CONVERSATION STARTERS
Conversation Starters help us dig deeper, connecting Sunday’s sermons with our Monday lives. These prompts have been designed to help Community Groups grow in their relationship with God, with one another, and with their neighbors. Please know that these questions are meant to be a resource to you. You do not have to follow them verbatim or get through them all. We trust you to know your group and to ask the questions based on your group needs.

1. What stood out to you from the sermon?

2. Paul says joy is found in selflessness (Philippians. 2:3-4). What’s your gut reaction to the statement that joy is found in selflessness?

3. In Philippians. 2:2, Paul asks the local church at Philippi to ‘complete [his] joy’ by being and doing particular things. What stands out to you about the things he names and why?

4. Out of a desire to participate with the Spirit (Philippians 2:1), how can you embody this call to serve others in your house, workplace, and community group?

PRAYER PROMPT
Pray that the Holy Spirit would give us conviction, and that we would courageously partner with God's Spirit, to give up our rights and serve those in our lives this week.

Title: Joy in Selflessness
Scripture: Philippians 2:1-11
Speaker: Joseph Luigs, JosephL@ChristCommunityKC.org

“God has the same shape as Jesus, and he always has....What Jesus did was local, of course, because that is how serious and real our history is to God. But what the cross was locally is universally and always the divine nature.” - John Howard Yoder, He Came Preaching Peace

“Paul’s point, then, is not that Christ exchanged the ‘form of God’ for the ‘form of a servant’ but that he now manifests the ‘form of God’ in the ‘form of a servant.’” - Stephen J. Wellum, God the Son Incarnate

“We confess that, although our Church is orthodox as far as her doctrine of grace is concerned, we are no longer sure that we are members of a Church which follows its Lord.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

Although [x],
not [y]
but [z]

Although [status],
not [selfishness]
but [self-abasement/slavery]

Although [equal with God],
not [selfish exploitation]
but [self-emptying slavery in incarnation and self-humbling obedience in death]