“ALWAYS”:
THE CHRISTIAN STATE OF MIND
“Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I will say, rejoice.”
This is an easy verse to memorize. It was, in fact, the first verse I memorized as a camp counselor at Red Rock Bible Camp. Another older counselor encouraged me to dwell on this verse and recite it often. It was a good one. Very positive. Very upbeat. Good instruction.
But as I recall, I don’t think I truly understood this verse. What does it mean to rejoice? What does it mean to “rejoice in the Lord”? And then there’s that crucial word “always.” And that’s the one that causes the most difficulty. Always?
How am I supposed to rejoice when there are unresolved wars in the world? How can I lift up my hands in praise when my soul is down in the dumps? Do I rejoice when the doctor says I have cancer? Is it possible to rejoice when your children are rejecting the faith? Do you rejoice when the bill for your winter tires is cutting into your budget? Rejoice in the Lord always? How?
We might think that Paul is telling us to be excessively cheerful idiots in the face of difficulty. It sounds like we are supposed to pretend that everything is sweetness and light, that everything will turn out alright if we just think positively. This is just plain naivety, Paul. We can’t do it. Especially the realists amongst us. Is this what Paul is saying?
No, Paul is not asking us to blindly accept difficulty and tragedy with a smile. He is inviting us to develop a vision of life and its challenges that engages them through a renewed mind. No longer do we despair or panic when disappointment strikes. Paul is saying that through Christ we can face all things AND rejoice.
Let’s work this out as we unpack Philippians 4:4-9 and understand what Paul means.
1. Rejoice in the Lord ALWAYS! (4:4-5)
As Paul instructs us to “Rejoice in the Lord always…” we need to remember that Paul wrote these words while in prison. He is alone most of the time in a cold, dark cell; food comes only when a friend is allowed to bring him something; his only companions are the rats and the lice he picks from his beard. The outcome of his prison stay is uncertain. Paul is awaiting his sentencing. He could be beheaded any day for declaring “Jesus is Lord” over and above “Caesar is lord.” And this is just the climax of his life; Paul has known more suffering and deprivation that we can imagine (read 2 Corinthians 11:24ff).
So, if we think that Paul is being overly optimistic and naïve, we forget that he has experienced it all. And he still rejoices.
When Paul says “rejoice” it is in the present active voice. That means it is ongoing; he could say “keep on rejoicing.” Don’t stop.
The powerless platitude “be happy” is not helpful. Charlie Brown once said, “Happiness is a warm puppy.” Until the puppy runs away, or it dies. This is happiness based solely upon circumstances; how good things are going. This joy falls apart when the bank account is empty or your health fails.
In contrast, Paul has written extensively about “joy” in this letter in the strangest of circumstances. Preachers are taking advantage of his imprisonment, yet he rejoices (1:18); he speaks of being poured out like a drink offering (spent in serving them), and he rejoices (2:17-18); even as he describes the opponents of the faith, he rejoices (3:1); he rejoices in this church (1:4); he rejoices in the growing faith and his part in it (1:25); and again he tells these people THEY are his joy as they follow Jesus (4:1). Joy fills this letter and it’s really weird!
But here’s the critical part; don’t miss this: Rejoice in the Lord! Not in the circumstances, but in the One who is above all our circumstances. Paul’s joy, our joy as believers, is intimately and ultimately tied to Jesus Christ. This phrase “in the Lord” is used 9 times in the letter and it centers us in the realm of where we are to act, think, and feel. We are to hope (2:19), trust (2:24), receive one another (2:29), stand firm (4:1), agree (4:2), and rejoice IN THE LORD (3:1; 4:4, 10). Whatever we do, we are to do it with a consciousness of the Lord Jesus’ presence, that he is with us in anything and everything. He has not left us alone; he is with us.
Jesus is our joy. Jesus is our satisfaction, is another way of saying it. If we approach our jobs with the aim that this work will satisfy my need for purpose and enrichment, there most certainly will be days where you doubt that. If you go on a vacation with the expectation that this holiday will meet my need for rest and recuperation, you will be disappointed when the weather disagrees. But if we are conscious of the Lord Jesus in all we do, we find the one who loves us is present even in the cloudiest of days. Always.
And this is why Paul can say, “Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand…” (5). Our reasonableness is not just about being agreeable because we have Jesus. This word group starting with “rejoice” and being reasonable is about having a posture of endurance while the Philippians are being harassed. It’s about forgiveness. It’s about modeling Christ to those who are hostile to us. They can do that because their joy is not dependent on whether people like them or not. Their joy is in Jesus. And so is ours.
2. Pray about all things ALWAYS! (4:6-7)
Our joy is often stolen by the worries of life. In our advent series, I spoke of the anxiety epidemic that I experienced in college students. There are enough troubles in life, from the cost of living to relationship crises, to weight us down with worry. To “rejoice always” faces roadblocks in the realities of Canadian living.
Paul anticipates this because he knows of his own anxieties. And his response is this: “…do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God…” (6).
