Philippians 2:5-11:
Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
Who, existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped,
But emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men;
And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death, yea, the death of the cross.
Wherefore also God highly exalted Him, and gave unto Him the name which is above every name;
That in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth,
And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Philippians 3:8-9:
Yea verily, and I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for Whom I suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but refuse, that I may gain Christ,
And be found in Him, not having a righteousness of mine own, even that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.
Hebrews 11:24-26:
By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter;
Choosing rather to share ill treatment with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season;
Accounting the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt: for he looked unto the recompense of reward.
The Lord has directed that today we shall be occupied with the realisation of His full will, unto which He has called us.
This morning, you know, we were considering that great law: realisation and fulfilment, the law of the government of the Word of God. We were only able just to touch the very fringe of that matter, and I can only trust that it has at least introduced you to a new consideration.
Because of that emphasis, I trust that you will have a much closer and more careful regard for the Word of God in every matter of life.
All those who have been of service to the Lord and to others have been people of the Word—not just people who knew the Word, but people whose heart relationship to the Word of God made them men of the Word.
All who have in any way fulfilled the function of spiritual leadership, like Joshua, have, as we saw, based themselves utterly upon the Word of God. It is like that all the way through.
But the greatest of all, the Lord Jesus, was meticulously careful in everything. He moved according to the Word. The Scriptures had such a place in His whole life, conduct, teaching, and work that He became known as the Word of God. He was it.
The Word is not something only written in a book. It has become personal—personified in life, character, and being.
If we are going to be used to others, if we are going to be able to fulfil any responsibility at all, like those men in the beginning—in the church in Jerusalem and in Antioch—we must be men of the Word.
They were men who waited on God for His Word. They did not organise the church, decide upon programmes, plans, and schemes for the church, and then ask God to bless them. They never introduced anything until they had waited on the Lord for His Word about it.
The question was always: “Is this according to what is revealed?” That is the only way of growth in the church, of building up.
Well, as you see, it opens a very large door. We are not going to pass further on that matter. I just re-emphasise that a divine law of spiritual progress—in the individual life, in the church life, local and universal—is the absolute government of the Word of God.
“To the law and to the testimony! If they speak not according to this word, surely there is no morning for them.” If it is not according to the Word, there will be a hidden peril in it.
Well, we go on this afternoon to another law of this progress in the will of God unto its ultimate realisation. Remembering the whole matter, this is inherent in our calling. It is not something extra for the Christian life. It is not something optional. You cannot have a Christian life and decide whether you can have this or not have it. It is fundamental and intrinsic in the Christian life.
So is what we are going to say now about another law of the will and purpose of God in our calling. It is what is suggested—and more than suggested, presented to us—in the Scriptures which we selected for this purpose, out of many others.
What I am going to call it is the law of renunciation.
In Philippians 2, the Lord Jesus is presented to us in terms of the great renunciation. Being equal with God, the margin says that He regarded it not as something to be grasped, held on to tenaciously. But He emptied Himself. He made the great renunciation in heaven.
The Apostle Paul has caught that mind which he exhorts Christians to have. He has seen the point. It came to him in that great encounter with the Lord at the beginning of his Christian life: he saw.
Then all other things, however great they were—and they were many, and they were great, as he tells us in the letter to the Philippians—they lost their grip on him because something else got a grip on him.
He made the great renunciation; perhaps not in the same dimensions as the Lord, but for him it was everything, as it was for the Lord. Now, everything may not be as great as the Lord’s everything, but it is everything. If it is everything, well, that is it.
He counted all these things—the catalogue of advantages which were his by heredity, by birth, by upbringing, by training, by acquirements, and so on—all these things, as refuse. He renounced them.
And in the great renunciation of his Master and of himself, the church has benefited through all these generations. That is the point. That is the point to which you have to come before long.
Then we read of Moses. We could have mentioned many others in that same chapter, Hebrews 11. Moses renounced all that he had in Egypt—the learning of the Egyptians, the court of Pharaoh, all the advantages centred there. He made the great renunciation, again because of the people of God.
Now, that is the point. Before we come to its application, let me remind you that one of the clear marks and traces of the devil and his handiwork is the distortion of good into evil: good things made into bad things.
Satan creates nothing. He is not a creator. He creates nothing, but he seizes upon what has been made; and what has been made for good, he turns into bad.
Hence, you have a whole list of paradoxes in the Bible. It is fascinating to follow them, which I am not going to do; I only give you the hint. There is a whole list of paradoxes, or seeming contradictions, and they reveal this trail of good things in divine intention turned into bad.
Take the matter of ambition. Ambition, indeed, is the parent of many evils.
Ambition in the world—what ambitious men and women there are, who, to realise their ambition, will tread upon all principles, will ride roughshod over all sensibilities! Ambition is the driving force: to get, to be, to master, to dominate.
