Lent Reflection, Day 23, March 27

For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will save it.
Luke 9:24

Additional Reading: Philippians 2:1-11; Colossians 1:15-23

We didn't climb up to heaven and beg to get into the family; rather, he entered into our broken world and surrendered Himself even to the point of death…

Philippians 2:6-11, I believe, is one of the most powerful passages in the New Testament. It is impossible for my finite mind to wrap itself around the idea that an infinite God chose to leave the glory of heaven to be born completely naked and dependent into this harsh world in the form of a baby. I cannot comprehend how Jesus, "who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness." How is it that the path God chose to take in order to reconcile humanity was that of a servant? A servant who, "humbled himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross!"

This downward mobility is so counter-intuitive to our worldview that it is impossible not to mentally trip up over the idea. The first 3 verses describe the emptying out of Jesus, or what Henri Nouwen calls, “the descending way.” We are left questioning the logic of this move when we are suddenly shaken up in verses 9-11 where Paul reveals to us the true power of the descending way: “Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 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!

The love of God has become visible in Jesus most clearly through the descending way. That is the great mystery of the Incarnation. God descended to us human beings to become a human being with us; and once among us, descended to the total dereliction of one condemned to death. It isn't really easy to feel and understand this descending way of Jesus. Every fiber of our being rebels against it. We don't mind paying attention to poor people from time to time; but descending to a state of poverty and becoming poor with the poor, that we don't want to do. And yet that is the way Jesus chose as the way to know God.

God's way can only be grasped in prayer. The more you listen to God speaking within you, the sooner you will hear that voice inviting you to follow the way of Jesus. For Jesus' way is God's way and God's way is not for Jesus only but for everyone who is truly seeking God. Here we come up against the hard truth that the descending way of Jesus is also the way for us to find God. Jesus doesn't hesitate for a moment to make that clear.

Henri Nouwen, Show Me The Way