and what's happening around you. If you want to be joyful, you have to have a personality and a heart posture of humility.

Let's read it together. It says, verse number one, if there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the spirit, if any bowels and mercies, fulfill ye my joy that ye be like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind, let nothing be done through strife or vainglory, in other words, self-centeredness, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves. Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who Christ being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, but he made himself of no reputation and took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and he became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. So joy is found in humility. Let's look at humility today. The first thing I want you to see here is found in verse number one.

It's this. It's the source of humility. Where does it come from? Where does humility originate from? If you look in verse number one, there's a word that's mentioned four specific times. It is the word if. He says, if there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the spirit, if any bowels and mercies.

Here's what I want you to know. This is a, if you could call it a rhetorical question that he's asking about these things, you could actually translate the word if, and you could say since, or because. In other words, he could have said, since you have consolation in Christ, since you have comfort of love, since you have fellowship of the spirit, since your bowels and mercies. Here's the point, is the reason why that word don't miss this, he's not really saying, hey, if you have it, maybe you don't, maybe you do, that kind of thing. He's saying that this is certainties, not possibilities. He's saying that the things that he mentions, those four specific things here in verse number one, they're certainties for the followers of Christ. Remember, he's writing to Christians, he's writing to those that have trusted Jesus as their savior. If you're in here today, and there's been a moment in your life where you trusted in Jesus as your savior, then this is for you, and he says these four specific things.

I want to look at them real quick. The first one is this, consolation in Christ. The word consolation is a Greek word, it's parakleikos. And this word is so good, it's actually the word for encouragement that we see throughout scripture. And so this word, this encouragement, is actually talking about the strength and empowerment that we have specifically in the indwelling spirit of God.

He's saying, here's the origination for humility, here's how you get humility, here's how you can become humble. You have it within your relationship with Christ, you have consolation in Christ. The second thing is this, comfort of love. Comfort of love. Not only are we encouraged and strengthened in our innermost being in Christ, we have comfort of love. God is the God of all comfort, and he is love. And here's what he's saying is, if you have experienced this inwardly, then you can live a humble life. The third thing he says is fellowship of the Spirit. You see, the Spirit of God is within you.

At the moment that you trust in Jesus as Savior, the Spirit, God himself in the form of the Holy Spirit, comes and he indwells your life. And if that's you, if you're a Christian here today, you have the means, not in yourself, because we all struggle with being self-centered. We all struggle with being in our flesh what we want to do. We want life to be all about us. We want us to be the center of attention, don't we? We want to be the center of the story.

We want to do what we want to do. And what he's saying is, the origin for humility is actually found in a relationship with Christ and who lives inside of you. In other words, if you want to be humble, the first step for you to be humble, it's found in a relationship with Jesus Christ. It's found in a relationship with Christ. He goes on to say, if any bowels and mercies. Bowels implies tender affections.

In other words, it carries on this idea of this tender love and affection that we have. If you've experienced the mercy and love and grace of God. He's saying this, that that is where humility comes from. So the first step, I want you to understand, if you're in here today and you kind of feel like, man, yeah, that's me, arrogant or prideful and I want to be humble. We all desire the posture of humility in our spirit. We all want that.

You say, how do I get that? The first step is you have to trust Jesus as your savior. The second thing I want you to see is this, the nature of humility. The nature of humility. If you look at verses two through four, he says this, verse number two, fulfill ye my joy.

In other words, this is what's going to make me joyful. And he goes on, he says that ye be like-minded. Paul's saying that if you can be unified and humble, that is what's going to bring him joy. That's what's going to bring him joy, being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem other better than themselves.

Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. The second thing I want you to see in these few verses is this, what does humility look like? Like Paul, he expounds upon it here. The first thing that humility does is found in verse number two, it unifies. Paul is expressing that the unity of the church is what will fulfill his joy.

That will make him joyful. And by the way, God is happy with a unified church. It brings him joy when the church can be unified. And here's what I want you to understand about our relationships with people within the church is humility, if you're going to be humble, it unifies us together.

