Lent Day 3 – Kenosis

Philippians 3-11 Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Kenosis – a Greek word much debated and misunderstood over the last 2,000 years of Christianity.

Christ “emptied” Himself – Kenosis – when He became one of us, Paul told the Philippians. Heresies have built upon that sentence and that single word. Teachers have stripped it of context and come to the erroneous conclusion that Jesus emptied Himself of divinity, ceased to be God, becoming only man dependent upon God.

But God did not say to the world – to you – “I love you so much that I’m sending someone else.” No, He sent Himself…emptied…

Emptied of the opposites of humility.

Emptied – to live life as a servant far from the applause and adoration of Heaven. Trading in glory that wad rightfully his for the humility of humanity, the scorn of the crowds, the doubt of His own family, the questioning of the religious scholars, the dust of the Earth in His teeth and the cross before Him.

I want to become more like the emptied Christ. To take up the towel I must lay down my rights. To wash your feet, I must be cleansed of self-seeking, self-exulatation, self-protection and selfish ambition.

We are to live empty of all this and filled with the thinking of Christ, who, though He was in the form of God…served us as one of us.

Dietrich-Bonhoeffer-quote

Our Prayer

My God, bring me from the stage to my knees. Strip us of “I deserve” thinking and live the servant life through us.

Give feet to wash today. To fill every space we enter with the fullness of the emptied Christ.

Amen.