To thine own self Preach Truth...

In my last post, I mentioned the importance of preaching to one's self the truth of the gospel when we observe communion and when we sing songs in worship. I wanted to spend a little more time thinking about the importance of this in the life of the believer and to see a few ways scripture exhorts us to make this a priority in our own lives.

Last Sunday night, I had the opportunity to bring the sermon in our evening worship service. I spoke from Psalm 43 which is an amazing prayer to the Lord where the psalmist ends by preaching to himself to "hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God."

The psalmist begins with a prayer of vindication from his enemies in verse one.

1 Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against an ungodly people, from the deceitful and unjust man deliver me!

2 For you are the God in whom I take refuge; why have you rejected me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?

3 Send out your light and your truth; let them lead me; let them bring me
to your holy hill and to your dwelling!

4 Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy, and I will praise you
with the lyre, O God, my God.

5 Why are you cast down, O my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God.

Psalm 43 (ESV)

We see that he is locked in a struggle with those around him and he is tormented by the thought that he is forsaken and rejected by God because he is enduring persecution. He is a man with a divided mind because he admits that God is his refuge, but feels that he's forsaken. So he has outer circumstances influencing his inner spiritual life.

But there is a drastic shift in verse 3 that gets to the heart of the matter. The psalmist may be struggling in a battle against those around him, but ultimately it is not the REAL battle. His real battle is against unbelief. It is worship of the true and Living God that is the solution. He asks for guidance (send your light and truth) so that he will be led to God's presence and to the altar where his sins are forgiven and finally to God himself who is his ultimate and final greatest joy. When God, as his exceeding joy (or literally the gladness of his rejoicing reigning) is in His rightful place at the center of this man's worship, the Psalmist confesses that he will be whole.

He walks through these truths: that God gives guidance through light and truth; that God forgives sins; that God is to be the soul and foundation of all joy; that God is rightly to be praised even in the midst of persecution.

The result of recounting these truths is that the Psalmist then turns inward on his divided heart and preaches to himself. He questions his own heart in the light of these great truths when he says, "Why are you downcast, O my soul, and why are you downcast within me?" His next step is to preach to himself to hope in God. He acknowledges that his circumstances and his feelings are not the source of his hope. As Christians we are not to be tossed about by our circumstances and he confesses this. All of this culminates in the hope that in spite of circumstances he will worship and praise God and worship him.

On Sunday nights, part of our worship practice at our church is to read through a chapter or section of scripture together. We always have a scriptural call to worship in our Sunday morning services but we seek also to have the plain reading of scripture in our other services in accordance with 1 Timothy 4:13. We began this practice with Psalm 119 and we have read about 30 psalms, the books of Hebrews, James, 1 & 2 Peter, 1, 2 and 3 John, Jude and we just finished Ephesians. This Sunday night we read Ephesians Chapter 6. In this chapter, Paul exhorts the church to put on the full armor of God as a way to combat the the attack of Satan and reminds us that the battle we fight, ultimately isn't against earthly forces or our earthly enemies (just as the Psalmist understands). My sermon was a little long so I didn't get the opportunity to draw out this point from this passage, but I was pondering as we read that PREACHING to YOURSELF is how we "PUT ON" the belt of truth and the helmet of salvation.

This is not optional for any true Christian. The act of "putting on" truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation is the act of preaching to ourselves these truths. We are to actively affirm what scripture tells us to our hearts. We are to actively speak to our divided hearts. We all experience it and it is combated in our hearts by putting our minds and emotions in the way of the train of God's word: his light and truth. This is why it is so necessary to preach to ourselves.

Next Sunday, as you enter your place of worship, pray with Paul that great prayer he prayed for the Ephesians that the eyes of their hearts will be enlightened in order to know what is their hope.

Next Sunday, when you bow your head in prayer at the close of your churches service of worship, preach to yourselves the light and truth that you have sung and heard opened to your mind in the sermon time.

Next Sunday, make God the gladness of all your rejoicing!

