7/14/24 | Philippians 4:10-13

10 I greatly rejoice in the Lord, because you have finally renewed your interest in me. In fact, you were already interested, but you didn’t have the opportunity to show it. 11 I’m not saying this because I’m in need, because I’ve learned to adapt to any and all circumstances. 12 I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I learned the secret of living contentedly in any and every situation, whether well fed, hungry, having a lot, or in need. 13 I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

Philippians 4:10-13, NVI-PT, translated from Portuguese 

One night, several weeks ago, I learned a dear former professor of mine passed away unexpectedly, Dr. Wesley de Souza, or Wesley as I knew him. I had just wrapped up a time of prayer that evening, pouring out my longings for restoration and healing, leaving me feeling empty but more at peace. To help transition toward bed, I opened my phone and scrolled through Facebook, quickly learning this news. 

This particular professor shaped my understanding of mission and evangelism. I went with him and several classmates to Venezuela for a missions course, learning about and supporting the work of a Methodist seminary there. Through these experiences, I became acquainted with both his scholarship and his heart. In his lived example, I saw not only a model for mission and evangelism, I also saw a model for living life as a pastor and Christian. 

As I scrolled through the comments, I saw where another professor had reposted a Facebook post from Wesley. About a month earlier, as he lay in intensive care, he had posted a quote from Philippians 4; an English translation of his native Portuguese language. He shared that, despite his dire circumstances, he was finding peace and joy in the love of family and God. Then, he quoted a famous verse this way: “I have learned to adapt to all situations in life.” (Phil. 4:11, NVI-PT) All my life, I have heard that verse as, “I have learned to be content with whatever I have.” (NRSV) Turns out, my former professor had one last witness for me. 

In that witness, I have found much hope. As I have studied this passage from Philippians, I have clung evermore closely to it. There’s tremendous hope here. I chose that passage to end my forthcoming book about suffering, and this sermon is an adaptation of that concluding chapter. For me, as we as a family transition and seek a fresh start, through all the last several months have brought, these verses, this translation, the fresh word from God spoken to me through Wesley’s final witness, have provided encouragement and inspiration. As I begin preaching again, now exclusively online and of course in a different format, I pray that these words inspire and encourage you, too. 

Paul, as you may recall, is in prison. The church in Philippi has written to him to inquire as to how he’s doing. This is one of the tricky things about interpreting Paul’s letters. His letters are typically replies to letters he received; letters we do not have. But, we can infer that the church in Philippi is very concerned about his condition and treatment in the prison. 

And with good reason. Romans valued order very highly, so those considered to be disrupting the order of the empire were treated particularly poorly in prisons already considered to be poor. Paul has suffered greatly since his conversion on that Damascus Road, and now suffers as he languishes in poor prison conditions. The church in Philippi is rightly concerned!

Yet, Paul writes that he’s learned to, in the words of most English translations, be content, whatever his circumstances. As I grew up, I heard this verse often quoted when I wanted something I could not have: a new toy, a video game, a car, any kind of material item. So until reading my professor’s English translation of his Portuguese Bible, I had always considered this to be about finding contentment with current material possessions. 

That, however, could not be further from the truth. Paul lived an itinerant lifestyle, staying with friends or hosted by churches he visited. With all his traveling, whether by foot on Roman roads or in ships, he would have packed light, having few materialistic possessions. Paul, at the time he wrote this, would not have referred to contentment with his materialistic possessions; he lived a non-materialistic lifestyle!

He then further explains what he means by “content” in verse 12, “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I learned the secret of living contentedly in any and every situation, whether well fed, hungry, having a lot, or in need.” Such writing refers not to material items but to the basics of life. Here he is in prison, probably poorly and perhaps not adequately clothed, shivering or sweltering with the weather, surviving off meager rations, perhaps suffering with disease or other maladies. Under such conditions, he has learned “the secret,” of how to be “content.” 

Based on this, I think the Portuguese translation is better: Paul has learned to adapt to his ever-changing circumstances. Whether he’s well-fed or not, whether he’s shivering and sweltering or comfortable, whether he’s healthy or racked by disease, he’s learned to adapt such that he can say he is okay. Throughout this letter, which is indicative of all his letters, he shows much more concern for the people to whom he writes, like this church in Philippi, than he does for himself. While sitting in prison, almost certainly suffering, he says, “I want you to know, beloved, that what has happened to me has actually helped spread the gospel…” (1:12) His primary concern remains the mission, and supporting the churches who look to him for guidance. 

So he has learned to adapt not simply to find peace and contentment but to continue the work to which God has called and equipped him. What an inspiring example of faith! In that example, I felt called, and inspired, to figure out how to adapt to my current circumstances. I wondered to myself how I could experience the peace, the contentment, the adaptation, that Paul describes here. 

