Rejoice Always and Don't be Anxious

Gracious God, as the Bible is read and taught to

us today, deliver us from unbelief and

disobedience. Help us to exhort and encourage one another,

that none may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Produce in us the fruit of your Spirit, for the glory of

our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

What is something that brings you joy?

Small joy, big joy? A quiet

coffee overlooking some feature of nature? Spending time

with your grandkids or children?

Watching an adult go 6'7?

Achieving something you've never done before?

How do you express that joy?

Maybe a smile. Do you tell a neighbour or a

friend? Do you give thanks to God?

Now what is something that makes you anxious?

Maybe something uncertain you've got coming up.

Or you watch the news with all its doom and gloom,

or there's a relationship that is— there's tension there. What do you do with

that anxiety?

Today we're going to look at both expressing joy and dealing with our anxiety,

2 seemingly opposite emotions, and we're going

to do that in light of the fact that we are to live for Jesus,

our Savior and our Lord. Who is going to return.

Now, over the last 4 weeks, we've been looking at various passages in Philippians.

We've seen how through faith in Jesus, who died for our sin and was raised

as Lord, we're saved. And that through that same faith in

Jesus, we are then made citizens of Jesus's kingdom,

and we look forward to being with Jesus in his glory.

And then what we have in Philippians chapter 4 is a series of

Philippians 4 · chapter mention

encouragements and exhortations for God's people as

they live as members of Jesus' kingdom while we wait for

his return. And we're going to look at 3 of those exhortations this morning,

2 in detail, one very briefly.

The first one is rejoice always,

verse 4 of chapter 4 in Philippians.

Rejoice in the Lord. Again I will say,

rejoice. Not once but

twice is the command to rejoice. Now what does

it mean to rejoice? Well,

it's to celebrate, to be joyful in,

to give an expression to our joy.

Rockhampton rejoiced when the government announced that Rockhampton will host the

2032 Olympic rowing. The billboard across

the bridge had some very celebratory crocodiles.

Last weekend, half the people who watched the grand final

rejoiced because their team won.

Here in Philippians, we are called to rejoice in

the Lord, to express our joy in

the Lord, and the Lord here is Jesus. Paul makes

this clear in his letter. For example, in chapter 2,

verse 10, he writes, at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,

in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess

that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the

glory of God the Father. Jesus is Lord and we

are to rejoice in him always. But how

can we do this when life throws us lemons?

When our circumstances are less than desirable,

when our health might be failing,

when the ebb and flow of life storms at our door,

how can we have joy, let alone express that joy? How can

we rejoice? Well, Paul gives us

an answer. Paul is in prison, and first-century

Roman prisons were not pleasant places to be. He's facing

the real possibility of death for proclaiming Jesus.

And yet, if you read through the letter of Philippians, Paul rejoices a lot.

Paul rejoices that God is at work in the Philippians.

He rejoices that the gospel is being proclaimed and spreading.

He rejoices that God answers prayer. He rejoices in

Christ who is exalted, and he rejoices that he's

going to get to share eternity with those who

have faith in Jesus and that that eternity is secure.

It's not the situation that Paul finds himself in that is

causing him to rejoice, but the eternal

spiritual reality of God at work through Jesus Christ.

This is really helpful for us today.

When we place our faith in Jesus, Jesus gives us a joy in him.

A salvation that we can be thankful for no

matter what our earthly situation is. Even when

things are pear-shaped, we can be confident

that God is at work in his church, growing mature

disciples, adding to the church those who are putting their faith in Jesus.

Rejoicing doesn't always mean feigning happiness or just pretending that

everything is okay all the time.

But it is to express our joy in Jesus.

It means rejoicing doesn't depend on our feelings. We can

feel down, sad, frustrated, unhappy,

and yet we can still rejoice in the Lord because

it's about the joy that comes from knowing Jesus and not from whatever

our external circumstances might be.

So how do we practice rejoicing?

We express our joy. In church, we often sing

songs of rejoicing. Last week we

had our favorite hymns event. That was a great afternoon of rejoicing in the salvation

that we have in Jesus Christ.

We can rejoice in prayer. We can rejoice

in the quietness of our hearts, thankful to God for his goodness. We can rejoice

each other by expressing the joy that we have.

One simple way that we can practice this exhortation to rejoice

is that every time we pray, to start the prayer with, I praise you,

God, for... and then choose

one thing about Jesus to praise God for.

His life, his death, his resurrection,

your salvation, Jesus's work in the church.

