Sermon
Series: Philippians, Part 7
The Great Christological Confession:
The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi, Part One
Philippians 2:5-11
[Audio file on Internet Archive at https://archive.org/details/Philippians25-11_975.]
5
Let this mind be in you, which was also in
Christ Jesus: 6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not
robbery to be equal with God: 7 But made himself of no reputation,
and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: 8
And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. 9 Wherefore God
also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: 10
That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things
in earth, and things under the earth;
11 And that every tongue
should confess that Jesus Christ is
Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Introduction:
In any list of “The Greatest Chapters
of the Bible” Philippians 2 must be included. It ranks with Psalm 23, “The
Shepherd Psalm;” Isaiah 53, “The Suffering Servant;” John 17, “The Great High
Priestly Intercessory Prayer;” Romans 8, “The Hope Chapter;” 1 Corinthians 13,
“The Love Chapter;” 1 Corinthians 15, “The Resurrection Chapter;” Hebrews 11,
“The Faith Chapter;” and Revelation 21, “The Holy City Chapter.” Philippians 2
knows no equal as the “The Great Christological Confession: The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi.”
Many years ago I learned from the following about “The Full
Mention Principle” of Biblical interpretation:[1]
J. Edwin Hartill, Principles of Biblical Hermeneutics (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing
House, 1947), pp. 76-78.[2]
Arthur T. Pierson, The Bible and Spiritual Criticism: Being the
Second Series of Exeter Hall Lectures on the Bible Delivered in London, England in the Months of February, March and April, 1904 (Minneapolis: Bethany Fellowship, Inc.,
n.d.; 1970 reprint of 1905 original by The Baker and Taylor Co., New York), pp.
45-48.[3]
Here in Philippians 2:5-11 we have the
full mention of the doctrine of Christ.
John Murray
begins his sermon on verses 5-9 with these words:
“The first mystery of being is the mystery of the Trinity. This is
not a mystery that came to be. The revelation of this mystery came to be, for
all revelation is temporal, given to temporal creatures. But the truth of this
mystery is eternal. It is that of God’s eternal being in three persons. The
second mystery is that of the incarnation. This is the mystery of godliness,
the mystery of Christianity. It is a mystery that came to be, one that had a
beginning in history. The Son of God became in time what he eternally was not.
He did not cease to be what he eternally was but he began to be what he was
not. It is with this mystery the text deals.”
— John Murray, “The Mystery of Godliness” (sermon on Phil.
2:5-9), in Collected Writings of John
Murray, 4 vols., Vol. 3: Life of John Murray, Sermons & Reviews
(Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1982), pg. 236.
Murray
concludes, “The apostle has here delineated the great pivots of the mystery of
godliness.”
— Op. cit., pg. 240.
— Op. cit., pg. 240.
B. B. Warfield
recalls an ancient sermon from a millennium and a half before that magnificently
describes what the inspired Apostle accomplishes in the words of this text:
“Whenever the subtleties of heresy confuse our minds as we face
the problems which have been raised about the Person of our Lord, it is
pre-eminently to these verses that we flee to have our apprehension purified,
and our thinking 3 corrected. The sharp phrases cut their way through every
error: or, as we may better say, they are like a flight of swift arrows, each
winged to the joints of the harness.
The
golden-mouthed preacher of the ancient Church, impressed with this fulness of
teaching and inspired himself to one of his loftiest flights by the verve of
the apostle’s crisp language, pictures the passage itself as an arena, and the
Truth, as it runs burning through the clauses, as the victorious chariot
dashing against and overthrowing its contestants one after the other, until at
last, amid the clamour of applause which rises from every side to heaven, it
springs alone towards the goal, with coursers winged with joy sweeping like a
single flash over the ground. One by one he points out the heresies concerning
the Person of Christ which had sprung up in the ancient Church, as clause by
clause the text smites and destroys them; and is not content until he shows how
the knees of all half-truths and whole falsehoods alike concerning this great
matter are made by these searching words to bow before our Saviour’s perfect
deity, His complete humanity, and the unity of His person. The magic of the
passage has lost none of its virtue with the millennium and a half which has
fled by since John Chrysostom electrified Constantinople with his golden words:
this sword of the Spirit is as keen to-day as it was then, and happy is the man
who knows its temper and has the arm to wield it.”
—
Benjamin Breckinridge
Warfield, “Imitating the Incarnation” (Phil. 2:5-8), sermon in The Gospel of the Incarnation (New York:
Randolph, 1893), pp.
