Bridge on the River Kenosis: From Officers Who Won't Work to Servants Who Will

I was challenged by my professor to write a blog post, reflecting on a personal experience with “kenosis” or a time from the last week that, “God allowed you to empty yourself and reveal more of Him to someone in your world.”

This whole idea of a Kenosis Experience comes from Philippians chapter two. In Philippians 2:7 it states, “Instead, he [Jesus] gave up his divine privileges he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being,” the phrase “gave up his divine privileges” in the Greek is the word Kenosis which means he emptied himself. This was a voluntary act of Jesus. We find that what he emptied himself of in order to become man, was his glory. As it is stated in John 17:5, “Now, Father, bring me into the glory we shared before the world began.” What Jesus was asking that the father restore to him was his position, his recognition and his status. (Barnes)

At work, there is often the temptation to view certain tasks as being below myself. These menial tasks usually include handling a customer that could be a bit of an annoyance, or cleaning up a mess that could take significant time, or even something like fulfilling a simple request for help made by a coworker. When presented with tasks such as these, it’s a temptation for me to say, I can’t be bothered trivial things like this, I’m a manager! and instead defer it to one of my associates. Every day there is an example of this by another manager and it frustrates me to see. 

This attitude that my fellow managers and I can take on in these cases is reminiscent of Colonial Nicholson, in the classic movie The Bridge on the River Kwai. In it, Sir Alec Guinness’ character, Colonial Nicholson, famously refuses to neither allow his officers to partake in the bridge building, nor do any sort of manual labor himself because of their status as officers. It is a recurring instance in the movie where Nicholson refuses the order given by the Japanese commander, Colonial Saito, and says, “Officers won’t work!”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXdycEK_38Y 

We can often fall into having this type of mindset when it comes to our service of God. Because of our pride we view certain ministerial tasks as being below us. We see them as being the kind of manual labor that we “officers” simply should not partake in. Because to partake in labor of that sort would be a failure to recognize our “status” and our “position.” It would be humiliating to our egos. Having this mindset often leads us to avoid pouring ourselves out into the river, and instead step over the kenotic opportunity effectively building a bridge over the river Kenosis.

What we as Christians need to discover is that in order for us to be effective servants, in order for us to let God make the most use of our lives, we must have the attitude of Christ and we must experience this “kenosis.” We must empty ourselves of our own glory and recognition, empty ourselves of who we think we are, our titles, our status, our position, the praise and acclamation that we receive from men, our selfishness, our egos, our self-centeredness, our pride. We must empty ourselves and take up the position, not of an officer who won't work, but of the servant, who is filled and led by the Holy Spirit and will.