©1999 Larry Huntsperger
Peninsula Bible Fellowship
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5/23/99
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Let Your Requests Be Made Known
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Phili. 4:6-7
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5/23/99 Let Your Requests Be Made Known
Phil. 4:6 Be anxious for nothing, but in
everything by prayer and supplication with
thanksgiving let your requests be made
known to God.
Phil. 4:7 And the peace of God, which
surpasses all comprehension, will guard
your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
These two verses in the 4th chapter
of Paul's letter to the Philippians
appear in the middle of the most concentrated
section of this short letter.
If you have been a part of our study in this book
you know why Paul wrote
and what He was seeking to accomplish
through his words.
This remarkable New Testament jewel
provides us with the weapons we need
for survival in the hard times of our lives.
It is a book written for the times
when our spirit feels imprisoned,
for the times
when it seems as though
the winter will have no end.
It is a book written for the times when we hurt,
the times when the future appears to be our
enemy,
the times when we cannot even think about
tomorrow
because it takes all of our faith
and our energy
and our courage to face today.
It is not a theoretical book,
not a theological treatise on the problem of pain,
not reflective, meditative writings
by Saint Paul examining some of the
sticky questions
surrounding the problem of evil in the
world.
It was not written by Paul
from his paneled and padded office,
with soft music playing in the background.
It was written by Paul in prison,
hampered in his writing
by the Roman guard chained to his side,
wondering if this was the day
when he might be called before
Caesar
for the trial that could end with his execution.
This is Paul sharing with us
how the reality of God
and the presence of Jesus Christ in his life
plays out in the face of real evil.
As we've studied our way through this letter in the
past few years
it's been fascinating to see
both what Paul talks about
and what he does not.
He has said almost nothing
about the sources of evil in our lives.
He makes no attempt to explain
why he hurts.
He does, however, say a great deal
about how God has used his pain
for good in his life
and in the lives of others.
And he has also talked a great deal
about both the attitudes
and the actions that have formed
the sure and certain foundation for
himself
as he has faced each new day.
The passage we have been in most recently
is a passage in which Paul
has taken the heart of what he wants to
share with us
and concentrated it down
into a series of short,
powerful statements.
This is Paul's survival kit for hard times -
his weapons,
his tools.
The section began two verses earlier in Philippians
4:4,
and we have seen three weapons so far
in verses 4:4-5.
The first came in his restatement
of the major theme of the letter:
Phil. 4:4 ¶ Rejoice in the Lord always;
again I will say, rejoice!
And we spent several weeks
talking about what that meant.
Then we moved on to the second and third
statements:
Let your gentle spirit be known to all men.
And then,
The Lord is near.
And now this morning we will look at
the 4th of the five weapons
provided for our warfare against evil
and the pain it brings.
And even before we look at what Paul says,
there are some obviously unique aspects
of this 4th weapon.
First of all, it is longer than any of the others.
The first three Paul presented
in just a few words.
This one takes up two verses
with a total of 40 words
in the New American Standard Translation
we're using for our study.
And there is something else I find fascinating here as
well.
In all 4 of the other principles
the crucial truth is simply stated...
€Rejoice in the Lord always...
€Let your gentle spirit be known to all
men.
€The Lord is near.
And we'll see the same pattern
with the final truth
we'll look at next week.
But with this 4th truth
Paul leads us through a 3 part learning process.
He begins the process with a hook.
He says, "Be anxious for nothing..."
Now why does he do that?
Because he knows what's going on inside us
at those times when we hurt.
Do you know what this is?
This is the dentist
taking that little wire probe of his
and jabbing it into the tooth we're
having a problem with,
bringing that electrifying jolt of pain,
where our entire body goes rigid,
and then he says, "Does that hurt?"
This is the hook that draws us in.
This is the point at which Paul gets our total
attention.
Because this is where we live
during the hard times of our lives.
Anxiety isn't just an occasional irritation.
Anxiety is the air we breath.
