Controlling Your Tongue - Philippians 4:5a Series

Philippians 4:5 Let your gentleness be evident to all.

Introduction

David’s brothers were all at the front lines of the battle, fighting for King Saul against the Philistines, and David gets sent to bring some food to his brothers. When he arrives, he asks what’s going on, and his brother overhears.

1 Samuel 17:28 When Eliab, David's oldest brother, heard him speaking with the men, he burned with anger at him and asked, "Why have you come down here? And with whom did you leave those few sheep in the desert? I know how conceited you are and how wicked your heart is; you came down only to watch the battle."

Don’t you just love it when someone takes that approach with you? They won’t listen to you, they barrage you with questions, they don’t give you a chance to even answer , the questions are belittling and insulting, and they assume bad motives on your part. Eliab wins the most unreasonable conversationalist award for the OT. And look at the effect it has on David:

29 "Now what have I done?" said David. "Can't I even speak?" 30 He then turned away to someone else.

Unreasonable people are exasperating – even to a man after God’s own heart. The problem is, all of us have a little bit of Eliab in us, don’t we? Paul’s going to help us with that tonight.

In this section (Php.4:4-9) Paul is giving us 3 principles for preparing our hearts for unity and harmony in relationships. The first one we saw last time in v.4 – enjoy God. Enjoy God so that your joy level stays up high enough so that hard, painful circumstances don’t steal your joy and cause you to be irritable toward others. The second way to prepare your heart for harmony is in v.5.

Definition

5 Let your gentleness be evident to all.

This isn’t the typical word for gentleness. The Holman translates it graciousness, but I think the best translation of this word is in the ESV – they render it reasonableness. That’s really the idea. It’s a word that means to give people a fair hearing, to give deference, or to yield. You can think of it as relational generosity. A financially generous person is quick to sacrifice in order to give you what you need with regard to money or possessions. A relationally generous person is quick to sacrifice in order to give you what you need with respect to the relationship. So it means you are generous when it comes to giving others the benefit of the doubt when they disagree with you or hurt you. You’re generous with your attitude toward the person. You’re generous with your listening ear. You’re generous with your sympathy for their point of view – especially when it’s conflicting with your point of view. Relational generosity. One scholar defined it as a sweet reasonableness. And as I read through all the commentaries , one scholar after another after another referred back to that as the best way to describe what this word means – a sweet reasonableness. It’s the opposite of being stubborn or quarrelsome. When someone disagrees with you, you’re reasonable – not in a begrudging way, but with a sweet, soft attitude toward the person.

So ask yourself, how generous are you toward people with your attitude , your listening ear, your sympathy toward their point of view, or giving the benefit of the doubt? Are you tight-fisted and stingy with your attitude? Or are you magnanimous and generous with them?

Context

Now, in v.4 we had to think a little bit to see the connection with unity. We had to think through how joy in the Lord helps cut down on fighting. But this one isn’t hard at all to see the connection. Obviously we’re going to get along better if we are all sweetly reasonable toward one another. The first principle (happiness in the Lord) – that prepares your heart in relationship to God. This second one – sweet reasonableness and relational generosity – that prepares your heart in relationship to people. And it has to come in that order.

So often we start with people, and try to get our joy and happiness from them. And that always causes conflict, because when you try to get your happiness from a person , that person will never be able to deliver, and you’ll start to resent them. Any time you have a taking posture toward someone, rather than a giving posture, you’ll ruin that relationship. We receive from God, and then give to people. That way you never run out, because God has an infinite supply, and you can afford to be relationally generous with the people around you. So, with regard to God, find joy in him. With regard to people, give joy to them. And doing that requires reasonableness.