Philippians 2:2-4 - Do nothing out of selfish ambition

2:2

Paul urges them to use all they have received from the Spirit to help bring unity in the church. They are to have the same love. It is amazing how easily we can turn something that is positive into something that can be used for divisiveness. People will claim to be concerned for an individual who they see as having been mistreated in a certain way, but what they will end up doing is creating division, and so more pain for people.

If we receive wisdom from the Spirit He does not give it to us so that we become puffed up, but so that we can build up the church and proclaim the gospel to the world. We are to work for unity.

Note that Paul urges them to do this in order to make his joy complete. One might have expected him to urge them to do this in order to make God’s joy complete, but he doesn’t do this.

2:3

Attitudes which lead to disunity are doing things out of selfish ambition or a desire to impress others and prove how clever we are. People can see difficult circumstances in a church as an opportunity to put themselves forward. Our goal in all circumstances should be the glory of Christ and promoting the work of the gospel. We need to watch our attitudes very carefully. The antidote to this is to value others above ourselves. When self ambition takes over we will find that that we are actually treating other people as objects, looking at them purely in terms of how we can get our own way.

2:4

The negative attitudes mentioned are all to do with us looking to our own interests above all else. Instead we should look to the interests of others. Now this does not mean that we have no concern for our own interests or that we are treated as doormats, but we should look to Christ. He always had the interests of others at heart.