If you're feeling brave, another way that you could express your joy is you

could try writing a song.

One of the hymns that we sung last week at our

favorite hymns was It Is Well with My Soul, and we heard

the story of Horatio Spafford who wrote it.

He had just experienced financial ruin.

His family were going on holidays and his family went before him.

But the boat that his family were on struck another boat.

It sunk within 12 minutes and he lost 4 of his daughters.

When Horatio was then making the same trip to meet his wife,

he penned the words, when peace like a river

attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows

roll, whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to

say, it is well, it is well with my soul.

That is rejoicing always.

It requires a confidence in Jesus' death and resurrection for our salvation,

a joy that can only come from him.

And if you don't know that joy, I invite you—

God invites you, Jesus invites you— to come today and place your

faith in Jesus. He is our precious Lord and Savior.

Only he can give us the joy of knowing our eternal salvation

is secure, our sin eternally forgiven, our eternal

life sure, so that we can rejoice always.

So rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice.

Well, the next exhortation is in verse

5, and it's to live out our Christian faith with Christlikeness that

people can see.

Let your reasonableness be known to everyone.

The Lord is at hand.

Reasonable here is often translated gentleness, and it's

the sense of letting the grace-filled life that you have in Christ be

on show. The life that comes

from, in part, from rejoicing always, And in a moment,

the life that comes from not being anxious because we trust Jesus Christ.

But it's the life transformed by Jesus needs

to be on show, our faith made known to everyone in

word as we proclaim and rejoice in the gospel,

and indeed as we live a life that matches the transformed

life that we proclaim.

And we can do this because we know the Lord is at hand. Jesus is

going to come back again. We know the end of history.

Jesus is going to come, the world as we know it will end and the

new heavens and the new earth will begin.

And all those with faith in Jesus will be there with him.

And knowing the end of history enables us to live for him now, even though

it might mean suffering.

But also, we want to make our faith known, don't we?

We want other people to know the joy that we have in Jesus.

It's one of the reasons the draft mission statement we're going to look at in

our workshop today is based on the Great Commission of Jesus to make disciples.

It reads, we know and share God's love for us in Jesus and invite people

to trust in him. We want people to know the joy that we have in

Christ.

So that was the brief exhortation.

The next exhortation we're going to look at is the way in

which we approach anxiety.

And this is one we struggle with, isn't it? Verse 6: Do

not be anxious about anything. This is

hard because it's not like anxiety has a switch. You can't just go,

ah, God says in Philippians to not be anxious about anything.

Okay, switch off the anxiety and

there, I'm not anxious anymore. Nice if it did work like that,

but it doesn't. According to a national study of mental health and well-being

in Australia, 1 in 5 people in a year

in Australia will experience anxiety levels that could be diagnosed

by a doctor. It means that

you probably have experienced anxiety at some time or another. You may

even be experiencing it now.

Philippians uses a broader definition of anxiety than the medical world,

which captures apprehension and worry and being disproportionately concerned

about something. You think about anxiety over interactions

with a person that just is able to push all of the right buttons,

excessive apprehension over a job interview, awake at night

worrying about a family member or something that is outside of your control.

And then we read verse 6, do not be anxious about anything.

And notice here there's no loophole. It covers everything.

So how can we do this? Well, we need to read the

whole verse. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication

with thanksgiving Let your requests

be made known to God. Prayer,

supplication,

requests— 3 words that mean we need to short-circuit anxiety

through entrusting it to God in prayer.

We need to bring to God our anxious situation,

not because he doesn't already know what our anxious situations are.

He knows what we need even before we ask.

But because in prayer we're expressing our faith in God and we're asking God to

do what we cannot do ourselves,

it means we can pray about that family member who is making unwise

choices. It means we can wake up in the middle of

the night and when we're stressed about our workload, we can bring

it to God in prayer. Or in those moments when

we're feeling the fear and uncertainty of the future, Whether it be related

to money or job or health, we can pray and

we are to do it with thanksgiving, knowing the goodness of God.

Now this is not a natural thing to do, to pray.

Our world has many ways of dealing with anxiety, from seeing doctors to

going on holidays to taking up mindfulness and ice baths

to working less, pushing for the 4-day work week, to working more,

never stopping working. Many people feel

the need to hold on to their anxiety in the hope that they can just

somehow deal with it, that they're strong enough to be able to get rid of

it. Now, some of these

methods for getting rid of anxiety, they do have a benefit,

particularly seeking medical assistance for chronic anxiety,

but it's not to be the Christian's first port of call.

