Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. 

Isn’t this like saying,

If the sun rises in the east, please become united in why and how you are living. In love pursue common objectives. It will do my heart good. (my paraphrase)

Perhaps anticipating the question, “What exactly this would look like?”, Paul says….

Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others……Your model in this life style is Jesus Christ; therefore;

Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, 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.  Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 

In Paul’s age where there was a stock of multiple deities and the reference point of great kings was Alexander and Augustus (who themselves were not opposed to being considered divine), Jesus, a Jew who died on a cross, was an unlikely model of a divine KIng, yet……

For this (very) reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

NT Wright points out that Jesus did not cease being like God, the divine ruler, as he subjected himself to the humiliation of the cross. Rather, he was just demonstrating what He was actually like in the core of his being as he willingly laid his life down for others. God’s nature is love and love is sacrificial.

In the cult comedy Friends, the character Phoebe is asked if she would like to help her closest friends on a project. She responds, “Gee, I wish I could but I don’t want to.” Upon hearing this unapologetic, honest, un-sacrificial response the room goes silent while the line gets a big laugh. I wonder why. Could it be because Phoebe revealed everyone’s heart as she dared say what they were thinking but were simply too mannered or guilty to say? It might be funny but it is also sad. I think even more accurately, it is sad because it is deemed funny. I got an education when I originally committed the faux pas of expressing this sentiment a decade ago.

I learned as I made comments such as this about lines and ideas from Friends or other contemporary comedic offerings that humor is sacred. To examine the premise of a joke violates the unspoken but culturally adopted commandment that says,”Thou shalt not challenge the basis for what I deem funny.” If I caught the drift of the thinking behind this law it went like this; I laughed…. Laughing makes me feel good…. I feel good which is the point of life. I’m viewed as puritanical because I ask, REALLY!? I know I’m on a soapbox but I will dismount after one more paragraph.

Where the contents of movies is even more crass than Phoebe’s, I have made challenges on the basis that the content is not  true or lovely or worthy of praise. Before turning away in silence, they said, “I don’t care. That was funny!” I had invaded their holy of holies with the inspired word and was told quite clearly (without a word ever having been spoken), “What I think is funny is sacred to me so back away.” If the informal contract of friendship was to stay in force, I would now have to comply to this newly added condition. But Paul just presses on and says…..

Work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or disputing; so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world.

My point? Phoebe’s light had gone out and so has ours when, free of any fear and trembling, we fail to have in us that sacrificial attitude that was in Christ. We may pine for the inspiration that would prevent us from saying (or thinking), “Gee I wish I could help, but I don’t want to.” But we need to understand that, as his apprentices, we must obey often before being gripped by any inspiration. There is a good reason for this.

If we are not walking with him as his apprentice, we will still be walking in the flesh where we do not know how to love yet and we only know truth in propositional ways (as opposed to experiential ways).  If we have not walked through this intimidating barrier of not wanting to when we are commended to we have yet to discover that with Christ in us we do in fact have the motivation within to do all things and that this (at least in part) is the basis for the hope of glory.

So, whether we are in the mood to not,  the command remains..

Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.

So when we come to that place where Phoebe was (presented with an opportunity to help), we may respond (in thought), “Gee, I don’t really want to, and then (in word) reply, “And I am happy to lend a hand.”

Regarding the unity this passage is focussing on; Where our agendas are laid aside for others we will discover that we have moved toward unity without anyone having wrestled down the opposition and arm twisted someone into agreement. Love will bring about unity on the things that really matter (which is the needs of others) while our doctrinal debates look ludicrous to the world around us and do not cause us to glow to very brightly.

Father, Help us to rethink the role of these people you have placed all around us who sovereignly touch us and whom we are sovereignly touched by. Help us to see that it is in their needs that we fulfill our calling as lights in this darkened world. Deliver us from our excuses of not being called or not being inspired where we are really just saying, “I wish I wanted to but I really don’t want to.” Animate the life of your Son within our hearts to respond afresh in our perspective and choices to the ways you have currently set us up. Amen.