Welcome to Silent Sounds! As students and their leaders are at the beach this week, we welcome you to join them in a consideration of one of the most important questions in life: Who is Jesus? Each day’s devotional will build on our understanding of the Person, character, and work of Jesus, culminating in a declaration and confession of the foundational truth of our faith: Jesus is Lord!
Who is Jesus? Is He just a teacher and healer? A friend? Is He someone to turn to during a family crisis, or someone who can help with a difficult problem or a relationship challenge? Just as a student’s initial response may fail to encompass all that Jesus is and desires to be in our lives, we may all struggle to accurately and adequately describe all that Jesus, the central figure in all of human history, is.
The Scripture for our devotionals this week is Philippians 2:4-11, one of the most important descriptions of Jesus in the entire New Testament. As we walk through this passage verse-by-verse, we will build on our understanding as we focus on what God’s Word says about Jesus. Each day, ask God to open your mind and your heart to discover all that He desires to reveal to you from this passage.
"Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus."
Philippians 2:4-5We read in Psalm 139:14 that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” God made each of us with a unique set of interests and gifts. Because He loves us, He wants us to develop these gifts and use them in ways that give us pleasure and a sense of fulfillment. But the word “also” in these verses tells us that God desires that our attention is not just on ourselves, but on the interests and well-being of others. As we grow to know Jesus more fully, we will understand that loving and serving others is part of the “mind” or attitude of Christ. Serving others is why Jesus came, as we will discover as we continue our study together.
"Who, as He already existed in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped."
Philippians 2:6What does it mean to say that Jesus existed "in the form of God?" It means that Jesus is God! Even a single grain of sand is so complex that it is made up of millions of atoms. There is no way to explain the complexity of the world we live in without acknowledging that it didn't simply come into existence by accident. There is a God who created the world and everything in it. And the wonder of it all is that this God desires that we know Him and have a relationship with Him.
"He has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, without the possibility that mankind will find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end."
Ecclesiastes 3:11It is built into the nature of man to long for and desire to know God. This verse from Ecclesiastes states that God has "set eternity" in man's heart, which means that the desire man has to know God has been placed in him by God Himself. And it is because God wants us to know Him that he sent His Son, Jesus, to live among us. God exists, and He sent Jesus to teach us what He is like and to satisfy the hunger we have to know Him. If you want to know what God is like, look at Jesus. Because Jesus is God, nothing is impossible to Him, and His divinity gives meaning to His words and works. In fact, any teaching that makes Jesus merely a good man or a prophet is inaccurate.
So often we focus on our search for God and our desire to know more about Him. Isn't it amazing to consider that God wants to know us, and that He desires that we know Him. That is why, when we ask God to reveal Himself to us in a fresh and new way, we can be confident that He will hear and answer that prayer. When you learn more about Jesus, you are growing in your knowledge of the God of the universe. Everything that exists was made by Him and He holds everything together.
Think about this for a moment. All the deepest mysteries that humans have considered and search for, and the deepest desires and longings of men's hears, can be met by knowing Jesus. God wants to reveal Himself to you. He cares about you, He knows everything about you, and He wants to know you.