You’ve probably heard the story about how
on Thanksgiving Sunday 2005, six weeks before the building opened, we had our
first service in the building.
The building was really just a shell, and
after the service we handed out sharpies and invited people to write their
favourite scriptures on the concrete floor to be immortalized. That was the plan, and it sounded good in
theory, after all we were using permanent markers. But you know what they say, In theory there is no difference between theory and
practice; in practice there is.
Last summer
when we tore up the old carpet I was excited to see all the promises that we
had written on the floor, and there they were, gone. I would suspect that it was the glue that
held down the carpet, combined with the scraping that eradicated our
scriptures.
However we are
promised in Isaiah 40:8 The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of
our God stands forever.” And Jesus
promised us in Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth will disappear, but my words will
never disappear.
I can’t tell
you every scripture that was written on the floor, I do know what I wrote and
it is on the concrete beneath my feet, I wrote 1 Corinthians 9:16 Yet
when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to
me if I do not preach the gospel!
And even though
the writing on the floor is gone I can tell you that the one scripture that was
written over and over again and that was Philippians 4:13 For I
can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.
Our preaching
series this Fall at Cornerstone is “Hashtag This” and we’ve been looking at
various words and phrases in the Bible that deserve a hashtag. For those who don’t have a clue what I’m
talking about. A hashtag is simply a
means of identifying a common theme in social media, Facebook, Twitter and
Instagram. So you type the #sign or hashtag followed by
a description of your subject, written without spaces.
Week one was
#gointoalltheworld Week two was
#castthefirststone and two weeks ago we looked at #turntheothercheek.
I would suspect
that 2000 years ago if Hashtags had of been a thing that when Paul’s letter was
being read someone would have claimed Philippians 4:13 with the hashtag
#icandoallthings, and while I love the verse and I have claimed it many times,
most of those times I claimed it out of context.
Let’s begin by looking at How We Take the Text Out of Context
We’ve been down
this road before and you’ve heard me say it before but listen up this is really
important. As you read the bible and
claim the promises of the bible always, always, always remember the words of D. A. Carson who often quoted his minister father
saying "A
text without a context is a pretext for a proof text."
Like the man who was looking for direction from the
bible and so he decided that he would simply open the bible and put in his
finger and go from there. So he did and
his finger landed on the last part of Matthew 27:5 Judas hanged himself, he figured that couldn’t be
what he has looking for so he did it again this time his finger landed on Luke 10:37 now go and do the same. Well, that wasn’t getting him anywhere so he
decided one more try, and this time he ended up at John 13:27, “Hurry and do what you're going
to do."
And yes all three verses came from the bible, and if
you put them together they would indeed say “Judas hanged himself, now go and
do the same, Hurry and do
what you're going to do." But that
wasn’t the intent, those texts may be from the bible but they are out of
context.
So regardless
of what you might think, Philippians
4:13 For I can do everything
through Christ, who gives me strength, does not
necessarily mean that you can do everything that you set your mind to through
the power of Christ. We keep on using
that verse, but I don’t think it means what we think it means.
If that was the case we all be ultra-talented,
uber-rich, super successful and very thin and we aren’t. And as long as we cling to a promise which isn’t
really a promise at all, we are destined for disappointment, guilt and doubt. Because when we can’t do it, whatever it is
then we feel spiritually defeated and think, “Well, Paul said that we could do
everything through Christ, so how come I can’t stay on my diet, how come I
can’t learn to sing, or how come my business failed?”
And those are good questions, if we were
meant to take Philippians 4:13 in isolation.
But Philippians 4:13 wasn’t written in isolation. Paul didn’t just write those words on a slip
of paper and send them to the Philippian church. “Oh look everybody Paul wrote to us and said
Philippians 4:13 For I can do everything through Christ, who
gives me strength,
So, what was Paul telling the people he
wrote that letter to all those years ago?
Well to discover the truth here we first need to put Paul’s words into
context.
We
Need to Put the Text into Context
Remember this was a letter, we are reading
someone else’s mail here. The letter was
written by the Apostle Paul to the church in the city of Philippi.
