Philippians 4:19 The God Who Provides

 

Are you depressed or discouraged? Has life gotten you down? If so, somewhere in the Bible there is a promise of God to cover it. I am convinced there is no need, no anxiety, no worry, and no dismay for which God has not made dozens of encouraging and uplifting promises.

Think of the breadth and scope of God’s promises. There is John 3:16, a promise of everlasting salvation, Romans 8:28, John 10:9, John 10:27-28. Some promises concern prayer: Philippians 4:6-7, 1John 5:14-15. Then we come to what is perhaps the greatest promise in the entire Bible. It is great because it includes all other promises. It is Philippians 4:19. Do you stand in need of salvation? God will supply salvation. Do you need strength for life’s trials? God will supply strength. If you are lonely, God can meet you and comfort you in your loneliness. If you are discouraged, He can lift you up. No need is left out, for the verse says that “God will meet all your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.”

A verse like this needs to be savored in each of its phrases, and the place to begin is with the two most important words in the sentence, the subject. The words are “my God.” Who is the one who Paul knew was able to supply the needs of the Philippian Christians? It was not any God, for he did not say “a god” or merely “the god in whom you may happen to believe.” Paul was not referring to the gods of the Greeks, Egyptians, Assyrians, or Romans. When Paul said, “my God,” he was being specific and personal. Paul’s God was Jehovah, the God of Israel was had revealed himself to human beings personally in Jesus Christ. This is a great God. He is a gracious and effective God. In fact, to the biblical writers all other gods were “no gods” (idols); they were nothing. The God of whom Paul speaks is a God who will support His people and who will not let down the one who believes in Him. Is He your God? If He is not your God, if you have never come to Him through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, the promises of God’s care in the Bible are not for you. On the other hand, if you do believe in Him and wish to obey Him, you will find Him strong in you need. You will find Him entirely and consistently faithful.

The emphasis of the first part of the verse is on God, but the second part speaks of human needs. We must think of this also. What are our needs? First, there is our need for forgiveness. God provides that abundantly, for He offers forgiveness of sins that are past, present, and future. Forgiveness is made possible for us through the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, and we receive it personally by acknowledging our sin before God ad accepting Christ’s sacrifice. Forgiveness is not our only need, however. Our second greatest need is for fellowship with God. Without God we are spiritually hungry, empty, and miserable. God longs to be known by us, to fill the spiritual vacuum of our hearts, to commune with us personally, and to meet us in our deep longings. Moreover, He is able to do so abundantly “according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus. We also need God’s defense against enemies, and God is able to supply that too. There is one other need that must be added, for it is sometimes true that in God’s sight we have a need for that which in not so pleasant. We need to be disciplined, taught, or tested. If that is the case, then it is also true that Philippians 4:19 is a promise of God to supply the unpleasant discipline and testing.

The final phrase of our text speaks of the measure of the supply of God for our need. The measure is this: “according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” God has promised to fill the need of the believer in Jesus Christ out of His infinite wealth and resources. He will expand us as time goes on, and we shall come to hold more. We shall become more and more like Jesus Christ. But even at the greatest extent of our enlarged capacity we shall only touch His resources slightly. There will always be infinite resources beyond the ones we experience. In this life, as in the next, God shall supply all our needs, according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus, and still there will be inexhaustible resources beyond.

Philippians 4:19 Reflection Questions:

What are some of your “go to” Scripture verses when in a time of need?

Do you think that you can exhaust the riches of God by your needs, however great they may be?

What is your current need? Pray and ask God to supply for it now!

Isaiah 28:14-22 The Covenant with Death

 

Like a skilled orator, Isaiah has approached his target group indirectly, but now he unleashes on them the full force of his inspired rhetoric. The word “scoffers,” in verse 14, is a strong indictment, since scoffing in the Old Testament thought, is the very last degree of ungodliness. The rulers in Jerusalem are, if anything, worse than those in Samaria had been. The words attributed to them in verse 15 are highly ironic. They themselves would hardly have described their alliance with Egypt in these terms, but Isaiah puts into their mouths words which show the real import of what they have done. They have inn reality entered into a covenant with death and made an agreement with the grave (Sheol). If they think God’s judgment will pass them by as it did their ancestors, they are mistaken. The promise of effective support which the alliance offered was a false hope, and the faithless diplomacy by which it was constructed was therefore a “refuge of lies” (v. 17). Like the fool’s house in Matthew 7:26-27, it would be swept away; or to put it another way, having made their bed they will have to lie on it, but they will find that it is too short; it will not give them any comfort or protection.

These were not idle threats, as Jerusalem’s leaders were soon to learn to their great loss. But neither did they represent the Lord’s normal attitude to His people or His way of relating to them. Much more typical were His actions at Mount Perazim and Gibeon referred to in verse 21. At Perazim He gave victory to David by breaking through his enemies like a bursting flood, and at Gibeon He defeated Israel’s enemies by raining down hailstones upon them from heaven. That is how He would prefer to act now, and that is why He appeals to His people in verse 22 to stop their scoffing. But since they will not listen, He must turn His judgment, pictured as flood and hail in verse 17, against His own people and use their enemies as His instrument to punish them. It is the very reverse of the way things used to be, and not at all the way the Lord desires them to be. Like a loving father who must take a stick to his rebellious son, he does what he must do with a heavy heart (v. 21b). A parent who acts in this way does so with an eye to the future – to the good that will come if what is hard but necessary is done now.

The same basic thought underlies the image of the precious cornerstone, the sure foundation (v. 16) which stands centrally within the unit and is in many ways the key to the whole. The Lord demolishes what is false only that the true may rise in its place. He acts in the interests of the long term. His ultimate aim is not the destruction of Zion but its renewal. Demolition is a necessary, if distasteful, prelude to rebuilding. And the Lord is already laying the foundation for that new Zion of the future. The stone bears an inscription which gives the hallmark of this community: the one who trusts will never be dismayed. It represents collectively those who, very much against the current trend, placed their whole confidence in the Lord and waited quietly and confidently for Him to act. It was from among this faithful remnant that the Messiah finally came, which is why the New Testament writers see this verse fulfilled ultimately in Christ Jesus.

Isaiah 28:14-22 Reflection Questions:

Have you ever been disciplined by the Lord? What lesson did you learn?

What are you building your house on, Rock or sand?

Are you relying on world or placing your whole confidence in the Lord?