Communion and the Art of Preaching to Yourself

My church observes communion on the first Sunday morning of every month. Prior to this, we observed the Lord's Supper every quarter, but not on a set Sunday, so at times it seemed sporadic. I have been so thankful and happy about this change to our service planning. I love communion. I love proclaiming the Lord's death till he comes. I love glorying in the cross and in my savior Jesus Christ. I love my brothers and sisters at my church and I love seeing a visible representation of our unity in Christ as we take the elements together. I am also encouraged and strengthened as I see foreshadowed before our church, the great final supper where the bride will meet the bridegroom and feast in the comfort and peace of the Lord, God Almighty.

The Lord's supper could be preached every Sunday and the immeasurable riches of God, the unparalleled sacrifice of our Savior, the glory of being accepted into God's family, the hope that it gives as a sign that he is coming again, the beauty of the atonement, the pervasive reality of the forgiveness of our sins, the importance of eating it in a worthy manner, the importance of the proclamation and remembering, all these could never be mined to their depths in any way. Nonetheless, we try. We remind ourselves of its significance. We seek the wisdom and encouragement of its promise. We seek the communion with our risen Lord.

This past Sunday, my pastor preached a wonderful sermon on the importance of proclaiming the Lord's death till he comes. It was a beautiful service although it had a few glitches that bother the worship leader side of me (caused by yours truly!!!). But as a worshiper, I was reacquainted with my hope that is expressed in a multitude of ways through participating in communion with my brothers and sisters. And it is this hope and our assurance of it that sustains us. Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. (Hebrews 11:1, ESV) Proclaiming the value and the nature of Christ's death till he comes is one of the most tangible ways that we can preach the cross to ourselves as well as preach our hope for his return to own mind and heart.

Preaching to ourselves is something I'll pick up on later, but more and more I see that singing is exactly this. I think that when Paul tells the Ephesians to "speak to one another with Psalms and hymns and spiritual psalms" he's giving them the greatest tool they have to preach to one another and to themselves. Singing songs in worship, for me, is a chance to meditate on great spiritual truths and to preach them to my own heart.

"My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and Righteousness"

"Let goods and kindred go, the mortal life also. The body they may kill, God's truth abideth still"

"No guilt in life, no fear in death: this is the power of Christ in me. From life's first cry to final breath, Jesus commands my destiny"

"What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus."

"Judge not the Lord by feeble sense, but trust Him for His grace; Behind a frowning providence, he hides a smiling face."

"There is no shadow of turning with Thee; Thou changest not, Thy compassions they fail not; As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be."

"He rules the world with truth and grace, and makes the nations prove the glories of His rightousness and wonders of his love."

"All glory and praise to the Lamb that was slain, Who hath borne all our sins, and hath cleans'd every stain."


I could go on and on, but I won't. My point is that when we sing these lines, we preach to one another the truth of scripture in these songs. So, we preach to ourselves as we sing as well as when we take communion. Below is a new hymn for communion written by Keith and Krystyn Getty. Read and preach its truths to your own heart.

Behold The Lamb (Communion Hymn)

Words and Music by Stuart Townend & Keith Getty & Kristyn Getty
© 2006 Thankyou Music

.

Behold the Lamb who bears our sins away,

Slain for us - and we remember

The promise made that all who come in faith

Find forgiveness at the cross.

So we share in this bread of life,

And we drink of His sacrifice

As a sign of our bonds of peace

Around the table of the King.

.

The body of our Saviour Jesus Christ,

Torn for you - eat and remember

The wounds that heal, the death that brings us life

Paid the price to make us one.

So we share in this bread of life,

And we drink of His sacrifice

As a sign of our bonds of love

Around the table of the King.

.

The blood that cleanses every stain of sin,

Shed for you - drink and remember

He drained death's cup that all may enter in

To receive the life of God.

So we share in this bread of life,

And we drink of His sacrifice

As a sign of our bonds of grace

Around the table of the King.

.

And so with thankfulness and faith we rise

To respond, and to remember

Our call to follow in the steps of Christ

As His body here on earth.

