I'm Third

I was talking with a friend of mine recently and she mentioned that she has been reading part of Philippians 2 every day so I thought I would take a look at it to remind myself what it says. Go ahead, take a minute right now and read it.

Did anything stand out to you? Verses 3-6 stood out to me;

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus..."

Say what? When I look at the choices I make, it is amazing how many I make that are about what's best for me. Can you imagine doing NOTHING out of selfish ambition? What would that look like?

"Consider others better than yourselves." Who exactly is "others"? I don't consider myself to have a large ego most of the time but how often do I put "others" above ME? I struggle much of the time putting my own family above myself. I struggle putting my friends above myself. Am I supposed to put even people I don't know above myself? Look to the interests of others?

I am so good at thinking about myself, where will this end? It ends with verse 5 which tells us to have the same attitude as Jesus. While this is not possible for us here on earth, we can submit to the process of becoming more like Jesus by putting our desires, our needs after the desires/needs of others. I more than a little convicted thinking of Jesus leaving his place next to God to come here as a man, live as a man, experience all that we experience and then die in our place. If anyone had the right to think of himself above others, it was Jesus. Instead, Jesus gave up EVERYTHING, He did "nothing out of selfish ambition", He considered others better than himself, He looked to the interests of others.

I went to a youth rally several years ago and heard the phrase "I'm third". Jesus is first, others are second and I am third. That is the perspective that I want. I am not even close to 100% successful with that but I am trying creep that percentage closer and closer.