Okay. Listen, I've been around churches my entire life. And here's what I have found with churches that we would call this like a church split.

Many of us, we know that, right? We've heard of churches having struggles and not getting along and things like that. Here's what I'll tell you is that usually those things happen not because people in the church are trying to be too humble. I've never met a church that they split and a church started out because everybody was just thinking about everybody else more than themselves. In fact, it's the opposite. Know what happens? Churches are destroyed and torn apart.

Why? Because people are thinking of themselves and their own agenda most of the time more than the people around them. And so he's saying that the nature of humility is this, it unifies the body of Christ together. But the second thing about humility is this, it thinks of others.

It thinks of others. Look at verse number three, let nothing be done through strife or vainglory. In other words, don't do anything with yourself in mind. Instead, do everything in lowliness of mind. Let each esteem other, better than themselves. Don't do anything out of selfishness.

Don't do anything out of selfishness what you want, what you desire. When I was in Florida in college, went to college in Jacksonville, Florida and I worked at an academy. It was a Christian private academy and after school I was in charge of the entire after school program for the elementary, believe that or not. I know some of you are thinking, really? You?

Yes, I don't know. They couldn't find anybody else so they went to the bottom of the barrel and they found me. So I was over this and we had in our after school program, it's pretty large school, we had about 350 to 400 in just the after school program in elementary. I remember that I had all of our workers and our employees, they would watch different areas of the playground and different things in the afternoon and I always stood near the front and one of my jobs was, especially on the hot, hot days, I was one of the ones that would call water break. Here's what I'll tell you, on a hot day, that's what all these kids are craving, all 300 of them and they're all out across the field and the playground and they're all out there and any time they heard me, I had this megaphone that I would carry and believe it or not, I had to use the megaphone to get my voice that far out and so I would take this megaphone and I would talk into the megaphone and I would say, hey, water break, everybody come in and they would all run and they would line up based on their grade. Here's what happened literally about every single water break as I stood there, all the kids, they would run our direction and then there was always usually some fights at the front. Kids were pushing kids, trying to get in front and there were sometimes it got really bad, kids were pushing people down.

We don't ever have that problem here at our school but maybe we do, I don't know. I remember talking to some kids that got into a fight, one of them pushed this kid down so I had to talk to him in my office and I was talking to him, I was like, hey, let's get to the bottom of this, why did you do this and things like that and you know what happened, the reason why they were always fighting in line is because they wanted to be first. They didn't want anybody to be in front of them, they wanted to be first in everything and you say, okay, pastor, that's a bunch of kids and things like that. Here's what I want you to know, our situations in life might not look like a bunch of kids trying to be first for a water break but here's what I've learned about a lot of adults, they want to be first in everything. They want to be first and they want life to be about them.

That's what I've seen, I mean, I've been around adults, I work with adults, that's what we all struggle with because in the innermost part of our life, we want everything to be about us and what our agenda is. That's what we struggle with and what Paul's saying is that is the fleshly nature that we are battling with. He says that no, if you live out your humility in life that comes from a relationship with Christ, you can then change that on its head and now you're not thinking about yourself, you're thinking about everybody else, you're not the kid trying to be in front of the line, you're the one standing there letting people go in front of you. That's his point here in verse 2 or verse 3, he's saying hey, don't look at your own self, don't look at things for your own vainglory, instead think about others and think about them. The third thing is this, humility, the third thing about the nature of humility, it serves others. It serves others. Listen, let me just say this, you should be looking to serve others, not yourself. That's a fruit of what has happened inside of us, we should be serving the people around us. In other words, we should be looking for opportunities to serve others. Have you ever met somebody who only wants to serve themselves and only wants to do what's on their current agenda? And anytime you ask them to help you with anything, they always have something else going on?

You want to put that to the test? Move houses sometime and ask for help moving. That's the time that you'll be like, man, nobody wants to help do that, right? And here's the point, it's he's saying here in verse number 4, look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others. In other words, it's a life when you're living in the spirit, it's a life where you're not thinking about yourself anymore, you're actually turned around and you're thinking about the needs of everybody around you. That's what humility looks like, it's thinking of others, it's serving others. And Paul's saying this, that true joy, it's found in living your life for other people around you. Paul is saying that humility, it brings joy. What doesn't bring joy is living for yourself, living for your own life and your own agenda. No, he's saying you want to be joyful?