And it was a special group that Paul was
writing to. Back in the book of Acts we
discover that it was Paul who had started this church. And it had begun with his preaching on a
riverbank and with one convert, a lady named Lydia.
And so Paul had seen this church born and
watched as it grew up. He is writing to
the church as the founding pastor of the church, which meant he had a little
skin in the game, so to speak. And by
this time the Church in Philippi was pretty much a mixed bag of folks.
There were those Jewish, Roman and Greek
backgrounds. So understand not only did
they come from different cultures they came from different faith back grounds
and different economic and social backgrounds as well.
There were folks in the church who had been
raised in the Monotheistic faith of the Jews as well as the Polytheistic faith
of the Romans and Greeks.
There were servants, masters and small
business owners. But regardless of their
differences they were one church and one family, they had all found a church to
call home.
It’s now been eight or nine years since
Paul started the church and he is now in prison for preaching the Gospel. And it’s from his prison cell in Rome that
this letter was written, it was one of four books in the New Testament that
Paul wrote from his prison cell. And for
the most part this has been a letter of thanksgiving and celebration, a letter
of encouragement written to lift people up.
And in closing Paul wants to end on a
positive note. It seems that the church
had lost track of Paul for a couple of years, they didn’t realize that he had
been arrested and imprisoned.
Remember this was long before social media, Paul was unable to update his Facebook status to indicate that he was in prison, he couldn’t tweet about it or change his “Linked in” profile from tentmaker to prisoner.
Remember this was long before social media, Paul was unable to update his Facebook status to indicate that he was in prison, he couldn’t tweet about it or change his “Linked in” profile from tentmaker to prisoner.
But when the church discovered his
predicament they sent a messenger from the church along with a care
package. And Paul is thanking them for
what they’ve done, but he’s also assuring them that he isn’t upset that they
had taken so long to respond. And this
is what puts vs. 13 in context.
So Paul begins this section by writing Philippians 4:10 How I praise the Lord that you are concerned about me again. I
know you have always been concerned for me, but you didn’t have the chance to
help me.
The sentiment here gets a little weird, because
he starts by kind of saying “thank you for your help.” But in the next verse he
basically says “But I really didn’t need it.” Philippians 4:11-12
Not that I was ever in need, for I
have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live
on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in
every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or
little.
So Paul is saying “Thanks, sort of. It’s nice that I have what you sent but I was
content with what I had before you sent it.”
You know when someone gives you a present and you say, “Thank you, but
you didn’t have to.” That’s what Paul
was saying, and that is what leads into verse 13 and what puts #icandoallthings
into context.
Let’s read it
in context. Philippians 4:11-13
Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be
content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or
with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation,
whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little. For I
can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.
Listen up
folks, Philippians 4:13 is the
secret to spiritual contentment, not necessarily the secret to worldly
success. It would appear that Paul was
teaching a concept that was later spelled out by Alfred
Nobel who said “Contentment is the only real wealth.”
Let’s flip it
around and read it another way.
For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength, for I
have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live
on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in
every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or
little.
And so while seeking the promise of
success, we may very well miss the promise of contentment. It was Bernard Williams who reminded
us “We may pass violets looking for roses. We may
pass contentment looking for victory.”
And you understand that the real promise of
Philippians 4:13 may be at odds with the perceived promise of Philippians 4:13.
Because the promise that we want to claim
from Philippian 4:13 is often asking God to do what we can’t do on our
own. Or at least what we don’t think we
can do on our own.
One thing that we often miss is that God
has already given us the ability to do the impossible. Human history is full of instances where
people have done the impossible.
Before May 6 1954 it was thought to be
impossible for a man to run a mile in less than four minutes, until Roger
Bannister did it. Now it is routine.
Before December 17 1903 the dream of
heavier than air motorized flight was considered impossible, until 2 brothers proved
it possible. Remember until you try the
impossible you will never know what is possible.
Before July 20 1969 very few people thought it would be possible for a man to
walk on the moon, and there are some people who still think that is
impossible.
Every day we do what
used to be impossible, from talking on cell phones to driving automobiles, to
surviving cancer, simply because someone decided to do the impossible.
And if the truth was
known, too often we want God to do the possible for us. It’s just that for us to do it on our own
seems like way too much work so we ask God for help.
