Read the Bible in 2023 ◊ Week 27: Sunday

Sunday’s Bible reading is Philippians 3–4. Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi is about joy in the midst of the circumstances of our lives. As you read this letter you’ll find that even it’s structure reflects this. Paul opens the letter with mention of how God has worked in the circumstances of his imprisonment, and he closes with  encouraging the Philippians on living in their own circumstances and writes about what he has learned in own life’s circumstances. In the midst of the letter Paul talks about the Lord Jesus, who is our joy.

Chapter 3 opens with Paul’s major theme of joy and rejoice.

J. A. Motyer writes,

“As 2:17f. Paul was dwelling on the topic of joy, but at that point it was the shared joy of believers. He has more to say on the subject and so, having paused to outline his plans touching Timothy and Epaphroditus, he now resumes his theme: ‘To proceed, then brethren . . .’ (3:1).

“The command which Paul gives in 3:1 acts as a bridge between what he has taught and what he is about to teach. Jesus has been glorified as God, Saviour, Example and Lord. So then, rejoice in the Lord. He is about to be displayed as the Christian’s pride, choicest possession, ambition, pattern, possessor, the crucified and coming Saviour. Should we not then, rejoice in the Lord?”²

William Hendriksen notes that although Paul has already written about joy in his letter, for the first time in 3:1 he adds the phrase, in the Lord.³

Paul rejoiced in the Lord. Why was he able to do this?

It wasn’t that Paul hadn’t suffered—he suffered much—it wasn’t that Paul never knew sorrow—he knew affliction and rejection; it was that Paul gloried in the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, his Lord.

I’ve heard some cliches about happiness and joy—you may have heard some as well—and I always found them to have a finger-pointing, discouraging tone, but Dr. MacArthur distinguishes between the two in a way that I have found to be very helpful. Both are emotions and both are exhilarating, however, happiness is focused on circumstances, while joy is focused on a relationship. I’ve added the emphasis:

“Paul is not talking about happiness when he talks about joy and rejoicing. Happiness is from hap…hap is a circumstance, happenstance, happenings, happiness, all the same word group. That is to say happiness is an emotion or an exhilaration associated with certain events. It is not an emotion or an exhilaration associated with a relationship. It has to do with an event, a thing, a happening. So the kind of joy that Paul is talking about and calling for, and this by the way is a command, and the command implies the capability of obedience on the part of a believer which in itself is no doubt a test of true salvation. But he says…rejoice in the Lord…commanding us to joy. But it is not the kind of emotional outburst, good feeling, exhilaration that is associated with an event. It is the kind that is associated with a relationship. It doesn’t even say, “Rejoice because of what the Lord has given you…rejoice because of what the Lord will give you…rejoice because of what the Lord is giving you.” It doesn’t say, “Rejoice because of what the Lord has done for the people that you care about.” It says, “Rejoice in the Lord.”

“It is the exhilaration in the relationship, perhaps the simplest human analogy to it would be the joy of a parent in a newborn baby…there is something about the relationship that literally exhilarates the soul. It is the same kind of emotion only in much greater and deeper proportion as that of falling in love. And it isn’t so much that your emotion and your exhilaration and your exuberance and that overwhelming sense of silly peace that you enjoy is related to what the one you love does for you as it is just the thought of the one you love. And extrapolating out of those irrepressible human joys that come out of relationship, we can magnify that concept in to what we ought to feel and ever rejoice in that we enjoy with the Lord Himself.“⁴

In chapter 4, we again see Paul’s concern for the Philippians. He wants Euodia and Syntyche to live in harmony, and he wants the Philippians to have peace in the midst of their circumstances. In Philippians 4:4 we find the key verse to this letter as Paul enjoins them again to rejoice in the Lord.

Paul closes his letter by speaking of needs and contentment.

We all want joy, we all want to be content. As Christians we know we are to be joyful, to be content. This is a spiritual battle. These aren’t topics to superficially glide over or to deal with by denying our anxieties or our suffering. The Lord Jesus is our Advocate. The Holy Spirit is our Advocate, our Comforter, called alongside us to help us. Through His Word, God gives us help. God will use the gifts of others to help us. The things I share with you are things God has used to help me.

In a sermon on “Contentment,” Dr. MacArthur said (my emphasis):

“Paul this prisoner, Paul chained, Paul captive, Paul ridiculed, Paul slandered, Paul persecuted, yet absolutely content, untouched by the circumstances.

“And so that introduces the question to us, how do you get to this point? What are the components of contentment? How do we understand practically how to become content? And as I look at this chapter I think the whole chapter sort of folds in on top of verse 11, speaks to it. So let me give you some things to think about, just a list of things that feed into contentment. Number one, contentment comes from cultivating the love of others. It comes from cultivating the love of others. It’s about giving your life away.”⁶

MacArthur returns to the theme of relationships. Focus on relationships for joy. Focus on relationships for contentment. (My emphasis).

