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Thursday, December 26, 2013

THURSDAY 12/26/13 Daily Readings for Advent...Advent is for adoring Jesus..... Conclusion

THURSDAY 12/26/13 Daily Readings for Advent...Advent is for adoring Jesus.....


Conclusion


MY FAVORITE CHRISTMAS TEXT




My favorite Christmas text puts humility at the heart of 
Christmas. So this Christmas I am marveling at Jesus’s 
humility and wanting more of it myself. I’ll quote the text in a moment. 


But first there are two problems. Tim Keller helps us 
to see one of them when he says, “Humility is so shy. If 
you begin talking about it, it leaves.” So a meditation on 
humility (like this one) is self-defeating, it seems. But even shy people peek out sometimes if they are treated well.

The other problem is that Jesus wasn’t humble for the 
same reasons we are (or should be). So how can looking at Jesus’s Christmas humility help us? Our humility, if there is any at all, is based on our finiteness, our fallibility, and our sinfulness. But the eternal Son of God was not finite. He was not fallible. And he was not sinful. So, unlike our humility, Jesus’ humility originated some other way. Here is my favorite Christmas text. Look for Jesus’s humility. 


Though he was in the form of God, [Jesus] did not 
count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but 
made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, 
being born in the likeness of men. And being found 
in human form, he humbled himself by becoming 
obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 
(Philippians 2:6–8)


What defines Jesus’s humility is the fact that it is mainly a 
conscious act of putting himself in a lowly, servant role for 
the good of others. His humility is defined by phrases like



› “he emptied himself [of his divine rights to be free from 
abuse and suffering]”

› “he took the form of a servant”

› “he became obedient to the point of death, even death 
on a cross”

So Jesus’s humility was not a heart disposition of being 
finite or fallible or sinful. It was a heart of infinite perfec

tion and infallible truthfulness and freedom from all sin, 

which for that very reason did not need to be served. He 

was free and full to overflow in serving. 

Another Christmas text that says this would be Mark 
10:45: “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and 

to give his life as a ransom for many.” Jesus’s humility was not 

a sense of defect in himself, but a sense of fullness in himself 

put at the disposal of others for their good. It was a voluntary 

lowering of himself to make the height of his glory available 

for sinners to enjoy. 

Jesus makes the connection between his Christmas


lowliness and the good news for us: “Come to me, all who 

labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take 

my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and 

lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my 

yoke is easy, and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:28–30). 

His lowliness makes our relief from burdens possible. If 
he were not lowly, he would not have been “obedient unto 

death, even death on a cross.” And if he had not been obe

dient to die for us, we would be crushed under the weight 

of our sins. He lowers himself to take our condemnation 

(Romans 8:3). 

Now we have more reason to be humble than before. 
We are finite, fallible, sinful, and therefore have no ground 

for boasting at all. But now we see other humbling things: 

Our salvation is not owing to our work, but his grace. So 

boasting is excluded (Ephesians 2:8–9). And the way he 

accomplished that gracious salvation was through volun

tary, conscious self-lowering in servant-like obedience to 
the point of death. 

So in addition to finiteness, fallibility, and sinfulness, 
we now have two other huge impulses at work to humble 
us: free and undeserved grace underneath all our blessings 

and a model of self-denying, sacrificial, servanthood that 

willingly takes the form of a servant. 

So we are called to join Jesus in this conscious self

humbling and servanthood. “Whoever exalts himself will 

be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalt

ed” (Matthew 23:12). “Have this mind among yourselves, 

which is yours in Christ Jesus…” (Philippians 2:5). 

Let’s pray that this “shy virtue”—this massive ground of 
our salvation and our servanthood—would peek out from 
her quiet place and grant us the garments of lowliness this Advent. “Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (1 Peter 5:5).


You have been reading "Good News of Joy", by John Piper

http://dwynrhh6bluza.cloudfront.net/resources/documents/5544/DG_Advent_eBook-2013.pdf?1384881563

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