Day 30

“I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who strengthens me.”    — PHILIPPIANS 4:12-13

The more affluent and comfortable we are, the more we seem to lose the capacity to be content. The more we have, the more we want, and we develop an almost insatiable desire for more.  

It is no coincidence when Paul writes that he has ‘learned the secret of being content in any and every situation’, he is writing from prison. He has been deprived of some of the best years of his life. Almost certainly he is in Rome, having been arrested in Jerusalem, held without trial for two years in Caesarea, and then shipped to Rome when he appealed to Caesar. On the way, his ship sank and he ended up spending the whole winter shipwrecked in Malta. When he eventually got to Rome, Caesar wasn’t interested, and the book of Acts finishes with Paul having spent two years, either in prison or under house arrest in Rome, and deprived of freedom. In round figures that is almost five years of imprisonment at a peak time in his life.

We might expect his letter to the Philippians, written from jail during this time, might have held a little bitterness, or anger, or at the very least, frustration over the injustice he has suffered, having been taken out of circulation and restricted from preaching the gospel in the way he had intended.  His desire had been to go to Spain and take the gospel there.

It is in such circumstances we either become angry and frustrated, or we find a new security and peace in God. Bad events either take us from God, or drive us to God. It is never the event itself that determines the state of our heart. It is how we relate to God in the circumstance. Paul wrote, “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation”. It was not automatic or instinctive; he had to ‘learn’ it.  

This is why God, in His wisdom, permits and often orchestrates difficult times so that we can learn to experience His presence and sufficiency in ways we are unlikely to seek when the sky is blue, the grass is green and everything in the garden is lovely! Everything that threatened to push Paul down was another opportunity to experience the risen presence of Christ within him as sufficient. When he writes in this context, “I can do everything through Him who strengthens me”, he is not meaning that he can do anything he wants, but that he can live in any situation – for Christ is his strength. 

PRAYER: Dear Lord, thank You that I can discover new things about your presence in me, and your sufficiency for me, when I am driven to You by difficult circumstances. Help me to learn true contentment as I rest in your presence.

TO REFLECT UPON: Are there occasions when I have allowed tribulation to drive me from Christ? How do I find security and strength in Christ Himself when in difficult times?