Mowing (Technically)

Philippians 2:1-11

Phrases that spoke to me today:
• Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit
• Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus
• He emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant
• He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross

Applying the Word to My Life:
A couple weeks ago the yard had gotten completely out of control - part of it was just a busy schedule, but there was a bigger part underneath. The boys had been mowing the whole time, but when they hit something in the way - a board, a branch - they'd move it aside, mow past it, and set it back down. The ground right along the building, where the grass and weeds had grown tall and thick, never got touched.

We had a talk about the difference between technically mowing and actually taking care of the property. They had, in fact, run a machine with a spinning blade over the lawn to make the grass shorter - nobody could argue they hadn't mowed. But the debris piled at the fence line and the overgrown edge along the building told a different story - the parts that took real effort, the parts nobody would notice unless they went looking, never got touched.

Here's the thing - I could write a rulebook to fix it: move every branch, trim within six inches of the building. I'd still miss things - an acre of property has endless ways to go wrong. But if the job is approached with actual care instead of a checklist, none of that's necessary. You move the branch because it shouldn't be there and you care - not because rule 2a says so.

The gap - between following the list and actually caring - is a tempting place for our faith to live too. You could try to write down every way to love your neighbor, and it would still fall short somewhere. Paul knew a list would never be enough. Instead of handing the Philippians a longer one, he points them to a mindset to have: "Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves."

Then he shows them what that mind actually looks like, lived all the way out. Christ, who had every right to hold onto equality with God, "did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant." He went to the one place no rule would have reached - taking on our weakness, our death - and "became obedient to death, even death on a cross."

The two great commandments were never really two - just one love, pointed in two directions. Philippians 2 shows how far that love goes once it stops checking a list and starts actually caring.

That's what "called to be saints" actually means - not clearing some bar of extra-credit rule-keeping, but doing what love actually costs, the way Christ did it first.

Over the next several weeks we're going to meet people who answered that call in every kind of circumstance - a tax collector, a cloistered nun, farmers and teenagers and bishops who paid for that love with their lives. Different people, different centuries, same call.

The funny thing is, the people we meet along the way would be the first to tell you they aren't exceptional. What's exceptional is the love they had for others, and the good God produced from that love. The call to sainthood isn't a call to be extraordinary. It's a call to love with all our heart and leave the extraordinary to God.

My Response for Today:
Today I'll find the "edge along the building" in my own life - the place I've been technically covering but not actually caring for - and do the real work there.