By David ReayThursday 27 Jan 2022LifeWords DevotionalsDevotionsReading Time: 2 minutes
Let Christ himself be your example as to what your attitude should be. For he, who had always been God by nature, did not cling to his prerogatives as God’s equal, but stripped himself of all privilege by consenting to be a slave by nature and being born as mortal man. And, having become man, he humbled himself by living a life of utter obedience, even to the extent of dying, and the death he died was the death of a common criminal. That is why God has now lifted him so high, and has given him the name beyond all names, so that at the name of Jesus “every knee shall bow”, whether in Heaven or earth or under the earth. And that is why, in the end, “every tongue shall confess” that Jesus Christ” is the Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (PHILLIPS)
When we need to pick up some weighty object, the experts tell us we must stoop down, bend low, so that we can bear the weight without too much strain. We have to get close to the object in order to do what we need to do.
When God determined to rescue us from our estrangement from him, he didn’t stay at a distance. In the person of Jesus, he came down to our level in order to help us. If he was going to lift us up, he needed first to bend down himself.
And then we are told, rightly, that if we are to have a new beginning, there first must be an ending. Or to put it in agricultural terms, if a crop is to grow, a seed must first be sown and buried in the soil. Or to put it another way, new life comes from death.
Jesus’ one-man rescue mission culminated in his death. But out of that death came new life as he conquered death by rising from the dead. His earthly life ended, but it resulted in new life being offered to each of us.
Christians call this coming to earth the incarnation. God taking human form. God not staying in heaven lamenting our plight and wringing his hands helplessly. He lowered himself in order to raise us to new life. He stooped to conquer.
Blessings,
David