As we share in His suffering

We proclaim Christ will come again!

And we’ll join in the feast of heaven

Around the table of the King

Where's my smarts?

I saw this on another site and thought I'd check it out.

I'm in the process of improving the blog, then I'll get

down to serious blogging. Check back soon!

ht: Locusts and Honey

A Look at a New Hymn

Holy Spirit, Living Breath of God

Words and Music by Keith Getty & Kristyn Getty

© 2006 Thankyou Music

.

Holy Spirit, living Breath of God,

Breathe new life into my willing soul.

Bring the presence of the risen Lord

To renew my heart and make me whole.

Cause Your Word to come alive in me;

Give me faith for what I cannot see;

Give me passion for Your purity.

Holy Spirit, breathe new life in me.

.

Holy Spirit, come abide within;

May Your joy be seen in all I do—

Love enough to cover ev'ry sin

In each thought and deed and attitude,

Kindness to the greatest and the least,

Gentleness that sows the path of peace.

Turn my striving into works of grace.

Breath of God, show Christ in all I do.

.

Holy Spirit, from creation's birth,

Giving life to all that God has made,

Show your power once again on earth;

Cause Your church to hunger for Your ways.

Let the fragrance of our prayers arise.

Lead us on the road of sacrifice

That in unity the face of Christ

Will be clear for all the world to see.

As Christ's followers stared into his beautiful new face, I can only imagine their heartache and fear coupled with with a renewed strength and hope in Christ, this one who arose from the dead. They witnessed him die and they saw the size of the stone, yet there he was speaking with them. He had spent 40 days with them and he smiled down as he told him that he would send another, the helper that they remembered he had spoke of earlier. They asked him their last questions and watched him enter into the heavens...These men and women believed that Jesus was telling them the truth. They were waiting and praying on the day of Pentecost, when the promised Holy Spirit came down.

Today, all those who worship the God of the Bible have been called to be FILLED with the Spirit. Paul tells us what the fruit of that Spirit in us will look like in Galatians 5. He tells us that the we must live by the Spirit to keep from fulfilling the desires of our sinful flesh. This is so important for every Christian. The depths of what this means would fill one thousand blog posts. The intricacies of this truth and the myriad of ways the redeemed have sought to be filled with the spirit would fill one thousand blogs! My point is that I am not going to write much about this. I am presuming you all know of the Holy Spirit's work in your salvation as well as his work in your Sanctification.

Today I want us to think about the way we think about the Holy Spirit's work in our public worship. The hymn above is another wonderful offering from Keith and Kristyn Getty. It zeros in on the Holy Spirit's work in all of our life, but also has great indications and reflections on what the Spirit is doing in every worship service we attend. Like most songs we sing in church, this hymn is a Prayer. In lines 5-6 of the first stanza the congregation is asking that God's Holy Spirit make his word have a new life in us, so that, in turn, we will have greater faith.
Do we pray this before we read scripture? Do we, as worshipers pray this for our Pastor before he is about to deliver the sermon from God's word? Do we ask God for greater faith when we don't understand? I recall a conversation with a college classmate who shared that she was (although she didn't put it this way) losing her faith in the God of the Bible. All the objections of her religious education were mounting and she was doubting more and more. She was carefully lamenting the inevitability that she would probably soon stop believing completely. I remember asking her (remember she said that she still did believe!) if she had prayed for more faith. When we are in the depths of theological despair, or in the depths of personal despair, do we pray that God will give us more confidence in his promises and in his work? Do we ask (line 4) to renew our hearts and to mend those that are broken?