565-566. This sermon was originally published in The Gospel of the Incarnation (New York: Randolph, 1893), and then reprinted in The Saviour of the World (New York: Hodder and Stoughton, 1914; reprinted Cherry Hill, NJ: Mack, 1972), pp. 247-270; and in The Person and Work of Christ, ed. Samuel G. Craig (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1950), pp. 563-575. It is available as a downloadable PDF file on The Gospel Coalition at https://blogs.thegospelcoalition.org/justintaylor/page/files/2010/09/Warfield-Imitating-the-Incarnation2.pdf [accessed 15 JAN 2017]. The source information for Chrysostom’s sermon Warfield refers to is included
in the Appendix below.
Transition:
“…the most astonishing model of self-abnegating love for the
sake of others, as a ground for moral improvement. Paul explicitly
offers such an appeal in Philippians 2:5-11.”
— D. A.
Carson, The Gagging of God: Christianity
Confronts Pluralism (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996), pg. 327. Highlighting
mine.
Outline:
The Preface to
the The Great Christological Confession:
The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi
(2:5)
Part
1: The Humiliation of Christ (2:6-8)
I.
The Mind-Boggling Mentality of the Messiah (2:6)
II. The Essence
of the Action of Incarnation (2:7)
III. The
Highlighting of the Humiliation of Christ Jesus (2:8)
The Preface to the The
Great Christological Confession: The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi (2:5)
The purpose for
this passage is made clear in verse 5:
Let
this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus:
Warfield begins his sermon on this passage of Scripture with
these words:
““Christ our Example.” After
“Christ our Redeemer,” no words can more deeply stir the Christian heart than
these. Every Christian joyfully recognizes the example of Christ, as, in the
admirable words of a great Scotch commentator, a body “of living legislation,”
as “law, embodied and pictured in a perfect humanity.” In Him, in a word, we
find the moral ideal historically realized, and we bow before it as sublime and
yearn after it with all the assembled desires of our renewed souls.”
— Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield, op. cit., pg. 563.
We must not only ask ourselves at this point what this
means, but how it is even possible for us to do so. We are confronted in these
words with a demand placed on us by God in His Word to do something that flies
in the face of the natural man, and the sinful world that we find ourselves in.
1. This mind
2. in you…in
Christ Jesus
3. also
The work of Christ has been rightly divided into the
periods of His humiliation and His exaltation. His humiliation includes the
beginning of His incarnation in His conception and birth, and also embraces his
obedient life, death and burial. His exaltation includes His resurrection,
ascension, enthronement and reign. However, we must continually remind
ourselves even as we consider these aspects of His work as we deal with this
passage of Scripture that this is first and foremost about His person. We are
to see in what He did the kind of person that He is, and specifically, the
mindset of the person of Christ. We are not commended here to do what He did in
every respect, but we are directed to have this very same mindset or attitude.
What he has done is the outworking of how He thinks.
The trajectory of the hymnic confession that follows in
verses 6-11 spans from the Servant Songs of Isaiah’s prophecies, the Prologue to
John’s Gospel, John’s account of the footwashing in the upper room during the
final hours before the crucifixion, to the Gospel records of the resurrection
and ascension, and the worship scenes in what John saw and heard as recorded in
the Revelation.
Mt. 11:28-30 —
28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will
give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and
lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. 30 For my
yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
Rom. 15:3 — For
even Christ pleased not himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them
that reproached thee fell on me.
Phil. 1:1 — Paul and Timotheus, the servants of Jesus
Christ, to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the
bishops and deacons:
Part 1: The Humiliation of Christ in The Great Christological Confession: The
Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi (2:6-8)
I. The Mind-Boggling Mentality of the
Messiah (2:6)
Who,
being in the form of God,[4] thought it not robbery to be equal with God:[5]
Here is contrast. It is this contrast that makes what
Christ does in the next verse so utterly incomprehensible.
“In the first line the highest
possible exaltation of Christ is described in that he had “the form
of God”; and in the last line the lowest possible degradation with the abrupt
qualifying phrase, “death of cross,” in which even the article is wanting.”
— Nils W. Lund, Chiasmus in the New Testament: A Study in the Form and Function of
Chiastic Structures (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press,
1942; reprint, Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1992), pg. 217. Highlighting mine.
