Our scripture text this morning is Philippians, Philippians 2. We'll be reading verses 1 through 11, our focus being verses 9 through 11. That can be found on page 1,248 of your Pew Bibles. It isn't a typical or traditional Easter text, meaning that it's focusing on the actual resurrection of Christ per se, But we would see in this the very truth of the resurrection and what the resurrection means. So we're taking the resurrection and the truth of Easter and we're looking at, well, in light of this, what does that mean? What does the future look like because of the first Easter? Before we read from Philippians 2, let's ask for God's blessing. Lord God, we come before you to focus on what is principle to the gospel, what is fundamental to our faith. This is the nitty-gritties, the center of what we believe. And Father, we pray we would not only understand it, not only that we would have that in order in our knowledge and in our minds, but that we would also have it pervade who we are. And what would be pervading us is this knowledge, the knowledge of our humiliated Lord unto the exalted Lord and what it means because of his exaltation for the church and for us now. We ask this in your name. Amen. Philippians 2 beginning in verse 1. So, if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, 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. And this is our text this morning. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name. So that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Amen. This ends the reading of God's word. May he bless it to us. Oh, what a day it would have been to be one of the disciples standing there to see Jesus in His human form again, to see Jesus raised to life. Oh, what it would have been to be one of the women who went to the tomb and saw it empty, only to have Jesus reveal Himself to them as at first being mistaken as a gardener, as the Gospels say. or the disciples to be in the room and to have the upper room locked, and here is Jesus's resurrected body. Oh, what it would have meant to have been there, right? Perhaps the highlight of life for the disciples, I would think. Which makes us think of a question. We weren't able to see this. None of us here were able to witness the resurrection. We, even if we at times doubt like Thomas, we weren't given the opportunity to take our hands and place it in his scars. We weren't given the opportunity to touch him or eat with him. We weren't given Peter's opportunity when we had denied him to see him, to have him before and repent three times to be brought back by Jesus' own face, his own presence there. So what is the highlight of our life? If that would be such a highlight of the faith of the disciples, what about us? What's the highlight of your life? And I want you to think about that even considering what you are now, the history you've lived, but to and through eternity. Now you can say, well, how can you do that? How can you say what's the highlight of your life? We haven't reached glory yet. You know, glory's gotta be pretty great. Isn't that the highlight? Well, certainly. But I know for a fact that for all of the faithful, for all those who place their trust in God, we will have on the top of our list as the highlight of life something that no one will miss, and that's what's described in the text, the exaltation of Jesus Christ. We're at a moment in time when the judgment day comes, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess him. We won't miss that. And that'll certainly be a highlight of our existence because we live for the glory of our Lord. And His glory is our own. It's our own even just to see we love so much and hold so dear, exalted. But it's our glory as well as He is so gracious to bring us as people into that glory and exaltation, to wrap us up in it, to share in it. And that begins with his resurrection. This passage that we read, it's a very well-known, very beautiful text that presses the human mind to even be able to comprehend it. It's deep. It has mysteries present there. We can't focus on all of it today, but you see the text is very neatly divided into two states of Jesus. into Jesus' state of humiliation, and you see that in the first verses up to verse 8, and then it shifts in verse 9, which is our text this morning, to his state of exaltation. So you have these, shall we say, two halves of Jesus' life, or these two states, and the one idea is the humiliation and what he had went through by taking on the form of a servant, but then what happens? And the shift occurs into his exaltation with the resurrection. That's what causes the blossoming and the fruit of the resurrection of Christ, leading to his ascension and his exaltation, leading to this day. We see then both humiliation and exaltation. We see every knee bowing in verse 10. We see every tongue confessing in verse 11. And that's how we're gonna go through this text, beginning with exaltation in verse nine, borrowing a little bit from the previous verses about the humiliation. We're looking at the exaltation of Christ. As this text shows, you can't look at his exaltation without first understanding his humiliation. And we're not gonna go into this as in-depth, having covered it Friday. But you see what he did. You see that though he was existing, as the text says, in the form of God, equal to God, that's what this means, very God of very God, as we will confess, full of glory and splendor, that is the form of God. What does the text say? He did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped. What