Give your life away. That's his point. And then he goes on in verses 5 through 8 and he changes things and he says, okay, I'm going to give you the greatest example of humility that there is. The third thing I want you to see is this perfect example of humility. You find it, verse number 5, let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Paul is saying this, that hey, listen, living for yourself, that's not the mind of God. That's not a fruit of the spirit. No, he's saying that the mind of God should be in you and by the way, you have the Holy Spirit living inside of you. That's the point that he made in verse number 1.

You have the strength. You have the spirit inside of you that gives you the strength to live a humble, not a proud life. And he says the same mind that was in Christ can be in you. And then he goes on and looks at the mind of Christ. He says, who, Christ, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God but made himself of no reputation and he took upon him the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. So you say, what did Jesus do? How did Jesus show humility and he gave us the perfect example, the perfect model for how we should treat other people and how we should live. The first thing Jesus did was this, you find it in verse number 6, he came to us. He came to us, verse number 6, who being in the form of God. When Jesus came to this earth, was he 100% God?

Yes. Yes, he was. He was 100% God when he came here. I want you to understand that Jesus resided in heaven, in the presence of God, this perfect heaven and because he was thinking of you and not himself, he came to us in the form of God. He came 100% God in the flesh. And here's the point, when he says this phrase, he thought it not robbery to be equal with God, he didn't lay down his deity. No, he was 100% deity, he was God in the flesh. But here's what Paul's saying, is when he came for you, when he came for me, he could have come and he could have demanded all of us to bow down to him. He could have demanded right off the bat when he arrived to be treated like royalty because he was the son of God. But you know what he did? While he was 100% God, all in this moment, he could have used his deity for his personal advantage, but you know what?

He didn't. He came as a humble baby that was born eventually to die for you. You see, Jesus is the perfect example of humility. He came to us. But number two, Jesus served us. Jesus served us.

Look at verse number seven of our text. But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant. You see, Jesus, he served us, he came to seek and to save. He came not to be served, but to serve.

He came to give his life for us. And so what Paul's saying is that Jesus, he came from heaven to earth and his point of being here on earth was to serve you, was to give his life for you. And Paul's saying that we should be treating people that way. We should have that mind, the same mind that Jesus came to us with, the same mind that Jesus served us with.

That's the mind that you and I should be having in our life. The third thing you find in verse number eight is this, Jesus sacrificed for us. Paul's reminding the Philippians that the ultimate example of humility was when Jesus became obedient to the cross. You see, he became obedient to the cross. And here's why that was humble. Here's why Paul is mentioning Jesus serving us and Jesus sacrificing for us and how we should live in relationships with other people in the same way is because on the cross, Jesus, I've asked you this before, what could Jesus have possibly obtained on the cross that he didn't have before?

Think about it. Like Jesus in heaven, he was, you know, he's full deity, right? He had position, acceptance, he had everything that he needed. Like why on earth would he leave heaven and come to earth to sacrifice? What could he obtain through the cross that he didn't have before?

A relationship with us, a relationship with us. That's why the scripture says that this brought joy to them. Joy was set down before him. He endured the cross. Why was that a joyful moment for him? Because he was doing it for you. Because he was giving his life.

He was serving you and sacrificing for you. That's what Jesus has come to do. And now we have the mind, we should have the mind of Christ the same way that Jesus has treated us and that he was humble for us.

That's how we should treat one another. You know, Jesus illustrated this why he was on earth in John chapter 13. We know this story.

I encourage you to read it. We kind of just came through a series about the upper room and we went through all of the different events that led up to the crucifixion and the resurrection. And in John chapter number 13, Jesus is in this upper room and he's gathered his disciples together.

And he's gathered all of them together. And up there in this upper room experience, all of his disciples are there. This is kind of his last few moments that he had with his disciples before he was going to be arrested. This was the last act, the last teaching that he could impart to them before he was going to be arrested and eventually tried and crucified and resurrected.