It is the backdrop to every event,
every scene,
every other activity in our lives.
When Paul says, "Be anxious for nothing"
he knows our honest response will be,
"Yea! Right, Paul.
Anxiety is where I live.
It's all I know.
It's what I do best.
If you've got an answer for me,
you have my full and undivided attention."
Then Paul moves on
to the second step
in his three part learning program.
He shares the principle,
the concept,
the weapon he knows we need.
He says,
in everything by prayer and supplication
with thanksgiving let your requests be
made known to God.
And Paul is using a contrast
within these first two phrases,
a contrast that is essential
to the heart of the message
he wants us to hear.
The contrast is between the words
"Nothing" and "Everything".
Be anxious for NOTHING, but in
EVERYTHING by prayer...
For those of you
who have not yet had your spirit
imprisoned in pain
what I'm about to say
will make no sense to you.
It will sound like religious platitudes,
like god-words,
church-words,
nice things every good Christian should
remember.
But for those of you
who have lived in anxiety
I believe this contrast
will have the clear, powerful ring of
reality.
You see, when our spirits are imprisoned in pain
ANXIETY is the air we breath.
And through this contrast
I see Paul saying,
"I want you to exchange your anxiety
for communication with your Lord."
Where you have been breathing anxiety
I now want you to begin breathing prayer.
And this is why we spent two weeks
talking about the true nature of prayer
before we moved into these verses.
Because, you see, when we hurt
only living reality can bring us through that hurt.
If our world is going smoothly,
and we can live with the illusion
that we can hold our little kingdom together
the way we want,
then any old religious system will do.
We can recite our little memorized prayers,
or carry on our comfortable little religious
routine,
and even believe our doing so
is the reason why our life is going well.
But when pain intrudes into our lives
religion and ritual will not meet the need.
When we hurt
we need a real God,
a God who understands our pain,
a God who shares that pain with us.
We need a God who loves us,
a God who is right there with us in the pain,
a God who hasn't set up
some intricate series of special little
prayer-hoops we must jump through
in just the proper order
before He'll hear us.
We need the real thing.
We need to know we can literally
breath back to God
everything that's going on inside us.
And when Paul sets up this
nothing-everything contrast
between anxiety and prayer,
mentally I picture
these two huge tanks
connected by pipe
with a valve in the middle.
The first tank is my anxiety level.
And I start out with that tank
filled to the brim
until my whole life is anxiety.
And then Paul tells me
there is another tank over here,
a tank called "Prayer".
And as I begin to let my spirit
breath back to God
all those things that have filled me
with so much anxiety
it's like opening that valve
and allowing my anxiety
to flow into my communication with God.
And the goal is to allow the anxiety tank to contain
nothing
and the prayer tank to contain it all.
Now don't turn hyper-spiritual on me here
or the power of Paul's words will be lost.
Remember how we defined prayer?
Prayer is simply
a child of God sharing himself honestly
with his Heavenly Father.
Paul is not talking here
about establishing
or lengthening your "PRAYER TIME".
He is talking about learning to live
in the reality of the constant presence of God.
OK, this may help.
Paul is setting up this contrast
between anxiety and prayer, right?
So, what he's saying is that
whenever we feel anxious
we are to breath that anxiety back to our Lord
in prayer.
"But I feel anxious all day long!"
And that, of course, is the point -
that is what Paul is offering us.
He wants us to learn to live
in the constant presence of our God,
sharing with Him
each new pang of anxiety
as it appears.
"But I don't know that many prayers!"
Good!
Because God doesn't want "YOUR
PRAYERS",
He wants you, sharing yourself,
your fears,
your anxieties,
your pain with Him.
And that is why Paul says what he says:
in everything by prayer and supplication
with thanksgiving let YOUR requests be
made known to God.
And there will be some times,
times when it matters the most,
times when you've tried so hard
to phrase it just right,
and you just don't know
how to do that any longer,
times when you do not know how to pray the
right way,
and all you can say is, "Oh God...Oh God...Oh
God...all I know is that I need You,
and if You are not there,
then I have no hope."
