A Word in Season: All Your Needs (Philippians 4:19)

The Generosity of the Philippian Church

Ever since the gospel had touched the hearts of men and women in Philippi, it had made them gentle and generous Christians. Lydia immediately took Paul and his traveling companions under her care, having been converted together with others of her household who believed.

And the Philippian jailer too. Once he had heard with his household the gospel of Jesus Christ and had been converted and baptized, immediately he was taking care of the wounds of those men who previously had been in the inner prison in the stocks under his slightly less tender care.

And that spirit of affectionate generosity had never ceased, so that when he writes to the Philippian church, the apostle is able to give thanks to God and to them for their kindness toward him in his further hour of need.

God Supplies All Our Need in Philippians 4:19

And conscious of what they've given, he reminds them in chapter 4 and verse 19 that my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. What a sweet assurance for these men and women.

Perhaps, as we've said, they've made themselves poor in giving, but God will supply their need. There will be other needs that they have, other challenges that they face, some of them would be profoundly individual.

Men and women in the congregation who have particular challenges, particular demands laid upon them, some of those would be spiritual. Perhaps some of them struggle with temptation or sin, with mental affliction.

Others of them might have real needs in bringing food to put on their table. It may be congregational demands that they face, issues with persecution, challenges with ungodliness in the society at large, the need to remain faithful and to continue pressing on, perhaps some of the tensions that arose within that congregation.

The God Who Assesses and Provides True Need

But however many and however great those needs might be, Paul brings God himself into the equation. My God, the one that I preached to you, the God in whom you also came to believe, the God of heaven and of earth, the God of all grace, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the one who reigns on high but who stoops down to behold the people upon earth and looks with that kind and gracious and loving eye upon his children in particular.

This is the God who is able now and willing to step in and to make a proper assessment of the true needs of his people. It's not a matter just of what they want. It's not even according to their wisdom that these things will be calculated.

But God will assess and supply what is truly needful for them in all things and he will do so according to the riches of his grace, the riches that he has in glory. And it may be there that the sense is just the glorious abundance of what God has at his disposal, at his command, the treasury of divine blessing which he can dispense as he wills.

You see, if someone poor were to act according to their riches, then you might feel that they've been very generous but still not have received very much. But when someone who is rich acts according to the measure of their riches, then even a little might be an abundance to us.

All Good Gifts Flow Through Christ Jesus

And here is a God who has all things at his command, a God who acts according to the riches in glory that come to us by Christ Jesus. Again, Paul brings us back to the fountain and the center of the gospel.

It is by him that all good gifts will flow to us. It is in and with and through him that God will dispense all things needful to his people. Now, are we his people and is he our God also? Is your God Paul's God?

Is he the one whom the apostle Paul proclaimed in all his saving goodness and mercy revealed in his son Jesus Christ? There is then no limitation on his ability and willingness to supply all the needs of all his people in every place.

You and I today, whatever may be our circumstances, out of the depths of our need individually or congregationally, may cry to the God of heaven and earth with confidence that he shall supply all our need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.