Get Your Hands Dirty

So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Philippians 2:1-4 ESV).

 

I have found that manual labor often involves me getting my hands dirty. The idiom of “getting your hands dirty” comes from a sense of being intimated involved in work. Sometimes that means being the leader and at other times it means being led. It is the only means to real humility. Our reading today comes from one of the warmest and friendliest of Paul’s letters in the Bible. The church in Philippi seems to have been quite healthy and a source of joy for Paul.

 

Of course it was not perfect. No church is. As we read along in Philippians, we see hints and whispers that Paul knows a few unhappy and unhealthy things about this congregation. There are some cracks in their unity, some struggles with pride. In Philippians 2, Paul begins to address this. And he lays it on pretty thick. “If you are even remotely Christian,” Paul says, in effect, “then make me even more joyful by embracing ­humility.”

 

Many theologians teach that humility is the core Christian virtue, the characteristic that makes us most like Jesus. Humility helps us realize that even though we all have gifts and talents to do many things, that does not make us better than anyone else. Instead, we try to see life as a level playing field on which each person does her or his part. And at the end of the day, we pay more attention to others than to ourselves. Let someone else compliment you for your work while you focus on building up others.

 

We all need each other. Each of us needs to be thankful for the next person. This is, as Paul explains next (in verses 5-8), the pattern established by Jesus—so this is the pattern to follow. There is no room for competition or denigration between those of the community of faith. Go ahead… get your hands dirty in the loving of others.