The Wonder of Christian Contentment Philippians 4:10-13

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It is common for people to take verses in the Bible out of context.
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The verse that is maybe the most often taken out of context is Philippians 4 .13.
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This verse says, I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. If you watch a sporting event, you are bound to see this verse on a uniform, a baseball glove, a football helmet, or a basketball shoe.
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The reason these athletes use this verse is they think that they can perform above and beyond because of the strength that Jesus gives them.
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NBA star Stephen Curry has famously written this verse on his shoe.
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This famous inscription on his shoe inspired a shoe line called,
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I can do all things. And it comes from this verse, Philippians 4 .13.
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This verse has made its way into popular culture. An unchurched person on the street may be able to tell you this
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Bible verse if you ask them it. Now the question we have to ask is, are they using this verse the right way?
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And the answer is, no, they are not. Why do
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I say that? In order to understand what this verse says, we must first understand the context.
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Not just this verse, but any in the Bible. You can make a verse mean whatever you want it to mean if you take it out of context.
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So what we are going to do this morning is find this meaning from following the whole thought of the
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Apostle Paul. Not just the verse, but what it says before and what it says after.
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And then we'll find out the meaning. The verses we are going to look at are verses 10 -13 of Philippians 4.
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And what we are going to see is that the topic this morning is finding contentment in the circumstances that God has placed you in.
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Not on becoming Superman because of the power that Jesus gives you, like it has been taken. So this sermon is titled,
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The Wonder of Christian Contentment. And we are continuing our sermon series through the letter of Philippians.
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This is our second to last sermon in this sermon series, if you can believe it. We're almost done with the sermon series before we move on to the next one.
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So we're winding down here. Philippians 4, 10 -13.
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I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me.
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You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation
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I am to be content. I know how to be brought low and I know how to abound.
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In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.
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I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. So this sermon this morning is calling you to discover the rare jewel of Christian contentment.
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And if you look at your bulletin, the outline, I put Jeremiah Burroughs after that quotation.
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Jeremiah Burroughs was a Puritan, an English Puritan, who lived in the 17th century.
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And he wrote a book called The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment. And what
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I'll say is it's one of the best books you'll ever read. So I highly recommend that book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment.
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And I'm using it in my proposition this morning, my big idea. So discover the rare jewel of Christian contentment and there are two ways how.
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The first is by learning that circumstances do not determine self -satisfaction.
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Circumstances do not determine self -satisfaction. Last week we learned about how to deal with anxiety biblically.
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We deal with anxiety through prayer and occupying our minds with Godward thoughts rather than worries.
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Paul then transitions from anxiety to our topic this morning, the topic of contentment.
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And we will look at verses 10 through 13 here. What we will see in this text is that you can have much and have little and still be content.
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Before we jump into the text this morning, we should look at what contentment means. This is a word that, it's important to understand the definition before we jump into the topic here.
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This is an important topic to me personally because this is the first, this topic is the first sermon
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I ever preached. On August 7, 2011, I preached the text that I read this morning, 1
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Timothy 6, verses 3 through 10. So I was 24 years old at that time and so ever since then
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I've loved this topic. So I've studied it quite a bit. So this is my definition, which
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I think is the biblical definition of what contentment is. Contentment is being satisfied with where God has you.
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What He has given you and the gifting He has given you and you are not looking for the next best thing or more material possessions or to be someone you cannot be.
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That's the definition of contentment. I read a book one time titled, The Green Grass Conspiracy.
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And of course that comes from the grass is always greener on the other side. And what people find is that when they go to that greener grass, they find out it's not greener.
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The same problems you had here, you have there. And sometimes it's worse. So this means that we are not satisfied where we are but always think something is going to be better.
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One pastor called it the giraffe syndrome. You're looking over the fence to see how great the next place is going to be.
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Of course, giraffes have long necks and they can see a lot of places. So these two descriptions have to do with wanting to go somewhere else.
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Frankly, I do not sense that this is a big problem in this church or this area, wanting to go somewhere else.
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One thing that's been fascinating to me in my first several months here is that many of the people
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I talk to love it here. And they don't want to go anywhere else. And so you're not really looking to go somewhere else.
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This is the place where you want to live. And that's great to see. As your pastor,
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I'm going to help you grow here and reach your neighbors for Christ. And so I'm glad to hear you say that when you say this is where I want to be for the long haul.
