Short answer: Philippians 2:5–11 says that Jesus, existing in the form of God, did not treat equality with God as something to grasp but took the form of a servant and became obedient to the death of the cross. Because of that, God highly exalted him and gave him the name above every name, so that every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. The passage makes the name of Jesus a story before it is a title, and it ends with that confession bringing glory to God the Father.
A song sung in a letter to a church
Philippians is a letter, written by an apostle to a congregation he knows and loves, and this passage sits inside an argument rather than standing alone as a poem. Verses 3 and 4 lay the groundwork: do nothing out of rivalry or conceit, count others better than yourself, look not only to your own interests but also to the interests of others. Verse 5 then turns that instruction into a pattern, telling the readers to have in mind what was also in Christ Jesus. The verses that follow supply the content of that mind. The setting is a real church, not a lecture hall.
Most readers notice that 2:6–11 reads differently from the sentences around it. The lines move in a deliberate arc, and many take them as an early hymn or confession the apostle takes up and shapes for his point. The shape is downward first: existing in the form of God, not grasping equality with God, emptying himself, taking the form of a servant, being found in human likeness, humbling himself, obedient to the point of death, yes, the death of the cross. Then the turn: God highly exalts him and gives the name above every name, so that every knee bows and every tongue confesses Jesus Christ as Lord. The descent is not the end of the story.
Verses 12 and 13 show why the hymn is here. The apostle draws the conclusion for a congregation he cannot visit at the moment: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work. The command is not self reliance; the next sentence grounds everything in God's action. Nor does the emptying mean the Son stopped being God, since the same lines end with universal worship of him. The covenant setting is the gathered church under Christ's lordship, so these are gospel commands, not terms of the old covenant.
Note on 2:12–13: the call to work out salvation is immediately anchored in God who works in the readers, so the passage never commends self effort apart from grace.
The mind of Christ: emptied, obedient, exalted
Paul sets the pattern in verse 5 and then fills it out with a chain of plain contrasts. The same person is described first as existing in the form of God and then as taking the form of a servant. Those two descriptions are not set side by side as rivals; they are held together of one Lord. Verse 6 says he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, which suggests a holding on for advantage rather than a denial of who he was. The eternal Son did not clutch at his standing but chose the low place.
Verses 7 and 8 explain what emptying means by the phrases that follow it: taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men, humbling himself, becoming obedient to the death of the cross. The text describes self giving, not the loss of identity. He did not stop being who he was; he took on what he was not. The obedience is real and costly, and it runs all the way to the cross, the death reserved for rebels. That is the mind Paul asks the Philippians to share.
Then comes the turn in verses 9–11. God highly exalts him and gives the name above every name, so the name is given, not self claimed. At that name every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Verse 12 draws the practical conclusion, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, but verse 13 immediately grounds it: God works in you both to will and to work. Working out is not self reliance. It is serious, reverent response to the God who is already at work.
The name given to the humble one
Paul does not drop a poem into the letter without warning. Verses 3 and 4 tell the congregation to do nothing through rivalry or conceit, to count others better than themselves, and to look beyond their own interests to the interests of others. Verse 5 then turns that instruction into a pattern: the mind they are to share is the mind that was in Christ Jesus. Everything that follows supplies the content of that mind. The passage is therefore not a free standing doctrinal hymn but the ground under a call to humble, unified life in a real church, gathered under Christ's lordship rather than under Sinai.
The story Paul tells runs downward before it runs upward. The one who existed in the form of God did not treat equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, yes, the death of the cross. The emptying is the servant's path, not the surrender of deity; the passage never says the Son stopped being God. It says he refused to clutch at status and went all the way down.
Because of that obedience, God highly exalted him and gave him the name above every name, so that every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. The exaltation aims at worship, and the confession ends where it must, to the glory of God the Father; the name of Jesus and the Father's glory are never set against each other. Verses 12 and 13 draw the conclusion: work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you both to will and to work. That is not self reliance. The command rests on grace, and the God who commands is the God who supplies the willing and the doing.
Where readers differ on the emptying and the name
Paul sets the pattern in 2:5 and then fills it out from 2:6–8. The Son already existed in the form of God, yet he did not treat equality with God as something to seize. He emptied himself, took the form of a servant, and was found in human likeness. Careful readers part ways here. Some say he added a genuine human nature and set aside the independent use of his divine attributes. Others say he veiled his glory without any change in what he is. The text does not settle the mechanics. What it rules out is a Christ who merely looks like a good example or a creature promoted to greatness.
The next question is literary. Some readers hear a hymn the apostle quotes; others hear his own composed summary. Either way, the shape of 2:6–11 carries the argument, moving from preexistence to obedience to exaltation. Notice the stairs downward: form of God, form of a servant, human likeness, death, and then the cross named specifically. Notice the turn at 2:9, where God acts. The name above every name is given, not seized. Readers also differ on 2:10–11, whether every knee bowing means universal salvation or universal acknowledgment of his lordship. The confession itself is not in dispute.
What stays central across these disagreements is plain. The Son truly became human. He truly obeyed to the point of death, and the death of the cross is named. God truly exalted him, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. Hold that confession as the anchor, and let the disputed mechanics stay disputed. Do not press the emptying to mean the Son ceased to be God, and do not read 2:12 as self reliance, since 2:13 grounds the working in God himself. The passage gives a pattern to follow and a Lord to confess, not a puzzle to solve.
