I have been memorizing Philippians 2:3-9(ish) and I am feeling some need to personally dissect the verses. I do not do this very often. Usually I just read memorize and move on, but these ones are sticking me a little.
3: Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit but in humility count others more significant than yoursleves. This is so counter intuitive to the way that humans think. We want to look out for #1 and make sure that everyone knows who is in charge. But Paul is telling us to drop this notion and actually value others more than yourself. And there is no limitation on who these "others" may be. They may be people that you actually do consider more significant than yourself (parents, husband, respected authority figures, childhood heroes, most of my work relationsips :). Or, they may be people that you don't necessarily respect or admire (my students, my president, some of the bosses I serve under people I meet randomly). The question is, what do I need to do with this?
4: Let each of you look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of yourselves. This verse is actually somewhat of a comfort to me. Maybe I am seeing this in a selfish way, but in the back of my mind I always considered my faith to be an "all about others" kind of thing. Which is true, don't get me wrong, but this makes it sound like the emergency plan that airplanes use where you are supposed to secure yours first before anyone else's. If you don't...you may not make it!
5: Have this mind among you, which is yours in Christ Jesus, It is mine because he generously gave it to me. If only I would link in with it. It is truly the only way that verses 4 and 5 can be accomplished, because humans are not born with the mindset of servants.
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