Philippians 4:6, commentary and pictures

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything make requests known to God by prayer and earnest supplication joined with thanksgiving and gratitude. Every matter, need, trouble and difficulty, small or great, is to be told to Jesus rather than carried as anxiety or discouragement. Asking is to be done as a child trusting a heavenly Father, believing He hears simple heartfelt prayer and will receive the request, with full belief that He is abundantly able and infinite in power to fulfill all He has said. Those who pray in this way are kept by the peace of God beyond human understanding guarding heart and mind through Christ Jesus, so that quietness and confidence become strength.

Words and Philippian Setting

Be anxious for nothing means to allow nothing to cause anxiety, worry, fretting, or burdening anxious care, and not to fill the soul with worriment by dwelling on suppositions and unpleasant things. It means not to be over-anxious about anything, but to tell troubles to God, entrust the case to Him, and trust all with Jesus who stands at the helm while waiting on the Lord and casting the burden upon Him. In everything requests are to be made known to God by prayer and earnest pleading joined with gratitude, thanksgiving, and praise while waiting for His help. Every need, matter, and concern is to be brought to Him through prayer and supplication with thanksgiving rather than carried as anxiety, in humble faith that He hears simple, heartfelt prayer.

The verse belongs to Paul's word to the Philippian church to stand fast in the Lord, where he beseeches Euodias and Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord and asks the true yokefellow to help those women who labored with him in the gospel, with Clement and fellow laborers whose names are in the book of life. It is spoken to brethren dearly beloved, including those women and fellow workers, calling them to unity and steadfastness. Its immediate setting joins rejoicing in the Lord always and letting moderation be known to all because the Lord is at hand. Receiving the peace of God which passes understanding to guard heart and mind through Christ Jesus belongs with it, together with thinking only on things true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous and praiseworthy.

That rejoicing and remembrance that the Lord is near accompany this trust, and doing what was learned, received, heard and seen in Paul brings the presence of the God of peace. Beholding the good and storing the mind with peace, righteousness, and grace replaces climbing on the judgment seat to judge motives and think and speak evil. Standing fast in this way is the only true education of walking humbly with God and keeping His law, rather than taking the mold of human ideas and worldly higher education that causes departure from the faith.

Trusting Prayer Instead of Anxiety

Every need, concern, trouble, perplexity and difficulty, small or great, is to be brought to God and told to Jesus rather than carried as anxiety or discouragement. Nothing is to trouble the mind into anxious care, but in every situation troubled minds are to turn to Him in prayer and earnest supplication with thanksgiving, entrusting the case to Him. Trials, temptations, sorrow, weakness and heavy care are reasons to take everything to Him rather than become discouraged, for neglecting prayer brings needless pain and forfeits peace, while in the humble work of daily life faithfulness in the tasks providence assigns can be joined with trust in His care, and every part of life including business can remain joined to religion. He is a faithful friend who shares sorrows, serves as refuge, and gives comfort, protection, counsel and grace to those who ask.

Asking is to be done as a child trusting a heavenly Father who means what He says, believing He hears simple, heartfelt prayer and will receive the request because His word is yes and amen in Christ. Confidence is due that He hears and answers those who come to Him in faith, without anxious care and doubt. The verse is a personal promise to be appropriated by individual faith, with explicit and encouraging assurance that all things asked in believing prayer will be received.

It has no value without full belief that God who made the promise is abundantly able and infinite in power to fulfill all He has said. God's Word, not unreliable feeling, is the secure foundation on which hope may safely rest, establishing, strengthening, settling and riveting the soul to the Eternal Rock. Religion fed and kept alive by emotions is valueless, and distrusting His Word dishonors Him more than anything else, for worry itself shows unbelief. Wisdom is given to earnest seekers who trust without doubt.

Trust is to continue without doubting when an answer is not immediately returned. Even when no visible sign, remarkable evidence, special feeling of His presence, compassion and keeping power is perceived, His loving, tender care remains real, He attends to the cry, governs all things, and brings light to the heart. Even when circumstances seem closed and hostile, trust like Paul's looks to deliverance from wicked people, and believing that Christ hears and answers brings God's peace which surpasses understanding. The human part is simply to trust and the divine part is to keep; obeying by bringing every need in earnest asking with a heart full of thanksgiving leaves the soul resting in perfect peace beyond understanding guarding heart and mind through Christ Jesus, while worrying forfeits that keeping peace. Trusting His promises must be joined with cooperation with Him and acting in faith, for a person may fail a test He permits and fail to recognize an answer, and continuing to worry can hinder His work so that He will not help while cooperation is refused. God already knows necessities, yet requests are to be presented to Him with praise while waiting for His help, trusting Him to open the way in perplexity when it accords with His will and brings glory to His name, which brings relief instead of distrust and discouragement.