And it is this contrast that stands in stark relief to
those mean-spirited preachers addressed in the first chapter of this prison
epistle. Nothing could be more different, or more absolutely contrary than the
mind of Christ, and the mind of those preachers mentioned in 1:14-18 —
14 And
many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more
bold to speak the word without fear. 15 Some indeed preach Christ
even of envy and strife; and some also of good will: 16 The one
preach Christ of contention, not sincerely, supposing to add affliction to my
bonds: 17 But the other of love, knowing that I am set for the
defence of the gospel. 18 What then? notwithstanding, every way,
whether in pretence, or in truth, Christ is preached; and I therein do rejoice,
yea, and will rejoice.
Paul did not deal in depth in that initial chapter with
the motives of those preachers “of envy and strife” and contention, who are not
sincere, but are pretenders who wish to hurt Paul. He did frame this contrast
in his exhortations to the Philippian Christians in the opening paragraph of
this chapter with words that speak directly to the spiritual sin in the motives
of those preachers (1:3):
“Let
nothing be done through strife or
vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than
themselves.”
Those who had no glory, but vainly aspire after it in the
flesh as the preachers mentioned earlier are doing, are engaged in a mindset
that is diametrically opposed to that of Christ. He had eternal glory, and what
He went after was so inglorious on the face of it that sinners cannot possibly
comprehend how or why He would ever have considered for even one moment doing
what He did. His leaving His glory behind so completely as the words of the
next verses explain is in every aspect the exact opposite of what vainglorious
sinners do.
It is this contrast that Paul wants the Philippians to
see so that they see these preachers for what they are. This is very similar to
what Paul does in 2 Corinthians with the false apostles, but in that case he
had to address a church that had to a great degree been taken in by them, and
turned against their spiritual father, Paul. This does not seem to be the case
with either the Philippian Church, or with these mean-spirited preachers who
Paul did, after all, refer to as
“brethren in the Lord.” Therefore, while there are comparable issues involved,
the manner in which Paul addresses the issue of these preachers here is set up
an example, a model, by way of sharp contrast that may at one and the same time
alert and help the Philippian Christians, while it also shames those preachers.
We may say, in modern parlance, that what we have here is
a “come to Jesus” moment. In other words, in the words of this verse we not
only have a stark contrast between Christ and those who are vainglorious, but
we also see Christ presented by Paul as a model that exposes mean-spirited
preachers for what they are and shames them. Paul is in prison in Rome. He is
unable to deal with these contentious pretenders in person. However, the
inspired epistle that he has delivered to this church is sufficient to teach,
to reprove, to correct, and to instruct in righteousness (2 Tim. 3:16). Pride
and humility, love and hate, the spirit and the flesh, all may be seen in the
light of God’s Word for what they are. Come to Jesus. Look to Jesus. Bring it
to Jesus. Then examine yourself and others by that standard.
The deity of the Messiah is expressly affirmed in the
words of this verse. In his sermon on this passage Warfield includes a wonderful
illustration of how this should be understood using the example of a sword.
““Form,” in a word, is
equivalent to our phrase “specific character.” If we may illustrate great
things by small, we may say, in this manner of speech, that the “matter” of a
sword, for instance, is steel, while its “form” is that whole body of
characterizing qualities which distinguish a sword from all other pieces of
steel, and which, therefore, make this particular piece of steel distinctively
a sword. In this case, these are, of course, largely matters of shape and
contour. But now the steel itself, which constitutes the matter of the sword,
has also its “matter” and its “form:” its “matter” being metal, and its “form”
being the whole body of qualities that distinguish steel from other metals, and
make this metal steel. Going back still a step, metal itself has its “matter”
and “form;” its “matter” being material substance and its “form” that body of
qualities which distinguish metallic from other kinds of substance. And last of
all, matter itself has its “matter,” namely, substance, and its “form,” namely,
the qualities which distinguish material from spiritual substance, and make
this substance what we call matter.”
— Warfield, op. cit., pg. 567.
[Sermon preached 15 JAN 2017 by Pastor John T. “Jack”
Jeffery at Wayside Gospel Chapel, Greentown, PA.]
Complete Outline:
The Preface to
the The Great Christological Confession:
The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi
(2:5)
1. This mind
2. in you…in Christ Jesus
3. also
Part
1: The Humiliation of Christ The Great Christological Confession: The Apostle Paul’s Carmen Christi (2:6-8)
I.
The Mind-Boggling Mentality of the Messiah (2:6)
Appendix: Miscellaneous Resources on Philippians 2:5-11
1. Sermons
John Chrysostom (349-407), “The Homilies Of St. John
Chrysostom Archbishop Of Constantinople, On The Epistles Of St. Paul The
Apostle To The Philippians, Colossians, And Thessalonians,” trans. John A.
