April 22, 2001

Philippians 1:1-11

How to Be Thankful in the Midst of Troubles

  1. Introduction
    1. Illustration – Theologian Frederick Buechner wrote – One winter I sat in Army fatigues somewhere near Anniston, Alabama, eating my supper out of a mess kit. The infantry training battalion that I had been assigned to was on bivouac. There was a cold drizzle, and everything was mud. The sun had gone down. I was still hungry when I finished and noticed that a man nearby had something left over that he was not going to eat. It was a turnip, and when I asked him if I could have it, he tossed it over to me. I missed the catch, the turnip fell to the ground, but I wanted it so badly that I picked it up and started eating it anyway, mud and all. And then, as I ate it, time deepened and slowed down again. With a lurch of the heart that is real to me still, I saw suddenly, almost as if from beyond time altogether, that not only was the turnip good, but the mud was good to, even the drizzle and cold were good, even the Army that I had dreaded for months. Sitting there in the Alabama winter with my mouth full of cold turnip and mud, I could see at least for a moment how if you ever took truly to heart the ultimate goodness and joy of things, even at their bleakest, the need to praise someone or something would be so great that you might even have to go out and speak of it to the birds of the air.
    2. Context – Buechner learned the secret of being thankful sitting in the cold mud, Paul learned the secret of being thankful in a cold prison, and from him we can learn the secret of being thankful even in the midst of troubles. Philippians 1:1-11 will help us understand this secret.
  1. Scripture Passage
    1. Philippians 1:1-11 - Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus at Philippi, together with the overseers and deacons: 2 Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. 3 I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. 7 It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me. 8 God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. 9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.
    2. So much of the time we have a hard time finding things to be thankful for. Paul could have. He was in prison in Rome. He’d had a lot of things go wrong in his life. But he still had a thankful heart and an outward focus. Today we’re going to figure out how to be like Paul, how to be thankful in the midst of troubles.
  1. Attitudes that Help Us to Be Thankful
    1. Right from the start we see that Paul and Timothy have a great understanding of who they were. They identify themselves as "servants," and the word is also often translated as "slaves." It’s hard to be thankful if you’re arrogant or think more highly of yourself than you should. Paul could be thankful because he wasn’t arrogant. We can be thankful if we are not arrogant or don’t think we’re better than other people are.
    2. Then we see Paul actually blessing them. "Grace and peace to you" was a blessing Paul liked to use when greeting those who received his letters. He blessed all the believers in Philippi, the "saints" or "holy ones" or ordinary Joe Christians, and the leaders of the church. Not only does being humble help us to be thankful, but also having an attitude of blessing toward others will help us to be thankful. Have you ever noticed how hard it is to have a good attitude when you’re yelling at someone? You can’t be blessing someone and have a bad attitude toward them at the same time. In order to be thankful in the midst of troubles we have to be humble and we have to bless others.
    3. Illustration – Thomas A Kempis wrote, If you should temporarily lose your sense of well-being, don’t be too quick to despair. With humility and patience, wait for God who is able to give you back even more comfort. Brother Lawrence wrote, I don’t pray that you may be delivered from your troubles; rather, I pray that God will give you the strength and patience to bear them. Comfort yourself with him who nails you to the cross. He will let you go when he is ready. Happy are those who suffer for him. Both Thomas and Lawrence understood that it is not the troubles that get to you; it’s the attitude with which you approach them. Arrogance and angry fits will get you nowhere in a hurry. But humility and the act of blessing others even in the midst of troubles will help enable God to carry you through those troubles. Especially when we take time, like Paul, to look at what we have to be thankful for.
  1. Why Both Paul and We Can Be Thankful
    1. The first reason Paul is thankful is because of the bond he shares with the Philippians as brothers and sisters in Christ. Paul says, "I thank my God every time I remember you." He says he prays "with joy because of your partnership in the gospel." Paul is rejoicing in community, a group of people that truly care about each other and spread that love to others. We have reason to be thankful when we belong to a community of faith because of the mutual love and caring we have for each other. Why? Because verse six tells us that the same God who "began a good work" in this body of believers will constantly work to complete it, or to bring it to the goal, until the day Christ returns. We can be thankful in the midst of troubles because we know we have friends and a God who care very deeply about us.
    2. But Paul says it’s not enough to be thankful because others love us. In order to be thankful in the midst of troubles we also have to love others. Paul tells his readers in verse seven, "I have you in my heart." Paul deeply loved the Philippians, and he adds that he yearns after them "in compassion of Christ Jesus," as the Greek puts it. The word for compassion used here is the strongest word Paul could use. In other words, we have to love each other with the same love that Jesus showed us. That can be a problem for us, because there are people we don’t like a whole bunch. But our actions still have to reflect love for them, and eventually our attitudes will begin to match our actions. Being humble, blessing others, and experiencing the love of others will help, but we won’t be able to be thankful in the midst of troubles if we don’t love others ourselves.