Our first port of call is prayer,

yet often it's not what we do, is it?

I remember being rebuked by a member of the last

church that we were at. I told him I was worried about something and I

couldn't sleep the previous night because I was worried about it,

and he asked me this question. Did you pray about

it? And to my shame, I had to say, no,

I hadn't. Yet God

couldn't be clearer here, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving,

bring your requests to God.

So why do we struggle to pray?

Well, here's a couple of reasons.

We might doubt God's power, believe that God

is too small, that God is not able to handle our anxieties

because He's not powerful enough.

And so that person doesn't pray because they don't think God

can do anything about the situation. They believe the devil's lies

that God is too small to do anything.

Our God created the heavens and the earth.

He spoke and it came into being. Our God is powerful beyond our comprehension.

He can answer prayer and he does with infinite power.

Our God is not too small.

A second reason we might not pray is that we doubt God's love for

us and believe that he doesn't care.

God's looking after the whole world after all, caring for its

billions of souls. Why would God care about poor

little old me? And so instead of prayer,

this person wallows in self-pity, anxious but

not bringing it to God,

and deep down falls for the deception and thinking we're

not important enough for God to care about us. Yet God

does care. He knows the number of hairs on your head.

He breathed life into our being right from the very moment

of conception. God cares about you. He cares about us.

And he showed us he cares by sending his only Son to die on the

cross for our sin so that we can have eternal life.

The third reason we might not pray is because of our own sinful pride

and we believe that we don't need God. We don't

need God to help and so we don't pray. This person

might not put it in those words but nevertheless they refuse to pray and

so they operate in their life without reference to God, trying to deal with

anxieties without reference to God.

And yet the Christian should pray because we trust that God is powerful enough,

that he is infinitely wise and good and that he cares for us.

And we should come before him depending on him rather

than trying in our own sinful way to rebel against the Lord.

And when we pray, God makes a promise. Verse 7,

and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your

hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Jesus. Instead of worry, God's peace.

And God says it'll guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

Now this can mean one of two things.

The first is that God is promising that he will guard our eternal salvation

in Christ Jesus. Roman soldiers in Philippi, they kept

the peace by placing a garrison of guards around the city to keep it safe.

In the same way, God protects the heart of the Christian's salvation in

Christ Jesus so no one can steal it away.

The second thing this verse could mean is that God will give us an experience

of peace which is found only in Jesus Christ.

I think the emphasis in this passage is on the first meaning, that God will

guard us. He will set a garrison over our heart so our salvation will not

be stolen away. But when we know that

we have peace with God through Christ, when we know that God is powerful,

good, and wise, and that we can trust him with our anxiety,

God uses that to give us a peace about the situation

in which we could never have otherwise.

How does he do it? Well, it surpasses all

understanding. We can know that he does.

God is at work. So pray when you're

anxious and know God's peace.

And we might need gentle reminders to pray when we're anxious.

We might need a brother and sister in Christ to ask,

have you prayed about it?

We might need to be that brother or sister to someone else and pray

with them.

To add to that, to pray when you're anxious, it's really helpful if you're used

to praying and asking God for things when you're calm and not anxious

by having a daily pattern of prayer.

If you're not sure what to pray, begin by using the Lord's

Prayer. But when you're praying, do not be afraid

to use your own everyday words and just talk to God.

Express your worry. Ask him to take care of it.

You can be honest with God. He is good and wise and powerful.

He hears our prayers and he will know what to do.

He will give you his peace, especially when we're anxious.

So today we've seen that we are to rejoice always. I'll say

it again, rejoice. We're to live out our faith in a way that makes

it known. We're not to be anxious about anything but instead pray,

trusting God, knowing that he will give us his peace.

And all the while we do this, knowing that the Lord is at hand,

he is near, he's coming back.

Let's now ask God to help us with those things.

Heavenly Father, we rejoice in you.

We rejoice in the salvation that you have given us in Christ,

and we praise you that you are at work in us and in our world.

Help us to rejoice always, knowing that eternal joy awaits

us with Jesus, even when things are hard in this world.

We ask that you would help us to let our reasonableness be known to all

as we live for Jesus, that we might share Christ with them,

and that more and more people would come to know him. And finally,

Lord, we ask that you would enable us to not be anxious about anything,

but that you would, by your Spirit, move us to pray about

those things. Thank you

that when we trust you and depend on you in prayer, you promise

your peace which surpasses all understanding, and that you'll guard our hearts and

minds in Christ Jesus, in whose name we pray.