For our first ten years as s church we met
in rented facilities and we kept trying to find a way to get land and build,
but we weren’t all that serious about sacrificing for it. We really wanted God to provide a piece of
land and a building without us having to pay too much for it.
It was only when we moved ahead with the
capital campaign and folks in the church committed over $350,000.00 toward the
project that we realized that God had already provided for our building.
And today I still talk to Pastors of
churches that meet in schools and theatres, and community centres and they want
God to give them land and provide them with a building, but they aren’t willing
to do it themselves.
And maybe if we listen hard enough we can
hear God whisper those words that parents across time have told their
children. “You can do it yourself.”
You can quit drinking, you can lose weight,
you can read the bible you can love the unlovable.
And notice that Paul’s contentment didn’t
depend on what he had. He said he was
content when he had a little and he was content when he had lots. And sometimes it easier to be content with
little than with lots. We’ve all felt
the curse of the desire for the “Next best thing.” Perhaps today Paul would write, I’m content
with a “flip phone or an iPhone 7.”
It was Charles Caleb Colton who wrote “True contentment depends not upon what
we have; a tub was large enough for Diogenes, but a world was too little for
Alexander.” As
a point of interest Colton was an English preacher in the early 1800s. And while you may think you’ve never heard of
him, you’ve probably quoted him. It was
Colton who wrote “Imitation is the sincerest of
flattery.” And “True friendship is like sound health; the value of it is seldom known
until it be lost.”
The danger of discontentment is spelled out
by Solomon in Ecclesiastes 1:8 Everything is wearisome beyond
description. No matter how much we see, we are never satisfied. No matter how
much we hear, we are not content.
And Paul warns Timothy of the consequence
of discontentment in 1
Timothy 6:6-10 Yet
true godliness with contentment is itself great wealth. After all, we
brought nothing with us when we came into the world, and we can’t take anything
with us when we leave it. So if we have enough food and clothing, let us
be content. But people who long to be rich fall into temptation and are
trapped by many foolish and harmful desires that plunge them into ruin and
destruction. For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. And
some people, craving money, have wandered from the true faith and pierced
themselves with many sorrows.
But it’s not enough with knowing the
context of Philippians 4:13 because while one danger is to take it out of
context we have to Be Careful to Not Take the “In Context” Out of Context And now you think
that I’m just babbling.
Paul tells the church in Philippi that they
didn’t need to worry about him because he had discovered the secret of
contentment. But while Paul may have
been content Paul was never complacent.
Had Paul’s
contentment led to complacency, the church as we know it would not exist. Paul was always pushing himself to do more,
to plant more churches to reach more people. His hashtag probably would have been
#contentnotcomplacent.
It was Jimmy Carter who said “I hate to see complacency prevail in
our lives when it's so directly contrary to the teaching of Christ.”
Every one of us
has the power within us to change our world if not the world.
God calls us to
do better and to be better Christians.
We can’t be content to not grow as Christians, instead we care called to
strive, to grow and to mature. We can’t
be content to see evil and allow evil without speaking out against evil. Albert Einstein said “The world is in
greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who
actually commit it.”
We can’t be
content to let someone else to change the world, to let someone else rescue the
slaves or feed the hungry or provide clean water in West Africa And we can make a difference, if only we are
willing to step outside of our comfort zone,
Which is why Benjamin E. Mays wrote “The
tragedy of life is often not in our failure, but rather in our complacency; not
in our doing too much, but rather in our doing too little; not in our living
above our ability, but rather in our living below our capacities.”
If the most
famous prayer of them all is the Lord’s prayer.
Which by the way speaks to both contentment and complacency when Jesus
taught us to pray “Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” We
are content in the will of God but we can’t be complacent as long as God’s will
is not being done in our lives.
So if the most
famous of prayers is the Lord’s prayer I’d say the Serenity prayer has to run a
close second. Written by Pastor Reinhold Neibuhr in the
1940’s and now a staple for AA and other 12 step groups, it seems like a good
way to end today’s message. Let’s pray
it together:
God,
grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
Courage
to change the things I can, And wisdom
to know the difference.