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“Did you win?” That was my mom’s question when we got back from a Little League game. Of course, her son was one of the great Little League second basemen of all time. But it was all about winning in those days. There were losers and winners. If you lost, that would spur you on to practice harder and play better the next game.
Winning and losing is important, in sports and war. Defeating the enemy is the objective of going to war. May 8, 1945, was Victory in Europe Day, when Nazi Germany submitted to unconditional surrender to the Allied forces. August 15, 1945, was Victory in the Pacific Day with the surrender of Japan.
The objective in war is to win. I have a news flash for you this morning. Victory on Earth day was when God highly exalted His Son, Jesus Christ. The war has been fought, and we have won! Or rather, He has won for us. He came as our Champion, our David, and through His death, burial, resurrection, and exaltation He sank the stone deep into the enemy’s forehead.
“Did you win?” Yes, we won. Steve has won! Though we face trials, diseases, and death, we have great reason to rejoice. The angel Gabriel told Mary her Son would be great. He would sit on the throne of His father David and reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom would have no end (Luke 1:32-33). Our Champion is now seated at the right hand of Almighty God, waiting for the right moment when He will come for His church, and then in glory defeat His enemies, set up His millennial kingdom, and rule over this entire world as King of kings and Lord of lords! Then we’ll serve Him and reign with Him forever and ever. Oh yes, He won, and He has brought us into His victory.
Turn to Isaiah 45:22-24 and Philippians 2:9-11. We’ll read these passages with all the passion of victory we can muster. Isaiah 45:22 is the verse God used in Charles Spurgeon’s conversion.
Isaiah 45:22, “Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; For I am God, and there is no other. 23 “I have sworn by Myself, The word has gone forth from My mouth in righteousness And will not turn back, That to Me every knee will bow, every tongue will swear allegiance. 24 “They will say of Me, ‘Only in the LORD are righteousness and strength.’ Men will come to Him, And all who were angry at Him will be put to shame.
And to our passage for this morning:
Philippians 2:9-11, For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
The war is ended, Christ was won. We shall see this morning He is highly exalted to God’s right hand, to the position of sovereign rule and power. How did He get there?
THE HUMILITY OF CHRIST.
Notice in verse 9, “For this reason.” For what reason? Philippians 2:8 is the key to Christ’s exaltation, “He humbled Himself.” This is Paul’s purpose in this passage for all of us. How did Christ win? He won through humility. He was the second Person of the Godhead, but He didn’t cling to His exalted position. He laid aside His divine prerogatives. He humbled Himself to become a man, even a servant, and joined us humans in all but sin. He obeyed the Father completely, all the way to death, even the death of a Roman cross! He humbled Himself to fulfill the great plan of redemption, bearing the wrath of God in the place of all those God would call to Himself. Humility. That’s the key to Christ’s exaltation.
HIGHLY EXALTED.
Verse 9, “Wherefore God highly exalted Him.” “Highly exalted” is one word (huperhupsosin) and only used here in the Bible. God “hyper-exalted” Him. We have hyper-cars these days, ultra-high-performance vehicles with hundreds of horsepower and crazy top speeds. Sometimes we “hyper-ventilate.” We breathe too fast. But God “hyper-exalted” His Son because Jesus humbled Himself. That’s God’s way. First humble yourself; then God exalts you. James 4:10, “Humble yourself in the presence of the Lord, and He will lift you up.” God doesn’t have proud, arrogant people walking the streets of heaven.
Humility before exaltation is God’s way and Paul’s whole point in the context. Don’t be afraid to humble yourself, be a servant, deny yourself, and esteem others above yourself. Be concerned about the things of others because even if it looks like you’re losing, you’ve already won! In Christ we’re overcomers. John 16:33, “Take courage. I have overcome the world.” He already fought the war for us, and we are seated positionally with Him in heavenly places (Ephesians 2:6). It’s all about Christ, our super-exalted Lord and Savior. He’s our King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the center of our faith, assurance, and hope. He is the anchor of our soul Who has entered through the veil into heaven as our Forerunner (Hebrews 6:19-20). They dragged Polycarp to the arena to deny Christ. He declared with confidence in Christ’s victory, “I’ve served Him for 86 years. He’s done me no wrong. How can I blaspheme my King, who saved me?” So they tied him to a post and burned him. They would drag to the stake many more who knew Christ had overcome the world.
HOW WAS CHRIST EXALTED?
“For this reason also God highly exalted Him.” Our Savior couldn’t have gone any lower, and now He couldn’t be exalted any higher!
Hebrews 1:3, And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high….