And in that moment, in the upper room experience, you know what he did? He knelt down and kind of laid aside his royal garment and he laid it aside and there in that moment he grabbed a towel. And Jesus, the son of God, he knelt down and began to wash the disciples feet.

And in the last moments, the last moments before he was going to sacrifice and give his life on the cross for the entire world, for you and for me, Jesus is trying to teach his disciples something. And so as he gets down and think about it, I mean, he's the son of God and as his hands are going to wash these disciples feet, they immediately start to think like, no, no, no. Remember Peter, he steps up and he's like, no, Lord, like, no, you should never wash our feet. You should never wash our feet.

We've seen what those hands can do, right? And Jesus is trying to teach them something. And in this moment, as he begins to wash his feet, I want you to think about this, and this is the way that we should be treating one another, is who was in that room? Peter. That very night, Peter was going to deny Jesus three times, deny that he even knew him.

You know who else was in the room? Judas. The very man that's responsible for giving up Jesus who would betray him. Judas is in the room. And the rest of the disciples, that all of them would run the other way and deny Jesus that night.

You know what Jesus did for them? He knelt down. And in that moment, he washed the feet of Judas. He washed the feet of Peter. And he washed the feet of those disciples one at a time. And by the way, the master, the rabbi, would never wash anyone's feet. The only people that would wash feet were the lowest of the low, the slaves. They were the bottom of the totem pole. They were the only ones, and here Jesus, the Son of God, the King of Kings, he's about to give his life for them, for the ones that he's looking at as he looks up at Judas and he knows what's happening and he looks up at Peter and he knows that before the night ends, those guys are all going to deny and turn their back on him and abandon him, and yet Jesus in this moment washes their feet.

And in verse number 15 of John chapter 13, here's what Jesus tells them after he's done. And by the way, it took time. It took time. It was not something that was quick.

It took time. And after Jesus had had this moment with the disciples, he was teaching them something. He said this, verse number 15, I have given you an example that ye should do as I have done to you. In this moment, as he's kind of commissioned them, he's about to go to the cross, he's about to be arrested here in just a few short hours. And in this moment, he stands and he says, hey, you know how I washed your feet, Peter?

You know how I washed your feet? And he goes through the disciples. He says, listen, I've given you, I've done this as an example that ye should do. In other words, you should do for others what I have done for you. You see, what was Jesus teaching us? He's teaching us that this, washing the feet of others, serving others, thinking of others, sacrificing for others, putting others' needs ahead of our own.

Here's what he's saying. He's saying that this is what it means to be in sync with the gospel. This is what it means to be in sync with the gospel. You want to live out the gospel in your life?

Go and wash people's feet. You want to live like Jesus lived? You want to behave like Jesus did?

Go and think of others more than you think of yourself. You want to experience what fullness of joy looks like, Paul's saying? He's saying the only way to find joy, the only way to experience joy is to give your life away. His point here in Philippians 2, he says that the standard, the standard for humility, it was set when Jesus left royalty behind and he came to this earth and was crucified for us. That's the standard. That's the mark. That's what we should be doing.

And then he has the nerve to say, hey, I've done this as an example. Now Christians, those who have experienced consolation in Christ, those who have experienced comfort of love, those who have experienced the affection and love and mercy of Christ in you, Christian, go and do as Jesus has done for us. That's the message. That's where true joy is found. So if you're in here today, I want you to know if you're struggling with joy, you're struggling with happiness, it's probably because you're allowing everything around you to dictate your joy.

It's probably because you're living your life for you. You know, when I was growing up, many of you probably had the same thing. I remember in school, I went to a Christian school, they would always like teach it this way. You remember the word joy, the acrostic? You know what I'm talking about?

What's the first one, Jay? Jesus, others, yourself, right? And as a kid, you're thinking, you know, like, you don't understand it completely. But as I've gotten older, you know what I've learned?