The second stanza turns from issues of our own belief and inward worship, to the aspects of our outer worship. Romans 12 teaches us that worship is not about our personal feelings, it involves our public actions. The sacrifice we are to give is ourselves, and we are to make that sacrifice to God through the way we love other believers (vv 3-9). We need to be reminded as we worship, that we are supposed to treat those we worship with in the next pew over as more important than ourselves. We are to sow paths of peace among our brothers and sisters (St.2, line 6) and we should recognize that the bible teaches that our strivings, or controversy, or hard times are all means for God's grace to be displayed in our Christ-like attitudes and the Christ-like attitudes of others. We should ask that God's spirit help us to display the proper attitudes in bad circumstances but also to recognize the encouragement that other's attitudes should be for us. This goes along with the forgiveness that is spoken of in the third line of this stanza. We need to ask the Holy Spirit to give us love enough to cover every sin that we commit when we apologize to a brother or sister for a wrong we have done, and to cover the sins of others who have sinned against us.

I have been attending church, literally, from before my birth! It is sad to say that I have watched more arguments between brothers and sisters than reconciliations. Is that your experience? Do we allow hurt feelings and grudges to fester and grow, lurking under our skin...perhaps looking for another person we can “vent” to, and perhaps get them to see the importance of recovering the pews in this particular color, or show them how we can't support the pastor any longer since he's been preaching about?...We all know the way we act. Do we seek God's Spirit to help us purge these sinful attitudes that we harbor and tendencies that we know we have? We need to search our own hearts to see if there is any way that our attitude is producing sinful actions and stirring evil thoughts. The Holy Spirit will bring sin to light. It will be obvious. Do we pray that, when the conviction comes and our sin is obvious that we will be given the strength and grace to seek God and forsake the flesh, the grace to crucify our flesh? We need to do all of this corporately as a body of like-minded believers who have been washed in the blood.

The final stanza is the corporate expression of the first two stanzas. As a church we need humility to realize that the work God does on Earth comes by his power, not ours. I know many pastors who have forgotten that along the way. We need to hunger for God's ways. That will be shown by the way we handle and seek to understand the word of God. Hunger is a wonderful metaphor. It is something we will never satisfy completely. Hunger lasts as long as we have breath. O would that we all would think on the precepts of our God as much as we think on our next meal. In lines 7 and 8, we are praying for the end to which God created Church is to live out for the World's sake. Jesus told his followers that the ultimate witness to the world isn't people knocking on doors, or religious leaders on CNN or on their own radio shows. The witness God has chosen, purchased, prepared for and planted on this earth is his bride, the catholic Church (little “c”) that is represented in our communities by us. We may be feeble and broken hearted and persecuted, but we are God's witness to the world. The way we love each others is a witness to the World.

We need to prepare our hearts and ask for the Holy Spirit when we worship so that the face of Christ, shining through our transforming faces, will be visible and clear to each other and to every unregenerate person we have contact with.

Pray for our churches and our Denominations that we will humbly submit ourselves to these scriptural truths and that as we worship, we will be seeking to be changed by giving glory to our Tri-une God who seeks to help us be conformed to his image.

A final note I want to make is that the humility displayed in asking and seeking the Holy Spirit in these things show the tremendous amount of faith and trust we have in our Great God of highest Heaven, which is also the title of the Sovereign Grace song that I will look at in my next post.

New Blog for Southern Seminary Bloggers

SBTS Blogs

I am currently a student at SBTS. There is a wonderful new resource out there in the blogosphere for those who want to hear what the young voices of are seminaries are saying. The new site Said at Southern Seminary is a very clean and useful metablog that links to many blogs of students, faculty and alumni. It is their blog debut today, so check it out.

One important and useful resource on the SASS Blog is the Seminary worship podcasts. As a seminarian, one of the greatest privileges of this time in my life is the ability to be fed by some of the country's greatest preachers and sit under the teaching of our institution's fine instructors when they preach. Seminary worship audio is free to download. So take a look at that. Also in the Podcast section, you can download episodes of Dr. Mohler's Radio program as well as his weekly Sunday School audio from Highview Baptist Church. Dr. Russel Moore, the Dean of the School of Theology also has Sunday School audio that you can access there. These can be great resources if you, say drive a long way in to work from out in the boonies and would like to listen to great preaching, teaching or ...radioing? I suppose that's what you would call it...radioing...anyway. I recommend highly the Seminary Sermon Audio. Dr. Mohler's sermon on the 10th commandment is highly recommended.