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And as your pastor, I'm here to equip you to do that. To grow and to be used by God in the lives of others as well.
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So going somewhere else might not be a temptation for you. But the temptation to want more stuff and to be someone else, that may be a legitimate temptation that you have.
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And when I say to be someone else, what I mean by that is to have another's gifting. Saying, you know,
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I wish I could do what this person does, but I can't. That would be an example of discontentment.
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So we need to be content with what God has given us and who He has made us to be. Now we should never be content with our maturity in Christ.
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We should always strive for more. And so that's an important point to make. We should always strive for that, realizing that others have possessions that we don't have and others have talents that we don't have.
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We should be content with those things, but we should never be content staying in the same place with our relationship with God.
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We should always be striving for more. And we've seen that as we've gone through the letter of Philippians.
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Striving for more. So that's a brief description of what contentment is.
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Now we are to be content as long as we have the essentials of life. What are the essentials of life?
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The essentials of life are food, clothing, shelter, etc.
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And the Bible affirms this statement. If we do not have the essentials of life, our daily needs, then we should not be content.
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1 Timothy 6, 6 -8, what I already read this morning, says, Now there is great gain and godliness with contentment.
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We brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of the world. But if we have food and clothing with these, we will be content.
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So those are the essentials of life. So we should strive to follow
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God and be content with the essentials He has given us to live. So if you do not have these, then you should long to have these.
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It's okay to be discontent in that way. But I trust that all of us here today have these.
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And so we should be content. So let's zero in on our text this morning with that qualification.
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What we see in verse 10 is that Paul had a need, and he wanted something from the outside to provide for his need.
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Was this an essential of life like food or clothing? I think not. He needed something from the outside, but it was not food and clothing or shelter.
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And we'll see that in a little bit. But let's first look at verse 10 here and see how Paul explains his need.
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This is what he says in verse 10. I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me.
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You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Paul says in verse 10 that the church in Philippi were concerned for him.
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But they were unable to provide for his need because they had no opportunity. What we will see in next week's passage is that once they had opportunity, they did provide for his need.
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And it was provided through the messenger from Philippi, Epaphroditus. But that's next week. We'll look at that then.
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What we see in verse 11 is that Paul was not in a position where he lacked the essentials of life.
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Because this is what he says at the beginning of verse 11. He says, not that I am speaking of being in need.
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He is telling this church that he did not really have a major need. You've got to remember,
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Paul was under house arrest as he's writing this letter. He was writing this letter from Rome to Philippi and he's in prison.
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His situation was not great, but it appeared that he did have the basic essentials of life.
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We know that his situation was less than spectacular, being in prison. But even in prison, he found a way to be content.
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And this is what he says in the remainder of verse 11. He says, for I have learned in whatever situation
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I am to be content. We have learned over the course of this sermon series that circumstances should not determine our joy.
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Our joy is determined by our relationship with Christ. So through the ebbs and flows of life, through the ups and downs of life, you have this steady joy because Jesus is with you.
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Now what we will see in the second half of verse 11, is that our circumstances should not determine our contentment.
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So they shouldn't determine our joy, they shouldn't determine our contentment. Paul was in a difficult situation and yet he was content.
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This is an important point to make. Contentment is not for those in low positions only. We often think that.
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I don't have much, so I'm just going to be grateful for what I have and be content. It's also for those who have much.
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This past week, someone I used to listen to, Chris Cornell, I used to listen to Audioslave when
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I was a child. I don't listen to them anymore, but I used to. And so it perked my attention when I found out that he had taken his life after a concert on Thursday.
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And if you're wondering how popular he is, I looked one of his songs up on YouTube. One of his songs had 180 million views.
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So he was someone who was quite a popular guy. And after a concert, to the surprise of his wife, he took his life.
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He had much. Millions of dollars, fame, anything you could imagine.
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Freedom to do what he wanted. And it wasn't enough. He took his life.
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And that's the situation that many face when they don't have Christ. Sometimes the people are baffled by people who have everything that take their life.
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Think about Robin Williams a couple of years ago who took his life. He was actually, he went to Hazleton, not too far from here, for treatment.
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But because of, I don't know what he was dealing with. I don't know what was going on in his thoughts.
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But we can assume that he was not content in Christ. And so it's sad when you see that.
