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How community works

PictJesusWashFeet

“In humility count others more significant than yourselves. . . . He made himself nothing.”  Philippians 2:3, 7

How does community work?  By love?  Yes.  Of course.  But that isn’t Paul’s point in these verses, which are all about how community works.  And we can do bad things in the name of love.  We can walk into a situation with love as our purpose, only to trouble that situation by our good intentions but bad judgment.

The key word is humility in verse 3.  And the measure of that humility is the word nothing in verse 7.

“He made himself nothing.”  That is threatening to us.  We wonder how much it will cost us.  But it has this advantage.  It works.

When we make our egos nothing, willing to wash each other’s feet even while being scrutinized on our performance — see Peter above — we are becoming what proud human touchiness cannot resist.  Heart-level connections form when people can see, “He isn’t out for himself.”  Community starts to work.

Let’s not trust our love.  In humility let’s become nothing, as the Son of God did.  He knows what works.

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