Have you ever noticed that the word “down” is rarely associated with anything good in the English language. We’ve all heard of things in decline described as “going downhill,” and we’ve also heard of the “down and out” and the “downtrodden.” We’re familiar with words like “downfall,” “downscale” and expressions like “feeling down in the dumps.” Of course, on the other side of the coin is that word “up,” which is contained in such expressions as “upwardly mobile,” “upper class” and “upscale.” We speak of things “looking up” and we described people on the rise as being “up and comers.”
It is paradoxical the way that the Bible calls us to think of such things as up and down, first and last, and high and low. The law of gravity says that what goes up must come down, but the law of our God states that people who lower themselves will, in the end, be raised up. This Sunday as we continue our study of the paradoxical teachings of the Bible we’ll be looking at a number of scriptures that confound fallen expectations surrounding such notions as greatness, and becoming first.
If you’re looking for a passage to begin preparing your heart for this subject, try spending a little time this week with Philippians 2:3-11. That might be a good place to start, and it would be a great scripture to commit to memory.