Oh, and have we not in our lifetime seen something of that? These ambitious people, as we conventionally call them, have thrown the world into the most distressing and awful state—literally multitudes being murdered for man’s ambition.
Ambition, you know, can come and has come into the church of God. Men, as Peter calls it, “lording it over God’s heritage,” wanting to be something in the church, fulfilling some secret ambition. They do not realise it, perhaps, and they do not recognise it, but others do. That is it.
Well, here is something that is easily said: God created ambition. That is a divine thing.
Translations do not help us too much in this, but Paul said, “We make it our ambition to be well-pleasing unto Him.” Make it an ambition! Oh, you have redeemed a bad word. You have salvaged something that has gone astray, that the devil has taken and turned to his own use.
It was ambition in Satan before his fall that led to his fall, and he, like the serpent, has injected that poison into human nature. But ambition—“we make it our ambition”—is something divine.
We could go on with a whole lot of paradoxes like that. Paul gave us a list in one place: “Sorrowful, yet always rejoicing”; “as poor, yet making many rich.” It is a paradox, surely.
Now, here we are in the presence of one of these paradoxes in this very chapter, Philippians 2, and in this very consideration of the great renunciation.
Satan has taken hold of something that God created and put into man and into His universe. What is it? To acquire, to possess, to have.
It is not wrong in itself to have. It is not wrong in itself to acquire or to possess. If you have had many battles over whether you ought to have this, whether it is right to possess that, then in your very nature there are the traces of this divine thing—the desire to possess, to be enriched. There is acquisition. Yes, God put that in.
We were looking at Israel this morning, and what a lot the Lord said to them about having: “I bring you into a land flowing with milk and honey,” and so on. “This is for you to have.” I mean, you can have it—to be a wealthy people. “Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, to you have I given it.”
Over against that stands renunciation. Is that a contradiction? Renunciation now becomes a law of having. He let go, and He was given. He renounced, and was endowed with all the fullness of God.
Satan uses this divine thing and twists something which is divine, which is of God, which is quite right in its own nature, and makes it an evil thing. So we have in this world this terrible assertiveness—to get, to control, to push, to dominate.
Well, where does the solution lie? Where does it lie? The answer to that question is the answer to the paradox.
You see, it is just there where the enemy has done his work, introducing the self into a good thing—power, possession, having—for self, grasping for self. But “He emptied Himself.” That is the whole story of redemption: the emptying of self.
All the wonderful issues in this whole universe, along the line of redemption—what man is going to have by God’s gift, and what we may have now by God’s gift in a spiritual way, every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ—all that fullness unto which we are called in the will of God comes along the line of the conversion of ourselves, coming round not this way, but that way; not unto self, but unto God.
Now, do not miss that very principle. Work strongly on what I am saying. Peter slipped up there because he was not converted, really, at that time. I know I am going to be challenged on that.
There was a real sense in which Peter was not converted until after Pentecost. We are not going to argue that out; say what you like about it. But when the Lord came with the basin and towel to wash his feet, Peter said, “No, Lord; Thou shalt never wash my feet.”
Then the Lord said, “If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me.” Oh, well, Peter yielded at that point. But it proved, a very few hours afterward, that really it was Peter who was in view—to have all he could get, even though he meant well.
When the Lord said, “You will get a great deal,” the great lesson that Peter would learn was renunciation. Be careful as to your ambition for fullness. Who is your thought? What is it for? Is it for self, or is it for the Lord?
Now, the principle lying behind Philippians 2 is just this: the Lord Jesus let go all that He had—heavenly glory and equality with God—not for Himself. It was His already. There was nothing whatever that He needed to do, or could do, to enhance His own possession and right.
But God had to be vindicated in the creation of man. God created man, took that tremendous responsibility of creating man.
Have you often felt that? Oh, some of your natures are better than mine. But I have sometimes wondered whether God could justify creating man collectively as he is today. I just think of the history of man, and one wonders what God was thinking about.
He took the tremendous responsibility of making the whole race—making you, making me. I have had to turn that back on the Lord sometimes and say, “Lord, You made me. You made me. You gave me a being, but I came within Your responsibility.” Well, that is helpful sometimes. I believe that.
God had to be vindicated in His creative responsibility. Therefore, He had to save this man that He had made, and He had to be glorified in this man.
There is no salvation and there is no glorification while man is a selfish creature. Selfishness discloses everything, does it not? It robs all glory everywhere. That thing has got to be touched and dealt with—not theoretically, not sentimentally, not theologically, but actually, actually.
There is no way of dealing with anything actually—and do underline that word: really, truly, actually—but by taking that thing and destroying it in your own person and work, and being the opposite yourself by a mighty, deep work of God.
It is the vindication of God, the justification of the Father, the justification of creation, making possible men coming to that glory in fellowship with the Father in heaven for ever.