Peace and Strength Received

Those who turn every need into prayer and earnest pleading joined with gratitude, refusing anxiety about anything, are kept by the peace of God that passes human understanding to guard heart and mind through Christ Jesus, so that quietness and confidence become strength. This means bringing every matter to God as a child trusting a heavenly Father who means what He says, believing the request will be received because His word is yes and amen in Christ, without doubting when an answer is not immediately returned and remembering that the Lord is at hand. It means not being over-anxious and not filling the soul with worry by dwelling on suppositions and unpleasant things, but even when everything seems in confusion with annoyances and trials coming, trusting all with Jesus who stands at the helm, waiting on the Lord, casting the burden on Him, gathering and remembering precious tokens of the Saviour's love and mercy and tender compassion, and rejoicing in the Lord always.

In this way the mind is guarded from what would depress it and kept under God's control and at rest. Trusting God and submitting to His will even in little things brings peace, restfulness and confidence in Him and leads to continual rejoicing. Faith enables freedom from fretting and worry even in disagreeable circumstances, for resting confidently in God's love and depending on His infinite power brings a deep tranquil joy.

Prayer lifts the person above discouraging doubts, despondency and human passions, gives strength to face spiritual conflict and trials patiently, and connects the soul with God who knows and governs all things. It is the way to bring personal needs to God in humble dependence and living faith rather than dwelling on doubts and fears, and God hears the helpless cry and brings light to the heart even when no visible sign of His presence or compassion is felt. That assurance that God hears enables believers to remain cheerful in tribulation and to rise above despondency through God's power working in the heart.

As believers trust Him, God gives counsel and grace to those who ask, imparts His peace to those who commit themselves to the Lord and rest in Him, and fills mind and heart as they commit the keeping of their souls to Him and put away anxiety and worry. He gives wisdom to those who earnestly seek it without doubt, and brings hope and courage for standing firm against spiritual evil and growing in sanctification. Believing that Christ hears and answers brings God's peace in discouragement and trial with thanksgiving for His keeping power through Jesus Christ, even if joy and blessing are not felt while praying. Offering prayer and thanksgiving and making requests known to Him who has promised to hear the needy when they call gives precious assurance that the Lord hears prayer and enables committing the keeping of soul and body to Him as to a faithful Creator.

The verse commands the higher Christian life of overcoming anxiety and worry by trusting the heavenly Father in everything, keeping the peace of Christ, reflecting gladness and joy, and resting in God's promise to keep the soul in perfect peace. The human part is simply to trust and God's part is to keep, worrying forfeits that keeping peace, and obedience calls for frequent spoken thanksgiving for His keeping power and saving grace. Obeyed as an order from the Captain of salvation and great Healer for spiritual health and power, joined to rejoicing in the Lord always and letting moderation be known because the Lord is at hand, it keeps believers from being careful or anxious about anything and from being intimidated by Satan's devices. Steadfastly looking to Jesus and talking faith, hope, courage and the greatness of God's power rather than Satan's power, believers come off more than conquerors through Him who loved them, with all sufficiency and grace liberally supplied to everyone who cooperates with divine agency, while the peace of God which passes understanding keeps hearts and minds through Christ Jesus as they rejoice in His all-sufficient love.

Manner of Faithful Prayer

Prayer is to be persistent and ongoing, an unbroken union with God through which life from God flows into the believer and purity and holiness flow back to God. It is to be earnest and persevering, with the whole person consecrated to Him, for calling on Him is His command, and obeying His gracious commands serves present and eternal good and glorifies His name. It must be sincere and whole-hearted, humble, trusting, earnest and persevering, not divided, faint, and quickly forgotten, for such divided prayers do not bring the blessing of peace.