He is Lord of lords and King of kings! Look at the contrast with His first coming when He was despised, hated, and rejected. They tried to assassinate Him outside his own hometown of Nazareth by trying to push Him over a cliff. The Jews said, “We’ll not have this man to rule over us.” That’s the heart of every sinner who has not yet repented and confessed Him as Lord and Savior. “I can do it my way. It’s my life, I’m in control, I’ll make up my own mind. I may become a Christian when I’m good and ready, but not now!” Jesus was cursed, spit upon, his beard plucked out, slapped, beaten, punched, betrayed, slandered, mocked. His back was flayed with a flagellum, a horrible whip used by the Romans on condemned slaves. And finally, they crucified Him.
But what does verse 9 say? God highly exalted Him! Jesus didn’t exalt Himself. He came to do the Father’s will and therefore God said, “Okay my Son, you obeyed and went down as far as possible, and now I’m taking you as high as possible to my right hand, the position of absolute sovereignty and authority over the nations.” In the future Jesus Christ will rule the nations with a rod of iron. During this church age in Matthew 28:18 He says, “All authority is given to Me in heaven and on earth.” He assured us in Matthew 16:18, “I will build my church and even Satan’s worse effort will not overpower it.” We evangelize with the confidence that Christ is highly exalted and sovereign over the nations.
Not only did God highly exalt Him, but He gave Jesus a name which is above every name. How did Peter describe Christ in His Pentecost message? “Having been highly exalted to the right hand of God… Let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ – this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:33, 36). Who has the greatest name in all history? Certainly not Nebuchadnezzar, or Alexander the Great, or Julius Caesar, or Genghis Khan, or Napoleon, or Isaac Newton, or George Washington Carver, or Thomas Edison, or Rockefeller, Vanderbilt, Carnegie, Henry Ford or Donald J. Trump. Of all human beings, who has the greatest name? None other than our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
How did God super-exalt Jesus Christ and give Him the greatest name above every other name? There are four powerful steps in the process from Jesus humbly completing the Father’s will to His exaltation.
First, God raised Him from the dead. The resurrection sank the stone deeply in Satan’s head. The resurrection was our guarantee that Christ won the war between good and evil, the devil and God, and that our justification was validated. Over and over in Acts we read, “You crucified Him, but God raised Him from the dead!”
Second, God superexalted Him to glory through the ascension. Forty days after His resurrection, His men stood there on the Mount of Olives and watched as He ascended and was received out of sight. Two angels stood there and made this promise: “Why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in just the same way as you have watched Him go into heaven.” Jesus is out there beyond where he ascended, and He’s coming back. Zechariah 14:4 promises a specific place for His return: “In that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in front of Jerusalem on the east.”
Third, God ushered Him into the seat of honor at His right hand. That’s where He is today. He is seated at God’s right hand in the seat of sovereign power. He is there now as our highly-exalted Lord and Savior, Prophet, Priest, and King. Acts 2 tells us Jesus Christ sent His Spirit down to the earth to apply His work of redemption to the hearts of His elect, calling and drawing them throughout the centuries to this very moment. Christ is highly exalted there as our great High Priest, interceding for us, hearing our prayers, giving us grace and mercy for our daily needs (Hebrews 4:14-16).
Fourth, the final aspect of His superexaltation is universal obeisance and confession that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God.
Philippians 2:10-11, so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
This is formidable when you think of the godless chatter in this world. The time is coming when every knee will bow. Every single tongue will confess. No exceptions. Everyone. Your knees and mine will bow before Jesus Christ, whether saved or not. Every tongue will confess Christ for exactly Who He is, LORD of all! Think about the 8.2 billion tongues on earth today. What are they confessing? Who is their God? To whom or what are they bowing? Here’s one of God’s descriptions of the world’s tongues. Psalms 73:9, They have set their mouth against the heavens, And their tongue parades through the earth.
Picture this – every knee bowing, every tongue confessing, regardless of where you are in God’s universe – in heaven, on earth, or under the earth! Angels and believers in heaven, humans both saved and lost on earth, and demons and all lost souls in hell under the earth bowing and confessing Christ is Lord. Every atheist, evolutionist, false prophet, false religious leader, and untold billions of lost souls in the spiritual blindness and deafness of their own depravity, bowing and confessing before Christ.
Biologist Stephen Jay Gould wrote in his essay in the book Darwin’s Legacy: “No intervening spirit watches lovingly over the affairs of nature. No vital forces propel evolutionary change. And whatever we think of God, his existence is not manifest in the products of nature.” I went out to USI to hear him lecture back in the 90s. Showing his version of the evolutionary process called punctuated equilibrium, he assured us as he pointed to his graphic of evolution, “There is no higher purpose in this long process. We are where we are in the process by pure chance.”