That was the motive that led Him to the great renunciation, the letting go. It was, first, upward—toward His Father’s vindication; and, secondly, outward—toward men, for redemption from that twist which the devil had brought into them, by which so much misery could be made.
It was your salvation and mine from something that the devil had planted in the race, which is a contradiction to what God means. That was outward, not for Himself—not for Himself.
All that is included in this description: He emptied Himself; He humbled Himself; He took the form of a bondservant; He was found in fashion as a man; He became obedient unto death.
And it was the most shameful and ignominious form of death that this world has known. I have always been taught that crucifixion was the worst form of death. That is letting go of self, is it not? All self-interest. That is renunciation—all that was involved.
For the Father first. That is why He is always speaking of the Father: “My Father, My Father.” It was the vindication of the Father, the redemption of man unto glory, and the transformation and transfiguration of humanity.
Notice: ambition, purpose, the will of God.
Now, friends, you and I are in the way of this, are we not? Have you not noticed that the Lord’s dealings with us, when He gets His hand upon us, are along this line?
Again and again in Christian experience, we come up against a situation where it is a matter of whether we can hold on or let go. Are we going to let go? Can we let go? Can we renounce?
We are stuck until we do. We cannot get past it. It may be an incident in life; it may be what we might call a small thing in comparison with other things. But there it is.
“Shall I keep this bone between my teeth and worry it to death, or shall I let go?” All right, now it is settled.
And have you not, on the other side, experienced that when at last, through the grace of God, by the grace of the Lord Jesus, you let go and say, “Lord, all right, my hands are off. I renounce”?
I am not talking about just resigning. Be careful. Becoming resigned to your fate is not the will of God. I am not saying, “Well, I am no longer interested”—a negative attitude, a passive attitude.
No: positively, “Lord, this is what You want. You have it, and You have a purpose in bringing me to this position. I let it go. I renounce.”
When we get there, something greater than all that we had wanted comes. It is strange, is it not? It works like that.
What about Abraham and Isaac? Could not Abraham have argued with God? Could he not have supported his tenacity over Isaac? Oh yes, he could have built up a tremendous argument against offering Isaac. But he came to the point of the great renunciation: he let go.
But again, he not only got Isaac back, but he got a nation: “And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” From inward to outward, you see the range of a renunciation—a tremendous potential of enlargement.
Moses—we have picked him out amongst all these—could have argued on the ground of sovereignty: “Well, Lord, Your sovereignty so ordered that, when all the babes were being slaughtered, I was spared; and that Pharaoh’s daughter came along that day, and Your sovereignty rescued me and took me right into the palace.”
“Brought up in Pharaoh’s house, educated according to all the wisdom of the Egyptians—Your sovereignty was in this.” That is the point.
He let it all go. He left it all. He renounced it all. Why? Because he became converted—not in the New Testament sense, perhaps, but converted: turned around, with a reversion, or a conversion.
He turned from inwardness for his own people—his race, as we know, was on his heart—to the people for God. He chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God. What I may lose does not matter so long as the people get the benefit.
Do you see the point? Do you see the Son, Christ, repeating Himself in these men’s lives on this one principle: renunciation?
Because He, the Lord, the Son of God, did this, wherefore God highly exalted Him and gave Him the name which is above every name.
At the name of Jesus every knee shall bow—in heaven, on earth, and things under the earth. There is a peculiarity here. You notice that often something like that is said, but the third dimension is left out. The “under the earth” is left out. On other occasions it is “in heaven and in earth.”
I leave that for you to think about. In this case, the underworld is also going to bow to Him. His renunciation means that the underworld, the full dimensions of the universe, are affected.
What a range is affected by the ability to let go unto God. I think I hardly need say more than that to make the point. It is one of the most difficult things that you and I have to learn.
But He was meek and lowly in heart, and meekness is just that—just that selflessness, the outward aspect of life: “Not for myself, but how much others can gain if I have to lose; if I may lose, that the people He has created may be benefited.”
That is the law of enlargement—enlargement.
I stopped short in the quotation about Moses. You noticed that, of course, if you were watching. I stopped short at a certain point because I am always afraid of this wretched self-interest about reward. It is always there. It is always, like Peter at that time, ready to pounce upon it.
“He had respect unto the recompense of reward.” That is where I stopped. Very well, very well. If it is by way of renunciation and loss, He has promised enrichment along that line.
We should not be motivated by reward, should we? No servant of the Lord ought to be motivated by what he is going to get out of his service. When you have done all, say, “We are unprofitable servants.”
Nevertheless, we can put right and proper emphasis upon it because of where we started. Are you following the train of thought? This is God’s will for you, for me, for mankind: to be enriched with all His fullness, to have all that He can give.
