The Descent-Ascent: Why the Way Up Is Down

Philippians 2:5-11 contains what many scholars believe was one of the earliest Christian hymns — a song the church was already singing about Jesus before Paul ever wrote it down. It traces a stunning arc: from the highest height, down to the lowest depth, and back up again. Down, then up. That is the shape of the gospel, and it turns out to be the shape of the Christian life too.

"Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men" (Philippians 2:6-7). The descent is staggering when you sit with it. He did not cling to His rightful glory. He emptied Himself — not of His deity, but of its privileges — and stepped into skin, into hunger and weariness, into a world that would misunderstand Him from the cradle.

And He kept descending. Servanthood wasn't a costume; it was the whole wardrobe. He washed feet. He touched lepers. He wept at gravesides. "And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross" (Philippians 2:8). The cross was the bottom of the descent — not just death, but the particular death reserved for the cursed (Deuteronomy 21:23). There was no lower step to take.

Then the pivot: "Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name" (Philippians 2:9). The exaltation matches the humiliation, step for step, in reverse. The One who went lowest is lifted highest. "That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow... and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord" (Philippians 2:10-11). The descent was voluntary; the ascent is the Father's vindication.

Here is where the thread grabs your own life. Paul didn't quote this hymn as abstract theology — he introduced it with a command: "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus" (Philippians 2:5). The mind of Christ is the downward mind. We spend our lives clawing upward — for recognition, for position, for being right — and the gospel says the way up is down. "Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up" (James 4:10). God does the lifting. Our job is the humbling.

That reframes everything: the apology you don't want to make, the credit you could take but shouldn't, the lowly task nobody sees. These aren't detours from greatness. In God's economy, they're the on-ramp. The cross looked like the end of the story. It was the hinge.

The descent-ascent is the deepest thread in the New Testament because it's the thread of Christ Himself — and everyone united to Him gets woven into the same pattern. Down, then up. Always down first. And the Father who exalted Jesus is faithful to lift everyone who follows Him the same way down.

If you want to walk through this thread day by day, the study The Descent-Ascent is in the Ten Threads collection.