Was Christ already God who humbled himself to become man, or a creature reaching toward divinity? The debate over the "form of God" and the emptying of Philippians 2. The opposing view is chiefly held by those who deny Christ's full deity or true humanity (Arians historically, groups like the Jehovah's Witnesses today), not by Chalcedonian Protestants.
13 verses are cited on this page. Each one links to its chapter in the Greek text.
Who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.Philippians 2:6
He is already in the form of God and equal with God before the emptying; equality is what he possesses, not what he reaches for. (See the harpagmos word study.)
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him.John 1:1-3
The Word is God, is with God, and is the maker of all things, so not himself a creature.
...for in him were all things created... and he is before all, and by him all things consist.Colossians 1:15-17
He is before all creation and holds it in being, the Creator's role, not a creature's.
...with the glory which I had, before the world was, with thee.John 17:5
Christ speaks of a glory he had with the Father before the world existed.
But emptied himself, taking the form of a servant... he humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death.Philippians 2:7-8
The emptying is not a loss of divinity but the veiling of it under a servant's form; the same person who is God becomes obedient unto the Cross.
...he also himself in like manner hath been partaker of the same... it behoved him in all things to be made like unto his brethren.Hebrews 2:14-17
He takes real flesh and blood, made like his brethren, true humanity assumed by the divine person.
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.John 1:14
The Word who is God becomes flesh; one subject, God the Word, now incarnate.
For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead corporeally.Colossians 2:9
The fullness of deity dwells bodily in Christ, God and man in one.
My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass from me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt.Matthew 26:39
Two wills in one sentence, his own and the Father's, and they are not identical or the prayer is theatre. This is the text behind the Third Council of Constantinople, which defined that Christ wills as God and as man without division or confusion.
Every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God.1 John 4:2
The apostolic test, aimed at those who granted his divinity and denied his body. The flesh is not a costume the Word wore, and confessing it is the mark John gives for telling the Spirit of God from the other.
And Jesus advanced in wisdom, and age, and grace with God and men.Luke 2:52
Advance implies something not yet had, which is the objection. What grows is the human nature he assumed, and a nature that could not grow would not be ours. The divine nature is not the subject of the sentence.
Christ is "in the form of God" and equal with God, and did not cling to that equality but emptied himself to take a servant's form (Philippians 2:6-7). He is the Word who was God and became flesh (John 1:1, 14), in whom the fullness of deity dwells bodily (Colossians 2:9). The emptying veils his glory; it does not surrender his divinity. The Council of Chalcedon (451) confessed him as one person in two natures, true God and true man, without confusion, change, division, or separation.