It is to be accompanied by watchfulness, including guarding speech from frivolous, evil, fretful, and harsh words, and answering in this way brings steady, earnest, hopeful peace of mind. It includes gratitude for received mercies and earnest requests for blessing for self and others, as a required duty and means of receiving help. Remembering and praising Him for goodness and mercies strengthens prayer, deepens love for Him, and helps trust that He will attend to needs. It is habitual communion in which needs are made known and fresh blessings are received with gratitude, and secret prayer sustains the inner life and gives the heart confidence to commune with Him.

Sincere prayer connects the soul with the mind of the Infinite who knows and governs all things; He attends to the cry and brings light to the heart. This holds rather than trying to resolve every uncertainty before exercising faith, and rather than dwelling on doubts and fears in humble dependence. It lifts above discouragement, despondency, and human passions, gives strength to face trials patiently, and remains true even when there is no visible or remarkable evidence, special feeling, or sign of His compassion and loving, tender care. Requests especially include the petition for forgiveness in repentance leading to reconversion, presented continually by knocking at the door of mercy and grace with sincerity and earnestness that keeps knocking and seeking until rewarded with the gifts needed to perfect Christian character, so that those who ask receive and are not left to beat about in the fog of uncertainty and discouragement.

It means to die to self and make every request known in urgent prayer while He may be found and waits to be gracious. Those who forsake wicked ways and thoughts and return receive mercy and abundant pardon, and those receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit enter deeper joys of salvation and receive power to witness to the uttermost parts, as when Moses pleaded to see His glory and was hidden under His hand in the cleft of the rock so His glory could pass by without consuming him. Uncertainty about duty is brought in earnest, repeated prayer for guidance and blessing, surrendering the decision to Jesus with praise until peace and assurance show duty, as experienced by a couple seeking wisdom. Intercession tells Him about a brother's need for recovery and reformation and keeps praying without despairing or letting go until the tempted one breaks the cords of unbelief, certain the conflict will end in victory.

Believers may join in prayer asking for help, favor, and the Holy Spirit's guidance and influence, trusting He takes the whole situation into account. Telling every need with grateful praise means keeping a set time for devotion early in the evening when all can pray unhurriedly and with understanding, not surrendering it for guests or social pleasure nor putting it off with talk and amusement until weariness makes it a lame offering. Made the most precious, sacred, happiest hour of the day and openly seen as such by visitors, it exerts a refining, elevating influence on all who share and brings peace and rest grateful to the spirit. Morning and evening the whole family is to be brought before Him at the family altar, presenting petitions, confessing dependence and His claims, keeping eternal reality before each member, and confessing Christ as Leader, Captain, and divine Teacher. Wherever one is, the heart is to be turned to Him to make requests known, continuing even when His presence or attending angels cannot be seen, taking courage in His care to receive strength and grace to do good.

Living Without Worry Daily

In humble daily work the verse means to do faithfully the tasks providence assigns and to trust God to care, without burdening oneself with anxious cares, making every need known through prayer and supplication with thanksgiving. It means anxiety is not to govern daily life: do each day's duties, do the best possible, ask God for help, leave undone without worry what cannot be done, meet tomorrow when it comes, and do not make a time of trouble before it arrives, for faithful attention to today prepares for tomorrow. Studies must not displace religious duties, and prayer and watchfulness must not be neglected; contentment with today's faithful effort brings trust for wisdom and help with quick perception and heavenly wisdom. Every part of life, including business, is to remain joined to religion by bringing cares and requests to God.

There is no need to worry about financial provision; instead rest in the Lord trusting the need will work out all right. God's people should serve faithfully without over-anxiety about burdens or work they cannot do; after doing their best they should leave the rest to God, who knows needs and can provide others to help. When a duty is given by the Master, it is to be taken up with single aim to glorify God and bless others, holding communion with God in Christ about the work, praying and earnestly asking for the promised blessing and for true understanding of what is to be accomplished, refusing to be drawn away or hindered by any counterinfluence, acting faithfully in bringing blessing to others, and giving thanks by praising God for cooperating with Him, with the result that the mind is made like the mind of Christ and true companionship with fellow workers is entered by seeing Christ in them. Asking God for grace in difficulties is connected with increasing in wisdom and knowledge.