But not selfishly; not for our own use, but for His glory, His vindication. If you and I yield ourselves to glory in that way, He is able to give us, then, of His fullness and endow us with heavenly riches.
I am quite sure that when we have found, in the discipline of renunciation, the right ground upon which to be what He wants us to be, then we have been through it.
You see, anybody who has really been through this—been right in that deep and desperate reality of facing something, some possession, something very much to them, indeed perhaps everything to them, something which might make or mar their life—has been faced with the question of willingness to let go unto the Lord.
My, it has been something, has it not? Almost devastating to self, to ambition. And when that devastation has taken place and we come out on the other side, it is done. It is done.
Then the Lord has His glory—or, forgive me, it is safe. It is safe.
I wonder how many of you, especially you servants of the Lord, whoever you are, have sometimes said to the Lord, “Lord, can You trust me with this? Can You trust me with that person? Can You really trust me to do this for me?”
“I know my own heart. I know its pride. I know its acquisitiveness, its love of position and influence. I know it. And I am afraid—afraid—that if You do, Lord, bless, I may subtly take some gratification to myself. Can You trust me?”
The Lord is working to get us to the place where He can trust us with eternal, heavenly responsibility, because He knows that that evil in our nature has been dealt with by the discipline of renunciation. You follow me? It is very true, is it not? Spiritual life, spiritual history, is like this.
There are so many tensions, are there not? My word, are we not suffering in life from nervous tensions? Strange.
Yes, many a nervous breakdown is due to this intensity, our own kind of intensity, that does us harm nervously and physically. What is it due to? We are not getting what we want. We are not having what we have set our heart upon. God is not giving it to us or doing it for us.
So we are in this state of tension, straining at life, and life becomes a strain. Even the Christian life becomes a terrible strain. But if you do not know anything about this, you are a very fortunate person. That is true.
Here we meet people everywhere under strain. What is the matter? They have not learned to let go to God.
Because I know, and you know by experience, that when you have come to the place where you let go to the Lord—I am very particular about saying to the Lord, mark you; it may be to the Lord through other people, or through somebody, something, but ultimately it is to the Lord—when you have done that, you have got there.
The wonderful calm comes: wonderful rest, wonderful peace. But that was over. Strange, is it not? It is very true.
His great renunciation meant that He identified Himself with man in the fall of man.
Temptation is not temptation—it has no meaning—if there is not something to work upon. Resolve this problem if you can, but it has no meaning at all if there is not something to work upon.
Not necessarily a sinful, evil, devilish nature, but just human nature as it is. And so, when the devil came to Him in the wilderness and offered Him the kingdoms of the world, it was no temptation if He had no heart for the kingdoms of the world.
If He could say, “We could have them; I am not interested in that. It does not matter to Me at all about the kingdoms of the world,” then He had no temptation, had He?
But if the kingdoms of this world were the very object for which He had come, there is a temptation. There is a subtle thing here, appealing to the soul-life, even to the Son of Man.
He became identified with men, knowing quite well the temptations of men and knowing man’s natural ambition—tempted in all points like as we are, apart from sin.
But He conquered. He conquered not by saying, “I am not a bit interested in this. There is no temptation to Me.” No. He said, “I am going to have that, but not at your hands, Satan; not by your gift; not along your line. I am going to the cross, and there I will destroy you and get this on proper ground.”
So He became in the likeness of man, knowing man’s temptation without the sinful nature—that is the theological problem, of course—but without the sinful nature, nevertheless with a human soul which could have ambition for itself or for God.
And so, in that temptation, it was always the Father: the Father, the Word that the Father had spoken—the battleground, you see. Not for Me, not for Me, but for others and for the Father.
I wonder if you follow me. I think we are touching things that are very real to the spiritual life. The whole matter is His identification with us in order to save us, and to save us from our selfhood, our self-towardness.
To save us by conversion—turning to God. The life of the Christian, then, simply is the life which is for God, is it not? It is for God.
We have to be tested on that so often. We get through; we come from this; we come to peace; we come to quietness. But that is over until the next time. That is the way we grow.
Next time will be more severe. Sorry to say that. In fact, you have learned something. You do not come into the more severe without the knowledge of what it means—the way through.
If you have learned something, you are able to say, “Ah, well, I have been against something like this before, and I learned how to get through it by the grace of God. All right, this is a bit more difficult, but it is the same principle.”
“I am not going to fight for my own way. I am not going to fight for my own interest. I am not going to exercise this bulldog disposition of mine to get hold of this and not let go. I am going to be ready to put that on the altar.”
And God—this solution comes that way.
The law of renunciation in progress toward divine realisation. May the Lord give us understanding and help.
I am sure we want to be quiet for a moment. God has spoken so clearly, deeply, to our hearts.
We are thinking of the whole burnt offering, on the altar laid.
The Lord expects some response from us to His loving call.