Broadus, in Saint Chrysostom: Homilies On
Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus,
And Philemon, Vol. XIII in A Select Library Of The Nicene And Post-Nicene
Fathers Of The Christian Church, ed. Philip Schaff (Edinburgh: T. & T.
Clark; Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, n.d.), pp. 206-218, s.v. “Homily VI. Philippians ii. 5–8,” and “Homily VII. Philippians
ii. 5–11;” on Christian Classics Ethereal
Library (CCEL) at https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf113.iv.iii.vii.html
and https://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf113.iv.iii.viii.html
respectively [accessed 14 JAN 2017].
John Murray, “The Mystery of Godliness” (sermon on Phil.
2:5-9), in Collected Writings of John
Murray, 4 vols., Vol. 3: Life of John Murray, Sermons & Reviews
(Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1982), pp. 236-241.
Benjamin
Breckinridge Warfield, “Imitating the Incarnation” (Phil. 2:5-8), sermon in The Gospel of the Incarnation (New York:
Randolph, 1893), reprinted in The Saviour
of the World (New York: Hodder and Stoughton, 1914; reprinted Cherry Hill,
NJ: Mack, 1972), pp. 247-270; and in The
Person and Work of Christ, ed. Samuel G. Craig (Philadelphia: Presbyterian
and Reformed, 1950), pp. 563-575; downloadable PDF file on The Gospel Coalition at https://blogs.thegospelcoalition.org/justintaylor/page/files/2010/09/Warfield-Imitating-the-Incarnation2.pdf [accessed 15 JAN 2017].
2. Specialized Studies
Daniel J. Fabricatore, A Lexical, Exegetical, and Theological Examination of the Greek Noun
[Morphē] in Philippians 2:6-7, Ph.D. dissertation (Clarks Summit, PA:
Baptist Bible Seminary, 2008); published as Form
of God, Form of a Servant: An Examination of the Greek Noun [Morphē] in
Philippians 2:6-7 (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2010).
Robert F. Gundry, “Style and Substance in
“The Myth of God Incarnate” According to Philippians 2:6-11,” in Crossing the Boundaries: Essays in Biblical
Interpretation in Honour of Michael D. Goulder, eds. Stanley E. Porter,
Paul M. Joyce, and David E. Orton Biblical Interpretation Series, eds. R. Alan
Culpepper, and Rolf Rendtorff, v. 8 (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1994), pp. 271-293.
Ralph P.
Martin, An Early Christian Confession:
Philippians II. 5-11 in Recent Interpetation (London: Tyndale, 1960).
Ralph P.
Martin, A Hymn of Christ: Philippians
2:5-11 in Recent Interpretation & in the Setting of Early Christian Worship,
2nd rev. ed. (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1997; previous rev. ed. by
Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1983; 1st ed. titled Carmen Christi: Philippians ii. 5-11 in Recent Interpretation and in
the Setting of Early Christian Worship, Society for New Testament Studies
Monograph Series 4, by Cambridge University, London, 1967).
Ralph P. Martin, and Brian J. Dodd, eds., Where Christology Began: Essays on
Philippians 2 (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 1998).
Wayne A. Meeks, “The Man From Heaven in
Paul’s Letter to the Philippians,” in The
Future of Early Christianity: Essays in Honor of Helmut Koester, eds. Birger
A. Pearson, A. Thomas. Kraabel, George W. E. Nickelsburg, and Norman R.
Petersen (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1991), pp. 329-336.
C. F. D. Moule, “Further Reflexions on
Philippians 2:5-11,” in Apostolic History
and the Gospel: Biblical and Historical Essays Presented to F.F. Bruce on his
60th birthday, eds. W. Ward Gasque, and Ralph P. Martin (Grand Rapids:
Eerdmans, 1970), pp. 264-276.
3. Sources for the Greek text of the New Testament and
textual criticism:
P. W. Comfort, New Testament Text and Translation
Commentary: Commentary on the Variant Readings of the Ancient New Testament
Manuscripts and How They Relate to the Major English Translations (Carol
Stream, IL: Tyndale House, 2008).
The Greek New Testament According to the Majority Text, 2nd ed., eds. Zane C. Hodges, Arthur L. Farstad,
et al. (Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1985).
Bruce M.
Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the
Greek New Testament: A Companion Volume to the United Bible Societies' Greek
New Testament (third edition) (Stuttgart, Germany: United Bible
Societies, 1971).
Bruce M.
