Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:
The apostle Paul is writing to the church in Philippi, a community he loved deeply, and this verse opens what scholars call the Christ Hymn — an ancient poem about Jesus voluntarily choosing to give up the privileges of his divine position. "Being in very nature God" means Jesus was not merely inspired by God or godlike in some vague sense; he was fully God in essence. Yet he did not consider his equality with God something to be grasped — the original Greek word suggests clinging tightly to something you are afraid to lose. This is the setup for what follows in the passage: Jesus's deliberate choice to become fully human, to serve others, and ultimately to die on a cross. Paul holds it up as the ultimate example of humility.
Lord, you held everything and chose to let it go. Show me what I am gripping too tightly today — status, comfort, the need to be right — and give me the courage to open my hands. Not because it is easy, but because you showed me it is possible. Amen.
Power is one of the hardest things to hold loosely. Even small amounts of it — a job title, a platform, being the most informed person in a conversation — tend to fuse with our sense of self. We start defining ourselves by what we have earned, what sets us apart, what we have worked hard to protect. So consider what this verse is actually describing: the one person in the entire universe with every right to grip his power and never let go chose, quite deliberately, not to. Not from weakness. Not from resignation. By choice. There is something quietly unsettling about this verse if you sit with it long enough. Jesus, fully God, let go. Which means every time you and I white-knuckle our position — our need to be right, our carefully constructed reputation, the version of ourselves we have built and defended — we are doing the opposite of what he did. This is not a call to low self-esteem or doormat living. It is an invitation into the strange, counterintuitive freedom that comes when you stop gripping your place in the world quite so hard. The question is not only what Jesus gave up. It is what you are afraid to.
Paul says Jesus was fully God, yet chose not to grasp that equality. What does it mean to you that this act of humility came from a place of total strength, not weakness or lack?
What is something in your own life — a role, a reputation, a right you feel you have earned — that you tend to hold tightly? What would it look like to hold it more loosely without abandoning it entirely?
This verse challenges the assumption that protecting your status and advantage is simply sensible self-preservation. Where do you see that assumption operating in your workplace, your culture, or even your church community?
How does Jesus's willingness to not grasp his equality with God change the way you think about your relationships with people who have less power, platform, or privilege than you?
Identify one situation in the next week where you could practice the posture of this verse — releasing a claim, an advantage, or a need to be recognized. What would that actually, concretely look like in practice?
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
John 1:14
In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
2 Corinthians 4:4
For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich.
2 Corinthians 8:9
For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
Isaiah 53:2
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:1
Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.
John 5:18
And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.
John 17:5
Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
Hebrews 1:3
who, although He existed in the form and unchanging essence of God [as One with Him, possessing the fullness of all the divine attributes—the entire nature of deity], did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped or asserted [as if He did not already possess it, or was afraid of losing it];
AMP
who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,
ESV
who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped,
NASB
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped,
NIV
who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God,
NKJV
Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to.
NLT
He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what.
MSG