Attitude Adjustment: Philippians 2:1-12 - Seventh Sunday of Easter

I admire those who work in professions which require skills, patience, and intelligence I don’t have.

Teaching is one such profession.

I remember Mike, Danny, and Ray: three of the biggest troublemakers in my school. They talked back, threw spitballs, and made rude noises. I’ll never forget how Ray jumped out the window when our eleventh-grade literature teacher confronted him over his disrespect.

The teachers constantly scolded them for their bad attitudes. 

But rebellious teenagers lack insight into what motivates their misbehavior. Attitudes have a purpose: to get attention, gain power, to defy authority. 

For better or worse, your attitude shapes how you interact with the world. My high school Sunday School teacher used to say that life is only ten percent of what happens to you, but ninety percent of what you make of it. 

Attitudes are powerful, but they can change. Even bad ones. Just ask the Apostle Paul. Once upon a time, he was Saul the Pharisee, a violent persecutor of Christians. Why did he do it? One reason was that he was ordered to by the chief priests in Jerusalem. But his ultimate motivation was that he wanted to present himself to God as someone so holy that he hunted down and destroyed unholy people on God’s behalf. 

On the road to Damascus, Jesus carried out one of the biggest attitude adjustments in all of Scripture. He is struck by lightning, blinded, then healed and baptized. He becomes Paul the Apostle, who traveled throughout the lands of the Gentiles, establishing numerous churches and ultimately writing two-fifths of the New Testament

Unfortunately, his faithfulness to Christ made him subject to the very persecutions he once meted out. 

He writes his letter to the Church of the Philippians from inside a Roman jail. The problem with Roman jails was that nothing was provided for you except for the guards, the bars, and the chains, which meant that your food, water, and clothing had to be provided for you by someone outside. Sure enough, when the Philippian Church learns about Paul’s imprisonment, they send money and people to care for him. His letter expresses his joy and gratitude for all they’ve done for him, which played no small part in shaping his attitude towards his situation.

Paul could’ve interpreted his imprisonment as divine retribution: once upon a time, he imprisoned Christians, now it’s his turn. Eye for an eye; tooth for a tooth. But that was not his attitude. 

He recognizes, and emphasizes to his supporters back in Philippi, that the Christian life is far more than just believing in and serving Christ. It is also suffering with Christ.

He exhorts them to have the attitude and adopt the mindset of Christ, “who did not regard equality with God something to be grasped” as Adam and Eve had done in the Garden of Eden. 

Again, every attitude seeks something. Christ sought obedience to God. That’s it. Not comfort, approval, power, or control. When obedience meant teaching the masses, that’s what he did. When it meant healing the sick and casting out demons, that’s what he did. When it meant being rejected and crucified, that’s what he did. 

Paul sees his own life—and his imprisonment—in the same light. That’s why he rejected self-pity, bitterness, or even fear, even though he had much to fear! But that didn’t matter because it was Jesus Christ who was living and suffering in him, and he trusted that if he died, he would die in Christ and ultimately rise in Christ. 

That’s a big leap of faith for any Christian to make in the face of adversity. That’s why it’s so important to beware of your attitude. All bad attitudes focus on the self. What’s going to happen to your soul if you’re constantly thinking about how much better other people have it than you? If you’re blaming others for everything wrong in your life? If you believe God is punishing you, but you don’t know what for? You may be fearing God, but you’re not trusting God.

In the same way that you can take on a bad attitude towards bad things, you can take on a bad attitude towards good things. Great is the harm done to the Body of Christ and done by the Body of Christ by people doing God’s work to gain recognition, power, control, or good feelings. Great is the harm done by those who plunder and exploit the Body of Christ with the attitude that they are entitled. 

I will go so far as to say that the biggest problem afflicting today’s Church isn’t a membership problem or a money problem or a cultural problem. It’s a mindset problem. Just the same, the biggest problem afflicting the average Christian isn’t a time problem or attention problem but a heart problem. 

You can be Christ-like and do Christian things. But it adds up to nothing if your attitude and Christ’s are not one and the same. 

Only the Holy Spirit can change your attitude. When that happens, you do nothing, except show up. It’s Christ who lives and breathes and works in you. 

Consider Paul, chained up in prison, living a purposeful, hope-filled, joyful life despite all the suffering and danger, because Christ is living in him. And, because the Body of Christ is present with him, each is mutually encouraged by the other’s faith. His body was chained, but his spirit was free, and his rejoicing. 

Believe me when I say that the greatest thing you can seek from God in prayer is the attitude and mind of Christ. You can ask for strength in trials, healing from afflictions, and provision of needs. Sometimes, you will be satisfied by God’s answers; sometimes not. But the attitude of Christ is the quiet confidence and blessed assurance that with Christ living and breathing in you, God will work out all things for your deliverance.  God will enable you to both to will and to work for his good pleasure—and your peace.

Philippians 2:1-13 (CEB)

Therefore, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort in love, any sharing in the Spirit, any sympathy, ² complete my joy by thinking the same way, having the same love, being united, and agreeing with each other. ³ Don’t do anything for selfish purposes, but with humility think of others as better than yourselves. ⁴ Instead of each person watching out for their own good, watch out for what is better for others. ⁵ Adopt the attitude that was in Christ Jesus:

⁶ Though he was in the form of God,
        he did not consider being equal with God something to exploit.
⁷ But he emptied himself
        by taking the form of a slave
        and by becoming like human beings.
When he found himself in the form of a human,
⁸         he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death,
        even death on a cross.
⁹ Therefore, God highly honored him
        and gave him a name above all names,
¹⁰     so that at the name of Jesus everyone
        in heaven, on earth, and under the earth might bow
¹¹         and every tongue confess
            that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

¹² Therefore, my loved ones, just as you always obey me, not just when I am present but now even more while I am away, carry out your own salvation with fear and trembling. ¹³ God is the one who enables you both to want and to actually live out his good purposes.