Metzger, and United Bible Societies, A
Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Second Edition a Companion
Volume to the United Bible Societies' Greek New Testament (4th rev. ed.) (London;
New York: United Bible Societies, 1994).
Novum Testamentum
Graece, eds. Eberhard and Erwin Nestle, 27th ed., eds. Barbara
and Kurt Aland, Johannes Karavidopoulos, Carlo M. Martini, and Bruce M. Metzger
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1898, 1993).
Maurice A. Robinson and William G. Pierpont, The New Testament in the Original Greek:
Byzantine Textform 2005 (Southborough, MA: Chilton Book Publishing, 2006).
4. Greek Grammar and Vocabulary
F. Blass, and A. Debrunner, trans. and rev. Robert W.
Funk, A Greek Grammar of the New
Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 9th ed. (Chicago: The University
of Chicago Press, 1961).
Ernest De Witt
Burton, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses in
New Testament Greek, 3rd ed. (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1978
reprint of 1900 edition, University of Chicago Press, Chicago).
H. E. Dana and Julius R. Mantey, A Manual Grammar of the Greek New Testament (Toronto: The Macmillan
Co., 1927, 1955).
G. Adolf Deissmann, Bible
Studies: Contributions Chiefly from Papyri and Inscriptions to the History of
the Language, the Literature, and the Religion of Hellenistic Judaism and
Primitive Christianity, trans. Alexander Grieve (Winona Lake, IN: Alpha
Publications, n.d.; 1979 ed., reprint of Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1923,
combining both Bibelstudien and Neue Bibelstudien).
Adolf Deissmann, Light
from the Ancient East: The New Testament Illustrated by Recently Discovered
Texts of the Graeco-Roman World, 4th rev. ed. of Licht vom Osten (Tübingen, 1909, 1923), trans. Lionel R. M.
Strachan (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, n.d.; 1978 ed.).
Murray J. Harris, Prepositions
and Theology in the Greek New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2012).
C. F. D. Moule, An
Idiom-Book of New Testament Greek, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1953, 1959).
James Hope Moulton, A
Grammar of New Testament Greek, 4 vols. (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark,
1978).
James Hope Moulton, Prolegomena,
3rd ed., Vol. I in James Hope Moulton, A
Grammar of New Testament Greek (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark).
James Hope Moulton and George Milligan, The Vocabulary of the Greek Testament
Illustrated from the Papyrii and other Non-Literary Sources (Grand Rapids:
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., n.d.; 1930 ed.).
The New International Dictionary of New
Testament Theology, 3 vols.,
gen. ed. Colin Brown, English ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House,
1978; trans. from Germ. original, Theologisches
Begriffslexikon Zum Neuen Testament, 1971 by Theologischer Verlag Rolf
Brockhaus, Wuppertal).
A. T. Robertson, A
Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, 4th
ed. (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1934).
Theological
Dictionary of the New Testament, electronic ed., eds. G. Kittel, G. W.
Bromiley, and G. Friedrich; trans. G. W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
1964-1976).
Nigel Turner, Style,
Vol. IV in James Hope Moulton, A Grammar
of New Testament Greek (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1976).
Nigel Turner, Syntax,
Vol. III in James Hope Moulton, A Grammar
of New Testament Greek (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1963).
G. B. Winer A
Treatise on the Grammar of New Testament Greek: Regarded as a Sure Basis for
New Testament Exegesis, 3rd ed., trans. W. F. Moulton, 9th ed. (Edinburgh:
T&T Clark, 1882).
5. Select Commentaries
Alfred Barry, “The Epistles to the Ephesians,
Philippians, and Colossians,” in Ellicott’s
Commentary on the Whole Bible: A Verse by Verse Explanation, ed. Charles
John Ellicott, 8 vols. in 4 ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, n.d.; 1981 reprint of
1959 Zondervan ed.), VIII:61-90.
D. A. Carson, Basics For Believers: An Exposition of
Philippians (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1996).
Fred B. Craddock, Philippians,
in Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, eds. James
Luther Mays, and Paul J. Achtemeier (Louisville: John Knox, 1985).
J. Eadie, A Commentary on the Greek Text of the
Epistle of Paul to the Philippians, 2nd ed., ed. W. Young (Edinburgh:
T&T Clark, 1884).
Robert Gromacki, Stand
United in Joy: An Exposition of Philippians, The Gromacki Expository Series
(The Woodlands, TX: Kress Christian, 2002).
G. Walter Hansen, The
Letter to the Philippians, The Pillar New Testament Commentary, gen. ed. D.