Because, journeying through the land of suffering brings discord, discontentment, and maladaptation. We find ourselves struggling mightily because of all the hardship, change, instability, and fear wrought by this journey. For me, understanding that Paul had learned to adapt, to cope, no matter his circumstances, gave me hope: that I, too, could discover this “secret” that has given him peace and contentment, no matter what dire circumstances he knows, no matter the dire circumstances I and my family have known. Paul knows something deeper about how to walk through the land of suffering than I do.

I wanted that deeper thing because, too often these last several months, I find myself feeling ushered into increasing darkness. Many of you know that journey: becoming sick in September, having to take leave in November, being hospitalized in December, and starting recovery in January. Jackson got sick in January and missing the rest of eighth grade, suffering for three months with a terrible case of mono. I entered into a work from home arrangement with the church as I recovered and waited for insurance to approve treatment. The church committee supervising me lost patience and ended my employment. Suddenly, just before I was fully recovered, I found myself without a job, with significantly reduced income, our life in Macon threatened, our world, already turned upside down by the loss of health for me and Jackson, turned upside down yet again. As the weeks progressed, it became clear that there were no options for me in Macon for work, and because of disaffiliations, no churches to serve in South Georgia. We had to move, and now find ourselves in a period of transition, reimagining and reinventing life in the mountains of Western North Carolina. We have been through the wringer! Whatever Paul had discovered, I needed it. Whatever secret he speaks of, I needed to know it. 

How do I adapt to these circumstances, finding peace? When any of us goes through the wringer, when we know deep suffering, when life just won’t quit, when we are disoriented, when life is turned upside down, how do we adapt, finding peace? Paul claims a secret. What is it?

And through Wesley’s witness, I found it.

The very next verse, after he had expressed having found a secret, tells of that secret: “I can do all things through [Christ] who strengthens me.” (Phil. 4:13) This very famous verse was so familiar to me that I had not paused to consider it in context: that this is the secret to which Paul refers, that Christ strengthens him to endure whatever life brings, whether for good or ill. That while we might quote it to ourselves or to a friend before a challenge, Paul means something deeper still: that we can adapt and find peace, regardless of our circumstances, because Christ strengths us to do so.

Which led me to wonder about that word strengthen. Turns out, it can also be translated as empower, such that the verse would read (as some translations do), “I can do all things through Christ who empowers me.” It might feel like semantics, but that word empower has a different connotation and spoke a powerful word to me. Strengthening connotes the ability to stand up under a weight, holding things steady. Empowerment connotes the ability to do something about that weight, to respond to its proximate cause. 

Empowerment spoke to my current circumstances. As I felt ushered into an increasing darkness, I felt increasingly powerless. It seemed I was a victim of my circumstances. As much as I tried, as much as I engaged the very practices I recommend in other sermons, I felt more and more like a victim, unable to control anything at all, destined to suffer with no recourse. That feeling of powerlessness, tossed about by the ups and downs of my health and Jackson’s, the vagaries of my insurance company, the fear and thoughtlessness of the church committee, all left me feeling traumatized, powerless. 

Perhaps you can relate. It’s easy while journeying through the land of suffering to feel victimized. In fact, we have learned together about the need to accept our circumstances and admit our powerlessness to get ourselves out of the land of suffering. Part of learning to cope, to adapt, involves accepting where we have power and where we do not. Only God can fully rectify the circumstances that led to our suffering. Restoration is in God’s hands. 

Yet, that does not mean we are powerless, nor that we are victims to our suffering. We always retain control over how we respond to our circumstances. We might be powerless to change the circumstances, but we are not powerless in how we respond to those circumstances.

Therein lies the secret Paul found, and tremendous hope for all of us as we journey through the land of suffering. God empowers our response to suffering circumstances. By drawing closer in our faith through regular spiritual practice, we find empowerment to adapt and, in our adaptations, find peace and contentment, regardless of our circumstances. 

As this reality settled in, I thought about how I have responded and how I could respond. As just one example, I walked more than 250 miles in the last five months, for walking has proven helpful. Even when I do not feel well, I still force myself to get out and walk, knowing that it is good for my soul as well as my body. At the time I read my former professor’s post, I thought about giving up walking, or at least walking less, feeling increasingly despondent. This said to me to keep going, that God empowered me to walk. And, as I considered this, God reminded me that often I find peace and new insight through walking; God used walking as empowerment for the journey. 

