The selfless, other-centered behavior of Christ, as portrayed in Philippians 2, is striking, whatever your social location.

The following contrast shows just how radically counter-cultural Christs attitude toward his divine prerogatives was for those who ascended to the heights of secular power in the ancient world. Compare these two perspectives on power and authority:

Eteocles speaks here to his mother, about his status as King of Thebes, as a civil war is about to erupt between Eteocles and his brother Polyneices over who should rule the city (from Euripides, Phoenissae, trans. E. P. Coleridge, updated):

Mother, I will tell you this without any concealment. I would ascend to the rising of the stars and the sun, or dive beneath the earth, if I were able so to do, to win a monarchs power, the chief of things divine. Therefore, mother, I will never yield this blessing to another, but keep it for myself. For it would be a cowards act to lose the greater and to win the less.

Now compare Pauls portrayal of Christ (Philippians 2:5-8, my interpretive trans.)

Have this mindset among yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although he was clothed in a robe of divine glory, did not regard this equality with God as something to be used for his own advantage. Instead, Christ made himself nothing, taking on what amounted to slave status by becoming a human being. Then, as a human, he further humiliated himself, by obediently submitting to the most shameful form of death imaginabledeath on a Roman cross.

Jesus gave us his divine prerogatives. So, according to Eteocles, Jesus' activities constitute nothing but "a coward's act."

But what about the outcome?

The path Eteocles chose resulted in disaster (Euripides is a tragedian, after all!). Eteocles and his brother Polyneicesdied simultaneously from wounds received dueling with each another.

What about the outcome of the path Christ chose? The wonderful result will someday be acknowledged by all (Philippians 2:9-11):

Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and graced him with renown above all renown, so that at Jesus name every sentient being will humbly bow, in heaven on earth and under the earth, and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

So, who really lost the greater and won the less, as Eteocles puts it, above? The one who sought to preserve his status? Or the one who selflessly surrendered it"made himself nothing" (cf. NIV, 畆留畚故 畆虜劉僚竜僚, v. 7)in the service of others?

Got a college or seminary degree? Got a lot of money? Are you a pastor? Someone's boss? A parent? A teacher? A college professor?

What will we choose to do with the status and authority that God has given to us?