More on worship to come!

A.W. Tozer and Worship in the Church

It is cinco de Mayo. For those of us at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, this means the official last day of classes for the semester, and the looming dread of finals week which begins on Monday. I probably should be studying, but I am at work, where I can only concentrate in spurts, so I generally read blogs or short prose. I am reading a collection of sermons by A.W. Tozer entitled Whatever Happened to Worship? It has been a blessing. In a sermon entitled "Born to Worship God," Tozer preaches from Genesis 3 on the fall of Adam and Eve. In it, Tozer characterizes the world as a man with amnesia who can't put his finger on who he's supposed to be. He moves to revelation and the Gospel and makes an interesting statement about the Church's purpose. Below is the quote in context:

"Yes, worship of the loving God is man's whole reason for existence. That is why we are born and that is why we are born again from above. That is why we were created and that is why we have been recreated. That is why there is a genesis, and that is why there is a re-genesis, called regeneration.

That is also why there is a church. The Christian Church exists to worship God first of all. Everything else must come second or third or fourth or fifth."

I think that nearly everyone would agree with this after a few moments thought. I am a worship leader, studying worship and thinking always about corporate and private worship, so I agree quickly. But I think that, while we all may agree that this is the reason the church exists, we all live a different existence . I wonder if our children and teens were asked why the church exists, whether their immediate response would be that the church (Christ's body) exists for all eternity to worship and give glory and praise to God.

I wonder how many church members think that the church exists first for evangelism and baptisms? As a Southern Baptist I have heard more than one sermon that would not hold up to Tozer's assessment.

I wonder how many Christians think that the church exists PRIMARILY to alleviate the pain and suffering of others? Or how many people think that the church FIRSTLY exists as a means of grace for other Christians to be strengthened and girded up in their struggle against sin?

The thing is that it is so easy to be led by this kind of thinking. The truth is that the worshiping church, those who worship the the great and mighty and awesome God of the Bible WILL do all these 2nd and 3rd and 4th priorities. Feeding the poor isn't left out because it's not first. John Piper is famous for, among other things, writing that "the reason why missions exists, is that worship doesn't."

Worship is our motivation for evangelism, our motivation for caring for our brothers and sisters, for caring for the sinner, for loving the orphan.

SO...Sunday morning, before you go to church, how will this effect you?

When you're showering and getting ready to go to your Sunday Gathering, how will this reality shape your thoughts?

How will it shape the planning of our public gatherings?

How will it effect our programs, our ministries and our outreach?

How will this reality change what our choir anthem will be this Sunday?

Should I even have a Choir anthem?

As a worship minister how does this effect the lengths I will go to to preserve and strengthen worship in my church?

"Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." 1 cor. 10:31

Virginia Tech and Spring Break

At seminary, we do not have spring break. Technically speaking, it is called "Reading Days." We get a week off, giving us an opportunity to do the reading we've undoubtedly gotten behind on. Mine was a spring break as I got to spend a wonderful week with my family and didn't do as much reading as I should have done. I also was able to be at the burial service for a close friend who passed away recently. I did not make it for the funeral service that was the day before Easter, but I was extremely thankful for the opportunity to make it to the burial and to visit with many of our mutual friends, church members, and her family. I am thinking about doing a series of 4 or 5 posts about the ways that this blessed saint helped me grow and learn more about Jesus Christ (It's hard to call her a saint without tearing up even now). But that is for some other time. My point is to explain where I've been for over a week after boldly proclaiming that "I'm Back!"

I've been thinking a lot about my friend Karen's death and find myself remembering odd things at odd times. I can only imagine what the friends and family of those murdered at Virginia Tech must be thinking. It will be months of remembering the little oddities and idiosyncrasies about their classmates for some. For others it will be a wound deep in the heart of a mother, father, sister, or brother, best friend...a wound that will never be healed.

