Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
Phil 4:6-7
Don’t worry about anything;
instead, pray about everything.
Tell God what you need,
and thank him for all he has done.
Then you will experience God’s peace,
which exceeds anything we can understand.
His peace will guard your hearts
and minds
as you live
in Christ Jesus.
The astute ones among you will wonder what Ian is doing. “Ian, you have made a mistake. The propositional analysis that you have given us in this Gem is different from the propositional analysis you gave us in the previous Gem.” Good observation. I have noticed these two verses can be read two different ways. I will explain as we go. If you want to compare the differences, simply open my website twice in two different windows, one with this Gem and one for the previous Gem and scroll the windows to the propositional analysis in each one. I am sure you can work it out. You will see in following Gems why I have done this.
For the moment, take a look at the contrast Paul has made in the opening statement.
Don’t worry about anything;
instead,
pray about everything.
Worrying and praying are contrasted.
- Don’t worry about anything
- Pray about everything.
Do you see it? Not only are worry and prayer contrasted but so too are about anything and about everything.
Are you a worry wart? Do you worry about anything and everything? Do you worry about things that haven’t happened yet? Just because they might happen, it could happen, it will probably happen to me. Before I became a Christian and learned to trust Jesus, I would find myself worrying about all sorts of things. Big things and small things. I could turn a small thing into a big thing without even trying. Then I came across these two verses, Philippians 4:6-7. It became my favourite piece of biblical advice. No wonder Philippians is my favourite book in the Bible; it is filled with all sorts of good things as we are seeing in this Gem series. I realised from these two verses that I worried about things that I didn’t need to worry about. I worried about things that hadn’t happened yet.
- “But it could.”
- “Yes, but it hasn’t yet and it probably won’t.”
They were the kinds of conversations I would have with myself prior to the 19th of August 1973. It was in the Navigator Conference of 1974 that I came across these two verses and was taught the power of them. We can easily become trapped in a cycle of worry. The devil, satan (whose name I refuse to spell with a capital S) milks your worry for all it’s worth. It is all because you have no control over what might happen, your future, the disasters which might come into your life. Oh that is very true. But you also have to admit that worrying doesn’t change anything! Stop and think for a moment. Cast your mind back to that time when you worried about something and your worrying solved the problem.
- Did you try to think of something?
- Did you come up with a single example?
- Any one thing?
- One single example?
I am sure the answer will be NO. I was challenged to do this in ’74. I couldn’t come up with a single example.
Worrying, being fretful instead of faithfully trusting, is pointless. When you do that you are substituting praying for worrying. You are being fretfully fearful; instead of faithfully trusting in the One who can actually do something to change your situation. The main point in all of this is DO YOU TRUST HIM ENOUGH TO LEAVE YOUR FEAR AND WORRIES WITH HIM TO DEAL WITH? The Greek word for worry is [μεριμνάω] (merimnaō] – to worry, be anxious, fretful, full of fears and anxieties. The same word is used in:
So I say to you, Take no thought for your life, about food or drink, or about clothing for your body. Is not life more than food, and the body more than its clothing?
Matt 6:25
The same word [merimnaō] is used in Matthew 13:22 when Jesus talked of the cares of this world. Just as stated in that verse, worry is like weeds that will choke you with anxiety, concerns, worries and fears, being fretful and not prayerful. Paul makes it very clear that it is prayer or it is fear. Notice the second contrast – anything or everything. Do you see that Jesus taught the same thing. “Take no thought” is the same as “don’t worry about anything“. This idea is mirrored in both Jesus and Paul’s teaching. Paul begins this sentence with the Greek word μηδεν (mēden) meaning “not one thing” or “no thing”, “no issue”, “no matter” or simply “nothing”.
μηδὲν μεριμνᾶτε, ἀλλ᾿ ἐν παντὶ τῇ προσευχῇ
{not one thing} worry, but in {all things} the prayer
Literally:- ‘Not one thing worry about; but all things (everything) pray about.’ Take note of the symmetry in the construction. [Mēden] is a strong word to say “not one thing”, “nothing”. When emphasized, as it is here by putting it in the place of emphasis at the start of the sentence, we could translate [mēden] as “absolutely nothing”. Don’t allow your thoughts to be drawn into worrying about absolutely anything even for a nanosecond. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that going down the worry trail will spawn worries like viruses and you know all about those at this Covid point in time. Worrisome thoughts, fears and concerns will grow to consume you.
Put simply: Don’t worry about anything, instead pray about everything.
- Oh you know there is more to come don’t you.
- You can just feel it.
- You would be right.
Thanks for these words of encouragement, words of comfort! These really help in this difficult time. Many Blessings
Just read 1995 .Thanks I just needed to hear that again. I find that as I get older it gets easier to go down the worry path . Bless you brother have a great day.
Pleased the timing was bang on; glad to be of help.