“Paul experienced contentment and satisfaction in any circum­stance, because he didn’t define his life by the kind of circumstances he experienced. He defined his life by the kind of relationship that he had with people. If he could preach the gospel and people would be converted, that was contentment and satisfaction, regardless of his physical condition. If he could have a ministry in the lives of people to bring them to a deeper knowledge of the things of God, a ministry that brought about their sanctification through the truth, that was enough to bring him contentment. If he could bring a word of comfort to a troubled soul, if he could bring a word of instruction to an ignorant mind, that was enough. It was about the people. It was about the people. If he could lovingly pour out the truth of God to a congregation, he would suffer anything to get that privilege. And you see this in the opening of this chapter.

“Let me read you the first 3 verses, “Therefore my beloved brethren whom I long to see,” now those are very, very intense words that speak of Paul’s affections. “My beloved brethren whom I long to see, my joy and crown so stand firm in the Lord, my beloved.” And then he says, “I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to live in harmony in the Lord. Indeed” – suzugus, true comrade – “true yolkfellow, I ask you also to help these women who have shared my struggle in the cause of the gospel together with Clement also and the rest of my fellow workers, whose names are in the book of life.” And just reading that you’re just caught up with the fact that this man’s life was all about people. It was about a congregation in Philippi who were beloved brethren to him. So beloved, were they, that he calls them that twice in the same verse.”⁷

It’s not that Paul was never hurt by people. It’s not that people never let Paul down. If you read 2 Timothy 4:9–22, Paul talks about being deserted and being harmed. But as you read, you’ll also see many names listed of those to whom Paul had poured out his life, those who became colaborers with Paul in the gospel of Jesus Christ: Luke, Mark (once deserted Paul, now useful in service to Paul), Prisca, Aquila, and many others. People whom Paul loved; people who loved Paul.

And why does this love exist?

MacArthur speaks again of the Lord. (My emphasis):

“But please notice, verse 4, carefully, “Rejoice in the Lord.” It doesn’t say rejoice in your circumstances. It says rejoice in the Lord, that is rejoice that God is the God of goodness and power and mercy and grace and provision. Rejoice that the Lord is your shepherd and you shall not want. In other words your rejoicing is not in the circum­stance, it’s not in your own ability to evade the most fatal blows, your rejoicing is in the Lord. Jesus said, John 16, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you will weep and lament. The world will rejoice superficially. You will be sorrowful but your sorrow will be turned to joy.” And that’s the promise of the Lord, that he’ll always be there to provide what we need to turn sorrow into Joy.”⁸

There’s a lot more detail in the sermon on contentment. If you read it, you may need to read it in small segments because there’s so much to think about.

Joy and contentment are hard for me. I struggle with them when I suffer, when things go wrong, when people let me down. Help one another find joy and contentment by loving those Christians whom God has placed in your life. Build those relationships that bring joy. Love one another because God loves us. Rejoice in the Lord.

Remember God saved us by His grace. God enables us to walk and live by His grace. He loves you. He will help you.

Paul closes this wonderful letter with these words.

Encouragement for the Philippians. Encouragement for us.

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Silvesterzug Laterne: Bk muc. (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Wordle cloud: Philippians 3:1, 4:4.
^1,2J. A. Motyer, The Message of Philippians: Jesus our Joy (InterVarsity Press: Downers Grove IL: 1984) I substituted Furthermore for Finally in Philippians 3:1 because Motyer writes that the Greek word translated as finally in this verse has “the basic meaning ‘as to what remains’, hence ‘additionally’, ‘furthermore’, ‘from now/then on’, ‘to proceed’, etc.” 146; 147.
³Williams Hendriksen, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon (Baker Book House, Grand Rapids MI: 1962) 147.
⁴John MacArthur, Copyright 1989, Grace to You. All rights reserved. Used by permission. This Grace to You sermon, “The Distinctive Qualities of the True Christian, Part 2,” originally appeared here.
³Williams Hendriksen, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon (Baker Book House, Grand Rapids MI: 1962) 147.
⁵I’ve substituted For the rest for the word Finally in Philippians 4:8. This is a translation of the same Greek words found in Philippians 3:1. The Rev. Alfred Marshall gives this translation in The Interlinear Greek-English New Testament (Zondervan, Grand Rapids MI: 1958, 1959)  787, as does Hendriksen in his commentary on page 198.
^6,7,8John MacArthur, Copyright 2002, Grace to You. All rights reserved. Used by permission. This Grace to You sermon, “Contentment,” originally appeared here.
An index of Dr. MacArthur’s sermons on Philippians can be found here. The summer I became a Christian, my Bible study group used Dr. Motyer’s small booklet, The Richness of Christ, Studies in the Letter to the Philippians.

This post is included in the categories of Heresy and False Teachers because Paul warns of them in Philippians 3. You can learn more about them in Dr. MacArthur’s sermons or in J. A. Motyer’s book.

I’m using Michael Coley’s Bible reading plan (one page PDF to print) to read through the Bible in 2023. Each day my posts are on different books because he divides Bible readings into seven categories, one for each day of the week: Epistles, The Law, History, Psalms, Poetry, Prophecy and Gospels. There’s more information on his plan and other ones at Read the Bible in 2023.

Copyright ©2011–2023 Iwana Carpenter