Peace with Him and Peace Within
Philippians 4 series – part 1
TCF Sermon Text
October 7, 2007
Illustrate my worry bag: ask a volunteer from the congregation – come, stand on a chair, and hold my worry bag. In a symbolic act of turning my worries, my anxieties, over to God in prayer, I’m putting my worries into this bag. I’ve written a handful of the things I get anxious about and I’m putting them here, following the scriptural admonition in Philippians 4 to not be anxious about anything, but instead to pray about everything.
So I write down my worries, and as a symbol of turning them over to the Lord in prayer, I’m putting them in my worry bag. Now, I can relax, right? I can have some peace.
But in reality, what often happens? We don’t leave these things there in the worry bag, do we? We don’t leave our worries, our cares, with God. We take them back. We start to, or continue to, worry about them all over again.
That’s why we need reminders like this scripture.
Let’s read the whole passage I referenced from Philippians:
Philippians 4:4-7 4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Q. What lies at the bottom of the ocean and twitches?
A. A nervous wreck.
Many of us are nervous wrecks. We’re sitting at the bottom of the ocean of our cares, our concerns, our worries, our anxieties, and our lives are twitching.
But in this passage of scripture, the apostle Paul gives us the only genuine antidote to this problem, which we’re going to look at this morning, as the first of a three-part series on Philippians chapter 4.
I don’t think any of us truly enjoys worrying, or anxiety. But I also think there’s not a one of us here who doesn’t worry to some degree. Worry and anxiety is a universal part of the human condition. What’s not universal is how we deal with it, or the tools we human beings have to deal with it. The fact is, as followers of Christ, we have assets to tap, in the battle against worry, that those who don’t follow Him don’t have. As followers of Jesus, when it comes to our worries, our anxieties, we can have Peace with Him and peace within
How can you tell when it’s going to be a rotten day?
When you see a 60 Minutes news team waiting at your office.
Or how about when your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles?
Or, you wake up to the soothing sound of running water... and remember that you just bought a waterbed.
You call your wife, and tell her that you would like to eat out tonight, and when you get home there is a sandwich on the front porch.
When your car horn goes off accidentally, and remains stuck as you follow a group of Hell’s Angels on the highway.
When the bird singing outside your window is a buzzard.
When you call your answering service and they tell you it’s none of your business.
These are the kinds of things that signal it might be a day to worry. But here in Philippians 4, we have Paul, who’s a guy, we can all agree, had a lot to worry about. He was in prison then, and he had been imprisoned and beaten before. He was a smart guy, and he had to have known it was likely he’d be executed. He’d experienced persecution like none of us have ever really known. He not only had a lot to worry about, he didn’t have much to rejoice in at the moment. Yet, here we see the apostle telling us to rejoice. Not just to rejoice, but to rejoice always. And he repeats this admonition for extra emphasis.
So this isn’t some pie in the sky, positive thinking, denying reality, “gee, can’t we all just get along” and not worry kind of statement. This was a real-world, rubber-meets-the-road statement, forged in the reality of Paul’s difficult existence. Now, what Paul writes to us here would be true even if he didn’t face the circumstances he faced, even if things were going just peachy for him.
But somehow, it seems there’s more power in the reality of his circumstances, related to the fact that he still can tell us, despite his personal experience, or maybe even because of it, “rejoice in the Lord.” Don’t worry about anything.
Of course, he doesn’t just leave us there, or it would sound very much like a platitude. It would be like that song from several years ago. Don’t worry. Be happy. That’s helpful, huh? Don’t worry. Be happy. Oh, OK. I was going to worry, but since you say I shouldn’t, I guess I won’t. I’ll just be happy.
No, Paul had a foundation on which to build his advice to us, and that’s what we’re going to look at this morning. This foundation bookends the verses we read. In the first verse, verse 4, it says “Rejoice.” But the key phrase, the phrase that makes this possible, the underlying reason we can and should rejoice, is what follows. It’s “in the Lord.” And then in verse 7, the last verse of this morning’s text, where Paul writes of God’s peace guarding our hearts and minds, we see a similar phrase which carries the same idea. “In Christ Jesus.”
So, our rejoicing isn’t just rejoicing in circumstances, whether good or bad. It isn’t just rejoicing because Paul told us to, and it sounds nice. It’s rejoicing “in the Lord.” Our hearts and minds are guarded with God’s peace, according to verse 7, not necessarily because things get better because we’ve prayed, though they sometimes do, and sometimes don’t. Our hearts and minds are guarded by God’s peace because we’re “in Christ Jesus.”