God's servants should seek His wisdom and guidance rather than depend on human counsel, bringing every difficulty and request to God in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving and praise in faith; His help and guidance are reliable and His peace guards heart and mind through Christ, while relying instead on human strength and guidance can lead to unbelief. The verse guards a minister against doctrines leading to dissension and strife, confusion, turning aside to strange doctrines, and departure from true faith, calling him to hold the beginning of confidence firm unto the end by much prayer, to humble his heart before God, watch unto prayer, guard his spirit, practice the life of Christ, think and do only what is true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous and praiseworthy and what was learned and received and heard and seen so the God of peace will be with him, to seek to overcome rather than act as the evil one desires, and thus prepare for future immortal life lest he lose his soul. In the face of teachings that cause confusion and threaten faith, prayer is needed, and trust in God is to remain firm.

For one who criticizes the ministers Christ sends and feeds on their defects, it means controlling spirit and words at home and abroad, refusing to live on supposed imperfections, and instead storing the mind with peace, righteousness, and grace and thinking on whatever is true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous, and praiseworthy with rejoicing in the Lord always and moderation known to all because the Lord is at hand, because the brethren criticized are the property of Jesus Christ whom He died to purify, refine, and clothe in righteousness. Instead of climbing on the judgment seat to judge the motives of others and think and speak evil of them, behold the good and look on and think on what is true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous and praiseworthy. God commands not to feed the mind by dwelling on others' mistakes and failings, suppositions, and unpleasant things, but to tell everything to God in prayer; spiritual experience depends on what the mind feeds upon and assimilates just as the body is built up from what is eaten, and continually dissecting the words and acts of others to find what is objectionable makes religious dyspeptics who miss the good and pleasant things and lack proper food for spiritual vitality and healthful growth.

Even when everything seems in confusion with annoyances and trials, be not over-anxious and do not fill the soul with worriment, but trust all with Jesus who stands at the helm, wait upon the Lord, cast the burden upon Him, and gather up and remember the precious tokens of the Saviour's love and mercy and tender compassion with rejoicing in the Lord always, bringing the peace of God which passes all understanding to keep heart and mind through Christ Jesus. In distress and grief prayer brings relief and helps escape the tempter's snare, bringing wants and wishes to God. In facing temptation, every need and trouble small or great and every concern should be brought to Jesus in prayer as a precious privilege of sharing all the heart with the most sympathetic friend; seek His strength humbly, trust that He helps, express gratitude in thanksgiving, and seek Christ's presence at every step, for faith in His promises turns the mind from discouragement and supports daily victory and leaves Satan little opportunity.

Sincere prayer humbly telling God what is needed in recognition of helplessness and need for strength brings angelic prompting toward a better course when in danger of doing wrong or influencing others to do wrong; neglecting to pray for help leaves one likely to go astray. When faint-hearted or despondent, tell Jesus everything in prayer and ask Him for help, including humility, wisdom, courage, and stronger faith, rather than burdening others with discouragement. Trusting God and submitting to His will even in little things brings peace, restfulness, confidence, and deep tranquil joy and leads to continual rejoicing; committing oneself to the Lord and resting confidently in His love and depending on His infinite power brings His peace, and faith enables freedom from fretting and worry even in disagreeable circumstances. Believers should pray with grateful thanks seasoned with thanksgiving and praise to God's holy name, cherishing true faith and the love of God in the heart without doubt, trust God, wait patiently, keep working for the Lord, and press forward in hope and courage in trust that the Lord will strengthen and preserve and never disappoint, for God is helper and will not disappoint.

Telling everything to God and telling Him little trials and large perplexities as to helper, strength, and sympathizing Friend touched with infirmities is the privilege of everyone, for Jesus is the friend who bears sins and griefs and Christ is the only hope and sole dependence in whom is strength; morning and evening the whole family is to be brought before God at the family altar, presenting petitions, recognizing dependence on Him and the claims of His service, keeping eternal reality before every member, and confessing Christ as Leader, Captain, and divine Teacher by making requests known and asking His guidance. It means to be of good courage and to be happy and peaceful in God, letting nothing come between the believer and the Saviour, to put away anxiety and worry and commit the keeping of the soul to Him, and to bring burdens to God in prayer and cling closely to Christ through living faith, as He fills mind and heart with His peace. It belongs to an appeal to exercise faith in God so believers can rejoice even amid trials and persecution and work in the spirit of Christ to win others to the truth. Parents should pray earnestly and trust God to remain with them and protect their children from Satan's power, for prayer is communion with God who gives wisdom, strength, peace, and happiness and is not to be neglected.