does this mean? It means that in the humiliation of the Son, the eternal second member of the Trinity, the Son of God, did something. He emptied himself. Now, that doesn't mean he ceased to be God. It doesn't mean he put away a divine nature. You can't. He has his divine nature. But what it does mean is he assumed a human nature, assumed the human nature of a servant, of a slave, of a man of sorrows, and thus emptied himself, veiled, didn't lose, but veiled his glory. and didn't count who he was in his divinity, who he was equal with the Father, who he was in full glory, something to be grasped. Meaning he didn't press his claim. Meaning he didn't press that and stand on that. Meaning he didn't identify, which isn't to say he didn't ever say he was God, but he didn't identify with that nature as much as he took on this suffering man form to do what man needed done. A servant form, a humiliated form, and that is how he thus emptied himself, taking this human nature. It was not the full revealed glory of God, but a poor man to exist as a man of sorrows, humbling himself to exist as the lowest human being who ever existed, quite frankly. That is what he took. He became the very embodiment of the people's sins. As we saw Friday, he was properly cursed because of it. He was properly crucified because of it, because he took all sin to himself and the Father punished him accordingly. This is his humiliation. Jesus was credited with all of the sins of his people, all of their dishonor. But you see in the text, all of this was, as verse eight says, a product of humbling himself. in obedience to the point of the cursed death of the cross. Now, on Friday, we had looked intensely at the forsakenness of the Son, trying to press that as far as our minds could grasp what it means for Jesus Christ to have been forsaken of God. And though we could see that the Father could simultaneously judge him, curse, forsake him, We also see what is true and part of that mystery, which lies in this text behind all of that humiliation, the father could also love him. Love him with the deepest of loves and be more pleased with him than he had ever been pleased with man before. for the son had humbled himself in obedience, the greatest act of obedience that could ever be accomplished. And so do you see the loneliness, the lowliness of the humiliation of Christ is fittingly addressed by his state of exaltation. You see it goes together. You see it's fitting. What the Father is saying here is, and Paul's using it in Philippians as an example for us, that this is what you do. This is how you act. But the theology being conveyed here is this is what the Son of God did. This is what Jesus did. He so humbled himself. He became so least, so poor that it was fitting and His reward to now be exalted because of His faithful ministry, His faithful service. The reward that's given to Christ was vindication by God. And at the center, at the very center of the resurrection stands the truth that it was a grand vindication. What do we mean by that? Well, as we saw on the cross, it was all judgment. It was all God turning His face away from the Son. It was wrath. That's what was there. And what needed to be done now, as our text is saying, was vindicate Him. Because though He became a curse, He was greater than the curse. And though He was the man of sorrows, it was a man of sorrows and a suffering unto exaltation and victory. And so what needed to happen is vindication. What does vindication mean? It's authenticate, verify, stand behind as a witness and say he is righteous and what he's done is accepted. That's the resurrection. And that's why it matters so much to us. Let's put it this way. Let's just think of like David and Goliath or that time when wars could be settled on two champions coming to fight. What's sort of ironic about David and Goliath is there was still a battle, but we'll set that to the side and we'll just use the point of the two heroes coming to fight. Jesus is our hero. What happens to him happens to us. We stand or fall on where he goes. We put it all on him, or God, more correctly, put all of our fates on him and in his plan on this man. And what you see on the cross, you would seem to think that Satan, that evil, that sin had buried him. He had ended in the grave. He had ended dead. But the truth is, is that our hero in this locked, single combat stands up. He's raised up and is victorious through what he has done. Now do you see how important that would be to us, that army, watching our hero? You see the applause, the praise that would come from our lips because what was the alternative to victory in him was hell. You can watch sports and you can be very invested in a team and really want them to win, but nothing like this. Nothing like your very eternal destiny is sewed into this man. And so his exaltation is incredibly important to us. His resurrection is incredibly important. And what Philippians 2 is saying is that the Father has exalted him to vindicate him, to show that everything he did was accepted, that all his law-keeping was right, that everything he suffered on our behalf was received. that there is no condemnation for the man who took and represented us because he is resurrected, he is glorified, he is exalted. Jesus, in his human nature, has achieved for men and as a man what no other man did and could do. This text is describing what Jesus did as a man. You see, there's no change in Jesus' divine nature. A divine nature can't change. The divine nature is perfect. To even