The mind of Christ, from servant form to the name above every name
Paul does not ask the Philippians to admire a distant example. He tells them to have the same mind that was in Christ Jesus, and then he shows what that mind looks like. The one who existed in the form of God did not treat equality with God as something to seize. Instead he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, made in the likeness of men. The emptying does not mean the Son stopped being God. It means he laid aside the privileges of that position to enter human life as a servant. The gospel becomes visible here as a movement downward, not a formula.
That movement goes all the way to the cross. Found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death, yes, the death of the cross. The cross is not a detour around his identity. It is the shape his obedience took. Then the text turns: therefore God highly exalted him and gave him the name above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. The Father's exaltation answers the Son's obedience. Confession is the response the passage names, and it is spoken to the glory of God the Father.
So then, Paul says, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. The next verse keeps that from becoming self reliance: it is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure. The command rests on grace, not on willpower. This is why the passage belongs in an Advent study. The child in the manger is the eternal Son who took servant form and obeyed to death. His name is Jesus, and one day every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Have this mind: worship that reaches the kitchen table
Paul gives one command in this section, and it is not a feeling. Philippians 2:5 reads, "Have this in your mind, which was also in Christ Jesus". The mind he describes is the one traced in the verses that follow, where the Son of God takes the form of a servant and goes to the cross. This is addressed to a whole church, not to a solitary reader, which means the first place it shows up is in how we treat people near us. Paul says it plainly in 2:3–4: do nothing through rivalry or conceit, count others better than yourself, and look not only to your own interests but also to the interests of others.
What does that look like on an ordinary Tuesday? It looks like letting a coworker's idea stand without needing to improve it, or taking the harder shift so a parent can get home. It looks like listening in a small group instead of steering the conversation, and doing a household chore no one will notice. These are acts, not moods. The passage does not promise that such service will be appreciated, that relationships will smooth out, or that anyone will see. It promises something better grounded: God is at work in you, and the shape of that work is the self giving mind of Christ.
Then come verses 12 and 13, and they must be read together. "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling," Paul writes, and immediately adds that it is God who works in you both to will and to work. This is not self reliance; the command rests on grace. Nor does the emptying in 2:7 mean the Son stopped being God, since the same passage ends with every knee bowing and every tongue confessing him as Lord. So Advent reading here leads to worship and to quiet obedience, not to a guarantee of ease or visible results, but to confidence that the God who began this work will carry it on.
Biblical fidelity check
Read Philippians 2:5–11 closely and two mistakes press in. The first is treating the passage as a moral pep talk: imitate Jesus, try harder. But Paul does not begin with our effort; he begins with who Christ is, existing in the form of God, and what he did, emptying himself by taking the form of a servant and becoming obedient to death. The second risk is flattening the emptying into a loss of deity, as though the Son stopped being God. The verses that follow explain the emptying as self giving, not subtraction. The one who humbled himself is the one God highly exalted.
Careful readers disagree about the mechanics of the emptying: did the Son add a genuine human nature and set aside the independent use of his divine attributes, or veil his glory without changing what he is? The text does not settle this. Some also ask whether 2:6–11 is a hymn Paul quotes or his own summary, and whether every knee bowing means universal salvation or universal acknowledgment of his lordship. What the passage rules out is a Christ who is merely a good example or merely an exalted creature. Central across these debates: real humanity, real obedience unto death, real exaltation, and the confession that Jesus Christ is Lord.
Following the theme of Philippians 2:5-11 through Scripture
These studies open up the surrounding verses and the shape of Paul's appeal to the church at Philippi: Philippians 2:5-11: The Mind of Christ and Divine Humility, The Advent Calendar: Luke 2 and the Purpose of Waiting, Shepherds and Angels: Luke 2:8–20 Explained and Aijeleth-Ha-Shahar: The Psalm Jesus Quoted on the Cross.
Frequently asked questions
What does it mean that Jesus emptied himself in Philippians 2:7?
It means he did not cling to his divine standing but took the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. The sentence moves straight from emptying to servanthood and human likeness, and the next verse carries it to obedience and the death of the cross. So the emptying is described by what he took on and how far he went, not by the Son ceasing to be God. The passage says he existed in the form of God before he emptied himself, and nothing here cancels that.
Why does Philippians 2 say God gave Jesus the name above every name?
God gave it because of the obedience described just before, humbling himself and becoming obedient to the death of the cross. The word therefore at the start of 2:9 ties the exaltation to the path of 2:6–8, so the name is God's response to the Son's self-giving. The name is not seized or self-awarded; it is bestowed. And the purpose given for it is worship, every knee bowing and every tongue confessing that Jesus Christ is Lord.
How is Philippians 2:5–11 an Advent passage if it does not mention his birth?
It is Advent because it tells how far the coming went: the one who existed in the form of God took the form of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. Advent is about the arrival of that one, and this passage names who arrived before it describes the manger. It also points forward, since the servant who went to the cross is the Lord every knee will bow to. Reading it in Advent keeps the whole arc in view, from his self-giving to his exaltation.