We cannot underestimate how important these qualifying phrases are. The truth is, it’s difficult to rejoice in many of the circumstances of our lives. Sometimes it’s more than difficult. Let’s be honest. It’s more like impossible. So, the secret of Paul’s exhortation to us are in these words. In the Lord. In Christ Jesus.
When we’re in Christ, when we’re in the Lord, we have peace with Him. Paul’s telling us, and his own life is an example of this, that no matter how dark the circumstances, when we are in the Lord, we can rejoice.
That doesn’t necessarily mean we’re happy about the circumstances. In some cases, that would be not only impossible, but maybe sadistic. The reason we can rejoice is not that our problems aren’t a challenge, but that He is with us. I am with you always, Jesus said. I will never leave you or forsake you, Jesus said.
When we are in the Lord, when we are in Christ Jesus, that means our names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. That fact alone is a reason we can rejoice. These are the promises those of us who are in the Lord can cling to, when the circumstances are not something we can realistically be happy about – when these details of our lives are not something we can rejoice in.
You might say that the keynote to the whole letter to the Philippians is joy. The prevailing mood of joy has resounded through the epistle. In fact, some form of the word joy is used 10 times prior to the passage we’re looking at this morning, from Phil. 1:4 where Paul writes: In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy, to Philippians 4:1 just a few verses before our passage this morning, where Paul writes: Therefore, my brothers, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, that is how you should stand firm in the Lord, dear friends!
Life Application Bible tells us:
It seems strange that a man in prison would be telling a church to rejoice. But Paul’s attitude teaches us an important lesson: our inner attitudes do not have to reflect our outward circumstances. Paul was full of joy because he knew that no matter what happened to him, Jesus Christ was with him. Several times in this letter, Paul urged the Philippians to be joyful, probably because they needed to hear this. It’s easy to get discouraged about unpleasant circumstances, or to take unimportant events too seriously. If you haven’t been joyful lately, you may not be looking at life from the right perspective. Ultimate joy comes from Christ dwelling within us. Christ is near, and at his second coming we will fully realize this ultimate joy. He who lives within us will fulfill his final purposes for us.
Now, let me be brutally honest with you. You’ve heard the phrase preaching to the choir? Usually that means you’re preaching to a group that already knows and understands what you’re preaching – it’s a group you don’t have to convince. I’m going to twist that phrase a little bit today. The choir this morning definitely includes this preacher. What’s more, I know many of your circumstances, and I know you’re in the choir, too.
I’ve found it difficult to claim much joy in my life lately. I want to rejoice in the Lord. I want to have God’s perspective, the perspective Paul’s urging us to see here, because I want to be able to more consistently rejoice in the Lord.
Charles Eerdman writes:
Rejoice in the Lord… proclaims the ideal for every follower of Christ. Paul insists that joy is not to be an occasional experience, and for exceptional people. It would be a mere mockery to urge any person to rejoice always, or even to exhort some persons to rejoice at any time, were it not for the supreme and essential words, “in the Lord.” Abiding joy is possibly only in view of all a man has and may have because of his relation to the Lord Jesus Christ.
In preparing for this message, I’ve read extensively from the sermons of a late 1800s/early 1900s Scottish preacher named Alexander MacLaren. He has some great thoughts on this passage of scripture. Here’s the first one I want to share with you:
It has been well said that this whole epistle may be summed up in two short sentences: ‘I rejoice’; ‘Rejoice ye!’ This continual refrain of gladness is all the more remarkable if we remember the Apostle’s circumstances. Yet out of all the darkness his clear notes ring jubilant; and this sunny epistle (comes) from the pen of a prisoner who did not know but that tomorrow he might be a martyr.
The idea here is that a close and real relationship with Jesus is the foundation of real joy – real rejoicing – peace within. We tend to think of rejoicing in a thing, a person, or in a circumstance. And yes, that can be true. I rejoice at Luke and Michele finishing the sword of the spirit award. But Paul is using this phrase “in the Lord” here much as it’s used in other contexts in scripture.
It’s used extensively in Ephesians, for example. MacLaren points out that the phrase “in Christ Jesus” is the signature stamped upon all the gifts of God, and upon all the possible blessings of the Christian life. In Him we have inheritance, in Him we obtain redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins. In Him we are blessed with every spiritual blessing.