say it could change or be added to would imply that it had been imperfect before. There is no change in his divine nature. However, the great mystery of the incarnation is that the Son of God became flesh, that there was assumed to that divine nature, to the person, I should say, of the Trinity, the Son of God assumed our nature. and became that humiliated man because man, we put it this way, man needed to dig himself out of that mess. Here's what we mean by that. Man sinned, and so man must pay for his sin because God is just. Man needed to pay the penalty. Man needed to keep the law, and that didn't change. A covenant of works needed to be kept, but it couldn't be kept by any of us. We're already guilty in Adam. Enter the humiliation of the Son of Man. Enter His exaltation and what that means. This text is so rich. So we see His humiliation, but then even in the original language, you see what this is meaning in His exaltation. The word used is that highly exalted terminology is really better put like hyper-exalted. Exalted to the nth degree that that the son here that Jesus Christ this suffering servant This humiliated man has been so exalted so hyper exalted. He has taken the highest place He can't go any higher He has come full circle from divine into this human form to now exalted but but what's now exalted is is the body is the human body the human nature and what he's done and Receiving a name above all names, our text says. And at this point, Paul doesn't tell us what that name is. There's a suspense he's building. You know it belongs to Jesus, but what is this name? He doesn't say it yet. He adds emphasis to it. All we know is that he's been so hyper-exalted, highly exalted, to receive a name above every name. Now we see in our second point in verse 10 of the text, every knee bowing. Every knee bowing. This is a result of that exaltation. It's a result of this state that Jesus has entered into where every knee bows before him. And here's that longed-for day that we began with. Can you just not wait for this day? When every knee will bow down before the resurrected, glorified Lord. Now this raises a series of questions. When will this day be? Who will all bow down? Why will all bow down? First, when will this day be? We don't know the time or the hour. God's word is very clear on that. We don't know the day when Jesus will return. We can add to that, did it happen already? Is this only future in essence? And the fact is, there's an all-readiness to this component, and I would say it began with his resurrection. It began on that first Easter. And why can we say that? Because it begins in the household of God. where his people already bend the knee before him, where his people already give to him and take the confession on the lips, the name that is above every name, where we afford to him highest honor and praise and glory. This has taken place in part, we could say. So when will this day be? We say it's begun and it began on Easter, the first Easter. We praise him. We acknowledge him as the hyper-exalted one and that it's Jesus alone. So part of that is an already component, but you really see there's a not yet element to this as well. This is talking about that day when he comes again. This is talking about a future day when this will quite literally happen. when there will be those who will confess Jesus as the Exalted One over all, and all will say it. And yeah, we await for that day. We await for that day with longing. So it's come in part, and Jesus is on the throne. That's not what we're waiting for. We're waiting for the complete final vindication, the complete final revelation and glorification of who Christ is and what He has done. So there is that not yet element. But who will all bow down? What does the text say? It says every knee, and then notice, in heaven and on earth and under the earth. It's covering all realms of existence. It's covering heaven where God dwells with the saints departed and with his angels. It's covering the realm here on earth. It's covering the realm under the earth, Sheol, So what does this mean? All beings will bow down. All rational beings will bow down, bend their knee before Him, and proclaim Him exalted. No one's left out. You know what this means. Everywhere you go, walking down the sidewalk, every person you see, You might not know a thing about them. You might never cross paths with them again. They're going to be there. You might not know whether they're saved or not, but they're going to be there and they're going to be bending their knee. What other event so all-encompassing, so universal, so impactful? What other truth then informs how we act on this life now? every knee-bowing. What other truth informs missions and evangelism like that? Will this person bend their knee willingly and lovingly, or will it be out of necessity? Will it be a bending in joy at receiving their Lord, or will it be a bending of the knee that they didn't ever want to bend? It adds that impulse to the truth of the resurrection and what that means and to the truth of Jesus' exaltation. Every knee will bow. Everyone will confess it. Why will all bow down? It's actually a good question to ask. It's a good question to ask because even though we get why believers would bow down, Why would unbelievers and why would the spirits bow down who have so heavily opposed Jesus in every way, has been the sworn enemies of Jesus and the church, who have sought his downfall or who have sought to thwart his church and his mission, why will they bow down? And yeah, we