And at those times
that's all you need to say.
Now there is a third part to Paul's teaching pattern
in these verses as well.
1. He begins with the hook, "Be anxious for
nothing..."
2. Then he gives us the principle, "in everything
by prayer and supplication with
thanksgiving let your requests be made
known to God."
3. But he doesn't stop there.
He goes on to offer us
a specific, powerful promise.
He says,
And the peace of God, which surpasses all
comprehension, will guard your hearts and
your minds in Christ Jesus.
The emotional power of that phrasing
is remarkable.
Paul creates the mental image
of the peace of God
forming itself into
a highly trained band of special military
forces,
forces that then take up their position
as the protective guard around
our hearts and our minds -
both our feeling and our reasoning
processes,
protecting them from the anxiety attacks
that have been devastating our lives.
But I need to clarify something here
if Paul's promise is going to make any sense to
us.
I'll give it to you in a statement,
and then I'll take a few more minutes
to try to explain it.
The statement is this: the peace Paul is talking about
in this verse
comes not from the things God does in response
to our prayers,
or even from the hope of the things
God will do,
the peace comes as a result
of our seeing the world as it really is.
And now let me try to explain.
If you were here two weeks ago
you may remember a statement I made
concerning why I believe
God wants us to pray.
I said that prior to our submission to Christ
the central foundation of our lives
was the belief that we could live our lives
just fine without God.
And now, as Christians, the greatest single tool we
will ever have
for affirming our submission to
and our dependance upon God
is prayer.
The central message in every honest prayer we pray
is always the same:
"You are God,
and I need You desperately."
Prayer,
unlike anything else in our Christian lives
forces us to acknowledge that central truth
again and again and again.
Now whenever we hurt,
or whenever we find our lives
filled with anxiety,
that happens because something has crowded into
our lives
over which we have no control.
Obviously, if we could control it
then we would change it
so that we wouldn't hurt any longer.
Now, our natural tendency
is to look for some way
to regain control so that we can make the pain
stop.
Our society as a whole offers all sorts of answers:
We find a good lawyer.
Or we go to the doctor.
Or we find a professional resource
or a support group
or a government agency.
And the Christian community
has its own subtle way
of regaining control as well.
And I have to be very careful
with what I say here
so that I'm not misunderstood.
Do you know what the Christian prescription is for
regaining control?
Make right choices.
If I make the right choices
then my life will turn out right.
We want to believe
that there is an absolute cause-and-effect
relationship
between making right choices
and reaping right results.
Trouble with the kids?
Well, correct your parenting techniques
and the problems will go away.
Trouble with your mate?
Or with your boss?
Or with your neighbor?
Well, follow the Biblical principles involved
and the situation will turn out fine.
And you can see how easy
I could get myself in trouble here.
I've invested a good portion of my life
attempting to understand
and explain to people
what a lot of those right choices are.
I am a strong believer in them
and in their tremendous value.
But there is a danger that comes with making right
choices,
the danger that we might end up believing
I can control my life
and my future
through the choices I make.
Or even worse,
believing that, because I have made right choices
God now owes me the kind of life I want.
Paul, of course, knew different.
He'd lived a life
filled with right choices,
and yet now he sat in prison
facing an uncertain future.
And yet his spirit was at peace
because of this process
of breathing his life back to God
through prayer.
Because, you see,
through prayer we once again discover
and reaffirm the truth
about the way life really is
for the child of God,
a truth we forget very quickly.
And this is the truth:
that our God is really there,
that He loves us more deeply than we could
ever imagine,
that even though we are not in control,
HE IS,
and that He can and He will work all things
together for true good in our lives.
In that knowledge we find true peace.
Phil. 4:6 Be anxious for nothing, but in
everything by prayer and supplication with
thanksgiving let your requests be made
known to God.
Phil. 4:7 And the peace of God, which
surpasses all comprehension, will guard
your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.