I don't want to say much more about the hard days ahead for these folks who will be forever changed this evil act, mainly because no words seem right in my mind. I hear people discussing this for the purposes of pushing their own ideologies and political agendas and I hear many, in the media at least, sensationalizing the story. But I know there is an answer to why this happened. There is a solution to the problem that caused it. It's just not going to be found in punditry or from politicians or from the anti-gun lobby.

Sin is the reason.
There is only one solution to it.

I want to refer you to a post at Tim Challie's Blog. He is acquainted with a couple of pastors in Blacksburg. He posted some emails and correspondence he's kept for the last two days. One email gives some prayer requests and details about the prayer service that was held last night and he quotes one of the speakers who referenced (i know it's confusing) an email from his Archbishop Emannuel Koliny of Rawanda. He quoted a Benediction that was dear to the hearts of many African believers, one that has been spoken in response to many atrocities on that continent. Here is the link to the entire post. The benediction is below.

Let us all pray earnestly that God will work and heal and pour out His Spirit so that this evil act will be used to unite strong families and churches, to rally the hopeless, and awaken the sleeping for the Glory of the Almighty God who is the only soothing balm for the pain of this life through his Son Jesus and the Spirit that is within those who love him. Our hope is not in the quick response of a police precinct, or in the wisdom and judgment of a university president. It is in Jesus Christ, who died for our sin, arose from the grave according to scriptures ascended to God's right hand and intercedes now for us, leaving us his Holy Spirit to help us till the day he comes again to judge sin and evil and to reign forevermore where we will have every tear wiped and every eye dry. God speed the day of your appearing.

Minister: All our problems . . .

People: We send them to the cross of Christ!

Minister: All our difficulties . . .

People: We send them to the cross of Christ!

Minister: All the devil's work . . .

People: We send them to the cross of Christ!

Minister: All our hopes . . .

People: We set on the risen Christ!

Minister: Christ, the Son of Righteousness, shine upon you and scatter the darkness from before your path: and the blessing of God Almighty, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you, forever and ever. Amen.

Christ has RISEN! He has Risen Indeed!

Easter people, raise your voices. Christ has conquered the grave! What a blessed morning. I won't make a long post this morning, but I wanted to direct you to a song by Andrew Peterson. It is Called High Noon from the album "Love and Thunder." I've been singing it for a week and a friend of mine did an excellent post on this song just yesterday. I told him I was going to save my words and use his! You can read his wonderful post HERE.

His name is Stephen Caveness and his blog is thought provoking and always interesting. It's called the lower case because he types with %60 of his fingers and can't hit the shift key, but I don't hold that against him!

Go check it out and enjoy the beauty of our risen Christ.

A Good Friday

What a good Friday! Christ bore our sins on the cross. Ephesians 1:7b says that in him, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. I'm so thankful to be free from the guilt of my sin and reconciled to my God through Jesus Christ but I can never get through this day without being completely humbled. I pray that we all will realize that our freedom was bought with a price: nails in perfect hands.

I'll leave you with a new-ish (2005)hymn by Keith Getty and Stuart Townend. They are the wonderful writers of many wonderful new hymns for the church. Their hymn In Christ Alone is now the #1 song in Britain according to CCLI. That is a blessing. It's great that British churches are singing these glorious truths about our wonderful savior. Maybe we will soon be singing God honoring and Christ exalting NEW songs that will help build our churches and ground them in the orthodoxy of scripture. You can see many of their other songs and learn about them HERE and HERE

"The Power of the Cross"
Words and Music by Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

Oh, to see the dawn
Of the darkest day:
Christ on the road to Calvary.
Tried by sinful men,
Torn and beaten, then
Nailed to a cross of wood.

CHORUS:
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Christ became sin for us;
Took the blame, bore the wrath—
We stand forgiven at the cross.

Oh, to see the pain
Written on Your face,
Bearing the awesome weight of sin.
Ev'ry bitter thought,
Ev'ry evil deed
Crowning Your bloodstained brow.

Now the daylight flees;
Now the ground beneath
Quakes as its Maker bows His head.
Curtain torn in two,
Dead are raised to life;
"Finished!" the vict'ry cry.