    3. Maybe the toughest way we can be thankful is found in verses nine to eleven. These verses seem harmless enough. Paul tells the Philippians that he prays that their love would be grow in knowledge and depth of insight, that they would be able to discern what’s best, that they would be pure and blameless to the end, and that they would be filled with righteousness. These are great things to pray for! If we daily prayed for one another along these lines we would see God do remarkable things among us. The problem for us isn’t the prayer, it’s the underlying attitude. Paul did not give himself a single bit of consideration in his prayer. After the phrase "this is my prayer" the words "I" and "my" do not appear in verses nine through eleven. Paul is showing us an important principle: if our only focus is on ourselves and our needs, it is impossible for us to be truly thankful. Being thankful means having an "others-oriented" focus. Focusing on the needs of others and seeking to meet those needs in any way we can will help us be thankful. Why? If we focus on ourselves and our needs we will begin to grumble that we don’t have enough stuff, or that our needs aren’t met, or that we aren’t getting what we deserve. But when our humble heart of blessing helps us to love others and allow them to love us in return, and we focus on meeting their needs, we see how truly rich we are and we will be thankful even in the midst of deep troubles. The relationships we share with each other and with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ are what make us truly rich, not money or big houses or Lamborghini’s or lots of stuff. Being thankful means that people come before projects and that someone else comes before stuff. If we can’t get that basic concept down, we don’t have a prayer of being really thankful for anything. Putting God and others first will always help us to be thankful in the midst of troubles.
    4. Illustration – You remember Ebenezer Scrooge from Charles Dickens’ "A Christmas Carol"? Scrooge starts out believing his money is the most important thing in the world. Then he gets the wakeup call. Three visitors show him how his attitude toward money has ruined relationships and hurt people in the past and will continue to hurt them in the future. And how, if he continues his life the way it has been, he will die without a friend in the world. So he wakes up, discovers it’s still Christmas morning, and begins to make right the wrongs he has done. Dickens makes an excellent point: if we value our stuff and our pride so highly that it affects our relationships, we are missing out on life. The relationships we build, both with each other and with Jesus Christ, are the most important things in life. Our relationship with Jesus Christ allows us to bring the honor and glory to God that we were designed to. Our relationships with each other allow us to share His love with everyone and to experience that love through others ourselves. If we are to be thankful in the midst of troubles, we have to be humble, to bless others, to be in a community where we can be loved, to love others ourselves as Christ loved them, and to value others and seek their good far above our own. These attitudes will help us to be able to be thankful in the midst of troubles.
  2. Conclusion
    1. What troubles are you struggling with? How’s your attitude in the midst of them? Probably the most pertinent question is this: who or what is number one in your life? If number one is yourself or your stuff or your money, you will never be able to be truly thankful. But if number one in your life is Jesus Christ and others, then you will be able to be truly thankful no matter what the circumstances.
    2. Are you thankful today? If not, what is keeping you from being thankful? If you are putting yourself first, and you want to change that, you have a golden opportunity today to do so. If you don’t know Jesus as your Savior, and you want to, now is the time to take that step because only He is able to help us to be truly thankful. If you do know Jesus, and you’ve been putting yourself ahead of Him and ahead of others, now is the time to accept His offer of help and change that. All you need to do is ask Jesus to help you, to commit yourself to following Him, and to put into practice what you have learned today.
    3. We’re going to take a few minutes to think about what we’ve heard and to allow God the Holy Spirit to speak to our hearts. While we’re doing that, I’ll ask that a song by Petra be played called "Thankful Heart." Then you’ll have a chance to respond. Let’s take those few minutes to decide how we’re going to respond to God’s call.
    4. If you’ve come to the decision this morning that you need to ask Jesus into your heart and life, to forgive you for your sins, and to give you a thankful heart, please take a card from the pocket in the chair in front of you, write "Jesus into my heart" on the back, write your name, address and phone number on it, and leave it on the seat when we’re through this morning.
    5. Those of you who have know Jesus as their Savior and want Him to change your heart into a thankful one, please take one of those cards and write "thankful heart" and your name on it, and leave it on your seat when we’re through here this morning. I’ll collect all of the cards and pray for you.
    6. Now’s your chance to respond to God’s call. Don’t let it pass you by. I’ll give you a few minutes to fill our your cards, then we’ll pray.
    7. Let’s pray
 1