Stand Firm, Don’t Worry, Pray About Everything
So then3, my friends, how dear you are to me and how I miss you! How happy you make me, and how proud I am of you!—this, dear friends, is how you should stand firm in your life in the Lord. Euodia and Syntyche, please, I beg you, try to agree as sisters in the Lord. And you too, my faithful partner, I want you to help these women; for they have worked hard with me to spread the gospel, together with Clement and all my other fellow workers, whose names are in God’s book of the living. May you always be joyful in your union with the Lord. I say it again: rejoice! Show a gentle attitude toward everyone. The Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything, but in all your prayers ask God for what you need, always asking him with a thankful heart. And God’s peace, which is far beyond human understanding, will keep your hearts and minds safe in union with Christ Jesus.
Phil 4:1-7
I have gone back to Gem 1960 to pick up the next section we need to investigate. That was the last Gem were I made the divisions in the remaining part of Paul’s letter before I spent some time plumbing the depths of Chapter Three. I didn’t realise at the time it would take me 28 Gems before I came back to pick up this segment again. I hope you are picking up on the thing to do when you want to dig deeper on the text of the Bible. Let’s face it we have covered some classic portions of Paul’s letter to the saints in Philippi, so it is little wonder that it has taken me almost thirty Gems to cover the content.
I think that you will notice this segment divides nicely into two parts:
So then3, my friends, how dear you are to me and how I miss you! How happy you make me, and how proud I am of you!—this, dear friends, is how you should stand firm in your life in the Lord. Euodia and Syntyche, please, I beg you, try to agree as sisters in the Lord. And you too, my faithful partner, I want you to help these women; for they have worked hard with me to spread the gospel, together with Clement and all my other fellow workers, whose names are in God’s book of the living.
Phil 4:1-3
May you always be joyful in your union with the Lord. I say it again: rejoice! Show a gentle attitude toward everyone. The Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything, but in all your prayers ask God for what you need, always asking him with a thankful heart. And God’s peace, which is far beyond human understanding, will keep your hearts and minds safe in union with Christ Jesus.
Phil 4:4-7
I gave the combined segment the title Stand Firm, Don’t Worry, Pray About Everything.
But after dividing these two segments, I would retitle this first segment: Stand Firm; Help Euodia & Syntyche to Stay of One Mind.
I will leave you to come up with a title while we plumb the depths of this one. When it comes time to deal with the second segment I will ask you readers for your suggestions for a suitable title. In the meantime, let’s use our skills to investigate this section.
Stand Firm; Help Euodia & Syntyche to Agree
So then3, my friends, how dear you are to me and how I miss you! How happy you make me, and how proud I am of you!—this, dear friends, is how you should stand firm in your life in the Lord. Euodia and Syntyche, please, I beg you, try to agree as sisters in the Lord. And you too, my faithful partner, I want you to help these women; for they have worked hard with me to spread the gospel, together with Clement and all my other fellow workers, whose names are in God’s book of the living.
Phil 4:1-3
This is such an interesting little section I suggest you take some time to mine some of the treasure for yourself before I start. There were numbers of things which struck me as little gems as I read it through. So I thought this would be another example for you to look into to test your skills as I have done before. When I have done that numbers of you have thanked me for giving you the opportunity to see what you can find, before I take you on a guided tour and point out some interesting landmarks as we come to them. I haven’t done that for a long time. So, see what treasure you can find in this short segment.
Now I will leave you to do your CSU detective work on this short but sparkling passage.
I think you will agree that it is about time you had a short Gem from Ian; you have had some long ones lately.
If God only gives us what we can handle, sometimes I wish he didn’t trust me so much!
Mother Teresa
People laugh because I am different. I laugh because they all are the same.
Jonathan Davis
If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
Derek Bok
It’s not the pace of life that concerns me, so much as the sudden stop at the end.
Calvin and Hobbes