Jesus Gave Up His Heavenly Life

One of the mysteries of the Christian faith is that God has always existed as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Since before the creation of the world, these three have existed in an exchange of love and unity so perfect that we describe “them” as one God and three persons. This love flowing back and forth from God to God is the foundation for the reality we describe as Heaven. Everything we love about the idea of Heaven is born out of the glory of the love of God being exchanged between the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

So when we think about Jesus and the sacrifice He made for us, we often think about the fact that He was unjustly accused, the pain He endured on the cross, the loss of His physical life, and the punishment He took on Himself for our sins. Rarely, though, do we think about the fact that Jesus made an earlier sacrifice. Jesus actually willingly laid down the life of Heaven to come to be a man. He left perfection and chose to live in a world damaged by sin and full of brokenness. He stepped outside of the tangible presence of God in order to lay down His life for us. Paul actually says that He “did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped,  but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men,” (Philippians 2:6-7).

Jesus had to give up everything that made Him God in order to walk out our redemption. He had to leave the unbroken relationship with the Father He had since the beginning of time in order to come and save us. He left the comforts of Heaven for a life on Earth that would end with the most terrible death humanity had yet devised. He traded everything He had so we could know the Father.

Friends, this reality should challenge us to our very core. At it’s root, there is a radical surrender unlike anything the world has ever seen at play here, all for our good. This sacrifice caused our salvation.  It purchased redemption for our world.  This sacrifice wasn’t just to save us though, Paul also uses this picture of Jesus laying down the privilege of being God as an example of what we are to do: “Have this attitude in yourselves.”

We are to lay down our lives the same way Jesus laid down His. Not just by suffering a painful death on the cross, but by leaving behind our privilege for the sake of others. Nowhere is this message more needed than in the West. We have become, for all intents and purposes the most comfortable generation in the history of mankind. And yet, though we have more comfort, more ease, and even more ability than generations past, we seem to struggle with sharing the Gospel and leading people to Jesus. We believe this is because of the hardness of our hearts, the wealth or wisdom of the population, or the fact that our culture is just tired of Christianity.

Maybe.

But what if the problem is at least in part that we’re not willing to get uncomfortable? What if as a church, we haven’t done what Jesus did? Is it possible that we haven’t been willing to embrace the radical leaving behind of the comforts of the world and the comforts of the church to bring the Gospel to places damaged by sin? Is it possible that we are making the opposite choice that Jesus did? Are we choosing the comfort of a relationship with God and God’s people, the comfort of nice things, the comfort of safety, and loosing out on a life lived among the lost helping them find their way back to God?

Friends, today, I want to challenge you. There is a radical sacrifice that Jesus made when He became a man. He laid aside His status. He embraced suffering, even to the cross and it opened up salvation for millions. Can you lay aside your status? Can you bring the Gospel to those who don’t have it? Can you embrace the suffering that comes along with that life, knowing others will come to Christ?

I don’t believe that most of the world hates Christ. I believe they’re waiting to see the life of Jesus displayed in front of them. The question is will you lay down your life like He did? Will you embrace the radical surrender of your own life for the life of Christ?

I challenge you to do it.

Photo by Josh Boot on Unsplash