You’re not ready for the kenosis of being.

od exalted Jesus, not because of His original divinity, but because He put humanity above Himself. He accomplished that only by emptying Himself of His divine privileges.

Theologians call this the kenosis – referring to divine self-emptying.

Kenosis is the noun form of the Koinē Greek verb – kenow – I empty. The Messiah came into the world emptied of self.

Theologians debated throughout the centuries as to the extent to which Jesus laid aside His divine attributes; but the early church did not set out to answer that question. To them, and to Paul, the meaning of this kenosis is clear in the passage in its call to imitate Christ:

“Let this same mind be in you that was in Messiah Jesus.”

The passage in verses 6-11 from which we derive the idea of kenosis was a hymn composed by the early church that captured what it means to be in Christ. Theologians call it the Christ hymn of Philippians 2. There is an emptiness where there is no-thing, just be-ing in God. And so, here — now — the kenosis of being.

Power Down
That is the place where I access the power of the Spirit, the power that is within that no human agent or agency can give or take away. And it is all that I need. It was all that Messiah needed to deliver humanity from the stronghold of death. It is power that comes through powerlessness, such as self-emptying – kenosis.

The primitive church used to sing or recite this “Christ hymn” before they became a religion called “Christianity.”

Before Roman imperial values infiltrated the church.

Before Rome took the church completely over as its chief instrument of imperial enforcement. The hymn served as a rebuke to Caesar who set himself up as a god (calling himself “Son of God”), though he was a brutal god demanding worship. The hymn was a call to resist a Roman imperial culture that revolved around pride and hierarchy with the emperor at the top, ensuring the enforcement of brutal decrees in the interest of power and control.

The hymn asserts, contra Caesar, that though Jesus was the real Son of God “He did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied himself… humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death….”

Our Turn in the Beloved Community
Discipleship requires this very thing of us. Any version of the gospel that implies the contrary – hierarchy and triumphalism, power and control, even the obsession with being right — is a perversion. Here in his letter to the Philippians, Paul used the hymn to encourage and foster beloved community built on kenosis – self emptying.

The place at which I meet God is an empty space, a non-egoic space. My beliefs, my culture, my religion, my race, my caste, my gender – all the my-s — fall away to an empty space in surrender to no-thing, to be everything — one with God, restored in this present — now.

Paul puts it this way: “It is no longer I who live but Christ lives in me” (Galatians 2:20).

In Philippians 3:4-8 he counts his maleness, his religious certitude, and ethnic identity as “rubbish” in light of Christ. In the Galatian conversation, Paul contends with a community where ethnic identity, gender identity and class identity determined belongingness. Paul’s argument in Galatians is that these are ego identities that hinder unity in community and unity in God.

In the Holy of Holies of Our Very Being
That call to empty self is a call to the holy of holies of being. We pride ourselves in the outer space, such as what to wear or not wear.

We are also keen about the inner space; maintaining it through diet, exercise,, adequate sunshine and fresh air. All that is important to quality of life on earth.

However, I wonder about that innermost space, the holy of holies of being. How many of us dare to enter there?

I suspect that many of us define our relationship with God via beliefs and practices or attachment to a denomination, and we believe that we are God’s people. As such, the risk would be that the attempt to unite with God takes us to the head space where I (ego) live, rather than deep into our being into that no-thing space where God dwells. A faith community that is peculiarly noetic – built on intellectual verity — can be intent on convincing people of the rightness of its beliefs. We judge people’s worthiness to join or remain in good standing based in large part on their intellectual assent and consent to these beliefs.

However, if the head space, what we believe, is the point of identity with God, we miss out on the profound life affirming sanctum sanctorum — holy of holies — where there is no-thing.

That’s a place where there are no dogmas, no policies, no “my” or “I”; only God, where we unite with God in the deepest of communion.

To experience the holy of holies of being is to experience it in others and minister to them from that central place free of anxiety and the need to win (a “soul”). There I empty myself and hand it over. “I no longer live, it is Christ who lives.”

The Refuge Into Nothingness
As a chaplain, I ministered to a patient who no longer wanted to live because of the unbearable pain of a cancer that had metastasized. She said that in spite of her desperate desire to die, she was afraid of the “nothingness” of death. Though she had grown up in a Christian family, her science vocation, as she processed it, left her with no transcendent anchor. She did not believe in anything beyond the present life as it is. Her prodding pleaded with me for “something” as she prepared to plunge into death. I knew as a chaplain that I could not evangelize. That, and my deep sense of empathy, pulled me into a state of pure calm.

I drew upon her science orientation. “Can you perceive of ‘nothingness’?” I asked. “Yes,” she said, and it’s frightening, but I do not want to live anymore.”

“So tell me, if you can perceive it, is it nothing?”

The scientist was moved. My directing questions formed a bridge by which she accessed a point of perception towards some thing infinitely greater than herself. In Jungian psychology, it is the transpersonal – the non-egoic state. For me, it is the no-thing – that neither religion or science can define — the deep space of kenosis. As her body’s cells broke down and her knowledge, beliefs, and high social status lay worthless to quell her fear and her unbearable pain, she entered into total surrender. I witnessed it.

“Thank you,” she said with a very weak, but powerful voice. “Will you pray for me”?

No doctrine — no preaching.

No believe this — no believe that.

Naked — empty; just God.

Is this how it was with that thief on the cross next to Jesus?

God raised up and exalted Jesus, not because of His original divinity or because He was entitled – and he was entitled – but because He placed humanity above Himself. That is life-giving humility that requires self-emptying – kenosis. Let this same mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus. When I surrender to Christ living through me, I need not live my life to prove anything. I need not try to outdo others, grasp for influence, dominate others or prove that I am right.

Let us enter into the kenosis with Christ

This is freedom.