This union with Jesus, this “in Him,” is the foundation and the source of everything that’s joyful. To be in Him means that our whole being should be occupied with Him, the whole of our thoughts and our behavior should be submitted to Him.
He that is absorbed in a great cause; he whose pitiful, personal individuality has passed out of his sight; he who is swallowed up by devotion to another, by aspiration after ‘something afar from the sphere of our sorrow,’ has found the secret of gladness. And the man who thus can say, ‘I live: yet not I, but Christ liveth in me,’ this is the man who will ever rejoice. If you and I have that union with Jesus Christ of which (this verse) speaks, then we shall be, not wholly, but with definite increase towards the ideal, independent of circumstances and masters of our temperaments’ Alexander MacLaren
I like that phrase. Masters of our temperaments. Isn’t that where we all want to get? Not tossed about by the winds, the waves, the cares, the fires of life, but having that peace within, and because of that, rejoicing, where our attitude is not ruled by our circumstances?
That moves us along to the next part of these verses I’d like to look at. Verse 6 says, “Do not be anxious about anything.” So, we go from one seemingly impossible admonition…Rejoice always…to another: Don’t worry about anything, don’t be anxious about anything.
But thankfully, Paul doesn’t leave us hanging here, anymore than he left us hanging in verse 4. In verse 4, he made it clear that the only way we can rejoice always is “in the Lord.” It would have been cruel, and very unrealistic, to ask us to rejoice always without that qualifier: In the Lord.
Likewise, it would be very cruel to tell us not to worry, without giving us a good alternative. In verse 6, he tells us to trade our anxiety for prayer. He tells us to put our worries into God’s worry bag and let him handle it. Instead of worrying about anything, Paul says, pray about everything. Everything. Little things, big things.
God is intimately involved in our lives. Sometimes our worries are the results of hundreds of little things, and not so much big things. God cares about the little things, too. Sometimes, most of the little things in our lives are OK, but there’s a big thing or two that consumes our thinking. It eats us up. It keeps us up at night.
Paul’s saying that we shouldn’t worry about any of these things, big or little, but we should toss everything, by prayer, into the worry bag.
Is this a call to a carefree life? Does that mean we’re smiley-faces all the time? Does this mean we shouldn’t be concerned about the little details of life that include our responsibilities? Does this mean we’re callous to the cares of others? I don’t think that’s what Paul’s saying to us here, either. To care and be genuinely concerned is one thing. To care for others, to weep with those who weep, is a scriptural admonition. To do our duty, to be responsible is a godly response to much of life.
These are not the things Paul is referring to in this passage when he says don’t worry. This passage is absolutely not just positive thinking. Positive thinking often denies reality. Positive thinking pretends that things aren’t bad, when they really are. There’s a difference between not worrying about anything, and instead praying about everything, versus the kind of positive thinking, or positive confession, we hear about in the world, and even among Christians.
Worry has the connotation of anxiety, harassing care, and of attempting to carry the burden of what the future holds yourself. It’s unreasonable anxiety, especially about things over which we have absolutely no control.
It doesn’t mean we don’t grieve. It doesn’t mean we don’t care for others. It doesn’t mean we deny reality. When Paul tells the Philippians, and by extension, us, to stop worrying, it’s not because he makes light of the troubles they’re facing. It’s because he knows that God is greater than all their troubles. And when he tells us to take those worries and turn them over to God instead, he’s reminding us that God is able.
If a man does not pray about everything, he will be worried about most things. If he does pray about everything, he will not be troubled beyond what is good for him, about anything. So there are these alternatives; and we have to make up our minds which of the two we are going to take. The heart is never empty. If not full of God, it will be full of the world, and of worldly care. So the victorious antagonist of anxiety is trust, and the only way to turn gnawing care out of my heart and life is to usher God into it, and to keep him resolutely in it. Alexander MacLaren
So, what we’re talking about here is trust. When we worry, we’re implicitly saying, whether we consciously think of it this way or not, we’d rather trust ourselves with this care, with this anxiety, with this problem. We say by our act of worrying and being anxious that we’re independent in a way, that somehow our worry can accomplish something in whatever that situation might be.
Of course, we’re fooling ourselves – and the problem is, we know it. The evidence that we know we’re fooling ourselves is that we worry. Why worry at all if we truly think we can handle it alone?
