Philippians 4:4-7
All right, thank you for your singing. If you’ll stand, we’ll read our scripture this morning, and this is Philippians chapter 4, 4 through 7. Here’s what Paul writes, Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice.
Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
Here’s the promise. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
All right. We’re in the homestretch here in the book of Philippians. So, if you want to turn to your Bibles to Philippians chapter 4, you can just follow along with the outline on the screen this morning.
We’re in the homestretch. And as you know, Paul’s writing this thank you letter back to the church. He’s in Rome.
He’s in prison. He’s awaiting a trial. He doesn’t know if he’s going to live or die.
And he makes wise use of his time, doesn’t he? He spreads the gospel. And some of Caesar’s household comes to faith in Jesus. And he writes four letters, four prison epistles.
This is one of them, primarily a thank you note, because the church has sent a gift through Epaphroditus to Paul. So, this morning in the first seven verses of chapter 4, we’re going to answer five questions. And you have them on their outline.
And so let me just review those questions. Here’s what we’re going to answer. What does it mean to stand firm in the Lord? That’s found in verse 1, Paul’s admonition to stand firm in the Lord.
What does that mean? Number two, who are Euodia, Syntyche, and my true companion that’s mentioned in verse 2? Who are these people? Number three, what’s the book of life that’s mentioned in verse 3? What’s the book of life all about? Number four, what does it mean to rejoice in the Lord always, as Paul writes? And then he says, and again, I say rejoice. Do we have to have a smile on our face all the time and just always choose joy? What does that mean to rejoice in the Lord always? And then lastly, we’ll finish with this. This is one I need every day.
How can I have victory over worry and anxiety in my life? How can I have victory over worry and anxiety? So, the book of Philippians is Paul’s most personal book. Chapter 1, he says, I have you in my thoughts. I have you in my prayers.
I have you in my heart. And look how he starts out verse 1 of chapter 4. He gives six enduring terms. Therefore, my brothers and sisters, we’re part of God’s family.
You’re my brother and you’re my sister in the Lord. You whom I love, who I long for, you’re my joy, you’re my crown. One translation says, you’re my beloved or you’re my dear friends.
And so, Paul has this intimate, close relationship with the church at Philippi. He was their founding pastor and he loves these people and they love him. And so, Paul begins by just reaffirming his love and his relationship with the Philippian believers.
1. What does it mean to “stand firm in the Lord”?
But let’s get to our questions here and then we’ll answer these and think about three applications from the first seven verses here. Here’s question number one. What does it mean to stand firm in the Lord? Therefore, my brothers and sisters, you whom I love, I long for, my joy, and my crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, dear friends.
So, it’s a command. It’s an imperative. It says, I want you to stand firm.
And so that command, that imperative, I believe can apply to two areas of our life. Number one, he’s telling them to stand firm in truth, to stand firm in doctrine. Secondly, stand firm in your duty.
Stand firm in your belief. Know what you believe. Stand firm in your behavior.
And so, the apostle Paul tells the believers in Philippi, I want you to be grounded in truth. You heard the story of the pastor that the elderly couple that visited his church and he wanted to kind of get to know them a little better. So, he made a personal visit to their house and he sat down with them.
And after they kind of got to know each other a little bit better, he began to ask some questions about their spiritual background. So, he turned to the husband and he says, well, can you kind of share with me, what do you believe? And that kind of took the husband by surprise. So, he kind of thought about it for a little bit.
He really didn’t know what to say. He says, well, I believe exactly what my wife believes. He turned to the wife, and he asked the wife, well, what do you believe? And she thought about it a little bit and she said, well, I believe exactly what my husband believes.
And finally, the pastor said, well, what do you both believe? And they said, pretty much the same thing. So, we need to know what we believe. Did you know that there’s five fundamentals of the faith? These are truths that might be referred to as bullet theology, because these are truths that we should be willing to die for.
Because without these truths, then we don’t have the essence of the gospel. Here they are. The inerrancy of scripture.
The scripture is without error. It is the inspired word of God. Secondly, the virgin birth and deity of Christ.
That Christ is who he said he is, he’s the son of God. The third one is the substitutionary atonement. He who knew no sin became sin for us, so that in him we might become what? The righteousness of God.