could say it's a coercion. We could say it's a force. And I think that is true in part, but I want to point to what we see even in the Gospels. How do you see demons reacting? When Jesus comes in contact with many of them, they come before him and bow down before him. And it's not out of joy, and it's not out of love. It's out of a sense of duty. It's out of a sense of there's no other option. You see, believers, it'll be the best moment of our life to bow down in joy before the Lord we know and who knows us. We will gladly bend our knees and we will do so with so much joy and the knowledge that He is our Lord. It'll be an act of great worship and praise to His name. That's why believers will bow, but what about everyone else? There will be in it a certain act of submission. They will be so defeated and so judged that there is nothing left for them to do but bow down and recognize they have lost. And Christ has won. There is no recourse but to submit. So there will be an element of submission to it, but I also believe there is room here for a certain reverence and awe, but not what the believer experiences. We reverence the name of God. We have reverence and awe for him and we get to see all his glory and it doesn't make us shudder when we see it in Christ. When we see the glory of God through Christ, it is the best of sights. It's what gives us our joy. We long for it more and more because we're coming to it as the people of God, as His children, cleansed in Christ, able to see glory, wanting to see the exaltation of Jesus Christ. And so there's a reverence and awe there, but for unbelievers and for spirits, demons, There will be a reverence and awe. It'll be a reverence because he will be so reverential and so awe-filled that they can't deny that. And I believe there will even be a recognition that it is fitting that they do so because he is so magnificent and so glorified, but it will not be an act of true worship. It will not be an act of joy. It's the difference between the army that has fought for this great exalted monarch, who bow before him because the victory is won, and the conquered army who see how great he is and bow out of necessity, but who also hate it nonetheless. Two camps. Two responses, but every knee bowing, that's the response of the resurrection. Do you embrace resurrection life? Do you know it? Is it in you or not? It also brings up a very clear point. It's more important that you bow your knee now than it is then. It's more important that you bow your knee now than it is then because that changes how you receive it. And that's really behind why Paul wrote this text. It's an example to follow Jesus, but it's orienting before us. This is coming, people. This day is coming, and every knee will bow, and you better be ones who have bowed it now, who serve him now. Obey him. That's the point. You see, don't allow the truth of the resurrection and the truth of Jesus' exaltation slip from your minds and take away your boldness. What gives us courage? What gives us boldness in our fight? It's this day. It's the exaltation of our great leader. It's that that gives us courage. It's that that gives us boldness. There's been some scholars who've said, sadly, by comparison, the church of today cuts a poor figure. To a large degree, we have lost the boldness of the early church. We largely have privatized the resurrection, and that, for the most part, we see there only what Jesus can do for us personally. The gospel has been reduced to views rather than news. What does that mean? It means the gospel has been reduced in this climate of today to just a view that you might believe in. Oh, you're a Christian. You believe in that. You believe in the resurrection. That's a nice view that you have. And I hope you take a lot of personal satisfaction and comfort from that. Maybe that will help you in your life. It's a great view for you. We see it as a view to hold among many views rather than news. rather than on the front page of the newspaper of what is happening this day, where it's written large on the Times, not the New York Times. Let's say it's the World Times, something like that, because it's for all. And what's on the front page of that? A picture. And the picture is of Christ glorified and everyone else bowing before Him. That's on the front page. That's what's happening. And that's what gives us boldness, and that's what gives us courage. As personal as the resurrection is, and it is, we've been talking about that already, bend your knee personally. That's a personal decision you must make. As personal as it is, it's noteworthy, it's newsworthy, it's of note, it's important. It affects the entire world. And it affects all that we do. The early church could be very bold in its proclamation in a multi-faith, multi-cultural situation when they didn't have anything. They had nothing to their name, and all they were going out with was a message of resurrection. and look at the boldness by which they went out and what they proclaimed, and what was guiding their mission, what was guiding Paul's mission, you better believe, was this truth, the exaltation of Jesus Christ, and that every knee would be there, and every knee would be firmly planted in the dirt, worshiping the Lord, or at least submitting to Him. That's what guides us and gives us strength. We need to have that faith. To see what difference the risen Jesus has made to the world, and it's not just to you personally, it's to the world itself. From creation and the substance of creation to all mankind. And