CHRIST the WILLINGLY POOR ONE: “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery (harpagmos, a thing to be seized) to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation…and…humbled Himself…” (Php 2:5-8). Jim Elliott, who gave his life for the Master at age 28 on the shores of Ecuador’s Curaray River, wrote the following prayer: “Father, let me be weak that I might loose my clutch on everything temporal. My life, my reputation, my possessions, Lord, let me loose the tension of the grasping hand. Even, Father, would I lose the love of fondling. How often I have released a grasp only to retain what I prized by ‘harmless’ longing, the fondling touch. Rather, open my hand to receive the nail of Calvary, as Christ’s was opened—that I, releasing all, might be released, unleashed from all that binds me now. He thought Heaven, yea, equality with God, not a thing to be clutched at. So let me release my grasp.”