The famous atheist Richard Dawkins maintains that while there appears to be design and purpose in nature, the appearance is deceptive and living organisms are actually the product of purposeless material forces. He said, “Though we shall all die someday, we should count ourselves fantastically lucky to have our decades in the sun.” Dawkins is 83 years old.
John Lennon ignorantly said in a 1966 interview, “Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. We (the Beatles) are more popular than Jesus now!”
On the other hand, baseball Hall of Fame Mickey Mantle, who drank hard most of his life, had a liver transplant but it wasn’t helping. He asked his Christian friend Bobby Richardson to come to his bedside. He told his friend, “I’ve accepted Christ as my Savior.” Bobby wanted to be sure Mickey understood, so he gave his friend a thorough explanation of the gospel of salvation through Christ’s work on the cross for sinners. After Bobby finished, Mickey confessed, “That’s just what I’ve done. I have received Jesus Christ as my Savior. I’m trusting in Christ’s death for me to take me to heaven.” This reminds me of another dubious character who said, “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.” And his Savior replied, “Today you’ll be with me in paradise!” Wow!
REVELATION: WE WIN!
David Wells in his book, Above All Earthly Powers, notes how Christ’s sovereign rule is hidden in this interim between the cross and the second coming. Today the mystery of iniquity is at work in this world. We don’t always see how God is weaving it all into His glorious purposes, but we live by faith, not by sight. And we have the book of Revelation to give us understanding. We’ve read the last chapter which tells us Christ wins and everyone who repents and trusts their souls to Christ joins in that victory.
This is what Revelation is all about. We who are in Christ win! Watch how Christ proves to the entire watching universe of untold millions or trillions of angelic beings, good and evil, that He is the Winner. Revelation 5 asks the question, “Who is worthy to open the book, the title deed to planet earth, and break its seals?” No one was found. John starts weeping! Listen to this. One of the elders says, “Stop weeping; behold, the Lion that is from the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has overcome so as to open the book and its seven seals.” He is the Lamb standing, as if slain! He is the one who in great humility came to earth as a man and purchased for God with His blood men and women from every nation and tongue.
Then this Lion-Lamb begins to unleash massive and formidable global judgments through the coming seven-year tribulation period, fulfilling Psalm 2.
Psalms 2:7-9, “I will surely tell of the decree of the LORD: He said to Me, ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You. 8 ‘Ask of Me, and I will surely give the nations as Your inheritance, And the very ends of the earth as Your possession. 9 ‘You shall break them with a rod of iron, You shall shatter them like earthenware.'”
In agony under many of these future judgments, men will continue to blaspheme God and refuse to repent. Under the fourth bowl of wrath in Revelation 16:9, “Men were scorched with fierce heat; and they blasphemed the name of God who has the power over these plagues, and they did not repent so as to give Him glory.” In Revelation 17, ten kings join the Antichrist forces to do battle with our Lord.
Revelation 17:14, “These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful.”
And then at the end of the seven years, here He comes. Listen to this description as Christ descends from heaven to earth at His second coming on that white horse with a whole army of believers dressed in white. You and I could be part of this!
Revelation 19:15-16, From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. 16 And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.”
Jesus Christ is victorious! We win! Jesus Christ throws the Antichrist and the False Prophet into the lake of fire. Revelation 20:1-6 tells us Satan is locked up in the abyss and Jesus Christ rules this earth personally for 1000 years as King of kings and Lord of lords. In the end, every remaining rebel in God’s universe will be brought before Christ at the Great White Throne Judgment and will be forced to confess that He is Lord to the glory of God. Every single knee will bow, every single tongue will confess before Christ. No exceptions. We can picture lost people on their knees going into eternal judgment, the lake of fire, confessing, “Jesus Christ is Lord!” John Flavel wrote in his book, The Fountain of Life, “Oh what pale faces, quivering lips, fainting hearts, and roaring consciences will be among them in that day.”
SO WHAT?
The ultimate purpose of all creation is the exaltation of Christ; that He will be highly exalted above all so that God the Father might be glorified in His Son. Listen, don’t push Christ away. Don’t bet your life on yourself when God tells us Jesus Christ is the winner. Now is the time to bow your knee before Him and confess Him with your mouth. Make it personal between you and Jesus, King of kings and Lord of lords.
For those who have called on His name, Jesus Christ accomplished the victory. The devil is doomed, sin is paid for, death is abolished, it’s over! We won! In all our weakness, trials, hardship, pain, suffering, and struggling in these dying bodies, take courage – we won. Our brother Steve won – because Christ won.
God has us here to spread the word of victory in the gospel and urge every unbeliever to unconditional surrender to Jesus, our exalted Lord. God promises in Romans 10:9-10, “If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved.” That means in Christ you win.