Be Anxious For Nothing

Paul wrote to the Philippian church:

do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Php 4:6–7.

μεριμνάω merimnaō; means “to be anxious, or to care for.” It is translated anxious, care, concerned, have … care, worried, worry, or worrying.¹

There are three things that Paul contrasts with “being anxious.” They are prayer, supplication, and requests with thanksgiving.

This statement comes just after the declaration that “the Lord is near (Phil. 4:4).” This lends itself to the immediate prohibition to stop worrying. The present tense, Do not be anxious, indicates that it was a habit that the church had adopted. Apparently, the Philippians had gone from being concerned, per the translation of the same Greek word in 2:20 (mentioned above), to being overly concerned, to coming to the point of distress. In other words, this preoccupation with worry was now negatively affecting them.

From the contents of the letter, we learn that concerns for the welfare of Paul and Epaphroditus (1:12; 2:26) and threats of persecution for faith in Christ (1:29–30) caused the believers in Philippi to be anxious. Paul understands that anxious thoughts naturally multiply in times of trouble. But he calls for his friends to make a concerted effort to stop their obsession with worrying.²

The fact that Paul categorically says that they should not be anxious about anything, which some translations translate with the word “nothing,” shows that there is nothing at all that should be causing anxiety in their hearts regardless of the previously mentioned threats that they faced. And contrary to that, Paul says, “but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.”

Comprehensively, we should make everything known to God. We should use three overlapping words to accomplish this: prayer, supplication, and requests with thanksgiving as well. Dr. Hanson, in his commentary on Philippians, writes:

A comprehensive positive—but in everything—establishes a total contrast with the comprehensive negative—nothing. Only by praying with thanksgiving in every situation is it possible to stop being anxious about anything. The continuous positive focus of praying with thanksgiving to God in everything breaks and replaces the habit of worry. “To begin by praising God for the fact that in this situation, as it is, he is so mightily God—such a beginning is the end of anxiety.” The string of three synonyms for prayer—prayer, petition, requests—with the additional emphasis on thanksgiving encourages all types of prayer.³

Paul uses a variety of words to describe the positive characteristic that the Philippians should use instead of worry and anxiety. The first term that Paul uses here is προσευχή “proseuchē;” which is translated, “prayer.”⁴ In the biblical sense, it is used to convey a request of God or a reverent petition.

The second term Paul uses is δέησις “deēsis,” which is translated “a need, or entreaty.”⁵ It is often used to convey an earnest or urgent request of the Lord.

Paul adds the descriptive word: “with thanksgiving.” This is the word, εὐχαριστία “eucharistia” which is translated thankfulness, or giving of thanks.⁶

And then Paul says to let your requests be made known to God. The Greek word for “requests” is, αἴτημα “aitēma” is translated, “a request.”⁷ This is often used in the Bible of a formal request that one would submit to a higher authority.

Paul often referred to prayer in his writings, and he had confidence that it was effective. In Philippians, he uses this word as he talks about his prayers for the Philippian church (1:4) as well as their requests for him (1:19). Because he and this beloved church were “going through the same struggle” (1:30), both their prayers for him and his prayers for them included urgent petitions for the Lord to accomplish the things needed for them which was caused by their suffering for their faith in Christ. And Paul had confidence that the requests made on his behalf by his friends in Philippi and God’s supply of the Spirit of Christ would accomplish his deliverance (1:19). His first hand experience of what petitions to God had accomplished in his life gave him the assurance that God would meet his and their needs as they lived for Him (4:19).

But Paul is specific in this. We are not to pray with vague and repetitious words that do not convey the real depth of our needs and walk with Christ. Too often, we do not know how to pray. Too often, we come to the Lord with repeated phrases that don’t carry much depth. We just seem to be unaware of the deep well of blessings that we can draw on in our communion with God.

Paul is encouraging the believers in Philippi to substitute their worries and anxieties with prayers, petitions, urgent requests and thanksgivings to God instead of their preoccupation with their weighty situations. Oftentimes, people who have anxiety preoccupy themselves with what might happen, or with thoughts of what people say or could say. Oftentimes, fear of man is a central part of our perspective. We are afraid. But in lieu of this, we need to focus our attention on communicating the specifics of our situation with the Lord.

I was told in my college days, to ask myself in a progression: What do I feel? What do I think? And what do I know? And you can come to the Lord with that pattern. You can confess to Him what you feel, and talk about what you think because of that. But you should end on what you know of life and your situation in lieu of anxious thoughts. The Bible has so much to say about God’s plan and sovereignty. The story is so much bigger than us, and yet God is not so concerned with the grand scheme and all the important people that He is not intimately concerned with your story as well. Be encouraged. Have peace in the storms of life.

Although both interpretations can be supported from the Greek words and the context, the interpretation that points to the superiority of God’s peace over human planning and ingenuity seems to fit best with the promise that God’s peace will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Paul’s image of guarding comes from the presence of the Roman garrison housed in Philippi to keep the peace of Rome, the pax Romana, for the benefit of the Roman Empire. The verb guard conveys the general meaning of “to provide security, guard, protect, and keep.” This verb is used by Paul with a specific reference to the military function of guarding the city gates of Damascus (2 Cor 11:32) and probably has the same military overtones in Philippians 4:7, “in order to ring bells with his readership at Philippi where a military garrison was stationed to guard the pax Romana.” Although the peace imposed on the city of Philippi expressed the superior intelligence and planning of the Roman Empire, the effectiveness of God’s peace-keeping force far surpassed even the best military minds of the Roman army. The garrison guarding the Roman peace could only exert external pressure, but God’s peace guards the interior lives, the hearts and minds, of believers in Christ.

The heart is “the center and source of the whole inner life, with its thinking, feeling and volition.” The mind (or, a better translation, thought) is “that which one has in mind as a product of intellectual processes.” Paul uses the term thoughts five times in 2 Corinthians with a negative sense as a reference to corrupt thoughts opposed to Christ and Christian knowledge (2:11; 3:14; 4:4; 10:5; 11:3). In Philippians 4:7, however, the term appears to have a neutral sense of thoughts that proceed from the hearts of Christians. In his letter to the church in Philippi, Paul recognizes the sad fact that the hearts and the thoughts even of Christians are susceptible to envy, rivalry, selfish ambition, vain conceit, and selfish interests (1:15; 2:3–4). But he assures the church that through prayer, God will keep the peace in the community by guarding the innermost “emotions, affections, thoughts, and moral choices” of the members of the community. By referring to the hearts and minds⁸⁵ of believers, Paul is giving a holistic summary of the interior life of the church and all its members. A narrowly personal reduction of the reference to hearts and minds to an individualistic sense—peace in my own heart and mind—misses the need for relational peace addressed throughout the letter, especially in 2:1–4 and 4:2–3. God gives peace and keeps peace in the community in Christ Jesus. This community of believers residing in Philippi lives in Christ Jesus. This significant phrase, in Christ Jesus, appears eight times in this letter (1:1, 26; 2:5; 3:3, 14; 4:7, 19, 21) as the unifying thread of the entire discourse.⁸

Robert L. Thomas, New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries : Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998). ↩︎
G. Walter Hansen, The Letter to the Philippians, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Nottingham, England: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009), 289–295. ↩︎
Ibid. ↩︎
Robert L. Thomas, New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries : Updated Edition (Anaheim: Foundation Publications, Inc., 1998). ↩︎
Ibid. ↩︎
Ibid. ↩︎
Ibid. ↩︎
G. Walter Hansen, The Letter to the Philippians, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Nottingham, England: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009), 289–295. ↩︎