Oh, to see my name
Written in the wounds,
For through Your suffering I am free.
Death is crushed to death;
Life is mine to live,
Won through Your selfless love.

FINAL CHORUS:
This, the pow'r of the cross:
Son of God—slain for us.
What a love! What a cost!
We stand forgiven at the cross.

THURSDAY THOUGHTS

Today is Maundy Thursday. This is the day in the holy week in which Christ served his disciples the cup and bread after observing the Passover meal. He broke it and served it and proclaimed that it was his body, given for his disciples. He took a cup and proclaimed that it was his blood poured out for the forgiveness of the sins of many. John's gospel tells us that, after they had eaten, he also washed their feet in a gesture of humility. He stooped with his shirt around his waist and served them...he touched their feet, a very lowly act to their near-eastern sensibilities and customs. He commanded them to do this also and gives them a new commandment that his followers love one another in the same way that he loved his followers. He continued teaching that night and journeyed with them to a garden to pray, knowing exactly what the night would hold. What makes these events amazing is that Jesus Christ is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. He was sinless and perfect. He was before all things and ...well, just let the Holy Spirit through Paul make it clear:

15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation;
16 because by Him everything was created,
in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible,
whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—
all things have been created through Him and for Him.
17 He is before all things, and by Him all things hold together.
18 He is also the head of the body, the church;
He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
so that He might come to have first place in everything.
19 For God was pleased [to have] all His fullness dwell in Him,
20 and through Him to reconcile everything to Himself
by making peace through the blood of His cross—
whether things on earth or things in heaven.
Col. 1:15-20 HCSB

It is this amazing man, who occupies the first place in EVERYTHING who condescended to serve others. This is utterly amazing. This majestic God-man washed the feet of people. He healed people. He smiled at children. He had compassion on the crowds of people. He hung on a tree to reconcile people to God. He poured out his blood for people. While I marvel in astonishment at this truth, I would have to admit that I don't think about it enough. I don't dwell on the implications of Christ's humility. The picture of the strong showing his strength in weakness doesn’t enter into my self-seeking attitudes very often. We see this “great reversal” throughout scripture from the exodus to Hannah’s Song in 1 Samuel, to David and Goliath, all the way to the song of Mary in Luke’s Gospel. Paul spoke about God using foolish things to confound the wise so that they will be shown to be the true fools by their unbelief. God will exalt the humble, but the proud will be made low. Paul understood humility and this great reversal and with that understanding and he also wrote to some other Christians and said:

5 Make your own attitude that of Christ Jesus,

6 who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be used for His own advantage.

7 Instead He emptied Himself by assuming the form of a slave,taking on the likeness of men. And when He had come as a man in His external form,

8 He humbled Himself by becoming obedient
to the point of death—even to death on a cross.
Philippians 2:5-8 HCSB

This humility is so important. We are exhorted to follow Christ’s lead and wash the feet of our brothers and sisters.
Many wonder why marriages between Christians fail. I know that I am a stronger head of my house when I display humility and service.
As a member of a church staff, I often wonder about how dissension crops up in the church body and I can’t help believe that a failure to have this understanding of Christ-likeness is the culprit every time.
Many Christians wonder why the world doesn’t come rushing to the spring of living water and flood the doors of churches all across our nation and world because of the infinite value of our savior. Many Christians think, how can people just throw their lives away, and repeat things like, "It takes more faith to believe there is no god than to believe in God!" The real reason is that they don’t see real humility in us. They see no advantage in Christianity and hey, why should they? The bible tells us that they don't discern or understand spiritual things, so how are they to truly know that they are wasting their life and missing out on the bread of life and the well that flows with living water? Humility is important because Jesus taught us that the world would recognize us by how we care for each other. Humility can be explained as beautiful evangelistic selflessness.

If you are interested in following Christ’s example of humility, there is a great little book by C.J. Mahaney that uses scripture to help transform our minds into the likeness of Christ. It is called Humility: True Greatness. I highly recommend it.