He paid our sin debt. Number four, what we celebrated last Sunday, the literal bodily resurrection of Jesus. We stand firm on that because what? Without the resurrection, we’re wasting our time.
There is no gospel. And lastly, the second coming of Christ. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the Apostles’ Creed.
It’s one of the earliest creeds that was written. It’s from 140 AD, so this has been around a long, long time. And the apostles and the early church fathers got together and wrote a statement of some very important doctrinal truths.
Let me just read it to you. It’s a couple paragraphs long. Here’s what the Apostles’ Creed says.
I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ, his only son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. He descended into hell. The third day he rose again from the dead.
He ascended into heaven. He sits on the right hand of God, the Father Almighty, from whence he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the universal church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.
That’s the Apostles’ Creed. So, to stand firm means that we need to know what we believe. And you know what? God’s given some gifts to the church, and they’re listed in Ephesians chapter 4, to help us with that.
And the Apostle Paul, writing to the Ephesian believers, writes about some of the gifts that God has given, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, what, to equip God’s people for works of service, and to become mature in Christ. And then verse 14 says, then we will no longer be infants, talking spiritually, being tossed back and forth by the waves and blown here and there by every wind of doctrine. In other words, there’s lots of false teaching out there.
There’s lots of different doctrinal truths out there. And when we know what we believe, we’re not going to be swayed. We’re not going to be like chasing after, oh, that sounds appealing.
No, because what? We’re grounded in truth. And so, to stand firm means to stand firm in what we believe, but also in our behavior, because we’re in a spiritual battle. And Ephesians 6 talks about standing against what? The wiles of the devil.
In fact, that word stand is used four times. And so, we’re to what? To stand firm, not only in what we believe, but in our Christian life, our journey. Paul talked about it in Philippians 3. He says, I press on toward the goal to win the prize.
And we listened to a song a few weeks ago, and we studied that passage. In Jesus’ name, I press on. And so, it’s to keep living for God and keep working for him and standing firm in the truth.
2. Who are Euodia, Syntyche and “my companion”?
Well, there’s a second question we’re going to answer, and it’s found in Philippians 4:2. Here’s what Paul writes. I plead with Euodia and I plead with Syntyche. Not in the top 10 baby names in 2025, but here’s Paul’s plea.
I plead with them to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you, my true companion, help those women who have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel. So, who are Euodia and Syntyche? And apparently, they were two women in the Philippian church.
And apparently, they were having a dispute or disagreement. And apparently, it was public because Paul is 800 miles away in Rome, and he hears about it. But these two ladies aren’t getting along.
And so, what does Paul write? He says, I ask you to be of the same mind. These are ladies who apparently have worked with Paul side by side and sharing the gospel and serving in the church. Help those women who have labored side by side with me in the gospel.
They were part of Paul’s ministry team. And he admonishes them, I want you to be of the same mind. He writes about this in Philippians 2, Paul does.
He says, make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. It’s unity. It’s oneness.
Apparently, these ladies were having this public dispute. And he asks them to be of the same mind. There are times for the sake of unity within the church that we need to set aside our personal preferences for the sake of unity.
And so, that’s what he’s asking these ladies to do. We don’t know what that dispute was about, but there are times where we need to, if it’s a personal preference for the sake of unity, we need to set that aside and have a oneness and unity in the Lord. Well, Paul mentions a true companion here.
In verse 3, I ask you, my true companion, help those women since they contended at my side in the cause of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers. So, some translations use the word true companion. King James uses my true yoke fellow.
The New Living Translation says my partner. So, who is this person? And the answer is we don’t know. I don’t know who he is.
But apparently, Paul knows him and Paul’s asking him to come alongside and help these two that are in disagreement come to, what, oneness and unity. And that’s a biblical principle, isn’t it? There are times if we can’t settle a disagreement with another believer, maybe within the church, what’s the easy thing to do today? The easy thing to do is just like, well, I’m just going to run off and go somewhere else, go to another church. There are times when God leads us from one church to another, but what God wants us to do is he wants us to, what, work out those differences.
If you can’t do it, then you need to look for another mature believer that can come in and help you resolve those differences. And so, Euodia and Syntyche were two women having a disagreement, and Paul says, hey, let’s just all get along and be of the same mind and set aside those personal preferences for the sake of harmony and unity.
