The Right Question--April 16, 2025

 The Right Question--April 16, 2025

"Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves. Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death--even death on a cross." [Philippians 2:3-8]

The right question is not, "What gives ME an advantage?" It's not even, "What gives the advantage to MY group of like-minded individuals?" either.

For the followers of Jesus, the right question is, "What is for the good of others?" because that is Jesus' driving question first.  And if it is Jesus' core concern to seek the well-being of others (even before his own), then it is also God's deepest concern as well.

And to hear the apostle Paul tell it, using these words many of us heard back this past Sunday in worship, that question is the only way to understand the real meaning of the cross of Jesus, as well as our way of life following him.  Jesus goes to the cross as the ultimate expression of not seeking his own interests first, but rather seeking the interests of others--a whole world full of us, sinners that we are--before his own. Jesus didn't stay safe.  Jesus didn't keep himself comfortable.  Jesus didn't stop his mission at the point it became inconvenient, dangerous, or painful.  He continued to seek our well-being, even when it meant pouring himself out completely.

For Christians, then, this is our new way of seeing the world and acting within it.  This is what it means to "let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus," as Paul put it.  I think that needs to be made clear here, because sometimes churchy folks reduce the idea of having a "Christian mindset" to avoiding swear words or bawdy jokes, or memorizing Bible verses, or scowling and scolding everyone else for not being good enough, or contemplating how many angels could dance on the head of a pin.  But Paul doesn't see this as a matter of abstract theologizing or dour moralizing, but of love as our guiding principle.  To "have the mind of Christ" is to love in such a way that we put others' interests before our own--and not merely a select group of others who are in MY group, or my family, or my town, or my country, or my ethnic group, or my political party.  It is to seek the good of all, even including strangers, neighbors you don't get along with, and enemies--because that is precisely how Christ has loved us, even at our worst.

It is worth noting that this is non-negotiable in Paul's view.  He doesn't envision some sort of two-tiered Christianity where the elite saints receive halos for special levels of Christ-likeness while the rest of us get to wallow in our same old selfishness.  Neither does Paul let us off the hook for this kind of other-centered love because Jesus has already done it for us first.  We should be honest about this, especially us Protestants.  Sometimes we talk about how Jesus "paid it all" and "took our place" in such a way that we sound like we're saying "I don't have to love others selflessly, because Jesus already did that perfectly. I just get to put my name on his paper and hand it in as my own."  But that is literally the opposite of what Paul says here.  He does affirm that Jesus has already loved us wholly and completely, to the point of laying down his life for us and putting the interests of the whole world before himself.  But Paul takes that as the starting point for us--that very same mindset becomes our own.  We are called to embody the same kind of love, not in order to earn love from Jesus, but precisely because we are already the recipients of such love.  But there is no version of Christianity where I get to say, "I get God's love, and therefore I don't have to care about THOSE PEOPLE." There is only the inverse: "Because we have been loved by God, we are learning to love all, which means putting the interests of others--including "THOSE PEOPLE"--even before our own."

All of this may seem obvious, at least to read from the actual words of the New Testament. But we need to be clear about this because I find very frequently Respectable Religious Folks balk at this "others first" thing the moment it becomes real and concrete in an actual situation of daily life. When it comes to our money, our time, our resources, or our comfort we start to get stingy and slide back into that same old "You've gotta look out for Number One!" mentality that the world still wrongly calls common sense. We start making excuses for why THEY don't deserve our help, or why THEIR concerns just aren't as important as our own. We start inventing reasons why others should be disqualified for care, help, or even just basic human decency.  And very frequently, we end up pitting the well-being of others against our own, as if it life is a zero-sum game, and then we tell ourselves that, "It's either us or them in this situation. What do you expect--that I lose my good position so that someone else can have it?"  And of course, yes, that is exactly what Paul has in mind--simply because he has been paying attention to Jesus.

Yes, in other words, we are called to put our lives on the line for the sake of helping others whose lives are at risk.  Yes, we are called to offer up our comfortable situations, our reputations, or our resources, for the sake of others who are in need.  Yes, we are called to choose the roles of servant-leadership and selfless love, rather than treating the world like one giant corporate ladder to be climbed toward success.  We do those things because we have been loved in that way already, and Jesus' love does something to us.  Jesus' love makes us into his likeness, even as it embraces us precisely as we are, and even when we are pretty much stinkers.  Later this week, many of us will sing that beloved old hymn, "My song is love unknown, my Savior's love to me--love to the loveless shown, that they might lovely be."  That's just it: we have been met in all of our loveless self-centeredness, precisely as we are, but that love does something to us.  It turns us inside-out, or rather, it meets us when sin has bent us inward on our selves and pulls us right side out again, as we were meant to be all along.

The next time you and I catch ourselves thinking, "Why should I care about THAT person, when I don't even know them?" or "THEY don't deserve my help or concern, because they are not worthy of it" before we rattle off a list of excuses (especially ones spoon-fed to us by talking heads on TV), it is worth it to hear these words of Paul's from the letter to the Philippians.  Maybe we will discover we've been asking the wrong question for so long we forgot it was possible to ask a better one.  Maybe the cross of Jesus will re-shape our minds to find the right question and to answer it with our hands, feet, and hearts.

Lord Jesus, shape us by your cruciform love to think, speak, and act in ways that look like yours.