1. That Christ did not seek to retain an appearance of Divine glory and co-equality.
  2. He divested Himself actually of His appropriate and descriptive ensigns of Divine nature and government.
  3. He entered upon a course of responsible subordination.
  4. He united Himself to human nature by a perfect incarnation.
  5. He stooped to the most extreme depression of state.
  6. He reduced Himself to the necessity of death.
  7. He yielded to death in a peculiar form.

Lessons.—1. How admirable is the expedient of the Redeemer’s incarnation! 2. What a sublime example does the conduct of the Saviour afford.—R. W. Hamilton.

Ver. 5. The Christian Temper the Same Mind which was in Christ.

I. Some things in which we cannot consider Christ as an example.—All those graces in us which suppose our guilt and fallen state could not be exemplified to us by our Saviour.

II. Some things related of Christ we must not pretend to imitate.—What He did under the character of Messiah was peculiar to Himself, and not designed to put us on doing likewise.

III. Why Christians should copy the mind and temper of Christ.—1. It was the design of God to set His Son before us as the model of the Christian temper. 2. He was a pattern admirably fitted to be proposed to our imitation. (1) He was an example in our own nature. (2) His circumstances and conduct in our nature adapted His example to the most general use. (3) His example was perfect, so that it has the force of a rule. 3. The relations in which we stand to Christ and the concern we have with Him lay us under the strongest engagements to endeavour a resemblance. He is our friend, our Lord and Master, our Head, our Judge, the model of our final happiness.

Lessons.—1. Christianity in its main design is a practical thing. 2. We see the advantages we have by the Gospel beyond any other dispensation for true goodness. 3. How inexcusable must they be who are not recovered to a God-like temper and conversation by this most excellent dispensation! 4. With what care and attention should we study the life of Christ!—J. Evans, D.D.

Christ our Pattern.

  1. The mind of Christ was a pure mind.
  2. A self-sacrificing mind.
  3. A lowly mind.
  4. A forbearing mind.
  5. A constant mind.
  6. A prayerful mind.—Preacher’s Magazine.

Vers. 6, 7. Christ the Redeemer.—This which the Son of God did and underwent is the one fact of heaven and earth, with which none in creation, none in history, none in your own personal being, can for a moment be compared, but in the presence and in the light of which all these ought to be contemplated and concluded—that it is the great object of faith and practice. Of faith—for upon the personal and hearty reception of it as the foundation of your life before God, that life itself, and all its prospects, depend; of practice—for high above all other examples, shining over and blessing while it surpasses them, is this mighty example of the Son of God. Oh, brethren, how the selfish man and the selfish woman and the selfish family ought to depart from such a theme as this, downcast for very shame, and abased at their unlikeness to the pattern which they profess to be imitating! Oh that this question might be fixed and rankle like a dart in their bosoms, even till it will take no answer but the surrender of the life to Him, and, by the daily grace of His Spirit, living as He lived!—Alford.