3.What is the “book of life”?
Third question, and this is found in the last part of verse 3, as Paul writes that this true companion needs to come and help the women who have contended at his side for the sake of the gospel, along with Clement and the rest of my co-workers.
Here’s the phrase, whose names are in the book of life, whose names are in the book of life. So, what is the book of life? It is mentioned four times in the Bible. Here in Philippians 4:3, it’s mentioned three times in Revelation.
Revelation 3:5, 20:12, and 20:15. There are also two other references in Revelation to the Lamb’s book of life. So, what is this book all about? Apparently, there’s a book of life that contains the names of all those who have been redeemed or saved.
God has a book, and in that book are the names of what? All those who have come to know Jesus as their Savior. And so, when we come to the end of the book of Revelation and something called the great white throne judgment, that’s not a judgment for believers, but it’s for those who have not received Christ as their Savior. John writes about the great white throne, and here is the presence of everyone.
And I saw the dead great and small, verse 12, standing before the throne, and the books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.
The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. God is a just God, and eternal condemnation will be worse for some people than for others, I believe. There are degrees of punishment in hell.
Then he goes on to say, then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the lake of fire.
And so, there’s the book of life, and in that book are the names of those who’ve come to faith in Jesus. So, there’s an old hymn. I don’t think it’s in our hymn book, but the hymn writer writes the hymn entitled, Is My Name Written There? Let me just give you the words.
Fans of one Lord, I care not for riches, neither silver nor gold. I would make sure of heaven, I would enter the fold. In the book of thy kingdom, with its pages so fair, tell me, Jesus my Savior, is my name written there? Lord, my sins, they are many, like the sands of the sea, but thy blood, O my Savior, is sufficient for me.
For thy promise is written in bright letters that glow. Though your sins be as scarlet, I will make them like snow. Is my name written there, on the page white and fair? In the book of thy kingdom, is my name written there? The last stanza, Oh! that beautiful city, with its mansions of light, with its glorified beings, in pure garments of white, where no evil thing cometh to despoil what is fair, where the angels are watching, yes, my name’s written there.
And I trust you know this morning, Christ as your Savior, and if you do, your name is written in the Lamb’s book of life. In November 22nd, 1963, name Ronald Wayne Clark, written in the Lamb’s book of life, I trust your name is written there.
4. What does it mean to “rejoice in the Lord” always?
Well, question number four, back to Philippians 4, what does it mean to rejoice in the Lord always? And then Paul adds, and again I say rejoice, Philippians chapter 4, verse 4. So, here’s Paul, it’s the joy epistle, he’s writing from prison, and yet he’s choosing joy, but what does it mean to rejoice in the Lord always? I remember the first church that we were at in Ohio, Strongs, Ohio, there’s some good friends of ours that attended, and husband’s name was Steve, and I liked Steve, and he became a great friend, but Steve like was always smiling.
I mean it started to bug me, because you know, he just had this smile on his face like all the time, and like man, doesn’t this guy ever like get down, or get discouraged, or is that just a genuine joy that he has? So, I asked the question, do we have to be joyful all the time? So, there’s a book entitled Joy and Tears, The Emotional Life of a Christian by Gerald Peterman, and what do you do in your life when you get a cancer diagnosis? How do you respond when a marriage ends, or a company downsizes, and you lose your job, or your child becomes sick with a serious illness, and are you just supposed to plaster a fake smile on your face, and say well praise the Lord, and quote Romans 8:28? Well, here’s what Gerald Peterman writes, he starts out by quoting Romans 12:15, which says rejoice with those that rejoice, and weep with those that weep, or mourn with those that mourn, and he writes that verse presupposes that we can distinguish rejoicing from what? Mourning, or weeping, or entering into someone’s pain, and so no we don’t have to go around like choosing this smile on our face when our heart is breaking, because as Ecclesiastes 3:4 says, there’s a time to weep, and there’s a time to laugh. 1st Corinthians 13:6 says, love does not rejoice in evil. We’re not going to read some story in the newspaper of horrific evil, and say well isn’t that wonderful, we’ll choose joy.