But when we transfer that worry to One who really can accomplish something… to One who really does have the power to deal with this problem, we’re saying – I trust you to handle this, more than I trust myself. We’re exchanging trust in ourselves for trust in the Lord.
An important element of this exchange – this laying these burdens, these cares, these worries before the Lord – is thanksgiving. Paul says instead of being anxious about anything, we’re to pray about everything, and to pray with thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving is an attitude of the heart, and it’s the attitude with which we should always approach someone who can do something for us that we can’t do ourselves. Prayer is not a demanding attitude. It’s, as Paul says, a petition. Prayer is actually very humbling. We don’t pray, we don’t petition, to someone we don’t think can help. When we need something, we ask someone who, at least in that area, has to power to grant us something we need.
So, at least in that area, they’re greater than we are, because they can give us something we don’t have. Of course, in this case, we present our requests to God. He has everything. He has all power. He can do anything. So we’re definitely in the humble state of needing something from someone greater than us, someone who has the power to do something about our worry or care. We shouldn’t approach Him with anything other than a thankful heart. Thankful for what He’s done, and thankful in advance for what He’s able to do.
“To begin by praising God for the fact that in this situation, as it is, He is so mightily God – such a beginning is the end of anxiety.” Karl Barth
… prayer (prayer in its devotion) and petition (prayer in its personal detail) with thanksgiving for appreciation of past mercies stimulates to trust for future ones.
International Bible Commentary
Constant prayer, specific petition for needs, and thanksgiving are not only the Lord’s antidote for such anxiety but God’s expressed will in all circumstances Baker Bible Commentary
1 Thessalonians 5:18 (NIV) 18 give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus
There’s that phrase again – “in Christ Jesus”
For how should he ask for future things, who is not thankful for the past? Chrysostom
Then, of course, Paul saves the best for last in these verses, and it’s where we’ve been headed with all these thoughts.
We’ve been looking at trading our anxieties for God’s peace. Now, we’ll look at this idea of peace some more next week when we look at the next few verses in Philippians 4. But Paul tells us here in verse 7 that, as we turn our worries and cares over to God, He’ll give us peace.
Not just any old peace. The peace of God. Not having to carry these worries anymore, and turning them over to God, who can do something about them, brings us peace.
We all want peace, don’t we? There are few things worse than a mind consumed by anxieties. When that’s the case, worry is our constant companion, and an unwelcome companion at that. The first thing we have to note is that this peace is available only to those who already have another kind of peace.
Romans 5:1 (NASB77) Therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
So, let’s start there with this assumption. There are essentially two kinds of peace revealed in scripture.
1. Experiential (Phil 4:7)— in the midst of the day-by-day experience of the believer, this is inner peace, this is the peace of God. This peace can be forfeited or lost when we’re out of right relationship, or when we don’t trade in our worries to God.
2. Judicial (Rom 5:1)—The fact that our sin war with God is over - the issue has been decided. This is peace with God - made possible by Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
We cannot know real peace, even as a subjective feeling, as an experience, peace within, unless we know the Lord Jesus as an objective reality, unless we accept what He has done, live by His Word, in right relationship with Jesus.
That is, we cannot have peace with God, or the peace of God, without unconditional surrender to His terms of peace.
For there to be real peace, someone has to win the war...
Think about it - any lasting peace has seldom happened in history unless one side was beaten, overcome, whipped. When the nation losing in a war continues to fight against all odds, they usually end up completely destroyed.
That’s what the U.S. was trying to avoid with Japan at the end of World War II.
This was so clear in the PBS documentary The War, which aired last week. Until the atomic bombs were dropped, it seemed Japan was willing to fight it out until the end, which would have likely included millions of Japanese civilians defending their homeland unto death.
Peace comes when one side overwhelms another side, and the losing side in the war unconditionally surrenders. Unconditional surrender applies with the peace of God just as clearly as it applies to the peace with God only possible through Jesus.
6 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything (NLT)
Instead of worrying, we should pray. Those are the terms of unconditional surrender to God. So, when we do it backwards, when we worry instead of praying, our surrender to God, our turning over to God, of these anxieties is not unconditional. It’s like going back into the worry bag and choosing to fight these battles again.
Now, the battle’s not with God. It’s with these cares and worries. But we still have to surrender these things, unconditionally, to God, to experience real, and lasting, peace. I don’t know about you, but I want to unconditionally surrender my worries, my cares, my anxieties, to someone far more capable of dealing with them than I am.
Response – prayer