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So just because you have a ton doesn't mean you're going to be content. Now Paul describes his situation here in verse 12.
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And he describes how he has found contentment in low situations and in times of plenty also.
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In verse 12 he says, I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance,
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I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.
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Much of Paul's life was spent in low situations. But he acknowledges that he also at times had much.
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He says he knows how to abound. Think of Paul's life here. For the little bit that we know about his life.
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Paul was imprisoned at the end of the book of Acts. And so if you read the book of Acts, you see that he spoke to kings.
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He had a prominent position. He spoke to thousands. And now he finds himself talking to someone across his jail cell.
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Can you imagine? Plenty and hunger in those two situations.
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Abundance and need. So he was in high positions and he was in low positions.
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And of course as he writes this, he is in a low position. But he knows what it's like to have much.
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But in all of these circumstances, he is content with where the Lord has placed him.
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And as you think about your life, as you think about your journey through life, there's times where you've had a lot.
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And there's times where you haven't had much. I can think of my life, the journey that Brianna and I have been on.
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How important it is to find your contentment in Christ. And the contentment is not found in the circumstances.
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It's found in continually trusting in Him. And as Paul went through his life, he learned the secret of contentment.
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You notice how he says that here in verse 12? This is a secret. This is a secret to life that you can have.
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And it's going to help you get through life, the difficulties of life. This secret.
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And this is why Jeremiah Burroughs titled his book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment.
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It's a secret that once you find it, you find out that it is a treasure. It is a jewel.
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And it's so important to find. And it's a secret because it's something you learn as you walk with God.
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On your journey, you realize, I can have Christian contentment. I can have this because I am walking with God.
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It is a discovery. Only a Christian who is satisfied in God has this.
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Because people ask you, why are you so content? Another word for content is satisfied.
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Why are you so satisfied with your situation? It's because I have Jesus. Paul learned this, and we can learn it too.
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This is something we can have. It is a jewel because it is one of the keys to living a joy -filled life for Christ.
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Your circumstances shift, but your satisfaction in Him remains the same. And your trust with where He has you remains the same.
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A content life with Christ is a wonderful life to live. So here at Eureka, we must strive to have this life in our individual lives and our life as a church together.
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Because, yes, we have individual lives, but we are doing life together as a church. So this is the first way how you must discover the rare jewel of Christian contentment.
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The second way how is by realizing that you are to be content with God's assigned task.
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Realizing that you are to be content with God's assigned task. Verse 13 provides us the reason this contentment is possible in all circumstances.
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Here's what he says in 13. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
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This verse may be more than any other verse in Scripture is taken out of context, as I mentioned in the introduction.
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I mentioned Stephen Curry, but not only him, also many athletes put this on their shoe or uniform.
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I can't tell you how many times I've seen this show up. It may show up on a license plate,
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I don't know, or somewhere else too. And the way they are using it is to say there is nothing
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I can't do because Christ is in me. Because of His power, I can go above and beyond and do all things.
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But we know that's not true. I can't be an astronaut. Actually, my dad,
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I think he'd be okay with me telling you this. As a child, he wanted to be an astronaut, and then he learned he couldn't do math.
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That's a problem. You can strive to be the best you can at math, but there's a certain limit that you have where you can't go to that level because God hasn't given you that gift.
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So you can't be whatever you want to be. But with the gifting that God has given us, we should strive to be what we can be within that sphere of the gifting
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He's given us. So we need to think about that. So this is how the verse has been taken.
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I can go above and beyond. I can be Superman because Christ is with me.
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But what we must understand is that this verse should not be taken out of context like it has been. When you take a verse in the
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Bible out of context, you make it mean what you want it to mean, not what the author's intention is.
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Because every time we open up the Bible here, we want to know what is the author saying. The author is thinking
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God's thoughts after him. So this is the Word of God. So when we figure out the meaning of a passage, we're figuring out what is
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God's meaning in this text. So we know what verse 13 means based off of what the previous verses say.
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So in verses 11 and 12, Paul says that in difficult circumstances, whether good or bad, whether plenty or hunger, he has learned how to be content and to be satisfied with where God has placed him.
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So he's satisfied in the position in life with where God has put him.
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In verse 13, what Paul is saying is, I can do my work for Christ in every circumstance because Christ strengthens me in every circumstance.
