Day 5: Yielding as Strength

Reading: Philippians 2:3-8

 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

 5 In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

 6 Who, being in very nature[a] God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
7 rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature[b] of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
8 And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!
 
Footnotes
[a] Philippians 2:6 Or in the form of
[b] Philippians 2:7 Or the form

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Devotional: 
Philippians 2 describes how Christ, though equal with God, chose to empty Himself and take on the form of a servant. This was not weakness. It was the most profound act of strength the world has ever seen. Yielding to one another in the church follows this same pattern. It is not passive resignation. It is an active, intentional choice to elevate others above yourself, to lift them toward the Lord rather than pulling them toward your own agenda. The church that yields together reflects Jesus to a watching world. Choose today to yield in one specific relationship, and trust Christ with the outcome.