“For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself” (Gal. 6:3).
It is bad enough for a man to be deceived by another; but it is worse to be deceived by himself. But this verse gives the true corrective and preventive of self-deception—and it is found in a man’s thinking himself truly what he is; that is, nothing.
But this is not natural. The natural thing is for each one to think himself something; and then continue so to think until he becomes more and more something, and the chiefest of all. That is simply the secret and the spirit of self-exaltation.
But the truth is that of himself man is nothing; and the true way for any man to find this truth is to confess that he is nothing. That is simply the way of self-abnegation. And then he can become something.
Now the reason of all this is that man is separated from God; and this separation was accomplished by his accepting the suggestion, and following the way, of the one who originally in his self-exaltation, declared; “I will be like the Most High” (Isa. 14:14). And the end course, with that one, is that he shall be absolutely nothing. For of him at the end of his course it is written: “Never shall you be any more” (Ezek. 28:19). And when he entered upon that course which inevitably ends only in his being absolutely nothing, then it is certain that at the beginning of it he practically made himself nothing, and that all through his course he was truly nothing.
It is so also with the man who accepted the leadership, and followed in the way, of this one. By this the man made himself nothing. And so it is written: “All nations before him are as nothing: and they are counted to him less than nothing, and vanity” (Isa. 40:17). And “they that war against thee shall be as nothing, and as a thing of naught” (Isa. 41:12).
Yet the original leader, and, from him, all who are led in this course, really think themselves to be something, when, in very truth, they are nothing.
Now there is a way out of this nothingness into that which is something, and in which each one shall be truly something. And this is in the way of Christ—the way of the cross. Christ is the example: he has led the way; for “he emptied himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.” Thus he gave himself up to be, and to become, lost and nothing, that he might redeem those who are lost and nothing.
Therefore all are exhorted: “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery [a thing to be seized upon and to be held fast] to be equal with God: but emptied himself,” and became nothing. And because he did this, and through his doing it, “God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things under the heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9-11).