Then, and perhaps most powerfully of all the thoughts I had, I heard God say to me to find joy in the mission. God has called us all to be witnesses, just like my former professor was even as he lay dying. While I am suffering, I am not dying just yet, so surely I could also find ways to witness. And not just ways to witness; ways to experience joy through laboring on behalf of the gospel, like Paul notes in Philippians chapter one. I prayed and asked God to reveal those ways to me, and one of them was in writing this book. Another is the return to writing the weekday devotionals called, Think, Pray Do. If you have not yet subscribed, I invite you to do so at tedgoshorn.org. Another is to offer sermons most week, just like this. And then, yet another is to maintain an open mind about where God is calling. As an interviewer for a job said to me the other day, “be inventive in powerlessness.” That is my prayer: how can I be inventive, responsive, in powerlessness? In other words, how is God empowering me now? 

I wonder for all of us today, how is God empowering us? How are we empowered to respond in powerlessness? How is God speaking to us amidst our suffering, hardship, anger, jealousy, discord, disorientation, and discontentment? 

I preach today as one who has not yet finished the journey. At one point, I wondered to myself if preaching like this was a case of the blind leading the blind. I do experience blindness at times still as I journey, including just yesterday, forcing me to take a pause from writing. Yet, I find empowerment, and increasingly so. I pray that in bearing witness to this empowerment, in bearing witness to my current suffering and in exposing past times of suffering, you will find empowerment, too; practicing faith in a way that draws us all closer to God while journeying through the land of suffering. 

I trust that as God empowers me, God uses me. That was Paul’s message. In all his circumstances, he learned to adapt, to find contentment, because God continued to empower him to spread the gospel. Even in suffering, even in the worst circumstances, God empowers us. We are not our own, we are made to spread the love of God throughout our corners of the world. No matter our suffering, God gives us what we need to adapt, find contentment, and empowers us to spread that love. 

In The United Methodist Hymnal, we omit a verse of Robert Robinson’s Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing, from which I got the title for this book. After the second verse, and before what the Hymnal lists as the third, Robinson writes: 

Oh, that day when freed from sinning

I shall see Thy lovely face

Clothed then in blood washed linen

How I’ll sing Thy sovereign grace. 

Come my Lord, no longer tarry

Take my ransomed soul away 

Send Thine angels now to carry 

Me to realms of endless days.

Robinson certainly speaks of the eternal life we will know after meeting with death. And yet, I cannot help but hear the hope I long for in those last four lines, wishing for God to come quickly and send me to renewed days where I no longer suffer, for in “endless days” I hear days where suffering is ended. As we have seen, we know that God will do just this; suffering will not last forever, and God will “no longer tarry,” but will bring us to “realms of endless days.” 

But until then, I will raise my ebenezer; in Hebrew, a stone of help. I will raise an ebenezer of writing, finding joy in the mission. I will raise an ebenezer of friends, finding comfort in their love. I will raise an ebenezer of honest prayer, an ebenezer of caring for others, an ebenezer of focusing on what truly matters. God empowers me to raise these ebenezers. In the physical ebenezer we built here at the cabin, we see a reminder that not only will God provide in the future, ending our suffering, but that God empowers us now, giving us what we need not only to adapt and cope, but perhaps even, to thrive despite our suffering. 

In the end, this journey through the land of suffering is also a journey of discovery. As I lean into these practices, I discover God’s faithfulness afresh and anew. As I pray and ask God to show me how God empowers me to live into the mission, even in my current condition, I discover new joys and challenges in my vocation. Even while walking this journey through the land of suffering, there are yet joys to be discovered; new ways to experience the love of God. 

So, I invite us all to raise our ebenezers. Whether a physical, metaphorical, or both, raise an ebenezer. Raise an ebenezer through prayer, asking God to show how to adapt and find contentment and peace. Raise an ebenezer of mission, living into the gifts God has given to share love into the world. Raise an ebenezer of love, choosing to live into the relationships God has given that bless and provide in life.

Declare defiantly that God isn’t done with us yet, that the suffering does not get to have the final word; God will make something tremendous of us yet. Even in suffering, we find ourselves on a journey of discovery. God empowers us not to resolve our own suffering, but to adapt, finding the peace that Paul knew even in prison. If Paul can find his way to knowing inner peace, no matter his circumstances, we can, too. For God empowers us still today, so raise your ebenezer.

Lately, as I walk and now even run sometimes, I hear familiar words from one of my favorite bands. In those words, I hear God speaking to me during this journey in the land of suffering, saying I empower you, I provide for you, keep walking because I have given what you need to adapt, to be at peace, even to thrive. Hear these words, whatever suffering comes to mind today, as encouragement for all of us to keep walking until we know suffering no more:

“So when your hope’s on fire but you know your desire, don’t put a glass over the flame, don’t let your heart run cold, I will call you by name, I will share your road.” 

Amen.