Encouragement to Humility

So, I've been blessed with the opportunity to study through the Mind of Christ with my family here in NC (that would be www.faithbaptistdurham.com) and I thought it a good idea to try and exegete the passage (Philippians 2:5-11) for personal insight while doing the study.  I'm attempting to put some of my good seminary edumucation to work and start with the Greek text. I'm not an expert, but I can work with what I've got.  So here goes a little insight from verse six of this text.  Also, thanks to Dr. Black for challenging me with an aspect of Christ's life brought out by studying this text.

Philippians 2:6 - "who continually existing in form of God, He Himself considered that to exist equal to God was not a prize (or to be exploited)"

The first thing that jumps out of this text to me, something that I'd never grasped in English translations, is the present tense of the verb translated exist.  Yeah, a lot of jargon that doesn't mean much, right.  The present tense is a tense of continually, on-going, habitual activity.  Jesus continually existed in the form of God.  Now, what is amazing is that Jesus didn't magically become God one day.  He is not a God that was made.  He wasn't begotten into God-hood, like an offspring from one of the Greek mythology stories.  Jesus simply continually existed as God.  I know, I know.  John has already pointed this out, right?  Very true, for in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God (emphasis based on Greek wording).  But I think that the Philippians passage beautifully points out Jesus' continual existence as God...that as long as God has been God (eternally), Jesus has been God as well (eternally).  We worship God in trinity, and trinity in unity, neither confounding the persons nor dividing the substance.

Now, the thing that was beautifully pointed out to me about this passage was to think about it in relation to the temptation of Jesus and the episode in the garden when He is confronted by the soldiers.  The temptation that first confronts Jesus is to take advantage of His godliness. And in the garden, when Peter cuts off the ear of the soldier, Jesus rebukes him and adds that He could call down an army of angels if He so desired.  Who would've thunk it that Jesus was tempted by the allure of accomplishing the will of God by taking advantage of His very being God.  And to think, He had...possessed the ability to do it!  But still, He humbled Himself to the point of dying a cursed death...my cursed death.

Oh the humility and obedience that our Savior had.  It pains me to consider how short I fall of the example He has shown me.  And all the more, I rejoice in the grace that covers my insufficiencies.  May we heed the challenge modeled by us by Jesus, to live a life of humility and obedience, living out the command of Paul in Philippians 2 to have the very mind of Christ in us.