No, no, and so here’s, again I’m going to read a couple paragraphs from Gerald Peterman, so what does it mean when it says rejoice always? Well Peterman writes, when we look, we need to look at Paul’s word for always, which in the original is ah-ee, sometimes this word always refers to something that happens continually, continuously, 24 7. For example, Jesus says he always does his father’s will, and that the father always hears him, John 11:42. Hebrews says Jesus always lives to make intercession for us. On the other hand, this same word Paul uses for always sometimes refers to things that happen often or typically.
For example, during Jesus’ trial, he was asked in question about his teaching and about his disciples. He responded, I have always taught in synagogues and in the temple where all Jews come together. Always here means typically or characteristically.
Jesus didn’t always teach in the temple, he taught in other places. So even in Philippians, Paul mentions that while writing, Philippians 3:18, he wept over the enemies of the cross. So, Paul’s not rejoicing over the enemies of the cross, Paul is weeping in Philippians 3:18 because they’re enemies.
And so, the summary is joy should be characteristic of our lives, it should be our typical experience. But if we have times of pain, weeping, or anxiety, that does not mean we fail to obey the command of Philippians 4:4. It might mean instead that we’ve obeyed the command of Romans 12:15. Now that kind of helped me, you know, that God’s given us emotions, and sometimes we’re filled with joy and happiness, and other times we’re entering into someone’s pain, and we’re hurting with them.
And that doesn’t mean that we’re not obeying Philippians 4:4. The joy needs to be the typical characteristic of our life, but not all the time. I hope that makes sense. Here’s the last one, number five.
5. How can I have victory over worry and anxiety in my life?
How can I have victory over worry and anxiety in my life? And we’re going to look at that in Philippians 4:6 and 7. So Jesus talks a lot about that. Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 6, I think it’s four, five times, is don’t worry, don’t be anxious, don’t worry, God closed the birds and the fields. He’s going to take care of you.
Don’t worry. And that’s what Paul writes here in Philippians 4:6 and 7. He begins to talk about worry. Now there’s general categories of worry in our life.
I just jotted down a few. We worry over family, and I’ve discovered that as you get older and your family begins to grow, there’s more people, not only you worry about your kids, not only worry about their marriages, their grandkids. The worry list gets longer.
And so, we worry about family, don’t we? We worry about finances in our economy. We worry about our health. We worry about the future.
Especially, you know, young people and what’s God’s plan for my life and what’s his direction for my life. And so, we have this worry list. Dr. Vance Havner, a late Southern preacher, said worry is like a rocking chair.
It gives you something to do, but it gets you nowhere. But worry really doesn’t change anything, does it? So here Paul says, do not worry. Now here’s a definition from, this is from Dr. Ray Pritchard.
He writes, worry is excessive concern over the affairs of life. The key being excessive. Worry happens when you are so concerned about the problems of life that you can’t think of anything else.
It is an all-consuming feeling of uncertainty and fear. And the Apostle Paul and God tells us, don’t do that. So, there’s a fine balance between just stewing and worrying and a life of anxiety over here.
And I know a family in our previous church, and the husband was not the leader in the home, not providing for his wife. And when she used to express that concern, he would just say, well, just trust God.
But while he was trusting God, he was just sitting in his chair doing nothing when he should have been out looking for a job. So, we don’t want to go that direction, do we? So, the sweet spot is in the middle here. And so, what does Paul tell us? It’s a command.
Do not be anxious about anything. That is an imperative. Stop worrying.
Now I got to ask a question here. Does anybody remember the Bob Newhart show? Have you ever seen the clip where a woman comes in and she’s paying lots of money for advice and he asks her like, well, what’s your fear? And she says, well, my fear is that I’m going to be like put in a box and buried in the ground. And so, she looks to Bob Newhart for advice.
And finally, Bob Newhart says, well, here’s my advice to you. Stop it. She goes, what? Stop it.
And they go on and on. He says stop it about six or seven times. He says, stop it.
He says, if you don’t stop worrying about that, that’s a horrible thing to think about. So just stop it. And that’s the only advice that he gave her.
Well, that’s what Paul’s saying here. First of all, we need to stop worrying. And here’s what we have to admit.