Like I'm as self-centered as anybody in this place. Like when I live in my flesh, here's what I want to do. Everything that I want to do. When I'm in my flesh, I want what I want.

But here's what I've learned. When I live in the spirit, and I'm walking in the spirit, and I'm living out the gospel in my life, I've learned that joy is not found in living for myself. It's not found in wanting what I want.

You know what it's found in? Giving my life away. And that's the point. If you want joy, just give your life away. For some of you, that might look like your time. For some of you, that might look like your thoughts. For some of you, it's just serving somebody around you. For some of you, it could be sacrificing something that you want for the good of somebody else.

You see, that's the point. Jesus was the model. He was the standard by which we shoot for. And when you live like Kim, here's the good news of what the Spirit has done for us. We can have the mind of Christ. We can live like Christ.

We can go and do like Christ has done. Not because of your flesh, because in our flesh we are weak and self-centered. But when you live in the Spirit, you're going to be amazed by how much you think of everybody else and how little you think of yourself.

And that's the point. You see, fullness of joy, it's found in humbling ourself and giving our life away by serving people, by unifying with the people around us, by sacrificing for the people around us. That is where fullness of joy is found. Can you bow your heads with me? Very simplistic message today, but I think it's something that all of us need.

I think it's a message that every single person, myself, as I studied this this week, listen, sometimes as your pastor, I'm no different than you. I want what I want. I want to do what I want. I want everything that I desire.

I have as many preferences and things like that as anybody in this room. And as your pastor, here's what I want you to understand. This has spoke to me that, listen, joy is not found in my agenda. Joy is not found in me wanting to do everything that I want to do. Joy is not found in living for myself. No joy, you know what joy is found in? Joy is found in giving my life away. Joy is found in giving my life to everybody else around me because that is what Jesus has done for us.

He gave his life for you. That's the standard by which you are to go and do likewise to the people around you. If you're in here today, I want you to be honest. Nobody's going to judge you because my hand is raised so I can empathize with you. If you're in here today, who's going to be honest and just say, pastor, I'm not going to lie. I live for myself and I can be self-centered in my home with my friends, perhaps in your church, at your job. And you say, sometimes I do, I make life about me. If you're in here today and that's where you're at today and you're going to be honest, would you please slip up your hand?

Yes, I see hands going up. Thank you. Thank you for your honesty. Listen, I love honest, honest people because God, he sees your heart so you can fool him. You can't fool him, like you can sit there all day long. And here's the thing, God sees you.

Here's what I want you to understand. Joy is not found in living for yourself in those places. Joy is found in giving your life away. Why don't you approach your week, be filled with the spirit and say, how in the world can I just give my life for my spouse today? How can I sacrifice what I want for them, for my family?

And then when you go to work in the morning, be filled with the spirit, understanding that the strength is from him. How can you go to your workplace and say, hey, I'm going to give my life for the people that I work with. I'm going to give myself away for them. I'm going to give myself for my friends at school. I'm not going to be about me. I'm not going to make life about me. I'm going to give my life for them. How can I sacrifice? How can I serve?

How can I do that? Because that is where joy is found. That's why some of the most joyful people are the ones that have very little. You don't know why? Because they found that true joy is not having a lot.

It's actually giving away what you have. That's where joy is found. And let's stand at this time.

Nobody's looking around. If God speaks to you, maybe you need to come and pray. Maybe your hands were raised. And listen, I just want to pray for you. But as I pray, if you need to come kneel. Father, so many hands were raised in this place. So many people admitting that we struggle with self-centeredness.

We struggle with looking at life through us. And God, in your word here in Philippians 2, you've showed us that the standard is actually giving your life away. You are the standard. You gave your life for us. And now you've challenged us to go and do that for other people. God, bless in this invitation time. Speak to our hearts. For it's in your name we pray.

Hey, nobody's looking around. If God spoke to you in any way, the altar is open. Maybe you need to come pray. Dads, maybe you need to just come pray and just say, I'm going to pray and I'm going to give my life for my spouse, for my kids, for the people around me. Maybe you need to give your life away for people at work. How can you serve? How can you sacrifice with the people around you?