Robert Barron - All the Way Down
Peace be with you. We come, of course, today to Palm Sunday, where the Church reads from one of the great Passion narratives from the synoptic Gospels, this year from St. Matthew. If you look back at my archive of sermons, you'll see I've preached many times on these Passion narratives. What I wanted to do today, this year, is look at a text, it's one of the most precious texts we have in the entire tradition. It's offered as the second reading for Mass today, and I think we don't focus upon this text enough. I'm talking about this little passage from the second chapter of Paul to the Philippians. Remember, Paul had been evangelizing in today's Turkey, Asia Minor. And then he says that through a dream he has this summons to come to Macedonia to cross over into what's now Europe and begin to preach the Gospel there.
And one of the first places he comes is the little town of Philippi. It was an important town for the Romans because a great battle had been fought there after the death of Julius Caesar, when Brutus and Cassius were conquered by Antony and Octavian. So it was an important city and one of the first places Paul preaches in Europe. And think, that leads to the evangelization of the entire European continent, which then carried the Christian faith all over the world. So the words he writes that little community are extremely important, and he writes a very kind of personally tender letter to them. It's clear that he loves them. Well, in the second chapter, you find this passage. It's Paul's words, but they think the heart of it is a hymn or a kind of poem that Paul probably learned from the Christian liturgy in the earliest days.
Now, if he writes Philippians sometime in the midfifties of the first century, which seems likely, and if, by that time, he already had taken in a hymn that was being used, these words, in their essence, go back to the very beginning of Christianity. And I think they serve as a beautiful summary statement of the Christian faith. So let me look just briefly at some of these marvelous moves. Paul says, "Christ Jesus," or "Christos Iesous" in his Greek, but in his Hebrew mind, he would've been thinking, "Mashiach Yeshua," Jesus, the Anointed One. Mashiach would mean the new David, the new King of Israel. Mashiach Yeshua. "Though he was in the form of God..."
May I just say, everybody, do not believe people that say to you that belief in the divinity of Jesus is some later accretion, it happened at the time of Constantine, it was invented by later theologians. Nonsense. One of the earliest texts we have about Mashiach Yeshua, about Christos Iesous, one of the earliest texts we have says he was in the form of God; truly human, of course, but in the form of God. Don't think that later on Christians made this up. Nonsense. "Though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped".
Now notice something very interesting here. Well, who's this God, the equality with whom he's not grasping? Well, there must be another who's also God. Don't believe those who say, oh, the Trinitarian doctrine, that's a later invention, you know, centuries afterward. Nonsense. From this very early text, we have the Father, who is God, the Son, who is God, but the Son who says, "I'm not grasping at equality with the Father". But "Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave". The Son, who's in the form of God, the Son who is divine, empties himself willingly. The Greek there is the term "kenosis". He empties himself willingly and takes the form of a slave. It's marvelous, everybody.
What does the power of God look like? It doesn't look like domination, doesn't look like someone clinging to prerogatives. But the power of God is expressed precisely in a willingness to empty oneself out of love, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness. A slave. They knew what slaves were. Slavery was everywhere in that society. The lowest rung of the social ladder, a slave. How far does the Son of God descend in this kenosis? As he does not deem equality with the Father a thing to be grasped at or held onto but rather emptied himself, how much? He went all the way down, everybody, first into our humanity. This is the Creator of all things. This is the ground of being. This is the sheer act of existence itself, who out of willing love empties himself and enters into our lowly humanity.
But more to that, not becoming a king or a potentate or a rich man, but rather becoming like a slave, like a servant. He humbled himself. Just think for a second about this, everyone. Name another religious tradition or philosophy that would say God, the Creator of all things, is marked by humility. We say many things about God, about his compassion, about his love, or about his justice, or about his sovereignty or his omnipotence, or whatever, but humility? That God empties himself to such a point that he becomes a humble servant? So your head's starting to spin a little bit. If it's not, you're not getting what Paul's saying. If it's not, you're not really understanding what Christianity's all about. God did not deem equality with God a thing to be grasped at, but went down, down into our humanity. Yes, even to the point of being a slave.
Now, listen to this. "Becoming obedient" in itself is very interesting. Who is the one becoming obedient? Who's obeying whom here? Well, the Son is obeying his Father. Again, don't you tell me that the Trinity and this Father-Son business was invented long after, that Jesus was just a charming, itinerant Jewish preacher that taught us nice ethical truth. Nonsense. Nonsense. From the earliest texts we've got about him, what's being discussed is his divinity and how the Son, obeying the Father, comes all the way down. How far down?
Listen: "Becoming obedient to the point of death". I mean, what if you said, "Okay, the Son of God humbled himself, became one of us. Okay, even became a servant, a slave for us. But somehow he's not going to be allowed to die. He's not going to die". No, no. Paul says, "Becoming obedient even to death". Well, does he go down any further? Listen: "Even death on a cross". Oh, the cross is a charming religious symbol. Not for these people, and not those who heard this, trust me. Trust me, when they heard "death on a cross," a chill went up their spine, because they knew exactly what the cross was like.
This brutal form of torture unto death, producing literally excruciating, that means "from the cross", excruciating pain to the point of death. You see what Paul's saying here? "Though he was in the form of God, he did not deem equality with God a thing to be grasped, but rather emptied himself and took the form of a slave, being born in human likeness". He obediently accepted even death. Let's go down further, death on a cross. What's being described here, everybody, and how wonderful that at Palm Sunday we come to the culminating point of Lent and we're reflecting on the Passion of Jesus; that's exactly what he's reflecting on too, the downward trajectory of the Son of God, all the way down.
Now why? Why? You say, "Well, okay, that's I suppose an interesting little acrobatic move that the Son of God made". It was an act of acrobatic love. Because why did he go all the way down into our limitation and into our humanity with all of its struggles and so on? Why did he go all the way down into death itself, yes, even death on a cross? Because he wanted to reach every one of us who had wandered far from the Father. Remember, the one to whom he's obedient is the Father, the equality with whom he didn't grasp at, but out of obedient love went all the way down, all the way down, to gather in everyone who's wandered far from the Father.
Now, keep going with this little fascinating hymn where the first Christians were trying to articulate what they believed. "Because of this, God", now we're talking about the Father again, "Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him the name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord". Now you see what's going on here. The Father sent the Son all the way down to grasp everyone who'd wandered from the Father. But now in exalting the Son, everyone is brought back to the Father.
This is not just, "Hey Jesus, isn't he something"? It's Jesus, having gone all the way to the limits of godforsakenness, now can bring back to the Father everyone whom he has grasped. The Lover sent the Beloved all the way down, so that in the love that connects them he could bring them back. Put in later theological language, the Father sent the Son all the way down so that in the Spirit he could gather them back into his life. Just at the end now, let's meditate briefly on this, that wonderful phrase: "so that every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord".
There is Mashiach Yeshua again; Jesus the Anointed One is Lord. What's the purpose of Christian life? It's to find ourselves, sinners who have wandered far away from God, to find ourselves once again brought back to the right praise of the Father. How do we do that? By making Jesus our Lord. "Every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father".
See, what's sin, everybody? Sin is wandering from the Father. What did the Father do? Well, he so loved the world that he sent his only Son all the way down, all the way, yes, to death, death on a cross, that we might be gathered in the Spirit back to him. So on this Palm Sunday, as we meditate upon the Passion of the Lord, find again the capacity to say, to the glory of God the Father, that Jesus Christ is Lord. And God bless you.