He doesn’t make light of our anxieties; he knows they are real. But he is convinced that God is able and powerful to help us in any trouble. Some say, “Go ahead and pray, but I’m going to do something,” as if to say, “prayer is doing nothing.” Prayer is not inactivity; it is not passive; it is not being apathetic or denying the problem. Prayer is how we fight life’s battles. Prayer is the answer to anxiety. How so?
Sam Storms contrasts anxiety with prayer (see chart) and shows us that anxiety causes us to look to ourselves for answers while prayer turns our gaze to God. Anxiety narrows our focus of life into “me and my” where prayer opens our hearts to a more expansive picture and reminds us that God is bigger than our problems. And it is human to try and solve our own problems, but problems are often beyond our ability to solve; but God is able to do more than we imagine. It is easy to look around, to the left, to the right, or ask ChatGPT for an answer, but prayer draws our gaze upward. Our anxiety likes to control us and rule us; prayer turns the control over to God.
Rick Warren writes, “Worry is the warning light that God is not really first in my life at this particular moment because worry says that God is not big enough to handle my troubles” But DA Carson said, “The way to be anxious about nothing is to be prayerful about everything.”
There are six aspects of Paul’s prayer to consider: “in everything” – every circumstance, no matter how small or trivial, “by prayer” – seeking God on your face or while kneading dough with words that may not make sense, “supplication” – going to God with everything in your being and depending on his grace, “with thanksgiving” – meaning that we remember how God has been faithful in the past and will be faithful with this, “with requests” – being specific in the “what” not the “how,” “God” – being present before God. This is how we are to pray…
And God’s response to prayer is powerful: “And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus,” (7). I pray this over people frequently because of the power in these words.
3. Prepare your mind ALWAYS! (4:8-9)
The peace of God will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. I would love this to be automatic. But the truth is we have some work to do in helping God to instil this peace in our minds.
Rejoicing in the Lord always is a state of mind. Praying is training the mind to go to God with everything that causes anxiety. But if we feed our minds with that which makes us anxious, we work against the peace of God.
I believe this is why Paul moves into these verses about these virtues. He instructs the Philippians with two commands: Think and Practice.
Think about these things: Things that are true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, things that are worthy of praise. Philosophically, you don’t have to be a follower of Jesus to think about these things. They are pretty general and good. Knowing Paul, however, and the repeated use of “whatever,” I am certain that we are meant to consider these “whatevers” through a gospel lens. For example, whatever is true is truth that conforms to the gospel of Jesus. Whatever is just – that which is good and right – is best discerned through knowing Jesus. In other words, Jesus is the standard by which these virtues are measured. Am I feeding my mind the things of God?
What we feed our minds determines what dominates our thinking, right? News; commercials that show us things we don’t have and should desire; crimes that dominant our society. Our addiction to TV is one example of feeding at the world’s trough of anxiety; it is the source along with online media of these “anxieties.” I’m a TV junkie so I point fingers back at myself. Most of us average about four hours of TV a day (or if you include our devices, who knows?). On average, a person who reaches the age of 65 will have watched nearly 8 years of their life watching TV. Now, what are you watching? I heard a good one the other day: Instead of asking what’s wrong with it (what I’m watching)? Ask, “What’s right with it?”
Is your mind at war with itself? Are you worried about many things and at peace about nothing? Consider what you are feeding your mind with.
Paul says, “What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me – practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you,” (9). The correlation between what you think and what you do is tight, I mean, it’s so connected! What have we learned from Paul? To rejoice in the Lord; to pray about all things. Practice this attitude, this state of mind. The alternative is to feed our minds and ultimately practice that which exacerbates anxiety - As Petra sang back in the 80s “Garbage in, garbage out.” Similarly, if I want to live a life that counts for something, I need to take in good stuff.
We spoke of the peace of God guarding your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus; that theme returns as we speak of the mind. If we think or meditate on the gospel of Jesus and practice the life of Jesus – the God of peace will be with you. The peace of God and the God of peace are the same presence, because the person of God is our peace.
The Christian state of mind involves seeing life through a mind renewed by the person of Jesus Christ. I admit, this is a radical way of thinking. It is not normal. It is radical because we live in a world of vengeance (of getting even), a world of despair and hopelessness as newsfeeds tell us of some new calamity or problem, a world that just not fair. And in this kind of a world, we are supposed to rejoice in the Lord.
Gordon T. Smith of Ambrose University said, “…the Christian mind is marked by a deep identification with the pain and suffering of our world – in our experience and in the work and relationships of others. We do not despair…we do not grumble and complain. Rather, with patience and perseverance, we allow our own experience of pain and disappointment to draw us…into the Passion of our Lord, so that increasingly we can see and respond with a Christian mind, that is, a crucified mind, to the life and work to which we are each called.” Thus, we rejoice in the Lord always, because Jesus has overcome the worst of life that we can experience. He has won. AMEN
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