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Whether it's a great circumstance or whether it's a low circumstance in worldly standards.
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It is Jesus who enables him to do all things. And what Paul means by all things, we need to ask that question.
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The everything here, the all things is bound by the context of this passage.
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Paul is saying that he can submit to God's will for his life in all things.
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Whether plenty or hunger, he can submit to his will and be content in that circumstance.
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And he can be faithful in that circumstance. If God wants Paul to speak in front of great crowds and prominent people, he will do it.
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If God wants Paul to talk to one person across his jail cell, he can do it.
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And he can do it because Christ strengthens him. He can do these things through the one who strengthens him.
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He is content to do either one because his contentment does not come from the circumstances.
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Imagine someone who can only speak to a crowd of a thousand people but can't speak to five people.
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That's a person who is not willing to do all things through Christ who strengthens him or her.
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Because they're not trusting in God for the circumstances. They're not being content in the circumstances that God has placed them.
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And Paul knows that God is over his life and he knows that God has placed him where he is at that moment.
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So he is going to fulfill the task at hand there. God has given him an assignment and he is going to strengthen him through it.
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And Paul is saying, I am content in the assignment that God has given me.
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So Eureka, think about where God has you right now. Your job, your family situation, the ministry you perform at this church.
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Be content in it and realize that you can do this thing through Christ who strengthens you.
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And in a future place, he puts you, you can do that through Christ who strengthens you also.
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So be content in the assignment he has given you.
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Whatever it may be. The all things that you can do is what God has given you to do.
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The all things is referring to the circumstances. You can do these things through the grace or strength that he gives you.
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So God places you where he has placed you and you are content with his will for your life. It is our responsibility to carry out the task at hand.
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We need to be faithful in the task that he has given us. Not to wish our task was something else.
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Think about Paul in this prison cell. He is thinking, I am not in front of kings anymore. I am not in front of great crowds.
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I have to talk to this criminal next to me. I don't want to do that. This can't be God's plan for my life.
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But Paul is saying, you know what? I am going to talk to this guy because I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
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He probably wasn't enthralled with the circumstance. But he was faithful in it. He realized he could still fulfill the will of God for his life in that circumstance.
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And so he was faithful. At Eureka Baptist Church, we need to be content with where God has us.
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This doesn't mean we don't want to grow numerically as a church. That would be great if we grow the right way.
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We do want to grow that way. But we need to realize that God has us where he has us at this appointed time for a reason.
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And we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. And so we need to be faithful right now where he has us.
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We can't look at other churches and say, why can't we be like them? We should say, you know what? We need to do the best we can do with what we have.
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Right where we are. And we need to be faithful to the Lord. And so we need to do that as a church.
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Now and in the future. And the past is done, so we can't do that anymore.
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But now and in the future, we need to be content with where God has placed us. And realize that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us.
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So when we understand this verse in context, it makes a lot more sense, doesn't it? We can't be
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Superman. None of us can. But we can be faithful where God has placed us.
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And God can do great things through us. So in whatever position God has placed us, we can do all things through him who strengthens us.
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So discover the rare jewel of Christian contentment. By learning that circumstances do not determine self -satisfaction.
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By realizing that you are to be content with God's assigned task. We must refuse the temptation of being discontent with the lot that God has given us.
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Gifting, possessions, where we are in life, where we are as a church compared to others.
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Through Christ's strength, we can be faithful to follow Christ and fulfill our ministry in the circumstances that we find ourselves in.
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We must know that we are not where we are by accident.
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None of us are. We're all here because God has placed us here. God has placed us where we are for his specific purpose.
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And this should come for us. And let us be faithful in it. Let us fulfill the purpose that he has for us.
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Right where he has us. Let's pray. Father, we can do all things through you who strengthens us.
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In the circumstances that you have placed us. And so, Father, my prayer for this church is that we would be faithful to do this.
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That you would strengthen us to do this. Because, Lord, the task that you have given us is far more important than we could ever realize.
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The world looks on and doesn't see how important our task is. We serve the
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King of the Universe. We serve the Lord Jesus Christ. And angels are observing this worship service.
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And they're not in other places. But they're here. Because they care what is happening here. Because what is happening here is so important.
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And I pray that we would realize that, Lord. The supernatural aspect of this ministry.
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Of the church. And so, Lord, help us to be faithful right where you have us.