This kind of worry is a sin. And we have all these categories of sin, you know, horrible sins, acceptable sins. If the Bible says don’t worry and we’re worrying all the time, then that’s a sin.
And so, we need to acknowledge that because it’s what? What is worry? We’re not trusting God. We’re wanting to take things into our control. We’re not trusting a sovereign God who loves us and has a plan for our lives and loves you and your kids and your grandkids more than you could ever imagine.
And so, Paul says, number one, stop worrying. And then he gives us a prescription. Here it is.
Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. So, he tells us, stop doing this. Here’s what I want you to do.
I want you to pray. And I want you to take that worry list. And sometimes it’s even helpful to write it all down.
I want you to give it to me. Casting all your care, that word for care is worry and anxiety. This is 1st Peter 5:7.
Cast all your care upon him because he cares for you. God will take care of your family. God will take care of your finances.
God has a plan for your life and your family’s life and we simply need to trust him. And then there is the promise. And that’s how verse 7 ends.
What happens when we stop worrying and we take all those requests, our worry list, and we pray about them? Here’s the promise. The peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts, that’s your emotions, and your minds, that’s your thoughts, in Christ Jesus. The word there, is like a military word, standing guard.
God’s going to give you the peace of God that surpasses all understanding. And so, we can go through the storms of life and if you know the makeup of a hurricane and the center of a hurricane is what? The eye. And there are storms all around and then you get into that eye of the hurricane and all of a sudden, it’s completely calm.
3 Application Questions
And that’s what God promises to us. It is the peace of God that surpasses all understanding. Well, this morning as we close just three application questions because we’re kind of camping on this word peace because the Bible talks about three kinds of peace in scripture.
1. Have you made peace with God?
And so, here’s our three questions. Question number one as we think about application, have you made your peace with God? In other words, is your name found in the book of life? Romans 5:1 says, therefore being justified by faith we’ve made peace with God. Before we become a child of God, we’re his enemy.
We’re in darkness. And then through the blood of Jesus and his forgiveness we are at peace with him. Romans 8:1, there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
2. Are you experiencing the peace of God?
We’ve been forgiven. Sins have been paid for and we have peace with God. The second question is this, not only have I made my peace with God but are you experiencing the peace of God in your life? I don’t know about you but life is challenging and we’re all just a phone call away from difficult news and difficult things happening in our life.
And I tell you what, this is something we need daily in our life. When that anxiety and that worry comes and when we’re awake at night and we’re wondering and we’re worrying, you know, don’t count sheep, talk to the shepherd as they say. Pray.
And trust God. And that peace of God will fill our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. So, you can experience the peace of God even when you’re walking through the storms of life.
3. Are you at peace with others?
Lastly, third one is this, are you experiencing peace with others? So, these are, I call it the triad of peace, you know, peace with God, the peace of God, and then peace with other people. The old poem, oh to live in heaven above with those we love, oh that will be glory, but to live on earth below with those we know, well that’s a different story. And sometimes it’s difficult to get along.
And yet what’s the scripture tell us? We need to work to maintain unity. Here’s what Romans 12:18 says, if it is possible as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. If it’s possible as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
So do everything you know how to do to make peace with that situation. But guess what? Sometimes peace takes two partners. And sometimes peace with another person doesn’t always happen.
And there’s times where we just kind of need to separate or put up some boundaries. But in general, like God wants us to live at peace with others. And so, I trust you’ve made your peace with God.
I trust you’ll experience the peace of God today and take some time later today if you’ve got worries and anxiety and turn that worry list and make it into a prayer list. And then I trust that you’ll experience peace with other people. But Jesus said, I came to give you peace.
Not like the world gives. But I’ve come to give you peace. He’s called the Prince of Peace.
Isaiah 26:3 says, you will keep in perfect peace the one whose mind is stayed or focused on God. So, what we tend to do is we focus on the circumstance. He wants us to focus on him.
I don’t know what burdens on your heart this morning. Someone has said we’re either coming into a trial or in the midst of a trial or coming out of one. But life is hard.
The fact of the matter is all of us have things in our lives that cause us worry and anxiety. And as we close our service this morning, let’s put into practice Philippians 4:6 and 7. Whatever’s on that worry list in your heart this morning, give it to God. The great burden bearer, then you will experience his perfect peace.