Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Meditation on Philippians 1:1: Servants
Reading 1: Philippians 1:1-11
Philippians 1:1 focal phrase: “servants of Christ Jesus” focal word: servants
“Servants” may be an under-translation of verse 1, as I’ve said before. But that doesn’t make it a bad translation.
After reading N.T. Wright’s sermon on Mark 10, “The Servant King,” (published in his collection Following Jesus), I’ve been reflecting on the English word “servants” and Paul’s Greek letter to the Philippians.
“Mark’s message, the message of the Servant King, the message that you and I have to grasp today, is that we are called to be followers, disciples of this Servant King, so that the victory of the cross may be implemented in the world,” Wright says.
Christ as Servant King in Mark, or as exalted servant in Philippians 2, is a paradox. And following this servant leader is a paradox, as Jesus himself says in Mark 10: “whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.”
Servanthood goes directly against the normal force of human nature. We’re born with an instinct to look out only for our own needs. As infants we are driven almost entirely by the urgency of our hunger and digestion. As toddlers our hardest lesson is to learn to share. By the time we’re adults, altruism can seem unnatural.
So servanthood is a reorientation of your entire self, through Christ, to seek the flourishing of others as intently as you seek your own. (Servanthood is not necessarily the abandonment of seeking to meet your own needs, but the abandonment of seeking them to the exclusion of the needs of others—as well as the abandonment of mistaking your wants for your needs.)
Discipleship can seem like such an abstraction. What, exactly, is “following Christ”? What does it really mean to walk with someone you can’t see? Jesus’ words in Mark, and Paul’s in Philippians, begin to answer the question: servanthood. Reversing the normal force of human nature. Pouring yourself out for others as Christ poured himself out for the world.
The gospel of Mark probably wasn’t written down yet by the time Paul wrote to the Philippians in the early 60s A.D. But it was already circulating orally around the early church, and Paul probably had much of it memorized, including Jesus’ words in Mark 10:
Their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them. But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.
In many of Paul’s letters, he needs to establish his credentials right up front, and so he introduces himself as “Paul, an apostle.” But to the Philippians, he identifies himself as a servant. And then he goes on to say, “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,” who came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life.
This letter arrived in Philippi, and now it arrives in our mailboxes. “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” Follow the one who “emptied himself” by emptying yourself. Serve Christ by serving others.
Related Resources
Commentaries on Philippians
More Meditations
Meditations on the Psalms