finally, we see every tongue confessing in verse 11. Every tongue confessing. We come here, Paul has left it in suspense. What's the name above every name? What's the exalted name above all? Lord. Lord. We sort of use that name frequently. I don't say wrongly in that sense, but let's not let the frequency of it diminish that it is the most exalted name. And how could we say that? Every Sunday evening, we confess our faith. We ask this question, Christian, what do you believe? form of a creed, whether it's the Apostles, Nicene, or Athanasian. What stands behind all of those creeds is a very simple creed. What was in the early church the definitive mark? What's the truth of Christianity itself? The sum and substance of any creed is this, Jesus is Lord. Jesus is Lord. What does that mean? What does that mean that Jesus is Lord? This has a very deep history. Please turn with me in your Bibles to Isaiah. Isaiah 45. Isaiah 45. We're going to read verses 18 through 25. I want us to have the whole context, but pay special attention to verse 23. There's a historical and Old Testament background to what Paul is doing here. and to what he's saying about the exaltation of Christ. And think to yourselves, just who is the Lord here? Isaiah 45, 18 and following. For thus says the Lord who created the heavens, he is God, who formed the earth and made it, he established it, he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited. I am the Lord and there is no other. I did not speak in secret in a land of darkness. I did not say to the offspring of Jacob, seek me in vain. I, the Lord, speak the truth. I declare what is right. Assemble yourselves and come, draw near together, you survivors of the nations. They have no knowledge who carry about their wooden idols, and keep on praying to a God that cannot save. Declare and present your case. Let them take counsel together. Who told this long ago? Who declared it of old? Was it not I, the Lord? And there is no other God besides me, a righteous God and a Savior. There is none besides me. Turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is no other. By myself I have sworn, from my mouth has gone out in righteousness a word that shall not return. To me every knee shall bow. every tongue shall swear allegiance. Only in the Lord it shall be said of me, our righteousness and strength. To him shall come and be ashamed all who were incensed against him. In the Lord all the offspring of Israel shall be justified and shall glory. Jesus has an exalted name. What is his name? Lord Lord that Lord Who there is no another Now obviously we have the mystery the beauty of the Trinity here Clearly that's writ large So we would ask it in this way, how here you have Yahweh, that's the Lord, all caps. This is Yahweh speaking. The triune God is speaking here. Now, how does this happen? The rule of the Father, how is that facilitated? How is that brought out? How is Isaiah 45 and this text brought out concretely into the world? Who is the one who brings this out? Who is the one exalted to that position? God the Father has done so by exalting his Son to do this in the power of the Holy Spirit to see it done. What this is saying is that Jesus occupies the throne of Yahweh, of the God of heaven and earth. Because the Father, here's the beauty of the Trinity, is so pleased at the obedience of His Son to bring not just His divine Son, who's always been on a divine throne, but a man. to sit on His throne. Has any man been so exalted? No. And had any man been so humbled? No. See what the resurrection means? It isn't just that we won't die, or that we have life eternal, It actually isn't just that sin is put away. It's that our Lord, our Savior, Jesus Christ, flesh and blood of us, of our nature, sits on the highest throne in heaven and universally reigns on behalf of us, His people, to put the world to right. We say, He's risen, and you know the response, He's risen indeed. This is what we're meaning. This is what the creed means when you say Jesus is Lord. It's come full circle. The line of one who was existing in the fullness of the glory of God, who had so humbled himself by taking this form, is now hyper-exalted. All this theology then has a very practical point. Paul had given it in verses three through five. Let's go back to that. It wasn't part of our text, but it explains the context. What does he say? Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, and then He goes into this. That's why we do it, and that's why we obey, and that's why we bend the knee now. That's why we live for Him. You might say, I already call Him Lord, I already bow the knee before Him. And that's great, but we need this. We need to be reminded of this. We need to feed on this. We need to live in light of this every day, understanding what we mean when we confess as our salvation, Jesus is Lord. So people of God, kneel before your Lord Jesus Christ. He is risen and every knee and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. Amen. Let's pray. Lord Jesus Christ, we address you in prayer even at this moment. You sit bodily on an exalted throne and there is no throne higher. Our words come before you. You have the power to do all that you will. You have the love for your people to do it all for our good. And you are bringing everything to an appointed end. And we have just read of the day when we will all bow before you and all proclaim rightly so that you are Lord. We praise your name and let us live in humility and love in light of this truth. We ask this in your name. Amen.