A. Carson (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 2009).
William Hendriksen, “Exposition of Philippians,” in Philippians, Colossians and Philemon,
New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1962), pp. i-vi, and
1-218.
Matthew Henry, Matthew
Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible (Iowa Falls, IA: World Bible
Publishers, n.d.), VI:722-747
Robert Johnstone, Lectures
Exegetical and Practical on the Epistle of Paul to the Philippians with a
Revised Translation of the Epistle, and Notes on the Greek Text (Grand
Rapids: Baker Book House, n.d.; 1955 reprint ed. from 1875 printing by William
Oliphant and Co., Edinburgh).
Clarence M. Keen, Christian
Joy, or Outlines and an Exposition of Paul’s Letter to the Philippians
(n.p.; n.d.).
Joseph Barber
Lightfoot, St. Paul's Epistle to the
Philippians (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, , n.d.; 1953 reprint ed. from 1913 original
by Macmillan, London).
R. P. Lightner, “Philippians,”
in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An
Exposition of the Scriptures, 2 vols., eds. J. F. Walvoord and R. B. Zuck
(Wheaton: Victor Books, 1985).
Ralph P. Martin, The
Epistle of Paul to the Philippians: An Introduction and Commentary, Vol. 11
in The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries, gen. ed. R. V. G. Tasker (Grand
Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1959).
J. Vernon McGee, Probing
Through Philippians (Pasadena, CA: Thru the Bible Books, n.d.).
Matthew Poole, A
Commentary on the Holy Bible, 3 vols. (Carlisle, PA: The Banner of Truth
Trust, n.d.; 1975 reprint of 1963 ed. from 1685 1st ed.), III:680-704.
A. T. Robertson, Paul’s
Joy in Christ: Studies in Philippians, A. T. Robertson Library (Grand
Rapids: Baker Book House, 1917; 1979 reprint).
Archibald Thomas Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament
(Nashville: Broadman, 1932).
Moisés Silva, Philippians, Baker Exegetical Commentary
on the New Testament, ed. Moisés Silva (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1992).
John Trapp, A
Commentary Upon All the Books of the New Testament, 2nd ed., ed. W. Webster
(Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, n.d.; 1981 reprint from 1865 ed. by Richard D.
Dickinson), pp. 602-613.
M. R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (New York: Charles Scribner’s
Sons, 1887).
A. Blake White, Joyful
Unity in the Gospel: The Call of Philippians (Colorado Springs, CO: Cross
to Crown Ministries, 2015).
End Notes:
[1] See also Keith Piper, Answers
Book at http://answers.libertybaptistchurch.org.au/answers/124-140.pdf [accessed 15 JAN 2017].
[2] This is available online or as a free PDF file
download (60 mb) on Seminario LAMB at http://seminariolamb.com/biblioteca/lib/lib-biblical%20analysis/Principles%20of%20Biblical%20Hermeneutics%20-%20J%20Edwin%20Hartill.pdf [accessed 15 JAN 2017]. Print editions are
available on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Principles-Biblical-Hermeneutics-Edwin-Hartill/dp/0310272556/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1394410156&sr=1-1 [accessed 15 JAN 2017].
[3] Print editions are available on Amazon at http://www.amazon.com/Bible-Spiritual-Criticism-Arthur-Pierson/dp/B0045PPI6W/ref=sr_1_54?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1394411355&sr=1-54&keywords=Arthur+T.+Pierson [accessed 15 JAN 2017].
[4] “…the participle in Philippians 2:5-7 (“…Christ Jesus,
who being in very nature God, did not
consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing”)
should probably not be taken concessively (“although
in very nature God”) but causally: “…Christ Jesus, who, because he was in very nature God, did not consider
equality with God something to be exploited, but made himself nothing.”” D. A. Carson, The
Gagging of God: Christianity Confronts Pluralism (Grand Rapids: Zondervan,
1996), pp. 259-260. Here Carson cites Peter T. O’Brien, The Epistle to the Philippians: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), pp. 205-216. Op.
cit., pg. 260, note 10.
[5] Though published after the sermon on this text, I
would draw attention to the thoughtful and provocative article by David
Schrock, “Augustine on the Trinity: Jesus Christ ‘In the Form of God’ and ‘In
the Form of a Servant’” (3 FEB 2017), on Via
Emmaus at https://davidschrock.com/2017/02/03/augustine-on-the-trinity-jesus-christ-in-the-form-of-god-and-in-the-form-of-a-servant/ [accessed 3 FEB 2017].
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